Blog New Knowledge on Things They Already Know

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brain cogsIf you place a ripe banana next to a green tomato, the tomato will ripen, too, explains Brian McMahon in Mental Floss Magazine.

Interesting facts such as this can always be of business blogging help, but that advice comes with two provisos: 

  1. Your reason for including the fact in your post must be apparent early on in your SEO marketing blog post.
  2. The new information should relate to something with which readers are already familiar.

Of course, as I’m careful to explain in corporate blogging training sessions, freelance blog writers can help clients achieve goals other than search engine optimization. The Say It for You website explains the promotional benefits, credibility benefits, and even training benefits that derive from blogging for business.

If you’ve stuck with me this far into the metaphor about the green tomatoes, you’re a very unusual example of a blog reader; most visitors to a blog are unlikely to keep reading, and the answer to “So what?” must come earlier in the post.

As a professional providing blog writing services, I should have used the very first paragraph of this post to explain that the ethylene gas released by the banana’s ripening affects the tomato.  And the “so what?” In similar fashion, the very fact that a company even has a well-kept blog with lots of fresh content tells people they’re “in the game” and that they care about all aspects of their business.

It’s worth noting that there seems to be a “spillover effect” on the business owners themselves.  The process of planning the blog content (whether you’re doing your own blog content writing or using a blog writing service, is a form of training on talking effectively about your business.

“Green” in terms of online marketing?  Stick around those blogging “bananas”!

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PRWeb Ups the Ante on Say It For You Tidbit Challenge

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This is one time having been one-upped feels ONEderful!

Stacey Acevero of PRWeb not only rose to my Say It For You blog content writers’ tidbitbaked goods challenge, she expanded the original four tidbits by another four, in each case detailing who might use each one for business blogging help.

As part of corporate blogging training, I’d suggested to other Indianapolis blog content writers – in fact any feelance blog writers – that they need never run out of ideas if they keep a collection of interesting tidbits of general information on hand. I challenged providers of business blog content to use at least one of four interesting tidbits I’d found in Mental Floss Magazine as a jumping-off point to explain some unique aspect of their own products or services.

After four years of business blog writing, what I continually find is that business owners lack the time and discipline to keep providing fresh content on their SEO marketing blogs over sustained periods of time. In fact, you wouldn’t believe how many blogs end up being abandoned within months, even weeks of being started. But for anyone either writing their own content or hiring professionals like me for business blogging assistance, the big fear is running out of ideas. The tidbit challenge was just one way, I’d suggested, to get the creative juices flowing again.

Rather than choosing one of the four tidbits I’d mentioned in my blog post, Stacey Acevero went back to Mental Floss to find additional tidbits. For example, it’s true that most supermarkets place their bakery areas near the entrance to the store; studies have shown the aroma of fresh-baked goods makes customers spend more money.

Ingeniously, Stacey suggests that non-food service businesses can use this technique by putting their most tantalizing product in front of prospects sooner rather than later. A music artist, she points out, might put his best single on the front page of his website, while a retail store might put their most colorful clothes in the windowl

Thanks, Stacey and PRWeb for helping me prove my point.  “…and voila!” she exclaimed. “That blog post pretty much wrote itself.”

Well… I don’t know if as a longtime professional ghost blogger I’d go quite that far.  Good blog posts hardly ever “pretty much write themselves”.  But a great tidbit is certainly great business blogging help!

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Corporate Blogging For Business Is All About Customer Service – an Unfortunate Lesson from AirTran Airlines

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UPDATE: DURING THE SECOND WEEK OF AUGUST, CHANEL JOHNSON, DIRECTOR OF CUSTOMER RELATIONS FOR AIRTRAN, ARRANGED TO REFUND BOTH THE AIRTRAN AIRFARE AND THE U.S. AIR AIRFARE!  MS. JOHNSON EXPLAINED THAT THE AIRTRAN REPRESENTATIVES HAD NOT FOLLOWED AIRTRAN’S TRAINING GUIDELINES.

