Friday Digital Roundup
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@Spaghetti_Jo
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How To Write A Rubbish Blog
I’ve failed already.
If you’re wondering how I can immediately fail to write a rubbish blog, it’s because I’ve actually written something. The first hurdle that people fall at is never writing their blogs – there’s no chance of a good blog (or a great blog) if you don’t even have a blog. You’d be amazed how many people this applies to.
For the heroes who get some words onto the screen, another staggering chunk of people falls at the second hurdle: sharing the blog. You need to let people know the blog exists so they can read it. A blog without any readers is a very sad blog.
How To Write A Rubbish Blog
How terrible can a blog be?
Very. Truly. Awful. Physically make me wince bad. There was one that made me want to bleach my eyeballs. What was so wrong with these blogs?
Confusing your blog for a blatant sales pitch
Nope. Don’t do this. If you want to talk at someone about how awesome you, your company, or your product/service is, go and find a mirror. Your reflection is the only person who has any interest in listening to someone who wants to talk without regard to the listener – and that’s because they don’t have a choice!
Sure, we know that 99.9% of blogs exist to generate money in some form or another. This doesn’t mean that your content can, or should be, overt sales content. You need to show some consideration to the reader:
- Who are they?
- What might they like to hear me talk about?
- What would be of value to them?
- How can I make this interesting to them?
If you aren’t prepared to ask yourselves those questions, you’re wasting your time.
Punctuation isn’t optional
Commas are your best friend. Full stops are your second-best friend. Dashes are your third-best friend. Embrace them. Include them in your blog as much as possible because they will make your blog a much nicer place.
Keep your sentences short and snappy. Proofread before publishing.
Gimme a bit of space
White space in a blog is amazing and endless scroll is used everywhere for a reason so there’s no need to squish all your content together with no line breaks or headings. It doesn’t matter how good your words are if looking at the page they’re on causes eye strain. There are about 99,000 Google searches every second: people don’t have the time, inclination, or need to hang around for badly formatted content. There’s plenty more to choose from.
Embrace:
- Headings and sub-headings.
- Line breaks.
- Small paragraphs.
If in doubt, make a list!
Don’t be a try-hard
It’s just going to be awkward so don’t be someone you’re not, behave in an inauthentic way, or jump on bandwagons just for the sake of it.
Not everyone is witty or funny (unlike us ?). You don’t need to be. Even if, as an example, you love Aldi’s sassy twitter vibe, it doesn’t mean you have to try and be the same.
We are using this International Day of Peace to extend our antennae out to @marksandspencer
— Aldi Stores UK (@AldiUK) September 21, 2022
Unless you’re a part of Aldi’s social media team, in which case, you carry on as you are!
Be natural. Write as you would talk to someone in person. Read back your own words and, if you’re cringing or confused, edit.
What drives you nuts about blogs?
Comment below and let us know or, if you need someone to fail at writing rubbish blogs for you, we’re the team. Just say howdy!
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1 comment on this article
Todd at 10:47am on September 28th 2022
Takes tips and applies*