In any type of business, whether it be a business which sells products or a service business, you get questions every day from clients and customers. And if you publish a blog to promote or market your business you should be taking advantage of all those questions. When I first started my service firm’s blog, one way I was able to move up in the search engines so fast and so high was to take those questions and make a post out of them.
What I soon discovered was the simple fact those questions I was getting every day either on the phone or in person from clients and prospective clients were some of the same search terms people were typing into Google and Yahoo. And, what I also found, they were basic questions. Questions which made great blog post and were easy to answer.
Of course I never used names or anything that might identify someone in the blog post. And when the post would go up, I did notice my hits and placement improve in the search engines.
Everyday you are getting questions and/or comments from clients, customers and prospects. If you are not taking those and making them into blog post you are really missing out on a great opportunity. Not only is it great post content, it shows you are connected to what is going on in your niche. Using those questions and/or comments also gets you involved in the conversation taking place in your niche or market.
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Jun
27
Blogging Tip — Become a better blogger
I started blogging February of 2005. The first blog I published was Kansas Family & Divorce Lawyer and then in March of 2005 I published Home Office Lawyer. However before I even started blogging I spent at least 4 months researching and looking at what blogging was all about. I spent a lot of time reading other blogs in the legal industry. And let me tell you back then, there weren’t that many. There were two blogs I read daily and I absorbed every word they wrote. The first one was Real Lawyers Have Blogs and the second one was ProBlogger.
Reading other blogs in your niche is the first thing you can do to be a better blogger. See how they write and what they write about. Take a look at what you think they are doing right and even what you think you could do better. Watch how they link to other articles or blog post in their writings. What are they linking to and look at their design. And while you are there, don’t forget to engage in the conversation. Even if you don’t have you blog up and going yet. This is a great way to get noticed even before you have your blog going.
Next, if there were only two blogs on how to blog out there, I would recommend you read these two, ProBlogger and Copyblogger. These two blogs are the blogs I go back to daily. There is a reason why they each have thousands of subscribers and once you visit them, you will see why.
One other thing you can do is to reach out to other bloggers. We are an interesting lot. Most of us are more than happy to talk about blogging. Drop them emails and ask questions on their blogs. You might be amazed at how willing most are to reach out to you and answer your questions. I did and I am still thankful to this day for the time one particular blogger was willing to spend with me answering my questions. Some of them were a bit silly, but I never received a stupid answer.
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Jun
26
Blogging Tip — Avoid writer’s block
I often get questions from new bloggers asking, “how do I come up with blog post ideas” or “how do I write so many post during the week?” One method I have found that works well is to have some way to file away the ideas I get during the day and/or week. It is not unusual at all for anyone to be sitting at their desk or having a conversation with someone, like a client and come up with a post idea. We get questions everyday from clients that are common questions which we provide answers for. Why not take those questions and turn them into blog post? Just like this one.
However, since we have ideas come to us everyday, we need to file them away for future use. Problogger sometime back had a great post on how he does this called, “My Blog Posting Workflow”. His method of keeping track of his ideas was very similar to my own. I too keep a file folder on my desktop where I file away post ideas for the blogs I publish. And in those folders I keep TextEdit documents with at least the title and ideas as they come to me. I also put links to other blogs I want to include in my post so I don’t have to hunt for them later on.
In addition to this, I also take advantage of the third party blog editing tools I use. Each of them has a draft folder included in their features. When I get a new idea, I will start the blog post in the editor and continue to work on it as ideas come to me. I also may only start out with a title and a few ideas and links as I do with the TextEdit documents I save on my desktop. The main thing to remember is to just start to write and save your work along the way. This way when you have a complete block, you can go to both of these tools and have a blog post already started.
There will be those times when you don’t have your computer with you and you certainly still need some way to get those ideas down for later use. Don’t forget about pen & paper. I carry with me a Moleskine Notebook just for this purpose. A great example of a way to use this is a blog post on Blogging Tips a few days ago called, “an innovative way to plan your blog post”. While I may not go to the extreme as is describe in that post. I do make notes of ideas I have concerning blog post using a similar method while I am away from my computer. And you should too.
Posting to a blog takes work. Don’t let anyone ever tell you otherwise. But it is something you can manage if you use the two methods describe above. If you have other ways or methods you use to avoid writer’s block, please leave a comment here. If we get enough, don’t be surprise if I use them for a future blog post. After all, another way to avoid writer’s block is to take advantage of your blog’s comments and turn them into a blog post of their own.
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