Learn how to blog and become a…. PRO Blogger

Did you know that 82% of marketers who blog consistently (at least on a weekly basis) -acquired a customer from using their blog, as opposed to 57% of marketers who blog sporadically or only monthly?

This post appeared on Marketing Offline Online April 23, 2018

Businesses that blog get 97% more inbound links – And since social media and blogging are so closely tied together, you’ll also want to track which of your posts are being shared the most on social media.

More on this …

Social Media Strategy Goals for your Blog

Do you have a goal for your business?   Do you know what you want, but not how to get there?

Start by being clear about what it is that you want. If that includes blogging for your own business then you need to set up a social media strategy.  There are blogs on almost every subject you can think of, yet they all different.  We are attracted to people for many reasons, but mostly because of who we see them as. Entertaining, colorful, informative or attractive. This is called branding.   Their style and their personality. You need to be YOU and create this unique recognition and reputation for yourself.

Branding

The process involved in creating a unique name and image for a product in the consumers’ mind, mainly through advertising campaigns with a consistent theme.

Branding you and your business

Your Brand is  everything you do In your Business:
– your consistency -followers like to be able to find you on a regular basis
– your authenticity – you are unique,  no one else is quite like you so your content is unique  – your core value – the big benefit our prospective clients  receives from engaging with you

Your Content Marketing

Content Marketing plan, such as starting a blog or make videos or podcasts, blog posts.

Your blogging goals become recognized by your ideal customers when you produce services and products that build trust in your relationships.  “That know, like and trust factor.”  KLT.  Content between brands and consumers. Your content is the hub or center that attracts your target audience to your blog for your business.

Social Media

Make sure your social activity where you share on networks, is tied to your buyer personas.  If you’re a business brand, you ’re spending a lot of time on LinkedIn which is business oriented. If you’re a lifestyle type of brand, you probably are going to be more on Pinterest, Facebook, or Instagram.

Different Ways Of Learning
Some people are more visual, while others like to read. Some like video or audio. We all have different learning styles. Re-purpose your content to reach your audience on their own platform of preference. Take your most popular blog post and turn it into a  series of short videos. I use Lumen5 (free) to create a video with music and images to go with the content of a blog post. Very effective for people who like video and the music is nice too.  You could put this video in the article itself adding interest with less bounce rate, or you could add it to your Facebook business page with a link back to your site or a Twitter post in the article its self.

It’s important to get that mix of social media marketing going to the right people. Where does your target audience hang out? Master one social platform at a time and then move to another. It’s quality, not quantity that rules social media. An interesting article on what Facebook is doing might be of interest to some but not all of your prospective customers.

Facebook’s  Change To it’s News-feed

Facebook is taking a big chunk out of the news-feed Facebook now wants to replace news with more content from friends and family. With all new fake news and injustice to women, the new algorithm will change, (as it always does) but this time it’s different.  All the more reason to have more than just Facebook as your source of social media.

“Facebook wants to encourage GENUINE interactions on their platform.

So, “the soul-less re-posting, the click-bait tactics – all  those things are going to be penalized…which doesn’t actually sound like a bad thing.” – Cathy Topping of yourwebtoolkit.com  She is right I’d say.

Mike Stelzner founder of Social Media Examiner emailed me some important info on the new Facebook News Feed changes.

Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook’s CEO) said Jan 11th. “We are making a major change to how we build Facebook.” Head of Facebook’s News Feed (Adam Mosseri) outlined coming changes. He posted in media groups of which Mark Stelzner is a member.

Fact 1: Adam said, “space in News Feed is limited.”

Fact 2: “We’ll show less public content, including videos and other posts from publishers or businesses,”

Fact 3: “Pages may see their reach, video watch time, and referral traffic decrease,” -Adam Mosseri

Fact 4: “Over the next few months, we’ll be making updates to ranking,”

So here is what we know so far:

• #1: Video will get less watch time. Inference: you’ll see less video in the News Feed.
• #2: Links to external pages will get less visibility. Thus, they won’t be showing as many links to blog posts, news, and so on.
• #3: Posts from people and pages will be impacted. In Facebook’s News, Media, & Publishing group

So what are the important ranking factors?

Facebook will “prioritize posts that spark conversations and meaningful interactions between people,” – Adam Mosseri.

In a recent Wired Magazine exclusive interview, Adam said, “we’re going to be (weighing) long comments more than short comments,” and that “comments are more valuable than likes.”

So, actual “meaty” dialog between people (not pages and people, see the language distinction) is critical for News Feed exposure.

Now to video. Adam said, “video is, primarily, a passive experience. You tend to just sit back and watch it. And while you’re watching it, you’re not usually liking, or commenting, or speaking with friends.”

I believe this means a lot fewer shorter videos, a lot fewer Tasty-style how-to videos, and a lot fewer video animations. Adding that Instagram (owned by Facebook) now has HGTV video

At this point, it should be very clear that your strategy has got to change…

Some of Mike’s ideas
Step 1: Scale back your frequency of posts. Less is more here.

