Small Business Online Marketing Tips – The 7 Ultimate Blogging Tips For a Coaching, Training or Consulting Business
So you have started blogging and nothing much seems to be happening in your business. Should you give up? Should you go on blogging? Should you have a blog at all?
By the time you finish reading this article, you will have discovered:
- why your business needs a blog,
- where your blog fits in the overall structure of your coaching, training,
- healing or consulting business,
- how to use blogging to grow your business without having to convert your
- business into a blogging factory,
- and what your next step should be.
TIP #1 – Your Blog Is Not Your Business
Your blog, the same as your website, is NOT your business. It is a tool you can use in your business and as such it has a place.
Don’t waste your time, energy or money trying to learn how to “monetize” your blog. You are a professional and your blog should be used to position you as an Authority in your field, not to try to make you pennies on paid advertisement, which only cheapens your image.
That being said, your blog can also be a very profitable tool in your business, helping you attract clients who are looking for the solutions you provide, build a relationship with your website visitors and existing clients, engage your visitors and turn visitors into clients.
Tip #2 - Get blog clarity
So why does your business need a blog? Your blog positions you as a Leading Authority in your field (the word authority comes from the word author, and if you write you are an author).
Your blog is one of the most powerful tools in your attraction marketing. You offer solutions to the problems your audience has and that brings people to your website, instead of you having to chase them.
Your blog differentiates you and your business from everybody else who seems to do what you do, by showcasing your personality, your voice, and your unique way of helping people,
Your blog gives you leverage by allowing you to interact with your audience and creating community without having to reach out to them one-on-one.
Your blog helps the people looking for what you have to offer find you through the search engines like Google, Yahoo, Bing.
I want you to start thinking of a search engine like a library and your website with a blog like a book. The content of your blog will allow the search engines to determine what your website is about and to whom they should be showing it.
If there isn’t enough content in your website or if the content is all over the place, the search engines don’t understand what your website is about and they won’t show it to people.
HOT TIP – Decide what is the main keyword of your website. This decision is like deciding what is the topic of your book. Use the keyword tool that Google offers for free to learn more about the keywords that your audience when they search. (If you need help with this, see the video here http://anarosenberg.com/online-marketing-tools/).
Tip #3 - Set smart goals for your blog
This is where your blog fits into your business structure: it is an excellent attraction marketing tool.
What does this mean exactly to your business? It means that you should be using your blog to attract the people who are already looking for solutions to their problems by blogging about what your audience is looking for.
The number one goal of your blog should be to build a list of subscribers because a lot of visitors don’t buy or hire you in their first visit and if they leave your website without giving you their email addresses so that you can follow up with them, they might never find your website again.
Once you have permission to follow up with them, you can start building a relationship, adding value and showing them the opportunities to work with you.
Other smart goals for your blog are:
- To engage, educate and motivate your audience.
- To build your credibility and trust.
- To position yourself as an Authority in your field.
- To strengthen your relationship with existing clients in order to make more sales or get more referrals.
- To get more speaking engagements or get press.
- To increase the understanding of the services you provide.
- To promote your products, programs and services.
HOT TIP – Have always a valuable resource to give away in exchange for the visitor’s contact information related to the topic of your blog post.
Tip #4 – Know and understand your audience
Your blog should not be about you or even about coaching or the modality or methodology you use to help people. It should be about your visitor and their problem.
It is very easy when we start thinking about marketing our business online to forget that we are still talking to ONE person, or rather writing for ONE person, not to a group.
Get a clear client’s avatar and write having that person in mind (For help on how to do that, go here http://anarosenberg.com/online-marketing-strategy/).
HOT TIP – You are NOT writing your blog for your peers. You are writing for ONE person who has a problem and needs immediate help.
Tip # 5 – Use the right blogging platform
If you are blogging to grow and market your business, use WordPress.org because it is installed in your domain and in your hosting. In other words, it belongs to you and you can have full control of it.
Remember that you’re not blogging as a hobby, so platforms like WordPress.com, Typepad, Blogger, etc. are not recommendable. Why? Because your blog doesn’t belong to you and you are doing the heavy lifting of bringing visitors to a website that is not yours. That is not very smart.
Tip #6- Plan and be consistent
Decide on how often you are going to post and be consistent. Show that you are a professional and that you keep your word.
How often should you post? It is crazy. Everybody recommends something different. Some people go so far as to say that you should be blogging several times a day.
You are a business owner so I don’t think it is realistic to expect you to produce awesome content every day. I would go as far as to say, not even every week. Twice a month is a good starting point.
Now we’re going to talk about how to plan your editorial calendar, have fun blogging and helping people and make it easy to be consistent. If you know what you are supposed to write about, it is much easier.
Block 1 hour to plan your content for the whole year:
STEP 1 – Do 30 minutes of research. What are the most frequently asked questions your audience has? What would be the smart questions to ask, instead? What do they talk about in forums and groups? What do they need help with?
STEP 2 - Brainstorm ideas for 30 minutes. Write down 50 ideas. Don’t censor any of them yet. Just write down as many ideas for blog posts as you can.
STEP 3 – Choose your 26 best ideas and enter them every 2 weeks in your calendar so that you always know what you will be writing about.
STEP 4 – If you come up with a great idea, add it to your editorial calendar.
STEP 5 – Block the time in your calendar to actually produce the content. Make an appointment with your blog and keep it!
HOT TIP – Making it fun really helps!
Tip #7 – Call To Action
We have mentioned that your content should be awesome and wow your reader. It should be immediately applicable and useful.
Now, we are going to talk about inviting your reader to take ONE action after reading your post. Are you going to ask them to share, to comment, to click a link for more information or to take some other step?
Decide what the CTA (call-to-action) is going to be before you start writing and remember that you can only ask for ONE action, so choose it strategically.
HOT TIP - Make it easy for your reader to take that action. The more complicated the next step is, the less probable it will be that people take time to do it.
Next Step - Don’t neglect your headlines
The headline of your blog post is what gets your visitor’s attention and makes sure that they start reading.
You have done all the heavy lifting creating awesome content. Now, create an awesome headline that matches the content.
Till next time… remember your awesomeness is portable. You can take it with you anywhere.
With love
Ana