The unique selling proposition (USP) is one of the cornerstones of marketing. There has to be a reason people do business with you and not someone else – a winning difference that sets you apart and makes you the only real choice.

Traditional marketing advice will have you lock yourself in a cave for weeks listing all of the features of your business, translating them into benefits, then somehow finding that one compelling point that will differentiate you from everyone else you could possibly compete with.

There’s nothing wrong with this approach if it works for you. But if it doesn’t, try throwing it out the window and doing it the cheap and easy way instead.

If you’re not trying to launch FedEx, you don’t need a USP as robust as FedEx’s. Try each of these five-minute exercises and see if it doesn’t shake loose a USP that will work for your site.

Remember that information consumers don’t go to just one blog, subscribe to just one site, or buy just one product. They want anything and everything about the topic they love.

That means your USP doesn’t have to beat everyone else out. It just has to play nicely with the other offerings in your group.

The Crossroads USP

To create a crossroads USP, take two seemingly unrelated ideas and bring them together.

The hit movie Speed was famously pitched as “Die Hard on a bus.” Clueless is Jane Austen’s Emma set in 1995 Beverly Hills.

You can create a crossroads USP by taking something well-known and presenting it to a new audience. Maybe you’ll offer Yoga for Stockbrokers, or Business Blogging for Veterinarians.

Copyblogger is a crossroads blog, showing how to use direct response techniques to create better, more compelling blog content. And as the site and the world around us evolve, we’re finding ourselves at a new crossroads, between internet marketing and social media.

You’re looking for two roads that are different enough that you create some energy, but not so different that you can’t realistically bring the roads together. The Complete Guide to Flower Arrangement for NFL Players probably won’t find the audience you’re hoping for.

The Metaphor USP

Sometimes you can find an overarching metaphor that will snap everything into place.

For example, Duct Tape Marketing offers something you can find in lots of places—marketing advice for small businesses.

But that “duct tape” metaphor tells you a lot. It tells you the approach is practical, effective, and not terribly fancy. It probably skews slightly toward men, but not exclusively. It can be used in lots of different ways. And it doesn’t take itself too seriously.

No one’s ever going to confuse Duct Tape Marketing with a site called Green Planet Marketing or Mama Bear Marketing. Each creates its own USP just by using a metaphor to define the market, the approach, and the angle.

The Persona-Driven USP

If all else fails and you can manage to be reasonably interesting, your USP can simply be . . . you.

As Scott Stratten recently posted on Twitter, “If you are your authentic self in your business, you have no competition.”

Seth Godin, Donald Trump, Martha Stewart, Tony Robbins, Cal Worthington (and his dog Spot), Frank Kern and Gary Vaynerchuk have all created persona-driven brands. They started with something fairly ordinary (business advice, housekeeping tips) and made it extraordinary through the force of their personality, their passion and their individual expression.

To some degree, this is limiting. The business can’t ever get any bigger than you are. But each of those people has learned to partner and delegate in order to create companies that go far beyond a single individual. (You don’t really think Martha Stewart plants all those tulips herself, do you?)

If you’re going to create a persona-driven USP, you’ll need to keep showing up. It’s your job to stand front and center and say something interesting. You’ll provide the voice and the flavor for the site.

But don’t think you have to have a “shock jock” personality for the persona-driven USP to work for you. Chris Garrett and Darren Rowse are both soft-spoken, helpful gentlemen who have created wonderfully successful businesses by focusing on what they cared most about and how they could help others. They used their own experience as a filter for their audiences, with powerful results.

Why you?

At the end of the day, the only reason you need a USP at all is to answer that question. Why you?

Why should anyone read your blog? Why should anyone buy your product or retain your services? What do you have to offer that makes it worth anyone’s time and/or money?

It can be a painful question, but it doesn’t have to be one that ties you in knots for weeks on end. Keep it simple, and keep moving forward. The strongest USP on earth won’t help you if you don’t back it up with all the other actions that create a successful business.

About the Author: Sonia Simone is Senior Editor of Copyblogger and the founder of Remarkable Communication.

On Twitter yesterday Yaro asked me whether I like Twitter more than Blogging.

My reply was of course limited to 140 characters and as a result not overly comprehensive:

“no I like blogging more than Twitter but Twitter is fun and a useful part of the mix of what I do - both have their place”

I thought perhaps it was a topic worth expanding upon here on ProBlogger. While I’ve shifted most of my blogging about Twitter to TwiTip I thought it might be worth sharing a few of the thoughts on how I’m using Twitter here on ProBlogger.

What follows is both a more extended answer to Yaro (and others) but also a collection of thoughts on my experiences of working with Twitter over the last few months.

Blogging Remains My Primary Activity

While I tweet more often than I post to my blog - my blogs remain my primary focus and what I spend most time building.

It may not always seem like it when you look at the 20+ tweets that I produce a day on my twitter account but when you consider that a tweet takes seconds to write and a post can take hours - the blogs I run do take considerably more of my time and focus to produce.

My thinking around this is something that I’ve talked about previously in my description of how I use social media as outposts as opposed to my blog which I see as a home base.

In essence my use of twitter is something I do as a support to my blogging.

I guess the question will come at some point whether I will need to change this approach a little when my Twitter follower numbers go past my blog reader numbers. I suspect my approach won’t change at this point - however it’ll probably present some interesting challenges in working out priorities.

Blogging and Twitter have Different Strengths

Having said that blogging is my primary focus it is increasingly obvious to me that both mediums have their own strengths and that Twitter is able to achieve things that blogging can not (at least for me).

The immediacy of Twitter and the fact that it is a network that can spread word of a story, idea, question or thought quickly around the world to many thousands of people very quickly makes it unique.

For example one of the main ways that I find Twitter useful is getting quick feedback or answers to questions from a diverse group of people. While you can get similar feedback from a blog post Twitter is much faster. On the other hand a blog lends itself more to discussions among readers that are a little more considered, in depth and interactive (between those responding).

