Welcome to the One on One conversation series, where Small Business Trends will be speaking to some of the best minds in business today. The goal of the series is to pick the brains of successful entrepreneurs, best-selling author, and executives with organizations serving the small business community, to provide the Small Business Trends community with their valuable business insights.

On Fridays, One on One lets you hear from — as well as learn from — people who have done it, who are doing it, and who will share their experiences and knowledge to help you do it for yourself.

If there are people you’d like us to go “One on One” with, just let us know, and we’ll see if we can make it happen.

Jon Ferrara is a serial entrepreneur and a pioneer in the customer relationship management (CRM) industry. He co-founded Goldmine, one of the first contact management apps; his newest company, Nimble.com, is a social CRM service for small businesses.

Brent Leary spoke with Ferrara in this interview, which has been edited for space. To hear a full, audio version of the interview, scroll down to the loudspeaker icon at the bottom of the page.

Question: What is different about starting this kind of company now, as opposed to when you started Goldmine?

Jon Ferrara: I think the best ideas come from your own need, because you are passionate about it and you understand the problem.  When I started Goldmine, I saw a need for teams to communicate and collaborate together, and to integrate that communication back to their customers and prospects. Goldmine was the first networkable sales team tool.

Today, I am seeing the same type of need. Small businesses need to attract and retain customers more than ever.  But the way they are doing it has radically changed.  Customers aren’t [paying attention to] your advertisement; they are having dialogues amongst themselves about what they are going to buy.

Smart companies today are figuring out that they need to find out where those conversations are occurring and get in there and listen and engage, leveraging the way customers want to talk today.  Many times that is social media and the Web.

Question: How has the Internet changed business relationships, particularly at the small business level?

Jon Ferrara: Business relationships have always been social.  People buy from people they like, and they like people who know them.  The only way to know them is to listen.  I tell all my salespeople that when they go into a customer’s office, they need to look at the walls. People put things on their walls that enable you to build connections, relationships, intimacy, which leads to trust.  Today, social media enables you to listen, engage and look at people’s walls in wider ways than you ever thought possible.   Smart businesses today are leveraging social media to connect with their customers.

Question:  What lessons did you learn from starting and running Goldmine in the ‘80s and ‘90s that help you with Nimble today?

Jon Ferrara: The environment that I built Goldmine in back in the late ‘80s is the identical environment that we find ourselves in today.  There was a recession; people were looking for ways to do things more effectively and better and to do more with less.  We bootstrapped Goldmine, and the lesson I learned is that you don’t need to spend a lot of money to reach customers.  Back in the day, we called it PR. Today, people are leveraging social media to get their message out and build connections and relationships.  That is really what has changed for today’s startups and small businesses, and I think the companies that understand how to leverage social media, to listen, engage and communicate and collaborate internally and externally, will be the companies that will grow fastest.

Question: With Nimble, you are building an on-demand, social CRM service aimed at the small business market. Goldmine was aimed at the salesperson and sales teams, correct?

Jon Ferrara: Our idea with Goldmine was that people don’t work in a vacuum, they work as a part of a larger team, and everybody on the team touches the customer. Goldmine was the first networkable relationship manager, but it was not just for salespeople, because it’s not just salespeople that touch your customer.  That is a mistake that many companies make — empowering just their salespeople with contact or relationship tools. Everybody should be open to connecting with the customer.

What’s different about Nimble is, where Goldmine leveraged the network to enable a team to communicate and collaborate, we are leveraging the Web and social media. Nimble not only allows your team to internally communicate and collaborate, but also to listen and engage. By listening and engaging, you are able to build thought leadership on top of [data] mining, in ways that are just tremendous.

Question: Do you think CRM is more important to small businesses today, or was it more important back when you were building Goldmine?

Jon Ferrara: I think it is absolutely more important today.  The old ways of touching your customer — cold calling, direct mail, advertising, faxing — just don’t work anymore. If you empower your team to touch the customer and to listen and engage, it will transform your business. Small businesses are nimble, and by leveraging these new methodologies of connecting with customers, they can transform their businesses much faster.

