Get More Return by Blogging Better

Amanda O’Brien

Who We Are

Amanda O’BrienVP of Marketingamanda@hallme.com@amanda_pants

Hall Web Serviceswww.hallme.comwww.hallme.com/blog@hall_web

• 10+ Years in Business• Online Suite of Tools

Got Questions?

• Use GoToWebinar “Chat” or “Ask a Question”

• Twitter with @hall_web

Document or note your current

blogging efforts.

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What are you doing?

What are you not doing?

How are people reacting?

What do you want to be doing?

What are your competitors doing?

What are your heroes doing?

• Who is going to read your blog?

• What other blogs do they read?

• What's their preferred way to get content?

• How hungry are they for new stuff?

• How did they find you?

• What do they want to hear from you?

• Conversation – Talk WITH not AT

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Know Your Audience

• Pay attention to comments

• Engage every commenter

• See what content is popular on other blogs

• What questions are people asking you offline?

• What are their pain points?

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It's About Them, Not You

• Who is your company - one person or many?

• What is the tone of the message - professional, personal, sassy?

• Who is responsible for creating content and who oversees it?

• How will blog content be promoted or references in other marketing materials?

Corporate Voice

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• What is the expected time commitment?

• What is the expected responsibility?

• Who is engaging commenters?

• Who gets involved if things get negative?

Make them BEFORE you have a problem!

Policies

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• You can't write if you don't read

• Find people on blogsearch.google.com, Technorati, regular Google search, links people send, etc.

• Learn how to use an RSS reader (google reader)

• Start to participate with your favorite blogs

• Blog rolls

Input/Output

• How often you post?

• Who posts, when?

• The nature of the posts - do people have a regular "beat“?

• Can change based on real-time data and audience reaction

Creating Your Editorial Calendar

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• Content updated regularly

• SEO friendly

• Bonus terms

• Inbound Links

Blogs and SEO On Page SEO items

• Title

• Content

• Keywords, categories

• Links

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Speaking of Analytics… Better Content

More info:

http://www.hallme.com/blog/looking-for-good-blog-topics-try-keyword-questions/

http://www.hallme.com/blog/category/blogging/

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Survey blog subscribers what do they want more of?

Blog about industries you want to get into

What do you want people to do with your content?Share or save to come back later?

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Bookmarking• Delicious

• Digg

• Stumbleupon

• Whitepapers

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Share• Simple Sharing

• Twitter

• Facebook

• Bit.ly

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• Funny - gotta pass it along

• Inspiring - reading this makes me want to DO something

• Valuable - wow, that helped me with this problem (resource, how-to, video, etc.)

• Important - you need to know this (news, events)

Why Content Gets Shared

Make it easy for people to find, receive and share your posts

• RSS/Email

• Social Add-ons

• Post on social networks

• Cross pollinate

• Be seen

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In Blogging, the Turtle Beats the HareBlogging is a marathon not a sprint.

In It For the Long Haul

• You will get better and faster

• Become part of your online community

• Don't burn out OR fade away (marathon not a sprint)

• Pay attention to trends

• Narrow your niche

Measure: Feedburner

• Trends - Are things growing?

• Sources - How are people subscribing?

• Reach - Who clicks on links in your RSS?

Measure: Google Analytics

• "Content" view

• Traffic sources

• Get familiar with advanced segments ...Or set up custom filters

What do you want people to do?

Conversions – Make them very clear

• Join email list

• Subscribe to blog

• Download whitepaper

• Buy something

• Contact you

3 Ways to reach out to other bloggers to help market your content

1. Create valuable content and make sure they can see it

2. Guest blogging opportunties

3. Comments

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Re-cap

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• Define who does what and when

• Know your audience

• Be consistent

• Listen, read, listen, read, write

• Measure

• Strategy

• Do something memorable, valuable and original

Learn More!• Web Vision Blog - http://www.hallme.com/blog

• Webinars – http://www.hallme.com/webinars

• Follow Hall on Twitter - @Hall_Web

• Call us! 1-877-425-5932 (HALL-WEB)

• amanda@hallme.com

• Problogger: http://www.problogger.net/

• #blogchat 9pm EST Sundays

• Webinars – next week ‘What is a CMS and Do I Need One?’ with Alayna

Questions?

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• Use GoToWebinar “Chat” or “Ask a Question”

• Twitter with @hall_web