The Business Blogging Bible - Blog Marketing Success

I started writing a book on blog marketing entitled The Business Blogging Bible. Then I decided to shorten the book, publish it online, and make it free for everyone. So here you go ... 101 steps to blog marketing success. Enjoy! -Brandon Cornett, author

Part 1 - Planning Your Business Blog

Even if you already have a blog up and running, and you're eager to advance with your blog marketing campaign, you should start with this chapter. It may illuminate some things you forgot to consider when you first created your business marketing blog.

1. Blog for the right reasons.

Blogging takes work and dedication, and it goes a lot easier if you really want to blog. On the other hand, if you create a business blog simply because others are doing—and you lack the passion and purpose needed for an effective blog—than you will face an uphill battle from the start.

Good reasons to start a business blog:

• You love to write and wish to apply that skill toward your business development.
• You have something informative, interesting or helpful to share with others.
• You have a lot of information at your fingertips that could be put to good use through an online publishing channel.
• You want to start an online conversation with your audience.

These are all good reasons to create and manage a business blog. But creating a blog just because the other guys and gals are doing is almost always a bad idea.

2. Understand the benefits of blogging.

After all, this is your primary source of motivation in the early weeks or months of your blogging efforts.

Here's a more complete list of reasons why today's business professionals should blog, starting with the one we already know.

Easy to Publish — Business blogs are easy to publish, even for the web novice. That's because the blog does all of the technical work for you. You simply type your message, add links or images as needed, and click the "Publish" button. The blog will convert your text into web code for proper display on the Web. This simplicity is ideal for the small business owner, who usually does not have an extensive IT department (if one at all).

Easy to Launch — Blogs are also fairly simple to setup, especially if you get help from an experienced blogger. For instance, I recently set up a business blog for a company that provides factoring financial services to small and medium-sized businesses. I customized a WordPress blog template, designed a few buttons, and that was it. In two days, the blog was up and running.

Blog Marketing Success — As your blog grows in size and popularity, it can support several marketing objectives at once. It can help you attract readers, generate valuable leads, improve your search engine visibility, and position yourself as a trusted expert in your field. In other words, a business blog can help you compete with the "big dogs" online—because after all, nobody knows how big you are online. If you blog effectively and build an audience of loyal readers, you could even outperform your larger competitors online!

3. Get a plan on paper.

In business, it's wise to have a plan for everything. Just like you need a good business plan before starting a business, you also need a good blogging plan before launching your business blog. Among other things, this will help you develop the blog in your mind before you try to develop it for real.

Some of the things you should include in your business blogging plan:

• A description of the blog's intended audience
• A description of the type of content you will publish
• A list of categories / topics the blog will have (initially)
• A list of authors, if you plan to have more than one
• A publishing schedule for your business blog
• A list of content / ideas sources for blogging material

You will learn more about the items on this list as we proceed through this tutorial.

4. Identify your audience.

Creating an audience description is one of the most helpful things you can do when planning your business blog. You must first understand to whom you are writing before you can write to them effectively.

For best results, seek input from multiple people within your organization to create a well-rounded "audience profile." Your customer service people, for example, will be able to tell you what kind of concerns and questions your audience has.

Compile all of this information into an audience description and add it to your blogging plan, mentioned previously. For example, here is my audience description for this tutorial in particular and my blog in general:

My audience consists of business managers and owners who want to use the Internet to grow their businesses. They want to learn about blogging as way to share information, expand their web presence, increase their web traffic and attract new business.

5. Make a list of audience needs.

In my audience statement above, you can see that I've briefly outlined my audience's wants and needs. By doing the same for your audience, you will be able to use your business blog to address those needs. This is smart business in general, but it's an equally smart approach to business blogging.

6. Choose the right person.

Who will publish your blog? Will you have one author or several authors? Will you write the blog's content yourself or delegate it to someone else in your organization? These questions all fall under the "Person" factor — the third of our five P's.

