This class shows you how easy it is to blog on a WordPress website. How to optimize each blog post for the search engines (SEO), add pictures, tags, categories and keywords. Learn how to blog effectively and save time!
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Archive for blogging
Reading Time: 1 minute
Blogging is the central part of Content Marketing. Yes, it’s time consuming, but think of it as “sweat equity”. At first it will take more time, but as you blog more often, it will be easier and less time consuming. Don’t over think it!
Basic Blogging Master Class:
Here are the class notes:
https://azsocialmediawiz.com/wp-content/uploads/BootCamp2-Blogging.pdf
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Reading Time: 4 minutes
You want to learn:
I read somewhere, “Content without a strategy is just noise.”
Wow. So, are the blog posts or videos that you’re producing good content of true interest to your target, or are they adding more noise in a noisy world?
Is what you’re writing or creating what you think your target would be interested in or what you know they need?
How do you find out if your content is effective?
The first telltale sign is your website statistics and analytics. You should review these stats every month:
- How many people visit your site per day and month?
- How long do they stay?
- What’s your bounce rate?
- How many pages do they view while they’re there? (Hint: the longer they stay on your site, the greater the chances they will do something.)
- Which pages or blog posts were the most popular?
- How many people converted from a visitor to a lead? That is, they downloaded an ebook, a coupon, whitepaper or signed up for your newsletter.
Do you really understand your target market?
- What are their pain points that your product or service can alleviate?
- Are they under 40 or over 40? You talk to the generations differently.
- How can you make their lives better, easier, more fun, luxurious, productive, simpler, less painful?
- Who else do they follow? Where do they go for trusted information? Who influences them?
- What are their likes and dislikes? (This free workbook will help you define your target market whether you’re B2B or B2C)
Have you done your research?
One thing all this technology has provided is a lot of data. You can easily find statistics on any target market and industry. Don’t skimp on this if your marketing is going to be effective. As a member of Your Social Savvy Solution, you get all the resources you need to guide you while you do this research.
You want to learn:
- Which social media networks do they frequent the most?
- What type of content do they prefer to read, watch or listen to?
- What is their buying journey?
Have you set goals?
- What do you want to accomplish? Set SMART Goals.
- Do you want to grow your email list? Yes!
- Would you like to drive more traffic to your website? Absolutely!
- How about increasing conversions? Of course!
- Would you like to increase sales? Who wouldn’t?
- Do you want to get more followers on the social networks? All of the above!
Now, based on your workbook results, research and goal-setting, you can come up with a content strategy on how best to reach your target.
- What are you going to blog about?
- How often are you going to blog?
- Are you going to do videos? Professionally produced or self-produced on your cell phone?
- How often are you going to share it on the social networks?
- What other sources of quality content (not yours) would be of interest to your target? And how often are you going to share it?
The idea of blogging often is to make people want to come back for more.
Furthermore, at the end of each month, you must review your analytics. There is an excellent, easy-to-understand video in the Social Savvy Solution Training Center on exactly how to do this. You don’t have to hire a geek to help you go over your analytics. Trust me. I created these videos especially with the non-techie people in mind.
For any online marketing to be effective, you can’t skip any of these steps!
Learn to do it right or hire someone who knows what they’re doing. But that’s way more expensive. Figure a content marketer worth their salt will charge from $500/m and up. A good social media marketing guru, from $750/m and up.
Our online training center is only $20/m and you will learn how to do everything yourself and with practice, you’ll be able to manage your social media in 30-minutes a day and a create a blog post in about an hour.
What are you waiting for? Start learning now and be more effective tomorrow!
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Reading Time: 5 minutes
What would you do if I told you that taking a few seconds to do something that will improve your search engine optimization, keep visitors on your site longer, increase your page views and decrease your bounce rate, you’d do it, right? I hope so. Taking just a few seconds to use categories and tags in all your blog posts will absolutely help.
Here’s why you need to incorporate categories and tags in your blog posts…
- Categories and tags are keywords. Google loves keywords. Especially those that are relevant to the nice fresh content that you’re writing. Those very keywords, you discovered from your research, your target audience is entering into the search box. Additionally, they’re the ones that will help you come up on the first page of Google when someone is looking for information on that topic.
