How Not-So-Bright Ideas Can Brighten Business Blogs (Part One)

Ig Nobel Prizes honor bad ideas, or more correctly, achievements "that make people laugh, and then make them think." (Ig Nobel winners are invited to a gala at Harvard U., then have the chance to lecture at MIT.)

One of my favorite reads, Mental Floss Magazine, highlights some of these "Not-So-Bright-Ideas in Science". I couldn’t help thinking that business bloggers can take some to-to-do tips from the not-so-mad Ig Nobel scientists.

Ig Nobel Medicine Prize:
Warned as a child that cracking his knuckles would cause arthritis, Donald Unger embarked on a sixty-year experiment to prove his mother wrong.  After cracking the knuckles of only his left hand twice a day, he discovered that his two hands remained physically the same, calling into question whether other parental beliefs are flawed.

Any business blogging tactic had better be able to justify the effort and expense in a much shorter time than sixty years! Through studying the analytics and making adjustments to website landing pages, calls to action, and overall marketing strategy, business blogging "experiments" need to make a beeline –  to your business’ bottom line!

Ig Nobel Mathematics Prize:
In response to the hyperinflation plaguing his country, Zimbabwe Reserve Bank governor Gideon Gono printed currency ranging from one cent to one hundred trillion dollars. While the bank notes had absolutely no measurable effect on inflation, Gono’s tactic was awarded a prize for "giving people a simple, everyday way to cope with a wide range of numbers".

While good blog posts can and should be entertaining, most online searchers are not pursuing a recreational activity, but instead on on a fact-finding mission, looking for information on products, services, and specialized know-how. The material you serve up in your posts needs to be not only valuable, but and actionable.

(At this point I’m going to follow my own bright idea about "pushing away from the table" and saving some the material for another day and a Part Two post on Not-So-Bright Ideas… )