The author(s) of a business blog will solely determine the blog's success or failure. The author is the blog, so it's critical to choose the right person for the job. If you run a one-man or one-woman operation, you will obviously be the blog's author. If you run a larger organization, you may have the opportunity to delegate blogging duties to the best candidate.

Whoever does the actual blog writing, it's crucial that they have a genuine passion for the project. It will require their continued focus and dedication, so choose wisely. And speaking of passion...

7. Follow the passion.

If you are going to maintain a business blog, you will get much further and enjoy greater benefits if you blog with passion and enthusiasm. There are two primary reasons for this:

1. If you blog about something you are enthusiastic about (a particular niche, industry, product, etc.), you will be more likely to blog often. As a result, your business blog will grow rapidly and thus provide more search engine visibility.

2. If you blog with enthusiasm and energy, people will find your blog more interesting (than if you were half-hearted about your blogging). This will in turn help you grow your readership and foster interaction with your audience through the form of reader comments. So instead of having passive readers, you could enjoy the lead-producing benefits of active participation.

Half-hearted commentary stands out like a purple elephant in the corporate blogosphere. This kind of commentary does more harm than good, whether it comes from the CEO, the communications chief, or Joe Employee. Enthusiasm comes across in blog posts — and it's contagious.

8. Blog in a real voice.

If you will be publishing the business blog on your own, this bit of advice is for you. If you have chosen a resident blogger, then be sure they get this information. As you get into the mindset of business blogging, remember to be yourself. Some bloggers feel they need to adopt a sort of persona to apply to the blog. Eventually, this comes across as contrived and false.

You will have an easier and more enjoyable time blogging — and your readers will enjoy it more — if you write in your own voice. So factor that into your blogging preparations.

9. Create a blogging schedule.

This step is not intended to keep your nose to the grindstone or anything. It will just help you keep your blog current. Remember, one of the primary differences between business blogs and business websites is that blogs are usually more current. That's why reader like them — they like the fresh, constantly updated content that the business blog provides.

My advice (and I've learned the hard way) is to start off with an easy publishing schedule. Start by publishing a new blog post once a week. Once you've got the hang of it and you've learned to work efficiently, you might step up the frequency. The important thing is to be consistent and publish as often as possible within reason.

10. Strive to be different somehow.

These days, there are quite a few business blogs online. There will be many more by the time I finish writing this tutorial. So simply publishing a business blog is not enough. You must work hard to make your blog different than those of your competitors, ideally making it better at the same time.

To put it more bluntly...

If you publish a mediocre business blog, you simply be adding to the noise. If you publish a truly unique blog, you will rise above the noise.

11. Strive to be better.

This tip piggybacks on the last one. Being different and unique is always helpful when it comes to business blogging. And the best way to achieve this is to be different by being better.

Spend some time reviewing the business blogs of others in your field / niche. Make a list of things they do well and try to incorporate those techniques into your blog. Then make a list of things the other blogs could do better, and pursue those things on your own business blog.

Chapter Conclusion

If you want your blog to succeed, you will have to dedicate a lot of time and energy to its growth and content. So it only makes sense to get off on the right foot. The more planning you do in advance, the more effective your business blog will be later on.

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Part 2 - Creating Your Business Blog

If you already a blog up and running, then you may want to skip over this chapter and head down to the next chapter on blog design.

But if you are starting from scratch and need to create a blog, this is the chapter for you! So let's continue our 101 steps to business blog marketing success with item #12...

12. Choose the right blogging program.

Before you can start growing your blog, you obviously need to choose a blogging program. These are the all-inclusive systems that will power your business blog. The three most popular programs are Blogger, WordPress and TypePad.

Some companies with big IT departments actually create their own blogging programs, but in my opinion this is often a waste of time and money. WordPress, for one, can be customized and configured to support any business blogging objective. So why reinvent the wheel?

