Before You Publish–Check for Spiders and Opportunities

March 9, 2006 by Liz

Before you hit that PUBLISH button . . .

Publishing occurs whenever an author shares a work with an audience. An email memo, a note that says where you are going, a paper you wrote for a class in Econometrics, these are all forms of publishing.

–ME Strauss

Reading for Spiders

Publishing for the web has two audiences–people and search engine spiders. The first time I read my work over, I read it for people. I checked for errors that get between my readers and the message. I also had my proofreader check it to catch what my dyslexia missed. Yesterday, she caught quite bit.

Then I go over it a second time quickly for my second audience–search engine spiders–to make sure the spiders don’t trip and have plenty to eat.

Making Sure the Investment Pays Off

Prorating the time that I spent gathering ideas, I’ve probably spent 60-90 minutes on this one post. Time is money, and I think of that time spent as an investment. Now is when I make sure that investment pays off. I’ve made a short Pre-Flight Publishing list that I run down, before I pass say, “Go.”

Is the content keyword rich? By waiting to read for keywords until after all other checks, I make sure that I don’t forfeit quality to pray at the altar of SEO. Now, I can look for keywords my readers might search for and make sure that they find the relevant content that I have to offer. I won’t be reaching, and they won’t be disappointed. Current relationships will stay strong, and new readers will be pleased with what they encounter here.
What tags might I add that belong with this post? Tags can help search engine spiders properly index my post. Post tags are definitely blog, brand, and business promotion. If your blogging software doesn’t easily allow you to tag your posts, there are plug-ins and hacks for every platform out there.
What related articles do I have that readers might be interested in reading? Offering related articles for readers to go to when they finished your post, gives people more information about a subject they’ve already shown interest in. It also gets readers more involved with you, your blog, your business, and your brand. The intra-link that you make at the end of your post shows people how your content relates and is relevant throughout your blog–this helps search engines index it as well.
Are there opportunities for trackbacks? If you’ve mentioned another blogger’s work or if what you’ve said meshes beautifully with the conversation on another blog, send a trackback to let that blogger know.
Is this that one-in-a-million post that I should self-promote to other blogs? If you’ve written the post that reveals the nature of how to get “Google Goodness” from every post, carefully write a brief introduction of yourself and your post to a select few bloggers you wish to share it with. Do be sure it’s a one-in-a-million post, and do explain your reasons for thinking it’s a match with their blogs. If you don’t read a blog, don’t send a link. Period. Either way, it’s a long shot that a post really is the one-in-a-million post that we think it is.

Those are just a few ways I try to diversify and grow my investment. I like to make sure the time I spend continues to pay off, compounding interest well into the future.

You probably have other ways that you build promotion into the posts you write. Will you take a minute to share one with us?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Turning Reluctant Readers into Loyal Fans

February 23, 2006 by Liz

In just a brief one-twentieth of a second–less than half the time it takes to blink–people make aesthetic judgments that influence the rest of their experience with an Internet site.

–Kamakshi Tandon
REUTERS, Internet users judge Web sites in less than a blink
Jan. 17, 2006

We’ve got less than a blink to grab a reader’s attention. The reader clicks in. Looks. Decides and then . . . and then what? . . . Do they stay or do they leave? If they stay, did what they see lend our words more credibility or did it take some away?

Design, curb appeal, packaging–whatever you call it–it’s what brings customer-readers further into our businesses and our blogs. They recognize what works for them and what doesn’t. If it doesn’t, they’re gone so quickly that even our stats programs don’t know. Try the Blink Test if you want a baseline idea of what your readers are seeing before they blink.

What about reluctant readers, undecideds who decide to stay a little longer? What can we do to convince them to stay? Better yet, how can we turn them into fans?

Capturing the Attention of Reluctant Readers

In educational publishing, we have a euphemism, “reluctant readers.” It’s used to describe kids who, when they see a textbook, they turn away to find their inline skates. When I write on literacy, they are my favorite customers to write for and about.

