Blog - Page 102 of 137 - Zoe M. McCarthy

How to Increase Visitors to Your Blog in Less Than 13 Words

Oct 2, 2014 | Blogging | 19 Comments

“Yet nothing in the marketing mix is more important than a strong title.” —Michael Hyatt

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Hurray! Hurray! This post is the 100^th I’ve written. Because I have guests on my blog, I’ve published more than 100 posts, but this is a milestone for me!

I looked back at my early posts. Five posts did well at the time of publishing and continued to be viewed more often than others over the past couple of years.

Tweetable

I believe the titles made these blog posts popular over time. Click to tweet.

5 Reasons I Don’t Care I Lost Money Self-Publishing(Blog #14)
Many in my audience are writers. They’ve probably considered self-publishing.

4 Crucial Elements That Make Your Audience Talk Up Your Creative Work(Blog #24)
Who wouldn’t want more people talking up their work?

4 Ways to Free Yourself from Procrastination in Your Creative Endeavors(Blog #27)
Who wouldn’t want to be free from evil procrastination?

4 Choices That Improve Your Perseverance(Blog #25)
Perseverance is a coveted commodity.

2 Tips to Pump Up Your Flat Characters in Your Story (Blog #28)

My Son’s just purchased 1970 Chevelle

Actually, the tag, Chevelle, that I included on this post, boosted this one to the all-time high number of views.

For over a year, this post received weekly views and spurred several emails from Chevelle-loving men. One wanted to buy our junked Winnebego mentioned in the content.

Including a word repeated often in the content (Chevelle) in my tags, showed SEO works.

Note Two Important Characteristics:

All titles have a number in them. Number of reasons, elements, ways, choices, and tips. In addition to “How to,” giving the number of items is particularly effective.
All titles told what benefits people would receive from the content. (4 directly; 1 indirectly) This is a must.

Tweetable

Work as hard on your post title as you do your content. Click to tweet.

Join me in celebrating Blog #100. What is the title of the most popular blog post you wrote and published? (Please no guest blogs whose titles’ effectiveness are masked by the promotion efforts of your guests.)

How You Can Conduct an Author Interview Like a Pro

Sep 25, 2014 | Writing | 20 Comments

“Remember, you are not the focus of the interview. Your only job is to make the interviewee look like a hero.“ —Carlos Cooper

My guest today is Amy L. Sullivan, author of When More Is Not Enough. Amy graciously agreed to share steps to conduct out-of-the-ordinary interviews, whether for blog posts, audios, or videos. Her book is for “families who are ready to move beyond seeing generosity as a series of tasks and instead, turn it into a way of life.”

Author interviews are a great way to highlight authors and establish connections. Follow these easy steps to look like an interviewing pro.

Prepare. Walk into the interview knowing something about the author: where they live, the name of the last book they wrote, a funny post they recently shared. Preparing ahead of time allows you to connect with the author immediately.

Pay attention to time zones. Make certain you confirm time zones. I learned this when I thought an author was in the Eastern time zone, but she was in the Pacific, and I agreed to a 9:00 pm interview.

Set a clear expectation regarding time. Let your interviewee know upfront exactly how much time the interview will take and then, stick to the time period given.

by jppi

Ask a variety of interesting questions and have more questions than you will need. I promise you every single person who interviews an author asks, “Where did you get the idea for your book?”

Be different. Come up with unique and well-thought-out questions and always have more questions then you need.

Along the same lines, if you are emailing questions to an author, don’t overload them with twenty questions. Send the author between five and eight questions and allow them to choose the questions they would like to answer.

In this interview with Jessie Benkert six questions was the perfect amount for my readers to get to know her.

Be fun. Forget ho-hum. Think of a way to add something unique to the interview.

by monosodium

In an interview I did last summer with Jeff Goins I asked Jeff to play the game Instant Answer.

This is how I found out he preferred U2 over Michael Jackson, chess over checkers, Downton Abby over Scrubs, and flying over driving. Interesting, right?

Ask the author ahead of time if there is anything specific he or she would like you to share with your readers. The author may want you to run a book trailer or include specific social media links. Ask and then follow through.

Make some noise. Once your interview is printed, yell about it on social media.

Be gracious. I know you know this, but drop the author an email thanking them for their time. It’s just nice.

Do you have any tips you can add to the list? Do you have a favorite author interview you have conducted? Leave the link in the comment section.

Tweetable:

Be fun. Forget ho-hum. Make some noise. Conduct an author interview like a pro. Click to tweet.

Bio: Amy L. Sullivan is author of When More is Not Enough (Amazon link). Amy also writes for oodles of print and online publications and loves speaking with groups of any size. Connect with her online at AmyLSullivan.com

The Essential Announcement Element to Lure Readers to What You Write

Sep 18, 2014 | Blogging | 10 Comments

“The danger of the Web is that you can go from idea to public announcement in under ten minutes.” —Seth Godin

by pedrojperez

We do much work to write an interesting blog post, article, or book. Yet our announcements to promote our work fail to draw people to it. We ignore the one thing that works. I say ignore, because experts are constantly encouraging us—begging us—to use this important bit of wisdom.

Here are examples to show you what I mean.

What Many of My Incoming Emails Look Like

Set 1:

Subject: Jane Doe Is My Guest Today

First Line 1: Come by and see what Jane has to say.

First Line 2: Stop by and hear about her writing journey.

First Line 3: If you have time, come by and encourage her.

First Line 4: You don’t want to miss what she says about her writing journey.

In Set 1, even though the senders address the readers, using “you,” they don’t tell them anything. We need to find at least one thing in our content our audience will want to know. And lure them with that tidbit.

by Jusben

This is what experts keep telling us:

Tweetable

To lure people to read your words, tell them what’s in it for them. Click to tweet.

Might This Email Work Better?

Subject: How You Can Win Over Unsupportive Family

First Line: Author Jane Doe gives several successful ways she won over her unsupportive husband and children.

by Prawny

Set 2:

Subject: I’m on Jane Doe’s Blog Today

First Line 1: I talk about my characters.

First Line 2: I’d love to hear your thoughts on my post.

First Line 3: Novel Baby is available; hop by and meet my characters.

First Line 4: See what I went through last month with my characters.

In Set 2, notice the words “I” and “my”? Most people probably don’t care about us, the blog we’re on, or that another book is out. We must find something in our content that will make readers want to go to Jane’s blog.

Tweetable

Give people a reason to care about your spot on someone’s blog. Click to tweet.

Might These Emails Work Better?

Subject: Romance Readers: 3 Reasons Experts Say You Must Read Novel Baby

First Line: In Blogging Books today, you’ll learn why readers, such as you, endorsers, and reviewers, loved the characters in Novel Baby.

OR:

Subject: How to Rebuild Your Life After Losing Your Job

First Line: From character Drew Peters’ journey in Starting Over, Blogging Books lists 3 pitfalls and 4 successful efforts to handle the loss of you job.

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Set 3:

Subject: Revamped Blog

First Line 1: Friends, I’ve revamped my blog. Check it out.

First Line 2: Fellow authors, I’ve got a new look! Tell me what you think.

In Set 3, when we write requests like this, we give people no reason to stop what they’re doing and go to one of millions of blogs to see our new look.

So, except for family members, this option may work better:

Tweetable

Instead of invitations to your new blog, write a great post & draw people to it. Click to tweet.

Which types of promotion emails do you seldom read?

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How to Increase Visitors to Your Blog in Less Than 13 Words

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