Six ways to make blogging about your business feel like a breeze.

Business blogging? Oh yes. You have a tab on your website, and you’ve done a few posts, but keeping it up to date is such a… drag.

As a business owner it’s pretty likely that you’re up against it. There are orders to place, suppliers to negotiate with and client visits in your diary.  And then there’s the invoicing, and the tax return. And hell, you’d like to have the occasional evening of mindless TV watching (Netflix FOMO is too real after all). You compare business blogging to the ironing. It makes you look smarter, but (let’s face it) it isn’t entirely necessary.

OK, it’s true. The sun will rise, the sun will set. You will continue to get recommendations and your local advertising will continue to look like it’s working.

But don’t you want more?  Want to expand your client base or be recognised as the go-to source of expertise in your field? Yes? Read on…

Does blogging really affect my business?

Blogging absolutely affects your business. And here are three reasons why:

1. Blogs increase your website’s visibility on search engines. Meaning that potential customers running a search for your services will be more likely to find you, and find you quickly. Google & co. favour websites that are well-tended, relevant and have regularly updated content. Business blogging is a simple way to tick this box.
2. Blogs help you look like an expert. No one knows as much about your business as you. So tell your visitors about the top tips for fixing a dripping tap or easing neck pain. It won’t take away your business, but a well-planned business blog will reassure your potential customer base know that you know your stuff.
3. Blog posts increase your social media currency. A business blog is just the thing to post. On Facebook, Insta, Twitter, LinkedIn – even a link on TikTok. And good content gets shared. So you’ll get more eyeballs. Which means more exposure, and hopefully more clients.

Six brilliant business blogging tips

Blogging for your business doesn’t need to be a headache. Here are six ways to help you find your business blogging mojo:

1. Keep it regular. Monthly will do. Fortnightly would be better. Weekly would be wonderful. Regularity is the thing that counts. If someone visits your site and sees that your business blog hasn’t been updated since last year, then what? Yes, you’re busy. But perhaps too busy. That’s not the message you want to send your customers. Regularity shows you are present in your business and on top of things. It shows you are on top of current trends and in touch with your clients’ needs.
2. Be flexible. It doesn’t have to be 1,500 word essay every time. A photo-story will hit the spot, a review or report on a convention you attended could work. But you must make sure each post in your business blog is relevant to your potential clients and includes enough substance for search engines to index. Your page content is crucial, but also pay attention to the page title, headlines, alt tags (descriptions) on images and metadata.
3. Get some help. Consider guest blogging with a complementary business, work with a copywriter, have a blogging binge on a rainy Sunday afternoon: do what you need to do to keep your business blog up to date.
4. Stay interesting. If you want people to read your business blog, make it relevant to your target audience. A review of a new restaurant is good if you work in party planning, but would be hopeless if you were a plumber. Better for a plumber to create a blog post about water-saving tips, or create a review of the top five online bathroom retailers. Think about the sort of questions you get asked about your business. What’s useful to your target customer? What’s interesting to them? Think from your customer’s point of view and you’ll get some usable ideas.
5. Plan it. Make a programme of blog posts and stick to it. Build in time for writing, reviewing and image searching. If you’re posting weekly then don’t feel you need to recreate War and Peace each time; you’ll burn out (and so will your readers). But if you are planning a less frequent posting plan, then balance out that lack of frequency with meatier articles.
6. Share it. There’s no point publishing brilliant content if you’re going to keep it hidden on your website. Plan a sharing plan and make time to execute it. There are lots of slightly geeky but brilliant ways to make sharing your content easy. Make them work hard for you. You get a double benefit whammy: more readers, and better search engine indexing. The more your business blog gets shared through trusted sites, the happier the search engines will be to push up your page rank. What’s not to love?

But I’m still stuck with blogging for my business!

There are a couple of options available…

1. You can work with a copywriter – I regularly plan, research and write regular blogs for my clients. In fact, it’s one of my favourite things to do!
2. You can polish up your skills – attending a workshop to help you refine your copywriting and blogging skills is a great investment. You’ll come away buzzing with ideas

Your business blog can become a winning tool in your marketing arsenal for very little financial investment. Keep at it, stay authentic to what you and your business stand for, and you’ll soon be reaping the benefits of your business blog.

Interested in attending my next blogging masterclass? Here’s all the information you need. Will I see you there?

