Successful Blog

5 Steps to Increasing Your Blog Comments

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How to blog series

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Virginia Cunningham

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You’ve created a blog, made a few posts, maybe even installed some ads for the extra income. You’re locked and loaded to take the Internet by storm. But where are all the comments? Where is the dedicated audience breathlessly hanging on your every word?

Don’t worry, you don’t have to succumb to the tumbleweeds just yet. If you’re eager for more fans, here are five steps to increasing your blog comments.

1. Comment On Other Blogs

Before anything else, you need to establish your presence in your field. This is most easily achieved by commenting on other blogs and making a name for yourself as someone worth listening to. By making smart, funny and helpful comments on other blogs, readers will be interested enough to follow you back to your own.

2: Respond To Comments

No one likes to be ignored, and if your commenters feel like they’re shouting into an empty void, they become much less likely to comment in the future. To gain (and keep) an active community of followers, you’ll need to make a habit of responding to their comments. Answer their questions. Suggest new tech. Outsource their problems if you have to. Regardless of the content, just make sure their comments don’t go unnoticed. They’ve taken time out of their lives to comment on your blog; the least you can do is offer them the same courtesy.

3. Create A Community

It’s basic psychology: people like to belong. Take advantage of this by turning your commenting pool into a community – a place with its own language and lingo, a place where people can build friendships and swap stories without feeling out of place. If something happens to one of your followers, spotlight it. If you think two people would really get along, mention it. Make introductions among your followers. Create memes. Reference inside jokes in your updates. When new visitors feel the urge to “fit in,” you’ll know you’re doing it right.

4. Ask For Opinions

The best thing that can happen to any blog is a lively debate, so inspire some passion by soliciting the opinions of your followers. Make polls, ask leading questions (“what do you guys think?”) and encourage the most vocal of your readers. Don’t be afraid to touch on scandalous topics, because those often create the most heated (and long-running) exchanges.

5. Be Interesting

What makes you comment on a blog? What pushes you from a mere reader to an active participant in an exchange of ideas? It wouldn’t have happened if the blog wasn’t interesting or engaging enough to merit your response.

To this extent, if you want comments, you just have to be a good blogger. You need to be active, interesting, and well-informed in your field. Your post should be entertaining and relevant. Your comments should be smart and useful.

Simply put, if you want more comments on your blog, make your blog worth commenting on.

Author’s Bio: Virginia Cunningham is a freelance technology writer based in Los Angeles, California. She currently blogs about id security, social media and gadgets.

Thank you, Virginia! Engagement is always a noble quest.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

Be Weird

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Rosemary O’Neill

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When I was in fifth grade, my mom sent me to school with my lunch in one of those silver ice cream bags from the grocery store. I was already “the new kid,” so this cemented me as “Silver Bag.” It started as a put-down, but grew into a term of endearment. I was weird, but weird-good.

As a new person encounters you and your business, do they think you’re weird? Do you allow them to see your weirdness?

It can be a secret weapon that throws people off-guard, especially in a purchasing situation. When people approach a new company, or new business contact, they try to put it in a bucket they’re familiar with. If you refuse to be categorized easily, their brains will keep processing you, trying to put a button in you.

Seth Godin’s book “We Are All Weird,” seems almost contradictory…if everyone’s weird, how does weirdness get recognized? And yet we are in a time now where off-beat is celebrated. How else to explain the rise of Nyan Cat?

One of the defining characteristics of Instagram is that you can do odd things to your photographs. They are also weird because they don’t have a web component—it is strictly a mobile application (we’ll see if Facebook removes some of that weirdness, I hope not).

Most businesses actively try to suppress their weirdness; I say “let it out!” Your target audience will have a much easier time finding you if they can see and relate to your particular brand of strange.

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Author’s Bio: Rosemary O’Neill is an insightful spirit who works for social strata — a top ten company to work for on the Internet . Check out the Social Strata blog. You can find Rosemary on Google+ and on Twitter as @rhogroupee

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Thank you, Rosemary!

You’re irresistible!

ME “Liz” Strauss

How Physical Exercise and Blogging Has Resulted in Empowerment in my Life

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If you are like the rest of the world then you must have encountered days when you feel depressed, dismal, and alone. Sometimes it’s easier to go through the life without even thinking about the challenges but the reality is that they are out there, and you will be facing one sooner than later. There may be things in your life that don’t work out as expected and this leaves you with a feeling of glum and optimism. It is normal for someone to feel this way.