- They help keep visitors on your site longer. When used, Categories and Tags appear on all your blog posts. When someone clicks on one of them, all the articles with that topic come up. Furthermore, it piques the curiosity of your visitor. The longer a visitor stays on your site, the higher the chances that they’ll do something, like convert into a lead or make a purchase.
- It decreases your bounce rate. The bounce rate is calculated by Google Analytics (you need to have this setup already). It measures how long a visitor stays on your site. If they land on your site and not see what they want, they’ll leave quickly – or bounce out. You don’t want that. Moreover, you want a bounce rate around or lower than 50%. That means if you get 100 visitors a week to your site, 50% of them stick around to read more than one blog post.
Where do I add Categories and Tags?
In a WordPress blog, they are over on the right column about halfway down the page. Choose no more than 3 categories. You can choose as many tags as are relevant to your blog article. Think of the category as the general topic of your post and the tags as the major keywords that you mention in the article.
Below Categories are the Tags. Add as many as pertinent to your post. Don’t over do it. Choosing these comes easier after you’ve done your keyword research. Always add your name and your company name to the tags. If you’re local, add your city. Think of different ways to say the same thing. Once you’ve used tags in more than one post, click on “Choose from the most used tags” and you’ll see a “tag cloud”. The ones with in the larger font are the ones that you use most often. Just click on them to add them. Saves a ton of time!
Another mistake I see people make is leaving “Uncategorized” as a category. This is an easy one-time setup fix.
Over on the left menu, under Posts, click on Categories. Here you can add all the topics that you plan to blog about in advance. You can always add a category on the fly from the right menu.
Then, on the left under Settings, Writing, find “Default Post Category”, and choose one of the most generic topics that describes your blog. This way if you forget to pick a category, it won’t be under “Uncategorized”. “Uncategorized” doesn’t help whatsoever – it definitely isn’t a keyword! If you have blog posts with “Uncategorized”, they’ll be automatically changed to whatever topic you indicate here.
When blogging regularly, at least weekly, and using categories and tags religiously in all your blog posts, you’ll start to see an increase in the number of page views per visit and a decrease in the bounce rate.
Have you been blogging and not using categories and tags?
You can easily add them to past blog posts by going to “All Posts” from the left menu. You’ll see a list of all your posts and columns for both categories and tags. Hover your mouse over the the post title and you’ll see links. Click on “Quick Edit” and you’ll be able to add the relevant categories and tags for that post. Click on “Edit” to open the full editing screen if you need to.
In conclusion, this is just a small part of what it takes to blog effectively. The easy-to-follow tutorials in the Social Savvy Solution Online Training Center will guide you through planning what to write about, how to blog on WordPress, how to get exposure and drive traffic to your website with social media marketing and how to see what’s working and not working each month.
For only $20 a month and you can watch all the videos at your own pace, at whatever time works for you! Cancel at any time, but you’ll see that the valuable update videos produced each month are worth every penny.
With time and practice, you’ll be blogging in less than an hour and managing your social media in 30-minutes a day! Yes, you can!
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Reading Time: 4 minutes
The purpose of blogging weekly is to keep Google happy and attract new visitors to your website who will convert to leads or clients.
What does Google want? Google wants fresh, relevant content written for the human reader.
What do your potential customers want? They want answers to their problems, information, advice or to be entertained – and the want it now!
The last thing Google or a potential customer wants to see is that your last blog post was March of 2012. OK, you may not be that bad. But even a month old is too old.
If you’re not blogging? How are people finding you?
First, if you haven’t updated your site in years, it won’t come up on Google search. Over 83% of searchers are on a mobile device. If your site is not mobile-friendly and responsive, you absolutely won’t come up. Basically, the only traffic you’re getting to your site is from someone who clicked on the link on one of the social media networks or they have your business card. Too few, I bet. Or they Googled your business name exactly. Most all business will come up for their name. But if there’s another business with a similar name, and their content is more recent, they’ll come up first. Not good.
Now, lets look at it from the potential customer’s point of view.