All three of the programs mentioned above can support a business blog, but they do have their advantages and disadvantages. My advice is to experiment with each one before making a decision. It's also wise to talk to an experienced blogger who has used more than one program. He or she can help you understand the pros and cons of popular blogging programs.

13. Choose a hosting method.

Let's end this section by talking about the different ways to publish content to a blog. When I say "ways to publish a blog," I'm talking about where your blog will be located on the web.

Basically, you have three publishing options:

1. Have the blog hosted by a blog company.
2. Make the blog an extension of your website.
3. Give the blog a domain of its own.

Option 1 - Host your business blog with a blog company.
In this option, your blog will reside under the blog company's web domain. For instance, Blogger's web domain is blogspot.com, so if Jane Doe setup a blog under this domain it would look something like this: www.JaneDoe.blogspot.com. Jane will never truly own this domain, because it is part of Blogspot.com. This is one of the down sides of this hosting option.

Option 2 - Make the business blog an extension of your website.
In this option, your blog will reside on your own web domain, but as a sub-domain. In other words, the blog will be an extension of your website. One of my marketing blogs, for instance, is an extension of the website ArmingYourFarming.com. I publish my blog to a sub-domain of my website: www.armingyourfarming.com/realestatemarketing.

Option 3 - Give the business blog a domain of its own.
In this option, your blog will reside in the top-level (or "root") directory of your website domain. So the blog becomes the website itself. When somebody types in the root web address ending with ".com" ... they land on the blog itself. This website, www.ceoblogwatch.com, is a blog, but it resides on its own domain. It is not an extension of a website like my real estate marketing blog under option #2.

I recommend you use hosting option #2 or #3 above. In either case, you will be hosting the blog on a server that you have access to, and you'll be able to back up the blog. If you host your blog with a blogging company (option #1 above), you will never truly own the blog or the content on it.

14. Create a checklist of needs and functionality.

As mentioned previously, there are quite a few blogging programs out there (aside from the top three: Blogger, WordPress and Typepad). Each program has its own pros and cons, so in order to find the one best suites for your needs you must first identify those needs.

Make a list of the things you want to do with your blog ... the kinds of functions you think you'll be using a lot. Uploading pictures? Adding guest authors? Encouraging reader comments? While most blog programs offer similar functionality, some of them excel in areas where others struggle.

So before you can begin experimenting with blogging programs (next item), you must first know what components are most important to you. That's the purpose of making a "needs and wants" list.

15. Experiment with WordPress, Blogger, Etc.

Which blogging program is right for you? Well, only you can answer that question. But here's the good news. You can experiment with most of the major blogging tools for free, simply by creating a blog (a five-minute process) and using the program for a while.

I recommend starting a blog through Blogger.com and WordPress.org (at least) to see how the programs differ, and to find out which one you like the most. All blogging programs perform similar functions, so it's mainly a matter of which one you like best.

16. Think ahead toward expansion.

When planning your business blog it is critical to think ahead. At first, you might plan to keep your blog simple. But I can almost guarantee you that you'll want to expand it and add things on as you go, once you're comfortable with the basics of business blogging.

For example, maybe you will start off with one author and a few categories. But what if your business blog later grows to include several authors, each with their own set of categories? What if you want to experiment with mobile blogging, podcasts, etc.?

My point is, try to think ahead as much as possible, and make sure you choose a versatile blogging program that can support your future goals.

Chapter Conclusion

Choosing the best bloggging platform for your own particular needs will make everything much easier. Experiment with the different blogging programs available today. Talk to a colleague who has used different blog programs. Make your choice based on research and experimentation — not by guessing.

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Part 3 - Designing Your Business Blog

You must design your blog for marketing success. You must make it easy for readers to use and interact with your blog, and to find the things you want them to find. At the same time, it helps to have an eye-pleasing design that is unique from other blogs.

So let's talk about how to accomplish these things, starting with item #17 in our 101 steps to blog marketing success.

