How To Get Better At Blogging
Your business blog is at the heart of your social media strategy.
So, it helps your business if you’re a good writer.
No pressure.
Writing is a skill that needs to be cultivated and nurtured. So, don’t feel bad if you find blogging to be difficult.
Writing is hard.
Also, here are 3 blogging hacks to help you stay on top of your game when it comes to writing for your business blog…
1. Writer’s block is real and you can overcome it.
Even the best writers hit roadblocks now and then. Writing is one of those things that looks like it’s really to do – until you have to do it. Even writers who write professionally, and who have worked on their skills for years, hit hard times.
They get tired.
They run out of good ideas.
Writer’s block is real and it’s awful.
Not to mention, terrifying.
Look – it happens to everyone. So, don’t feel bad if you just feel like you have nothing left to write about and your business blog is in danger of going dark.
For instance, consider the Artist’s Way.
The Artist’s Way, written by Julia Cameron, is a workbook that takes creative-types through strategies that are designed to cultivate their creativity.
An integral part of her teachings involves a practice called Morning Pages.
Morning Pages require you dedicate a part of your morning to free-think and dump all your thoughts in writing before you start your day or go to work.
This is 3 pages of longhand, stream-of-thought writing. You write about anything, without thinking about how artful or important the writing is.
You can blast out your negative thoughts, apprehensions, errands you need to run, things that are worrying you or angering you, your goals for the day – anything.
I’ll be honest, doing this feels pretty stupid, at first. Not going to lie.
But, when you do this diligently and consistently, you will discover that this routine clears your mind and helps your focus for when your brain has to do real work – such as writing a business blog.
Also, while most of your Morning Pages are going to be complete garbage – which is okay, because no one is supposed to read them – you will discover unexpected sparks of brilliance.
These kinds of ideas would never have formulated without the reckless wild abandon of doing a morning ritual where you let your mind wander freely and express itself on a page.
I think of Morning Pages as a sort of “workout” for the mind. While your goal might be to run a marathon, for instance, you would get in shape for that huge goal by building your muscles and endurance – not just running a marathon right away (a la Forrest Gump).
2. Experiment with different types of blog posts.
It happens to the best of us.
If you’re an entrepreneur and you’ve been blogging for a while, sooner or later, you’re going to feel tapped out.
Fresh ideas get harder to come by.
It can start to get less fun.
But, blogging with consistency is critical if you want to attract and maintain an engaged audience.
So, you have to keep at it.
Don’t despair. If you get stuck, you might need to think outside of the box.
Don’t be afraid to shake things up when it comes to business blogging, and know that there are many different approaches that you can take.
Certain types of blog posts are going to work better for you than others. It depends on your blogging style, the nature of your business, your industry – and of course, your audience.
For instance, consider doing an interview blog post.
An interview post is a dynamic way to create blog content.
Simply pick a guest to interview and compose some thought-provoking, open-ended questions.
Your guest should be a reliable expert in their field and should be able to provide value for your targeted audience.
Just as in the case with the guest blogger, when you’ve established yourself as an industry blogger, you might find yourself getting offers from various influencers or experts, saying that they’ll gladly do an interview with you for free.
Again, be careful of these generous offers. Trust me when I say that some of them will seem to magically appear from out of the woodwork.
First and foremost, you want to make sure this offer comes from a credible source. Ask yourself why you, your audience, or anyone for that matter should trust what this person has to say.
Second, you want to be positive that this person can offer value to YOUR SPECIFIC AUDIENCE.
Do not risk confusing or alienating your audience with frivolous, SPAMMY content.
It is completely acceptable if they want to plug one of their products, services, or lead magnets BUT this should not be the focus of your interview.
The focus should be on providing value to your audience and, in doing so, this positions you as a valuable resource for vital information.
You can record the interview in an audio or video file, and then have it transcribed using a service like rev.com to use in a written blog article.
Repurposing your content in this way will ensure that you can have SEVERAL media clips and tons of written content for your blog and social media.
Click here for 7 types of blog posts that will help you keep your audience engaged…
3. The length of your blog post matters.
When it comes to writing blog content, you want to be mindful of your word count.
Yes – size matters.
That is, it matters if you want to improve your chances of getting seen by search engines, such as Google.
Ranking higher in Google searches means you better your chances of more people finding you and doing business with you.
While there is no cookie cutter, one-size-fits all length for every business owner who is creating blog content, there are some guidelines that generally apply.
Here are some factors to consider when deciding how long your blog posts should be…
First and foremost, your blog needs to be at least 300 words long. This one is non-negotiable.
In order for Google to even acknowledge your content, your blog post needs to be at least 300 words long.
300 words is a minimum requirement, but if you’re just starting out with business blogging, it’s an easy target to shoot for.
Next, understand that dwell time matters… a lot.
In the Dark Ages of the Internet (like… pre-2010) all you needed to do in order to rank high in a Google search was write 300 words, and pack your blog post with as many key words and back links as possible.
Those days are dead and gone.
Nowadays (welcome to the future), Google is way more intelligent.
You can’t just trick people into clicking on your blog anymore.
You have to provide value.
If your content is not worthwhile – even if you write 3,000 words – people are going to quickly click away.
And Google and other search engines are going to notice this, and decide you don’t deserve to rank high in searches.
“The content HAS to be good,” says Franco Valentino of Narrative SEO. “I advocate the IDEA framework: Industry leading, Data driven, Educational, and Amusing. It’s the right thing to do.”
In other words, don’t try to hack Google. Instead, hack your audience.
Blogging for business can be daunting. Just be aware that writer’s block can strike anyone at any time and there are many tools available to you that can help you deal with it. Also, keep your mind open and experiment with different types and formats of blog posts. Finally, keep in mind that your word count matters, and you want to take this into consideration when you are creating written content to maximize your blog’s SEO.
If you’re ready to take your business blog to the next level, check out my FREE eBook, “How To Blog Like An Entrepreneur” here…
