July 28, 2006 Comments
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Chris Garrett has a fantastic post over at Performancing today that talks about whether or not you need to be an "expert" in order to be a good blogger. He makes some good points that need to be considered by any small business owner that's considering adding a blog to their site. Since article and blog writing advice often tends to center around the need to share unique and informative content, many small business owners shy away from the idea of blogging. Garrett points out that in reality, it's not necessarily what you know, but how you present it, that makes the difference.
From Garrett's post...
OK, I know you are thinking of a bunch of blogs where the author does share his or her expertise. You might include Performancing in this category, I don't know. Fact is for any given "expert blog" there are many non-expert blogs. I love bloggers that share their expertise, it is a good thing. Just, you know, not entirely necessary.
What I think sets apart a good blog from a bad one in most cases is not the knowledge or experience of the blogger but how interesting they make the content. If Scott Adams wrote the very same ideas in a serious political blog I would never subscribe to it, as well as his off the wall way of looking at life it is his writing style that grabs me. If you are not an expert but can be interesting or write particularly well I believe you can more than make up for a lack of expertise. Have all that and expertise you will probably do even better but don't hold back because you don't consider yourself an expert.
That second paragraph makes a really excellent point...one that I think it lost on a lot of site owners. There's so much pressure to be "the best" or to be "the expert" that many people forget that there's plenty of room for simply being "the information gatherer" or "the interpreter." So before you bypass blogging as a potential content and link generator for your site, think through whether or not you might be able to create a useful blog that would appeal to readers because of how you present the content rather than because of what content you're presenting.
Jennifer Laycock is the Editor of Search Engine Guide, an educational web site aimed at translating the search marketing world into something that small business owners can understand. Jennifer specializes in common sense search engine marketing, viral marketing and customer outreach via social media and blogs. A former search marketing consultant and in-house trainer, Jennifer’s clients have included companies like Verizon, American Greetings and Highlights for Children. Her primary clients now are a little girl named Elnora and a little boy named Emmitt.
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