I ignore at least 10 blogs for every blog that I read and enjoy. I ignore them for a lot of reasons, from the way they look to the way they sound. Unfortunately, your blog could be one of those that just isn’t doing it for me. Here are seven reasons why I give up on a blog. Are you making any of these mistakes?
I sometimes refer to the sidebar as the sausage of a website or blog because that’s where people feel the need to stuff every widget and plugin on the face of the earth. But it’s the sidebar content that’s helpful to visitors that will be helpful to you in the long run in the form of trust and loyalty. Here are some ideas for using a sidebar effectively – and some things you should consider getting rid of.
Whether you have a warehouse of inventory or a few items in an Etsy shop, your product descriptions can have a big impact on whether customers buy or just shrug and browse another site. Even if you’re selling a digital product, you still need a good description. But what makes one description “good” and another “meh”? Here are a couple of tips for keeping yours in the “good” column and increasing the odds that someone will click the buy button.
Someone once asked me: how do users read on the web? My answer? They don’t. Internet users scan. They pick out individual words and sentences. Check out these statistics from a recent study: 79% of participants always scanned a new webpage. Only 16% actually read word-by-word. Here is how you can make your content more readable and keep those wandering eyes from leaving your page.
Every day, businesses and organizations incorporate humor into their marketing content. Many do it effectively and reap the rewards. Many more fail and waste money. Here are a few tips that can help you do it right.
This year we decided to do things differently on our blog, and that meant using an editorial calendar instead of simply waiting for inspiration to hit. If you’re also into the whole “inspiration” thing, here are a couple of reasons to start being a little more left-brained. Since you’re already a subscriber and reader, you can access the calendar right now by shooting me an email and letting me know. I’ll send you the link and password!
When my daughter Caitlin cops a toddler ‘tude, my wife and I always make her say she’s sorry, and what she’s sorry for, so she knows what she did wrong – at least for the next 30 seconds or so. This is how part of a recent exchange went between my wife and daughter that made me realize how easy it is to misinterpret a message.
I always used to say that the best way to expose bad content was with “good SEO.” That’s because stuffing keywords and links into content was accepted by many as the way to tame the Google monster and punch a ticket to the top of search rankings. Thanks to the recent Panda and Penguin updates from Google that emphasize content quality, that approach isn’t necessary. Actually, that approach will get you in hot water with the search gods. Here’s why writing for people – not some scientific algorithm – is so much more valuable.
Your company’s tagline is part of the BIG THREE elements of your brand: name, logo and tagline. Because different people process information differently in their memory, you really need all three to create a strong brand awareness. Working with small business owners I’ve found that while just about everyone has a business name and most businesses have logos, very few have taglines. If your business doesn’t have a tagline, you’re missing a key element of your branding and marketing. Here are 5 things to consider when developing yours.
During the famous SALT talks in 1972, Henry Kissinger heard Leonid Brezhnev recount a chilling story about a condemned man and the tsar of Russia. The tsar had written, rather cryptically: “Execution impossible pardon.” Without punctuation, it was impossible to tell whether the tsar meant “Execution impossible, pardon” or “Execution, impossible pardon.” That seemingly trivial function, punctuation, can mean life or death. Before you click “publish” or hand your document to the printer, follow this important guideline.
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