Let’s say it’s an entrepreneur looking for a contractor in a specific city because she’s opening a new business. She goes on LinkedIn and searches for “commercial contractor my city”. She sees that the 2 folks that come up are not in her network. But, they have the links to their respective websites. The searcher clicks on the links and goes to the websites. Contractor 1 has a website that looks dated – old fashioned. She clicks on About Us to read about the company, who are they, how long have they’ve been in business, etc. Then she clicks on Blog. The last article was in 2012, just text, long paragraphs and no pictures or videos. Under Portfolio, there are pictures with no descriptions. You can’t tell where the projects were, how long it took to build, was it under budget?
Over at Contractor 2’s site, there are high-quality graphics with their last 3 projects on the home page. Each are linked to a blog post describing each project in detail. At the bottom are tags and categories with links to other similar blog posts by type of project. The person seeking will look for articles about projects like what she’s planning to build. She thinks, “This company has experience doing projects like the one I’m planning. I’m calling them.”
Also on their site are testimonial videos showcasing recent projects from start to finish with the happy camper client opening the door of their redone place. Yes, like the “reveal” on those home improvement shows. Ah, but before the entrepreneur makes the call, she’s going to check their Facebook page to see if there are any reviews and updates. (The first company didn’t even have a Facebook page. Oh, my!) There she finds 5, 5-star reviews. She’s sold.
Wow! That took maybe an hour. Which is how long it should take you to write a blog post.
Blogging regularly builds trust and credibility. People buy from whom they know and trust.
What should you blog about?
- Tell Stories – people like to identify with people in stories; use pictures of people like your target audience.
- Don’t let this happen to you! Hypothetical situations
- FAQs – anticipate what a potential customer will be asking
- Industry news – careful with the industry jargon, though. Remember your audience is not the expert. You are. Write for an 11-year-old.
- Offer advice, useful information
- Blog about what you know
Get more ideas in the blogging and content marketing class videos as a member of Social Savvy Solution! For just $20, you can watch as many videos as you want. Cancel at any time. But, I’ll be sharing updated videos each month.
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Reading Time: 2 minutes
You write what you think is a great blog article and share it on the social networks. However, when you check your stats a few days later, you see that only a 3 people clicked through to read it. What happened? Or what didn’t happen? It was probably your headline. Writing catchy headlines social media users will want to click on to read more is a skill anyone can develop with some free tools and the tips in this infographic.
One tool I use for both blog post headlines and email subject lines is Co-Schedule’s Headline Analyzer. You want to get a 65 or higher. Anything in the green — above 70 — is ideal. Now, you can drive yourself crazy trying to get in the green. Don’t. You can’t start each and every blog post with “What You Need to Know…”. (I use it often, but not every single one.)
This infographic from Squirrly, lists the Anatomy of Creative Headlines
If you don’t feel you have the creativity to write eye-catching headlines, we can help!
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Reading Time: 4 minutes
Blogging is a crucial part of online marketing in today’s digital world. Even if you’re blogging regularly, at least a few times a month, you may not be getting the results you want or expected. Moreover, it’s challenging to find the time to write an article that’s at least 300 words.
When I’m asked to do a free analysis, I usually find the same mistakes in many people’s blog sites. First, let me tell you that you’re in a big boat with lots of folks who just don’t know what they don’t know.
However, ignorance is no longer an excuse.
Here are the Top 12 Blogging Mistakes and Some Simple Fixes.
- Using the free WordPress or other free, third-party blogging platform. On any other platform, whether a free blogging site or social media, you’re just borrowing the space there. You don’t own it. To boot, you have to follow their rules and they can change them at any time AND use your content as they wish. I recommend having your own WordPress website.
- Using industry jargon. You’re the expert, your reader is not. Write for an 11-year-old. Use the Flesch Reading Score. The free WordPress plugin, SEO by Yoast, will test your post for you.
- Not creating fresh, relevant content regularly. To be effective and grow a following or build an email list, you should blog 2-3 times a week. And, once you’ve built an audience, you can get away with blogging weekly but, no less than that.
Related Content Hand Picked for You: Blogging 3x a Week Increases Website Traffic – Here’s Proof
- Not writing for the human reader. Write for your target market with the search engine and keywords in mind. Use a thesaurus. Don’t overuse your keywords.
- Forgetting to proofread before publishing. Check spelling and grammar. It is your online reputation! Preview the post, then read it aloud to yourself.
- Writing long paragraphs. Break up your content with bullet points, lists and H2 and H3 sub-headings.
