We take a page out of the “Perfect is Good, Done is Better” department for today’s missive.
This is, after all, the Year of Content. (3rd Anniversary Edition.) We get questions here at HQ at least once a month along these lines:
How can you crank out so many blog posts?
Don’t you have a real job?
How do you write so good?
And all three are tied in together in the subject of this here blog post. We’ve seen our traffic shoot up, we’ve seen business come our way (and we’ve turned some down) and we do think we have a writing style that is, well, good. Some tips – for what they’re worth. If this doesn’t motivate you, not sure what will.
(Actually, an open source photo of kittens will. Aren’t they cute?)
1. Have a Theme.
Nearly all of what we talk about here weaves in a couple different concepts: Entrepreneurship, Social Media, Startups, Communication, Marketing. We choose, usually, a couple of the concepts and weave them together. And we hustle to get them out the door in the a.m.
We’re also not afraid to revisit the old stuff. Something that happened a month ago, or five years ago. A post from last year that got people riled up.
Note that we’re not going to all of a sudden start writing about how cute kittens are unless we can tie that back to something we’ve noticed going on in the business world. But, that may work for you, your audience, or the audience you someday want to reach.
2. Make Writing PART OF your job description.
I am more likely to see your stuff if you actually put it out there. In order for you to actually put it out there, you need to make time to do it.
If blogging is a hobby, then it’s likely to fall down on the priority list, replaced by real work.
If blogging – writing – is part of your job description, you have gone from someone who likes to write to someone whose writing is a legitimate business development activity.
Make the time. Write.
For us, we schedule time first thing each morning. AND, when the mood strikes, or when an idea hits us like a ton of bricks, we queue up something for the files – maybe we’ll run it later, maybe we’ll see if there’s another outlet that would like to run it. Maybe it never sees the light of day.
But we write. And it leads to business.
3. Grammar and Spelling are Important, But.
In our haste to get posts out the door, we will sometimes neglect to spell check, or we’ll throw the wrong word in at the place wrong.
Back when I was running PR for a Fortune 500 company, the dreaded wordo or typo used to cause me sleepless nights. But, if you’re gonna live in the world we’re in right now, you’ve got to let go.
“It’s” and “its” drive me crazy. But it’s because I have internalized the difference, much like the 5-handicap golfer has internalized the rule about unplayable lies. This is great if you’re playing in a tournament, or if you want to impress your buddies at the Sunday Morning Tee Time.
Most of us, though, just want to go out there, hit the ball around, maybe wait for the beer cart girl to arrive, and have that one good shot per round that will get us back on the course.
Think of writing, blogging, and social media “stuff” in the same category. Doing a proposal that could get your company the next big contract? By all means, attack that with the red pen, get many readers looking at it, run it through the spell check.
Doing a blog post that needs to get out the door by 8:30? Go with the flow, even if there’s a chance of error.
4. We don’t have all the answers.
We check out other blogs, ones that always amaze us with their ability to amaze.
Two that are ENTIRELY DIFFERENT are these: Danny Brown and Redhead Writing. They succeed every time out in grabbing attention, telling a story, and changing how we think.
So, Gentle Readers, ready to crank your writing up to the next level?
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