HUBSPOT NOTES: Blogging Best Practices

All of the following comes from an online video presentation by HubSpot, posted in at:

http://www.viddler.com/explore/success-hubspot/videos/87/

Presentation by Lucy Orloski, HubSpot IMC, uploaded February 12, 2010. I viewed it on March 29, 2010.

Blogging Best Practices

Why Blog?

• Because it’s smart, not because it’s trendy
  • Adds pages to your site — makes it look bigger to Google, which causes Google to trust you more!
  • Each entry = opportunity to rank for a new keyword
  • Interesting content = more inbound links! — People will link to great content

Best Practices for Content

• People will only link to content that is worth linking to
  • Be educational, not promotional — if all you do is promote, people will be turned off; if you give good information relevant to your industry, people will share it with their friends
  • Think about what interests your audience -can you picture them forwarding the article to a colleague? Will it make them look smarter? Will it help them know more than before they read your post? Is it insightful?
  • Think of yourself as being a TEACHER — what can you help others to learn?
  • Use keywords in your entry titles! Really helps you get found better, but also helps readers know what you are writing about

Best Practices for Presentation

• Half the battle is writing something interesting — other half is getting people to read it!
  • Bad: Nothing but a big hunk of text — a blog is NOT a white paper!
  • Good: Break things up:
    • White space
    • Pictures
    • Bullets
    • Numbered lists
    • Bold key ideas
    • Colour key words or sentences
    • Catch people’s eye to a particularly interesting thought or idea
  • Can they understand the main idea of your post at 8:00 am before coffee?
    • What is the main idea?
    • Is it easy to grasp what you are trying to convey?
    • Are you using words that are easy to understand?

Free Pictures from Flickr

• Find photos for free at Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/creativecommons/by-2.0/
  • Click the thumbnail image of the photo you want
  • When looking at your photo, click the “All Sizes” button that’s sitting at the top of the photo
  • Right-click your desired image and select “Save As” to save it to your computer
  • Upload it where you’d like it to be in your blog
  • At the very bottom of your blog entry, write “photo by [Flickr User]” and link their name to their photo page

Calls to Action

• Be relevant, not spammy
  • Don’t use one if you don’t have a relevant Call to Action (CTA) for your entry
  • It’s like the old idea, “If you don’t have something good to say, don’t say it!”
• Keep it isolated to end of the entry
  • Keep it out of the meat of your blog post
  • Put it at the bottom, out of the way
  • Put it after the photo credit, in fact
  • The people who really want to can dig in further can pursue it if they want
  • The people who don’t won’t be offended by having it in their face, they can ignore it if they want

Conclusions

• Blog as much as possible
  • 2 – 3 times per week is preferable
  • 1 time per week is the bare minimum for real success
• Keep keywords in mind
  • Matters even in the title
• Don’t compromise on quality
  • Teach GOOD STUFF!
• Be non-promotional in your content
  • Keep yourself out of it
• Be relevant in your CTAs

These tips will help you pull good people into your site and turns them into leads!

Here, again, is the link to the full video by Hubspot, presented in Viddler:

http://www.viddler.com/explore/success-hubspot/videos/87/

Thank you, Lucy Orloski and HubSpot!

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Images: Screenshots taken from Viddler and HubSpot Webinar title page.