Question: Do you think successfully implementing CRM hinges on being able to integrate social media into a CRM strategy?

Jon Ferrara: Without social, CRM is a stale database.  Goldmine helped create the first model of networkable relationship management. Today, what’s different is the social aspect.  If all you are going to do is CRM, you can do databasing with anything. But combining the ability to communicate and collaborate, to listen and engage, transforms a business.

Our customers are crying out for one-to-one relationships and connections.  Companies that listen to their customers and engage in conversations will be the companies that have customers for life. Don’t we all want that?

Visit Nimble.com where you can find details about the private beta of Nimble.

From Small Business Trends

One on One: Jon Ferrara of Nimble

Occasionally cartoons are just handed to you.

One day my manager came to me with a stack of paper. “Mark,” he said, “would you do me a favor and shred these? Also, there’s lots of price info in there, so make sure to shred it really good, OK?”

I’m not kidding. “Shred it really good.”

I wasn’t quite sure how to do that – barring maybe setting the shredder on fire in the process – but I assured him I would.  I wrote down “shredder set to puree” on a Post-It, and drew it up that evening.

From Small Business Trends

Shredder Setting: Puree

So you’ve decided to start a small business. Great! Small Business Trends was created for people just like you to bring you the resources and information needed to grow your small business everyday. In fact, the collection of resources we’ve collected for this small business roundup may be particularly helpful in your new venture. We hope this startup guide will get you thinking creatively about the first steps in your new venture.

First Steps

Six entrepreneurs to inspire. When planning to start your own business, think not only of the money you’ll make but of awesome products and services you can create that will make the world a better place. Here are six entrepreneurs whose stories should get you started on the road to your first great business idea. Personal Dividends

Trusted resource or product pusher. David Siteman Garland frames this in terms of a Website marketing content, but in the end it’s really about all businesses. Before you start your company, ask yourself what need you fill, what resource you provide, what help you can render to the people who you hope will become your audience and customers. Don’t make the mistake of believing business is just about pushing a product. It’s about much more. The Rise To The Top

Legal

Is LLC right for your small business? The LLC, or Limited Liability Company, is a popular way to incorporate a small business these days. With some protection as far as litigation and while avoiding the tax difficulties connected to some other forms of incorporation. Learn the basics of the LLC format compared to other kinds of business setups to decide whether it may be right for your small business setup. MoneyedUp

A ton of small business legal resources. When it comes to seeking other legal advice on your small business startup you may wish to consult an attorney. But also remember there are a huge number of small business legal resources on the Web as well. For example, take a look at this incredible overview of small business legal resources (Thanks for the nod to BizSugar as well, guys!) in the initial nominees for an upcoming “Top 25 Business Law Blogs for 2010.” Add your own resources, if you like. LexisNexus Communities

Marketing

Learning more about marketing. In the end, your small business will only be as successful as your ability to market it effectively. This said, Susan Oakes runs down some of the most important myths about good marketing and gives us a guideline for what great marketing needs to be. M4B Marketing

Picking the right domain name. Another important part of starting your business will be establishing an online presence. Few businesses today will not need at least some Internet marketing and this means both a Website and a domain name. But how do you choose the right domain name for your small business Website. Here is one possible strategy. ScottFox.com

Financing

Do I want to give you money? OK. You’ve got a workable idea and have worked out the fundamentals of your business. You’ve thought about the legal organization of your business and created a marketing plan. But wait. Where will you get the money to start? Selling your business idea to investors is another point to consider. Startup Professionals Musings

Basic financials a startup MUST understand. Having great ideas figuring out how to structure and market your business and even how to raise funding is fine…critical in fact if your business is ever going to become a reality. But when it comes to running your business day to day, there are also three very basic ideas you must understand, potentially the difference between success and failure for your new venture. Michael G. Holmes

