Google
May: 65.0%
April: 64.2%
Change: +0.8

January 2009: 63.0%
Change: +2.0

Yahoo
May: 20.1%
April: 20.4%
Change: -0.3

January 2009: 21.0%
Change: -0.9

MSN / Bing
May: 8.0%
April: 8.2%
Change: -0.2

January 2009: 8.5%
Change: -0.5

ASK
May: 3.9%
April: 3.8%
Change: +0.1

January 2009: 3.7%
Change: +0.2

AOL
May: 3.1%
April: 3.4%
Change: -0.3

January 2009: 3.9%
Change: -0.8

Data scoring techniques tend to change over time making past data inaccurate. As always, information here is for entertainment purposes only.

Source: comScore

Google
May: 53.18%
April: 54.26%
Change: -1.08

January 2009: 54.31%
Change: -1.13

Yahoo
May: 8.13%
April: 8.30%
Change: -0.17

January 2009: 8.76%
Change: -0.63

MSN
May: 5.30%
April: 5.26%
Change: +0.04

January 2009: 4.47%
Change: +0.83

AOL
May: 1.59%
April: 1.58%
Change: +0.01

January 2009: 1.69%
Change: -0.10

ASK
May: 0.75%
April: 0.74%
Change: +0.01

January 2008: 0.74%
Change: +0.01

Data scoring techniques tend to change over time making past data inaccurate. As always, information here is for entertainment purposes only.

Source: Net Applications

Google
May: 63.2%
April: 64.0%
Change: -0.8

January 2009: 62.8%
Change: +0.4

Yahoo
May: 17.2%
April: 16.3%
Change: +0.9

January 2009: 16.2%
Change: +1.0

MSN
May: 9.4%
April: 9.9%
Change: -0.5

January 2009: 11.2%
Change: -1.8

ASK
May: 2.2%
April: 2.1%
Change: 0.1

January 2009: 1.9%
Change: +0.2

AOL
May: 3.9%
April: 3.7%
Change: +0.2

January 2009: 4.0%
Change: -0.1

Data scoring techniques tend to change over time making past data inaccurate. As always, information here is for entertainment purposes only.

Source: Nielsen Online

Developing a good blog isn’t about being a one-hit wonder. If all you have in you is one post then you’re better off guest-blogging for someone else, instead of trying to build a blog of your own. But if you want to develop your own blog with your own following then you’ve got to be able to deliver the goods on a regular basis.

So how do you make sure that each performance reaches it’s maximum potential? Start with the basics:

Proof and rewrite

Proof reading and rewriting is not to be undervalued. I can read something I’ve written a dozen times and each time find an error or a better way to word things. Of course a dozen times may be overkill, but each piece should have at least one or more reviews before being published.

Don’t be a afraid to rewrite large sections of your blog post if needed. I’ve found that if you write a post and give yourself a space of three or four days, or even a week or two, when you come back to review it you’ll have a whole new fresh perspective. As you proof for errors you can rewrite substantial portions, either adding or deleting content as needed to make it even better.

Integrate keywords

Since you are writing not just for readers but to get attention with the search engines you need to review your keyword usage. For the most part, using keywords should be a natural part of the topic you know so much about. Many times the research you perform will give you even more terms that are not a natural part of your vocabulary, but are for your visitors. Going back and re-editing your post to add these keywords can be highly beneficial in targeting your audience better.

No stuffing

Be consistent in your keyword usage without overusing the words. Make sure they flow in your content properly and you use them in headings, image alt tags and throughout the body content. Just be sure you keep it natural.

When you’re done writing, if you are unsure if you’ve used your keywords too frequently, go back and read your post out loud. If it sounds funny to you it’ll read funny to your visitors. Keyword usage isn’t about getting keywords in everywhere you can, but using them in all the right places that it makes sense.

Need, Value, Desire

And don’t forget to re-iterate the need, value and desire. Each post needs to come back to these three things. You keep providing that, you’ll continue to bring readers back while getting new readers each month.

Everybody has one great blog post in them. Fortunately, not every post has to be super-utterly fantastic. But you do need to be able to write good content on a consistent basis that keeps your readers coming back for more. If you do the first one right, follow it up with another done right. And then another. You don’t have to post every day, a couple times a week is fine. Take the extra time you need to write good content that ensures reader satisfaction and keeps coming back for more of the same.

