This week’s review is of Lani Giesen’s post: A personal blog is art, at Blogging Personal.

Blogging Personal is about personal blogging, a subject many people still consider nothing more than an online diary, and consequently oftentimes scorn.  However, given that Technorati currently tracks in excess of 112 million blogs, many of which are personal, it is time someone addressed the issues and misconceptions associated with personal blogs, and Blogging Personal is doing it beautifully.

The content is well written and thought out, and the blog itself has an obvious and clear goal.  As the blog is still fairly young (launched January 2008) it is impressive; and it already has a decent following.  If you haven’t seen it yet, do yourself a favour and check it out.

I cannot fault the writing but for the occasional typo (spell check woman! ) and the post is so neatly divided into sections that it makes it a pleasure to read.  But I would recommend one thing; more care with the lead (or lede) - the introductory section of the story.

Why is a lead important?

The first paragraph or two should tell the story; who, what, where, when, why, and how.  This is important because if you don’t win the reader in the lead, they go away - you need to give them a reason to continue reading.

More importantly, in this case, where you need to entice more readers, you need to show them, in the lead, what they can expect.  Show, don’t tell, and Lani does this particularly well. 

Much like the term link bait, the idea of a lead is to hook the reader.

Writing the perfect lead

• Does the lead give your readers specific information, or is the language too general and vague?
• Is the lead too long?  Could you include some of the information later on?
• Why is this story different/better/more useful than any other out there?
• Go back and check your lead; don’t settle for “it’s good enough”
• Make every word serve a purpose
• Do you have the necessary information to back up everything you say in the lead?
• Always ask yourself: Would you continue reading?

The only change I would make with Lani’s post is to take the first paragraph and make it the second paragraph – reworded a tad to fit.

I wish you so many good things Lani!  Keep going, you’re doing great!

A Personal Blog is Art: Edited 

A personal blog is Art. And personal blogging is an artform.

Some people might have an immediate negative reaction to that statement: The idea “Art” has a lot of baggage. It might seem elitist, it might seem like hubris, it might even seem daunting, but for any of you struggling to make connections between some of the advice written for bloggers and the work (Yes, work!) you do, I think that you’ll come closer to something you can hold on to by considering yourself an artist. Or, at a minimum, an apprentice artist.

This is my answer to the question I posed: What is a personal blog? and I expect it comes as no surprise.

Reading through all the responses to my question, there were a number of common threads. One of the strongest was how indefinable a personal blog actually is, that it was unique to each individual, to each blog, subjective and without limitation. I agree.

I’d love to hear what anyone else has to say about Blogging Personal, or any ideas on how Lani could make it greater still.

Many thanks to Tricia and Lani for letting me take a look at their blogs; this experiment has been interesting and informative for me, and hopefully for you too!

 Photography: Margo Love

Turns out, writing is cool again. Those who would have laughed at touching a keyboard ten years ago, are now are busy typing away, rushing to get their next post out. 

If you have a business, and you don’t have a blog, you’re missing out.  There is no better way to get your name, brand, and product out to the world, and into search engine results - just make sure you blog well.

So, what does writing well have to do with search engines?  Plenty.  If you write well, others will link to your article.  When others link to your article, search engines take notice and point to you too.

But - don’t think for one moment that you need a degree in journalism to have a blog - you don’t.  Some of the best bloggers have no formal training in writing, yet they are successful because they have taken the time to brush up on basics - you can too.

So, how do you write well?

Use plain English. Of the nearly 700 words in Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address, 505 are of one syllable, and 122 are words of two syllables

Use active verbs unless there is no comfortable way to get around using a passive verb - “The Googlebot saw him” is strong; “he was seen by the Googlebot” is weak

Get rid of small qualifiers. They dilute your style and persuasiveness. You are not sort of tired, or a bit confused, or somewhat annoyed. Be confused! Be tired! Be annoyed!

Keep your paragraphs short. Writing is visual; it catches your eye before it catches your brain

Get comfortable using a dictionary and a thesaurus; it expands your mind, and shows you care about your readers - you didn’t just throw it all together

Use fewer words but make them count 

Get to know the most common errors in English

Edit, Edit, Edit. Once you have written your article, go away, have a coffee, come back, print it up, and read it out loud. When you stumble over a sentence, rewrite it, because if you stumble, others will too

And a final point from Brian Clark about headlines:

I absolutely love clever word play.  Puns, turns of phrases, neologisms, Spoonerisms, etc… I love them all.  I just don’t use them in headlines.