Blog are also great for more in depth posts. This post is a perfect illustration of this - when Yaro asked me his question on Twitter I had 140 characters to sum up a lot of different thoughts and experiences and ended up not really saying a lot whereas this post is able to explore the topic in depth.

While some people see the strengths of one and the weaknesses of the other as reason to choose between Blogging and Twitter - I’ve come to see the power of using both in tandem. The key is to know what you’re trying to achieve with your online presences and to understand what each medium can do to help you achieve this.

Twitter and Driving Traffic

I’ve written previously about the topic of Twitter driving traffic to a blog and each time have talked about how much traffic ProBlogger gets directly from Twitter. The figures have increased each time I’ve written on the topic as my own follower numbers grow and of late the numbers have continued to grow considerably.

My Google Analytics stats show that Twitter.com is now the 3rd largest referrer of traffic to this blog (only behind Google and Direct Traffic). This probably sounds a little more impressive than it is - overall it sends around 4% of my traffic (Google is 46% and Direct Traffic is 21%). This doesn’t count traffic arriving from Twitter applications - so the figure is probably closer to 10%.

My other two blogs illustrate that Twitter’s ability to send traffic is varied depending upon your site. TwiTip has over 16% of its traffic directly from Twitter.com and Digital Photography School gets 0.34% of its traffic from Twitter (although my DPS Twitter account has considerably less followers).

Twitter is Quick but Takes More Time to Use Well as Follower Numbers Grow

Actually tweeting on twitter is a relatively quick and easy process. I’ve used a variety of tools in my use of Twitter that have helped me manage the process really well - however as my number of followers has grown so does the amount of time needed to manage the account - at least if I want to remain interactive and engaging.

The number of @replies and DMs that one gets as follower numbers goes up also rises and there comes a point where a Twitter user needs to decide how interactive that they can be.

As I write this my follower numbers are just over 42,500 - to this point I still read all replies and DMs but it is becoming more and more challenging to do and I’m aware that I’m going to have to make some tough choices in the coming weeks and months if the number increases as it has.

The ReTweet is Powerful

The practice of ‘ReTweeting’ has really come into its own over the last 6 months. While people have always ‘re tweeted’ what others have tweeted - a lot more tools and services have risen up around the practice of late. Some see retweeting as a measure of authority of a twitter user - I’ve personally been more interested in its viral nature, particularly when your link is the one being retweeted.

If a link gets retweeted widely it can drive many many thousands of visitors to a blog post.

In the last few months we’ve seen more and more bloggers adding retweet buttons to their blogs in a similar way to how social media buttons are often added to blogs - I’ve done it on TwiTip with a button from Tweetmeme which has worked well but I suspect we’ll see more and more tools released.

Usefulness Remains the Key to Both Mediums

I can’t stress it enough - the key to both success in both mediums is to become the most useful resource that you can to those who you come into contact with online. Solve problems, meet needs, connect with people where they are at and both mediums will come into their own for you.

All in All….

All in all I’m continuing to see the fruits of investing time and effort into both Twitter and Blogging. What about you?

by Marinel Mones

Twitter, the popular micro-blogging site, publishes online messages with a maximum of 140 characters. Currently, Twitter has an estimated 4.1 million visits to the site and climbing per month in the U.S. alone. It is considered to be the fastest growing social network, and is one of the most viral social media tools freely available. Many brands attempt to use the tool to market their services and products, but the successful brands use Twitter to listen and engage with their stakeholders. (img from seyDoggy’s photostream)

Brian Solis, a Principal at FutureWorks, said, “Of all of the social tools and services that are pervasive throughout our digital society, only a select few communities can boast the pseudo fanatical conviction that Twitter’s users unanimously possess.”

Twitter can be compared to skimming the headlines, only viral with links, tweets and conversation moving at the speed of 140 characters. At the same time, it lacks the depth of other forms of social media, like content rich blogs or a contact manager like LinkedIn.

Similar to other social networks, organizations should not just jump onto the Twitter bandwagon. Before engaging companies and organizations need to assess their purpose and potential benefits of using Twitter. Below are key questions to consider:

• What can Twitter do for my organization? Twitter connects organizations to their target audiences and allows them to build trust and relationships. This micro-blogging site is excellent for nonprofits and social good advocates to raise awareness for their efforts and a good place for micro-campaigns.
• What can we do for our Twitter community? Can we add to the conversation? What value do we bring to potential followers on Twitter? Are we ready to be present the other 90-95% of the time when we don’t have a need to communicate with the marketplace? Are we ready for an ongoing conversation?
• One account or multiple accounts? One account per organization is recommended. Multiple accounts create confusion. It’s OK for employees of an organization to have their own personal account as long as employees are being transparent of who they are and who they work for, i.e. “@Richard from Dell”. Organizations can elect a person to manage the account and engage with stakeholders. All Twitter correspondence regarding the organization’s information can be addressed with the main account. Employees could provide the Twitter handle (username) of the organization’s main Twitter profile on their own profiles (crosslinking is important for consistency and unification).
• How do I use Twitter? The opportunities for organziations to use Twitter are incessant. Twitter is a tool meant for engaging, not just following people and vice versa. The Dosh Dosh blog shares different ways beginners, professionals and organizations can you use Twitter. The list includes:
  • Networking – There are many ways to network on Twitter. Organizations should use Twitter search to find fellow industry organizations, professionals, and potential stakeholders to follow. If organizations can effectively build relationships on Twitter, the potential for leveraging Twitter in promotional efforts is endless.
  • Receiving feedback – As with every social media tool, listening and engaging with fellow Twitterers are fundamental. Network Solutions is a prime example of this. Network Solutions monitors the “Twittersphere” for conversations about the company – from customer service to providing potential stakeholders with coupon offers. Network Solutions responds to Tweets (the post/entry made on Twitter), often asking for feedback, and in turn learns how to better serve their clients.
  • Direct traffic – Crosslinking blog posts, new campaign information, etc. about your organization will help drive traffic to your site. Synchronize updates with your website. Micro-blogging sites offer badges (an image, usually squared and displayed on a blog, which signifies the blogger’s participation in an event, contest, or social movement) and widgets (mini applications that performs a specific function and connects to the Internet) to embed on web pages such home sites or blogs.
  • Provide information – Share information about organization on your profile and in your Tweets. This information should be relevant to your stakeholders. Information about local events, conferences, etc. are all appropriate. Providing information does not mean pitch your organization.
  • Read News – Twitter users tend to share information using tiny URLs. This can be blog posts or online news article URLs. In addition to following and engaging with industry professionals, the organizations should read the content – including the links – of those they follow and their followers, if the Tweet deems relevant.
  • Branding – An organization’s brand should permeate on and offline. Remember, brands are perceptions of organizations in the minds of their consumers. Be consistent by using established logos, colors, etc. Consistency signifies a united front for organizations.