Step 2: Figure out how to create content that will get people talking to EACH OTHER, not just you.

Step 3: Up your live video game plan.

Adam said, “live videos often lead to discussion among viewers on Facebook–in fact, live videos on average get six times as many interactions as regular videos.”

Step 4: Avoid engagement bait. These are posts that encourage people to comment. Adam said Facebook will “demote these posts in News Feed.”

Step 5: Master Facebook ads: This will be one of the only reliable ways you’ll be able to drive traffic off of Facebook.

Step 6: Learn Messenger Chatbots: Moving conversations into Messenger and using bots will be a huge trend that will allow you to nurture leads and sell.

A lot of the above steps will likely require a complete shift in your current Facebook strategy. If it helps, share this email with your boss, clients, or friends.

Ways to rapidly improve your Facebook strategy, live video experience, Facebook ads, and Messenger chatbot success.

Setting Goals For Your Business

Using an editorial planner is a great step for organizing your business.  I use a free tool called Asana. Good for people with a team or only for you.  Start with writing your to-do list for the next month as tasks. You can list by a table or a kanban (separate areas) It’s free and you can incorporate a buddy as well to whichever section you like. It works for soloprenures as well. I use it every day to organize my business.

Prioritize. When thinking about which goals, first ask yourself these questions:

• Are the goals you have right now realistic?
• Would there be some goals that haven’t helped that you could let go of?
• Which goals have more priority over others?

10 Exciting Pro Blogger Tips on Social Media and  Marketing Your Blog
Goals represent the big change or result you want in your business, the social media systems represent each planned step you take towards the big result.

1. Do Your Homework – Keyword Research

One of the biggest benefits of blogging…it brings organic traffic from the search engines.****
Having your site seen much more is relevant to your industry.  Google loves this. One of the first steps in the process of getting more search traffic through blogging is by doing your keyword research well.

So What Is Keyword Research?

It is the process of finding the different search phrases and terms that your customers would use to find your website.  So write blog topics that target these specific phrases. If one of your keywords is “social media branding.” That might inspire a blog post called ” Ultimate Guide to Personal Social Media Branding.”

Most marketers start with Google AdWords Keyword Planner as their keyword tool of choice because it’s free and produced by the leading search engine. You will need a Google AdWords account to use this tool, but all you need to do is create the account — you do not have to run any ads, you just use the research tool for your keywords. Some keywords I chose for this article – blog  1M-10M Low  / how to become a blogger  1K – 10K Medium/pro blogger   1K – 10K low

https://kwfinder.com/ Long tail keywords with Low SEO difficulty.

2. Learn From Your Competitors

If your competitors are blogging, and they’re successful, then you should spend some time examining what they’re doing.  They are doing it right! Not to copy but learn from them what is working. Try to implement similar strategies on your own blog.

For example, if you notice a lot of your competitors’ blog posts are lists, and they’re getting shared heavily on social media, then it’s probably a good idea to start creating some “Social media…” list posts for your own blog. eg. 8 ways to…. Or if you see that they’re marketing heavily on Facebook to push traffic to their blog, then you ought to be getting more familiar with Facebook and it’s Ads using the Power Editor.

I follow many successful marketers. I get great ideas from seeing what successful marketers are doing. I sign up for their newsletters and my email box and it gives me many ideas on what to work on, adding my own slant to it.

3. Let Your Own Personality Shine Through

There’s nothing worse than reading a  bland, boring blog post. In a world where companies tip-toe around saying the wrong thing, many businesses are afraid of being a little edgy or entertaining with their content. However, the companies that are really seeing the most success with their blogs are the ones that inject humor and fun into them. FUN! Think of the commercials for Bud Wiser with their horses.

4. Remember to Grow Your Email List

Building your email list is HUGE. Setting up an email subscribe form on your blog should be your #one priority. If you come up with an irresistible gift, people are happy to join your list so you can have them get to know who you are and what you can do for them.  (More on this in an article ) >Convert Kit for  Bloggers

While people will find your blog through the Google search engine, social media or links from other sites, if they leave your site after getting their information, well you just lost a lead. Give something away: Create a free report, offer a coupon code or make a free guide to entice people to sign up to your list. Get their email address by offering something of great value that they won’t refuse.  Give them your best info for FREE. They will be interested in what else you have and buy from you later on.

That is why there is a HUGE focus being put on getting people to follow you or your company on Twitter, or like your Facebook Page. Rightfully so!

Social media marketing is VERY important, but email gives you an even closer way to connect with your audience because you can contact them directly. There is 3x the number of emails out there as there are Facebook and Twitter accounts combined. Be sure to stand out with your email titles.

Here Are Some Tips On Growing Your Email List:

Make a strong CTA -Call To Action: People are very understandably protective of giving out their email address. Make your call-to-action so appealing that they can’t resist. Offer something irresistible.

Experiment: Try placing forms as pop-ups, in your sidebar, before/after blog posts, the top of the screen and other locations to see what converts the best. SumoMe  http://sumome.com/ It also comes as a plugin, for WordPress.

