In Business and in Blogging, Differentiation is the Key to Success

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“There are many ways to differentiate yourself,” writes Michael Hill in Measuring Ourselves. “Become the idea guy, the best manager, the highest-producing sales-person. Find your passion and use it,” he advises.

“Blog differentiation is one of the best ways to get more attention for your brand, Dave Taylor agrees. Starting a blog these days is easy, he admits. However, with millions of blogs that are already popular, it’s difficult to stand out from the crowd. Taylor lists several aspects of blog differentiation, including topic, demographic target and content style.

Collectivedge.com offers a number of differentiation suggestions that, at Say It For You, I’ve found to be very effective in blogging for business:

“Connect with your readers by always writing in the first person” 
In blog marketing, I stress first person writing because of its one enormous advantage – it shows the people behind the posts, revealing the personality of the person or the team standing ready to serve customers.

Don’t be afraid to be controversial.
In any field, there will always be controversy – about best business practices, about the best approach to providing professional services, about acceptable levels of risk, even about business-related ethical choices. Rather than ignoring the controversy, bloggers need to comment on the different views and “weigh in”.

Borrowing from successful writers allows you to pick up handy techniques and tricks.
Business bloggers, I teach, need to spend at least as much time reading as writing, in order to keep up on what others are saying on the topic, what’s in the news, and what problems and questions have been surfacing. Plus, when you link to someone else’s remarks on a subject you’re covering, that can not only reinforce your point, but add value to readers by aggregating different sources of information in one business blog.

Make it pretty – blog posts with images get twice as many shares.
No doubt about it, the story line is paramount in blogging for business.. Where visuals come in, whether they’re in the form of “clip art”, photos, graphs, charts, or even videos, is to add interest and evoke emotion.

As content writers, we help business owners and practitioners differentiate themselves. In fact, blog content is the ideal vehicle for adding explanations, offering more details and updates, telling stories, and expressing owners’ beliefs about what’s most important to them in serving clients and customers.

 

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The First Blog Post Shows the Palette

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There’s an exercise artists can do to break through their equivalent of “writer’s block,” my friend Phil read in an urban sketching book about using watercolor. Deciding what to put on the first page of your sketchbook is the hardest, the author understood. A new artist might experience inhibitions about opening the paint wrappers. But if the first page is used to give the artist a better idea of what the colors will look like on paper, the rest will follow naturally.

Beginnings are hard in any field. The first day of class, for example, gets a lot of attention from pedagogues, because what happens on that day shows students what to expect from your instruction, Alicia Alexander and Elizabeth Natalle explain in a text on interpersonal communication.

A second friend, book writing coach Myra Levine, says that each author’s first question should be “whose eyes do we see through?” Point of View, Levine says, determines every word you write. In Levine’s webinar offers writing “prompts” to help writers envision the “palette”.

Business owners and professional practitioners launching their blog often experience the same feel of “opening the paint wrappers” or putting the first words to web page. At Say It For You, we explain that the opening post will set the tone for the ongoing blog series, letting readers know:

  • They’ve come to the right place – this blog promises to be a good source for the type of information I want and need?
  • They can tell the author/company/practice is likeable, resonating with their own belief system.
  • They understand there’s a reason you’ve decided to use a blog as an ongoing communication tool.

Fear of flying is an anxiety disorder, and some of the elements of that fear have nothing to do with the actually risks associated with flight. In Fear of Blogging, David Meerman Scott says many business owners fear:

  • looking silly
  • not having important things to say
  • lack of computer savvy
  • blogging “won’t work” for their industry

Of course, from a business standpoint, fear of blogging can be a fearsome business mistake, since, in the time it’s taken you to read this far into my blog post, thousands and thousands of new blog posts have been introduced, some by your competitors!

So, go ahead – open up that new sketchbook. Peel the plastic off the paint tubes. Try writing the answer to this question:

If you had only 10 words to describe just how you ended up in – and why you’re
still in- your present industry or profession, what would those words be?

There’s your business blog “palette”!

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Sharing Wisdom from the Greats in Blogging for Business

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How did Chrysler, which not too long before had needed government-backed loans in order to survive, transform itself into a partner coveted by Daimler (the gold standard of European car makers), becoming the most profitable car company in the world? In his book Guts, Robert A. Lutz, Chrysler’s product-development genius answers these questions and many, many more.

For us blog content writers, there are several valuable lessons to be gleaned from this book by a business “great”:

The power of being personal:
Lutz lists his own credentials in the following order: parent, citizen, taxpayer, employer, alumnus. Guts is about Lutz himself as much as it is about his company, and that’s precisely what lends power to the narrative.

One interesting perspective on the work we do as professional bloggers is that we are interpreters, translating clients’ corporate message into human, people-to-people terms.  That’s the reason I prefer first and second person writing in business blog posts over third person “reporting”. I think people tend to buy when they see themselves in the picture, but even more so, when they relate emotionally to the people bringing them the message.