For example, social media consultant and social media for social good advocate, Beth Kanter, used Twitter to help a young Cambodian woman receive treatments for her health. Kanter challenged people at the Seattle Gnomedex 8.0 Conference in August 2008 to use their Twitter networks to raise money for this woman. In 90 minutes, Kanter raised $2,500 and by the end of the conference $4,000. Kanter was successful because she has a large network, but she also cultivates her relationship with her Twitter followers.

What Twitter Can Do For You

Tracking keywords and conversations is one of the benefits of Twitter. Organizations can follow dialogues and research key issues using Twitter Search and hashtags (#). Following conversations provides the organizations with benchmarks and results.

• The tracking keywords feature is used on your phone or IM. People simply send text messages with “track” in front of the word they’d like followed (i.e. “track nonprofits”). Results are given in real-time.
• There are many tools for performing Twitter searches. The most popular is Twitter Search (formally known as Summize before Twitter acquired it). Twitter searches enable organizations to filter conversations.

If an organization wanted to see what the Twittersphere was saying about them, they could easily use Twitter search to monitor the conversations. Twitter search also provides an RSS Feed (a system that generates frequently updated information from a site) for specific terms. Organizations could really use the search to answer questions and track trends.

• Hashtags make it easier to follower conversations on Twitter. Words or phrases marked with a hash (#) as a prefix signify tracking. People create hashtags in order to view the results and conversations in the Twittersphere. Hashtags are excellent to use for campaigns.

Communicating provides only140 characters to capture your stakeholder’s interest. If organizations continuously build relationships and network on Twitter and the campaigns are thoughtfully executed, then the campaign will be successful. It’s critical for 98% of marketers out there to ensure they don’t just broadcast using a Twitter profile (CNNers, Guy Kawasaki and Shaquille O’Neal aside). Success demands participation and conversation.

Take the Twit2Fit effort as an example. Twit2Fit is an ongoing Twitter movement that supports the health and wellness of people and challenges Twitter users to exercise and create or maintain a healthy lifestyle. When people tweet about exercising, they add the #twit2fit to their post. The movement encourages people to become healthy and allows Twitterers to show their support for better health and wellness.

Another example is Epic Change’s Tweetgiving campaign, an effort to raise money to fund a new classroom for a school in Tanzania. In just 48 hours, Epic Change was able to raise $10,000 through the power of Twitter and social media.

The best benefit organizations get from joining Twitter is the relationships. The Twitter community is continuously growing and thrives on participation and interaction. Think of your Twitter relationships as investments of the organization. To keep a client, you must continue nourishing that relationship and offer assistance as needed. Offer your Twitter community with information by providing answers pertaining to their sector-related questions. Listen and engage with your stakeholders.

Conclusion

Twitter is a helpful tool when effectively used. The dynamics of the Twitter community allows organizations to use connect with their stakeholders and offer information about themselves or their cause. Through this micro-blogging tool, the organizations can meet new people, share information with their stakeholders about organization updates or events, track trends and conversations in the nonprofit industry and even create a micro-campaign. With Twitter, organizations are listening, engaging and building relationships that extend beyond the social network.

Jonathan Thomas is a blogger and social media marketer that runs several successful niche blogs such as: Niche Blogger Today - a guide for niche bloggers and Anglotopia - The world’s largest Anglophile blog. You can connect with him on Twitter: @jonathanwthomas

The best way to build traffic for a new niche blog is to have lots of content and to post it regularly. Many new bloggers don’t realize this and are often disappointed with their traffic when they start out. They write a post or two a week and the traffic just isn’t increasing. It’s demotivating and makes you question whether or not you should waste your time niche blogging.

To help generate steady traffic and attract loyal readers, you need to have a content schedule. This could mean blogging five or seven days a week or it could mean just posting on the same two days of the week. Your readers want to know when to expect new stuff from you. So, why is it good for your niche blog to have a content plan and how should you develop it?

Why do you need a Content Plan?

Having a content schedule helps build loyal readership. If you write about specific things on specific days, readers will know when to come back. Readers will also take you more seriously if you have a methodical plan behind the blog, that is they know it’s not just the aimless ramblings of a procrastinator. It will help foster community and turn your blog into a favorite amongst your audience. A content plan keeps people coming back for more, especially with Niche Blogs.

Time Management

A content plan also helps you manage your time. When starting a blog, you’re often awash with tons of ideas for posts. So many, that you quickly get burnt out as the drudgery or writing about the same things sets in. If you organize your blog into content categories, you can spend your time focusing on several targeted ideas a week, as opposed to hundreds. This will fill your blog with relevant content to your niche, increasing the likelihood that people will find you via the search engines.

Good Habits

A content plan also helps to create good blogging habits. To maintain a successful niche blog community, you need to regularly update your blog (and not just with blog posts), respond to comments and overall monitor the site. You’ll create a production state of mind - meaning that you’ll get in the habit of writing a post a day, or even writing them all in one day and scheduling them to post. This will make the creation process much easier to begin and end.

Establishes Niche Authority

If you’re regularly writing about particular subjects, the sheer amount of content that this creates will establish your authority in your niche subject. Who are you going to trust more? The blog with a few sparse posts written at odd times, with very little information? Or the blog that is filled with relevant content to the subject your interested in that ’s updated in a methodical fashion?