In my experience, having bouts of sadness during tough times has become a learning experience, providing me with wisdom and strength. Life can take you in different directions and the end game isn’t always certain even when we feel that we are in control. The important thing to realize is that there is always a choice, to stand up and fight through another day instead of letting the adversities to pin you down and drowning in sorrow and despair.

So, how to overcome these challenges in life and stay resilient? For me, two things have helped me a great deal i.e. Exercising and Writing (AKA Blogging).

Mental and Emotional Toughness:

You might have heard of the expression “life is 10% what happens to us and 90% how we respond to it”. It’s true that “how we manage our lives” can make a huge difference to our lives. It is how we perceive problems that dictate the outcome in the end. Avoiding the feeling of being victimized can help you overcome adversity and triumph against your problems, when you feel strong both mentally and physically you will be able to view your situation with a sense of power and confidence.

Working out to lose weight can help overcome negative feelings

Staying in shape or losing weight through training can help you become more agile and in control of your physical well-being. When you are out of shape you might end up with a lot of habits that can hinder your wellness and make you feel weak and helpless. By becoming active and engaging in active lifestyle, you can start to empower yourself and gain the resolution that you may have lost.

How blogging can help overcome negative feelings

You have to understand that even at a standstill, life continues to progress, and you have to treat your body and mind as such, even when you are facing hundreds of problems, you’ve got to keep going. Writing can help take the edge off negative thoughts and creates an outlet for expression and problem solving. When you blog, you can let off some steam and help you gain a clear perspective of challenges that you may be facing.

Writing and Exercising to empower yourself

Writing and exercise is a means of caring for your inner being. Exercise and fitness encourage you to become stronger in life by honing your physicality. When you start working out, you are actually making the decision to do something good for yourself and nurturing your spirit by improving your overall physical state. The same can be said when you express yourself through writing. Sharing your positive (or negative) thoughts with others and getting their response can inspire you to maintain a good outlook towards your life and seek the solutions that may have evaded you in the past.

Getting involved in positive activities like writing or exercising will result in a healthy mental paradigm. Taking responsibility of your physical and mental well-being is imperative, so that you can perform better in life and develop a sense of self that is empowered and understands your true worth. Regular exercise is not just a bid to stay fit; it is a step towards more control and empowerment in your life. These are the principles that you will see getting highlighted at diet or weight loss programs like Medifast and Nutrisystem.

When you are taking good care of your mind and body, and spending time taking care of your personal well-being you will notice that everything else in your life will start to fall into place.

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Arba Hana is a young online entrepreneur, she writes for a discount websites sharing medifast coupons and nutrisystem discount code. There are other coupon codes like medifast or nutrisystem as well.

Have You Promoted Your Company Today?

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The old adage that you have to spend money to make money is very true, yet we all know businesses that do not adhere to this belief.

So, stop what you are doing for a minute at work and ask yourself a very simple question, is my company doing all it can to promote itself? If the answer is no, now is the time to speak up.

One of the first things you may hear from upper management is that we’re promoting the company within our budgetary means, aka we are spending as little money as possible to get our brand out there.

While it is understandable in a troubling economy that small businesses especially will want to refrain from large promotional expenditures, this would actually be a good time to be using promotional items in order to improve the company’s brand recognition.

Keep in mind that many other businesses are also probably thinking that everyone else is not spending money, so why should we? The simple response to that line of thinking is that while other businesses are holding back on promoting their companies, now is the time to strike.

Whether you are an administrative assistant, an upper management employee or even a company intern, don’t be afraid to offer your two cents as to how your employer can better promote the business.

Among the simple ways to do this include:

