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What-to-Wear Pre-Holiday Blogging

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“Planning ahead is always better, especially when it comes to the holidays,” planoly.com suggests. “What you choose depends on your blog focus and niche, but tutorials attract high search traffic,” the authors explain, using How-to-Dress-For-an-Office-Christmas-Party as a tutorial “model”, with possible posts on creating the perfect casual look, finding the best sales, which boots are favorites for the holidays, and which are the best winter workout clothes.

One point I’ve consistently stressed in these Say It For You blog posts is how important it is to provide valuable information to readers, while avoiding any hint of “hard sell”. The theme of getting ready for the holidays can be used as a jumping-off point for a wide variety of blog posts for different businesses – and for different professional practices.

  • Psychologists can write about holiday-time stress management.
  • Carpet cleaning companies can list reasons it’s best to have carpets cleaned before the holidays.
  • Hair salons can describe festive “dos” for party goers.
  • Appliance vendors can offer safety tips for using heaters in guest rooms.
  • Trip advisors can remind travelers of things to take care of before leaving their homes.
  • Financial advisors can offer tips for managing debt while still celebrating the holidays.

In the Grammarly blog, Lindsay Kramer explains that tutorial blog posts may take different forms: In a how-to post, the blogger explains the steps readers must take to complete a task. In an interview post, the interviewee may talk about techniques or items that work well for them. “Explainer” blog posts are similar to how-tos, but aren’t necessarily present in a linear, step–by-step format.

General rules for what-to-wear/do/say blog posts might include:

  1. Make all content as free of professional jargon and specialized lingo as possible.
  2. Break technical information into bite-sized pieces.
  3. Project warmth, showing your “human side”.
  4. Use clear typeface, bullet points and bolding to draw attention to important points.
  5. Suggest questions readers can ask themselves while choosing among options.

Providing valuable, usable, information to your blog visitors is a great idea year-round!

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The More We Blog, The More We Learn

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The secret of good writing, according to Richard Harding Davis, is to say an old thing in a new way or a new thing in an old way. For us blog content writers, “saying old things in a new way” means that each time we’re preparing to compose content for a blog, rather than asking ourselves whether we’ve already covered that material and how long ago, we ought to plan content around key themes. That way, we can be using the same theme while filling in new details and illustrations. This precise thing is a concern, I’ve found over the year, of many business owners and professional practitioners. Even if they understand the marketing value of the blog, their concern is that, sooner or later, they (or their writer) will run out of things to say. I need to explain that it’s more than OK to repeat themes already covered in former posts. The trick is adding a layer of new information or a new insight each time.

When saying new things in an old way, conversely, introducing new information or suggesting a new attitude towards an issue, behavioral science tells us to create a perspective of “frame”, presenting new data in a way that relates to the familiar. Perhaps some information you’d put in a blog post months or even years ago isn’t true any longer (or at least isn’t the best information now available in your industry or profession). Maybe the rules have changed, or perhaps there’s now a solution that didn’t even exist at the time the original content was written.

“Links – you need ‘em,” writes Amy Lupold Bair in Blogging for Dummies. On a blog, the author explains, links are part of the resource you are providing for readers.  Collecting links around a topic or theme helps to inform or entertain your blog’s readers. If you’re not only providing good content yourself, but also expanding on that content by using links, she adds, “you’re doing your readers a service they won’t forget.”

Thing is, as long as I keep learning, I stay excited and readers can sense that in my blog. Being – and staying – a lifelomg learner means “reading around” – reading other people’s blogs and articles, plus “listening around” paying attention to everything from broadcasts to casual conversations,

The more we keep learning, the better we blog, and the more we blog, the more we learn.

 

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Being Heard, Not Only Seen, in Your Blog

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In this week’s Say It For You blog posts, I’m sharing insights from the October issue of Poets&Writers magazine. An insightful profile of CelesteNG’s new book, Our Missing Hearts offers valuable concepts for business blog content writers. Poet Maggie Smith believes NG’s book should be required reading for all, “grappling with big questions such as art, freedom, and ethics”, but there is one particular line in the book that resonated with me as a content writer: “We talk a lot about being seen, but I think we also want to be heard. Everybody has stories inside them but not always someone to tell them to.”

Social media maven Neil Patel agrees, One sure way to sabotage your own brand on social media, he says, is talking without listening. “Users want something real. They want real people, real interactions, and real, unbridled human connection…The real human essence of the brand is what users want to see come through loud and clear.”

“Who doesn’t want a personal fortuneteller?” Tom Searcy writes in Inc.com. Customers are looking for people who “hear” their concerns about upcoming regulations, technology trends, mergers and acquisitions, and modern day issues. “Remember,” Searcy says,”When you talk to the buyer about the buyer, you increase his or her engagement.” Potential customers want great products, outstanding service, and a competitive price. But, according to According to research from HubSpot, there’s something else they want even more: listening.