Helps with Ideas for posts

Often, as you write in a more regimented, methodical fashion, you’ll come up with even more ideas for relevant posts. Then, you’ll find yourself altering your own content plan to fit in new and interesting ideas.

How to Develop Your Content Plan

The first step in developing your niche blog content plan is to sit and think long and hard about what you want your blog to be. Do you want to be a rockstar in your niche? Or do you want to be part of the scenery? Or do you just want a creative outlet?

If you want your niche blog to take over the world, then you need to post every day (and maybe more than once a day).

If you want to a part of a larger niche community, post 2 to 3 times a week.

If you just want a creative outlet, then post once or twice a week, depending on how the mood moves you but be sure to make sure it’s the same days.

What are Others Doing?

Research is so important when building your blog. Hopefully, you found people blogging about the same things as you. What are they doing? Do they have a schedule? What do they regularly write about? What are they doing wrong? And then ask the most important question a niche blogger faces:

How can you do it better?

Think About your Niche

Think long and hard about what interests you so much about your niche subject. What would you like to read about? Compare to your competition. Find some way to differentiate yourself while still focusing on the subjects that interest you the most. If you lack passion for any of your posts, it will show in your writing and will turn off readers.

Then think about how you can express your interest the most effective way. Think about the types of posts you’d like to write. That can be lists, interviews, reviews, features, videos, etc. Keep those in mind when it comes time to layout your content schedule.

Features and Small Posts

There are two types of posts that are relevant to niche blogs, features and small posts. Features are long posts (like this one) that focus on a subject and develop it fully (essay like, lists, interviews, etc). A small post is much shorter and focused on something that can be digested quickly (a video, photo slideshow, 2-3 paragraph post, etc).

You need to ask yourself what your feature to small post ratio will be. You will probably get burnt out if you post a long feature every day. Similarly, you niche blog may get stale if you only write quick short posts and don’t give your readers something MORE. Features are also more likely to gain attention on social media sites than a short post.

So, how many feature posts can you write for a week? How many short posts? It’s been my experience that one or two features is plenty for the week while 3 to 4 small posts will keep things interesting.

Always be Ahead

The most important aspect of developing a content schedule is to always be ahead of yourself. If your posts aren’t time sensitive, then schedule them out a week or two in advance. This will ensure that if anything comes up, you have a post going out no matter what.

Have a Backup

It’s not a bad idea to have a well full of articles that haven’t been published in your back pocket to use when you have nothing else to write about. It could be a longer feature you’re waiting for the right time to post or an idea your still wrapping your head around. Having these types of posts will help you when you’ve hit Blogging Burnout and can’t bear writing for a couple days.

Choose the days of the week you want to post

When planning your content schedule, keep in mind that there are blogging cycles during the week. There are days when your traffic will be down, such as Monday or Friday. People are getting back into the week on Mondays and people are exiting the week on Fridays. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday are the best days of the week to have big, content rich posts go out.

On some of my blogs, I use Friday as a link roundup day. I write about cool links that I found that don’t warrant their own post, but are worth sharing. On Monday, I usually put out a video or quick tip. Something light. Save the meat for the middle of the week when more people are paying attention.

Choose themed days

Some people might think it’s lame to picked themed days, but it’s a very effective way for people to remember your niche blog. For example, on Niche Blogger Today I have Theme Tuesday, Wordpress Wednesday, Technical Thursday, SEO Sunday, etc. It immediately lets people know what the column is about and gets them interested. I also recommend creating separate categories for each of these themed days, that way someone can find your themed posts all in one place when they are browsing your site. It’s not a bad idea to create category links for your themed days in your blog sidebar.

When should you schedule posts to post?

I’ve already talked about choosing the right days to post but what time of the day is it best to post? A general rule of thumb is to set your scheduled posts to go out mid-morning. People often are looking for something to read after they’ve settled at their desks with their cups of coffee. Also, by posting in the morning you’re more likely to get somewhere on social media sites because your content will be in front of people’s eyeballs for most of the day.

Always Double Check

Many bloggers don’t think of it, but they should be subscribed to their own blog feed. That way they will know if their scheduled post has gone up at the right time as well as making sure it’s formatted correctly. It’s also a great way to spot errors that can be fixed before your post hits critical mass. Also visit your own blog. Make sure the posts display correctly, respond to comments and interact with your readers. Engagement will keep them coming back.

Tweak

If something in your content schedule isn’t working, then by all means don’t be afraid to change your plan. If your regular posts on the mating habits of feral cats are not bringing in the traffic you expected, shift the topic into another category. Your niche blog should be an ever changing, ever growing organism that can change as quickly as it needs to in order to stay relevant.

What Strategies have Worked for You in Developing a Content Plan?

Another challenge that faces a lot of bloggers who’ve reached a point of getting their blog past the ‘launch phase’ and where they have regular readers is forming those readers into a ‘community’.

What I noticed in the growth of my photography site was that in the first 6 months most of my readers seemed to be in ‘consumption’ mode (there just to consume and not really interact or participate) and that in the next 6 to 12 months a community began to emerge with readers interacting more with me and one another. In the next 6 months readers have begun to really take more ownership of the site and are more regularly contributing not just in comments but in writing content, volunteering in the forum etc.

This seems to naturally happen over time to some extent - but was also something that I have been quite intentional about fostering within the readership.

Here are a few tips on how to do it.

1. Start with Comments

Perhaps the most natural place to start to build ‘community’ on a blog is within its comments section. This is a good place because in our day and age it is a place that most web users are ‘wired’ to look for interactivity in. The keys in building community within your comments section include:

• Ask Questions in posts (this will draw comments out of readers)
• Interact with Readers (if you’re not willing to comment why would others - this gets the ball rolling)
• Model the type of comments and tone you want (if you want people to feel safe and at home you need to police and moderate the trolls and spammers)
• Followup Questions (answer questions whether they be in comments or via email)

Further Reading: How to Get More Comments on Your Blog and 7 Ways to Turn a Blog Post Upside Down and Get More Comments

2. Reader Centered Posts

Show readers that you value them by regularly publishing posts that are ALL about them. There are lots of ways of doing this including:

• Answering Reader Questions
• Inviting Questions from Readers
• Posting a Question for discussion
• Highlighting a reader and their blog, comment, site

The key is to regularly build into the rhythm of your blog moments where your readers take centre stage and have an opportunity to contribute and be valued.