The benefits of writing well are many: more readers, increased links, higher rank on search engines, the power to influence, and revenue.

Pretty decent return for your investment, dontcha think?

For more information on writing well, familiarize yourself with On Writing Well, by William Zinnser and the writers’ bible, The Elements of Style, by Strunk and White.

An invitation

Much like Brian Clark did with his remixing headlines experiment, I thought I’d try an editing experiment.  If you have written a post that you think could have been written better, leave a link in the comments section below.  I’ll edit it for you and write up the reasons for the edits next week.

Dilemma

A dilemma is when you must must make a choice between two options, and both have nasty consequences.

For instance, in Roald Dahl’s James and the Giant Peach, James and the insects are inside a giant peach that is floating in the ocean.  Their dilemma is:
 
Do they eat the peach, and face death by drowning?

OR

Do they not eat the peach (keep it as a floating vessel), and face death by starvation?

Conundrum

A conundrum is a puzzling or difficult problem; almost everybody knows the most famous conundrum of all:

Which came first?  The chicken or the egg?
 
*Note:  ”dilemma” is often misspelt as “dilemna”

Copyright laws vary from country to country, but are generally put in place to protect the intellectual rights of authors of books, films, songs, websites, software, and songs.

Most countries follow the Berne Copyright Convention, which protects both published and unpublished work, and ensures copyrighted works are protected in foreign contracting countries.

The problem with the Berne Copyright Convention is the rigid rules. The need to intimately understand the law prohibit it from being useful in today’s digital age, where the user is now the producer.

In 2001, Professor Lawrence Lessig founded the Creative Commons as a way to bridge the gap between total control and anarchy in the copyright world.

A Creative Commons License is based on copyright and can apply to any work that is protected by copyright law. It gives you the ability to dictate how others may copy, adapt, or distribute your work.

For online writers, Creative Commons is the best place to start. The easy to navigate Web site helps you determine which license is best for you in a matter of minutes.

For an interesting read about the myths of copyright, check out Brad Templetons article: Ten big myths about copyright explained. (Yes, I know there are 11 points, but he liked the title too much to change it.)

A complete version of the US Copyright Law is available at the United States Copyright Office; the complete Australian Copyright Act 1968 (updated to Act No. 45 of 2005) is available from the Attorney-Generals Department, and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 can be downloaded from the US Copyright Office.

Anna Quindlen in a recent Newsweek column, March 19, 2007 points to Ann Coulter’s recent anti-gay slur against John Edwards, and talks of how

The landscape of American discourse has grown lousy with agents provocateurs whose careers are built around delivering verbal depth charges, not information.

And she hits it on the head. So many people out there, desperate to be read, seen, heard–especially online.

The information age has offered journalists another place to write; and citizen journalists the opportunity to be published. But with so many fighting for the same audience, who will win?

Interestingly, both can. It’s just a matter of style and time. Those who work on it can succeed, those who don’t, wont.

Journalists need to embrace the new medium and fit it into their needs. They have the writing skills; it’s just a matter of opening their mind to the possibilities of the new technology, and understanding it on a base level.

Citizen journalists and bloggers also have a great shot at success. Most are already tech savvy, aware of the do’s and don’ts on the Web, now it’s a matter of polishing up their grammar skills and getting the words right.

Only then, when both groups develop a unique online style, get over the distrust they have for one another, and begin helping one another, will the original intent and true power of the Internet be seen.

Sharing useful and reliable information will also help the search engines do what they are meant to do: manage the worlds information more effectively. There will be no reason for them to run around madly, constantly changing algorithms to sort the good stuff from the crap.

The only thing Googlebot and other search engine robots “see” when they crawl, categorize, and index Web sites is text.

They don’t care that your site was designed by the latest award winner, or that you have the next Bill Gates, sitting out the back furiously spitting out code.

What bots do look for in text, is relevant content. Spend your time putting together great information and Google and the rest of the search engines will hunt you down, index your site, and rank it well. (Google recommends you use the Lynx viewer to see how your site appears to the Googlebot)

Sounds simple right? It is, but here’s the kicker. People are wary of simple things, especially when it comes to technology.

So, let’s take a step back.

The major search companies, Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo! are just that–companies.

They want to make money (they are a business after all) and they are really, really good at it. Their chief concern is to find content that will bring them more traffic and advertising revenue, and the only way they can do that is by spitting out relevant results.

