Your job as a business owner is to solve client problems. Not only are you doing that with your products and services but you should be doing it with your blog.
Creating blog content for your business is crucial in lead generation. Every piece of copy and content that relates to your business has to be all about the client and how you help them.
Says every goddam content marketer.
Despite hating marketing terms and their cliched wisdom, so much of it makes perfect sense. It doesn’t mean that every strategy the ‘gurus’ spout is right for you (or even true) but still, this stuff works for a reason, right?
I bang on about using your business blog to attract clients and generate leads.
If you’re reading this you might want to know how to do it yourself. But if you want to write a business blog all about you, you’re going to need to leave. There is no hope for long-form that does nothing to attract people who need your products.
If you struggle with why you should blog, click here to see what I have to say on the subject.
We march on…
How to find solutions to client problems.
Sounds like an impossible task but if you know your ideal client well, and have tailored your business world around them, this shit should be easy.
Become your client.
I’m going to need you to adopt the acting techniques taught by Lee Strasberg (not really). The reason Brando and Pacino were (and are) such consummate actors is down to them getting inside their characters.
I’m not asking you to try a different accent but what I am saying is that you search on Google as your prospect.
Include keywords that you want to be found for when you ‘pretend’ to be your client.
Make a list of the search results. Which ones are landing on the first page of Google?
Take a look at those results and check out the structure of the titles and descriptions. What clues do they give on how well they’re constructed? How relevant is the content to those titles? Go ahead and click those links, read that content, see how it fulfils the promises made on the results pages.
Understand your clients’ user intent.
Say what?
When we search online we do so with a purpose.
That purpose could be to buy something or to learn something. We have a clear intent before we jump on Google. Your clients have problems that are centred around your industry but they’re not always after a product or service, they may just want information (in view of buying from you later).
That means they’re searching with informational intent and all decent bloggers will know which of their targeted keywords and phrases yields informational results.
If you’d like to find out more about intent and how it impacts keywords, click here.
How do you solve your own problems?
Look at your online habits (god help us).
When you want to buy a product or find info, you’ll type in a phrase with keywords that are specific to the subject.
That’s what your potential clients are doing. You see, this is why you need to know everything about the people buying your stuff.
Create solutions to client problems with your blog.
Can we all just pretend for a moment?
Can we imagine that you’re a wedding photographer that specialises in destination weddings? Thank you, much obliged.
Picture in your mind, silly (foolish) newly engaged couples excited (that won’t last) and itching to find their perfect wedding suppliers. They want inspiration, yay!
Yawn.
They might google:
‘Destination wedding ideas’ or ‘the best luxury wedding destinations’, maybe ‘how to create a destination wedding on a budget’.
If you’re a destination wedding photographer (or chimney sweep/pest controller/FBI agent), you can use your past client work to create blog posts that might be something your potential clients are searching for.
Use your past clients to attract new ones.
What?
You can create content from scenarios you’ve already experienced.
Mould a client process into a post that will help attract potential new leads. So, if you’ve already got a few destination weddings under your belt (or even one), write a post that will help users find out how it works.
Have I mentioned how important I think it is to have an ideal client?
Every business markets to a demographic. If you say you don’t, you just don’t realise that you do because not every man and his dog are buying what you’re selling. I hate to break it to you, honey, you’re not appealing to everyone.
Once you establish who your target customers are, you’ll start to create better webcopy and blog posts. You will have the focus to know who those people are and what they need from you, it’s as simple as that.
Write for your audience.
The skill of making all your blog posts about your potential clients will come, the more you do it. Like everything, you get less shit with practice.
If you want to write a post about receiving an award or going to an amazing place, it will exclude your potential client.
It will just be all about you.
If you can’t create posts in a way that will attract people to buy from you – don’t blog for business or outsource it. If you want to tell everyone that you’re an award-winning whatever pop it in your bio. No one want’s to read a thousand words or more about it, not even your mum.
Ultimately it’s about your objective and why you create any content in the first place.
If you want to know more about what I do, hit the button.
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