Update: This was a test post created during the To Blog or Not To Blog – An In Depth Look At the Why’s And The Wow’s of Blogging.

In a session today on Blogging, Wayne Schulz of Schulz consulting left a room of 20 people completely cured of insomnia!

Topics discussed were how to Blog, How to select stories and the top mistakes not to make.

Here’s the slide deck:

My very condensed notes from IT Alliance:

1. Background of Wayne Schulz – Schulz Consulting, LLC
– How started – geardiary.com blogger for about 1.5 year
– Why use blogging (search, credibility, developer yourself as an authority, save time in the sales process, develop qualified leads)

2. Comparison to other methods
– Email (overloaded and less effective than ever – people delete fast)
– Cold calls (plummeting response rates)
– Referrals (the best way to connect to prospects)
– Direct Mail (see cold calls above)

3. What is blogging software
– WordPress – http://www.wordpress.org (free download)
– Blogger – http://www.blogger.com

4. Why blog
– So customers, prospects, potential employees can find you
– Create searchable content
– Provide customer value – creates a reason for them to return to your site
– Re-use the content in your email newsletters (I use and recommend Constant Contact)!!
– Demonstrate uniqueness to prospects – differentiates you from the competition
– Get inbound links from others

5. Tips
– Rather than send an lengthy email or make a lengthy forum post – blog it
– Avoid the three killers: Politics, Religion, Sex (open a personal blog if you feel the urge)
– Be consistent and write at least daily
– If you find it interesting chances are someone else will
– If you think “should I write about this” – you probably should
– The best articles are those you aren’t sure about initially
– Use a pre-built theme
– Measure site traffic (I use Statcounter.com)
– Chose your story titles wisely – keyword rich, tag them, categorize them
– Find links in – Technorati
– Google Reader

6. Finding topics to write about
– RSS (set up Google Reader)
– Email exchanges with colleagues (groups.google.com is a great way to get your friends together)
– Articles online (re-blog)
– Articles on other sites (re-blog with a link back)
– Conferences
– Seminars
– Press releases
– Experiences you’ve had at a client working with products  (good and bad)
– Google news alerts

IMPORTANT: Be cautious with what you write and remember that your goal is to have your content show in search results. Expect companies to find stories that you’ve written (both positive and negative). Think before you push the “publish” button because you can’t easily take back something that’s been indexed in Google or other search engines.

7. Tips about wordpress
– Write offline (I use Marsedit on MAC – Ed Kless swears by Windows Live Writer)
– Use plug ins (wordpress.org)
– Connect your blog to an RSS feed (use Twitterfeed) to Twitter and FB
– Use images – people like pictures (Flickr is a great free tool that will let you email in photos)
– Use a custom theme (check Studiopress for a wide assortment of modifiable themes about $60 ea)
– Be consistent in your layout
– Spell check
– Keep the focus on the client (think benefit)

8. Demonstration of WordPress
– Create an article

Questions? Use the comment area below and I’ll be happy to answer to update the article as needed.

9. Integrating your web site
– Twitterfeed
– Facebook
– Friendfeed

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