Further Reading: The Power of Making Readers Famous

3. Interactive Tools and Projects

Whether it be running weekly polls, using quizzes, running a competition in your comments section or some other interactive tool or project - the more you get your readers to ‘do’ something the more ownership that they’ll feel over your site. I find that even the anonymous voting in a poll has the power to make a reader feel connected.

4. Invite Reader Generated Content

I’ve talked about reader generated content in an earlier post in this series with regards to how it can help you keep fresh content on your site - but the other benefit of it is that it can help readers grow in their connection to your blog.

The way I grew reader generated content on my photography site was simply to start a photography tutorials area of the forum there. In that area I invited readers to submit their tips. The idea was that the area would help identify readers from within the community who had a talent and passion for teaching others. I’ve since used some of the best tutorials on the main blog and one or two of the authors have become regular writers.

5. Become a Cheer Leader

Look for any opportunity that you can to cheer your community along. I regularly attempt to give feedback to DPS readers on how well ‘we’ are doing as a community. When ‘we’ hit a new milestone in terms of forum members or traffic numbers I talk about it in our newsletter, when ‘we’ get mentioned in a mainstream publication I make note of that….

My approach with this feedback to readers isn’t to highlight how good ‘I’ am as a blogger - but to show the community what ‘we’ have achieved. I find that each time I do this that the feedback has been excellent and that it spurs readers on to help us grow and become even better.

6. Give Readers Jobs

I wrote about this a couple of years ago now but one of the best ways to build a sense of engagement and ownership within your readership is to give readers jobs. You can’t do this with everyone of your readers but it is amazing how many people don’t want to just read and consume - they want to be a part of building something that matters. ‘Jobs’ can be anything from getting them to help you moderate comments, to being a forum moderator, to coming up with poll topics, to judging competitions, to writing guest posts etc

7. Set Reader Homework

Another great way to get a little more interactivity and buy in from readers is to set them homework in your posts. This is particularly effective when you have a ‘tips’ or ‘how to’ type blog where you’re teaching people and it is a natural way to finish a post to say ‘go and do this’.

Again at DPS we have a photography assignment area in our forum where we have a weekly assignment for readers to go away and complete before reporting back with an image that they’ve taken. Heaven forbid if we miss a weekly assignment - our readers would be up in arms!

You don’t need a forum area dedicated to this to set homework. Just end a post with an invitation to go and do something and to report back on how they did and you’ll find a percentage of your readers will complete the task and in doing so will feel more loyalty to you and your blog.

Further Reading: Building Blog Community by Setting Homework for Readers

8. Give multiple avenues to ‘join’ or be a ‘member’

I’ve mentioned a few times above the forum at DPS. I can’t express to you just how powerful that area of the site has become. While it doesn’t have as many unique visitors each month as the blog segment of the site - it is visited by a growing number of hardcore DPS fans who are visiting on a daily basis and really creating an amazing community there.

Similarly - adding a weekly newsletter to the site has created another ‘connecting point’ with readers and a gentle reminder each week to stop by the blog and or forum to interact. I’ve found that having a blog, forum and newsletter to be a lot of work but a fantastic way to engage with different readers in ways that appeal to their learning style. Many readers have connected in 2 and even 3 of these ways - each time they access a new part of the site they ‘buy in’ just a little more.

One last tip

Above all, the best way of building a community on your blog is to lead the way and start to BE the community that you want to form. This is something that will bring the 8 tips above to life…. or…. if you don’t do it is likely to ensure that you fail in building community on your blog. Readers will take your lead but are unlikely to want to join a community if you as the leader of it seems ambivalent about the whole thing.

How do You Build Community on Your Blog?

That’s enough of me talking - what have you found to be useful in building a sense of community on your blogs?

Further Reading: 3 High-Powered Reader Engagement Tactics and Secrets to Google Community and Conversation on Your Blog.

This post is part of a series on taking blogs to the next level. Next in the series we’ll be looking at shaping the brand of your blog.

A little while ago I wrote a post, dubbed “Blog Last.” It examined the strategic process that should proceed blogging in today’s social media environment, in response to the 86 percent failure rate companies are experiencing (image: Blogging and Recording by Jacob Botter). That being said, there’s still tremendous benefit available to those who can successfully blog, including:

This Network Solutions Solutions Stars blogging video (disclosure: we helped produce this) gets into greater details about the benefits of blogging.

But we’ve reached a point in the blogging era where marketing blogger rarely talk about best practices anymore. Darren Rowse still does a fantastic job of providing prescient tips. It seems like a good idea to dust off the cobwebs and put together a list of best practices for those who are just starting out. Here are my tips for writing a great blog.

Structuring Content

You need a guidepost to serve your readers. They are the people that matter, the stakeholders you are trying to serve with the blog. An editorial mission serves as a compass, and keeps a blogger from wandering into the inevitable eddies and pools on the social web that while personally interesting, your readers don’t care about. Write out a simple mission that generally determines the topics you’ll discuss.

What to write about on a day-to-day basis (image: Blogging Readiness by cambodia4kidsorg)? Ever have a creative session? Coming up with ideas can be a brainstorm. When stuck, I try to do anything but sit in front of the computer. Often relaxing, going to the gym, reading other blog posts and news sources online can trigger fantastic ideas.

Another source is my actual day-to-day work. If you’re working on it, it’s likely other professionals or stakeholders are interested in it, too. Your offline experiences are valuable & a great platform for a unique idea or perspective. Keep an idea log for future posts.

Do you have commentary to add? Let’s hope so. Because there are plenty of safe blogs out there. Choose a position, have a stance, offer a point of view, and take a risk. I’m more comfortable being wrong then being boring. And I’m not afraid to be criticized for standing up against what my be deemed popular in the echo chamber. That’s distinguished this blog from other social media conversations.

