Filling Your Trivia Basket for Business Blogging – Part D

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No question about it – trivia can be useful triggers for business blog content ideas, making the piece of a grilled steak on a forkchallenge of continually coming up with fresh content to inform, educate, and entertain readers a little bit easier on busy business owners and employees and on freelance content writers like us.

This week, I’ve devoted my  Say It For You blog posts to trivia found in Albert Jack’s book, Red Herrings & White Elephants, which traces the origins of phrases we use every day.

I’ve been suggesting types of businesses that might use each piece of trivia, but now that you’ve gotten into the trivia-mining swing, I challenge you to come with your own ideas for turning each piece of trivia into a  writing “hook”.

  • Let the cat out of the bag – Apparently there was a lot of cheating going on in the medieval marketplace. Having been shown a pig, a purchaser would be distracted by haggling with the vendor over price. When the buyer opened his bag at home, he’d find a cat had been substituted for the pig.
    This tidbit of information about dishonest dealing could be used by any business to emphasize its own merchandise return policy. A diamond merchant might cite its price protection guarantee, while a property appraisal website would discuss the importance of relying on a legally assigned value during a real estate transaction.

  • Bite off more than you can chew – We use this expression to indicate someone has taken on more than they can manage.  This phrase comes from the 1800s, when chewing tobacco was popular. The greedy would take such a large bite of tobacco, they were unable to chew it properly.
    The metaphor of unmanageable tasks applies to just about any business, and any blog content creator can discuss the wisdom of a business owner outsourcing certain tasks, from talent recruitment agencies to building cleaning services.Back when I was just beginning my work as a professional blog writer in Indianapolis, debates on the ethics of blogging for others often raged at networking meetings and seminars.  Meanwhile, of course, more and more companies were venturing into online marketing campaigns, viewing blog content writing as just another advertising and marketing function to be outsourced. Today, outsourcing the blog marketing function is common practice.

Be an ant. Begin stocking up on provisions for the business blog writing season ahead!

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Filling Your Trivia Basket for Business Blogging – Part B

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morning routineThis week, I’m devoting my Say It For You blog posts to trivia mentioned in Albert Jack’s book, Red Herrings & White Elephants, which traces the origins of phrases we use every day. With the fall season setting in, it’s a good time to stock up provisions for the winter business blogging ahead.

Trivia of all types, I remind newbie freelance content writers, make for good “foodstuff”, and can be used in business blogs for defining basic terminology, sparking curiosity about the subject, putting modern-day practices and beliefs into perspective, and for explaining why the business owner or practitioner chooses to operate in a certain way.

Here are three more interesting “red herrings” that might come in handy for days when content writers find themselves running out of ideas for blog posts:

  • A plum job – In the 1600s, the slang term for £1,000 was “plum”.  Back then, of course, that was a serious amount of money and happened also to be the fixed amount of payment for certain government jobs. The average layman considered that to be a huge pay for doing very little.
    What kind of business might make use of this tidbit of information?  How about an employment agency?  Clients of a financial advisor or of a bank might also find that piece of trivia interesting.

  • As fit as a fiddle – That expression indicates a person or animal who is in good physical condition. Back in the days of medieval court, it seems, the people considered most energetic and fit were the fiddlers, who would scamper about playing their music throughout the crowds.
    For what types of business might this piece of trivia add interest to the blog? A fitness facility comes to mind, as does any health-related professional practice.

  • The information about the origin of “as fit as a fiddle” makes for the perfect   jumping-off point for a discussion about the role physical activity plays in our health.
    To sleep tight – We use this expression to connote a good night’s rest. The first beds to be mass-produced in England had straw mattresses held by criss-crossed ropes attached to the bed frames.  As the ropes slackened with use, they needed to be tightened in order for the bed to remain comfortable. “Sleep tight”, therefore, meant “sleep comfortably”.
    This story could make for good blog fodder for a mattress store, a bedding company, or even a sleep clinic.

Stocking up on blog triggers like these can really help blog content writers get through the winter season!

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Filling Your Trivia Basket for Business Blogging – Part A

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Now that fall has officially set in, I’m reminded of Aesop’s Ant and the Grasshopper fable, cautioning us to beginThe Ant and the Grasshopper stocking up provisions for the winter ahead. I like the concept, especially when it comes to stocking up materials for business blogging. Continually coming up with fresh content to inform, educate, and entertain readers – well, that’s a pretty tall order for busy business owners and employees. (Face it, that’s a tall order even for us professional content writers.)  And without a system for stocking up ideas, content creation can quickly get to the overwhelming stage.

That’s exactly why I’m constantly on the prowl for blogging “foodstuff” that we content writers can “store up” in preparation for those “winter of our discontent” days when ideas just won’t seem to present themselves. One “provisioning” tactic involves trivia.  

Trivia can be used in business blogs for defining basic terminology, sparking curiosity about the subject, putting modern-day practices and beliefs into perspective, and for explaining why the business owner or practitioner chooses to operate in a certain way.