As part of the business blogging assistance I offer through Say It For You, I’m always talking to business owners about their customer service.  The challenge is – EVERY business says it offers superior customer service! (Has any of us ever read an ad or a blog that does NOT tout its superior customer service?) 

Blog content writing, I stress to business owners and employees in corporate blogging training sessions, has to tell stories specifically illustrating why your company’s customer service exceeds the norm.

We’re all familiar with the old saying about a chain being only as strong as its weakest link. I had a very negative experience, just a week ago, that made me realize how very apropos that saying is when it comes to customer service.  

By way of background, due to the extended delays and inconveniences AirTran had caused its passengers on a  flightfrom Indy to Florida several months back, the airline had awarded each of us a free roundtrip flight anywhere in the U.S., exercisable for one year. (Sounds like good customer service, doesn’t it?)

Working through my travel agent, I made a reservation for a one-way trip to New York City, returning to Indianapolis via Philadelphia on Sunday June 19th. 

  • Arising at 4AM June 19th to catch a shuttle to the Philly airport, I arrived at 5:45AM for my 7: 25 flight to Atlanta (set to connect  to a flight arriving home in Indianapolis around noon that day).  The computer printout of my itinerary was complete with flight numbers and seat assignments for each flight.
  • At the AirTran checkin counter, I presented my photo ID and my itinerary printout.  The AirTran agent informed me that I had no reservation for that day (Sunday June 19), but instead was scheduled to fly home on Tuesday June 21st!  When I pointed to my paperwork, he rather rudely told me that The Computer had me down for the 21st, adding that he hasn’t the authority to change a reservation!  Freeze that frame – this is the exact point of weakest link for Airtran – no one with authority to help when problems arise.
  • The next nine and a half hours become my personal illustration of Murphy’s Law (you know, the one about everything that can go wrong – will?)  The ticket agent insists I must remove myself and my luggage from the line, call the AirTran #800 line, and straighten out the confusion.  I hang on the phone through automated operator Hell for 19 minutes, at which point the system hangs up on me!
  • Returning to the ticket agent close to tears, I plead for help. Having no "authority" to change my reservation (even though there is room on the plane!), he offers to SELL me a ticket.  I hand over my credit card and pay $258 for my "free" ticket.  My bags are now set for Indianapolis.  Unfortunately, I am not…
  • The TSA Security computer "picks" me for a patdown AND a palm test.  I miss my flight.
  • All the sad details of the next 24 hours can be seen on the video.
  • At nearly 10PM on MONDAY night, I arrive home, $1,400 poorer (other AirTran flights were oversold, so I needed to fly USAir after staying overnight in a hotel) exhausted, having had to cancel business and personal appointments set for Monday.
  • The supreme irony in all this is that AirTran admitted to my travel agent that the mistake in the reservation was THEIRS, not hers.  AIRTRAN neglected to enter the proper flight date into their system!


Southwest, new owner of AirTran, has always been known for excellent customer service. I realize, now, though, that customer service is all about the weakest link.  No business can boast of offering excellent customer service if its employees have no authority to help when problems arise. Had AirTran given authority to ticket agents (the very employees who are interacting with the public) to handle problems in common-sense fashion, none of my sad story would have evolved.

I’m offering Southwest and AirTran the opportunity to make things right. (I don’t want more free flights on AirTran! I want to be reimbursed in cash.  I want to see some REAL customer service, even after-the-fact.) 

For my business owner clients to whom I offer business blogging services, I’m sharing a couple of important lessons:

  • Problems with customer service are going to arise – no way out of it.  But, those very situations offer you an opportunity to shine by making things right. Empower employees who are directly dealing with customers to handle problems.  Then use writing for business as one excellent vehicle to tell about your own mistakes and the way you offer outstanding customer service by making things right.
     
  • Corporate blogging for business is part and parcel of your excellent customer service!
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Corporate Blog Writing When You’re Not Centrum

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CentrumIf your business is a household name, well, great for you!  Needless to say, most business owners who hire Say It For You writers to create blog content in Indianapolis, are not quite there yet.