Other posts in the “Go Blog Yourself” series
* Introduction: Writing Your Blog Post with Pen in Hand and SEO in Mind
* Step 1: Know Who’s Looking
* Step 2: Know What They Want to See
* Step 3: Have a Good Pick-Up Line
* Step 4: Reveal the Goods
* Step 5: Be Easy On The Eyes
* Step 6: Keep Them Interested
* Step 7: Give Them More Than They Came For
* Step 8: Do It Right and Do It Again

A blog is different. You don’t want to leave them wanting more, but instead you want to give them far more than they expected. Of course, leaving them wanting an encore isn’t such a bad thing either.

Give them more while leaving them wanting more

As writers we often get caught up in words. Even as I’m writing and editing this post I’m concerned that it’s not long enough. That I don’t have enough words on the page. But good writing isn’t about adding more unnecessary words just to fill a quota. In fact it’s often just the opposite. It’s about eliminating the words that are not necessary so those that you keep make the most impact.

Giving them more than they came for means making sure that all your words have value. Don’t just write for the sake of writing but use words that make your point, convince the reader and close the deal. Sometimes a little fluff is okay, but only if it helps accomplish your goal and doesn’t distract the reader from what you want to get across.

Giving them more also means that you need to go out of your way to provide additional resources that your readers can peruse at your leisure. Wikipedia is the master of providing more. Wikipedia ensures that every topical page links out to other related content, both internal and external. I often find myself reading about one topic on one page and finally close my browser an hour later having moved from one related article to the next. My final end point is often so very far removed from my original topic of interest. That’s the value of interesting copy and good linkage. Here is a good example of how you can link on your own blog:

Wikipedia may cite more resources on each article and contain more links that you need in the average blog post, but the premise is the same. Back up your content with links, links and more links. If you are citing research, link to the original source. If you mention other sites, link to them. If you are writing on a topic, link to related articles on that topic.

Another good way to keep giving your readers more is to write a multi-part series of posts and link each post to the other installments. Make sure each post can be self-contained so as to satisfy the reader, but also make them interested in reading the rest of the posts in the series.

If you make it a habit to give your readers more than they came for they will continue to return to you as a valuable resource for information. Don’t rely solely on your own wit and wisdom, but link out to other resources that re-confirm what you say matters. Link to industry experts, related topics, studies and stats. Whatever is relevant to your readers within a given post can be linked to. This gives your readers the luxury of moving beyond your site into other areas of interest. If they want more, they can go get it.

Other posts in the “Go Blog Yourself” series
* Introduction: Writing Your Blog Post with Pen in Hand and SEO in Mind
* Step 1: Know Who’s Looking
* Step 2: Know What They Want to See
* Step 3: Have a Good Pick-Up Line
* Step 4: Reveal the Goods
* Step 5: Be Easy On The Eyes
* Step 6: Keep Them Interested
* Step 7: Give Them More Than They Came For
* Step 8: Do It Right and Do It Again

Think of your blog as a TV show. How many shows start out strong but can’t maintain the interest as time passes? I remember years ago watching the show Alias. It quickly became one of my favorite shows that I looked forward to watching each week. Then somewhere around mid second season it jumped the shark. (The post-Superbowl episode when SD-6 was brought down and the sexual tension between the two main characters… oh, never mind. Yes, I’m still holding a grudge!) Alias just as quickly became one of the many shows that I threw away.

While you don’t need to have sexual tension in your blog content (or an evil mastermind, for that matter) to keep people interested, you do need to have an element of anticipation. Your readers should want to come back and read what you have to say next. But unlike a TV show, the anticipation of each “episode” of your blog needs to provide a release, leaving the reader completely fulfilled.

Grab Attention

You need to open your blog with something that draws the reader in. When writing with search engines in mind this can often be a bit tricky. Stories often make the most compelling openings but they often lack the keywords that your audience needs in order to accept the post as valuable. If the story is short, it will grab the reader’s attention and quickly lead them into the “lesson” of the content.

You don’t have to have keywords in the opening paragraph for the search engines, but it can be an important part of gaining and maintaining long-term rankings. If you can integrate the keywords into the opening story then you’ve got the best of both worlds.

Story isn’t the only way to create a compelling opening. Sometimes getting right to the meat works best. Telling the reader the conclusion before you even tell them how you got there can get them invested into leaning how you came to that conclusion.

I suggest you pick up a few books or read some other blogs posts that address this topic specifically. You can write a compelling opening any number of ways, you just need to find what works best for you, your audience, and for each particular blog post.

