Business blogs and resumes have a lot in common, I reflected during a recent session for Butler College of Business sophomores.  Then again, not every one of the recommendations students were given for composing resumes is a good fit for blog content writing.

“Although there’s no one correct way to write a resume,” the workshop handout begins, “there are strategies to promote your abilities and to grab a reader’s attention.” Amen to that one, I’d say.  SEO marketing blogs are all about grabbing and holding readers’ eyeballs.

Resume writing tips that Indianapolis freelance blog content writers would do well to follow include:

• “Keep sentences short’ and begin with varied action words.”  
• “Use clear and forceful language that stresses achievements rather than duties.”  
• “Since most employers “skim” resumes rather than read them, your resume cannot be an exhaustive list of everything you’ve ever done.” Each blog post needs to have a laser-sharp focus on one central idea. Online readers’ notoriously short attention span is one factor that dictates focus in blog content writing.  
• “Quantify your accomplishments – dollars saved, dollars generated, percentage increases in effectiveness and quality improvement.”  
• “Proofread yourself and others do that as well.  Read backwards to catch mistakes.”

On the flip side, the advice I’d offer business bloggers diverges from some of the resume-building tips:

“No personal pronouns.”

As a corporate blogging trainer, I stress exactly the opposite: First person business blog writing has one enormous advantage – it shows the people behind the posts. In first person, blogging for business can reveal the personality of the business owner or of the team standing ready to serve customers.

“Use telegraphic style, omitting ‘the’, ‘an’, ‘and’.”

While I mention in corporate blogging training sessions that bullet points in general are a good fit for blogs (notice how I used bullet points in this very Say It For You post), entire blog posts written entirely in telegraphic style wouldn’t have a natural, conversational flow.

“Many inexperienced resume writers make the mistake of cutting and pasting descriptions of their past job duties.” On this one, I’m in total agreement: Like powerful resumes, the key to powerful SEO marketing blogs is to present experiences and capabilities as accomplishments, describing the personality more than the job.

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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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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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“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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Retirement planners have three roles, Marty Martin explains in the Journal of Financial Planning:

Listener

Connector

Resolver

Seems to me, keeping those same three roles in mind would help blog content writers plan an editorial calendar for the SEO marketing blog of any business, professional practice, or organization.

Listener

The goal is to uncover the facts and discover the emotions. When your client tells you the source of his or her concern, switch to the facts, and normalize the feelings (“It’s not unusual for people to feel a bit nervous about retirement.”)

Once the basic connection with online searchers  has been established through the blog post title and the keyword phrases, we blog content writers have our real work cut out for us – creating an emotional connection with readers. We need to assure them we ‘re listening.  We understand the issues, and they are hardly “alone” in their need for solutions to their problems.

Connector

The goal is to help the client connect the dots of the different types of data – their pension, their Social Security, their IRA, etc.-  plus connect the clients with other professionals for special planning they need.

As a freelance blog writer, I’ve always known that linking to outside sources is a good tactic for adding breadth and depth to my blog content. Linking to a news source or magazine article, for instance, adds credibility to the ideas I’m expressing on behalf of Say It For You client companies. When you link to another blog content writer’s comments about the subject you’re covering, that’s a way to reinforce your point and also shows you’re staying in touch with others in your industry. By connecting readers to other sources,  Indianapolis bloggers can really enhance and add value to the online consumers’ experience.

Resolver

The goal is to guide clients to decisions.  You strongly suggest your client make a specific decision, yet acknowledge it is the client’s decision, not yours.

A call to action is an image or text that tells your readers what action they should be taking next on your site. In fact, as a professional ghost blogger, I'd say the ultimate challenge blog content writers face is getting readers to "see" themselves using the products and services described in the blog posts. Providing several different options for readers (Read more, Subscribe to blog or newsletter, Download a document, Contact, Take a survey) guides readers to decisions while acknowledging they may not be ready to buy just yet.

Use business blog writing to showcase business owners’ and  practitioners in all three roles – as listeners, as connectors, and as resolvers!

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Switching gears is common for people who work in social media.

Among the greatest challenges is determining exactly when to post a given piece of content so it attracts the most “likes,” comments, and retweets. A recent infographic from LinchpinSEO could help crack that code by showing the best days to post to Facebook. Even better, it organizes the information by industry. [Read More...]