Close the Gap with “Gapper” Blog Titles!

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Some headlines convey a potential benefit; others convey a problem. Gappers, though, says advertising maven Michel Fortin, make people want to close the gap between the two, so they keep reading.  Headlines, he adds, can be newsy, sensational, controversial, intriguing, or inspiring, but "all that matters is that headlines get readers to keep reading".
In fact, Fortin compares headlines to resumes, which are not meant to land a job, but to land an interview.  "Headlines are the ads for the ad copy," he teaches.

Two Fortin tips on "gappers" are excellent advice for business bloggers, I find:

  • Adding a negative situation to the headline is effective, because it appeals to more dominant emotions of readers.  It’s more powerful, Fortin tells plastic surgeons, to ask, "Suffering from wrinkles?" than "Do you have wrinkles?" Rather than saying "Lose 40 pounds in 6 weeks!", it would be more powerful to say "Shed 40 pounds of disease-causing fat in just 6 weeks!"

In other words, think of a negative situation that is now present, or one that will be without your product or service, and write your headline about it.  That draws readers into the copy of the blog post, where you explain how they can close the gap between the bad situation and the solution. 

  • Start the headline with a verb, painting as vivid a picture as possible, advises Fortin.  "Zoom Past the Confusion" is a much better headline than "Get More Clarity!"  Rather than saying "Poor Fiscal Management Leads to Financial Woes", he says, try "Don’t Let Poor Fiscal Management Suck Money From Your Bottom Line!".

As a professional ghost blogger and blogging trainer, I think Fortin’s onto something with the "gapper" idea.  After all, SEO and keyword phrases get searchers to your blog.  The first thing they see on the Google (or Bing, etc.) page is – your title. Now you’ve got to pass readers’ "So what? What’s In It For Me?" test. 

Headlines that make people want to close the gap between:

  • Where they are & where they would like to be
  • The problem & the solution
  • The puzzle or dilemma & the answer

 – those are gappers!

(With profuse apologies to the late President Reagan, each time you write a blog, tell yourself – this one’s for the Gapper!)

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Getting Found – Even By Accident – is Good For Business Bloggers!

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A tiny chapter in the Book of General Ignorance illustrates a big idea for business bloggers – posting content with an eye for "getting found" by online searchers. Answering the question "How did Nome, Alaska get its name?", authors John Lloyd and John Michenson explain it was by mistake!

As a professional ghost blogger and blogging trainer, I found the first thing that resonated with me about that little chapter is that it's a myth-buster.  Myth-busting is a great way to generate content for your business blog – it's fun, it's informational, it's engaging, and it gives you a chance to showcase your own expertise in your field.

As with any other business strategy, myth-busting works best when done with a certain degree of finesse.  Remember, the idea is never to showcase the readers' ignorance or to "make them wrong" (so that they'll know they need your expert services).  Quite the contrary – you want a reader that feels "in the know", armed and ready to make intelligent choices.

There's a second reason, though, that I love the Nome story – it's a prime example of what I've nicknamed an "accidental organic donor". See, the story of Nome goes back to the 1850's, when an officer on a British ship noted the existence of a prominent point of land in Alaska.  In his notes on the manuscript map, the officer scribbled "Name?" (a reminder to look up the name later).  But when the document was being copied and the map of Alaska was being updated, a cartographer misread the note and wrote it in as Cape Nome (instead of "name"), and Nome it's been ever since!

In other words, sometimes there's a disconnect between what the online searcher originally  wanted and what he or she accidentally finds.  When that "accident" turns out to bring a new reader to your blog, (and if your content engages that reader's interest, the mistake can result in your converting a mistake into a customer!

 

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Blog Testimonials are Egg McMuffins!

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Just as shoppers are presented with lots of choices while browsing at the mall, Internet browsers have lots of choices about which sites to "enter".  If your "store window" doesn’t do it for them, they’ll be quickly moving on to your neighbors’ stores.  That’s why advertising blogger Michel Fortin stresses the importance of headlines in ads and in business blogs.

So, OK, you get them to come on in and check out your blog. What keeps those "shoppers" from turning around and walking right back out into the mall?  Your blog content. Obviously, It’s got to be on the mark – recent, relevant, and on point with whatever motivated the search.  We’ve all been there, done that – or gone away and not done that, as the case may be!