17. Keep things organized.

Organization is an area where a lot of business blogs falter. Organization is good for all aspects of your business. And when it comes to doing business online, organization becomes critical. Every goal you have for your business blog can be better achieved if you keep your blog organized. More to follow on this subject!

18. Use a custom design.

When you first create your business blog it will probably have a "default" design. This is one of the basic designs that come with the blog software program. But you want your blog to be unique, not cookie-cutter. So you will want to use a custom blog design. Blog designs are referred to as "themes" and "templates." There are literally thousands of them online, and they are designed specifically for certain programs. For example, if you are going to use WordPress as your blogging platform, you can visit the website below to shop for a WordPress theme you like:

• http://themes.wordpress.net/

Once you find a theme you like, you can download it to your computer, upload it to your web hosting account in the appropriate folder for WordPress themess, and then customize it with your logo, colors, photos, etc.

My advice is to choose a clean, well-organized blog theme — one that follows good standards of usability. When it doubt, pick a simple theme. A business blog should focus on providing quality information and attracting customers, not winning design awards.

19. Design around content and function.

Content and usability are two of the most important ingredients of a business blog. Content is what keeps people around, educates them, motivates them, inspires them to act, etc. Usability makes all of this possible. So anything you do from a blog design standpoint should be done to improve your usability and showcase your content. In other words, you should avoid design changes just for the sake of design.

20. Design with readers in mind.

Before you change any element of your business blog design / layout, ask yourself this question: "Will this change help my reader, or will it take something away? Will it make my blog easier to use, or will it just get in the readers way?" You must respect your readers if you want them to respond.

21. Realize that content outweighs design.

I don't mean to beat this to death or anything, but it bears repeating one more time. The content of your business blog is more important than your blog's design. Some of the most popular and successful business blogs today have very basic designs. The owners of these blogs don't do this because they lack design talent or "inspiration" ... they do it because they know a basic blog design with superb content is a winning combination.

22. Make your blog visually interesting.

We have talked a lot about things like content, usability and function. But with all of this being said, there is certainly nothing wrong with adding visual interest to your blog through design techniques. I encourage you to do so, but do it with an eye toward usability.

You can have the best of both worlds — you can create a visually appealing blog that's also incredibly easy to use. And your business blog will be more successful as a result.

Chapter Conclusion

Good design goes a long way in business blogging. A clean blog design will make your content more accessible and your blog more usable, two important criteria for online marketing success.

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Part 4 - Business Blog Usability

Usability refers to how easy (or hard) it is for people to use your blog, and it goes hand in hand with blog marketing success in general. After all, the easier your blog is for people to use, the more likely they will be to use it ... repeatedly.

Starting with item #23 in our 101 steps to blogging success, we will talk about ways to improve your blog's usability.

23. Keep things organized.

I told you we would revisit the topic of organization! But there's a good reason for it. An unorganized business blog is a failure waiting to happen. People are fickle and fast moving online. If somebody lands on your blog's main page and finds it cluttered or disorganized, they will leave faster than you can say "back button."

So always, always, always keep organization in mind, whether your writing a blog post or arranging your sidebar items.

24. Link to your profile page.

In most cases, business blogs are closely associated with one or more authors. There is nothing anonymous about a blog (or at least, there shouldn't be). So be sure to create an "About the Author" page for you and anyone else who regularly contributes to the blog. Link to these author pages from your blog's main menu, or from the sidebar area.

25. Link to your main website.

If you have a main business website in addition to your blog, be sure to link to that site from the blog. The top two links on all of my business blogs are "Blog Home" and "Main Website" (when applicable). I want people to be able to find these two things above all else, because there is no telling how or where somebody will enter your blog.

26. Link to your purpose / about page.

What's the purpose of your business blog? What do you want people to get out of it? How will readers benefit from visiting your blog on a regular basis? Create a blog post / page that answers these kinds of questions, and link to that page from your blog's home page.