  • The power of recounting past struggles
    The very name of Lutz’s book, Guts, speaks to past struggles, to hardships overcome. At Say It For You, I recommend including some How-I-Did-It posts in the blog marketing plan. There are several reasons that sharing secrets and failures helps readers relate to a business or practice:

    True stories about mistakes and struggles are very humanizing, adding to the trust readers place in the people behind the business or practice.

  • Stories of struggles and failures can be used as a means to an end, using the special expertise and insights you’ve gained towards solving readers’ problems.
  • Blogs also have a damage control function.  When customer complaints and concerns are recognized and dealt with publicly (there’s nothing more public than the Internet!), that gives the “apology” – and the remediation – a lot more weight in the eyes of readers.

    Does it help to share wisdom from leaders in your own industry or profession in your blog?
    When you link to someone else’s accomplishments or remarks on a subject you’re covering, that can have two important positive effects: reinforcing a point you want to make and showing you’re in touch with trends in your own field. Obviously, as with all tools and tactics, “re-gifting” content needs to be handled with restraint.

To me, though, the biggest advantage of sharing others’ wisdom in your own content, is that you’re showing that you’re excited by the insights you’ve gained, and you want your readers to benefit as well.

Sharing wisdom? Go ahead, I say. We can never have too much inspiration.

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Put Some First-Person Impact in Your Business Blog

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“You thought I was just brewed leaves and nothing more, but I’m the most consumed drink in the world next to water. I have launched ships and started wars, and I helped birth your country.” So begins a three page article by Kate Lowenstein and Daniel Gritzer about the history of tea.

We know what it feels like to be human and write from the perspective of a human. But, what does it feel like to be a shoe or a pencil or a dictionary? The point of view in a story, is “the narrator’s position in the description of events,” explains Pamela Hodges in thewrwitepractice.com. 

Looking for unconventional, potentially striking ways to explore what it means to be human in your writing?  It may seem counterintuitive, but personification—ascribing human qualities to inanimate objects—can open new avenues to plumb the depths of human experience, writes Katherin Quevedo of the Science Fiction Writers of America.

Whether you’re representing an inanimate object or a very human business owner or professional practitioner, first person writing has a certain power. Admittedly, nobody likes people who speak of nothing but themselves, but in blog marketing, I stress first person writing because of its one enormous advantage – it shows the people behind the posts, revealing the personality of the person or the team standing ready to serve customers.

  • “At —— Dry Cleaners, we believe….”
  • “At ——— Heating & Air, we always…..”
  • “Despite the widely held belief that….., I’m convinced that……”

In blogging, of course, different posts serve different purposes. First person (“I”, “I’m”,” we”, “we’re” packs emotional punch. Second person pronouns (“you”, “your”, and “you’re”) can be a good fit for how-to blog posts, while third person (“he”, “she”, “they”) pronouns may be the choice for news items.

Whether you as owner or practitioner are doing the writing or using the services of a blog content writer, your perspective can be provided only by you, in first person, straight to the readers:  In the blogosphere, the more personal, the better.

On the other hand, all content writing for marketing blogs needs to be based on the “you”s who are the targeted readers, and about their wants and needs. Bottom line? Keeping your target audience (the “you”) in mind, put some first person impact in your business blog!

 

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Rubber-Banding the Information in Your Blog

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“Let’s say you need to drink nine glasses of water a day, wear nine rubber bands on your left arm. Every time you drink a glass, move one rubber band to your right arm…Your goal is to get all of the rubber bands onto your right wrist by the end of the day,” womensrunning.com advises.

Hitting precisely the right “advertorial” note is the big challenge in corporate blog writing.  In fact, one point I’ve consistently stressed in these Say It For You blog content writing tutorials is how important it is to provide valuable information to readers, while avoiding any hint of “hard sell”.  Well, providing practical, actionable tips and helpful hints is a way to accomplish that very goal. 

Networking colleague Beth Stackhouse, owner of Stackhouse Interiors in Columbus, Ohio, offered a practical tip for home décor: To add color (as well as spices for the pantry) use indoor plants. Beth’s own peppermint, basic, and parsley plants add oxygen, color and texture to her living. Large plants make a room stand out, and are a great option for those on a budget who want to elevate their interior design.

Leadership coach and author Dow Tippett offers a practical tip for improving mental health – creating a gratitude ledger.

So, as a business blog writing trainer, how would I advise adapting that “helpful hint” strategy to marketing your business or practice?

1. Find complementary businesses or practices.  Ask the owners (or cite their blogs) for tips they can offer your readers.  Pet care professionals can share tips from carpet cleaning pros – or the reverse! If you’re a carpet cleaning pro, you can share tips from allergists. If you’re an insurance advisor, offer tips from car dealers about accident prevention.

2. Of course, you’re going to want to add some tips related to your own products and services. your own.  Fellow network board member Steve Rupp offers tips on cleaning windows as well as tips for buying a house.  A restaurant’s blog might offer hints on tipping etiquette or the temperature of “rare”, “medium” and “well-done” steaks. Whatever the product or service, readers will be hungry for information that helps them gain maximum advantage for buying and using it.

“Rubber-band” your blog content along with your water consumption. Helpful hint blog writing can be very useful to your business or practice!

 

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