Conclusions

The biggest mistakes a business startup faces. Though, they shouldn’t deter you from starting your new business venture, be aware there are many mistakes that can spell doom for your dreams of becoming a successful small business owner. Here’s a list of some of the big ones. WSJ

It’s lonely at the top. You’ll meet some fantastic people as you work to start your small business. Many will mean well, give you encouragement and even offer to help with your cause. However, in this guest post Brett Owens suggests that, when it comes to making that big idea really work, an entrepreneur is really on his/her own. Ego

From Small Business Trends

Small Business News: A Startup Guide

Although the results of the health-insurance reform passed earlier this year will take years to fully work out, there’s one way your small business might be able to save on health insurance right now, reports CFO Magazine: Do what a growing number of small businesses are doing, and self-insure.

Large companies have used self-insurance for a long time, but until recently, the conventional wisdom held that was only a good fit for businesses with 1,000 or more employees.  But new data from PricewaterhouseCoopers shows the percentage of employers with fewer than 1,000 people that self-insure has risen from 29 percent in 2008 to 48 percent in 2010.

Here’s how self-insurance works: Rather than paying a monthly premium to an insurance company, your company agrees to pay for employees’ medical claims. As with insurance, you build some type of deductible or co-pay into the agreement, so the employee is paying some of the cost. Your company may still use an insurance company to administer some benefits, and may choose to get stop-loss insurance (which covers claims above a certain dollar amount and below a certain limit, so you can “cap” your costs).

One 95-person company cited in the article has saved money by paying claims compared to what it would have spent on premiums. Other benefits include avoiding state taxes and other costs that insurers usually pass on to you-and you also save because you’re not paying the insurance company’s profit margins.

Many small business owners like self-insurance because it allows them to design a plan that will save them money and fit with their employees’ needs. For instance, if most of your employees are in a certain age group or are women, you can tailor coverage to fit their most likely medical issues.

Is self-insurance for you? Well, it’s not a way to avoid dealing with health-care reform; you’ll still have to meet the requirements of the new law. And it’s not a good fit for companies that are planning a merger, expect layoffs or have fluctuating cash flow. But it does enable you to avoid certain regulations that come with dealing with insurance companies. Michael Thompson, a principal in PwC’s human-resource services group, says self-insurance typically results in long-term savings, but you have to be comfortable handling the short-term risk.

From Small Business Trends

Can You Cut Your Health-Care Costs by Self-Insuring?

Whenever I speak about social media, the biggest question I get is “How much time do you spend on it?” My response? Not as much as you’d think. I use a number of time management tools to help me streamline my activity. The 5 with the greatest impact are outlined here:

1. Hootsuite or Social Oomph

The beauty of Hootsuite and Social Oomph is that they let you manage all of your Twitter activity and relationships in one place. You can post-date tweets for another time. You can monitor direct messages and mentions as well as your Twitter stream. You can decide which posts will go to which social media platforms.

2. RSS Feeds and Subscriptions

These allow you to pull information to you. When you want to know about items of interest to you or your following, or find fuel for articles and blog posts, it’s easier to have the information come to your e-mail or dashboard than to go out searching for it. Whenever you find a blog, podcast or newsletter that you’d like to continue to read, subscribe via RSS feed or subscription box. Then the information will come into your e-mail box.

Another way to use RSS feeds is to pull your social media platforms to a dashboard like iGoogle or Netvibes. Like to answer questions on LinkedIn but don’t want to go there every day to find them? Great! Use RSS feeds to have the questions show up on your dashboard and make it easier to participate online. In the same vein, you can see all of your social media platforms so you can update your statuses in one place – saving you the time of going to each site individually.

3. iGoogle or Netvibes

These dashboards make it easy to monitor your social media platforms in one place. You can also send your blog there. If you make the dashboard your home page, it will come up every time you log on. I use both and keep them open while I’m working. That way I can take a look a couple of times throughout the day and see what’s going on. I can update my statuses easily as well. I have a couple of LinkedIn Question categories that I like to keep an eye on, so I’ve got them on my iGoogle page. They automatically update so I know I am seeing the most current questions.

