So what do you blog about?
Remember these 15 content creating rules and you will hit the jackpot every time ...
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Educate * Empower & enlighten * Entertain * Engage * Envelop * Emulate *
Enchant * Expectation * Ebooks & emails * Effort * Ease * Eye pleasing *
Enthusiasm & Energy * Empathise * Experts
1. Educate ... with such little time available to readers they'll need to have a reason to keep visiting your blog. It's not enough to post your creations and expect them to buy. You need to educate them, teach them, enable them to learn from you. Short on educational ideas? Think tips, tutorials, techniques, tactics, teaching. If you know your audience like you should you'll find inspiration everywhere to deliver to them.
2. Empower & enlighten ... give them their feel good fix. Think inspiration, motivation, self esteem, encouragement, cheerleading, support, confidence boosting. Show you understand, care, empathise and are on their side
3. Entertain ... cute cats, funny feel goods, sassy sayings, questions & quotes, happy humour anything that will bring a little lightheartedness to their day. Consider tours, reviews, recipes, interviews, inspiration. Laughter & humour is contagious and bonding
4. Engage .... comments, questions, take an interest, get to know them, find things for them, think about them
5. Envelop ..... let them into your world, peeks behind the scenes, open up & be vulnerable, speak from the heart. Share your passion for your subject.
6. Emulate .... look at the online sites, blogs or resources you follow, read, devour. How do they keep hoking you back in? What are they doing to keep you coming back for more? Learn from the masters that capture your attention
7. Enchant ... use images & photos to evoke senses and speak to your readers, overlay your messages, allow pictures to speak for you - remember 'a picture paints a thousand words'.
8. Expectation .. be consistent updating your content, craft a content calendar and plan out what you'll feature and when. Become reliable & trustworthy in turning up for your readers; being erractic and unexpected will turn people away. Keep a list of topics that your audience might be interested in as a base for inspiring your content.
9. E-books & emails ... as collecting contact information from your readers is one of the keys to success, creating a free e-book as a thank you gift for readers lending you their email address for further contact is always popular
10. Effort ... although at first you may not be blessed with multitudes of readers, be patient, take your time and lower your expectations. Slow growth is better than no growth. It can take years for your blog to be popular and well subscribed so make sure what you're blogging about is a long term passion for you. Blogging is hard work but it's still one of the most effective methods of sharing your stuff.
11. Ease - make your content simple and easy to understand. Focus on writing for your customers and not to impress your peers. Think about what your readers want to read about and how they like to receive their information and focus on providing it to the best of your ability.
12. Eye-pleasing - colours, fonts, designs and layouts can all make or break a readers pleasurable experience of your blog. If in doubt, get some professional design help. Your blog is a representation of your image as a business & you only get one chance to make a first impression - make sure you're giving off the right vibes!
13. Enthusiasm & Energy - if you're not enthusiastic in your content, tone and ideas - how could you expect your readers to be about you?
14. Experts - follow industry experts, learn from them, quote them, reference them, link to them, share their material - you could even ask to guest post for them. Aim to become the expert in your niche.
15. Empathise - understand their struggles and show how you can help solve their problems
Here's a handy reminder graphic for you - feel free to share it!
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Think about your favourite sites, blogs or online resources - what keeps you going back for more?
