In Blogging For Business, Opening Lines Are Key

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Like even the smallest of meals, blog posts taste best when preceded by an appetizer. Sure, in any SEO marketing blog, it’s the keyword phrases in the title that start the job of getting the blog found. But, once the online visitor has actually landed, it takes a great opener to fan the flicker of interest into a flame.  In fact, a big part of blog content writing, I’ve found, involves getting what I call the “pow opening line” right.

Openers come in different flavors and sizes.  To help my business owner and professional practitioner clients and their freelance blog content writers focus on their blog post openers, I’ve selected several favorite lines from different blog writers    I follow:

Anomaly – statement that, at first glance, doesn’t appear to fit.
“This bad economy is being good to me.” 

Kathleen Haley makes the reader want to find out her secret, doesn’t it? The line is nice and short, with part of its appeal being the me” – this promises to be a post with a very personal twist. According to Chris Baggott of Compendium Blogware, one of the four variables that make blogs more successful than traditional websites is that they are personal.
 


Bold assertion.
“The best diet plan for overall health may not cost a thing.”

That opener by Jennifer Warner, reporting on WebMD about a survey on diets, commands attention because readers typically expect to be told about products they can buy.


In-your-face statement.
“That 3,000 word blog post you spent hours researching, writing, editing, and polishing? Yeah, I’m going to need you to go ahead and delete that,” says Erik Deckers as the opener for a post cautioning blog content writers against trying to put everything they know into a single post.

Because it’s so nervy and direct, Decker’s opening statement is an attention grabber.


Stage-setting statement.
“Secret truths seem to make their way to the surface in unguarded moments, whether helped along by too much alcohol or too little sleep.”

This is an opening line from the More Than Right political commentary blog by “Mr. Curmudgeon” (Too long a sentence for “pow”, but the intellectual, sardonic tone is a good fit for its target audience). Reader’s curiosity piqued – WHAT secret truths?

Scare tactic.
“What if your company stood to lose one of its biggest sources of income because a customer had already decided your product wasn’t needed?”

Corporate speaking coach Jean Palmer Heck knows that fear is an effective tool to change attitudes. By using the opener to remind readers of dangers they already face, Indianapolis blog content writers can pave the way to offering solutions..

An appetizer, according to the Free Dictionary, is “a food or drink served before a meal to stimulate the appetite”. That’s exactly what the “pow opening statement” is designed to do for online visitors!

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Blogging to Differentiate

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“When you walk into a room, everyone should know you for one thing,” says Jeff Bowe of Actum Group.  And that one thing needs to be very, very clear – to you and to your target audience. It’s all about differentiating oneself: “When you define your market, really define it. Draw an indisputable border around it, and then own that market with a message that will make all other less focused competitors disappear in the fog of clutter,” directs Bowe.

Business coach and author Jim Ackerman  strikes a similar note: “Any business owner needs to be able to start a sentence with ‘I am the only __________ in __________ who__________”.

As a trainer in corporate blog writing, I know how crucial it is for business owners and professional practitioners to differentiate themselves from that “fog of clutter”, using blog content writing to clarify their “only-ness”.

“Around here”, business owners (or their freelance blog content writers) must be able to clarify, “we:

  • ‘do things faster
  • ‘operate at a lower cost
  • ‘make fewer errors
  • ‘offer greater comfort or less pain for the customer
  • ‘provide a more engaging experience”

or ….whatever other differentiators there are.
 

People never buy what you do; they buy the results or the effects of what you do,” explains Bowe. But how will those results and effects differ when the customer chooses to do business with YOU is the $64,000 SEO marketing blog question. 

Perhaps the secret Indianapolis blog writers need to remember is what business coach Donna Gunter calls her WYSIWYG differentiation approach, or "What You See is What You Get."  “I am who I am and let that center of authenticity come through in all that I do,” she says.

In other words, Gunter wants to do business only with clients who “buy into” what she’s offering without needing to be convinced. By that definition, successful content creation for SEO marketing blogs consists of capturing the uniqueness of the business owners, practitioners, and employees who will be delivering the service and products.

Providing blog writing services means helping businesses and practices each speak their message in a very personal way. Reminds me of that oldie “Only You”. Corporate blog writing tells searchers why only you can give them exactly what they came for!

 

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Opinion Piece Blogging For Business

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“Cat blogs are blogs for and by and about the person blogging. A cat blog is about your cat and your dating travails and your boss and whatever you feel like sharing in your public diary,” explains marketing guru Seth Godin.

When Say It For You was started five years ago, it was certainly not with cat blogs in mind. I and my blog writing services clients in Indianapolis were interested in what Godin had termed viral blogs. Why write viral blogs? “The blogger is investing time and energy in order to get her ideas out there. Why?” Godin answers: “ To get consulting work, to find new customers for a business or to make it easier for existing customers to feel good about staying.”

I think of business blog writing as a kind of matchmaking service, an efficient, pleasant way to help my business owner and professional practitioner clients “meet strangers”, hopefully converting at least some of those into friends and customers.

Through the search engine optimization process, potential customers searching online for your type of product or service get to your blog. Then, when they read the very relevant information you've provided there, these buyers go to your website, and decide to do business with your company. I explain at corporate blogging training sessions.

 
Well, just the other day, I happened upon a http://www.corporatebloggingtips.com/blog post composed by Doug Karr, founder of the Marketing Technology Blog and co-author of one of my corporate blogging training session “bibles”, Corporate Blogging for Dummies. Karr’s title is “We Should Stop Saying Influential When We Mean Popular”.  Not only was this post based on a very interesting premise, it reminded me of the importance of including opinion in SEO marketing blogs.
 

