Successful Blog

3 Tips for Gathering User-Generated Content To Write A Blog Post

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By Dorien Morin-van Dam

Creating content is a tough task, especially since everything you want to write about has already been written about. It’s tough to be original, isn’t it? In recent months I’ve seen a surge in articles being written about user-generated content and how to create it. I have also spotted more and more articles written with user-generated content.

river flowing through farmland aerial shot

There are many social media platforms that lend themselves perfectly for sharing user-generated content; two very well known visual platforms come to mind first. The first one is Pinterest and the second platform is Instagram.

On Pinterest, people re-pin pretty pictures other people pinned before them – 80% of pins are re-pins. On Instagram, using re-post apps, people can easily find and share other peoples pictures, too!

But what about written content? Can we use text-based user-generated content?

A perfect example of written user-generated content is, of course, quotes! Who hasn’t seen and shared quotes on social media? I know I have. It would be a stretch to write a whole blog post just with quotes (it has been done), but I am here to suggest several other techniques that may help you seek out user-generated content.

Here are my 3 tips for writing a blog post simply by asking the right people!

1. Ask your fans.

One way I use my Facebook audience, for example, is to give them two or three words and let them free-associate with those. I often get great ideas for blog posts based on their answers. It shows what is foremost on their minds. I also ask questions on Twitter, but since my audience is greater and more diverse, it has not been as effective for me as asking my Facebook fans.

2. Ask the experts in your circles of influence.

You can do this via email or dedicated Facebook group. Those would be my first choices as I recommend you reach out to each individual privately, and of course, offer to link to them once your write your blog post. Here are some ideas on how to crowdsource content from the experts:

  • You can give each of them the same question (or hypothetical) situation to answer in their own way.
  • You can ask them to give you real life questions (sourced from their audience) about a specific topic you provide i.e Pinterest, LinkedIn profile, Twitter Cards.
  • You can ask them for a solution to a problem you are having. If you ask five experts you will be sure to get five different solutions.
  • You can ask for an interview from an expert. Whether you have created a set series of questions, or you make it up as you go, interviewing someone in your industry, a leader, is a great way to get user-generated content. You will be using their words, their thoughts, to write your blog.

3. Ask your peers.

Your peers are the people in your industry, your co-workers, your fellow bloggers and entrepreneurs. I love involving them and asking them questions or get input from them on a certain topic. People also love to be quoted.

If you go to your peers for a quote, at least they will be aware your are writing something that mentions them and will look for your article to be published.

Alternatively, you could read a series of articles written by your peers and take quotes, and link back of course, highlighting their take on issues.

Your Turn:

• Have you used any of these techniques to get content for your blog?

• Do you enjoy reading these types of blog posts?

• Can you think of other ways to gather user-generated content?

Author’s Bio: Dorien Morin-van Dam is owner and social media marketer at More In Media, a social media consultancy in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Dorien provides social media consulting, management, training and education; she is passionate about teaching social media to small business owners. She services clients all over the USA and has worked in many different industries as well as with several NPO’s. In her spare time, Dorien manages four kids, three dogs and a husband. She runs marathons and loves to bake, travel and read.

Photo Credit: eutoxeres via Compfight cc

I Am Not A Blogger

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By Lisa D. Jenkins

I believe in blogging. Just not for me.

Female silhouette

Every 7 days I sit down to write a post here. Against almost every bit of social media/blogging advice to the contrary, my own blog – for years aptly titled The Occasional and Erratic Blog – has sat sparse and neglected. But I’m just now understanding why.

Self-employment wasn’t so much a carefully considered selection for me as it was a response to circumstances that required immediate action.

My two kids and I had decided to leave everything and start a new life together. I’d held a job I loved at a state college for almost 10 years. With benefits the job paid enough to cover a fairly modest life for a family of three. As my son said at the time, “We might eat hot dogs and ramen forever, but they’ll be our hot dogs and ramen.”

A month after the divorce was final, I lost the job I’d held and loved for 10 years – statewide budget cuts were deep that year. There I was with custody of my 13 year old son, a 21 year old in college, a mortgage and no income to cover any of it.

It was at that moment I decided to truly support myself rather than once more place myself in a position of counting on something else that might dissolve.

I’d been watching social media evolve and participating for a while – hoping my Director would let me integrate it into our marketing – and I knew beyond a doubt that I could make this work for me and for others. So I took the leap and dove head first into finding my way as a social media professional.

