Ten Blogging Practices To Avoid
By PaperStreet on January 30, 2014 in Blogging
You frequently hear tips and tricks for making your law firm blog more compelling and interesting. If you are not getting the results you desire, take a look at these blogging no-no’s–they may help you clean up your act.
1. Ignoring Comments
The objective of your blog is to interact with your audience and build a reputation as an authority figure in your area. The fact that people are leaving comments is a great sign, so don’t ignore them. This is your chance to build relationships with your readers.
2. Not Posting Regularly
Regular posting keeps your blog alive. You want to make sure your latest post is, indeed, current. Stale blogs give the impression that your website is not maintained and not a priority—this isn’t the message you want to send to potential clients.
3. Using Images Without Permission or Credit
If you are directly borrowing from another source you should give credit, link back or ask permission before posting. Think of this as another opportunity to establish relationships with other people in your field. Most people are happy to share material and photographs … just ask.
4. Overwhelming Text
Your text has to be user-friendly, and that means shorter rather than longer. We recommend 500-750 words. If your content is shorter than 500 words your message may not be ready to deliver. If you can’t say what you need to in 750 words then you can break your post up into Part 1 and Part 2 (now you have two posts!).
5. Inconsistent Style
You should have a basic style guideline in place. It doesn’t have to be formal; just a general agreement of how you will handle the abbreviations of states, use of nicknames and references to major public figures.
6. Poor Organization
As your firm grows and expands, practice areas may change. Be sure to keep your categories and tags updated. Poor organization will result in frustrated clients who choose not to bother wasting their time trying to find what they need.
7. Too Much Focus on You
While it is okay to share your opinion and thoughts (you should do this), be sure to make your point so that it is beneficial for the reader. After all, your visitors are reading to learn something. Make sure that something is factual, not just your opinion.
8. It’s All About SEO
Yes, blogging is critical to your SEO campaign, and, likely the reason you are blogging in the first place. However, you are writing for people not Google’s spiders and crawlers. You will quickly notice your audience disappearing if you post solely to squeeze your keywords in.
9. Poor Titles / Sub Headers
You should be breaking your text up with sub headers. In addition your title should be catchy, while still explaining what the blog post is about. Internet readers skim, so make sure your title and subject head are interesting enough to make their gaze freeze for a moment.
10. Forgetting Spell Check
You don’t have to be an expert editor, or even an experienced writer, just make sure that you double check your work before hitting that “post” button. Spelling errors and basic grammatical mistakes give the wrong impression readers and can make you look less polished and professional.
