Know-How Exchange : Website Critique

The best bloggers have strong opinions about their topic. They don't take the "expert tone" ("in my opinion, this is the way to do things"). They don't take the me-too tone ("As others have said, this is they way to do things") They take the fanatic tone ("only dummies would do that").

You want to balance strong opinion with professionalism, since the goal for you is to have people hire you.

One technique that helps drive traffic is to invite some guest bloggers to write some articles (cross-market yourself). That will help attract more traffic. Likewise, you might want to write entries on others' blogs (that are on-topic). The idea is to build a blog referral source (blogroll).

As Kathleen mentioned, you'll also want to get your blog listed and keyword optimized.

As an aside: your blog should be benefits-based. Your new title ("Strategic business planning for better results") is a bit too generic for my taste. Perhaps something more like "Strategic Business Planning Tips".

While you didn't ask, I clicked on your website button from your blog and got a disconnect. Ideally, you want your blog to feel like an extension of your website (from a branding perspective). I would spend some more time getting the blog & website in alignment, focused on the benefit statement to your prospective clients.

Trouble is that by the time I write this reply there will be another 1000 blogs like yours created on the Internet.

You need to determine what you really want to accomplish with this blog. You may not need many people to read it. If this becomes an introduction of your abilities and services then providing links on your business card and emails may provide the most important readership even if it a small number.

On the other hand if you are trying to get a huge audience so you can earn advertising revenue then you need something more ... much more.

Personally I think blogs are just about dead. It is difficult to lead a useful dialog with readers via a blog.

I prefer forums or social sites like DIGG where the readers become deeply involved and the leaders (you) get to set the tone and direction.

Chris -

The blog / website disconnect was mostly visual. The colors weren't the same, the logo was in a different place, etc. (I don't want to critique your website, since you weren't asking about that).

Another suggestion: less text, more whitespace, and perhaps a catchy photo that reinforces the concept you're blogging about. That will make your blog easier to scan.

If you have 20 years of experience in planning, then perhaps it's time to share them a series of strategic planning mistakes (and of course, offer solutions). People love stories with a happy ending, especially if they can painlessly learn someone else's lesson.

Rather than think of making the blog look like the website (or visa versa), think of what look you're trying to achieve and have both of them reflect that. The website should have a link to your blog and visa versa, and the feeling is that they should feel a connected experience.

The key is getting the content spot-on. The visuals can continue to improve over time. But do keep them in-sync.

Relax, and don't worry. In the world of blogging, the first year to 18 months will seem like an exercise in public mental masturbation. Traffic may be low to non-existent for some time.

Its not that you have to find an audience, it's more about an audience finding you! Yes, your audience will find you. As you add more and more content, you will find your voice, your theme, your meme, and....suddenly, your audience will find you.

Sure, you may start out writing for a niche you think you fill, but as you write, your thoughts will eventually fit into a tighter and tighter pattern. Your writing style will be picked up upon, and the words you choose will be picked up by search engines. If you are natural in your writing, the search engines will pick up on certain words you naturally use more often and eventually dominate. If you try to force your wording to fit the search engine placement you want to occupy, your writing will be stiff disjoint to your personality, and sound contrived and fake, thus it will cost you readers. So, BE YOURSELF!

Your choice of blogging tool is, by its very nature and relationship to Google (Google bought Blogger a while ago) has a certain 'preference' in search standings. Google has never publicly stated the bounce in SEO you get using blogger, but from personal experience, it does tend to pop up faster on Google's Search engine than if you registered a domain name, set up and configured a copy of word press, and then began blogging.

It does look better if your web site does match your blog, or your blog match your web site. Mind you, there are also just as many positives and negatives having them as separate entities. Don't worry about it much, this is early days for you, experiment as much as you can and stretch your wings. Any mistake and miscalculation (not to mention opinion) you may make or have is best made now, before you have a huge following. Making mistakes in front of a small crowd is preferable to doing so in front of a couple hundred thousand or million people.

Register your blog with Technorati, Feedburner, Syndic8, and be sure to add buttons to Digg, Furl, Delicious, et all to help visitors social bookmark your blog (this helps in SEO too).

Now, sit back, think, write, write, write, and just let events unfold as they may. Cream rises to the top, eventually. If you are talented, your audience will find you. Revel in it when they do.

Darcy Moen
Customer Loyalty Network

Chris -- I have to say all this talk about blogging finally got me off my butt to post on mine. Thank you for ... posting this, putting yourself out there and being the last little nudge I needed. (All the stuff I teach clients, well, I'm doing none of it. Isn't that fabulous?!) These are great suggestions above. We should all be so good as to follow them. The one major thing I would add, is really, in all your SEO efforts, be careful not to lose yourself in it. I mean, don't lose your core, what makes you ... well ... you! Because then, maybe it's just a blog out there, and where is the meaning in that?

I think posting on other people's blogs and linking to your own as appropriate (esp. using your keywords), enabling trackbacks, linking to other sites, guilt tripping your marketing profs friends to come post on your blog and link you your blog from theirs ... all are good ways to grab traffic.

I used word press because eventually, when I get around to updating my [warning, shameless plug coming up, but it's really to illustrate a point] fabulous web design / creative firm / publication design company's site, I'll most likely be "importing" the blog to another URL, one that is more ... well, SEO friendly and such. And did you see what I just did in this post? I linked certain keywords to my site -- this is another thing you can do with your blog to make it jump (tastefully of course). (here we go here we go)

I unfortunately have NOT decided what my keywords will be, or even what my sub-title tag will be. For now... it is what it is. I think you're well on your way, and oh ... I'll post on yours if you post on mine. heh heh heh

Best Regards,

Jennifer
XPRT Creative

ChrisB,

I just ran a test on Blogger. I made a comment on a blog, and in less than 4 hours, Google had picked up on it and added a link to it in Search Standings. THAT is the fastest I've ever seen something get picked up. Of course, this is on a page that has a current page rank of 7, and about 35,000 unique hits a day. Would love to share the link, but I can't, it would mess up the stats as I'd be tinkering or influencing numbers, and we don't want that.

I've been a consultant to a few blog projects, hope yours makes it to the Technorati 100 too.

Darcy Moen
Customer Loyalty Network