27. De-clutter your sidebar.

The sidebar is a critical area of the business blog because it usually includes key elements such as menus, RSS feeds and the like. The trouble is, many business bloggers tend to clutter up their sidebars with unnecessary bells and whistles. Just because a particular blogging tool exists does not mean you need it in your sidebar. Use this area for necessary items only -- not useless bells and whistles.

At a minimum, your blog sidebar should contain the links to your profile page and "About" page mentioned above, your RSS subscription info, blog categories, and your "lifeline" navigation (next item). The more you add beyond that, the more you run the risk of cluttering your business blog and decreasing its usability.

Reduce clutter any way you can. Some business blogs have so many RSS buttons, graphics, advertisements, and other bells and whistles that they become an absolute mess. You can avoid this by cleaning up your sidebar area, using a supplemental menu area when necessary, grouping things logically, and removing anything that doesn't need to be there.

28. Include "lifeline" navigation.

There's no telling where somebody will enter your business blog, especially if it's a large blog with hundreds of posts. People might enter through the main page, or they might come in through a particular post by finding it in search engines.

So you need to ask yourself this question: "What are the most important items I want people to find from any page or section of my blog?" This is what I call your lifeline navigation -- the items you want to appear in the sidebar of every post and page of your business blog. It may contain some of the items mentioned above in items 24 - 26, or anything else you deem important. Just be sure to offer people a lifeline to find their way around, and include it on every page of your blog.

29. Create logical categories for your blog.

When used properly, categories are one of the most helpful features of a business blog. They allow people to search all of your previous blog posts by topic area ... but only if you categorize your posts effectively. Label your blogging categories with short but easy-to-understand names. This requires some forethought, so you will want to plan it out on paper when creating your business blog (as discussed below).

30. Think ahead when creating categories.

The best way to create categories for your business blog is to sit down with a piece of paper and think ahead, well into the future of your blog. Of course, you can't always predict how things will unfold. But the more you can think ahead, the better able you will be to choose and create the best categories for your blog -- before you start chalking up the blog posts. This will improve the management, organization and usability of your business blog.

31. Limit the number of posting categories to reduce confusion.

Most business blogs can get by with a handful of categories, if they've been properly planned out. More than ten categories on a blog, and you begin to create an information-overload situation.

32. Categorize blog posts consistently.

If you've done a good job setting up your blog categories, this should be pretty straightforward. Each time you create a new blog post, be sure to list it under the most relevant category. This might not seem like a big deal in the beginning, when your blog is young. But down the road, when you have hundreds or possibly thousands of individual blog posts, good categorization will help people find the information they're after.

33. Use inline links where applicable.

If you reference a previous blog post when writing a new post, link to the reference source. This is a great way to increase the usability of your business blog, because people can easily follow the inline links to the information you have cross-referenced. This is also great for search engine visibility, but we will get to that in Part 6.

34. Summarize long posts in advance.

Ever notice how the newspapers always put a summary sentence at the top of long articles? It usually comes right after the headline and before the actual story. This is great for blogging too. It lets people scan the top of the blog post to get an idea of what's to come. This increases usability because people can find information more quickly, and they can decide which blog posts to read and which ones to skip (hey, it happens).

35. Create RSS buttons for easy subscribing.

The one of the main differences between a business blog and a regular business website is that blogs are updated more often. At least, they should be. Even better, people can use the blog's RSS feed to keep tabs on future postings, either by using an RSS reader or a personalized page such as MyYahoo.com. Make it easy for people to do this by creating RSS subscription buttons and including them within your sidebar area.

You can use a chicklet generator to quickly and easy create such buttons, such as the one located at: http://www.kbcafe.com/rss/chicklet.aspx.

36. Conduct a simple usability test.

Ask a friend or colleague to visit your blog, and see how quickly they can (A) find the main menu, (B) determine the blog's theme and purpose, (C) find contact information, etc.

