Is Your Blog Fresh?

The freshness of a blog can go a long way in deciding how Google sees it. Yes! Google now wants your content to be fresh. If you are writing the same old stuff over and over again in the same old style that you have followed, then Google will definitely take note. But how can you make your content fresh? Well, it's very simple IF you are really keen in doing so.

There are a number of companies which are constantly changing their blogging structure to attrtact readers' attention. This is absolutely welcome! Then, there are those who engage with their fans by allowing their comments, howsoever negative, and continuing to create a dent in their brand image. How can you make your blog search-engine friendly? Well, the quickest way is by keeping your content fresh.

Read Up

The first step towards writing completely different and fresh content is by reading up on a whole lot of stuff. This will help you get the idea on the things that your market needs that will effectively put your blog on a new footing. Make sure to engage with fellow bloggers and interact with them on how they get the traffic.

Write

A lot! What you write will play a big role in deciding on the kind of freshness that your blog will have. Write in a way that helps readers get the idea quickly and they enjoy the write-up. Keep in mind that the article that you are writing needs to create a whole new impression in the minds of your readers. 

Listen

Never ignore your blog comments. If you want to provide fresh content, then the quickest way is by interacting with your followers and how they see your blog. This way, your business will definitely achieve the goal of "freshness".

In the end, you have to remember, there are hundreds of bloggers out there who are competing for the same audience. It is your writing which will set your blog apart from the rest! Cheers!

Why Blog?

This post is a part of an ongoing series in which I teach you on how to shape up your business's social media marketing strategy. Blogs are the cornerstones of any company's social media strategy.

Blogging is essential for your social media prospects

In order to grow its customer's base, a company needs to create the entire social media strategy based around the blog. Here is how blogging is crucial for your social media marketing strategy -

Blogging is your voice

Through your blog you get a centralized way of communicating with your customer. Remember, Facebook isn't forever, neither is Twitter and neither was MySpace. So, essentially, by blogging, you are actually saving your voice from losing listeners. Blogging is how your customer is going to find you from any social network you are on. So, Blog.

Blog=Brand Image

How you blog equals how your brand is looked at. There are a number of people who are always on the go. They are so busy in following and unfollowing people on Twitter, promoting their stuffs on Facebook, Twitter that in the end, they forget about the kind of image that they are creating in the minds of the audience. When you are small restaurant owner, you need to stand up for your business, but in a way that makes you popular with your customers.

Time-Saving

Gone are the days when you had to think about so many things before writing a blog. Before, blogging was all a personal affair. But, not anymore. When you are blogging, all you need to do is follow certain simple rules and get your brand the necessary eyeballs. If you find Facebook, Twitter too complex, then you will definitely find blogging easy.

Instant feedback

With blogging, you are at a better chance of measuring your reach with the audience. Be it publishing something creative or your business, you can instantly know about what customers feel through the comments' section. This way, you will know where you are going wrong. And one place where Blogging outshines social networking sites is that you get to play the role of a moderator. You can allow or ban comments. However, I would want you to allow the comments, both negative and positive and work on rectifying your mistakes too!

Obvious SEO Benefits

With cross-linking and promoting your website, it goes without saying, your blog will enhance your website's SEO rankings for sure. I will elaborate about this later on.

If you like this piece, then please "Like" my Facebook Page. Thanks.

pic courtesy - http://krazzybuddies.com

Is Your Blog Ready? 5 Handy Tips

There are probably hundreds and thousands of bloggers who are writing on what you are writing right now. What is there in them which you would love to surpass? One simple question - 

Is your blog ready to handle a sudden burst of traffic?

Leave No Stone Unturned

There are a number of bloggers who unknowingly do something that suddenly results in hundreds and thousands of blog-hits. They don't what have they written but it's for sure that they have written about something that everyone needed to know. Well, for the starters, you can never know what is THAT one thing you will do that will suddenly see your website clicks jump. But what you can do instead is be prepared to welcome all those visitors. 

Here is what you must do before you have that huge stroke of luck and have thousands of people visiting your blog. You wouldn't want them to be disappointed now, would you?

Never Compromise on Content 
That's right. Make sure that whatever you do, your post(s) must make others subscribe to your blog. You wouldn't want one-time visitors because it is the dedicated ones who really make the difference and publicize your blog later on. 

Know what Suits You the Best
If you write a sports blog, don't just focus on sports. Make your blog highly focused. If you are focusing on cricket, then don't talk on the things that others talk. Bring out some new stuffs about the game which no one else would know. Make your blog unique, a place where a visitor will find everything related to the topic that your blog is on. 

