22 Blogging Tips That'll Help You Avoid Writing Freak-Outs
Simple, helpful writing advice I share with clients to help them get over the writing hump. Sometimes it even works!
Everyone freaks out when it’s time to write.
Every.
One.
If you follow any writers or marketers you’ll have seen at least one post sharing ideas for overcoming the blank screen and the taunts of the blinking cursor (“Why aren’t you making me move,” the cursor says, blinking at you mockingly).
The tips below are from a document I shared with clients, especially service technicians and sales folks. Those folks had great stories, when they could be pried out. Part of our inbound efforts involved enticing these folks to contribute because it worked.
At one point, I had ghost-written the top two Google search results for “how to get rid of a black line on a copy” (and keyword variations), based on input from a few different clients’ technicians.
Everyone I ever shared this list with said it helped them. I hope the same for you. A few other quick thoughts before getting to the tips (or just scroll on down if you’re in a hurry).
First, this isn’t close to a comprehensive list. Why is that?
There is no single right way to write.
There is a right way for you.
These tips are intended to nudge you in the direction of getting those insights you have that are useful for your audience out of your head and shared with the world.
Always keep in mind that there is no magic to the craft of writing.
Anyone can write; and write well. As with any talent, there are some folks who are naturally gifted.
I think of it like cooking. Anyone can learn to cook. Maybe it’ll never be something you enjoy or are great at, but you should be able to feed yourself without risk of food poisoning. You don’t need to be Gordon Ramsey to do that.
Writing is the same way. Gather a working knowledge of the basics of grammar, spelling, and structure and then practice. You’ll improve. Will you ever be George R.R. Martin? Probably not, but you should be able to share your knowledge with your customers effectively.
If you’re willing to put in the time and effort, you can learn to communicate effectively via the written word. You know, writing.
Why Blog?
Most of these tips revolve around blogging. Blogging as a business helps you connect with your customers, providing information that is interesting and useful to them.
Blogs remain spectacular fuel for your marketing efforts. Companies that blog regularly report higher leads than those who don’t blog at all or blog only infrequently.
Blogs ultimately lead to sales – occasionally directly, more often by establishing a reservoir of trust among your potential customers. However, don’t cram your products and services into every nook and cranny of your blog posts
!
22 Blogging Tips
In general, your goal is to be useful. Provide helpful information. Use humor if that’s natural to you, but your goal with every post is simply this:
“Is my reader going to learn something they didn’t know about how they can improve [insert topic you’re writing about].”
1. [This tip was explicitly for copier clients. I tried to encourage as many service techs and sales folks to write as I could.] For most of you reading this, you’re blogging as part of an overall effort. If you write one post – ever – that’s OK. In general with blogs, more is better. We write enough blog posts for your company to start and maintain momentum for your marketing. Your blog posts are lagniappe (I’m from Louisiana, that’s a word that means “a little something extra”). If you are blogging alone for business, target one post/week at a minimum.
2. Shoot for 500 words. Fewer are fine. More is fine. I always say 500ish words because that’s short enough to be written fairly quickly, but long enough to make a point, ask for help, tell a short story, etc. There is no magic length that will make people read and share your post other than this:
Good blog post, regardless of length = will be read and could be shared
Bad blog post, regardless of length = won’t be read or shared
3. Don’t Plagiarize. Feel free to quote from other articles and research and link freely, but don’t lift work from others and claim as your own. It’s not nice. Also, Google doesn’t like it. [This was pre-generative AI, which is just plagiarism a word at a time. I’ll share AI and genAI thoughts in future posts.]
4. Write Like You. Be yourself, it’s too hard to be someone else. Have an informal style, great. More formal, great. Sense of humor, weave it in there. Have a hobby or love a particular movie, share anecdotes or use movie quotes to make a point (for better or worse, I wrote an entire blog based on quotes from The Princess Bride).
5. Show Up. If you only want to write a single post, that’s fine. If you want to be seen as an expert and trusted resource, you have to keep posting . . . and keep posting . . . and keep posting.
6. Don’t Get Discouraged! Seth Godin, arguably the Godfather of content/inbound marketing, wrote almost daily for three or four years before he started getting real traction and attention. Nineteen books and counting, he’s now one of the most recognized marketing experts in the world. Keep putting great work out there and good things will happen. [Note: you have to SHARE your content too, but this is a post about writing, not sharing.]
7. Write What You Know. You know stuff that your customers and potential customers would find useful and helpful, share it.
