To many people, “fresh content” brings blogging to mind. Depending on your offer, your brand, and a number of personal factors, that may or may not be true.

How a Blog Can Help Your Website

If keeping a blog sounds fun to you, and you’re able to generate the topics needed to update a couple times a month or more: fantastic. It’s an excellent way to keep your search engine optimization in tip-top shape—a way to use SEO keywords that meet the needs of your audience. And that’s the crux of it. The purpose of the blog is to be useful to your website visitors.

When people come to your website, they have questions. They might be looking to buy your offer, or they might be looking into who you are as a business. They also might just be looking up an answer to a general question they have related to your field.

• A fitness instructor might write about how to supplement marathon training with strength exercises.
• A tailor might write about simple sewing tricks like how to replace a button that’s popped off your sweater.
• Someone who works for a website design company might write about deciding whether to blog or not (OMG that’s what is happening right now).

That’s right: you are a subject matter expert! What do you know that your customer might not? While it’s important to keep your content high-level and concise on top-level pages of your website, blogging lets you get into finer detail about things your audience might be curious about.

What Your Blog Shouldn’t Be

At the risk of dating myself, I come from a time where the reason one needed a blog was so they could share their inside thoughts with the capital-I Internet. Blogs were synonymous with pouring your heart out to strangers, and dare I say being a bit…emo. (Yes I had a Livejournal, a Xanga account, and asymmetrical bangs with a side part.)

That honor is now reserved for one’s social media accounts. Blogging is now largely the domain of thought leaders and businesses. Sharing on your business blog shouldn’t be about keeping a public online diary.

Am I saying you should keep it sterile and impersonal? Not if you want people to read it. In fact, if you’re unable to muster the enthusiasm to keep up regular blogging, or if writing in general fills you with existential dread, just don’t do it! There are other options.

Refresh Your Content without Blogging

There’s more than one way to refresh the content on your website. Here are a few other ideas:

Update your products or offer information regularly.

If you’re like most businesses, you don’t have one single offer that stays exactly the same year after year after year. Even if the offer is the same, there are still elements about it that are different. Going into detail about your offer gives you more opportunities to display how they change. Maybe you added an additional service to your package, or a new flavor of kombucha, or you changed the design of your bicycle frames. Tell folks about it on your website.

Outsource the content to your customers.

Your customers can do work on your website for you, although you will have to do a little legwork to get them to do so. Frequently asking for reviews, then posting snippets of them on your site, can provide the social proof to folks that you are out there killin’ it on the regular. And it reminds the website crawlers that your page should continue to be indexed and prioritized.

Show off a little bit.

Did you just finish up a cool new project? Are the photos currently on your website looking a little stale? Get yourself some new photo or video and get them online. Updates that include visual content can be effective in getting positive attention—and keeping it.

Do What Feels Right

If you like writing, and you feel that you can share something with your customers that they’ll get value out of—get clickety-clacking on that keyboard. If that doesn’t seem like the best use of your time and energy, keep working on the things that are. It’s that simple.

And no, I am totally not listening to Fall Out Boy right now. Well, not right now anyway.

Imagine you’re having a party at your house (I know I have been imagining it a lot this year!). What would you do to make a guest at your home feel comfortable and meet their needs?

Your website is your business’s home online, and seeing yourself as a friendly guide will help you find the words and images that will make your website visitors want to stick around for a while.

Show Website Visitors They’re in the Right Place

Unless you’re throwing a backyard blowout, you would probably greet your customer at the door. You wouldn’t just leave the door unlocked for them to wander into like they’re in a gothic horror novel, trying to figure out whether this is actually where you live.

You also wouldn’t leave them standing on the porch as you give them a long list of facts about your house. They’re going to get uncomfortable and, if you’re in Oregon like we are, cold and possibly rain-soaked.

When someone lands on your website, let them know they’re in the right place in a concise and friendly way. Don’t write a wall of text on your homepage about how great your company is or your life story. Let them know that this is where the party is, and then get ready to guide them to the next step. They can learn about who you are along the way, or once they’ve made themselves comfortable and are ready to have a conversation.

Escort Them to the Main Event

Your guests are there for the party, not to chit chat in your foyer or stare at your cabinet full of figurines. You also want them to join the party (why else would they be there? ).  Sure, they might be able to wander toward the sound of music and voices to find the party, but walking them into the room yourself makes it far less awkward.

A good host guides their guests to where they want to go and gives them a clear vision of what they can do when they get there. Show them to the place where they want to go so they can see what awaits them.

“They’re grilling out on the patio if you’re hungry, and people are setting up to play board games in the living room if you want to play.” 

You and your website visitor have a common goal—to find out what your offerings are and what they can do. Don’t make them dig around to find your offers. Tell them immediately where to go to find the thing that they want to buy from you or learn about. Someone on your website isn’t going to hang out just to be polite if they don’t like the scene. They’ll just bounce.

