Coming up with new and original content for website blogging, Facebook entries and Tweeting can be difficult week in and week out. I try to stick to a general plan on my own bog and social media:
Blogs are the opportunity for you to explore things about your business that the public doesn’t know to ask. You can get into details that you normally wouldn’t have time to discuss with a client in a business meeting. In other words, put some detail in.
Blog entries are generally based on what I want people to know about my internet marketing business, and about the latest news about my business (focused more on my business than my industry – with that slant, anyway).
If the source of the idea is not originally mine, such as those inspired by recent news stories, it’s almost like a business version of a book report we were all asked to do in school. Don’t repeat the exact ideas, but summarize the ideas and concepts and write about your take on the subject and how it relates to what you provide customers. Interpret the news and tell your customers and clients why they should care.
Blogs are all about original content to help you rank well with search engines.
Good web content writers are invaluable for website ranking. As many of you probably already know, or were able to guess, Google can spot duplicate content across the entire scope of the internet. It logs these duplicates and tries to determine the original source, giving it the highest rank for that content. All the rest are just noted as duplicates. I don’t believe it matters whether you were the second, third or 100th person to copy it.
This is another good reason for you to blog about your business, not your industry, in your WordPress blog. Your small business is much more unique than your industry, and your take on your industry may be unique in the industry as well.
You know what they tell writers “write about what you know”!
Social Media Blogging
Whether you use social media once a week, or several times a day, try and have a purpose to your posts. If you have nothing to say, don’t force it. That said, if you have nothing to say about your business for a couple of weeks or a month, you may not be trying hard enough to educate potential clients about the benefits of using your services.
Facebook entries must be engaging.
These are published for people who are interested enough in you and your business to follow you. They are also the people who will help share your business news, so don’t bore them. (again, YOUR business news, not news in general, even if it is about your industry). Link to a page in your site that relates to the entry for a good SEO benefit.
Twitter entries are headlines.
Attention grabbers should be the content of your tweets. Things that might make people re-tweet them, or follow the link to your site. You should not generally attempt to make the 140 characters your only point, unless your point lends itself to that. Link to your site or a Facebook entry on at least 25% of your tweets for best benefit.