Chapter Conclusion

When it comes to business blogs, usability has a direct impact on profitability. Keep you blog clean and easy to read. Web readers and researches are skilled at hopping from site to site. They don't need much of a reason to bail out on you, and they'll do just that if your blog is hard to navigate.

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Part 5 - Writing Content for Your Business Blog

So you have your blog up and running, it looks great, it's easy to use, and you are ready to charge forward with your blog marketing program. Now what? Well, it's time to start creating content for your blog.

So in this section, we will pick up with item #37 in our 101 steps to blog marketing success. Let's talk about creating blog content!

37. Write in your own voice.

Don't try to impress people with your vocabulary. The best blogs convey quality information in a conversational style. You don't need to be a professional website copywriter to accomplish this. Just speak to your audience as if they were in the room with you -- don't lecture to them. As you go, you'll find that this approach makes the blog writing process much easier and quicker.

38. Follow your content plan.

Back in Part 1 you create a blogging plan, and that included your content. So if you haven't yet done so, create a content plan for blog writing purposes. It doesn't have to be any fancier than a notebook page with your brainstorming ideas and notes. Make a list of topics that (A) you know a lot about, (B) your target audience would find helpful, and (C) are somehow related to your business.

By creating and following a content plan, you will be able to write focused content on a regular basis. Writer's block is a myth created by lazy writers!

Learn more about the content plan.

39. Make each post useful.

Write each blog post so it can stand on its own. Each post should offer value on an individual level (in addition to being part of a greater whole). Remember, you never know where somebody will enter your blog, so you want them be impressed with your professional knowledge at all points of entry.

40. Create strong titles for each post.

When creating the titles for your blog posts, try to think like an ad writer. An interesting title that suggests a helpful post will pull in more readers. And that's the first step to turning strangers into readers ... and readers into customers.

I'm going to share a copywriting secret with you. If you want to learn how to create titles that draw people into the blog post, pick up a copy of Reader's Digest. I don't subscribe to Reader's Digest, but I read the cover every time I'm in line at the grocery store.

Why?

Because the Digest knows a thing or two about irresistible titles. In fact, the cover of each issue is nothing more than a list of article titles. And it's worth mentioning at this point that Reader's Digest is one of the best-selling publications on the planet!

Pay particular attention to their "how to" titles and articles. People love a good "how to" article. A successful copywriter once said that if you begin a headline with the words "How to," you can't go far wrong. I think he may have been right.

Blog Title Checklist:

• Does your title create a strong desire to read further?
• Does your title suggest that the blog post is helpful?
• Does your title identify your intended audience in some way?
• Does your title accurately describe the subject matter of the post?
• Does your title contain your key search phrase for SEO purposes?

41. Format content for the web.

Reading online is a challenge. You can make it easier on people by formatting your blog content for web reading. This means offering an advanced summary for longer posts, using plenty of headers and bullet points, and keeping paragraphs reasonably short (3 - 7 lines). If people enter your blog to find huge, dense, intimidating blocks of text with no formatting, they probably won't bother straining their eyeballs.

42. Keep it lively. Write with enthusiasm.

If you are going to maintain a business blog, you will get much further and enjoy greater benefits if you blog with enthusiasm. There are two primary reasons for this:

• 1. If you blog about something you are enthusiastic about, you will be more likely to blog often. As a result, your blog will grow rapidly and thus provide more value for readers, greater search engine visibility.
• 2. If you blog with enthusiasm and energy, people will find your business blog more interesting (than if you were half-hearted about your blogging). This will in turn help you grow your readership and foster interaction with your audience through the form of reader comments. So instead of having passive readers, you could enjoy the lead-producing benefits of active participation.

When it comes to business blogging, unenthusiastic commentary stands out like a purple elephant. Avoid this by choosing a topic that interests you, and blog about it with energy and passion. In time, this will help you improve your blog's readership, interaction, and general success.