8. But Don’t Be Afraid to Stretch. Interested in a particular topic? Do the research and write about something interesting to you.
9. Don’t Fake It. If you’re interested, it’s a lot easier to be interesting.
10. The Blank Screen Mocks You. When you get stuck – yes, when, not “if” – just write something. The physical act of writing or putting fingers to your keyboard -- gibberish, a note of gratitude to a friend, a tirade against that guy who cut you off on the way to work, anything – is often enough to get you moving. Things that sometimes work for me:
Get up and stretch
Take a 5-minute walk
Doodle
Pet one of the cats or the dog – whichever is closest.
Insert your own here
11. What Kind of Posts? There are a variety of different types of posts you could write:
How-To Do Thing X: Straight-forward advice. Here's an issue, here's how I solved it, a customer solved it, or suggestions for solving it.
Tips and tricks: similar to advice, list of 3 or 4 or 5 strategies for addressing a particular business or technical challenge.
Numeric list – the most shared and read blogs are top xx number blogs. You can surely find top 7 reasons to lease a copier vs. buy a copier?
War story: personal story of something that went really well (or even really poorly).
Opinion: what's going on in the industry that bugs you? Stir the pot. Don’t be afraid to take a stance on something, pro or con.
Call to action/asking for advice: Are you experiencing a problem that you're having a hard time figuring out? Use your blog as a platform to ask for advice/opinions from others.
What’s Keeping You Up at Night? What sorts of challenges have your customers scratching their heads or pulling their hair out (or both at the same time)? Technology? Strategy? Staffing? If it’s a challenge to one customer, it’s probably a challenge for others too. Write about it.
Prediction: What’s on the horizon that customers should understand and know about?.
12. Title Is Critical. Simple, accurate, and descriptive seems to work best.
13. Write in Digestible Chunks. Forget what your grade school English teacher said, you can have a single line paragraph.
14. Lists and Bullets Are Great. Oddly, oddly numbered lists do well – it doesn’t need to be a “top 5” or “10 best.” I’ve seen 7, 55, 78, and other numbers used in lists.
15. Give It a Break. If an entry exceeds 500 words, provide subheads (mini-headlines) throughout the piece to break up the text. Think of them as a bread trail to lead the reader through your points.
16. Length (again). Don’t be afraid to write a long post. Statistics stats show that if a long post is good, people will read it through.
17. Statistics Can Really Bum You Out. Don’t be alarmed if something that you write, that’s really good, doesn’t seem to generate a response. Web readers are fickle. While one can develop a good sense of what’s going to attract eyeballs over time, one is never going to be 100% accurate. A Led Zeppelin now and then is to be expected. Don’t worry about it. I’ve taken to blaming the tides for why various posts are read/not read.
18. Spell Check.
19. Reread AFTER You Spell Check. Their, there, and they’re are all correctly spelled, but you want to make sure you’ve used the right one.
20. The Oxford Comma RULES. I think it adds clarity. This is my favorite explanation as to why: JFK, Stalin, and strippers.
21. Link Love. Link to other blogs, articles, etc. as often as possible/is relevant to what you’re writing.
22. If you want to embed video and/or illustrations to make a point (or just to add visual interest to your blog), within the boundaries of fair use/copyright, please do. And be sure to name it appropriately – the search engines look at the names of the images, so they could help Google better understand what your blog is about. And don’t ever forget to add alt-text to your images.
Other Helpful Stuff
Here are a few of my go-to resources for writing:
Grammar Girl – for simple explanations of rules when you’re stuck (when to use “affect” or “effect”) this is a great resource. http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/grammar-girl
Copyblogger. – www.copyblogger.com is one of, if not the, best source of online writing tips I've ever found. I can't recommend subscribing to it highly enough. I get at least a great tip each week, if not more, from reading it.
Strunk and White, The Elements of Style. It’s considered a classic for a reason. Find it on Amazon, used book stores, and new book stores in one of its many editions.
On Writing by Stephen King. I like a lot of his work and the way he writes. Good combo of writing advice (Clif Notes version: Just. Write.) and his own writing journey.
Writing That Works is a good and easy to digest primer for writing effectively in business communication specifically. The advice applies equally to blog writing. It’s a little old, but the basic advice is still very good.
Now, GO WRITE!
There’s more because there’s always more writing advice and tips and methods and how to’s and techniques and . . . well, you get the idea.
To bastardize a phrase, every blog post begins with a single word, start typing.
Email me at duhonius@gmail.com or call/text me at 301-275-7496. Ask me about my “Newsletter-in-a-Box” offer.