Hello
This is the second in a series of emails title “zero to blogger” and they are aimed at getting your blog working for you. They work best when you implement the advice. Today we are going to look at getting found by your ideal reader.The ideal reader
Getting found by our ideal reader, the one that we defined yesterday is important. It takes a combination of SEO, hanging around where they hang out, promoting your blog and word of mouth. And that is just to get the readers!
Traffic is important but not as important as you think. Relevant traffic is very important. If you are writing your blog posts for silver surfers you need to make them feel at home on your blog. You need to use the language that they like and you need to reassure them that they are safe in your blog’s community. If you write for business people you need to write in their language and if you write technical papers, it’s ok to use jargon if your ideal reader will understand it. In fact, not only will they understand it they will respond to it as it ‘talks’ solely to them.
When you do this you will find that some people come and take a look at your blog and move on. They were never your ideal audience, you were not speaking to them. If they stopped and subscribed to you, they are not going to buy but don’t panic – these people are useful and we’ll look at them tomorrow. You are sifting your readers, the ones that fall from the sieve are not lost customers, the ones that remain in the sieve are those ideal customers that want what you have to sell.
When writing to your ideal reader you need to include some of the keywords that will attract her, in the blog post itself.
Examples of talking to your ideal reader
If you are a leasing company you may want to write about 10 things you should know about leasing your business/company cars, if business people are your target audience. Looking to attract those who are about to return their business/company cars? They may be looking for a better deal, so if you wrote about what happens when you return a company car when the lease is up – you will start to attract the ideal reader. Remember to add a liberal sprinkling of the keywords that you wish to be found for.
If you are a nursery school you may want to write a post about what your child can expect on their first day.
Speak directly to your ideal reader, and then make it clear what you would like them to do next – subscribe to your newsletter, tweet the post… decide on one thing you would like them to do and ask them to do it.
Remember, you may be looking to make a sale but they are looking to get to know you and they are looking to see if they like you and like your style. The more they like you, the more they will want to engage with you ie tweet your posts, write comments and share what you write. As they get to know you then they are in a position to become a customer.
Back at the beginning of this post I mention SEO, there are things you can do to your blog to help the SEO. If you don’t have a premium theme that is SEO ready, consider adding the All in One SEO plugin. (or get in touch and we can work out an upgrade deal)
Tweak your settings.
Instead of having your URL say www.myblog.com/p12
have it say www.myblog.com/how-to-lease-a-company-car
This simple change increased a friend’s blog traffic by 35% in three weeks, Google sent more targeted traffic.
On your WordPress dashboard…
Go to settings
Click Permalinks
Click Custom
Add /%postname%
Save the settings
Simple; tweak and forget.
Hanging out where your ideal readers hang out
- Forums are great for this if you have a business model that means you can share advice, tips and answer questions. Try Quora for general Q&As, it’s popular at the moment and if you need an invitation, let me know and I’ll send you one.
- Comment on other blogs and use them for networking, craft a useful comment and people will want to know who you are. They may be the people to recommend you in the future.
- Guest post – If you have a really brilliant post, consider offering it exclusively to a much bigger blog in your industry. Not only will you get a link back to your site, you will pick up subscribers. When I blogged about trending topics on Search Engine Journal I picked up 130 subscribers overnight. That is 130 more than I had yesterday! 130 more potential readers to become customers.
- Hang around the influencers in your industry, remember they may not be who you think they are.
When Warren Cass posted a guest blog from Dr Ivan Misner, Dr Misner tweeted it out and 27 people went to look from his 8,000 followers.
When LinkedIn expert Mark Perl wrote a guest post for Warren, the results were double and Mark has fewer followers. His followers are better engaged with him, and more likely to click through. The influencers are not always the people you think they are, so check and double check who you interact with.
A great guest post will lead to bigger opportunities for you and enable you to get found by your ideal reader.
Promoting your blog posts
Make sure you tweet your own blog posts out. Add your feed to Hootsuite or similar to do it for you or consider adding a plugin such as Twitter Blog Comments as mentioned here. Make it easy for your readers to share your content by adding sharing buttons.
Lots to think about today, if you get stuck ping me an email and I’ll help
PS I am on Twitter and you are welcome to tweet me @SarahArrow
If you found this post via a search engine or Twitter, welcome. It’s part of a 7 part series for better blogging and please subscribe so you get all the valuable information delivered to your inbox. The email series is free.
Sarah Arrow
Director of Special Projects at Sark eMedia
Blogging an issue for you? Social media not quite working how it should be? I started out as a transport blogger for a same day courier company, and grew into a kick-ass blog coach as well as creator of Birds on the Blog (listed 3 times by Forbes as a top 100 website for women).
You want your blog to make a difference, so subscribe here and stay in touch, my updates will help you connect the dots.
