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Just Who Do You Think You’re Talking To

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“What’s with the New Yawk accent?” asks Arika Okrent of Mental Floss magazine, referring to the well-known tendency of New Business challengeYorkers to drop their r’s.  In the 1960s, a Columbia University grad student named William Labov, hypothesizing that the missing r might be explained by social factors, tested his theory by visiting luxury department stores and bargain basement shops. The classier the joint, he found, the more likely salespeople were to pronounce the r.

The study was repeated in 1986 by Joy Fowler, finding precisely the same pronunciation difference between high-end and low-end store personnel. That begged the question: if more r means more prestige, why are the r’s dropped at all?

A recent inquiry by Maeve Eberhardt and Corinne Downs found the answer at the famous New York bridal salon Kleinfeld’s (featured on the TV reality show “Say Yes to the Dress”). The researchers discovered that the higher the client’s budget, the more likely the salesperson is to retain the r! However, the salespeople tend to drop the r when providing emotional support!

Now, you wouldn’t drop your r’s in a printed blog, of course, but there are tests you can put your blog through to see how you’re doing in terms of readability – are you reaching the right people and doing it by using words and sentences to which they can relate?  Readability Index Calculators (the most-used is the Flesch-Kincaid) can show where your writing is on the bargain–basement-to-“classy” scale.

As content writers, we try to keep blog content relevant to the topic and up to date with what’s happening in the field and in the news. Going light on jargon and technical terms without “dumbing down” the material shows respect for readers’ intellect – and for their time. But refining the content based on the target audience is the lesson we can take from the New Yawk accent story.

 The idea, of course, is to match your writing to your intended audience. Does the site target a more educated demographic, people with specialized knowledge or expertise in a particular area, or is it meant to cater to a general audience.

A good question for us blog writers to ask ourselves might be “Just who do you think you’re talking to?“

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Questions Readers Shouldn’t Need to Ask at an Open Blog

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“The best way to find out if a school is a good match for your student and your family is to visit the school in person.” Great-Schools.org offers a list of questions to ask at the next open house:

Does this school have a particular educational philosophy or mission? For blogs to be effective, they must serve as positioning statements. The “visit” has to cute boy sitting at table and writing. conclude with readers understanding exactly what your particular philosophy or mission is.

What is this school’s approach to student discipline and safety?

Prospects are always mentally posing the “What’s In It For Me?” questions.
What’s the benefit in this for ME? How will MY interests be protected and served if I choose to do business with you or become your client or patient? What will you do to keep me “safe” from risk?

What kinds of library resources are available for students?
Serving as a “go-to” source for online readers can be a great formula of success for
business bloggers. Readers could, in theory, have sought information from sources
more authoritative than your blog. Yet those same readers will be sure to appreciate that  you’ve gone to the trouble of culling valuable nuggets from a variety of sources and  helped them make sense of the information.

How do students get to school? Is free busing available?
Generally, online searchers want to find out what they’ll get if they buy and want to gain
perspective about how the pricing and the quality stacks up against the competition.

Online searchers who visit your business blog are very much like those parents at a school
open house. The parents are looking for the very best institution to help with their children’s
education. Online searchers arrive at your business blog needing to know how to find products
and services, how to do something, how to solve very specific problems.

Don’t wait for readers to pull out that list of prepared questions – your
blog content should address those questions ahead of time. That way, the answers will be
there waiting when visitors arrive!

 

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Business Blogs Must Magnetize and Mesmerize Before Monetizing

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Magnetizing, then mesmerizing your audience is all about you stepping out of old fashioned magicthe realm of mediocrity as a speaker or trainer and into the realm of magic, says Callan Rush, the self-dubbed Maven of Motivation. Only after those first two steps are accomplished, she explains, can any speaker monetize his/her business.

I was struck by how relevant Rush’s advice is to business blog content writing. Problem #1 for seminar leaders, she explains, is low attendance.  Isn’t “getting found” online the first step for businesses?  Doesn’t every business or practice need to draw online traffic before anything else can happen?

The first three steps on Rush’s Magnetic Marketing Checklist are:

  •  Choose a specific audience
  • Choose a specific problem
  • Create a tantalizing title

The Say It For You “take”:

Your knowledge of who your target audience is must influence every aspect of your blog  – the words you use in the title, how technical you get, how sophisticated your approach – all of it meant to magnetize the specific type of customer or client you want and those who will want to do business with you.  That’s why we content marketers use and repeat keyword phrases to help search engines  recognize us as the best match for the right online searchers.
Millions of people are putting ideas and information out on the Web, often just to share knowledge and give others the benefit of their opinions.  But in your case, you’re using your blog as part of your marketing campaign. The blog is your “podium” – you get to showcase your business so customers will want you to be the one to provide them with the product or the service they need. But, like the seminar presenters whom Callan Rush advises, even after they arrive, if you fail to mesmerize your audience – you’re toast!

Captivating readers, just as captivating audiences, depends on what Rush calls WDYD – (What do you do?)  In other words, you need to choose a very specific problem or need, and offer a very clear and compelling solution.

We business bloggers are faced with a tall order: our content must magnetize, then mesmerize. Only then will any “monetizing” become possible!

 

 

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