I was extremely vocal on Twitter and Facebook, learned WordPress and taught myself the coding skills we needed back in the day. Because: no plugins. I spent every single day learning and building connections by being helpful wherever I could. I offered advice, pointed people to resources, donated my time and writing to non-profits and I went to conferences. Nothing has been as keenly painful to my introverted self as that seemingly endless cycle of self-promotion but I did it. The one thing I never settled into was blogging.

Disclosure: Random exaggeration ahead.

“But you MUST blog,” says everyone always.

Yes, well, five years later and I’m still here – and barely blogging.

Inconceivable? Oh, it’s conceivable, I assure you.

But how to explain that to people and prospective clients became the issue at hand. Two weeks ago, on the Main Salmon River in the middle of Idaho’s Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness, it crystalized for me.

I don’t want to be an A-List blogger. I’ve no aspirations to write a social media or marketing book. I don’t wish to be recognized as a media personality. I’ve never pursued those things.

I define and execute strategy. I measure and analyze metrics. I engage on social media. I curate content. I design campaigns. I build relationships. And, I blog … for my clients.

I do the job I love in the best way possible for the clients I partner with. If my work isn’t the best example of my worth to a new or existing client, no amount of blogging on my own site will help.

Hi. I’m Lisa. I’m a social media practitioner and that’s all I want to be.

How does what you’re doing fit with what you want to be?

Author’s Bio: Lisa D. Jenkins is a Public Relations professional specializing in Social and Digital Communications for businesses. She has over a decade of experience and work most often with destination organizations or businesses in the travel and tourism industry in the Pacific Northwest. Connect with her on Google+

How To Finish What You Start

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By Gary Dek

How many times have you started writing a story or article only to stop halfway through and not finish it? If your answer is at least one, then you are like a lot of writers out there who spend their time beginning a piece of work, only to lose motivation and not finish what was started. I know I have at least a dozen half-written posts saved in the “Draft” folder of WordPress.

Creative inspiration is not the problem; staying productive and finishing what you start is. Fortunately, that can be fixed with a few strategies and conscious steps. The following steps will give you some tools to help you learn how to accomplish the task and make a habit of finishing projects before moving on to new ones.

finishing

Resist Embarking On New Endeavors

One reason why writers never finish anything is because they are constantly starting new projects before they have completed the previous ones. I like to call this “Work ADD” because I enjoy the adventure and challenge of working on new projects.

A couple years ago, I would start a new website every couple of months. I would literally design and develop a website then write and edit unique content over the course of one weekend. While you may think I “finished” the project, the most crucial part of starting any blog/site is promotion. I just didn’t do any of that, and that rendered my efforts a waste of time.

Restrain yourself from this compulsion and stay focused. When you come up with a fresh idea, jot down a few notes for reference and come back to it when you are ready to fully explore the opportunity. A few bullet points should help to jog your memory when the time comes.

Take Stock of Your Current Projects

It is time to review what on-going projects you have and determine if any of them are actually worth finishing. Maybe that editorial you started a year ago isn’t relevant anymore. Make a list of the ones you really want to keep, prioritize them in order of importance and work on them one at a time, checking off each as you go.

Don’t worry about how long it takes; after all, you’ve already invested the time to start and that’s a sunk cost. You might as well finish the project and recoup a portion of your invested time, assuming there is still value in its completion.

No matter how important that memoir seemed ten years ago, it might not have the same importance today. It may be time to let it go.

How To Assess Incomplete Projects

Divide your projects into three folders:

  • Projects that evoke enthusiasm and fit with your current goals.
  • Projects that you need to move on from, even if you are unsure.
  • Projects that you are not actively inspired to finish now, but that you might want to revisit another time.

This doesn’t mean pile everything into categories 1 and 3. Be objective and honest with yourself. It will definitely help unclutter your mind, goals, and work area.

Pick A Project and Stick With It

Take a look at the folder containing the projects you are excited about right now. Pick one of them and do not look at another until it is done. Whether it’s a blog, freelance gig, eBook, or another obligation, this project is going to be your primary focus.

So, how do you choose which item on your to-do list deserves all your energy?

Do you start with the:

  • simplest project: If you have a short story you are working on, you might want to finish it before you work on that novel.
  • longest-running project: If you’ve been working on a blog for 5 years and it has the most loyal following, do you keep up the momentum?
  • project you’re most invested in: If you are already a professional writer and the work you have left unfinished is guaranteed to bring in some much needed cash, it provides a better return on investment to satisfy your existing client obligations.