I have my Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and blog links attached to my Netvibes page. I’ve also added some other blogs that I’d like to follow there. Both websites are very easy to set up and manage. And, once set up, they handle themselves. Imagine the time savings of not having to go to each website to update your status!

4. Google Alerts

Want to know what’s going on in your industry? Looking for interesting articles to tweet or use to write articles or blog posts? Using Google alerts is a great way to have that information come to you. You can put any words into an alert and choose how often you’d like to receive an e-mail with whatever Google found with those words. You can then go to the webpage and read the item for yourself.

This reduces the time it takes to participate online. Instead of having to search the Internet every day, you’ll have the information you need coming to you. The more you can pull information to you, the less time you’ll have to spend accomplishing your online goals.

5. Linking

So you have all of these great Internet profiles. However, having to post to each of them could take over your life. Solution? Link them. Let’s start with Twitter. You can link your Twitter account to your LinkedIn and Facebook accounts. Now when you tweet the post will go to Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. One post, three sites.

Next is your blog. You can link your blog to your Twitter profile by using Twitterfeed.com. When you post to your blog, the post will go to your Twitter profile and then to your LinkedIn and Facebook accounts. One blog post, four sites.

If you write articles and submit them to online article submission sites, you can link those accounts to your profiles as well. When you post an article, the news that you’ve posted will show up on your LinkedIn and Facebook profiles.

As a small business owner, you need to have and maintain an online presence. More than that, you should be building your brand online. The challenge is to do this without spending all of your time on it. Using these tips can help you streamline your activity so you have time to be active online and in your business.

From Small Business Trends

It’s About Time: 5 Tools to Streamline Your Social Media

I’m not an SEO expert. Lucky for me, my partners in crime over at Outspoken Media are. But even though I’m not an expert, that doesn’t mean I’m not careful to pay close attention to SEO best practices when creating and publishing content. Paying mind to search engine optimization ensures that I’m giving the search engines all the clues they need to determine what my content is about, while also giving customers what they need to know, as well. And if someone as non-technical as I can do it, then you savvy SMB owners can do it too.

Below you’ll find 6 common SMB SEO mistakes and how to very easily fix them.

Mistake: Using duplicate Title tags

Your Title tag is the hyperlinked text a user will click on when your site comes up in their search results. And when they click on your link and go to your page, it’s the Title tag that sits at the top of their browser acting as a headline for your page. Both these facts should tell you that crafting a good one is really important. So why are you ignoring it? Spend time writing unique Title tags for every page on your site. The goal of your Title tag is to tell visitors what the page is about, while also making it compelling enough that they’ll want to click through. For example, don’t make the Title tag for your site’s home page [home]. This doesn’t tell anyone what that page is about, nor would it entice anyone to click on it. Instead, use something like [Business Name + Keyword].

Mistake: Having no content

Your Web site needs content. The search engines need something to rank and you need a way to show authority with users and answer their questions. You want to write at least one page of content for every product or service that you offer. I know it’s a lot of work, but this is your business. If you have a retail Web site, don’t just copy the 3-line manufacturer description because everyone is using that description. Write your own. Write a real About page, write a company history page, have a page on all of your employees, etc. Create video content showing people using your product, create a video about how users can hack your product to be better, create a video giving customers a tour of your headquarters. Let them submit their own videos. Write text to go with the videos. Start a blog. Create a podcast. Include text with your images. Use Google’s Keyword Tool or Wordtracker’s Keyword Questions Tool to see what people are asking about in your niche. There are so many ways to get content on your site, take advantage of them. A site with no content is a wasted opportunity.