Keep In Touch: If you’re only sending out emails once every three months, your list won’t pick up much traction. Try emailing a few times a week, or at least once a week. Try using a great autoresponder for your emails,  I like (Convert Kit)  Affiliate link.

5. Create a Blogging Schedule

Being consistent in blogging, it keeps people coming back. Not only that but publishing blogs on a regular schedule can even lead to more subscribers. They get to know like and trust you and enjoy visiting your blog on a regular basis.

From  (Be a Better Blogger), the company tested the difference between posting five days a week versus once a week. Here are the results:
. Social shares increased 84%
. Comments increased 119%
. Traffic increased 46%

Posting five days a week can be a challenge,  I posted on a regular basis for a PAC Challenge for a few weeks, daily.  Ideally, you should push for two to five new posts a week. But publishing at least once a week is better than companies that only blog once a month or less.

6. Don’t be all about the Sale

While your blog is a promotional tool. Blogging does generate leads, however, that is not the purpose of the blog. If you want people to know about your services, they should be able to go to your services page and read about them there.

Your blog is where you provide helpful information that they can benefit from somehow. So offer your audience and your potential customers’ value through your free content, and once you have built up that know like and trust factor, then the sales process doesn’t feel forced it will seem very natural.

7. Make Your Blog Posts Look Good

Too many blog posts are huge walls of text. Reading a blog post shouldn’t be like reading through a college research paper. What do you like to see on any blog?  Images that are beautiful or interesting.

Your blog posts should be visually appealing.
That means:

• Using lists
• Using images
• Using bold and italics
• Using Headings
• Using bullet points
• Using a nice sized font (preferably 16px)
• Keeping paragraphs short and sweet (two to four sentences)

If You’re Having Trouble Coming Up With Great Blog Post Title:

This is THE most important factor. Your TITLES!  You can use tools like HubSpot’s Blog Topic Generator. Simply enter up to three of your keyword phrases, and HubSpot will start by suggesting some good titles.

http://www.hubspot.com/blog-topic-generator

Or you can use Co-Schedules Free Headline Analyser. http://coschedule.com/headline-analyzer#

It gives you a list of what you try. For this article, I came up with these titles after several tries.

61 -10 Exciting Tips Pro Bloggers use in Content Marketing
62 – 10 Exciting Tips That Pro Bloggers use in Content Marketing
65 -10 Exciting Tips That Pro Bloggers us in Social Media Marketing
69 -10 Exciting Pro Blogger Tips on Social Media Marketing
63 – 10 Pro Blogger Tips on content and social media marketing
54 – 10 Pro Blogger Tips on content marketing + social media marketing + SEO?

8. Track Your Efforts

The only way to judge whether or not your blogging efforts are actually working is to have some type of analytics installed to measure your ROI. Google Analytics is free and you can start seeing which posts are the most popular, which posts people are staying on the longest, even which posts perform well.

9. How to Optimize Your Blog Post for SEO

As mentioned, blogging is a very good way to get some organic search traffic. In addition, your blog posts should be optimized for search engines. There are step by step ways to do this if you want to know how to become a blogger.

How to Optimize Your Blog post
. Put your main keyword in the post title ( ex  of this article title)
. Include related keywords in the content
. Use appropriate subheadings
. Optimize images –https://yoast.com/image-seo/
. Include internal links to other articles
. Link out to authoritative websites
. Include your main keyword in the URL

10. In addition to your on-page SEO

You will also want to make sure that you’re sharing your blog posts as much as possible through social media.

• Use the URL to your lead magnet in the bottom of your emails.
• In your Pinterest profile,
• or on Instagram the URL to your landing page with your opt-in.
• Use blog comments or anywhere else you can to get the word out.

The more people that find out about your content, the higher the chances of them linking to it.

And since social media and blogging are  closely tied together, you’ll also want to track which of your posts are being shared the most on social media. Use a spread sheet or a quick way to do this is with the Quicksprout social media analysis tool.
http://www.quicksprout.com/

Just paste in your site’s URL, then click on the social media analysis tab. You’ll see a list of the social shares each of your posts has organized by social media site.

Never sacrifice the quality of your blog. People want quality content, not  poorly written fluff that doesn’t provide any type of value. Take the time to create thoughtful content that has a purpose and you will have much better success with your blog like a Pro Blogger does.

If you found value in this article please comment below and share it with your social media. Sign in to my opt-in form for emails on weekends on marketing and social media tips and tricks for the level of marketer/blogger) that you are from the Quiz on the home page. of my site.

Sourced information http://sproutsocial.com/insights/blogging-tips/

About Kathryn Maclean http://www.facebook.com/marketingofflineonline
A blogger with WordPress /domains & hosting for web development. A certified Social Media Campaign specialist using Facebook, Twitter Pinterest, and Google + Also an Affiliate & Network Marketer and a member of a blogging community PAC Power Affiliate Company.