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Of the mistakes that business blog writers make, failing to make the post useful is one of the biggest. Your blog is like a sampler platter. It allows your visitors to “taste test” what it would be like to buy from you. If what you provide isn’t useful, you’re wasting their time and yours.
Aim for the Evergreens
Just as evergreen trees are always green, evergreen content is always useful and always relevant. Because of that, it is always sought out by prospects and clients. Aiming for the cheap traffic that might come by talking about a trending topic may get you more traffic at first, but that exposure will dry up as soon as the world moves on to the next topic. If you want a steady flow of traffic, keep it evergreen.
Immediate Application
Most of the people who visit your blog don’t know you. They are just learning about you. You are asking them to believe in you and to trust the advice you provide in your blog will work for them. The more work that you require them to do to gain the benefit from what you’ve written, the less likely it is that your visitors will try it. The longer it takes them to apply the tips you’re providing in your blog post, the longer it will take before your blog post brings them back to you.
Make It Valuable
This blog information should be so valuable that someone would gladly pay you to receive it, and visitors can hardly believe that someone would offer this kind of information for free. If you impress them that much, not only will they be more willing to refer other people to your blog, but the more likely they are to keep coming back for more. This is how you begin to build trust with your contacts and to build your audience.
Keep Their Goals In Mind
Write with a specific audience member in mind. Write with their goals and needs at the forefront of your mind. Help them take one small step forward in their journey to achieve those goals. Show them something they can do today that will make a big difference or clear a huge hurdle for them so they can make progress.
Don’t Hold Your Best Stuff Back
Helping beats selling. If you sell someone, you can make a customer today. If you help someone, you can make a customer for life. – Jay Baer, author of Youtility Marketing
There is a temptation to hold your best stuff back from the world, to keep it for those who can afford to pay. Here’s the reality. Every time you serve someone else with a blog post, every time you bring out your best stuff and give it away, you are planting the seeds of your own future success.
Not only are you going to help those who couldn’t afford to pay for your services anyway get what they need, you’re going to be demonstrating to those who can afford to pay but might attempt to do it themselves why it’s better left in your hands. Showing off your best work proves to everyone that your commitment is to their service, not your wallet.
This is using your blog as your beta test laboratory. You’re able to collect live feedback about what works and what doesn’t work for the audience you serve. Those who participate and comment are giving you valuable insights that are well worth the money you aren’t making off of them. It’s honest, it’s raw, and it’s real which is exactly what you need so that when you take that best stuff and you make it better, it’s a tested and proven product.
We’re Coming Close to the End of Our Better Business Blogs Series
It’s hard to believe, but we’ve already gone through six weeks worth of strategies for creating better blog content and it’s almost time to talk about how to promote those blogs we’ve worked so hard to improve. Come back next Friday for our final article in the Better Blog Series and the week after for the start of our new series, Promoting Your Business Blog.
What was your favorite tip?
Which tip did you find the most helpful or useful to your business? Which topic would you like us to have covered in more depth? Let us know!