But opinions are not the only way to add value. Your company must have subject matter expertise of some sort that your stakeholders need. Offer it, show it, and let it shine.

Blog content does not need to be perfect like a white paper or a corporate document. Think in brush strokes. That’s blogging. Taking an idea that wouldn’t necessarily make for a full article in a trade publication, but still has value for your readers is a natural. Remember, add some color commentary on pertinent topics.

Usually, except when writing a long position paper or primer like this one, try to limit posts to 3-10 paragraphs in length. Fully researched concepts can be broken into several posts, and later banded together for an ebook.

If you are trying to build readership, you want to post a minimum of two to three times a week. Great posts and events often drive readers into your blog. Consistent on topic discussion and frequency is what creates loyal readers.

Tone

It’s not a formal business document, folks. This kind of over-massaged approach to blogging kills efforts quickly. Minimize your approval processes and get away from fear-based control.

Personality should be included (image: 2000 bloggers by elaine vigneault). You have to be you, right? Let your humor, your attitude come through. It may not be perfect, and you may learn some things about how you affect people, but it needs to be genuine. Personality infused blogging attracts others to your writing, demonstrates transparency and authenticity, and really just returns your company to a human level.

How do you do this? Just write it like you were talking with someone on a Saturday afternoon.

Proof for grammar and typos, not business style. It’s a good idea to proof a couple of times. You won’t catch every typo (or at least I don’t). Remember, it’s a blog, not the Sistine Chapel. Let it go. Another thing is to try and remove unnecessary first person references (I, me) as the post is about them, not you.

Prepping Your Post for Primetime

It’s a good idea to link to a minimum of three other blogs per post. This gets you read by other bloggers, and also demonstrates that you’ve researched your topic, and actually have subject matter expertise to offer. Find an entire discussion on cross-linking here.

An ideal post offers at minimum a photo, and if at all possible additional video, and audio to supplement the post. This breaks up a post and tells a more compelling story. Shel Israel once noted that when he inserted multimedia into his post, he saw dramatic increases in readership. There are plenty of places to research this kind of cross-linking, multimedia and information.

Check out Flickr Creative Commons for Images (Make sure to provide attribution). A wide variety of video channels and hosting sites beyond YouTube can provide video resources. Places to research blog posts for cross-links:

When searching use key words and phrases from posts to find links. Reading these posts will also make your content stronger as you will be forcing yourself to take an extra half hour and fact check. In an
ideal world, you or your social media marketing partner is using del.icio.us (or other bookmarking service) to build a reservoir of links to informative posts for later use.

Getting Read

Comment on and link to other blogs as other bloggers will become aware of you and link back. Building relationships with other bloggers and influentials online is essential for your blog to become accepted.

Really, I cannot emphasize this enough. Rarely is content special enough to be discovered on its own. You must be participating, and become an active part of a community if you want your valuable content to be discovered and read. This in its own right could be another primer.

Don’t forget to register the blog with Mahalo, Technorati, Google, and other relevant search engines. Other smart tips include adding the blog’s url as a call to action in your email signature, on your business card, and on your social network profiles. In short, integrate with your other outreach efforts.

This is a guest post from Mark Hayward, you can follow him on Twitter @mark_hayward. The article focuses on helping business folk, both big and small, who would like to start blogging.

Do you own a business? Have you noticed a dramatic decrease in sales because of the current economy?

Here’s the thing: For people like Darren, Brian Clark, and Leo Babauta blogging is a full-time job, a primary source of income, and most importantly, a real and profitable business model.

But, what if you find yourself in a different camp?

Perhaps, if you’re like me, you own business that provides a service, manufactures goods or sells consumer products. Blogging is NOT your business, but you use (or would like to use) it as a tool to market and promote your venture.

When I was just getting started as a small business blogger one of the smartest observations I heard on the subject came from Shana Albert (a.k.a The Nanny612). She stated, quite simply: ‘I don’t make money from my blog, but I make money because of my blog.’

In essence, Shana uses her blog to strategically drive traffic to her business website where she sells pre-school curriculum. Her words of wisdom have stuck with me and I think any business, whether large or small, can really succeed in doing the same thing.

Further reading: check out Darren’s previous posts on ways of making money BECAUSE of your blog.

Blogging is for pimply-faced kids!

Surprisingly, a lot of business owners that I meet on a daily basis have a sentiment similar to the one above. In fact, most think;

Sure blogging and social media are great if you enjoy spending your days ‘cyberloafing’, but they certainly can’t help me to promote my business.

Quite honestly, I find it shocking and awfully hard to believe that MANY business owners still have this general view of blogging and social media.

A Personal Case Study

For those of you who might not know, I own a small business in the Caribbean. When I was first getting started I really had no budget to pay for advertising and marketing. As such, I have utilized nothing but blogging and social media for the past couple of years to promote my business. More specifically, when I took over this B&B venture there were no reservations, no customers, and no prospects. In a short period of time I have been able to go from a no cash or customer flow to maintaining a 70-100% occupancy rate depending on the month. (Yes, even in this economy!)

My business provides me with an opportunity to meet incredible people from all over the world. Most recently, I had a guest visiting from a neighboring Caribbean island and, he too, runs a small hotel.

During one discussion the gentleman told me that his business was down a whopping 75% over the past year. According to him, the lack of customers and drop in business could all be attributed to the state of the economy. Truly, I felt awful for him.

While I wholeheartedly agree that the collective global economy is in terrible shape, I asked him what type of promotion and marketing he was doing so that his customers could find him and to help keep his business in the public eye.

His answer (and I think this explains a lot):

‘We are doing what we have always done.’

Upon further investigation, I found out that ‘What we have always done‘ equated to a fairly decent website if it was the year 2000 and a U.S. based reservation service that is paid a percentage to make bookings for him. That’s it.

To be fair, my guest was a bit older and I think he was afraid to embrace new technology and marketing methods. But it tends to boggle my mind that even in this hyper-technical age he and many other business owners are missing a HUGE opportunity to promote their business in an extremely cost effective manner.