Have A Clear Vision of What The Finished Product Should Look Like

This may seem like a no-brainer, but you would be surprised how many writers or online entrepreneurs dive into a project without any idea of where they are going with it. We are all guilty of this kind of “we’ll see what happens” kind of thinking, but ultimately, without a destination, your journey will take you nowhere.

Instead, make a list of what you think constitutes a finished product. For example, if you are writing a blog post, there are specific points you need to hit before you can say it is complete. This might mean:

  • your article has a start, middle and end.
  • your article is at least 1,000 words and proofread.
  • you’ve gotten feedback from your editor, revised the post, and it is now ready for publication.

In your personal or professional life, pinpointing clear goals can ensure every little step you take brings you closer to achieving them.

Set Your Goals

You know how some people keep a “bucket list” of things they would like to do before they die? Well, you should keep a similar kind of list that consists of your business goals. For example, starting a blog could be one small goal because it’s easy – it can be achieved in an afternoon. The real goal should be to attract 10,000 visitors a month to that blog within the first year.

However, don’t set yourself up for defeat by outlining impossible goals. Deciding that you want to sell your first blog for a million dollars after a year is not realistic, especially if you are a new blogger.

Create a list of milestones with deadlines to keep yourself accountable, such as:

  • writing a page a day for a month
  • completing a detailed outline for your short story
  • writing a short screenplay
  • getting 10 posts completed before launching your blog

Pick 5 to 10 goals and put them on your calendar. Keep the list somewhere you will see it daily for inspiration.

Stay Motivated

Regardless of whether you use a free blogging site to write for therapeutic reasons, with the hopes of becoming a published author, or simply because freelance writing pays the bills and offers the flexibility to be with your kids during the day, you need to learn how to keep the momentum going and stay motivated long enough to actually bring your great ideas to fruition. Hopefully these steps will help you learn how to finish what you start.

What’s your top priority right now?

Author’s Bio: Author Bio: Gary Dek is the blogger behind StartABlog123.com and Gajizmo.com. He offers small businesses and entrepreneurs SEO advice ranging from keyword density research to recovering from Panda/Penguin updates to promoting their blogs and growing traffic.

Photo Credit: JefferyTurner via Compfight cc

Content: The Fit Matters

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By Lisa D. Jenkins

When I did a last read-through on the post I had for today, I scrapped the whole thing.

Content fit matters

I realized the words I’d written weren’t for you. They didn’t fit. They were too narrowly niched. They were written for my clients. You are not my clients.

Some of you are my peers, some of you are my competitors and some of you are my role models. We gather here because we’re each building an online business. What I write here needs to serve you and honor your time. It needs to add value to your day.

In the same way, regardless of where you publish, every piece of content you produce should serve your reader, honor their time and add value to their day.

Writing for your own blog is one thing – the occasional tangent piece can humanize your brand, but when you’re writing for the audience of a peer, colleague or client you must be respectful of the audience that’s been cultivated. Whether you’ve been asked to write guest post or you’re pitching to a new blog, it’s your job to cater to their fields of interest and needs.

Know Your Audience

Vegetarians don’t want to know how to barbecue the world’s perfect steak.

Parent bloggers don’t need your sports marketing strategies.

People discussing how to build their online businesses don’t have a use for decorating tips.

That doesn’t mean you can’t contribute something worthwhile to any of these groups. It just means that you have to frame what you know in such a way that it’s relevant to those who’ll be reading it.

Find A Way To Fit In

If you’re a barbecue expert, share one of your best sauce recipes and show how it can be used for corn on the cob or a thick slice of grilled cauliflower.

If you’re a sports marketer, adapt your strategies to helping parents provide visibility for their kids’ league sports or school athletic teams.

If you’re an interior designer, help online business owners understand how to choose the right color palette for their website.

Finding a way to tie the knowledge you have to a need your readers have, then sharing that knowledge in a clear concise way so they can put it to work for themselves shows that you understand what you do well enough to explain it simply.

It’s All About Perspective

It doesn’t matter who you are, your content is only a good fit when it helps someone. Never ever make the mistake of thinking you’re so big that it’s the other way around.

Author’s Bio: Lisa D. Jenkins is a Public Relations professional specializing in Social and Digital Communications for businesses. She has over a decade of experience and work most often with destination organizations or businesses in the travel and tourism industry in the Pacific Northwest. Connect with her on Google+

Photo credit: Sephiroth98

Head Smacking Realities: Why Blogging Isn’t Doing a Thing for Your Business

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By Tracy Vides

“Have a blog and you’ll start getting inbound leads.

“Blogging helps you gain traction and develop a community.

Companies that have blogs make more sales than those that don’’t have one.

