10 Week Blogging Success Recipe

August 12, 2014

CONSUME CREATIVELY

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Jump start your blogging efforts with this 10 week blogging success recipe. In just 10 weeks you’ll be able to create, distribute and promote great content in a timeline that won’t have you feeling overwhelmed. Let’s get cooking!

Ingredients

  • Blogging Ingredients 10 Blog Posts
  • 20 Social Media Posts
  • 5 Blog Post Emails
  • 1 Offering
  • 1 Offering Landing Page
  • 1 Offering Call to Action
  • 1 Offering Email
  • 1 Offering Thank You Page

Directions

Step 1: Stir Up 10 Blog Posts

The first thing you’ll need to do is plan out 10 blog posts so that you can publish one post per week for the next ten weeks. In order to decide what to write about, determine what your buyer persona needs/wants to know. When people read your blog posts you want them to feel like Finally! Somebody is answering my questions! Providing useful, relevant content on your website is a crucial part of the inbound methodology.

Some information you’ll want to jot down while planning each of your 10 blog posts includes:

  • Blog post publication date
  • Blog post title
  • 1-2 sentence description of blog post content

It’ll be much easier to work on writing the description of your post before trying to come up with a title. Your goal is to have one blog post ready to publish each week, so once you’ve finished planning each post, start writing!

Step 2: Mix In 20 Social Media Posts

Mix in 20 social media postsNow that you have 10 awesome blog posts you can repurpose that content and share it with your social media followings. For each blog post you’re going to schedule two social media posts, hence 20 social media posts in total. Remember to:

  • Schedule your posts to release after your blog posts have published.
  • Schedule two social media posts about each blog post, altering the language a bit for the second one.
  • Publish the second post on another day at another time to reach more viewers.
  • Link each social media post to your blog post.
  • Distribute across all mediums. We use Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Google+ but if your company is active on other social media platforms, feel free to distribute your content there as well.

When planning your 20 social media posts, take the time to write out the following pieces information:

  • Publish date of post #1 and post #2 for each of the 10 blog posts. These should be at least 1 or 2 days apart.
  • Where to post. Make a note of the social media platforms you’ll distribute the post on.
  • Why people need to read this post. Write one sentence related to the blog post that will grab readers and compel them to click on the link to your blog post.
  • Title of post.
  • Link to post.

Serving Suggestions

  1. If you’re publishing on Twitter, write this post first and then elaborate for other networks. Although you can write more for Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+, studies show that shorter posts are generally more successful.
  2. To post more than one time per day without effort, schedule posts of interesting articles you find while researching for your blog post.

Step 3: Blend Together 5 Blog Post Emails

So now that you’ve written all of these blog posts, you want to tell people about them via email. Since the plan is to publish one blog post per week, plan on sending out one email every two weeks with each email containing links to two blog post articles. The reason you’re promoting your articles through social media and email is because people discover information differently, so in order to reach the largest audience, you want to distribute your content on multiple mediums.

Each email will include:Blog Post Email Example

  • A photo with a caption related to your blog post.
  • The title of your blog post.
  • The date.
  • The name of the author.
  • A short description of the blog article.
  • A link to the article.

To the right is an example of a blog post email containing all of the key elements as indicated by the red boxes.

Serving Suggestion

The best days for email opens are Tuesdays and Wednesdays at 8am, 9am, 10am and 11am. The best days for click-throughs are Thursdays, Fridays and Tuesdays.

Step 4: Dish Out 1 Offering

Creating an offering is about providing visitors to your website with answers they need all wrapped up in a nice, neat package. The offer should be valuable so that people are willing to exchange their contact information in order to download it.

To create the offering you’re going to bundle the 10 blog posts you’ve written into one downloadable package. You don’t need fancy programs to create a pretty offer; you can create it using Microsoft Word or PowerPoint. The only requirement is that you need to be able to save it as a PDF.

A few must-have elements of your offering include:

  • A cover page. This makes the offering seem more tangible.
  • A table of contents. Each item listed here will link out to the topic.
  • An author introduction page. This page will include your name, job title, a bio and social media links.
  • 10 blog posts plus some. You don’t want the book to feel like just a collection of blog posts, so to fill in the gaps you might need to write a few extra paragraphs or add in more images or infographics to bring the book together.
  • A final call to action. The entire book wasn’t about selling anything, it was about giving people information they need, so a final call to action is your opportunity to actually sell something. You can promote another offering to move your customers down through the buying funnel or maybe offer a free consultation.
  • Contact information. It’s important to insert your contact information in the offering in case your readers have any questions, concerns or if they want to get in touch with you for a consultation.

Step 5: Whip Up 1 Offering Landing Page

Simply put, a landing page is a page on your website dedicated to promoting the offering you created. The information included on this page will help visitors decide if downloading the offer is worth giving up their email address. You’ll want to make the offer irresistible and have a clear value proposition.

Landing Page Example

On your offering landing page:

  • Use action language to promote the offer.
  • Be specific when describing the download.
  • Don’t include main navigation on the page.
  • Share a second offer if needed.
  • Add in a picture of the offering.
  • Include a download form that, at the very least, asks for their name and email address.
  • Place a button on the download form that links to the offering PDF once visitors have entered their contact information.

Step 6: Allow 1 Offering Call-To-Action to Simmer

The offering call-to-action is another supporting material needed to promote your offering. The CTA is the first chance you have to help visitors decide if they need the offering. The goal for the CTA is to drive people to your landing page.

Call to Action Example

Call to Action Example

The CTA needs to:

  • Be big enough for people to notice it.
  • Use action language to tell people why they need it.
  • Offer a clear value proposition.
  • Be specific when describing what they’ll get if they download it. This can be a shorter version of the description used on the offering landing page.
  • Create urgency, perhaps by telling people to download now or click here.
  • Be used everywhere. If you only have one offering, place it at bottom of every blog post.
  • Include a button that promotes an action, such as “Download Free E-Book”, and links to the offer.

Step 7: Sauté 1 Offering Email

Offering EmailThe offering email is yet another promotional piece for the offering you created and, just like the offering CTA, the goal of the email is to drive visitors to your landing page. This email will be sent to your contact list and to new people added to your list.

The content of this email will be similar to the landing page. You’ll want to be sure to address your contacts by name and let them know why this offering is of value to them. You might consider segmenting your contact list into groups of people with commonalities so you can send more tailored messages that relate to their need for the e-book.

Step 8: Serve Up 1 Offering Thank You Email

This is where you actually deliver the offering. Since you have your contacts name, include it in the salutation to personalize the email. Thank them for downloading the resource and be sure to add a download link that connects directly to the offering PDF.

You can use the second half of the email to sell and keep the ball rolling. This is where you might add a CTA for another offering or maybe promote a free consultation.

Finally, end the email with a nice sign off that includes your name, contact information and picture of yourself if you can. It’s a nice touch that lets your contact know you’re real, not an automated system. You can also add social media buttons to your emails, but if you do, make sure they link to the landing page, not the offering file. That way when it’s shared with other people, you gain their contact information as well by requiring them to fill out the form on the landing page in order to receive the offering.

Who Manifested This Madness?

Monica Maye Pitts

This fabulous human, that's who.

Monica Maye Pitts

Monica is the creative force and founder of MayeCreate. She has a Bachelor of Science in Agriculture with an emphasis in Economics, Education and Plant Science from the University of Missouri. Monica possesses a rare combination of design savvy and technological know-how. Her clients know this quite well. Her passion for making friends and helping businesses grow gives her the skills she needs to make sure that each client, or friend, gets the attention and service he or she deserves.

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