Appeal to Needs

Once you have the reader interested in whatever you have to say, you need to keep them moving through the content, consistently delivering information that keeps them intrigued. Unless your blog is for entertainment purposes, readers want to feel as if they have learned something. Heck, even entertainment blogs educate their readers in some way or another. But each reader comes to your site with a basic desire. It’s your job to meet that desire.

With business blogs there are three things you need to do. 1) Expose the need, 2) State the solution and 3) Provide the benefits.

Expose the need: What is it you want your readers to walk away knowing after having read your post? Make sure you expose the need in language they understand using concepts and illustrations that are familiar to them.

State the solution: Next, provide a solution to that need. The solution must be clearly stated and accurately explained. What must the reader to to achieve X results? What steps must they take? What products must they buy? What services must they engage in? These are all solution oriented questions that can be answered for your readers.

Provide the benefits: Finally, the benefits of each solution bust be clearly outlined. There is no sense in showing someone what they need, and how to get it if they are not fully aware of the benefits of doing so. The benefit is the final selling point that tells the reader that they truly do need what you are offering and that you have the right solution for them.

Ask Questions

Just as I did two paragraphs above, ask your readers questions. Questions get them thinking about answers and then allows you to insert your knowledge and expertise in providing an answer. An answer for an unasked question is often far less potent as an answer to a question that the reader is already contemplating… even if it’s a question you set them up with.

Not every question needs an answer. Some questions are designed to get the reader to move beyond what you can tell them and to think in terms of their own situation. Ultimately, if you can help your readers think for themselves this makes what you have to say even more valuable.

Inform

Finally, you want to make sure that each blog post serves its ultimate purpose and adequately informs your readers. They must walk away feeling as if their time reading your blog post was well spent. Failure to inform leaves your readers wanting. And unlike a TV show, and with the exception of the occasional multi-part series, leaving readers wanting does not bring them back for the next episode.

Keeping your readers interested in your content really boils down to creating good content that your readers find, well, interesting. If you keep your readers interested they’ll keep coming for more.

Other posts in the “Go Blog Yourself” series
* Introduction: Writing Your Blog Post with Pen in Hand and SEO in Mind
* Step 1: Know Who’s Looking
* Step 2: Know What They Want to See
* Step 3: Have a Good Pick-Up Line
* Step 4: Reveal the Goods
* Step 5: Be Easy On The Eyes
* Step 6: Keep Them Interested
* Step 7: Give Them More Than They Came For
* Step 8: Do It Right and Do It Again

Our love of beauty isn’t just focused on the human body. We love well manicured lawns, beautiful sunsets, and gorgeous building architecture. Some of us even go to restaurants where the food is pretty. Face it, we are very visual people.

It strikes me as odd, that as much stock as we place in things that are wonderful to look at, we often don’t take as much care with our blogs. I understand that it’s not easy putting together a website that looks good. It takes effort, skill and often a good amount of money. So instead of doing what needs to be done we skimp. Blogs, on the other hand are far easier, it’s just a matter of finding a good theme and running with it. But for whatever reason, that often doesn’t happen.

We dress appropriately for our jobs but our blogs are going to work everyday in beat-up sweat pants and unkempt hair. It may not be an ugly site, but it certainly ain’t much to look at.

This brings me to a humorous aside. Over the years I’ve talked to dozens of people who run crappy looking websites but they refuse to make any type of aesthetic changes to them. Why? Because they continue to get the rare compliment on how beautiful their site is. I’ve had this syndrome myself and it can be quite comical. All it takes is a few compliments from people who don’t know any better (why trust the experts who do) and it’s clear that the world agrees your site is the web equivalent of Halle Berry in the movie Swordfish.

Believe me, it’s not.

I looked.

Twice.

Looking good and having site appeal

Having a good looking blog starts with having a good looking website design. It’s amazing how easy it is to throw up a blog. But putting one together that is visually appealing to your audience is often another matter all together. There’s more to a website or a blog than a header, side navigation, and a few images.

What looks good varies from industry to industry so don’t think this is all about being “pretty”. You want to look good for the audience you are trying to reach. Pink and flowery doesn’t work with a rugged outdoors blog. Hard-hats and burly men won’t work on a blog about women’s health. Well, maybe it does a bit, I don’t know.