If you did hear one (or all) of those statements but are often wondering why nothing seems to be happening, you aren’t alone. There are millions of blogs that do nothing but exist.

Corporate or business blogging is even more difficult as it’’s like asking businesses to set aside resources to make it happen (compared to individual bloggers who are intrinsically motivated). Nothing happens without a reason and there are plenty of reasons why your blogging efforts aren’’t doing anything to meet your goals yet. Here are some of them:

No plans, no gains

Remember those days when everyone used to carry around business cards? You’d get yourself a set of cards too. Then, everyone and their neighbor got themselves a website and a bunch of social accounts and followed suit. Blogging, more or less, seems to have been bitten by the same bug. You blog because blogging apparently is the ““baby steps” of inbound marketing.

Starting to do something is good, and I won’’t bite you for that. Not having a plan in the sense of not knowing why you blog for your business in the first place is a sore wound.

Do you blog purely to drive sales? Or do you blog to become a thought leader? Do you blog to proliferate your brand name or do you engage in all-out blogging efforts? (Hope you end up getting inspired by How Jon Morrow Writes, as narrated by Demian Farnworth of Copyblogger.)

Figure out why you think you have to blog in the first place. What’’s all this trouble for? Write it down and think about it over a cup of coffee.

You pay attention to worthless stuff

Driven by the incredible amount of information available on digital marketing (most of it is farce, unjustifiable, or maybe just hype), your mind starts to nibble at things that don’’t matter at all: all the drive for ““SEO domination”” lets you believe that keywords should guide your content creation.

The truth is that keywords won’’t matter because the bots don’t buy; people do. All that time spent on social media takes your time away from creating awesome posts. Your blogs are way too short or perhaps way too long. Instead of thinking about your readers, you worry about Meta information, alt text, and backlinks.

There are many of those little gears that have to click in place to make your inbound marketing strategy work, starting with your blog.

Are you doing it right?

It’s not about words, links, or technobabble; it’’s about people.

Bloggers often forget that they are writing for people. Companies are even quicker when it comes to forgetting that blogging is an effort to promote brands, establish credibility, engage with potential and current customers.

David Silverman, author of Typo, and professor of business writing at Harvard, gives this test to his students:

Can you rewrite this bunch of babble into a word or two?

“It is the opinion of the group assembled for the purpose of determining a probability of the likelihood of the meteorological-related results and outcome for the period encompassing the next working day that the odds of precipitation in the near-term are positive and reasonably expected.

Businesses just worry about tools used, platforms that blogs should be based on, and the kind of voice, words, or personality that they expect blog posts to express. Of course, all this counts; individuality does matter, and these are what make blogs different from academic articles. Yet, you shouldn’’t forget that you are writing for people. Relationships still matter. You’ll need to get off the screen and meet actual people. You should be able to sell at a flea market before you can sell online.

Self-centered content strategy

First, your content strategy is self-centered. All that you blog about is how great that vacation has been, how life changing your moving to paradise was, how Venture Capitalists are now trying to break down the doors just so that they can invest, and how you grew your blog from 0 to 67,987 subscribers in 3 months.

What are some of the best examples of narcissistic and self-centered blogs, you ask? Go pick any of those nomadic vagabonds who try to sell you location independence and travel while working. It’s not to say that there’’s no value from such blogs. But more often than not, there’’s the ““me syndrome” creeping in with ““Where I Was Last Week”” and ““Exotic Destinations I’’ve Been To.”

Stand back for a moment. No one cares about you. Your customers — you know, the ones reading your blog — wouldn’t care if you just signed up a million dollar deal, bought another company, merged with a bigger one, or if you now float on $4 billion of excess cash balance in the bank.

All that your customers care about is what you can do for them. How many of your blog posts talk about your customers really? Can you actually count the number of blog posts that share something that doesn’t have anything to do with you, your business, the brand, the products or services?

Crappy content

Your content qualifies as crappy if there’’s no value given to your readers by the end of the post. There’s nothing it for them to ruminate, chew dry bread on, or ponder about. Your blog posts have nothing new to say.

I will repeat that. Your content is dry, sounds like a term paper, and makes readers scroll faster than ever. They won’’t read most of it they’’ll just scroll through and escape. And you’’ll never see them again!

Stop wasting time with blogs that don’’t make an impact. Stop hiding behind words. Show up with some guts and talk to your customers like they were your best friends. Be afraid to own up, accept your mistakes, speak your heart, and get bolder.