Think about it. If you are type “Ice Hockey” into Google, and it comes back with a list of a hundred sites dealing with refrigerators, chances are you will try another search engine. Can you really imagine Google saying, “…Um, no, No…thanks anyway, but why don’t you go to Yahoo! instead?”  This is an extreme example, but it will serve you well to remember this.

Write for the user is the mantra, but really, it’s just a variant of what is taught in journalism school – write for the audience.

To do this effectively, be prepared to spend time learning and researching. I said it was simple, not easy.

Webster’s Dictionary defines simple as:

“not elaborate or complicated; plain.”

It defines easy as:

“requiring no great labor or effort.”

You have to invest time and effort into writing your content.

Brush up on your grammar skills; write well constructed, succinct content, include enough varied information on the subject so your visitors don’t need to go elsewhere, use words that you know your users are interested in, and voila, your site suddenly becomes hugely attractive to the Googlebot.

Let’s say your forte is stone - specifically travertine, limestone, marble and apple stone. You want to hit the global market, even a local market, so the obvious choice is an online business - or you want to offer information to existing customers - or you want to attract new customers - doesn’t matter, the nett result is the same - you need an online presence and you need the search engines to see you.

There are three ways you can approach this.

The ‘easy’ route:

Build a Web site; take amazing shots of your work, post beautiful imagery on your site, describe what you do, put in costs and contact details, and then sit back. And wait. I guarantee you will still be waiting in six months; wondering why your site has no visitors (other than Aunt Gertrude) and why Google doesn’t see you.

Complicate the simple stuff:

Start by investigating search engine optimization (SEO). Learn about keyword density. Try and work out the algorithms. Put your site up and stuff as many keywords in as you can…

Given you are working with photographs; you will most likely stuff your image tags with keywords too.

Guess what? Googlebot will see you, BUT – remember what I said robots being simple? They work to formulas that will look at your site, see it is filled with useless information, and brand you “spam” (like the Monty Python song, spam is an endless repetition of worthless stuff). When a search engine deems your site spam, it goes away and ignores you.

Effort: Invest in mental power:

Start thinking laterally.

Sure, do all of the things in the ‘easy’ example above, but then do more. Remember, the more information you provide, the less reason your visitor has to go to another Web site, and isn’t that your goal? To entice the visitor to stay, look around, and ultimately buy your gorgeous stone?

So what else could you include? How about:

• What is marble/travertine/limestone/apple stone?

• Types of stone

• Terminology or jargon explanation

• How to care for marble/travertine/limestone/apple stone

• How do you get so many colors?

• How water affects stone

• The process of manufacturing stone

• Diagrams showing technical specs*

• Other uses for stone

• Benefits of using stone over tile

*If you choose to have the technical specs as an image make sure you label the image really well - eg.

“Technical-specifications-for-Urban-brvc” not “urban_brvc.gif”

You don’t want the URI reading: “Urban_brvc.gif”

This applies to the tool tip as well, instead of “basins” the tool tip should be very specific e.g. “Urban brvc basin”

By writing to the user, you have written to the search engines as well. Yes, it definitely will take more time to put together a site like this, but if you want the search engines to reward you, you need to put in some effort.

Oh, and if you think your work is now done, think again. Time moves on, and new information becomes available. Your visitors want regularly updated information, along with the basic reference material they have come to love on your site. Guess who else likes to see updated content. Yep. Those simple bots searching the Web—don’t disappoint them.

In this information age where time is limited and information is plentiful, people on the lookout for a particular piece of information don’t read – they scan. You have roughly three seconds to get their attention before they decide whether to read on, or click elsewhere.

Interesting note: Scan is a verb, meaning both to scrutinize, and, to glance over.

Have a great title

This is your only shot to grab the readers’ attention. If you fail here, there are plenty of other sites your reader can, and will, choose from. So, don’t fail.

Consider these things when you next write a title:

- Is it fun, or boring?
- Do you use jargon or English?
- What’s in it for the reader?
- Is it intriguing?
- Is it a hard sell?

A really cool experiment at copyblogger has readers sending in their titles, and Brian Clark rewriting them for optimum effect. This is a perfect opportunity for you to understand the power of titles in a fun, lateral, way—invest the time.

Brevity: Keep it short

Which do you prefer?