- Not sharing your content on social media. This is the main way to publicize your blog posts. Furthermore, it drives people to your site. Besides that, it helps with SEO. Google loves those relevant backlinks.
- No credible internal and external links. Add internal links to related content on your site and external links to related, relevant content on someone else’s site. The keyword here is “relevant”.
- Trying to be cute with your headline. Your headline should entice people to click on the link to get them to your website. Yet, creating “clickbait” is a no-no. Use this free Headline Analyzer to help you create catchy headlines. Write a good headline then deliver on the content.
- Not adding the title of the post or keywords to image “alt text” descriptions. If someone pins your picture on Pinterest, this is the description that comes up. Don’t make the user have to add their own description. On top of that, doing this also helps with SEO. The search engine doesn’t see the picture, it sees the file name and the “alt text” description. Also, don’t leave the file name with the original file number from a camera. Call it what it is.
- Leaving default widgets like “archives”. (Widgets are the boxes you see in the sidebar with calls-to-action). No one is going to look for what your wrote on a specific day. They’re looking for topics or categories. If anything, put a widget with a drop-down menu of your categories. Look for mine in the sidebar.
- Not having a “tag cloud” with the tags (keywords) that are relevant to your article. This is another way to keep people longer on your site. Additionally, keywords are what the search engine sees. Look over to the right sidebar and you’ll see mine. >>>>>
In conclusion, learning how to properly and effectively blog on your website can only benefit you.
Tip: Stop thinking of blogging as a chore. Think of it as a way to talk to your target market; to educate your potential customers; and to provide value to their lives.
Think these are a lot? Check out all the other mistakes that I see people making online with their marketing. Here’s a free ebook.
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Reading Time: 10 minutes1. Video – Hotter than Ever!
9. Provide the Answers
To have good SEO, you need to have good content. Content Marketing is a crucial a part of your marketing plan as are SEO and Social Media.
Here’s what you need to know and do regarding Content Marketing in 2017:
1. Video – Hotter than Ever!
Good content doesn’t only need to be written. In 2016 we saw Facebook Live Streaming Video take off and Facebook also admitted that Native Videos (videos uploaded directly into Facebook) get more exposure than plain posts.
To give videos an extra lift, embed them into your blog posts. The text of your blog post can be your video’s transcript, like I do with my Q&A posts.
“I think video is a megatrend, almost as big as mobile.” ~Mark Zuckerburg
What You Need to Do: Figure out how you can incorporate video into your marketing mix.
- You don’t have do one every day. Once a month or even a couple of times a month.
- Use your smartphone to create short how-to videos
- Get on Facebook and do a live video from anywhere — as long as you have wifi!
- Do a voice-over recordings of PowerPoint presentations
- Determine which format works for you — in ease of creation and amount of views they get
- Try Twitter live videos
- Coming soon – Instagram live videos
- Video Converts
In fact, when video is prominently featured on a landing page, conversion rates can go up by a whopping 80%. ~ Convince and Convert
2. Unique, High-Quality Content will be Key
Absolutely – Quality over Quantity! Don’t forgo quality in order to get more content out there.
- No fuzzy graphics — there is no excuse! You can create high-quality pictures with free online, easy-to-use graphics programs like Canva. Download free, license free, online pictures and graphics from sites that I list in this blog post. And don’t steal!
- Proofread before you publish or post — read your blog post aloud to yourself. Even your social media posts!
- Preview your blog posts before publishing — Do the graphics look good? Does the eye of reader make a natural progression down the page to your Call-to-Action?
What about unique?
“Most Americans are exposed to 4,000 to 10,000 advertising messages a day!” ~ Convince and Convert
What makes what you have to say or show unique? What makes you different? How is your content different from what your competition shares?
What You Need to Do: Plan out what content you’re going to create.
3. Reshare Your Content on Social Media
Resharing content can increase engagement by over 600%!
So you publish your blog post at 9 am and share it on all your social media networks at the time. Someone that logs on at 3 pm or in the evening probably won’t see it unless they have you in a Twitter list or Google+ circle; or have your posts showing first (a Facebook feature). You can manually schedule it to republish on your social networks using tools like HootSuite (ad link), Buffer or TweetDeck.