Great companies go to the extent of admitting their faux pas. Online marketing firm SEER Interactive admitted screwing up in their link building methods. AirBnB’’s Brian Chesky wrote up a self-deprecating post to own up the apparent horror that a customer had to face.

Doing this takes guts. Can you do it too?

Blogging needs you to post awesomeness regularly. It requires you to show up and be real. It demands that you use the fact that you are human to get other humans to buy from you, believe you, or accept your point of view. It requires you to multi-task. Blogging requires your belief to be brought to fruition by your determination and will.

As long as you produce blog posts because you should, your customers or readers will make it a point to leave because they can.

Author’s Bio: Tracy Vides is a content creator and marketer, who loves to blog about subjects as diverse as fashion, technology, and finance. She’s always raring to have a discussion on startups and entrepreneurship. Say “Hi” to her on Twitter @TracyVides. You can also find her on G+ at gplus.to/TracyVides.

Scaling Content Delivery to Fit Your Bandwidth

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By Lisa D. Jenkins

I wasn’t here last week. I know I promised more about visual content but something else has been wandering through my brain, and it’s taken me a bit by surprise. Because the connection is so weird.

Two months ago, I agreed to give CrossFit a 3 month try because The Husband, who loves CrossFit, has graciously embraced so many things I love – live Shakespeare, my quirky clothing choices, BBC television, wine, the crazy things I do to support the causes I believe in … he’s quite the sport.

Crossfit training

So on April 1, off to Arbor CrossFit I went with the goal of participating twice a week. In 2 months, I’ve been a total 4 times and here’s why: I refused to scale the workouts and I paid for it in over-exertion and injuries that equated to lost time. It’s entirely my fault.

I’m still not certain the workouts are for me, but I’ll tell you this: the culture at Arbor CrossFit has me committed to doing a full 3 months. Every person in that box is supportive, inclusive and helpful. They help everyone scale, because they want everyone to succeed. If your ego just won’t listen they’ll let you fail on your own terms but step up right beside you the second you need a helping hand to get back on track.

It occurred to me that I recognized something in this – and there was Liz Strauss whispering to my brain, “Surround yourself with people who won’t let you fail.”

If you’re in business, you can’t afford not to have a group of people like this. They can’t, won’t and shouldn’t do the work for you, but they can help you form an achievable plan and make the right choices. They’ll tell you when the load might be too big. They’ll help you figure out how to scale until you can carry that load. They’ll nudge you when you need to step into something bigger. I have that and it’s invaluable.

If you’re like me, the thought of blogging is rough. And when you read that ‘everyone’ says you should be writing on your blog every day, you get worried. Worried to the point that you never write a word, even if you have something valuable to say, because the thought of failing to publish regularly is paralyzing.

‘Everyone’ is wrong. In case you don’t have someone in your corner yet, I’m taking today to invite you to join me in scaling the weight of content delivery to something that’s manageable for you, so you can get started or re-start.

Try this: write a single post. How long did that take you, from start to finish? I mean to the point where it’s fully polished, proofed and publishable – because grammar and punctuation matter just as much as the image you include. Think about how often you can take that much time to write. Is it once a day? Bully for you! Is it once a week? Also amazing. If it’s twice a month, I’m right here cheering you loud and proud because that’s what you can commit to. Don’t take on a commitment you can’t fill. Publish a few articles consistently and over time you’ll know when you’re ready to bump up the blog delivery.

And if actual writing isn’t your thing? Find another way to tell others about what you do. Share how-to’s on SlideShare, replace long text reports with infographics that share key data findings, and if talking is easier for you, record podcasts instead of publishing articles. Communication isn’t a cookie-cutter proposition – modify the tools you’re comfortable with to deliver your message. (This by the way is a helpful bit of advice I received from my own core group – #Table2!)

I can’t tell you how I got from CrossFit to content – my brain is a weird and mostly wonderful place like that. But I can tell you this: I didn’t name my own sadly neglected blog the Occasional and Erratic Blog for nothing. I’m afraid to commit to writing. Publishing here twice a month is a serious stretch for me.

Now it’s your turn. Will scaling help you publish something online more often? Ready to commit? Tell me what you’re aiming for and every time you hit publish, come back here and share the link. I’ll check it out and give you a virtual high-five, a clap of the hands or anything reasonable you request. Let’s do this!

Author’s Bio: Lisa D. Jenkins is a Public Relations professional specializing in Social and Digital Communications for businesses. She has over a decade of experience and work most often with destination organizations or businesses in the travel and tourism industry in the Pacific Northwest. Connect with her on Google+

Photo Credit: Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson via Compfight cc