We’re not the only ones helping people discover web2.0 and the power of using a blog backend to get your message out- Debbie Weil is pushing her book “The Corporate Blogging Book” as a way to help CEO’s reach their markets.
The first chapter is available for download- and has the top 20 reasons why you should be a corporate blogger.
While we haven’t had a chance to read the book- we looked at the first chapter- and it pretty much says a lot of what we’ve been saying- except- we believe that RSS and Content Management Systems are the future of all websites- and that WordPress is the bomb (note- Debbie uses WordPress for her site).
She doesn’t seem to mention the power WordPress has for Google placement- which is another reason to use a blog to manage your site, but if you’d sign up for one of our seminars- you’d see that in action.
If you must insist on buying her book- here’s a link.
Writing for me is easy. Writing for some of you is hard.
Creating great content is the key to getting more visitors- so all you English majors out there- rejoice, your diploma may be worth something again. Chris Pearson has a post about content that’s worth reading- so here is the link and an excerpt:
Pearsonified | Best damn blog on the planet.
When you first got into blogging, I’m betting that refining your copywriting skills was likely the last thing on your mind – I certainly wasn’t thinking about it! Five months in, however, I see that developing this skill will pay huge dividends in launching future ventures, regardless of whether they take place online or offline. Simply put, being able to write great copy is one of those transferable skills that I talked about last time – it can help to set you free.
- Some tips I find useful- google what you want to write about- and then write about what you find (that’s how this post is being done- with the help of the Pressit function of WordPress). You can also set up a Google alert on your subject to find things for you.
- Look at your webstats search terms- then combine them in new ways- with meaningful insight- which should help you promote your search rank in the future. See this post.
- Ask your readers questions- and see where they take you with their comments- I read a post by Mark Cuban today about the future of movies- he had over 568 responses. I wrote about it.
A common complaint we get about using WordPress to run a site is “I don’t want my site to look like a blog” which generally means- I want the same old content up – and nothing ever changes. Chris Pearson talks about the Information Architecture of RSS – and how it can stop readers from finding content- Pearsonified | Best damn blog on the planet.
It’s worth reading- as are the comments- but, here is what Chris is missing- there are only 3 ways people find your site:
- You spend a ton of money building your brand and promoting your URL
-or-
- They find your site through search- which means you have great content and great search engine placement
-or-
- you’ve built great link networks, or are heavily linked to (hopefully not by spamming comments)
That’s it- once they find you- they either bookmark (favorite) you conventionally- or they subscribe to your feed. If they do the former- they may never come back- if they do the latter- hopefully, they’ll keep coming back as long as you deliver the content that interests them.
If they are smart enough to use RSS- then they know they can search your site for more data- a different layout, or navigation structure won’t matter at all.
However, after reading this, it made me want to add some plug-ins for most commented articles to The Next Wave site.
My solution, would be to use a variation on webstats to drive the most popular pages- not based on comments- or, to put some kind of rating system into the post options- so that you could use a theme switcher type plug in to re-order the site in different ways.
Either way- read what Chris wrote- it should get you thinking.