The point is, you have to make your blog appealing to the audience it is intended for. You won’t have credibility selling scientific papers with images of half-naked models used in your each of your posts. Of course you might sell more if you include the pictures in the papers, but still, your credibility will be shot, and you’ll annoy your audience for having to explain to their wives that they only buy it for the articles.

Once you’ve got a good looking blog, there is a usability aspect that needs to work as well. The navigation, headings, content, visuals and images all need to work together to complete the package.

Nobody get’s excited about seeing paragraph upon paragraph of blog content. Or for that matter too many pictures with little textual value. There is a balance somewhere in between. Your text can be made more visually appealing by formatting your heading tags to stand out and get read. Use pictures to provide visuals to your words. If you’re are pimping your products or services use pictures to give your content meaning, clarity and further understanding of what you are selling.

Too much of any one thing is still too much. Your blog needs to be balanced. Visuals need content and content needs visuals. And there is no reason that either the content or visuals should not be visually appealing to the site visitor.

Your readers will come to your blog for the content. But if it’s not presented in a visually appealing way there will be some credibility loss. This is especially true if your blog is tied to your business website. Build a decent blog design that fits your target audience and appeals visually to them for the type of information they are coming back to read. When you make it easy on the eyes, you make it something that people will continue to come back for.

Other posts in the “Go Blog Yourself” series
* Introduction: Writing Your Blog Post with Pen in Hand and SEO in Mind
* Step 1: Know Who’s Looking
* Step 2: Know What They Want to See
* Step 3: Have a Good Pick-Up Line
* Step 4: Reveal the Goods
* Step 5: Be Easy On The Eyes
* Step 6: Keep Them Interested
* Step 7: Give Them More Than They Came For
* Step 8: Do It Right and Do It Again

Ever wonder why so many commercials we see on TV revolve around sexual appeal? Because sex is appealing. At least when it’s packaged properly. Commercials using fat, bear-bellied men or “average” looking women are few and far between. Everyone is nicely toned, handsome or strikingly beautiful.

Blogging is no different. The best titled “pickup line” in the world is only going to get you so far. To get anywhere you have to prove that you’ve got the goods that go with it.

While I won’t provide a step-by-step tutorial on on how to write great content here, I will provide a few points will make what you have to say more appealing and more readable. The key is to draw your readers in and give them a way to enjoy the content, whether they are reading every word or performing a quick scan of your blog post.

Compelling Content

Each blog post must start with a compelling premise or something of interest. Not every post will be compelling to every person, but each post should be interesting to at least a portion or segment of your audience.

Speak the language

One of the reasons why it is so important to know your audience is so you are able to write using the words that appeal most to your audience. There are two parts to this. The first is using the keywords that your audience is searching for. We addressed that back in step 2.

The second is to write for the education level of your audience. You want to find the right balance so as not to speak over the heads of your lesser educated readers while also not talking down to those who are more knowledgeable.

If your blog targets a very knowledgeable audience then you want to keep the “basics” down to a minimum. If you are always explaining basic concepts your educated readers will feel that you’re talking to a lower-level audience. At the same time you can’t assume that your audience knows as much as you do. If they did you wouldn’t need to be blogging. If you assume your audience knows too much then they won’t be able to follow what you are saying because they are missing key components of information that have not been shared.

If you know your audience and their knowledge level on your blog topic, you’ll be able to write in a language that they understand and appreciate. Speaking to them, not above or below them, is essential to keeping them engaged in your content.

Scannable

Not everybody reads word for word and most people will at least scan the content before they commit to investing the time to read. Making your content scannable is crucial to keeping your audience engaged.

Scanability is all in the visual appeal of the content. Visually, your audience needs to be able to look at the post and see the important concepts and main takeaways . If they find those appealing then they may go back and read the content word for word. If they don’t have time for that then you’ve given them some valuable information just at a glance.

Bullet points: If possible you should break out pieces of your content into bullet points. This doesn’t work for every post but you should do it where and when you can. Bullets catch they eye and provide a nice list format that the brain can more easily remember.

Bolds and italics: Make key concepts stand out using bold and italics. This isn’t something you have to plan out, but once a post is completed you can look for things that you think should stand out. Anything that’s important enough that you want your readers to see without having to read every word can be either bolded or italicized. Don’t just use this strategy for keywords, look for key concepts instead.

Using bolded paragraph headings (or hx tags) also helps with the optimization of your posts, provided that there are some keywords being called out. Your first priority in your blog is to your readers so make sure anything you do with keywords is relevant and non-intrusive.