  • Social media – I’m still amazed when I peruse various sites on Facebook and Twitter,the two biggest venues for social media, and see that companies are missing the boat. I often hear that management feels it cannot get a true reading of return on investment (ROI) on its social media efforts, so the decision is made to bail on any additional SM work. The bottom line is that social media is essentially free, a great way to promote one’s company, allowing companies to appear as an authority in their respective industry by sharing worthwhile information for current and potential customers. Whether you are active or not in your company’s social media efforts, visit the company Facebook, Twitter, Google+ pages and any other sites your employer is on. Question the individual or individuals in charge of such sites if the pages are not updated regularly;
  • Community events – Getting involved in the local community is a great way with which to promote your business. Such opportunities are not only a way to build up goodwill within the community, but also to network with other local businesses. In the event you run a local cell phone business, get together with your area realtor, florist, eateries etc. to promote each others businesses. The old adage of scratching one’s back while they scratch yours is very true. Before you know it, you will have community members coming to you for business; hopefully you are returning the favor. Small businesses in a local community tend to stick together and patronize one another in order to keep the bigger corporations out, so be a leader in this area;
  • Use bumper stickers, buttons, business cards, T-shirts, etc. – These are great means by which to spread the word about your company. Imagine the potential response rate your small business could get around town if just your employees alone were sporting bumper stickers on their cars promoting your Web site, wearing T-shirts to the local stores and more. It may sound hokey to some, but making up such items is relatively cheap and can be very beneficial to those not aware of what your company does;
  • Buy local air or print time – This means to promote your company obviously involves some funding, but it can be money well spent. Even though many people tune out radio/TV commercials, and even though many newspapers are finding their numbers down these days, there still is a sizable audience that turns to these venues for news and information. Target the most effective times to promote your business, such as radio ads in drive time and coupons in the Sunday paper.

There are a variety of other ways you can employ in order to promote your small business, some of which may or may not get the owner’s approval. Remember too to never overlook your community’s Chamber of Commerce.

The bottom line is ALL employees need to be thinking about ways to better promote the companies they work for.

Remember, each and every employee has a vested interest in the company doing well, so promotion is everyone’s job.

Dave Thomas, who discusses subjects such as online marketing, writes extensively for San Diego-based Business.com.

SOBCon Chicago Revisited: Rick Turoczy on Positioning

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Photo by Steve Hall

We’re pleased to present a series of videos from the recent SOBCon Chicago 2012 – this first edition features Rick Turoczy talking about business positioning.  Rick, who lives in Portland, is the editor of the popular startup site  @siliconflorist and is the co-founder of @PIEpdx. the Portland Incubator Experiment.  His key takeaway:

“There is no weak position, there’s only weak positioning. There’s always opportunity no matter what position you’re in”

Enjoy the rest of Rick’s wisdom and experience, and if you want more, don’t miss SOBCon NW in Portland this September – yes, Rick (and PIE) will be there.

 

How To Prep Your Customer For A Killer Video Testimonial

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Sean Rosensteel

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Video marketing has become an extremely popular approach for generating interest in services or products offered online. With so many affordable tools in the marketplace, videos can be easily produced and distributed online for less than what other mediums (like TV) would cost.

Consequently, utilizing the ever-so-popular video testimonial has become a common approach to connecting with prospective customers. And the proliferation of video cameras installed on most computers manufactured within the last few years has made it easy for people to record their own videos. Businesses are starting to leverage this recent technology trend to gather raw video submissions from customers – without the enormous costs of doing an on-site or commercial production.

But preparing your customers to record a proper video is critical for gathering useful video clips that can be displayed as effective testimonials on your website, blog, etc. Here are some tips to ensure you get the most out of your customers when they hit that record button.

Don’t be afraid to give them some direction

A good testimonial doesn’t have to rely on fancy scripts to get the point across. But it can be to your company’s benefit to provide customers with some direction.

  • Consider giving them talking points, however broad they may be;
  • Encourage them to focus on their overall customer satisfaction, the ease of working with your business, or whatever other angle you want your testimonial video to take;
  • Encourage them to talk about any unique experiences or stories that reflect well on your company;
  • Don’t be afraid to ask them to talk about certain aspects of their experience that other customers aren’t likely to share.

Explain the real value of their testimonial

You’re probably seeking testimonials for one reason: they’re valuable to your business and can lead to more sales. Don’t sidestep this goal – let your customers know up-front how integral their relationship is to your business, and explain that their testimonial can be a big boost to your business’s future.

You don’t have to encourage them to exaggerate or lie for your benefit, but by understanding the value they have within your company, they will feel empowered to help – particularly if they are satisfied.

Strike while the iron is still hot

Timing is everything. The best time to approach your customers about recording a video testimonial is while they’re enjoying the benefits provided by your product or service.

If they’re actively enjoying your product or using your service, you have a better chance of getting them to agree to record a quick video than you will if you wait until their customer experience is weeks or months old.

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Author’s Bio:Sean Rosensteel is the Head of Business Development at Bravo Video, a web-based platform that enables businesses to easily capture video from customers, users and fans – right over the web.

Thank you, Sean, for adding to the conversation! Killer testimonials do so much.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!