Make Them Feel Welcome

Ever walk into a room of people playing a game or having a conversation and just feel totally lost? At the most awkward of parties, nobody introduces you around, nobody welcomes you or gives you background on what’s going on, and you end up just standing there, trying to figure out what to do with yourself. Don’t do that to your guests!

On your website, it isn’t enough to just name your offer, then list its features and price. The visitor won’t be able to see how they fit in unless you show them. How do they use your product? What will your services do to make their lives better? Invite them to see themselves as part of your offer so they don’t get bored and leave.

Point Out What They’re Looking For 

If your guest is holding a plate of cookies, or if they have to go to the bathroom after a long car ride, you don’t want to leave them hanging. It’s courteous to tell them where to put their food, where the bathroom is, where they can hang their coat and other house rules. And it starts your evening off on the right foot by helping them orient themselves to their surroundings.

In the same way, create a space on your website where people can ask you questions, find answers to questions before ever needing to talk to you, and fulfill other needs like making returns or accessing membership perks.

The way you interact online is different than how you interact in the real world, but you’re still inviting real people into your digital space. Make that digital space as comfortable as possible, and they’ll want to stick around—and maybe even come back!

Kelley generously took some time to chat with us about diving head-first into self-employment, reaching your ideal clients, where to find some extremely tasty baked goods, and how to know when to call in some professional copywriting help.

UPSWEPT CREATIVE: According to your Instagram, you “quit your job to become a writer.” What were you doing before this? Have you encountered any noteworthy and/or mundane challenges in making that transition?

KELLEY GARDINER: In short, I was sitting at a desk with other people telling me what to do. Before that gig, I was creating programming for a continuing education program department at a community college in Indiana. (Then, we moved back to Portland in a recession.) Things I miss about working in an office: the food carts across the street. People hardly ever tell me if my outfit is cute. It’s hard to keep myself on track, as distractions are everywhere, and other than client deadlines, nothing really HAS to be done. That newsletter can go out a few days late, and no one but me will know, you know? 

It’s also a challenge going into a field that requires putting a lot of yourself on the line and dealing with rejection. Desk jobs might be soul-crushing, but they usually require little emotional energy. Running your own gig takes a lot.

UC: What are some strategies you use to reach your ideal clients?

KG: Talk to them. Show them what a catch I am. The right people will pick up what I’m laying down.

Right now, I’m using a bunch of strategies: blogging on kelleygardiner.com with relevant, fun stuff, guest blogging to boost my quote-unquote authority, having lots of coffees with people, networking events. I’ve actually gotten to the point where I kind of like networking, because I realized that it’s not sleazy. It’s about talking to people, learning about what they do, and seeing how you can help them. Sometimes, you can help people by writing words for them in exchange for money. That’s a valuable service, and no one has to buy unless they really want to.

UC: We love the updated website copy that you wrote with us — how the heck did you capture Upswept’s brand voice so authentically?

KG: Luckily for me, you have a strong brand voice that I was able to plug into! My biggest job was pulling out messages that needed to be coaxed a little further. Like about how awesome you are. That’s an important one.

Maybe I cheated a little bit by following Upswept over the course of several years, and knowing Sarah for a long time.  [ed. note: hey, it’s important to do the research, however it happens!]

UC: Let’s say I’ve got a website for my business and I know it needs a copy overhaul, but I don’t think I have the budget for it and I want to try to rewrite myself. Do you have any advice for me? Where do I start? How do I know when it’s time to call in a pro?

KG: Just write it! That’s always the easiest and hardest writing advice. Getting started is the hardest part. Remember the basics: what your customer wants, and why you are the best person to deliver it.

Write it. Leave it for two days. Edit it. Have a friend come look at it.

Are people confused about what you do after they read your website? Are you getting the wrong kind of leads? Are people not taking the actions you want? You might need help.

To be honest, most people don’t have the cash for professional copy when they’re first starting out. When you’re ready to go to the next level, give us a call. I also happen to have super affordable consulting packages to help people get their brains wrapped around projects like this. I’m here to help!

UC: Do you have a preferred coffee shop or similar for working away from home?

KG: More like a small rotation of coffee shops. I’ll shout out Jet Black, my walking-distance vegan coffee shop extraordinaire, with the friendliest staff and usually cute dogs on the patio. Then there’s Hungry Heart Bakery in Montavilla. Get the banana walnut muffin and/or the chocolate chunk cookie. No, seriously. They are both extremely good.

UC: Is this the right time for the story of your book about roller derby?

It’s extremely the right time! Somehow, it’s been six years since I played roller derby and the book is out of date/not being published. But, lately, I’ve been thinking about how it’s exactly the kind of writing I want to do more of. Taking something overwhelming and breaking it down to easy-to-follow steps. Encouraging people to do the thing. Writing that’s easy to read and keep reading. Helping people! I don’t want to literally hold your hand, because you know, sweaty, but I want to make hard things easier and more relatable.

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If you’d like Kelley to make hard things easier for you, give her a holler via her website. We definitely recommend it!