Presenting your content in a way that appeals to the reader both visually and intellectually will help you establish yourself as a knowledgeable author on your topic. With enough time, and the continued production of quality content you’ll earn a reputation as an authority. Your readers will trust that your headlines won’t just be good pickup lines, but they’ll be just the taste of what will likely be a body of content they want to devour.

Other posts in the “Go Blog Yourself” series
* Introduction: Writing Your Blog Post with Pen in Hand and SEO in Mind
* Step 1: Know Who’s Looking
* Step 2: Know What They Want to See
* Step 3: Have a Good Pick-Up Line
* Step 4: Reveal the Goods
* Step 5: Be Easy On The Eyes
* Step 6: Keep Them Interested
* Step 7: Give Them More Than They Came For
* Step 8: Do It Right and Do It Again

Once you know who’s eye’s you’ll be turning your way, the next step is to really hone in on they type of content that they will want. In the world of movies, it’s not hard to generate a male audience. Show a little T&A, add some guns and explosions and you’ve got a movie almost any guy will watch.

But the world isn’t made up of only men. This something that Hollywood understands when it comes to selling TV advertising. There are the 18-49 year old male demographic, but there are also teenage boys, tween girls, older women, older men, etc. Each one of these segments has their eye on something completely different.

In the online blogging world, there is also a while range of audiences. You know who your audience is, but what are they looking for? The easiest way to figure this out is to perform a bit of keyword research. When looking for things to talk about you need to look at three different keyword categories:

Broad Topics

If you have a good handle on your audience, coming up with topics should be relatively easy. Of course this assumes you have more than a superficial knowledge of your audience, but you’re there in the trenches with them. In our illustration above we used keyword topics representative of a motorcycle battery site. If you want to write for an audience interested in learning more about motorcycle batteries you need to understand what topics they might be interested in.

Obviously the audience wants to know about batteries, but what other battery related topics might they want to read about? Some might want to know more about how to keep their batteries charged during the motorcycle off-season. Others will be interested in maintaining the life of the battery. More than a few might also be interested in various kinds of battery chargers. These are just a few broad topics that can be used to create good blog fodder.

Specific Desires

Next you want to research keywords that highlight any specific desires they might have regarding those topics. Some visitors will want information specific to Honda batteries while others will want battery information relevant for their Suzuki bike. You will find at some point your audience wants to know about different types of chargers such as solar, maintenance free or trickle chargers. And yet again, there may be more specific concerns regarding off-season storage ideas.

The key here is to let the keyword research help you find the terminology that your audience uses. You can write an article on battery maintenance and another on battery storage, and still another on battery care. Three different approaches to what is essentially the same topic, yet each blog post addresses the distinct terminology used by your visitors and can cover a different set of thoughts and ideas.

Immediate Concerns

Going beyond your reader’s desires, you can tap into some more immediate or urgent concerns. These can be found by looking at more specific phrases that show up in the keyword research. You’ll often see these in the form of “how to” type questions.

These questions can cover a wide range of sub topics using a variety of “long-tail” search phrases. This is really where you can get into creating dozens upon dozens of articles addressing all the various concerns that your audience might have.

In most industries there are no shortage of concerns that can be written about. Any question can turn into a valuable blog post. Any thought can be expanded on to provide your audience with new information, or at least new ideas to consider.

Any good keyword research tool will help you uncover the search patterns of your audience and provide you with dozens and even hundreds of search phrases that you can then use in your blog posts. Providing your audience with the type of content they want to see is essential to growing a blog that is well-read and respected in your topical community. Of course you have to write authoritatively on your topic but that’s another issue all together.

Other posts in the “Go Blog Yourself” series
* Introduction: Writing Your Blog Post with Pen in Hand and SEO in Mind
* Step 1: Know Who’s Looking
* Step 2: Know What They Want to See
* Step 3: Have a Good Pick-Up Line
* Step 4: Reveal the Goods
* Step 5: Be Easy On The Eyes
* Step 6: Keep Them Interested
* Step 7: Give Them More Than They Came For
* Step 8: Do It Right and Do It Again

But for every beautiful woman who takes her top off at the beach and gets the drooly-mouthed stares of the men in the vicinity, there are dozens of fat, beer-bellied men that make the kids giggle as they walk buy and attracts the incredulous stares of those who just can’t turn away. The question is–if we relate these images to blogging–which are you?