Another way to give your content extra exposure and traction is to publish it on LinkedIn’s Pulse. At the end of the post, add the line, “This post originally appeared on______” with a link to the original article on your blog. Your site still maintains the authority because there is where the post originated. Yet, on LinkedIn, you validate your expertise by showcasing what you know and how you can help people.
There’s a plugin I use called Revive Old Posts. For free, you can reshare to Twitter. With the upgraded version ($75/yr.), you can also reshare to LinkedIn and Facebook. I think it’s worth it just to save the time of manually scheduling. You pick the time frame and you can exclude posts that are not “evergreen” or are time-sensitive.
Think of it this way, your perfect potential customer could have missed it the first time it went out!
What You Need to Do: Don’t be afraid to reshare your content.
4. Blogging – a CORE part of your Content Strategy
Blogs are rated 1 out of 5 the most trusted sources of information online.
People ignore the paid ads in Google search and go for the organic content because they know that that’s where they’re going to find the authentic answers to their questions or problems.
What You Need to Do: Read some of my articles on blogging:
- How often should you blog?
- Blogging 3x a Week is the Charm
- What’s Your Story? Blogging for Business
- The Secret to Great SEO
5. Build Relationships through Your Content
“Content builds Relationships, Relationships are built on Trust. Trust delivers Revenue.” ~ Andrew Davis
And this applies not to just blogs, but what you post on social media and the videos and podcasts you produce. The more you post about what you know, the more you solidify and build credibility and trust.
Even if you use direct mail, people are going to check you out online, before they hire you or buy your products. People will…
- Google your company or brand name
- Look at reviews not just on Google, but on Facebook and Yelp
- Compare prices and check out your competition
- Read more information until they are satisfied that they can trust you
People buy from whom they know and trust.
What You Need to Do: Produce good, quality content, build your following and build your email list.
6. Visual Content
Yes, videos, but also pictures, animated gifs and infographics work. Even if you don’t sell a product, you can share inspirational and motivational quotes as well as original graphics.
B2B or B2C, you can use these two social networks to share eye-catching visuals….
Instagram:
Here are some recent Instagram stats:
- 68% of Instagram users engage with brands regularly
- Instagram has 58 times more engagement per follower than Facebook
- 50% of users follow a business
- 60% of Instagrammers say that they learn about a product or service on the platform
- 75% of Instagrammers take action after being inspired by a post, like visiting a website, searching, shopping or telling a friend
Pinterest: “The World’s Catalog of Ideas.”
Here are some recent Pinterest stats:
- 150 Million monthly active users
- 67% of pinners are under 40-years old
- Male users have grown by 150% in the past year
- 87% of pinners have purchased a product because of Pinterest
- 72% of pinners use Pinterest to decide what to buy offline
What You Need to Do: Go visual – figure out what will work for your business.
7. Be Impactful
For content to be Effective, it must have IMPACT. In order to be impactful, your content must be MEMORABLE. To be memorable, requires that you truly Understand Your Audience (target market).
Yes, we’re back to that again. What does it mean to Understand Your Target Market?
Knowing the answers to these questions as it applies to your perfect customer…
- What makes them happy?
- Who do they trust for information?
- Where are they hanging out online? In other words, which networks do they prefer?
- What angers them?
- What are their pain points and problems that you can solve?
- Who influences them?
- What are their wants, desires and dreams?
- How is your content going to impact their lives?
Is your content going to try to sell them something right away even if they’re not ready to buy? Or is it going to provide useful information that they can use right away hence building trust?
People Buy from whom the Know and Trust
You need to map where the customer is in their buying journey.
- Do they need more information?
- Have they developed trust towards your company?
- Can they make a decision to buy right away, or do they have more questions?
What You Need to Do: Download my free Define Your Target Market Workbook
- Answer all the questions as it pertains to your business whether B2B or B2C. You can have more than one target market.
- Create buyer personas for your defined targets.
- Research your target and your industry so you can understand their buying habits as well as their online media usage.
8. Create Memorable and Evergreen Content
If your business is anything like mine, you need to educate your target market in why they need your product or service; why what you have to offer is better, different, more effective, etc.
Your content can, of course, be in the form of a blog or static pages on your website, but they can also be….
