May-I-Help-You Business Blogging

help butlerProfessor Robert Krull of Texas Tech University studies the way online help systems are designed. Overall, Krull found, the largest problem participants had in using the help systems wasn’t in the information itself, but rather in finding the correct help topic. In other words, the people needing the help and the people providing the help were using different terminology.

Since the work I do as a freelance blog writer and corporate blogging trainer has everything to do with enabling people to search for and easily find the information, products, and services they need, I liked what Krull had to say about the importance of a common vocabulary.

First, Krull pointed out, online users “became lost in the unclear structure of the system”. Because they hadn’t framed their questions in the same terms used in the help programs, those readers became frustrated as they tried to navigate the system to get answers.

Ease of navigation (as I stress when offering business blogging help) is absolutely crucial to the success of any SEO marketing blog. From the manner in which the corporate blog page is set up to the corporate blog content writing, the process must be smooth.  Frustrating potential clients is to be avoided like the plague.

Krull goes on to discuss the way users “frame the search question”. Help system users are unfamiliar with the specific vocabulary used by a computer product.  They may frame their question by using one name for a category, when the program has it under a different label. Or, users may type in an entire sentence or question.

Since search engines “match” the words and phrases typed into the search bar with web pages that continually use those same words and phrases, business blog writing has a significant advantage over static web page content. Freelance content writers must be vigilant – just how is their content getting found?

The goal, of course, is to get the people needing the help (the online searchers who are the potential clients and customers) and those providing the help (the business owners and professionals using the blog writing services) on the same page, and most important, speaking the same language!

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What Stories Will You Tell in Your Blog Content Writing?

“I don’t do companies that don’t have a story,” states brand consultant Lynda Resnick. “Ifstoryteller they don’t have a story, they don’t have a business.” Executive consultant Bill Jeffries agrees.  “Leaders,” he observes, are effective storytellers.”

In corporate blogging training, I’ve found, a big, big part of providing business blogging assistance is helping business owners formulate stories. 
Every story, Bill Jeffries explains, contains certain elements:

Central characters: The history of the company and the value of its leaders are story elements that create ties between corporate leaders and blog readers.

Corporate blog writing must tell the story of the central characters in that business or professional practice. 

Plot: What do we do? How? Why? What does “success” look like to us?

Online visitors to your blog want to feel you understand them and their needs, but they want to understand you as well. The stories content writers in Indianapolis tell in their SEO marketing blog have the power to forge that emotional connection between company and potential customer.

Setting:  Each business story takes place in a physical setting (Where is the plant, the distribution area, the practice located?) The setting also includes the backdrop of the markets in which that business operates and the complex of problems for which they offer solutions.

Internet organic search is all about settings. Consumers are looking for places where they can feel comfortable and be assured of locating the products, the services, and information they need. The keyword phrases blog content writers use help draw visitors to the site, but the stories they find when they arrive provides the setting for the birth of a relationship of trust..

Learning to tell one’s business story carries special benefits for business owners. That’s true, I’ve learned, whether owners are doing their own blog content writing or working with a freelance blog writer like me.

I’ve called that the training benefit, because in the process of verbalizing positive aspects of a business or practice in a way that people can understand, leaders are constantly providing themselves with training about how to tell their story!

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Roughly Right in Business Blogging

cash register“It’s better to be roughly right than precisely wrong,” observed English economist John Maynard Keynes almost a hundred years ago.  I think that saying holds true when it comes to measuring the effects of SEO marketing blogs.

As a corporate blogging trainer and ghost blogger, I find business owners’ overriding concern is realizing a Return on Investment from their blog content writing efforts. Just the other day I attended a workshop presented by business development consultant Charlie Larson, who explored this very topic (measuring marketing ROI) with our American Marketing Association group.

Since “finance is the international language of business,” (was the message of the meeting), “business owners must understand the financial ramifications of all their marketing initiatives.”

As I look back upon my experiences with the different Say It For You corporations, small businesses, and professional practices, I tell Indianapolis blog writers that ROI is more than “analytics” and charts.

It’s not always possible, for example, to associate a specific ROI measurement to blogging for business without regard to all the other initiatives the client is using to find and relate to customers.  All the parts have to mesh – social media, traditional advertising, events, word of mouth marketing, and sales.  Every effort that “makes the cash register ring” contributes to “marketing ROI”.

