What Should You Look For In A Blog Writing ... - Zero-G Creative

When Google unleashed their Penguin armageddon on Search Engine Optimization providers last spring, they effectively did two important things:

1: They affirmed their company?s long-held beliefs on quality SEO tactics and effectively killed the spammy search engine manipulation techniques being employed by a great many SEO vendors, and

2: Ensured that ? at least for the?foreseeable?future ? content would be placed firmly in the online marketing driver?s seat.

And, predictably, we have seen a lot of business owners respond by diverting budgets from SEO and social media vendors in favor of blog or article writing services and coaching. But, with a lot of options out there, how do you pick the right fit for your firm? Zero-G has been helping business owners with blogging for the last two years, so I have a lot of insight to share on this.

There exists a wide spectrum of consulting/coaching and services in the online content marketing arena and, generally speaking, the spectrum starts on the left with firms and consultants who you will engage for a limited time to teach you how to blog effectively, how to use the tools and how to hone your writing for favorable SEO. On the right side of the spectrum we have, in essence, anonymous or crowdsourced ghostwriting services where clients pay a monthly fee and content appears on their website regularly with little (or often zero) interaction between the client and the writing resource. Oftentimes in this scenario writers are crowdsourced, meaning that each post written may have been crafted by a different writer.

Both sides of this spectrum are seriously flawed.

While you could effectively argue that the coaching scenario on the left will produce the best results, success requires a business owner or subject matter expert who is willing and able to write between one and three original posts religiously every week. The failure rate in this scenario is high.

On the ghostwriting side, while there?s no issue in ensuring that content will be consistently created and posted, the major tradeoff is quality of writing. Without direct access to the subject matter expert, writers often use competitive websites and blogs as research material. As a result the writing tends to sound mechanical and the quality of the posts are usually poor. It?s not uncommon for business owners to find content on their website that doesn?t accurately reflect what their business does or their opinion on important industry matters. You can probably guess that the failure rate in this scenario is high as well.

The best writing services are usually found in the middle of this spectrum, finding a balance between ensuring consistency (like the ghostwriter) but without compromising quality or the business owner/subject matter expert?s perspective. Good services will also include time to plan with the client on a regular basis and will keep writing resources on retainer (if not on staff) to ensure consistency in the writing over time.

Apart from these tips, here are a few questions you should ask any potential writing service:

• How will we measure success?
• How will we impact SEO?
• What is the process every month?
• What are my responsibilities in this process?
• What if I?m not happy with your posts?

Choosing the right partner to help you execute this strategy is one of the most important decisions you will make. Be sure to do your homework before you sign a contract.

Source: http://zerogcreative.com/blog/what-should-you-look-for-in-a-blog-writing-service/

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