- Videos
- Podcasts
- Infographics
- Social Media Posts
The objective is to build trust and credibility. You need to us Truth as a Service.
Evergreen content is anything that’s not time-sensitive, seasonal, or talking about an event or specific day. It stands the test of time. You can share it over and over again and it still is applicable. Its information is useful and solves problems that people keep having.
Give them best practices to tackle their problems. Think emotion and functionality. The folks at Copyblogger define it this way….
These special resources are in-depth examinations of a problem, solution, trend, or topic. They can help your audience find tons of information on a subject that interests them, which adds value to your blog.
Evergreen content is timeless.
What You Need to Do: Plan out your content marketing strategy.
9. Provide the Answers
It’s up to you to provide the answers to the questions Your Target Market Personas are asking. Are you getting it yet? You can’t answer the questions if you don’t know what they are!
I like Q&A sites like Mosaic Hub and Quora. I’m signed up to get an email every time someone asks a question in my fields of expertise. The idea is to try and be the first one to answer the question — providing the best answer. If you see that someone beat you to it and their answer is the same as yours, I give them a thumbs up and don’t bother writing the same thing. HOWEVER, this just gave you material for a blog post or a video. If people are asking it on those Q&A sites, they’re asking it also on Google and YouTube. [Related: SEO in 2017] YouTube is the 2nd largest search engine next to its parent, Google. The most searched-for phrase on YouTube is “How to”.
What You Need to Do: Get on those Q&A sites and search for the questions pertaining to your field of expertise.
10. Make sure EVERYTHING is Optimized for Mobile!
I cover mobile as it relates to SEO in the previous article of this 2017 planning series.
Here are some tips to make sure you’re content can be seen on mobile devices:
- Large enough type. No smaller that 14 pt, 16 pt is considered the best size.
- Pictures not too large and they should be responsive – that is, they move over when viewed on a small screen so you can see the text.
- External links (links to sites outside yours) should open to a new tab in the browsers.
- Your mobile website should have the same content as your desktop site. What that means is that it contains all your static pages and your blog posts.
- Make sure there are NO POPUPS in your mobile site. Starting Jan. 10, 2017, Google will block sites with popups in mobile!
What You Need to Do: Visit your site on a mobile device. If it’s not optimized, do something about it.
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Reading Time: 2 minutes
I keep telling people, it takes time to see marketing results. But do they listen, no. They are impatient. Some common misconceptions with online marketing are:
- If you build it they will come – NO! You build a website, then you have to produce and share content on social media.
- You can post anything you like – NO! What you share and post on social media has to have a purpose and a strategy, otherwise you’re just shooting in the dark.
- What you post is going to go viral – NO! Something going viral is a fluke. (Read this: 7 Features of a Viral Video.)
This quote from Content Marketing Institute’s article spells it out bluntly:
Too often, marketers expect quick results from content marketing, but it simply doesn’t work that way. In a metaphor borrowed from Chris Moritz, associate director of customer experience strategy at MRM//McCann, content marketing is like your 401(k) plan. No one should expect great 401(k) results at the beginning; rather, they should see the returns increase over time because of the compounded growth. Of course, if you want to see bigger returns faster, you can invest more at the beginning.
Bigger Returns Faster – what does that take?
- A properly setup website — preferably WordPress — optimized for Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
- Blogging at least 3 times a week
- Spending 90 minutes a day the first month on social media, finding and connecting with your target market as well as posting relevant content of interest to that target market.
And you have to have Google Analytics setup on your site so you can measure the marketing results!
If you’re unhappy with the results of your current marketing efforts, click here to schedule a free 30-minute consult and analysis and we’ll see what’s working and not working.
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Reading Time: 1 minute
How often should you blog?
Your website & blog is the center of your marketing – learn how to do it right!
Basically, the more often you blog, the more traffic you drive to your website.
- Your blog should be part of your website.
That’s why I recommend WordPress. - Your website should have a call-to-action where you capture leads. Turn visitors into leads then leads into sales.
- Have both strategic and tactical plans along with an editorial calendar.
- Monitor and measure what’s working and what’s not working. Check your analytics and insights monthly.
Watch this Facebook Live video on where explaining How Often Should You Blog…
Start with clearly defining your target market(s) with this free workbook. Click here to download.
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