Unfortunately, the conversation with my guest ended and I did not have the time that morning to discuss the issue further. However, if I had the time, and or, if you know a business owner in a similar situation, the following is what I would have passed on to him;

Ten Tips to Help You Blog Your Way to Small Business Success

Tip One: Define your goals

Whether you are a plumber, bike retailer, or cafe owner start by assessing your business goals and how you would like your blog to help you achieve them - e.g. Do you want customers to find you? Do you want to be on the front page of Google? Are you all about selling more services and product?

Tip Two: Research keywords

Before you begin blogging have a look at some of the keyword tools like the one found on SEO Book and determine what your potential customers and clients are actually searching for. If your business is active in a mostly local market, or generally for clients in a small town, then include the town’s name in your research. The information gathered from running a couple of keyword searches is extremely valuable when it comes to writing posts that are targeted and meant to highlight specific information.

Tip Three: Use free tools

I think many small business folk are turned off by blogging and social media because they are under the illusion that marketing online costs a tremendous amount of money. My chosen platform for my business website and blogging is WordPress, which, I am sure most of you know, is free to use and has some amazing free themes. (Note: If you want to spend a couple of dollars you can get Thesis theme.)

Tip Four: Educate the consumer

When starting a blog that revolves around your small business the general tendency is to want to publish a bunch of SPAM posts that extol your virtues. While it is okay to do this once and a while, I have found that educating the consumer works tremendously well and is highly effective. Also, please remember that there is a big difference between using your business blog to tell your story (How you came to own the business, defining your passion, etc.) and just telling people to buy your product or service because you are the best.

Tip Five: Allow 3 to 6 months for return on investment (ROI)

There are a few schools of thought when it comes to measuring ROI for business blogs. We all, myself included, are searching for that magic bullet that is going to draw in more customers. However, from my own experience and in discussion with other business owners who blog, three to six months seems to allow enough time to put up an adequate amount of posts (even if you only publish once a week) and to also obtain a quantifiable and measurable amount of customer data.

Tip Six: Research the competition

Small business owners sometimes feel funny inquiring about what their competition is up to. Keep in mind, this is business, I highly recommend having a search around the web to discern what your competitors are up to. In most cases I think you will be pleasantly surprised to find out that they do not have a strong web presence. And if they do, you will now know that you need to step your game up a bit more.

Tip Seven: Keep it simple

Business blog posts do not have to be extravagant Pulitzer Prize worthy affairs. If you should find yourself stuck for topics, or are facing blogger’s block, have a look at this post I recently did, 31 Blog Post Ideas For Small Businesses.

Tip Eight: Forums are your friend

One of the most common complaints I hear from business bloggers who are getting started is ‘Nobody is coming to my site.’ Is that so? I don’t care if you trade in rare eighteenth century chess pieces or high-end designer shoes; chances are a niche forum exists for your specific business. Do a simple Google search to find out where your customers are hanging out online and make a visit to those sites. Promoting your small business within a forum works best when you approach it in the same manner as step four. You need to educate the consumer and gain member trust before you can start endorsing yourself (otherwise you will be seen as a troll).

Tip Nine: Be consistent

Quite possibly the most important piece of advice for any small business blogger - You NEED to be consistent in your efforts.

Tip Ten: Once you are blogging regularly branch out into other social media

Starting a comprehensive social media and marketing plan can really help to give a traffic boost to your business blog. Social media does not have to be intimidating and you can easily start by uploading a few well tagged and described photos to FLICKR and then possibly move on to YouTube, FaceBook, and Twitter.

If you are a business owner who is struggling in this economy, or if you know of someone who is hesitant to embrace the power of blogging for business promotion, here are a few of additional resources that might help.

• ProBlogger - 21 Ways to Write Posts that Are Guaranteed to Grow Your Blog (not specific to small business but still great information!)
• Chris Brogan - Cafe-Shaped Business
• Duct Tape Marketing - My Social Media System
• Small Biz Survival - Small Biz 100

Are you a ProBlogger, or business owner who blogs? What are some tips that you might offer?

Mark Hayward owns a business and lives in the Caribbean. He is co-founder of the nonprofit, Train for Humanity, and you can follow him on Twitter @mark_hayward.

Today Ali from Ali Adventures (and other blogs) shares some tips on writing for the web.

You’re an experienced blogger. You know all the basics: you’ve read all about writing useful and unique content, and all your posts use subheadings, thoughtfully bolded text and bullet-pointed lists to be as reader-friendly as possible.

But could you be doing more? I spent two years working in an IT company, with overall charge of documentation, and these are some of my top tips for outstanding articles that deliver a brilliant experience for your readers.

In a world of Stumbles, Digging and Tweets, the few seconds after a reader arrives on your blog are vital, and the first post they see must provide a great reading experience.

1. Set Line Spacing to At Least 130% (1.3em, 16pt)

One of the most irritating mistakes on a blog – and one of the easiest to fix – is having lines of text that are too cramped up. Small clear text is fine, but scrunched-together lines make your posts look heavy and uninviting.

Check your blog’s stylesheet and look for a section (probably in “post” or “entry”) which specifies the default line-height in posts on your blog. It should look something like this:

.entry { font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.65em; }

If your lines are too cramped, change the “line-height” to a higher value. It’ll be an em (like mine), a percentage or a pt value (like font size). You can find out more on the W3Schools line-height page, or convert between em, percentages, pixels (px) and points (pt) at http://pxtoem.com/www.pxtoem.com.

2. Offer a Printer Friendly Version of Posts

With longer posts, or a series of post, it’s nice to provide a printer-friendly or downloadable version. One simple way to do this is to compile the post(s) into a pdf, and offer a downloadable link. (You can use software such as pdf995 to create pdfs for free.)

Think about which posts readers might want to print: perhaps detailed instructions, or posts which require a lot of concentration when reading.

Another ways of doing this is to install a plugin such as WP-Print that automatically generates a printer friendly version. A lot of big sites (such as newspapers’ websites) offer a “print this page” button, so it could make your blog seem more “pro” to a reader.