Keep a Tab on Subscriptions
Make sure that you keep a tab on the subscriptions. If you are employing newer ways and means to improve your blogging style, may be the designs, and yet you aren't finding any substantial growth in the subscription, then there is some problem that you just don't know. And if you find the numbers slowly coming down, then there are some serious problems with your blog. 

Design 
I have talked about this for a very long time. If your blog's design is not professional enough, then you can't expect readers to take your blog seriously. Make sure that the blog reflect's your style, your attitude, and more over, your company's attitude in this regard.

Sell 
Ultimately, we are blogging to earn money, right? Make sure that you are offering your readers something that they want. Possibly an eBook, or a Podcast link. Make sure to take advantage of Google Adsense and Adwords if you are a rookie blogger. But for small business owners, make sure that your blog sells your products and creates that "need" in your customers.

If you like what I wrote, then please feel kind to take a look at my lovely sponsors. Also, be sure to follow me on Twitter for the latest in the world of Social media and small business. 

Cheers!


image courtesy - businessweek.com

Favorite slideshows from my social media class

Over the course of the past few semesters I have made some of the slideshows I use in class publicly available on Slideshare. I also shared most of them on this blog. Since I periodically get requests for particular ones, I've decided to make the most popular ones available in one post here:

Blogging 101:

View more documents from Corinne Weisgerber.

Twitter for PR:

View more presentations from Corinne Weisgerber.

Using Twitter to Connect with Audiences:

View more documents from Corinne Weisgerber.

Twitter & Social Media for Crisis Communication:

View more documents from Corinne Weisgerber.

Monitoring Conversations Online:

View more documents from Corinne Weisgerber.

Guide to blogging, commenting & managing your personal brand

Since we will start setting up blogs in class next week, it's time to address blogging etiquette, reputation management and personal branding. That's why I've put together a slideshow on the topic. Take a look:

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: blogging reputation)

Resources for PR student bloggers

• Guidelines for PR student blogs: By Richard Bailey (lots of good ideas/links)
  
• Advice to start out careers in Public Relations - Bloggers with the Advantage: By Rajiv Harjai
• Should PR Students Blog? Hell Yeah: By Paull Young
  
• A View into the State of PR Education: By Richard Edelman (Why should you blog? Because Richard Edelman says so!)
  
• PR students: you are what you blog: By Stuart Bruce
  
• Promoting PR student blogs: By Karen Russell (Now that you've read about why you should blog and how to blog well, you should think about how to promote your blog)
  

Hillary Clinton promises government blogs in an effort to entice voters

In a campaign speech in New Hampshire on Monday night, presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton suggested that blogs could play a key role in making the U.S. government more transparent.

According to Clinton, "We should even have a government blogging team where people in the agencies are constantly telling all of you, the taxpayers, the citizens of America, everything that's going on so that you have up-to-the-minute information about what your government is doing, so that you too can be informed, and hold the government accountable."

If corporations can blog successfully, why not government? Would be interesting to see though if government blogs could convince the rest of the blogosphere of their authenticity and honesty. Judging by the current level of mistrust of all things government, that should prove to be a difficult task. Maybe comparable to Wal-Mart's trials and tribulations entering the social media scene?

Update: Incidentally, the White House yesterday launched its first version of a blog - a travel blog designed to report about President Bush's trip to the Middle East. The Trip Notes from the Middle East seems more like an online diary than a real blog though since it lacks any interactive functions (there's no comments feature).

Use your blog to pay for college - seriously!

I just stumbled upon this scholarship opportunity for college bloggers. The bad news: the application deadline is October 6th. The good news: the application essay for this $10,000 scholarship has a 300 word limit. So what are you waiting for?

Some ideas for deciding what to blog about

Since you are required to start blogging on a regular basis starting this week, I thought I'd add a few tips on how to identify potential topics. Remember that the idea of these posts is to get you to engage the course material critically and to have you keep your eyes open for interesting material to blog about. You will need to become an active learner and start being on the lookout for material to incorporate into the class instead of relying on me, as the instructor, to tell you what is important. Your blog posts should demonstrate your ability to locate examples of PR applications of social media on your own.

1. Start reading the PR blogs (Micropersuasion, PR 2.0, PR Squared, etc.). I have added a number of them to our course blog. This is where you'll find a lot of info pertaining to our class.

2. Read technology blogs. There are tons of them out there!

3. Watch/read the news. The presidential candidates, for instance, have been using different forms of social media for a while now, and you could find out about their latest uses by keeping up with the news coverage of their campaigns.

4. Start using some of the social bookmarking services we talked about in class. Find someone who tags social media sites and subscribe to that person's bookmarks via RSS. That way you'll come across sites/stories you may never have looked up on your own.

5. Just keep your eyes open while you are online - and have fun!