I don’t much like that euphemism applied only to those kids because I’m constantly having to remind other teachers that,

. . . we’re all reluctant readers and becoming more and more so. If you’re a skeptic on this point, try reading the tax code–or any “have-to” document on your least favorite subject. You’ll wish that there were something more to see than long columns of endless text, something to break up the boring words.

With more and more ways to spend our leisure time, even television shows are becoming bulleted lists.

Reader Support as Part of Your Brand

Those kids we call reluctant readers do leave their inline skates to read what they’re interested in–things like books on extreme sports and the latest gaming websites and blogs–if they’re made right. Here’s what you can take from educational research to catch the attention of normal, everday reluctant readers. You can use it to brand your blog as a worthwhile source of quality content. It’s one more way, that you can make customer-reader support a resounding part of your niche brand.

Use sub-heads liberally. Sub-heads break the text into shorter bits. Subconsciously that not only tells me what this bit is about. It also says I only have to read this far and then I get to breathe again. People not only like subheads, search engines like them too.
Use everyday words. A big vocabulary doesn’t bring us closer together, it sets you apart. The word use is a fine one, use it. Don’t set it aside for utilize. That makes me, as a reader, stop to wonder whether you mean something different from the what use would have said. Anything that stops a reader works against your message being heard.
Use pictures, images, art, and color to enhance your message. Do this with care. It’s easy to distract. Place only one or two images. Place them where they add value to the text. Try to put images where you’d expect to find them. If you’re not sure ask a customer-reader to give you feedback on how you’re doing. Remember that design seems easy, but it’s not.
Take the time to write something short. The point here is to make every word count. Read your post over to take out all of the words that you don’t need. Be lethal. It’s amazing how many extra words you can find when your quest is to go looking for them. A few sentences ago, I turned this into two posts instead of one.
Use typographic cues, such as bold and italic, to show what’s important. Be consistent and try not to make everything important. If you use underlined text to show what is a link, don’t use an underline for anything else. If you make everything important, then you’ve really said that nothing is.

Each of these points are about helping reluctant readers like me figure out quickly what’s important and what’s not, so that when I’m done reading what you wrote. I feel like we’re both smart.

Reluctant Readers to Loyal Fans

Ever read something that made you feel like the writer was saying something you always thought? . . . or something that just made you feel smart for reading it? Bet you went back to see what else that writer had to say . . . .

But then, you knew all this. You have a favorites list. You know what it takes to make a fan. I’m just offering some hints on how to get the undecideds to come in, so that you get a chance to do just that.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Success in a Blink and a Blink Test
Business, Blogs, and Niche-Brand Marketing
How to Code Accessible Links–Part 1
What Is Content that Keeps Readers?
Audience is Your Destination

What Is Content that Keeps Readers?

November 7, 2005 by Liz

Everybody talks about content, but nobody actually defines it.

What is content and how can content keep readers?

Content is more than ideas, more than words and pictures on the screen, more than links to articles and data. Content is everything we communicate to our readers. Content is . . .

Information Quality content is both fact and analysis. It offers meat and potatoes that anyone can find together with something original–analysis, predictions, interpretation–that comes only from the writer. Everything is relevant. There’s no time waster anywhere. The writer’s decisions are the “value-added”–the secret recipe. If we have the best recipe, readers will keep coming back to us.
Presentation Quality content is top-notch presentation. Simple is elegant. The best information is lost, if nobody reads it. Too many long sentences; too many bullets; too many links interrupting the text–these get between the reader and the ideas. If it looks hard to read, it is. Like a great wine in a crystal glass, great presentation makes great content inviting.
YOU We saw from our interviews last week, how readers respond to the intangibles Indie brings to his blog. Our presence, our voice, our respect for our readers, they are the nuance, the one-of-a-kind sauce on the expensive meal. Too peppery, too sweet, too salty, too bland, and readers will think this dish isn’t worth having again. On the other hand, get the right balance and they’ll be back every night.

When a blogger provides top-notch content with something extra, readers can see it. They appreciate the writer, and they enjoy the experience. Readers notice that “value-added” difference. They’ll be back to see whether we can do it again.

And that’s when consistency is the operative word. 🙂

–ME “Liz” Strauss