Stop Sabotaging Your Blogging Effort
We’ve all heard the chatter focused on blogging. Many marketers have found that blogging is a great way to attract visitors to their business. Providing interesting and informative content is a great way to engage and educate your audience. And turning your visitors into the customers that your business needs.
Posting on your blog is a great way to engage your audience while building your credibility and your brand. However, a blog won’t do that if your visitors quickly click away to escape your blogging gaffes. For your blog to be effective, it must be easy to find and actually read.
You need to be sure that you aren’t sabotaging your digital marketing strategy by committing these six blogging gaffes that send your readers running.
Don’t Play Music or Videos Automatically
Please, no, just don’t do it. There are few things that will make someone close out of a tab faster than the unpleasant surprise of blaring site music or the sound from a video they can’t find. Ultimately, your blog simply should be a place where your audience enjoys visiting and wants to spend time. If you really, really enjoy annoying videos I’ve included a doozy below for your enjoyment. It’s your choice whether you want to watch the video if you feel the need to be annoyed click and watch.
You invested a lot of time and effort into attracting visitors to your content. Once they’ve arrived, the more time your visitors spend with your brand the better. It’s also much more likely that they’ll return to you when they need a service or product you offer if they have been engaged and informed.
That’s why you need to create a useful, information-rich blog. Your blog must also be welcoming, friendly and comfortable for your audience. Your goal should always be to attract, rather than repel, your valuable readers.
Don’t Over-promote Your Business
Your business blog isn’t just for you to share news about your business. You can also tell about any promotions you’re running and about the products and services that you offer. It’s also a great time to include some business promotion.
Just don’t overdo it. The majority of your blog post should be about engaging your audience while entertaining or educating them.
Personally, I like to use the 80/20 Rule. 80 percent of your content should be written to engage your audience. You can use the other 20 percent to promote or talk about your business.
Tell Your Story, Just Do it Subtely
I love 60’s rock music and blasting it out of my huge stereo speakers. But sometimes I just want to relax and enjoy some folk music. Formatting your blog posts needs to be done with the same discretion. You need to use punctuation, underlining and bold type appropriately.
Used judiciously it can enhance your blog and help engage and grow your readership. When it is abused and overused, formatting will send your audience running before they make it through the first sentence.
You should never overuse these formatting elements:
- exclamation points
- capitalization
- underlining
- colored fonts
- font styles
I understand that you want to get your point across. But NO ONE LIKES TO READ a sentence like this!!!!!!!!!!
Your message is actually more easily understood when there are fewer distractions around your words.
Make Your Blog Posts a Conversation
It’s only natural to look to your past writing experience when you start blogging. For most people that’s going to take them back to the writing they did while they were in school. Your academic writing roots may not serve you well when it comes to writing your business blog.
Using the same academic style will have you coming across as formal in your writing. That’s not what your blog needs. Or what your readers want.
Blog writing should be less conventional than traditional professional writing, so it’s better if you:
Writing for your blog needs to be conversational. You need to write as if you were talking to a friend.
You need to write in the first and second person. You should use words like “I,” “we,” and “you.”
It’s OK to break some rules. You don’t want to completely ignore grammar and syntax while writing. But it’s important to that you remember that you’re not bound by all of the rules. It’s OK to start a sentence with a conjunction or use a phrase or sentence fragment sometimes.
Use contractions. It’ll make your writing sound more natural, it’s how we talk to our friends.
Use simple terminology. Keep your writing as simple. Don’t use unnecessary adjectives or big words to sound smarter. Keep it simple and write for a reading level of about eighth grade. You can use an online tool like Readability-Score.com to see where your writing stands.
Again, you need to always know your audience.
If you’re writing to attract and engage upper-level management, you may need to kick it up a notch. However, blogging isn’t like academic writing so you need to relax. You’ll accomplish more and engage your readers better if you loosen up and reign in your desire to write an “A” paper.
Narrowly Target Your Audience
The internet has revolutionized marketing, and sometimes we get hung up on trying to speak to everyone. We forget that people enjoy feeling special and personal. We don’t care for things that are generalized, generic, or inauthentic. By trying to talk to everyone through your blog it will likely lead you to talk to noone.
Sometimes You’re Just Trying to Convince the Teddy Bear
When you write your blog posts, you need an image of one imaginary reader in your mind. You’re writing directly to that reader. Imagine you’re talking to an auditorium full of prospects.
You know that your message resonates with teddy bears, and it’s something teddy bears need. Your job is to convince the teddy bear to act.
Doing this helps you develop the appropriate and consistent voice that you need. It will convince your target audience because it is natural, authentic and relatable.
Don’t be Afraid to Share Using a Blog
It may seem to be a huge task to write your own blog. It’s not as difficult as you assume it is, and the benefits far outweigh the pain. However many people are reluctant to even attempt it.
Their most common excuse is usually, “I don’t know what to write about!” I’ll admit it may seem to be difficult to select a topic. The best place to start is to write about something you know. Or write about something that “bugs” you.
You might begin by writing about something you like to do, or a place you like to go to. You may be surprised at the response of others to what you write. The most important thing to keep in mind is that you want to engage and inform your readers.
You never want to come across as preaching. Just tell your story. Make people feel like they’re having a conversation with you about something that interests them too.
If you’re a business owner, give blogging a try. You might find that you enjoy doing it and there may be an audience that appreciates the thoughts that you share. Happy Blogging!