Actually, the better question is, which audience do you want to attract. Some blogs are out there looking for the little-boy giggles. Others are trying to attract the same element that pays to go peek behind the curtain at the freak-show. If you’re a business blogger, looking to speak to other professionals, you may not even want to be the gorgeous woman taking her top off. The point here is, before you can really know who or what you’re going to be as a blogger, you need to know who your intended audience is.

If you start blogging without this knowledge then who ends up coming back to your blog may not be who you intended it to be. If you’re blogging for fun, this won’t matter so much. But if you’re blogging for professional reasons, then you really want to make sure you know your intended audience well.

Target Audience

Every grouping of people will have a different set of interests and needs. Sometimes these groupings overlap and you can attract people from multiple audiences, but knowing who your primary audience is will help you keep your blog focused on those that will matter most to you. Don’t try to be all things to all people, as you’ll more likely end up being nothing to most.

However if you can focus on one primary audience and perhaps one or two secondary audiences, you can keep your blog focused on delivering the type of content that your audience craves.

Areas of Interest

Once you have a firm grasp of your audience then find out what it is they are interested in that you can provide. If you’re writing a blog for small business owners, they could be interested in any number of things. Some might be looking for ideas on how to run their companies more effectively. Some might be interested in how political developments will effect their bottom line. Others might be looking for how-to information on a particular topic.

While the audience is the same, the area of interest can vary widely. It won’t do you any good to talk politics when the business owner who just wants how-to information. Similarly, the business owner looking for the ramifications the most recent vote in congress has on their business isn’t looking for 12 management techniques that create a better work environment.

In cases where areas of interest are the same within multiple audiences you can focus your blog posts on your primary audience while throwing in references that will benefit the others as well. For example, a student might be looking for the same information as the business owner, but for entirely different reasons. If you reach out to students as your secondary audience then feel free to throw in some examples that they can relate to.

Needs to be Met

Finally, you want to better understand the needs your audience have that isn’t getting met from other places. Some blogs can promote strategy, others just provide information. They guy interested in how politics affects his business may just want some basic information on the topic while another may be looking for tips he can employ to lessen any negative impact. Some may be looking for a community they can be engaged with about the topic, while another might only be looking for some input on how they should cast their vote to better serve their own personal needs.

Knowing the needs of your audience, or which audience it is that you want to attract, can help you focus your blog posts to more effectively meet those needs. It’s possible that one blog, focused on a specific audience with specific needs, can meet a variety of needs. There is no reason that you can’t create multiple blog posts on a single topic addressing the various needs of your readers. It’s knowing these needs that’s most important as this will give you fodder to write about that your audience will want to read.

By focusing on your audience, knowing who’s looking for you and what they want to read, you’ll be in a better position to attract that audience through random searches. As you write your posts you’re more likely to use words that your intended audience searches for in Google, Yahoo or Bing. This will result in more targeted traffic delivery through the search results.

Unless you know who you’re writing to then you really won’t be writing to anybody at all. Before you start your blog, do a bit of research and get an idea of who’s looking for what. This will help you better focus your blog on content that impresses those who’ll be looking for what you blog about.

Other posts in the “Go Blog Yourself” series
* Introduction: Writing Your Blog Post with Pen in Hand and SEO in Mind
* Step 1: Know Who’s Looking
* Step 2: Know What They Want to See
* Step 3: Have a Good Pick-Up Line
* Step 4: Reveal the Goods
* Step 5: Be Easy On The Eyes
* Step 6: Keep Them Interested
* Step 7: Give Them More Than They Came For
* Step 8: Do It Right and Do It Again

But who am I to condemn? You’re reading my blog post and making me think more highly of myself. But I’ll share. You’re welcome to get in on some of the ego action with your comments below! See? It doesn’t always have to be all about me.

But just because an over-inflated ego causes you to believe people want to hear what you have to say doesn’t mean you don’t have some valuable or important to contribute to the worldwide discourse on your given topic. As a business owner, communication is key and there is no better way to start a dialogue with your target audience than to start a blog.

The necessity of the ego doesn’t devalue the quality of your message in any way. Again, just like a politician requires an ego, it is often that very ego that helps them get things done, hopefully for the betterment of their constituents. If you think highly of yourself as a blogger, in sufficient proportions, you’re well on your well to being able to put together quality content that gets read, repeated, passed on, commented about and–most importantly–processed and put to good use.

