How to Start a Successful Blog

There are many benefits to blogging: being a thought leader, increasing website traffic, engage your audience and more. Recently, one of my clients decided it was time to start benefitting from a blog and needed advice on how to get started on creating a successful blog. I set up some foundations with him and thought it might be beneficial to anyone freshly starting out in the blogosphere:

1. Know your audience. If you’re writing for your company’s blog, write for who you are trying to target. If you are trying reach a certain buyer persona, write to them. If you are looking to ramp up on hiring this year, create posts about company culture. Your blog should compliment your company's strategic goals. For example, if you have a product that you are looking to market towards Enterprise size companies, it would not be advantageous to create posts targeting a B2C audience.

2. Be Helpful. Why do most people read blogs? Some people read blogs for entertainment, but most are looking for an answer that solves their problems. When thinking of topics, think in the form of questions: How to, Why you Should, Top Tips. If you have pain points within your own company via customers inquiries; view this as an opportunity to address via a blog post.

3. Writers block? Find inspiration all around you! If you’re at a loss of what to write try to find inspiration via trending industry topics, news and seasonal events. Last May, I wrote a blog about Vidal Sassoon who had passed away that week. Am I in the salon industry? No, but I always thought Sassoon was as talented with branding and marketing as he was with hair. A good example of utilizing the season to create a blog post is MyEnergy’s post on energy conservation during the holidays.

4. Make a schedule. The one thing my client asked me, is how often, how will I remember to blog and what will I blog about? My advice to him was to make a schedule. I suggested this as a way to stay consistent as he is very busy and always on the go. We ended up setting up a spreadsheet via google drive and planning a month in advance.

5. Readability is key. As well as being relevant to your audience, your blog should be easy on the eyes. Long enough to be engaging and yet not too long that it takes too much of your readers time. I try to keep my blog within 350 to 500 words and break up the paragraphs enough that my posts are easy on the eyes.

If you can keep yourself organized and create engaging content that resonates to your buyer personas than you’re on the road to success!

Do you have any further tips on how to create an accomplished blog? Leave them in the comments!

How to create conversations with your customers.

Have you ever had a conversation with someone who is having a conversation at you and not with you? You know, the conversation were all you hear is about their job, their family, their pets, them, them, them, them, them. Here you are sitting there looking attentive while wondering ‘when they will shut the hell up?’  Well consider your advertising, are you only talking about you, you, you? If so, please realize that your customers and leads can and will tune this out. Here are some pointers on breaking out of the monologue and developing a dialogue with your audience.

Realize it’s all about them not about you. You’ve got to face it – no one cares about your products or services. Sounds odd I know, but what I’m saying is people will care about what your product or service is going to do for them. With that being said, try to make sure your all copy has the word “you” more than it has the words “I” or “we”.

Refrain from spamming other people’s social media. This goes along with tip #1 but needs to be pointed out separately. Once in a while, when you have a great achievement sure it’s fine to point it out. Placing your business all over your friends and your business pages you follow however is just plain tacky and annoying. Taking a picture
of your product and then tagging everyone you can think of will easily get you defriended!

Use your social media to ask questions. Questions are great conversation starters. Boston television show Phantom Gourmet does an excellent job using their Facebook page to ask their ‘Phans’ fun, yet relevant questions to create conversation. Bonus: When you ask relevant questions to your fans you get valuable marketing information.

Use your Internet marketing to show your customers love. If you’re a B2B company, using your customers as case studies is a great way to showcase how your product/service made their company more efficient and also it allows you to cross promote your customer and who doesn’t love a little free promotion! If you’re a B2C company, social media is a great place to run contests and thank your loyal customers.

Negative feedback is a great way to show your customer service skills. As hard as it is to see a bad review, view it as an opportunity. In fact, use it to your advantage! How you respond to a bad review can really speak volumes about your company. For example, if you’re a restaurant that received a bad review on Yelp or Google, post a reply apologizing for the reason behind a bad review and offer a solution. First off your acknowledging and taking responsibility for what happened publicly and secondly you didn’t just say “So sorry, too bad.” - you offered a solution. It shows you care about your customers and your public image. Yelp’s Support Center offers further reading.

When it comes to lead nurturing, building relationships with your customers will be the key to a successful long lasting relationship is to show you care by creating an open dialogue. 

2012 Resolutions to maximize your personal brand

2012 is already looking good! Time to start new, new goals for your business and old habits to break.  Here are some resolutions to keep you on track for an awesome 2012.

1.) Network more. Get yourself offline and out there! Attend industry events as well as general events – you never know just who you will meet and how you can benefit. A good place to check out events in your area is on eventbrite.

2.) Learn a new skill. I really hate that statement Jack-of-all-trades, master of none. I agree with making sure to master something in your industry really well. I also think knowing and learning as much as you can in all aspects makes you an asset. This is especially helpful if you’re feeling the burn of a stagnant career.

3.) Stop wasting time on social media. Notice that I didn’t say stop using just stop wasting time. Don’t get bogged down looking at crazy status updates or dramatic tweets of your friends, instead try to spend more time on your business page than your personal page.  Keep your focus on being positive and leveraging social media to maximize your return on investment.

4.) Get rid of dead weight.  This sounds a bit harsh but it can work wonders for your business and for your own health. I call dead weight “psychic vampires”.  They drain your time, your energy and your funds.  They can be in the form of that customer you bend over backwards for but can never please or that employee who feels like you are always out to get them and drags your team down. I say fire that customer and that employee – it’s a bold move but it will pay off in the end.

5.) Find or be a mentor. Mentors and mentoring are one the most valuable business relationships your brand can have. If you’re an industry leader, try mentoring and spreading your knowledge to help future founders succeed and grow.  If you’re just starting out, find that industry leader and connect with him or her. A good place to find out more about finding or becoming a mentor is SCORE.

6.) Stay positive. Seems so obvious, right!? However it is hard to remain positive in a tight situation. Rely on your networks, family, and your mentor(s) to help get you through tough situations. Think about what is so great about you and your brand instead of thinking about how bad things are going.  

Following the above, I see nothing but good things for 20102.  I wish everyone the best of luck this year!