Business Blogs To Reveal and Advance

“Every sentence must do one of two things – reveal character or advance the action,” is Kurt Vonnegut’s advice to short story writers. Bloggers for business, I think, would be wise to follow that rule as well.

Reveal character:
Author and speaker Debbie Weil says the #1 rule for blogging is: Write from your passion! The whole advantage of blogs is that they’re short, conversational, and, above all, personal. People want to do business with people (in fact, as Chris Baggott of Compendium Blogware would say, they want to do business with people just like them!)

Your personality and character need to be revealed in each blog post. There must be no doubt about how much you care – about your industry, your products, your clients and customers – your blog must unmistakably demonstrate to online readers that in you they’ve found the “real deal”. (Just as in a face-to-face meeting, genuine character cannot be faked, but what I’m saying is your blog must let your enthusiasm shine through the screen.)

Advance the action:
The majority of traffic to any business blog comes from first time visitors, who may not, as Weil points out, even realize they’re reading a blog. Now that they’re here, you’re given a chance (very brief but very valuable) to prompt them to take the next step.

Usually we think of CTA’s (Calls to Action) as being a click on a button or widget:”Click here to contact, enroll, order, call, subscribe, etc. To me, though, as a professional ghost blogger and blogging trainer, each whole post is in itself a Call to Action! Your compelling description of how your solution (product or service) makes the reader eager to move to the next step.

Truly great blog posts offer far, far more than keyword phrases strung together in an attempt to “win search”. By revealing character , you advance the action!