Over these years creating Say It For You blog content for different business owners and professional practitioners, I’ve come to realize that, in addition to wanting to be heard, blog readers actually want to “hear”. Unfortunately, I came to realize, most blog writing was being devoted to describing “what we do”, describing all the services and products the company or organization offers. Too little space seemed to be devoted to “what we believe” and to “who we are” as citizens of the community. For that very reason, when I’m offering business blogging assistance, I emphasize that the best website content – and the best corporate blogs – give online readers a feel for the corporate culture and some of the owners’ core beliefs about their industry and the way they want to serve their customers.   Those “we believe” statements can turn out to be the business’ most powerful calls to action.

A provider’s blog may not, at least not on a level similar to CelesteNG’s book.”grapple with big questions such as art, freedom, and ethics”, but the content must clearly demonstrate that the owners “hear” their customers’ concerns, and that, in return, their prospects and customers are able to “hear them!

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Writing is Creative. Publishing Blogs is Creative Business

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“Writing is creative. Publishing is business,” Aaron Gilbreath says in the October issue of Poets & Writers magazine. There are many ways to write for money, Gilbreath says, including content marketing, copywriting, journalism and technical writing. Reality is, he tells “creative” writers of fiction and poetry, there may be good reasons to write free of charge in order to build a reputation…Gilbreath quotes poet Robert Graves’ quip: “There’s no money in poetry, but then there’s no poetry in money, either.”

While content marketing is on Gilbreath’s list of ways to make money (but excluded from his list of creative writing categories), at Say It For You, we consider creativity an absolute building block for success. But is business blog writing supposed to be creative? Yes, indeed. As writerstrasure.com points out, any nonfiction writing can be creative if the purpose is to express something, whether it be feelings, thoughts, or emotions. And, while the purpose of technical writing may be to inform and sometimes to trigger the person reading into making an action beneficial to the one of the writer, Idrees Patel admits, concise and magnetic writing is what will draw the reader in.

The question author Malcolm Gladwell gets asked most often just happens to be the same I’m most often asked when offering corporate blogging training sessions: “Where do you get your ideas?” the trick, Gladwell explains, is to “convince yourself that everyone and everything has a story to tell.”

Marketing seems to go in cycles, remarks Morgan Stewart in a Media Post Publications article. “We bounce back and forth between…left-brain marketing focused on analytics and segmentation, and right-brain marketing focused on the creative.”  Both types of marketing are needed, concludes Steward. “Left-brain marketing narrows target audiences. Creative pulls people into your message.  Creative gets people talking.

In offering business blogging help, I emphasize that in business blog writing, it’s crucial to avoid the urge to directly sell a product or service. Instead, the creative challenge, is continually coming up with fresh content to inform, educate, and entertain readers.

 

 

 

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Everyday Employee Experience at the Heart of Blogging

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“Narrative gives us a sense of shared experience and humanity,” Hubert Joly (former CEO of Best Buy) writes in The Heart of Business.  “Telling everyday stories – stories of employees, customers, communities, and how they impact each other’s lives – fosters a sense of purpose and connection..” For that very reason, thehartford.com explains, “Your employees need to understand your company, its values, its goals and its priorities.”Surveys show 72% of consumers report feeling closer to a company when employees share information about a brand online.

As I related in an August Say It For You blog post, when I’m working with a company to set up a business blogging strategy, encouraging that company’s employees to post blogs, quite often I hit a wall of resistance, with employees viewing blogging as just one more task to add to their work load. Should employees be required to write blog posts? Marcus Sheridon of SalesLion.com thinks so. Since one goal of content marketing is to produce as much content as possible, the more hands are put to the task, the better. With content that answers consumers’ questions so valuable, it stands toathat employees who deal with consumers every day should be the ones to write about it. Human nature being what it is, he says, if it’s not required, they won’t do it.

Sure, but after fifteen years of providing blog content writing services to dozens of different businesses and professional practices, I’ve come to the same conclusion as Stan Smith of pushingsocial.com: “Blogging is writing, and writing, for most people has a fear factor right up there with public speaking.  You can coach, bribe, threaten all you want but in the end, you’ll be writing most of your blog posts.” That’s precisely why I found Joly’s account of how things worked at Best Buy so inspiring. At every meeting, people would tell their own personal stories and how they personally had been able to make a difference to someone.

At Say It for You, as our team provides content writing services to business owners and practitioners, one way we involve employees is to highlight specific accomplishments in a blog. That brings a two-way benefit: When readers learn about an employee’s enthusiasm and how that person put in extra time and effort in serving customers, that tends to cement the customer’s relationship with the company or practice. As featured employees proudly share those write-ups with friends and family, the blog becomes a gift that keeps on giving.

Far from being a contradiction to concept of authenticity, we help readers “meet” the actual team of employees who are providing the product or service, the ones whose daily activities result in the benefits customers enjoy.

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