Blogging for business carries benefits in addition to helping increase sales, I’ve found. Continuously producing and making available quality content, I teach business owners, helps demonstrate that you care about quality in all dimensions of your business. As they blog, they are constantly providing themselves with training about how to effectively express to customers and colleagues their unique “slant” on their industry.

From an ROI standpoint, getting it “roughly right” when it comes to corporate blogging for business means checking with everyone involved in providing the service or product – those who work in sales, advertising, accounting, production, and distribution.

And, while total precision in isolating blogging ROI may not be possible, the blog’s general bottom line must be clearly in the benefit column.


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Blogging for Business in Gentler Phrasing

bitchy boss“Should Environmental Messages Be So Assertive?” was the question raised by researchers for a study published in the Journal of Marketing.  

Since, as a freelance blog writer and corporate blogging trainer, I’m part of each client company’s marketing team, I find my membership in the American Marketing Association very helpful, and often find information in their journal that can be of help to all Indianapolis blog writers.

“Environmental communications often contain assertive commands, even though research in consumer behavior, psycholinguistics, and communications has repeatedly shown that gentler phrasing is more effective when seeking consumer compliance,” this particular article begins.

In any kind of writing, the “tone” of the piece influences how great (or how little) an effect it will have on readers. When it comes to SEO marketing blogs, establishing exactly the right “tone” is crucial.  With the purpose of blogging for business being to cultivate relationships with potential customers, patrons, and clients, anyone providing blog writing services needs to “get it right” and “get” what messages are likely to be turn-offs to the target audience.  

“Many environment/social-related issues are forcefully promoted through assertive slogans such as ‘Use only what you need’ and ‘Stop talking, Start Planting’, I learned. Yet research strongly suggests that assertively phrased requests typically decrease compliance with the message, compared with less assertive phrasing, such as “Please be considerate and recycle.”

“Assertiveness interacts with consumers’ drive for freedom in a counter-persuasive manner”, conclude authors Kronrod, Grinstein, and Wathieu.

Talk about a piece of information blog content writers need to hear! If blog writing for business is about anything, it’s being informative and persuasive, and gentler phrasing can be one of our secrets to success.

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Okay, Okay Not Okay Enough in Business Blogging

Besides being innovative and funny, the Progresso Soup ads are onto something,
I think, that needs to be top of mind for Indianapolis blog writers. The commerciallosing weight with Progresso Soup teaches us to tailor our message to those people who won’t be saying “O-kay” in a bored tone of voice.

I confess that I really love all the Progresso Soup ads.  Since I’m a writer of SEO marketing blogs and a corporate blogging trainer, there’s one that really hit me between the eyes. This lady calls a Progresso chef to express her delight that she’s lost weight and now fits into her old jeans.  Each time she tries to tell him how excited she is about this, the chef merely replies “O-kay” in a bored way, like “So what?” – he doesn’t get it. Finally the caller says “Is there a woman I can talk to?”

My point is that anyone who does blog content writing needs to accept that not every reader who arrives at your business blog is going to “get it”.  In corporate blog posts, you target a particular audience and work to address their needs. As time passes, you continually hone your content in light of your own deepening understanding of what makes that group of people “tick”.

Before I write a Say It For You blog post, I noodle around the Internet for info and comments, and, in this one instance, I was thinking about Progresso.  I found a blog post that reinforced my point about not every reader “getting” it. This blog was posted by a lady who absolutely hates the very same Progresso ad I’ve been praising. She says it “grinds her gears” “How $-%-^-&-0-* (don’t read her post if you hate bad language) depressing that the commercial lets us know, in no uncertain terms, that men don’t have to go through dieting hell to achieve anything…”

Progresso hadn’t started their wonderful ad series yet, but four years ago I was talking about the same “getting it” idea in a Say It For You post about the Alice Cooper rock band.  When the band decided to have a man dressed in tattered women’s clothing and makeup, their motto was “If the parents hate it, the kids will love it.”

Narrow down your target market, I advise business owners in corporate blogging training
sessions.  Figure out what you have that those people want and need. Then speak to that audience through your blog. If the “wrong” readers hate your business blog, or just say “O-kay. O-kay.” in a bored kind of voice – that’s OK! The right readers will love it!


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