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Blog Posts Don’t Seal – They Enable

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Will blog marketing “close” deals in the same way as face-to-face encounters between prospects and sales professionals? The answer is obviously “no”. This week’s Say It For You posts are devoted to the topic of blog marketing and its place in the overall sales process.

In the book Close the Deal, authors Sam Deep and Lyle Sussman suggest that a salesperson faced with a demanding prospect ask “What concession do you need from me to close the deal right now?” In blogging for business, of course, such a “bargaining” exchange would not be taking place between the business owner/practitioner and the reader/customer. On the other hand, one purpose of blog content is to persuade readers to act.

A very non-technical way I have of explaining the concept of blog marketing is this: Rather than running traditional ads for your brand of hats, vitamins, travel, or paint, you provide lots of information on the history of hats, on why vitamins are good for you, about exciting places to go on safari, and on the psychology of color. Consumers interested in your subject, but who never even knew your name, come to see you as a resource.

When blog readers follow your “calls to action” by phoning your business or practice, faxing in a request or an order, signing up for your newsletter, subscribing to your blog through an RSS feed, or proceeding to your shopping cart to buy your product or service, you know your blog marketing strategy is working Understand, though – it’s entirely possible that none of those things will happen at the first “meeting”.

Just as in traditional selling, you need to use blog content writing to “prove your case” by:

  • offering statistics about the problem your product or service helps solve
  • comparing your product or service with others on the market
  • providing testimonials from past and present customers and clients

Generally speaking, as I often stress when I offer Say It For You corporate blogging training, blog posts are not ads, and there should never be a hard-sell or boastful tone to the content. Blog posts are closer in nature to informative “advertorials”, positioning the company or practitioner as helpful, well-experienced, and knowledgeable.

Primarily, the blog post has to add value. Not just a promise of value if the reader converts to a buyer, but value right then and there in terms of information, skill enhancement, or a new way of looking at the topic. The best blog posts are never about yourself, your company, your services, or your products, but about why you see things the way you do.

Typically, a blog post doesn’t “seal” the deal, so much as it “enables” the deal.

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5 Ways to Create Delicious Omelets and Blog Posts

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There are four types of omelets, Course Hero explains: American style, French Style, Frittata, and Souffle. Interesting information, I thought, but Upfront Magazine’s article “Good Eggs: 5 Ways With Omelets” is a better example for my blog content writers. Why?  The Upfront piece went beyond providing information to readers, offering ways they can put that info to use.  blog post illustrations

The five “ways” (each attributed to a particular chef) include:
  1. using pizza toppings
  2. trying sweetness (tucking banana slices into the omelet, with powdered sugar and chocolate sauce)
  3. adding richness with goat cheese, meet, and herbs
  4. adding yogurt
  5. going Midwestern by adding fried kielbasa
I found a number of things in the “5 Ways” article that illustrate good practices for blog content writers:
It’s a “listicle”. 
Lists spatially organize information, helping create an easy reading experience, and by most accounts, search engines like lists as well.
It uses “chunking”.
Chunking is a way for business bloggers to offer technical information in easily digestible form, tying different pieces of advice and information into a unifying theme. The “5 Ways” article combines cooking advice (“It shouldn’t be brown or crisp” with a variety of ideas.

It uses visuals.
Visuals are one of the three “legs” of the business blog “stool”, along with information and perspective, or “slant”. Whether you use actual original photos or “clip art, visuals add interest and evoke emotion, in addition to cementing concepts in the minds of readers. “5 Ways” is headed by pictures of the 5 types of omelets being discussed.

It has an effective title
“How long?” is one question I hear a lot at corporate blogging training sessions, referring to the blog post itself, but also to the title. While the most effective length for a title is whatever it takes to signal to online searchers that “right here” is the place they want to be, titles should not be overly complicated or cumbersome.

It curates and properly attributes to sources
Quoting others in your blog adds value – you’re aggregating resources for the benefit of your readers. Then, as business blogging service providers, we need to add our own “spin” to the material based on our own business wisdom and expertise. At the same time, it’s crucial to properly attribute quotes and ideas to their sources.

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Bloggership – the Art of Getting Them to Want To

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Products And Services Keys Show Selling And Buying Online

Dwight D. Eisenhower had a great definition for leadership: “Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it.”

Is it simply a matter of selling your product or service to prospective customers? After all, as Robert Louis Stevenson said, “Everyone lives by selling something.” Sort of, say  co-authors Steve Chandler and Scott Richardson in 100 Ways to Motivate Others.  “Leadership means asking for what you want, being very direct with your request, and having your communication centered on requests and promises.”

“Bloggership” might well be defined the same way as leadership, I think – getting readers to want to. “Briefly,” says Jim Connolly of Jim’s Marketing Blog, “here’s how content marketing works: You build and market a website and stock it with free information that has real value to your prospective clients.”

Damon Rouse of problogger.net advises business bloggers looking to sell stuff on their blog is to be careful not to be purely sales oriented. “While blogs can be used as a tool for selling, they are at their best when they are relational, conversational, and offer readers something useful that will enhance their lives in some way…Most people will not react overly positively to a blog that is just sales spin,” Rouse adds.

“If you show how individual bits of information are related in ways readers hadn’t considered, says Jim Connolly, that establishes your expertise and keeps readers’ attention long enough to you to your “ask”.

Even if “they want to”, readers may be fearful of making the wrong choice. Don’t underestimate those fears, cautions Whale Hunters’ sales trainer Barbara Weaver Smith.  You may be totally focused on the great advantages that you provide with your products and services, and forget that potential buyers are fearful of making the wrong decision. Searchers may lack experiences with the latest proce4sses or technology in your field of expertise, but they know what their own needs are.  Give them a “feel” for desired outcomes of a commitment to buy.

Bloggership – the art of getting online searchers to want to!

 

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Selling 102 for Business Blog Content Writers

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Exceptional Selling

“Your ability to constructively attract and engage a customer in relevant dialogue requires a conversational style as well as substantive content,” cautions Jeff Thrull in his book Exceptional Selling.

Thrull might have been offering advice to us blog content writers, I couldn’t help thinking.  What I like to call the “I/you conversational style” is precisely the approach most effective for business blogs.  At the same time, there is so much internet content proliferation that it’s definitely becoming a challenge to get noticed online. If the hard-sell technique ever worked, it certainly doesn’t work any longer!

Thrull describes the new reality of selling:

  • When customers are engaged, they learn.
  • When what they learn is compelling enough to make them want to change, they will buy.

In short, he’s advising – don’t push!

The good news in blog marketing is the same as the good news Thrull describes as operative in direct selling: Customers have negative stereotypes about salespeople.  That makes it easy to differentiate ourselves by acting against type. “When in doubt,” he says, “do the opposite of what a salesperson would do.”

Applying that very logic to blog copywriting, I advise using blog posts to demonstrate the business owner’s or professional practitioner’s expertise, and to offer valuable tips to readers.

The goal of each post  continues to be providing those who visit your site with a taste of what it would be like to have you working with them!

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