Mistake: Keyword-less URLs

Don’t STUFF them, but whenever possible you should be trying to get keywords into your URLs to help with your site’s search engine optimization. If you’re using WordPress, I recommend going in and tweaking your settings to better accomplish this. You can do that by going to Settings > Permalinks and selecting the radio button marked Custom Structure. Once you’re there you can decide if you want your URLs to end with /post-name/ or /category/post-name/. Depending on which you prefer, you’ll want to paste in one of the following pieces of code:

• /%category%/%postname%/>
• /%postname%/

And that’s it. Now you’ll be able to very easily alter your URLs to make them as keyword-rich and search engine-friendly as you can.

Mistake: Poor internal linking

We talk a lot about the power of links in SEO. You want people to link to you with keyword-rich anchor text as a way of telling the search engines that you are relevant to those terms. Well, then why aren’t you linking to yourself the same way? When you’re linking between pages on your site, make sure you’re using preferred anchor text to give yourself a boost in the search engines and give users a keyword-rich path to follow. You may not be able to control how other people link to you, but you can control how you link within your own site. Make it count.

Mistake: Using photos instead of text

I see this one a lot with small businesses. Mary owns a bakery on Main Street. The home page of her site is nothing more than a .jpg of her storefront with a link to the food menu. When you click on the Menu link to see what sounds good, you’re shown a scanned PDF version of the menu. This may be usable from a customer standpoint (and even that’s arguable), however, it’s useless from a search standpoint. The search engines can’t see or read your images. To them, Mary’s home page is blank and the menu doesn’t exist. If you want to appear in the search engines, you have to give the robots something to use to rank your site. And that means content. Whenever you’re using a photo, make sure there is also text to accompany it. And don’t rely on photos when words will do.

Mistake: Not using Alt tags with images

Related to the item above, spiders can’t see or read images. To help them get an idea of what the image is about, you need to include alt text that describes the image on the page. If you can, write the alt text to include a relevant keyword to again get that added boost. Again, it’s one of those small, little things that has a real impact.

Those are a few easy ways that you can quickly boost the SEO power of your content. They may seem like little things, but together, they pack a mighty powerful SEO punch.

From Small Business Trends

6 Common SMB SEO Mistakes (and How to Fix Them)

If you haven’t figured it out, gotten on board, jumped on the bandwagon (pick your own expression)…well, we’re not going to try to talk you into it. Just be aware of the incredible value social media can create for your business if you use it correctly. In this news wrap-up, we look at tips, trends and great ideas. And we’ll look at the benefits of harnessing social media power for your small business…and the costs of not doing so as well.

Trends

Leveraging your small business with social media. Here are 80 tips about using the tools of social media to vastly expand the reach of your small business. Everything from understanding the give and take of social media to building a brand is here plus much, much more. We hope you’ll bookmark this link for use in your business. Carol Roth

Preaching to the choir. Todd Mintz is pretty sure there are some people in small business who will never get social media. It’s probably only hurting them, but for those of us who will be doing business with them it’s probably best to be realistic. Don’t expect them to change and hang on to your business cards. Search Engine People

Are you doing social media wrong? Are you obsessed over the number of followers you possess or the number of retweets you’ve gotten today. Or are you becoming so overwhelmed you’re thinking about dumping the whole thing entirely? Before you do, read Sarah Lacy’s piece and find out which camp you belong to and who it is that’s ruining the party. TechCrunch

Techniques

Social media is a value to small business. But knowing what to expect is also critical. A social media marketing expert calls out some of the so-called gurus with their vague claims and questionable metrics in this humorous post. The trouble is, as mentioned in the previous post, worrying about metrics may be the wrong way to look at social media in the first place. Alex Blom

10 best social media campaigns. When you think of social media, you might be considering the number of Tweets or the number of friends you have on Facebook or any number of other measurements you might choose to make of the success of your social media campaign. But, as we’re reminded in the post above, there are numerous examples of highly effective social media campaigns that left no question of their effectiveness. JeffBullas.com

How to measure social media. Like the rest of social media can be of great value to your small business in many ways if you know what you hope to accomplish with it. But simply creating a blog and judging its success based on the amount of traffic or some other arbitrary means is like judging Twitter success by number of retweets and Facebook by the number of friends. Success with social media means an understanding of what you are trying to accomplish and having a means to measure the results based on the goals set. The post above is a good place to start. Convince & Convert