PS – Yes… AI can write a blog for you. Would I recommend this? No. Perhaps that’s a blog post for another day. However, bear in mind that everything AI creates is taken from existing content. It is also written by a robot. So if you’re happy with unoriginal content that lacks human emotion, fire away. But then again, I could be biased 😉.

Too much waffle? Here’s how to write clearly and concisely

There’s no magic in learning how to write clearly and concisely. But there are a few tricks involved.

There’s a real benefit to being able to write clearly and concisely – it can supercharge your other skills. If you’re able to get your point across and make it easily understood, you will appear more confident, authoritative, and even more persuasive.

Interested? Here’s where you begin…

How to make your writing more refined

Coco Chanel famously said, “before you leave the house, look in the mirror and remove one accessory”.  It’s an analogy that’s perfect for decongesting stodgy copy.

That’s because the best thing to do before you hit publish or send to print is to take a good hard look at your writing and remove the things that aren’t necessary. This will make your writing flow and read more smoothly – ultimately, you need to take things away to get clear, concise copy.

And let’s be honest – we’ve all been there. Writing emails, presentations or webpages in a rush, against a deadline. You tap away, creating a stream of consciousness. You give it a quick proof to make sure it reads OK – you check that you got your apostrophes in the right place and make sure you haven’t got any typos. And then you save it and move on to the next thing.

Then one day you come back to it. Or worse still, someone else reads it. And you realise that your writing is horrifically rambling. Some of the sentences don’t make sense. The call to action isn’t clear; no wonder you didn’t get the result you needed.

Three easy ways to write concisely and clearly

If you know your writing is wordy how can you fix it?

Here are three easy things you can do:

1. Cut out the waffle. Step away from the long phrases. Never use five words where one will do. Replace phrases such as “in order to”, with plain old simple “to”. Instead of “by way of introduction”, write “introducing”. Adding too many words won’t appear polite or refined. It will complicate and distract from your main message.
2. Lose the big words. Unless you’re writing a QI appreciation blog, it’s unlikely you’ll need super-duper long words. Use simple English. Long words don’t make you look clever, but they do suggest you don’t care whether or not people understand you. And worse still, long words are easily misspelt which makes you look daft. Stay in touch with your reader and don’t give anyone a chance to doubt you – use simple, direct language.
3. Basic punctuation. Use your full stop. Long sentences are prime fodder in creating wordy text. They go on and on, using a record number of commas and confusing everyone. Keep your sentences under control and stick to one or two ideas only. If you find yourself bringing in lots of commas, “ands”, and “buts” etc. it’s a good idea to take control and get out your full stops. Chop down those sentences – let your reader take a breather.

Another thing to help you write clearly and concisely

Here’s a bonus tip for you… download the Grammarly app to your computer. The free app is just fine (it’s what I use) and will call out any rambling sentences for you to examine. It can be a bit pernickety, so don’t feel you have to do everything it tells you. However, it’s a useful tool for anyone who writes.

 

If you found this post useful, you might get something from one of my other blog posts. How about my guide to using alt-texts? (It tells you how to make the images on your website SEO friendly and more accessible).

(The frankly mouthwatering photo at the top of my blog is courtesy of Cristina Matos-Albers on Unsplash.)

An easier way to find inspiration & creativity.

Creativity is a fickle mistress. Inspiration isn’t much better.

There for you in the middle of the night. Whispering sweet temptations, teasing you with wild thoughts.

They flirt with you as you drive on empty roads.

Ideas, dreams, what ifs.

But call on them when needed? They might come. Bounding towards you so readily you have to stop and catch your breath. But other times?

Not so much.

And if you have a deadline they’re guaranteed to miss it.

Creativity is a tease. Inspiration is a flirt. Coquettish in the extreme. They’re responsible for your greatest moments and biggest breakthroughs. But will send you insane with despair when suddenly, without warning, they stop returning your calls.

 

I’m writing this as I sit in a café. It’s almost a parody of the freelance writer. Flat white? Notebook? White noise of the coffee grinder? All present and correct. Creativity and inspiration have chosen to bestow me with their company today. It means I’m working at speed – with dreadful handwriting and writer’s cramp.

Another way of looking at creativity and finding inspiration

I’m going to stop with the sensual, womanly metaphors now. Because in truth, as much as it might be fun to think of creativity as a seductive and wayward lover, creativity is more like a bottle of water. You can’t drink from it infinitely without topping it up. When you get busy, you miss those opportunities to refill and before you know it, you’re sipping at an empty bottle.
It’s little wonder that as time goes on, the creative spark that sets you apart dulls. Your work becomes vanilla. Beige. Limp.

