We’ve got blog!

We are very fortunate that various members of the Austin AMA Board of Directors have started writing for the AustinAMA blog. Matt Lemke, Priscilla Brave and Angela Brutsché have all contributed posts, and more are in the works.

Our goal is to turn the Austin AMA Blog into a power marketing blog with original content as well as highlights of the best local content.  But if Austin AMA members can contribute 2-3 original posts a week we can kick butt in the original content department.

If every member of the AMA can contribute a post, even just one post a year, then we’ll have a post a day. That would rock!

What are the benefits?

1.) Our SEO will go through the roof. No matter what shenanigans the black hat SEO artists out there come up with, they’re always behind. Google is constantly changing its algorithm.

But it changes it’s algorithm to focus on one thing, and one thing alone: providing relevant results to searchers. Good quality content (in other words you, our members, sharing your knowledge), is exactly what web surfers crave, and what Google loves.

2.) Benefits our members. Our members joined for a reason: to feed off of the collective wisdom of the organization. Not everybody, in fact not even a majority of people can make it out to the monthly meetings, but they can browse to our website, sign up for an RSS feed or email subscription of our blog. Share your knowledge with them and give them the value they expect.

3.) Benefits you. Let’s face it: we also became members to drive our own businesses. While overtly commercial content is frowned upon, posts like our recent contributions by AMA board members provide valuable tips and tricks which increases your expert status with potential customers. Their thinking is: “if she knows this, can you imagine what a great job she can do with my marketing project.”

Share your expertise in a helpful way, and you’ll benefit too.

4.) Makes us better marketers. Because interruption marketing has taken its toll on consumer attention, we are more and more resistant to advertisements, spam, direct mail, telemarketing, and other types of “interruption” marketing. Content used to be king, but now content marketing is king.

Writing useful and even thought leadership style content on a regular basis hones our marketing skills in many ways. Writing good content helps us with: social media, our own blogs, reports, white papers, eBooks, newsletters, and any number of things I may have neglected to mention.

5.) The AMA will become a marketing resource to the Austin Community. We’re a marketing organization: We should be the premiere resource for marketing knowledge in Austin. Can I get an amen?

What makes a good blog post?

Here are guidelines for writing a good blog post:

A.) Content should be non-promotional. This is an obvious one but it bears repeating. Not only is it distasteful, but it makes readers run for the hills as soon as they read the first sentence.

B.) Content should be either a “how-to,” introduce a new concept, or a commentary on the industry. However, by far the easiest and most valuable blog post to write is a how-to.  Matt Lemke’s and Priscilla Brave’s posts were “how-tos”

C.) Make posts scan-able This is another obvious one for you savvy marketers. Break up paragraphs into smaller paragraphs. Use lots of section headers, bullet points, numbered lists, etc. A person should get the gist of what you’re writing about by reading the opening paragraph, and then scanning the section headers.

D.) Come up with a snappy title. I’m preaching to the choir here, but here’s an interesting twist on headlines: look at the cover of any Cosmopolitan magazine for good ideas (or if you have a good swipe file, share it with us!!!). This is a tip I got from Sonia Simone of Copyblogger.com: read any Cosmo title, and replace the words with your concept.

Example: Cosmo Headling: “Does Your Hair Make You Look Fat?”. Your potential headline: “Does Your Marketing Make You Look Dumb?” You get the picture..

E.) Provide images. Another great way to lose readers is to have 100% text. Use original images, or images from iStockphoto.com, or even infographs. Infographs are great because it engages more of the readers’ senses in the concept you’re explaining and can really create that “ah-haaa!” moment.

F.) Make it 300-800 words. Any less and it’s a stretch that it’s a real blog post. Any more and you might lose your reader.

G.) Edit like crazy. After you put your blog post to rest for a little bit, come back to it after a few hours or even a day. You’ll probably see type-os, wording that doesn’t work, and excessive wordiness. About 20-30% of the words of any initial copy are not necessary. Cut out unnecessary words.

The gauntlet has been thrown down

We’ve had a few AMA members step up to the plate. Who’s next?