Target Audience

Please keep your voice down. Are you the Billy Mays of social media? You know, the shouting TV pitch man who sold everything from OxiClean to Orange Glo in infomercials with a distinctive high volume style. If so, says Shonali Burke, you may want to tone things down a decibel or two. Social media is a conversation and it isn’t one way. BNET

The social media gender gap. If you plan to use social media to market or network for your small business, be aware of some cold hard facts. Data indicates that while women may constitute less than half of the online audience to date they are more engaged in social networking and social media in general than men. What will this mean when planning your social media strategy? The Defector’s Blog

Takeaways

Grabbing attention isn’t enough. Want to understand the basics of social media marketing for your small business? Start with a clear understanding of the revenue model for your business and how social media can increase your bottom line. Just standing out from the crowd without a clear strategy is not enough to bring success. Marcana

Are you over thinking it? Social media is an extension of you and your business. It’s as simple as that. If you can promote your business everyday by simply doing what you do and talking to the people who are regularly in your life, you can do the same with social media. Hannah DeMilta offers some additional thoughts about how. Switched On Media

From Small Business Trends

Small Business News: Social Media Power!

Are entrepreneurs financial risk-takers? Conventional wisdom says yes, but a recent research report from the Kauffman Foundation, Business Owners, Financial Risk, and Wealth, suggests otherwise.

Author Tami Gurley-Calvez studied 1989 to 2007 data from the Federal Reserve Board, Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF) to research three questions:

1.) Are business owners generally more or less financially conservative than their non-business-owning counterparts?

2.) Do business owners accumulate more wealth?

3.) Do business owners hold a smaller share of their financial assets in risky stock holdings?

While entrepreneurs are typically portrayed as financial risk-takers, Gurley-Calvez found that when it comes to saving and borrowing, they are actually more conservative than non-business owners. For instance, 45 percent of business owners said it was important to them to save for retirement; just 32 percent of non-business owners said the same. In addition, business owners were focused on saving for the long term; they were more likely than non-business owners to say their savings horizon was five or more years in the future.

Finally, whether investing, saving or borrowing, business owners were more thorough than non-business owners in investigating their financial options. Ninety-one percent said they spent a “moderate” amount of time or more shopping for the best investment or borrowing terms; just 82 percent of non-business owners said the same.

Business owners accumulate more wealth over time than non-business owners. But although business owners showed more willingness to assume above-average risk in return for financial gain, in reality, both business owners and non-business owners invested similar shares of their portfolios in safe assets.

Business owners were less likely to say that an important reason for saving is having liquid cash available. However, they were substantially more likely than non-business owners to say they could borrow $3,000 from family or friends if needed.

They are also more likely to borrow from other sources. In the past five years, 84 percent of business owners had applied for a loan, compared to just 64 percent of non-business owners. And only 23 percent of them had been declined, compared to 31 percent of non-business owners.

Gurley-Calvez thinks perhaps the reason business owners aren’t so concerned with liquidity is that they have “a stronger financial safety net.” Compared to non-business owners, business owners seem to have more financial resources available to them—meaning that what others perceive as “risky” does not seem that way to them.

From Small Business Trends

Are Business Owners Risk-Takers? Not When It Comes to Their Finances

Admit it: Sometimes you wonder if your content is really any good. Sure, you worked hard to write it, but you’re a business owner, not a professional writer. Are readers connecting with it? Do they understand what you’re trying to say? Is there an easy way for you to tighten things up and improve upon what’s already there?

Fear not, of course there is! Here are some tips to help you improve and write better content. It’s like 10th grade English without the fear of getting called on when you’re not paying attention.

Before you start writing…

1. Identify the goal of the content: One reason it takes us so long to write good content is because we don’t stop to decide what it is we want to say. What are you hoping your content will accomplish? Is the purpose of your article to explain how something works, put a customer on a determined conversion path, build brand trust? Whatever goal you’ve decided on, have it in mind before you start writing. Knowing your goal beforehand will help set the tone (and sometimes the filter) for everything that’s about to come next.