Writing a good blog, if you do it right, will really have less to do you than your visitors. While you have to think you’ve got something to say, it’ll be your visitors that confirm that thought or not. And while you may like the ego boost you get from growing your readership, you can also be providing a valuable service to those in need of such information.

Not to put it too bluntly, but the desire to blog often coincides with the desire for sex. You may feel the need to get what you want to say out there for public consumption, but it’s only going to be any good if you are making someone else happy with it. That’s what we’ll be exploring in this series of blog posts. How to write blog posts that target your audience, capture their attention, and keep them coming back for more.

I know nobody writes blog posts with a pen as the title suggests, but I think you get the suggestive innuendo. We’ll use that theme to further explore what it takes to put together a good blog. Not just a good blog post, but a good blog that gets read, repeated, passed on, commented about, processed and put to good use.

Oh, and we’ll also make sure to cover some of the SEO basics in writing your post. If you’ve got a great body, no sense keeping it locked in a closet.

Other posts in the “Go Blog Yourself” series
* Introduction: Writing Your Blog Post with Pen in Hand and SEO in Mind
* Step 1: Know Who’s Looking
* Step 2: Know What They Want to See
* Step 3: Have a Good Pick-Up Line
* Step 4: Reveal the Goods
* Step 5: Be Easy On The Eyes
* Step 6: Keep Them Interested
* Step 7: Give Them More Than They Came For
* Step 8: Do It Right and Do It Again

Google
April: 64.0%
March: 64.2%
Change: -0.2

January 2009: 62.8%
Change: +1.2

Yahoo
April: 16.3%
March: 15.8%
Change: +0.5

January 2009: 16.2%
Change: +0.1

MSN
April: 9.9%
March: 10.3%
Change: -0.4

January 2009: 11.2%
Change: -1.3

ASK
April: 2.1%
March: 2.1%
Change: 0.0

January 2009: 1.9%
Change: +0.2

AOL
April: 3.7%
March: 3.7%
Change: 0.0

January 2009: 4.0%
Change: -0.3

Data scoring techniques tend to change over time making past data inaccurate. As always, information here is for entertainment purposes only.

Source: Nielsen Online

The era of “there’s no such thing as a free ride” is coming to an end. So many things are free now days I often wonder how anybody makes money anymore, especially competitors trying to sell what someone else gives away.

But free works. This has been true long before the web was invented.

I’m not a big searcher, but I find that when I do I start with the basic concept of what I’m looking for. I’ll take a few seconds to scan through the results, and then I’ll go back and perform a more specific search. This pattern could happen two, maybe three times, until I feel that I’ve gotten the information I need.

Google
April: 54.26%
March: 53.77%
Change: +0.49

January 2009: 54.31%
Change: -0.05

Yahoo
April: 8.30%
March: 8.59%
Change: -0.29

January 2009: 8.76%
Change: -0.46

MSN
April: 5.26%
March: 4.85%
Change: +0.41

January 2009: 4.47%
Change: +0.79

AOL
April: 1.58%
March: 1.60%
Change: -0.02

January 2009: 1.69%
Change: -0.11

ASK
April: .74%
March: .78%
Change: -0.04

January 2008: 0.74%
Change: +0.00

Data scoring techniques tend to change over time making past data inaccurate. As always, information here is for entertainment purposes only.

Source: Net Applications

Every day, millions of people go to the web for research, shopping, news, entertainment and more. Offline stores are heavily promoting their websites to their consumers in the isles and at the checkout stand as a means of building brand loyalty as well as shopping convenience. Marketing your website online can literally add thousands, hundreds of thousands and even millions of dollars into your business bank account.

As consumers go to the web daily for any number of reasons, planning the online marketing strategy of your website can help you tap into each of those avenues as a way to generate new traffic, more conversions, and a loyal customer base. Ignoring the potential of the web will only serve to give your competitors a substantial advantage in reaching your target market. Not investing appropriate time, money, or resources into the online marketing of your website is akin to handing your customers over directly to your competitors.

Even if your business as little commercial viability online, having an accessible website allows people to learn more about you, your products or services, what types of things you do, what you believe in and care about, and how to contact you if needed. It’s about allowing people to come to you instead of pushing yourself on to them that is typical of most forms of advertising.

If you run a business of any size and you still have not made the jump to the Web, why not? If you know your business can make money online, (i.e. you sell an in-demand product or service) then investing money to build your web presence is almost a no-brainer. The question then becomes, how to do it right so you can be profitable.