This week, I’m devoting my Say It For You blog posts to trivia mentioned in Albert Jack’s book,  Red Herrings & White Elephants, which traces the origins of phrases we use every day.
In each case, I’m going to suggest types of businesses that might use that piece of trivia, but I challenge content writers to come up with their own ideas for turning trivia into writing “hooks”.

  • Piping hot – The old church pipe organs would hiss in the same way water does when it steamed, so, ever since the 1300’s, when something was boiling, it was  described as “pipe hot”.
    What kind of business  might make use of this tidbit of information?  How about a heating and air conditioning firm? A company that insulates pipes for residential or commercial buildings? A professional carpet cleaner? An aesthetitician who uses steam to clean out facial pores?
  • To thread your way through a crowd – Back in the 1500’s, mazes were a popular form of entertainment, and some people would take a clew (yarn or thread) and fix one end of it to the beginning of the maze, enabling them to find their way back out again. (The word “clue” derives from this as well!)
    To what kinds of business blog might this piece of trivia add special interest?  How about a tailoring establishment? A sewing or knitting supply shop? A surgeon??

Of course, stocking up on ideas for future blog posts isn’t all about trivia, as I explain to newbie blog content writers. Remember, the trivia tidbit is just the jumping off point for the message.

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“Right” Answers Make for Great Business Blog Content Writing

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question markOne of the givens for us content writers is that people are online searching for answers to questions they have and for solutions for dilemmas they’re facing. I really believe that blog writing for business will succeed only if two things are apparent to readers, and in the order presented here:

1. It’s clear you (the business owner or professional practitioner) understand online searchers’ concerns and needs
2. You and your staff have the experience, the information, the products, and the services to solve exactly those problems and meet precisely those needs.

The problem, though, and it’s an extremely common one, is that buyers tend to ask the wrong questions.  I read a marvelous commentary on this very point by Allen Hammer of email service provider Delivra. Among the top worst questions, Hammer observes, are:

  • How much does it cost?  (You should be asking “What value does your solution bring?”
  • What features does your system have? (Better to ask “How will your technology help us reach our goals?”)
  • How many clients do you have? (Better: “How do most of your clients partner with your company?”)

So, how can we get readers asking the right questions so we can offer the right answers? One way is to let some of your other customers provide the answers before the questions are even asked, say the authors of Tips and Traps for Marketing Your Business. Testimonials showing how your technology (or your product or your service) helped other clients reach their goals offer the right answer even if the reader, absent your blog post, might have asked one of those wrong questions Hammer lists.

What’s more, while question-answer is actually a very good format for presenting information to online readers, there’s actually no need to wait until readers actually write in questions.  Every practitioner hears questions from clients; every business owner fields customer queries daily. Sharing some of those – both Hammer’s “right” ones and the ones he thinks are “wrong” –  can remind readers of challenges they face and issues they’ve had with their current providers of products and services.

“Right’ answers make for great business blog content writing!

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It’s All in the Title in Blogging for Business

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titlesFor novelists, a lot goes into their title.  It’s how they relate to their work-in-progress, their baby, for months to come, observes WritersDigest.com . We blog content writers, of course, aren’t given months to agonize over the title of any one blog post. Still, titles are crucial in capturing the interest of both search engines and online searchers.

There are two basic categories of blog titles, we’ve found at Say It For You. The first simply conveys what content readers should expect to find in the post or article. That type of title is not “cutesy” or particularly engaging, but can be highly effective in business blogging because it’s short and to the point and uses keyword phrases that match up with what a reader may have typed into the search bar. The second category of arouses readers’ curiosity, but gives only the barest hint of the content to follow.  A compromise I teach is to use a combination of a “Huh?” title to get attention and then an “Oh!” subtitle to make clear what the post is actually going to be about.

Thomas Umstattd advises authors to use the title to describe not the content of the article, but the value readers can expect to find in the content, making a case for why readers ought to even bother reading on.

In “Title Trauma”, Cindy Callaghan of Writer’s Digest offers a few “outside-the-box” avenues writers can explore for creating captivating titles.

1. The Free Dictionary website offers common figurative phrases.

2. Alliteration.  Say you’re writing about a hair salon in Carmel.  Look for descriptive words beginning with C.   “Captivating Curl in Carmel“ might become your title.

3. Use song titles that express the idea you’re writing about.

4. Use word switcheroos: “Come up with a well-known phrase or slogan, and swap in your keyword, Callaghan advises. She used “What happens in London stays in London.”

The best writing and titling assistance of all for novelists, suggests Callaghan, is the kind that comes from a critique group or writing partner. Of course, the ideal situation for freelance blog content writers is where there’s an approval process.  Assuming you’re in the much more common situation of being your own editor, reading over the post in “Preview” mode, all formatted and ready for publishing, increases your chances of finding your own mistakes before anyone else does.

Pay particular attention to those crucial  5-12 words in the title. After all, you want business blog readers to do just that!

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