2. Decide on a hook: Every piece of content you write should have a hook. Just like in fishing, your hook is what you’re using to catch a reader in your net. Whether it’s a news hook, an attack hook, a humor hook or an ego hook, you want to decide how you’re going to draw people in. Keeping the hook  in mind will help you frame your article and organize it in your head. It will also determine the writing style that you use. You wouldn’t write a news hook with the same juice you’d use to write an incentive hook.

3. Think like your reader: Before you put fingers to keyboard, get in the mindset of your audience because your content is for them. If you’re attempting to explain something, talk about it from their point of view. How deeply would they need something broken down? Which terms would they use? Where might they get confused? Put yourself in the place of your customers and write like they would. Don’t use your view of the world. You’re the expert. It’s tainted with jargon.

4. Get rid of distractions: Log out of Facebook. Close Twitter. Stay away from YouTube. While it’s easy to head to these sites during a brain lull, they’ll only make your content sound more fragmented and make you spend three times as long trying to write. When it’s time to write, turn them off.

When you’re writing…

5. Only include what’s relevant: Do you still have the goal of your content fresh in your mind? Good. When you start writing, keep that goal in mind so that you only include information that supports your goal. Just because you know the whole alphabet about a subject doesn’t mean all of it belongs in one piece of content. For example, if you’re writing about how to make a good vanilla latte (my drug of choice), then you don’t need to include a five-page summary on the history of coffee, where the best beans are located, and how to brew the perfect cup. Leave the kitchen sink at home. The more irrelevant information you include, the further you take people away from your goal and the more you confuse them along the way.

6. Let yourself write: Stop me when this starts to sound familiar: You write a sentence. . . then you delete. You write three more and delete two. Then you get rid of a whole paragraph and pick at your title. Stop it! Writing and editing are two different stages of the content cycle, which means you shouldn’t attempt to do them simultaneously. When you sit down to write, just write; don’t self-edit. Focus on getting everything out that you want to say and putting it all down. Once it’s written down, then you can edit and make it sound cohesive. But the more time you spend self-editing as you’re writing, the longer and more fragmented your copy is going to sound.

7. Use short sentences: Short sentences are easier for writers to get out. They’re also easier for readers to take in. Stick with them and stop confusing people with overly complicated writing. Like short sentences, it’s that simple.8.

8. Use clear, direct titles: One of the best things you can do to improve your writing is learn to write killer titles. Direct titles aren’t always the most fun to write (who doesn’t love a good pun?), but they do the best job of telling readers and the search engines what your post is about. And that is your title’s main goal – to set up your content and make someone want to read it. Avoid getting so clever with your titles that you make it impossible for readers to predict what’s coming next or, even worse, set them up to be disappointed when your content isn’t about what they hoped it was. When all else fails, say what you mean. It’s true in life and in Web content.

9. Make it scannable: In our post on 4 things to consider when writing Web content, I encouraged readers to consider the medium when writing. Writing on the Web is different from other formats. Online, scannable content reigns supreme, as users still aren’t so great at reading on the Web. If there are five things you want readers to take away from your page, break them out into a numbered list and make it easy for users to grab on to them.  Lists, white space and short paragraphs are your best friends on the Web (other than links).

10.Use your voice: The quickest way to make your content unreadable is to remove yourself from it. In order for people to care, you have to give them a little bit of you. Voice an opinion, wear your heart on your sleeve, and write like it matters to you. It will take a little experimenting to find your blog but once you do it will make all the difference in engaging readers and bringing them into your site and your company.

Before you publish…

11. Read your content aloud: If you want to improve your content, read it aloud to yourself before you publish it to the Web or hand it to a customer. If you stumble over something  or think you’re being too wordy, so will your reader, and it may turn them off. I never publish or commit to any piece of writing before I’ve read it aloud to myself several times. Once I can get through it without stammering, I trust that it’s “ready.”