43. Keep your key audience in mind.

Back in Part 1 of this tutorial, I showed you how to create an audience profile. These are the folks who make up your intended audience. When writing your blog posts, be sure to refer to your audience profile document often. Keep your key audience in mind always when creating new content for your blog. Give them the information they want and you will earn their attention, their repeat business, and (ultimately) their business.

44. Relate each post to your overall mission.

We just discussed how you should keep your audience in mind when writing blog material. You should also keep your overall mission in mind. Why did you start your blog in the first place? What do you hope to achieve from your blogging efforts? Keep these things in mind when writing new posts.

45. Create new blog posts on a regular basis.

The sheer quantity of content you produce will benefit you in several ways. First, it will help you rank higher in search engines, and will help you appear in more searches for a broader range of phrases. If your business blog has hundreds of posts or pages of content over time, you will be casting your SEO net much further than with a static 10-page website. The size of a website is also one of the top-three ranking factors for most search engines.

A high-volume blog is also a great resource for readers interested in that particular business topic. So they will be more likely to stay on the blog for longer periods of time, which has a direct impact on the lead generation potential of your business blog.

Later in this tutorial, I will give you some tips for blogging on a regular basis (without running out of ideas or topics).

46. Write within your categories.

We have talked about blog categories in both the planning and usability sections of this tutorial. By writing your blog posts in line with the categories you've created, you will have a much more organized and topically relevant business blog.

If you need to create new categories later down the road, you can certainly do so. But here's my warning to you -- use categories sparingly and choose them wisely. Think ahead when creating categories. Try to limit them the number of categories. One of the most common usability problems I see on business blogs is the overuse of categories. Who wants to look through a list of 30 categories for information? Not me.

47. Recycle material.

Another great thing about business blogging is that you can recycle your blog content for other purposes, and vice versa. You can recycle material onto and off of your business blog. A few years ago, as a writer for a direct marketing company, I quickly learned that you never use a piece of written material only once. You can "recycle" quality content to get more out of your writing efforts.

• You could compile some of your blog posts, or maybe just expand on particular post, into a full-article length. Then you could publish this article online for additional website traffic, exposure and search engine benefits.
• You could use email content for blog posts. Think of all the content contained within your business emails -- all the questions you answer, all the information you provide. Why not recycle that into blog content? Perhaps you could use it for a steady stream of Q&A material.
• You could convert blog posts into material for an online press release ... or publish your online press release onto your blog.

These are just a few of the ways you can recycle written material onto and off of your business blog. I'm sure you can think of more ways, and I hope that you do. The end result of this is more exposure, more visibility, more potential web traffic ... and all with less effort!

Chapter Conclusion

Writing is the single most important act within business blogging. Once you get past the design, the bells and whistles, you have only the written word. What you write about on your blog will determine its success or failure more than any other factor, so take your blog writing seriously.

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Part 6 - Optimizing Your Blog for Search Engine Visibility

Let me begin by saying you should never blog just for the search engines. If you're going to start a company blog, you should do it for business and communication reasons, not for search engine optimization (SEO) purposes. With that being said, a blog can certainly help with search engine visibility!

So let's pick up with item #48 in our 101 steps to blog marketing success, by focusing on the many ways to boost your blog's visibility online!

48. Learn the basics of SEO.

I'm not suggesting you become an expert in search engine optimization. But I am suggesting you learn the basic principles of SEO -- things like keyword research and usage, link popularity, etc. Why bother? Because any business can benefit from an increase search engine visibility and web traffic. A blog can help you achieve these things, especially if you learn the fundamentals of search engine ranking and visibility.

49. Do some keyword research.

Before you can improve your blog's search engine visibility, you have to identify the key phrases under which your blog should be found. Key search phrases are those phrases your target audience would enter into a search engine when researching products or services like yours.

For instance, if I were a pool builder in Austin, Texas, my key phrases might include:

• austin pool builders
• pool companies in austin
• austin texas pool builders
• build a pool in austin texas
• and so on...

