Who Says Blogs Can’t Dance?

On occasion, I find the need to remind my ghost-blogging clients of the differences between their advertisements and marketing materials and their blogs. Business blogs exist to promote your expertise, products, and services, true, but in a manner much briefer and less formal than brochures, and a lot "softer" in approach than ads. The word "advertorial" is the closest description for blogs.

First of all, as I explained in Blogs And Billboards Strike Only When The Iron Is Hot, the only people who are going to notice your blog are those searching for information, products, or services that relate to what you do.  In other words, your blog visitors are already in the market for what you have to offer.  The iron is hot!

As fellow blogger Kyle Lacy points out, "Wouldn’t You rather shoot at fish in a barrel?" However (and this is a big "however"), your blog’s gotta "dance" to keep the readers engaged.  No, I don’t mean dancing around the issues.  I’ve been stressing in former blog posts the importance of offering relevant information and a clear viewpoint.  

In his popular business book "Who Says Elephants Can’t Dance?", author Lou Gerstner, known for having turned around the corporate culture at IBM,  rails against the over-use of Power Point slides that have lots of data and bullet points.  Instead, Gerstner advises, "Just Talk!"

The SpeakAssured team, dedicated to helping people overcome fear of public speaking, agree.  "Power presentations have little to do with technology…their power comes from the connection between the speaker and the audience," adding  "That’s the sort of power the SpeakAssured team wants to unleash."

Bottom line, folks, that’s the kind of power blogging can unleash.  Interested people are showing up at your blog.  Help them get to know you and your company.  No hard sell.  No formality.  No elaborate charts and graphs.  Just talk!  In blogs, the "dancing" comes from feeling connected.