12. Read backwards: If you often fall victim to typos and misspellings, then scan your copy backwards to allow your brain to see words out of context instead of subconsciously seeing “what you meant.”

Those are some of my tried-and-true ways of improving my writing. What tips have you picked up over the years? Whose writing do you most try to emulate?

From Small Business Trends

12 Tips for Writing Better Content

No matter how bleak the economic outlook, here at Small Business Trends we’ve always believed in the power of small business and entrepreneurship to change the world. In today’s news roundup, we look at resources for rebirth that can hasten an economic recovery in the hands of visionary and courageous entrepreneurs willing to use them.

Entrepreneurship

Weekly entrepreneurship links. Jakes Adams is a young, ambitious entrepreneur who claims on his “about” page I am not a successful billionaire entrepreneur. I have not started the next Microsoft, invented the next breakthrough consumer product, or sold my business for a ridiculous gain. I am not a business expert by any means. I am probably very much like you.” He runs a blog that includes a very interesting set of links each week just for entrepreneurs and small business people. (We especially like the video.) Entreprenant

Secrets of great entrepreneurs. Specifically, startup professional Martin Zwilling is talking about company founders here, but, of course, these principles would hold for many kinds of entrepreneurs. Sure, there may be some who break the mold, but Martin’s list is a great place to start if you’re trying to put yourself in the mindset of a successful business innovator. Startup Professionals Musings

Branding

A state of mind. Ever wonder why your customers or prospects never seem to get it? Why don’t they understand what you do, what your company is all about and why it’s so obviously superior to your competition? Ever think maybe you’re the one who just doesn’t get it? Jackie Purnell

Branding with your blog. If you’ve got a business blog, it can be an important source of branding for you and your business. This is probably not news to anybody these days, however, what may cause many to rethink their blog and how it is created is this post on a year’s oddyessy of blogging on a personal branding blog by Roger Parker. Personal Branding Blog

News & Policy

A correction…sort of. In Monday’s roundup we reported hiring among small businesses slowing for August as part of a general pessimism among some entrepreneurs and other small business leaders about the current state of the economy, but reader Frank Strong pointed out the above article which seems to indicate an increase in hiring. In fact, as the article we linked to yesterday indicated even August saw a modest seasonal rise in employment by businesses but the point being made is that this is still lower than hiring was earlier in the year. I’m sure we can all draw our own conclusions. Washington Business Journal

One city focuses on attracting entrepreneurship. While talk in the U.S. and beyond has focused on the importance of entrepreneurship to lead economic recovery, one U.S. city is doing more than talking the talk. Cleveland, Ohio, seems to be walking the walk. Here is an account of a community working to make the future of entrepreneurial rebirth a reality. Can others learn from the example? WSJ

Online

Want to get your small business online? OK, it’s the year 2010 and business is moving to the Internet at a huge rate. However, reports have indicated a large number of small businesses still have an inadequate or completely undeveloped Web presence. But by reading one quick blog post, you can change all that…or start a whole new business online. Chris Brogan

Do you need a mobile design for your Website. Jumping ahead a bit from the previous post, let’s say you’re an extremely savvy small business owner who keenly understands the importance of online marketing and, more than that, the critical move toward access of the Internet through mobile devices. So, what’s the next step for your Website to keep up with mobile technology? Or is there one? Small Biz Survival

Startup

You don’t need money. One of the greatest myths is that small businesses take money (capital) to start, usually from outside investors. Bootstrapping offers a whole new ethic of shoestring startup and cash flow growth, and many businesses are started this way with a few simple tips. Bootstrapper Handbook for Startups

20 bootstrapping startup techniques. So how do you start a bootstrapping business, built entirely on cash flow, credit cards or perhaps a few dollars borrowed from family and friends without outside funding? Here are some recommendations that may have you thinking about your business in new ways. Youngentrepreneur

From Small Business Trends

Small Business News: Resources For Rebirth