Key phrases are critical to your search engine success. The only way to connect with your key prospects through search engines is to know what phrases your key prospects are searching.

The trouble is, a lot of people waste time, effort and opportunity by incorporating the wrong phrases. This limits the number of people who find your blog or website, and it prevents you from tapping into the best audience of all -- people searching for exactly you what provide!

Here's the good news. You don't have to guess which phrases people are searching and which ones they're not. You can find out by using a search tracking service such as WordTracker.com or KeywordDiscovery.com. With either of these services, you can enter a particular search phrase, and they will tell you how many people searched for that phrase in the past month.

Both of the services mentioned above are paid services. But WordTracker does have a free version of their service that should be more than sufficient for your purposes:
http://freekeywords.wordtracker.com/

50. Create a spreadsheet of keywords.

Once you have access to a keyword tool, set up an Excel spreadsheet or a Word document for your list of phrases. For now, you only need two columns. Eventually you can add columns for additional purposes, such as keeping track of web pages you've written, your search engine ranking for each phrase, etc. But for now, your spreadsheet or table only needs two columns -- "phrase" and "count."

In the phrase column, you will obviously put the phrases that meet the three criteria listed below. In the count column, you will put the number of times the phrase is searched. This number will vary based on which keyword tool you use, but the exact number is not important. What is important is the relative difference between the phrases. For example, you'll get more traffic from a phrase that is searched 500 times a day than a phrase that gets searched only twice per day.

With that said, go for a mix of high-traffic short phrases and lower-traffic long phrases. The high-traffic phrases will be more competitive, but also more valuable. The lower-traffic phrases are easier to rank for, but will bring less traffic. Aim for a good mix.

Regardless of key phrase length, you want to create a list of what I call "high-value phrases." Such phrases have three things in common. These will be your minimum criteria when selecting phrases to put on your list:

(1) People are searching for the phrase.
(2) The phrase is related to your business / services in some way.
(3) You are capable of writing about the topic, or you know somebody who can.

51. Add a column for blogging coverage.

Now that you have your spreadsheet of key search phrases (relevant phrases that you have validated through a keyword-research tool), you can add a column for blogging coverage. This would simply be an additional column of the spreadsheet labeled with "blogged." When you blog about a certain phrase or topic on the list, indicate it with a mark under the "blogged" column.

Your list of phrases is also a blueprint for website growth. Think about it for a moment. What better way to grow a website than by creating content around the phrases and topics your ideal audience is researching?

52. Use keywords in titles.

Search engines pay a lot of attention to the title element of each blog post. When you create a title for your blog post, the title also becomes the HTML title element of that individual web page / blog post. When you are looking at a web page, you'll notice a short title up in the blue bar at the top of your browser window. This is the title element, and search engines use this title to understand more about your page content.

For instance, the title element of this web page is "Business Blogging Bible - 101 Tips for Business Blog Success."

The title element also appears in search engine results pages (SERPs), above the description and URL for each listing. So in this capacity, the title must be well written, descriptive and enticing.

Most blog programs take the title you assign to each blog post and automatically convert it into the page's title element. So you don't have to think about the web coding side of things. You just write a great title, and the blog program will handle the coding for you.

Here's what to take away from this lesson. The title you give your blog post is important for search engine visibility. So it should be descriptive, relevant to the blog post it describes, and filled with keywords and phrases.

53. Incorporate keywords into body of blog post.

Refer back to the list of key phrases you created previously. When writing new posts for your blog, be sure to incorporate those phrases throughout the post. This should happen naturally, because you are blogging about topics that are a direct spin-off from your key phrases.

Keyword-rich content is the foundation of good search engine visibility. Sure, you need to have inbound links to that content (covered below), but it all starts with the content itself.

54. Practice interlinking.

55. Submit your blog to web directories.

56. Convert posts into articles.

57. Connect with like-minded bloggers.

58. Create an authoritative resource.

59. Download my guide to blog visibility.

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