 According to FunTrivia.com, until 1996, Coca-Cola was the best known brand name in the world. It’s disputable whether the current best-known is McDonald’s or Microsoft, but you get the idea of how hard it can be for small businesses to compete against giants like that.

Since as a blog content writer providing business blogging training, I’m all about helping businesses market themselves effectively, I was struck by a commercial I heard the other day on the radio.  The advertiser was a vitamin company called Potency Best, and the gist of the promo was that the product was more effective than Centrum®.

I must say that, at first, I found Potency Best’s approach sort of startling – why bring the name of your biggest competitor to top of mind for your listeners? Would blog content writers ever want to mention their competitors in their SEO marketing blog posts?

M4B Marketing talks about “creative marketing to beat the big guys”. Competing against bigger players in your market can be tough, M4B acknowledges. One secret, they say, is for little guys  to provide extra services.. “Look at opportunities that help both your business and customers instead of focusing on the problems.” Blog content writing is the perfect vehicle for focusing attention on specialty products and on the type of personalized services small business can  deliver best.

Two and a half years ago, I wrote a Say It For You blog post about how Windex ® sales skyrocketed after the product was mentioned in the hit low-budget movie “My Big Fat Greek Wedding.” The eleven short, repeated exposures of the blue bottle were what did it in terms of marketing effectiveness for Windex. In corporate blogging training sessions I teach that one secret to blogging effectiveness is frequency of posting new content.

In corporate blog writing for the small business, then, it’s important to know who the Centrum® is, then to figure out ways in which you can measure up. Can you out-measure your “Centrum”? Spread the word through your small business marketing blog!


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Serving Punch in Business Blog Writing

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“Creating excitement through written words is a lot trickier than doing it throughpunch spoken words,” observes blogussion.com; you need to know the right methods of grabbing an interest.”  As a content writer in Indianapolis offering business blogging assistance to business owners, I appreciated Blogussions’ list of 45 words that can help spice up blog headlines. And, while I have my doubts about the likes of “ultimate”, “phenomenal”, and “mind-blowing” (always warning against hard selling in corporate blog writing), I think throwing in words such as “creative”, “powerful”, and “next-level” might, in fact, add some energy to otherwise repetitive SEO marketing blog posts.

I agree withLinda Ann Nickerson of Helium, who thinks “the best writing contains both fact and flair”. Nickerson recommends writers use both a thesaurus and a dictionary to “add variety and descriptive dimension to writing.”

Blog content writing, as I’m fond of saying during business blogging training sessions, is both science and art, with much of each relating to the words used in each blog post. “Imagine for a moment how dull the world would be if there were only one word to voice a particular thought,” remarks Pam Marshall in K12reader.com. “Luckily, we have synonyms and antonyms to add spice and flavor to our communication skills.” Of course, at Say It For You, where the mission of our business blogging service is to engage the interest of online readers in communicating the company’s message, words and pictures are our only tools. 

Even the simplest examples Marshall provides could, in fact, prove highly useful in corporate blog writing. In blogging on behalf of real estate, home decorating, or home repair businesses, varying the use of house, home, dwelling, residence, and abode might add some variety to the text; bed linen companies might refer to their wares as silky or downy in addition to “soft”.

“Even if a piece is otherwise well written, if it uses a particular word multiple times in a simple sentence or paragraph, it can probably be improved by substitution,” according to Hastley of airarticles.com.

When it comes to the “science” part of wordsmithing in blogs, Linda Nickerson makes the most interesting observation: “Aiming for optimum web readership, modern writers have focused on key word repetition in their published pieces.  In doing so, we may have sacrificed a slew of synonyns.”

No question, Linda. Blog content writers have to achieve two goals – getting found and getting read. In fact, both as a professional ghost blogger and as a trainer offering business blogging assistance, I rather enjoy the challenge of finding just the right mix to put “punch” in blog posts!


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