“I aspire to write like Walt Mossberg.”

or

“I was twelve and in grade eight when I discovered a love for writing. Steve, my English teacher let me rollerskate into class, for this, I adored him. I would sit and listen to his wise words, write furiously and constantly, and return to him for comment. His suggestions were always abstract and this encouraged my thinking. Suddenly, another idea would pop into my head and off I would go, running for my pencil. By the end of the year I knew I wanted to write; my love for information and words was set. Over time, I discovered the Internet and suddenly there was my topic: information. But, how to write about technology without it sounding like uber geek tech speak? This is what I wanted to do. When I first read Walt Mossberg’s column, I realized this is how everyone should write; this is how I wish to write”

Me? I’m a little over the second paragraph by about the word “Steve”

Imagine if

Think different, be unique. No one else can say it better than Seth Godin.

Basic grammar

Google won’t penalize you for spelling mistakes; their goal is to help the user find the most relevant information, so, they ‘fix’ spelling mistakes for you.

Readers, on the other hand, are not as accommodating, and will penalize you in a way that hurts most; they don’t come back.

Who wants to read something that’s difficult to understand? Why should they trust you if you can’t even get the basics right?

Think about this…

Basic grammar was taught to you in grade school. If you need a refresher, check out the Purdue University Online Writing Lab (OWL)

Understand the medium; what you can do and what you can’t

The Internet and the Web have been around for some time now, as has search. Understand the basics before you start; otherwise you might just miss some great opportunities the information age is giving you.

While you’re at it, why not check out copyright, fair use, online etiquette and standards.

aahhh… welcome to the information age

The idea of generating traffic to your website seems daunting for many; people often use not too clever ideas, sometimes learning about the Google death penalty as a result.

You don’t want that.  If people can’t find your site, they won’t come to your site; if they don’t come to your site – no surprise - your product or service can not sell.

Q: So how do you generate traffic to your site?

A: You encourage new links!  Think Link Bait!

Eric Ward sums it up neatly and accurately:

“Link Bait has been around longer than I have.  It’s what we used to call ‘content’.”

Matt Cutts describes it as “Anything interesting enough to catch people’s attention.”

Although it has an unfortunate name, the ideas are tried and true; just ask any journalist, PR or marketing person – you need to ‘hook’ the reader.

Types of hooks:

Informational Hook:

Provide information users find useful in the form of a report.  Make sure you work with subjects you either know well, or want to learn about.

For instance: If you have a thing for Bill Gates, look through his speeches for a common link; let’s say, predictions he has made about technology.  Then find out how many have actually played out, how many are on their way to reality and how many seemingly have no chance of ever working out.  Talk to others in the field and get good quotes.  Then write your report.  Title it “Bill Gates sees the future 90% of the time.”  Cite your sources, link to them and summarize your findings.

News Hook:

Write about breaking news if you have it or set up a site that is a reliable news source for a specific subject.  If you have an interest in aromatherapy for instance, put together a site that has latest findings, information about different oils, uses etc.  Become the expert.

Debate hook:

Find a story that someone in your industry has told recently, then retell from the opposing view.  This works best if you strongly disagree with what the person has said your voice will carry the passion.  It becomes much like a debate, however it does not mean you should be nasty or malicious, just give the flip side of an argument. 

Attack hook:

Being mean or talking about someone in a derogatory sense will bring you attention.  Be ready for backlash if you choose to use this one – unless of course your complaint is valid.

Humor hook: 

Tell a funny story, share a funny picture or video.  If you’ve been around an industry long enough, you should have enough anecdotal arsenals.  People like to laugh, or at least smile a lot.

If you are involved in the media industry, look for amusing stories in the industry rags, include weird and wonderful ads or stories you see in the papers, find or take silly photos, use funny stories from your past (no names of course) and don’t confuse this hook with the attack hook.  They are very different.

Tool hook: 

Create a tool useful enough to get people talking about it online.  Use an invention of yours and show people a way they can benefit from using it.  Then, and this is the bit you may not like, give it away.  Describe how someone can do/make something in detail, write a Google gadget and submit it.  Write about something that benefits readers and you have your hook.

Fear Hook:

If you do a great job writing your title and lead, scare tactics bring people in.  This hook needs great care too; you don’t want unhappy readers, you want to use link baiting effectively, and unhappy readers don’t come back.  Take care with your words and be prepared to back everything up.

I guess by now you have realized you need to tap into an emotion if you want people to come to your site.  Journalists have been doing this for a long time.  Take a look at any story and if it’s good you will see the author has reached out on an emotive level.  People respond to emotions, they cannot help it, it’s intrinsic.

If you want tips from a brilliant marketing mind – check out Seth Godin’s blog.

And finally, three lessons from a master baiter at seoblackhat.