This is a guest post written by Janet Aronica. Janet is the head of marketing for Shareaholic, a company that creates content sharing tools for publishers. You can follow Shareaholic on Twitter @Shareaholic and get daily content tips on the Shareaholic blog.
Ever write a blog post, hit publish, and feel like all you hear are crickets? If your content isn't remarkable, it's not shareable. Search is social. So whether or not your content gets shared makes a huge difference in your blog's traffic and lead generation.
People share content for a variety of reasons. A recent study from the NY Times' Consumer Insight Group (CIG) looked into why people share content online. Among the variety of motivations was a desire to define ourselves to others with the content we share as well as a desire to grow and nurture relationships by sharing entertaining or interesting content. Is your content interesting and entertaining enough for people to want to associate their personal brands with it? If not, you better re-think your approach and consider these 7 tips.
1. Your Headline Sucks
Your headline is the most important part of your post because it's your first impression. It's what people see in big, bold text when your blog post shows up in search engine results.
It's also what they see when your content is tweeted and shared on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Google+. So without a great headline, few people will get that initial intrigue that makes them want to click through and check out your post. Write great headlines that are descriptive but also spark a sense of urgency. And don't be afraid to try a funny or snarky one, too. Grab their attention with the headline, and hook them with the great content behind it.
2. Your Timing Is Off
According to HubSpot's research on the science of timing, blog posts published in the morning generate the greatest number of page views, especially when targeting women. Do you know your audience, and do you know when to deliver your content in order to get the best results? Get the insight you need to create more shareable content. Survey your audience and ask when they prefer to read your content, or dig into your audience analytics to get the information you need. And remember: planning ahead is key. Creating and maintaining a blog editorial calendar will prepare you to have content to publish each morning, versus constantly playing catch up and publishing posts in the late afternoon after you wrote them that day.
3. You Don't Have "Regulars"
You want your blog to be like Cheers -- where everyone knows your name. You want your posts to spark a conversation and to ignite an interest that keeps people coming back for more.
A great way to develop a relationship with your audience is by being attentive to blog comments. Spark a conversation on your blog by discussing recent industry events or asking for your readers' perspectives on new research. It's all about the writing style and balancing your point of view as the expert opinion and being a participant in the conversation. To get the comments rolling, make the content useful and thought provoking, and "reward" your commenters by responding. If you generate a group of regulars who always come back to read your blog content, chances are good they're also regularly sharing and evangelizing your content, too.
4. You Write About Yourself
Your company is interesting to you. It's also interesting to your mom. So she might subscribe to a blog full of company party photos, product feature updates, and long essays written from your point of view. But is your mom your target audience?
When readers are visiting your blog for the first time, they don't care about you yet. Make them care by addressing the topics they want to learn and talk about. How-to articles and lists of tips and resources are good formats to begin with.
5. Your Posts Are All the Same
Ever listen to a band and every one of their songs sounds the same? Boring! Change up the format of the content with charts, infographics, videos, photos, and other visuals to keep people coming back for more. If you look at Social Media Examiner's posts, you'll see how they break up the text with different visuals, headings, and bold text. Break up your content to make it easier to consume so you get more people to read it and more people to share it.
6. You Ramble
If there isn't a clear takeaway from your content, people don't have a key point or reason to share it with their friends and followers. Long paragraphs full of allegory, symbolism, adjectives, and adverbs are best saved for English class. Cut to the chase, and make the lessons from your content loud and clear.
7. You Make it Difficult to Share
It's surprising to me how many blogs don't have social sharing buttons. It's easy to get caught up in selecting the perfect design or theme and then forget about the obvious, functional elements likes social media buttons or "subscribe by email" widgets. Have at least a simple design that looks clean, but first get the basic features on your blog and get a content plan in line. Then go crazy with design.
What makes you want to share a blog post? How do you incorporate those elements into your blog? Let us know in the comments!
Image Credit: F Delventhal
As a marketer, you're all too familiar with the infamous lead gen goal. And if you're anything like us, you obsess over this number. It haunts your day-to-day work, and it keeps you up at night as visions of lead-capture forms dance in your head (it's still the holidays, right?). And even if you hit your goal this month, the glory won't last very long. As soon as the month ends, a new one begins, and you'll need to hit your goal yet again. Oh, the horror!
So per our second point, maybe you've already started slapping CTAs on all your web pages. Fantastic! But there's actually some strategy involved. If you're just putting any old CTA on any old page, then you need to be more careful. Use some logic here. If a visitor is hanging out on your products pages, that means they're likely further along in the sales cycle. Shouldn't the CTA on that page point to a more middle-of-the-funnel offer such as a free product trial, demo, or consultation? Try to align the offers you feature to visitors at their likely point in the sales process.
