Your blog is a gateway
Your blog is a gateway to your readers. They don’t want to get to the gate they want to go through it and have a fantastic journey.
In fact they don’t really want the journey at all they just want what they want at the end of it.
What is that?
The solution to their problem. The answer. Presented in the right way exactly for them. At this point they are unlikely to care about you at all.
They need to know you know your stuff and that you care enough to help them.
They will check you out. Test you. See if you have the answer.
If you have, you will have a reader who is likely to want to know your take on their problem. The specific ways in which your experience and expertise can help.
This photograph was taken in France. We turned up at the gate because there was a sign on the road advertising crepes / pancakes and we were starving.
The sign was not inviting but it was a Sunday night and we had been told there was nowhere else to eat within 15 kilometres. We wanted food and didn’t really care what it was.
What a delight to get to this gate and realise we were going to have a more interesting experience than simply eating a crepe.
What an intriguing view. We couldn’t wait to walk into the garden. This looked like an adventure we wanted to have.
We were’t disappointed in any way. The garden inside was sensational. Something beautiful wherever you looked. Lovely old trees. Rambling roses rambling. Little tables tucked into exciting nooks and crannies. And the thing we had originally gone for was amazing.
It was all organic. They were the best crepes I had ever tasted! We ate inside as it was not very warm in a small room and we exchanged friendly snippets of conversation with people at other tables.
Would I go back? Definitely! I will positively organise my time so that we go there again!
The gateway was inviting… as you can see.
How can you make your blog the equivalent of a beautiful gateway that will appeal to your readers? Don’t hit them over the head with information but provide an element of intrigue to satisfy curiosity, so that they want to walk, skip or run along the path!