If you run one of those niche businesses where online success isn’t a certainty, there is still value in being online. There is also value in investing in a bit of marketing in order to make sure your site can be found by those looking to find you, even if they just seek information.

Regardless if your business that can make a profit online or if the site’s just another way to provide information to the public, there are a few things that you’ll want to consider when budgeting for your website’s success.

Building a great website is a lot of work, but the job is never really done. There is always something you can do to improve performance, create a better customer experience, or generate a genuine desire for customers to return. And there are also things that shoo customers away, elicit a poor customer experience, and interfere with site performance. Here are just a few:

Too Many Ads

Business sites with too many ads make your site look unprofessional. Most business sites selling products or services are probably better served with little or no ads whatsoever. Ads are great on editorial and content driven sites, not so much with traditional product or service driven sites. The exception to this rule is ads for your own products. That’s called up-selling and is just good marketing.

Broken Links

Check your links regularly, like once a month. If you find any broken links, internal or external, be sure to get those fixed. If visitors click a link on your site they need to be taken to a legitimate page. It’s very easy for links to break if you ever move content around. You also want to check external links pointed in to your site. See if anybody has links pointed to you that are broken. If so, request that those be fixed or redirect them to the correct page.

Confusing Navigation

Keep your navigation clean and consistent. Make sure it is generally easy to use and to for the visitor to find what they are looking for without having to spend to much team reading through each navigation link. Navigation should be segmented, sections highlighted properly and any drop down or fly-out menus should be easy to use, as many are not.

Blocked Content

Don’t block content behind registration pages. You may feel a need to capture certain information from your visitors, but you’ll find you’ll have far fewer visitors if you force them to enter information they don’t want to give you. Give your content away, expect nothing in return and you’ll likely get a lot more back than if you force visitors into providing you such information.

Slow Load Times

Broadband has almost made this obsolete but there are still things that can interfere and cause your site to load slower than it should. Get rid of any convoluted code, unnecessary tracking javascripts, and size your images properly. These will all help. It’s also a good idea to have a reliable web host that you can trust to keep your information live and deliverable at higher speeds consistently.

Ineffective Site Search

If you have it on your site, your customers need to be able to find it. If you have a site search that doesn’t deliver the results then visitors will leave assuming you don’t have what they want. Check various keyword combination, misspellings, close matches, etc and make sure your search results give the visitors what they came looking for.

Long Checkout Process

Keep your shopping cart short and simple. Every screen they have to click through before their order is finished is an added opportunity for the visitor to rethink their purchase and leave the site. Don’t give them that opportunity. Get all the information you can on a single page, only going to multiple check out pages if absolutely necessary. And don’t collect more information than you need.

Follow these simple guidelines and you should see an improvement in your customer retention and return rate. Then again, if you’re just in business for the fun of it, don’t bother and see how quickly you lose business.

Google
March: 63.7%
February: 63.3%
Change: +0.4

January 2009: 63.0%
Change: +0.7

Yahoo
March: 20.5%
February: 20.6%
Change: -0.1

January 2009: 21.0%
Change: -0.5

MSN
March: 8.3%
February: 8.2%
Change: +0.1

January 2009: 8.5%
Change: -0.2

ASK
March: 3.8%
February: 4.1%
Change: -0.3

January 2009: 3.7%
Change: +0.1

AOL
March: 3.7%
February: 3.9%
Change: -0.2

January 2009: 3.9%
Change: -0.2

Data scoring techniques tend to change over time making past data inaccurate. As always, information here is for entertainment purposes only.

Source: comScore

Google
March: 64.2%
February: 63.5%
Change: +0.7

January 2009: 62.8%
Change: +1.4

Yahoo
March: 15.8%
February: 16.7%
Change: -0.9

January 2009: 16.2%
Change: -0.4

MSN
March: 10.3%
February: 10.4%
Change: -0.1

January 2009: 11.2%
Change: -0.9

ASK
March: 2.1%
February: 1.9%
Change: +0.2

January 2009: 1.9%
Change: +0.2

AOL
March: 3.7%
February: 3.8%
Change: -0.1

January 2009: 4.0%
Change: -0.3

Data scoring techniques tend to change over time making past data inaccurate. As always, information here is for entertainment purposes only.

Source: Nielsen Online

Below are some questions and statements presented to me regarding links. I have provided my thoughts and input that will hopefully give you additional input or confirmation of what you already believed to be correct.