“If you want people to see your stuff…, says Karr, “go for popularity.  If you want a lot of people to buy your stuff…go for influence.” Influencers don’t have millions of social media followers and fans and they’re not famous. What influencers have done is gain trust and build relationships.

I agree, and I liked reading the way Karr made the distinction. But as someone involved full time with online content writing, I realized I was being reminded of a really important point, one all freelance blog writers and business owners need to keep in mind. Whether it’s business-to-business blog writing or business to consumer blog writing, the blog content itself needs to use opinion to clarify what differentiates that business, that professional practice, or that organization from its peers.

There’s a saying that comes to mind:  There’s a big difference between having to say something and having something to say.”

When working with business owners to arrive at the right tone and the right emphasis for their business blogs, I begin by challenging the owner of the business or professional practice with the following question: "If you had only eight to ten words to describe why you're passionate about what you sell, what you know, and what you do, what would those words be?

When online readers find a blog, one question they need answered is “Who lives here?” Providing information about products and services may be the popular way to write corporate blog posts,but in terms of achieving Influencer status – that takes opinion!


 

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Things-You-Don’t-Know-About Blogging For Business

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Of all places to find an example of good business blog writing strategy – the Hot Hollywood section of a women’s magazine I picked up at the hair salon! But that’s just where I found myself reading Cheryl Hines’ “25 Things You Don’t Know About Me.”

Strange thing is, I’ve never even seen an episode of " Suburgatory", and what I didn’t know about its star was – well, everything.  As someone who provides blog writing services in Indianapolis, though, I realized how compelling it can be when someone offers to share stuff-I-don’t-know-about information.

On the face of it, it seems elementary – the first rule for how to write a blog is to share information about the business or about the professional practice or organization. In fact, the very purpose of the blog content is to showcase the accomplishments of the business or practice and the products and services it brings to customers.

But the Cheryl Hines title promised more than that – it offers to make readers privy to “special”, personal, little-known information. The insight I had was that, whether you’re doing business-to-business blog writing or writing SEO marketing blogs for a professional or a retail business, taking online searchers “behind the scenes” makes for content that is more compelling.

And, with business blog writing being generally shorter and less formal than websites, blog posts are the perfect vehicle for showcasing not only the business, but the history and the personalities of the people who implement that business’ or that practice’s unique approach.

Blog posts, I teach in corporate blogging training sessions, should include stories about how you solved client problems in the past and lessons you've learned that you'll be applying for the benefit of new customers and clients. Taking it even further, sharing early struggles and early mistakes can help readers identify with the humans “behind the curtain”.

Awhile back, I wrote one of these Say It For You posts about a Columbus restaurant named Schmidt's. I’d learned that the restaurant is run by the fifth generation of the Schmidt family.  That's exactly the stuff a good blog would share, I emphasized, including interviews with the oldest and youngest living Schmidts (complete with photos).  A skilled freelance blog writer would share tales of early Columbus days when the Schmidt German settler ancestors first arrived. 
 

Different kinds of online content writing, to be sure, appeal (or not) to different types of readers. Truth is, I have little practical use for the fact that Cheryl Hines sometimes buys a candy bar at the 7-Eleven and then splits it with the clerk, or even that she claims I’d want her on my team for Charades. Still, I’ve got to admit – after reading those 25 very human, very personal pieces of info I hadn’t known about her, I am far more likely to check out Suburgatory!


 

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Close-Up Blogging For Business

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“Gone are the days when speaking publicly meant only that – speaking,” says Jean Palmer Heck, teaching speakers to shoot videos audiences will want to watch. The same cautions might be added to the list of how-to-write-a-blog rules, I’d remind business owners, practitioners, and freelance blog content writers.

Begin by establishing the setting with a wide shot. The wide shot establishes place, temperature, and general environment, explains Palmer-Heck.

In online content writing, the opening lines need to establish that readers have come to the right place to find the information they were seeking. Those opening lines establish the general “setting” for the specific focus of that day’s business blog post. Establishing the setting includes clarifying the “slant” of the post – will readers find “how to” information? A list of sources for products? Some cautions and “don’ts? General definitions and categories?

Use close-ups for emotional connection and impact. It’s the details – of nature and of human faces that stimulate emotional responses in viewers.

“Blogging consists of one person — or one company — communicating directly with consumers in an unfettered, unfiltered manner. In that sense, blogs are a more personal form of communication,” observes Practical eCommerce’s Paul Chaney. In fact, as I explain to Say It For You freelance blog writers, blog posts have a distinct advantage over more static website copy precisely because of that razor-sharp focus on just one story, one idea, one aspect of the business or practice. And the “closer up” the focus in business-to-business blog writing, and the more personal the approach, the greater the impact.
 

One mistake amateur videographers make is panning in and out, “zooming” too much. Heck advises turning off the camera before zooming in, so that the focus is on the close-up scene itself, not on the camera’s movement.

In SEO marketing blogs, I remind freelance blog writers in Indianapolis, it’s the recurring “leitmotifs” that connect the various “zoom-ins” of the individual blog posts. In writing for business, the variety comes from all the details you fill in around these central themes.

The leitmotifs in blogs establish the setting which is the company’s or the professional’s signature style. The “zoom-ins” then help blog writing stay smaller and lighter in scale, making for blog posts audiences will want to read!

 

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