Blogging Tips

I read an interesting article this morning entitled Bloggers Erase Lines Between Traditional and New Media. The gist of it was two bloggers who had repeatedly been denied press passes by the NYPD (the police department is in charge of handing out press passes) finally obtained them.

This got me to thinking, what really makes an authority blog – ie, one people go to first for their information on a particular subject. As there are hundreds of millions of blogs, following is some concrete advice to make your blog stand out, get more traffic and increase sales using the tactics of “traditional media” journalists.

Use Sources: As in, quote news articles, give states, mention noted organizations, conduct interviews, etc. Reporters and journalists use sources in their stories. They find statistics, interview professionals, use case studies, etc. This gives more credence to their piece.

Many bloggers don’t do this. They speak from a “this is what I think” point of view (I do this a lot). And, while that’s nice if you have a personal blog, a professional blog should follow journalist leads and quote sources from time to time.

Use Tie-Ins: News is timely. Traditional journalists tie in their pieces to timely topics. And, this is why you’ll see practically every station/newspaper covering the same topics. While they may all do it differently, it is the same topic.

For example, right now, foreclosures are hot in the news. Practically every newspaper and nightly news cast will carry a story about how foreclosures are affecting their communities, homeowners, local businesses, etc.

No matter what your blog is about, you can usually find a way to tie it into a hot national topic. And, this gets good search engine juice for your blog too. How? By using the title of a piece distributed by the New York Times, for example, every time that piece pops up in a search, yours has a good chance of popping up too.

Write Well: While this may seem obvious, it bears repeating. Many bloggers write as if they’re barely literate. If you want to be taken seriously, you must write well. No matter how topical your blog is or how many sources you cite, if your writing is bad, nobody’s going to want to slog through trying to read it.

While blogs are a new media way of presenting information, the premise is the same – giving readers timely, topical information of interest to them. Hence, the same tactics apply whether you write for a newspaper or a blog audience.