3. Mix Lists and Paragraphs

Bullet-pointed lists are great for getting your message across quickly and clearly. But if your whole article consists of lists, readers are likely to feel as though you’ve just written an outline and presented it as a complete post.

A lot of lists can also make the text look “choppy” on the page, as the reader’s eyes will skip from one to the next.

Try having a few short lists, then a couple of full paragraphs. The variety both in the writing style and in the visual look on the screen will help keep the reader’s attention – increasing the chances that they’ll read right to the end of your posts.

4. Use On-Page Anchors

If you’ve written a long post with several subsections, it’s worth putting links at the top so the reader can navigate around the post easily. These are called “anchors”, and you can find out full details here.

To use an anchor in your post, switch to the HTML view, and put the following near the top of the post, where you want the list of links (the “myanchor” text can be anything you want, but it should be preceded by a hash symbol):

<a href=”#myanchor”>Jump straight to an anchor</a>

Then, wrap these tags around the heading of the relevant section. (Note that this time, “myanchor” does not have a hash symbol.)

<a name=”myanchor”>Section heading</a>

Using anchors is particularly important if some of your post might not be relevant to everyone reading; for example, if you’ve written a list of “Online resources for designers, writers and programmers”, it would make sense to save your readers from wearing out their scroll wheel. You could give links at the top like this:

• Resources for designers
• Resources for writers
• Resources for programmers

5. Use Links Generously

As well as using links in places where they’re considered “necessary” (linking back to previous posts of yours on the topic, acknowledging the source of images, linking to blogs you’re quoting from), try thinking of links as gifts to your readers. One of my blogging friends, Sid Savara, wrote recently in an email to me:

I try to link not just as a source, but for sort of “Easter Eggs.” That is, each link in my article can lead someone down a whole new rabbit hole.

This is exactly the right attitude. Readers who feel delighted by the richness of your posts, and who have found extra resources through your links, are likely to come back to your blog for more.

6. Use the Title Tag for Links

If you put a title tag in your link, readers can get extra information about the link when they hover over it. This is especially useful if you’re linking words in the middle of a sentence to a different blog post, as the post often won’t have the same title as the linking word.

You can set the title to anything you want. It’s often useful to give the title of the post or page you’re linking to, along with the name of the blog it’s on (if it’s not your own one). If you’ve set the link to open in a new window, it’s helpful to mention this in the title tag too.

To add the title to a link using a visual editor, click to edit the link, and look for an option called “Title”.

To add a title in HTML code, add it like this:

<a href=”http://www.problogger.net” title=”ProBlogger site”>

7. Create a Style Guide

The IT company I worked for had a “style guy” that covered everything from how titles were capitalised to how “alt” tags should be used on images (for accessibility purposes). Your writing will look more polished and professional if you’re consistent: for example, do you use single or double quotes? Do you capitalise words like “Government” and “Senate”? Do you write “website” or “web site”?

It’s worth creating a simple style guide for your own blog. This doesn’t need to be a huge task – you can just add to it as you go along.

If you have guest posters, or if you employ writers to work for you, you could give them your style guide and ask them to keep to your house style – to make sure that posts are consistent.

Do you have a tip for writing outstanding content that wows readers by being easy-to-read and looking professional? Share it in the comments!

About the Author: Ali is a freelance blogger and writes for a number of popular blogs (see her current list here). If you’d like to hire her, drop her an email at ali@aliventures.com.

Blogging for Business - Small Business Tips by One SEO Company
2009-01-20 04:13:17 (GMT) (WiredPRNews.com - Business, Press Releases, Technology)

Blogs generate traffic

Dallas, Texas (WiredPRNews.com) — I have been in the web business for many years now and have worked with a variety of local and international companies on their web design, search engine optimization (SEO) and web marketing projects. Inevitably, during a meeting where the client and I discuss multiple means of attracting web traffic, the client dreads blogging, usually because of unawareness or lack of time management.

I usually get the reply ‘Why don’t you blog for us, we don’t have time.’ Sure, we can blog for you but the business owner must understand the importance of using blogs a medium of attracting attention, and generating more qualified web traffic to the web business. The reason why blogging is necessary and the benefits of blogging are not clearly understood by business people. Let’s understand the basics of blogging and its benefit:

a) Blogs initiate dialog with web visitors

Blogs start a two-way traffic with web visitors. When you write about your products and services and write with authority, as though you are the master of your business and with in-depth knowledge about your products and services, you not only create awareness of the benefits and disadvantages about the product and service you deal in, you engage people’s attention. Your blog should also have a call to action, to make the readers of the blog interact with your website.

A call to action can mean asking them to leave comments, encouraging them to speak out. Comments left by the readers of blogs might include inquiries and leads that could lead to sales.

Blogs generate a prospective about your company. It silently speaks about the culture and vision of your company and even helps in building a brand image.

b) Search Engine Optimization (SEO) - Benefit of blogging

Blogs peppered with targeted keywords, keyword phrases and search terms related to your business puts blogs in plain sight whenever web visitors use related search terms. Instead of using long-tail keyword phrases, targeting niche keywords will help in attracting more qualified web traffic.

c) Blogs attract more links

Blog are meant to be informative and not advertisements. Informative quality, industry related articles that provide insight or a critical analysis of product and services you deal in helps you to get more links.

Links will get better search engine rankings for your website and will help in generating more traffic.

d) Fresh, original content for blogs

Fresh and original web content is the feed for search engine spiders. Websites that are updated frequently get crawled by the search engine spiders more often. Your website gets more authority and better search engine ranking.

By now, you should have enough reasons to being seriously considering blogging. For your interest and for the interest of getting more visitors to your website, blogging is the way to go. Don’t wait to begin blogging right away.

Start writing blogs, use targeted keywords and keyword phrases, generate qualified web traffic and get better search engine positioning and ranking. Fresh content and informative articles with SEO are best for search engine marketing

Contributor: One SEO Company = Web Design + Web Marketing + Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

For Custom Blog Development for your business give us a call and we will build a custom vanity blog for your online voice.

Contact: One SEO Company Tel: 214 722 6423