Refuel your creativity

Refill that bottle of creativity – or if you will, tempt back your wayward lover. Take action.

1. Stop. Give yourself a break. Exhaustion stops your brain working and leaves you good for one thing only; a good night’s sleep or even better – a holiday. Listen to your body and give yourself the night off.

2. Take inspiration. Head off and soak up someone else’s creativity. Visit a gallery. Read a book. Go to a gig. Now honestly, Instagram or Pinterest don’t count. You need to physically experience something for it to truly affect you. You need your synapses to fuse together in excitement. That ain’t gonna happen on your Insta feed.

3. Work at scale. Creativity needs space. Big rooms. Large tables. Enormous pieces of paper. Visit a gallery and have your mind blown by the scale of some of the pieces of work there. Sure, there are some gorgeous miniatures too, but creativity works best without constraint – give it some space.

4. Get outside. Maybe this is why so many freelancers have dogs. Fresh air, nature, trees – it doesn’t matter what it is, but the sense of otherness you can get from being anywhere other than your desk or studio might be just what you need to tempt back creativity.

5. Exit distractions. If there’s something nearby that needs my attention, I just can’t get creative. Kids, the washing machine bleeping that its finished its cycle. Oh yeah – my phone… Put me in the corner of a room with people I don’t know and I can produce my finest work…

6.What’s your poison? OK. I know this is contentious, but the relaxing properties of a G&T or glass of red wine can’t be underestimated. Hemmingway famously said that one should “write drunk, edit sober”. I’m not suggesting you habitually get legless at 1.30pm on a Wednesday, but an evening of creative reflection can certainly be improved with a glass of the good stuff.

7. Phone a friend. Sometimes it’s a case of chatting things through. Friends, family, other freelancers. Even the barista at your café, different people have different perspectives, so chat away and replenish your creativity.

But above all, there’s one thing that NEVER helps. Beating yourself up about it. Self-flagellation – the metaphorical or actual – won’t help. Switch off your phone. Close your laptop. Step away from your desk.

And she’ll come. She’ll come running – you’ve just got to give her time.

 

Need some extra help in finding your inspiration? Book a call with me. We’ll have a quick chat and then schedule in some time to brainstorm ideas and thoughts together.

Beyond Awesome. Better Ways to Say “Great Job!”

It’s nice to give praise. To tell people they did a great job or that you really enjoyed the coffee/meal/cake they made you. Positive feedback helps reinforce desired behaviours and sends a message of appreciation. Something that’s much needed in the workplace and home. But have you stopped to consider how you give praise?

“You did a great job Sally, well done”

“That presentation was awesome. Great job!”

“Amazing cake, thank you!”

Do you spot a theme?

Yes, the words are positive. But then if they weren’t, it wouldn’t be praise.

The other thing you may have noticed is that the words are all fairly general. They’re not specific and are easily swapped around with one another. “Awesome” could apply to the cake, presentation or job that Sally did.

So what?

The problem with using generalist vocabulary is that it lacks true impact and doesn’t really say what you were impressed with. The effect lessens with each usage. The problem with telling everyone that they do a great, awesome or amazing job, is that over time, the effect of that compliment diminishes.

How to give more constructive praise

It all comes down to the words you use. Be more thoughtful in your choice of vocabulary. Perhaps Sally did a “meticulous” job, or maybe she was “right on brief“. Both of these give Sally an idea of what you’re so happy about, helping guide her with future projects. She’ll be just as, if not more pleased than if you’d said “great“.

And that “awesome” presentation may well have been “inspiring“, “thought-provoking“, “highly competent” or even “well-judged and very funny“. So much more helpful than an over-used statement of  “awesome“.

And of course, you’d be absolutely right to describe a delicious cake as “amazing”, but how about getting a bit more creative with your compliments – “so rich and chocolatey”, or “light and delicious”, or even “just the sugar hit I needed right then”. You’ll be so much more likely to be offered an extra slice…

Let’s face it, no-one’s going to get grumpy with you if you happen to tell them they did something awesome. I certainly wouldn’t. But to give them a thoughtful compliment or well-considered piece of praise could well make their day.

And wouldn’t that be awesome?

 

Looking for better ways to express yourself? Sign up to my not-very-regular email updates and you’ll get more ideas and suggestions. (You’ll also get a FREE downloadable checklist to help you write better blogs – feel free to pass it on if you won’t use it!)