I think the Egg McMuffin story illustrates how testimonials in your blog can make the difference between engaging online readers – or losing them before you have the chance to even start the conversation.  Mental Floss Magazine’s "Egg McMuffin: Born of McLovin’" explains that back in 1972, Herb Peterson, who ran a McDonald’s in Santa Barbara, California, loved eggs Benedict.  Peterson created the Egg McMuffin (grilled Canadian bacon on a steamed egg over a slice of American cheese squeezed into an English muffin) and got scolded for serving it without authorization from McDonald’s executives. Even McDonald’s founder Ray Kroc thought the idea was crazy.

(Here’s the part I think is so relevant for bloggers:
"But, when Kroc saw how much customers liked the new sandwich he changed his mind."

In other words, stories about customer satisfaction turned around the skeptical attitude of the executive nay-sayers. That’s precisely the reason it’s so important to use customer satisfaction stories as content for your business blog. No ad copy, no claims, no statistics can ever wield the power of "people just like them" praising the product or service.

Testimonials go a long way in answering the five why’s:

  • Why this reader (is a good fit for your product or service)?
  • Why you the business owner?
  • Why this offer?
  • Why now?
  • Why this price? 

Whatever your "Egg McMuffin" is, be sure to showcase its fans in your blog!



 

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They May Look at the Website, But Your Blog Helps Them See!

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Communications coach and friend Myrna Selby forwarded a video to me relating to a psychology study on focus. In fact, the two professors who co-authored the study have published a book called The Invisible Gorilla and Other Ways Our Intuitions Deceive Us.

The directions are to count how many times girls in white shirts pass the ball to each other.  In other words, the viewer is directed to focus on one aspect of all the different things going on in the video.  But (and this is the whole point), when you focus on one aspect, you miss the others.

To me, that premise hits the nail on the head for the way websites and blogs relate to each other.  Websites present the big picture – the different services and products the company offers, who the principal players are, the mission statement, the geographic areas the company deals with, the “unique selling proposition” – in other words, the whole enchilada!

But, just like in the video, where the viewer can’t focus on everything that’s happening at once, on a website, each page and each block of content takes the mind away from all the others.  It’s exactly the same as focusing on the number of passes by the players dressed in white and missing the gorilla!

What each blog post does, then, is focus on just one aspect of your business, so that online searchers can feel at ease and not be distracted with all the other information you have to offer. In previous Say It For You blog posts, I’ve compared blogging to job interviews.  Each post is like one question at the interview.  The question might be about your technical knowledge in a given area, or it might be about your reliability, or about your salary expectations.  The interviewer will expect you to stick to that one subject in answering that question in the most direct way. That’s exactly what each blog post is designed to do.

Online searchers may look at your website, and that’s a good thing, but it’s your blog that will help them “see”.  Each single blog post makes it clear why this one set of products you have, this one service you provide, and this one piece of special wisdom you have relates to just what they need!

 

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Social Media Can Be “The Wiz” in Promoting Your Business Blog

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Wizard of Oz author L. Frank Baum is inspirational for business bloggers, and not only in terms of finding blog ideas in unlikely places such as the O-Z file cabinet label from which he took the name Oz.

Although he lived a hundred years ago, Baum was able to use the then-equivalent of social networking to promote his book. A Mental Floss Magazine article about Baum’s life explains that, while "the Wiz" may have been an immediate hit with children, librarians disapproved of the book and took it off their shelves, waging what was dubbed the "Wizard War of 1957".

While LinkedIn® would not make its debut for more than half a century, Baum had "friends", beginning with William Buckley, who wrote favorably about Oz in the National Review. Twitter® was unheard of as of yet, but apparently Buckley managed to "tweet" his approval to other famous authors such as Gore Vidal and Nora Ephron, who then "retweeted" to Ray Bradbury and William Styron.  Pretty soon, Baum’s friends had a "buzz" going for his book.

Bottom line (although not online!), through promoting the book, creating friends and followers, those who "liked" Wizard of Oz overcame the librarians’ negative reviews, and Baum  was able to take his place among the ranks of classic children’s fairy tale authors.

It’s not enough to just blog – you’ve got to spread the word about the blog and create "buzz"!

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