One of the best things that you can work with online is blogs. There are several benefits to having these set up, especially for businesses that are looking to gain marketshare in even the hardest of niches. By simply pushing information forward, you will find that you can gain steady traffic and information to any website or online project. For those unfamiliar with the benefits of these sites, it’s important to look at them as stand alone marketing websites. The collateral that can be created can be unique, informational, and possess a certain amount of publicity that would otherwise be lost in today’s busy internet landscape. Consider the following 3 benefits that are presented with blogging.

Content – When it comes to the online world, no matter what you’re trying to accomplish the old adage of “content is king” still reigns true. If you want to get anywhere on the web, you have to absolutely provide unique and relevant content for others. If you can somehow bring a fresh take on any subject matter, you will gain a flood of targeted users that will not only help your business grow, they’ll subscribe to your sites and promote your brand across their social media pages.

Search Engines – Search engines love blogs, and they continue to index them at a rapid rate. Your average website might be floundering one day, but add a blog component to it, and you will get indexed faster, more often, and get serious attention that would otherwise be lost.

Authority – When it comes to marketing on the internet, one of the best things that you can do is establish authority. Whether you are trying your hand at affiliate networking, or you’re trying to sell products on your own, you can gain a sense of authority by simply writing about different aspects of your business. Showcasing to potential clients that you’re competent and know what you’re talking about when you sell something is one way to bridge the gap between potential buyer and merchant. Do this properly and you will convert more revenue than ever before.

The aforementioned benefits of blogging for business are just a few things that you should consider. There are a great deal of other benefits that come alongside the above. If you’re working on a marketing strategy, you have to use these content management devices to help build connections with others that would otherwise not manifest. Test the waters, and you will see that you can create a lasting impression on the web.

How do you know you have a presentation? I posed this question to a sales team I was working with recently. One gentleman said, “If I win the business, I know I have a presentation.” To that excellent response I replied, “That’s how you know you have a good presentation. How do you know, before you even arrive at the prospect’s site, that you have a presentation?” Another gentleman offered, “Well if I have some PowerPoint slides that I can talk from, then I have a presentation.”

The belief that visual aids equal a presentation is a very common misconception. Visual aids are aids. They are not even necessary, usually. A presentation is the information, stories, statistics, quotes, and opinions that the presenter shares. Visual aids, if used, enhance the presenter’s message, not the other way around. Anytime visual aids become the presentation and the presenter becomes the aid, you will probably be boring your audience to tears. Below are three specific examples of how this happens.

Words, Words, Words

The visual aids are nothing but the presenter’s notes, which the presenter proceeds to read from the screen to the audience. Imagine you are sitting in an audience waiting for a presentation to begin. The presentation is scheduled for one hour. The presenter walks to the front of the room, clicks their clicker, and a large blue screen fills with a yellow, bulleted, run-on sentence that flies in from the left. For me, this is when dread sets in. Glaze is starting to form over my eyes. Fog is rolling in on my brain. The battle to stay alert and appear interested has begun and it intensifies with every bullet that appears.

When visual aids say as much or more than the presenter does, one of them is not necessary. Reading from wordy slides is not only boring, but also insulting to an intelligent audience. Many presentations I have suffered through would be more economical, less stressful, and better received as memos, special reports, or CDs that the audience could read individually on their own time. Unless the audience is taking notes, as in a training situation, wordy visual aids undermine a presentation. The point of a visual aid is to make the presentation more interesting not boring.

Tired Graphics

If your audience is thinking, “This is the 762nd time I’ve seen that piece of clipart.”, your visual aids are undermining your presentation. Similarly, if your audience recognizes your visual aid background as one of the popular software templates, your visual aids are undermining your presentation. Graphics are the solution to the wordy visual aid problem discussed previously. However, freshness now becomes the issue. Ideally, all visual aids would consist of simple, powerful, interesting graphics. In reality, time and money may be constraints.

Let the nature of the presentation dictate how far you will go to secure fresh looking graphics. For high profile or high opportunity presentations, more time, money, and effort should be placed on creating visual aid graphics. My recommendation would be to have a graphic artist assist if talent is not available internally. Examples of high profile, high opportunity presentations include the unveiling of a new product or service and sales presentations.

Just Like Everybody Else

If your visual aids fall into either of the previous two categories, Wordy or Tired Graphics, present without them unless the audience needs to take notes. Because most presenters use wordy or tired visual aids, audiences are conditioned to become bored at the first sight of a bullet. A bulleted list is like a timepiece on a chain that sways in front of the eyes chanting, “Sleep…sleep…sleep” I have discovered that being contrarian and forgoing visual aids can actually make a presentation a huge success.

I was presenting to 120 salespeople at an annual conference. I was the only non-industry, soft-topic presenter on the multi-day program. I arrived early and attended the presentation before mine. There were two presenters standing on an elevated stage behind podiums with a huge screen centered between them. The room was darkened as the PowerPoint slides clicked by. I surveyed the salespeople. No one was jumping out of his or her seat with excitement.

My host asked if I had any visual aids. I had PowerPoint slides but claimed that I had none and that I would work from my handout. I asked them to turn all of the lights up and requested a wireless microphone. Just turning the lights on had a huge impact on the audience. I moved around freely and referred to the handout periodically so the salespeople would feel anchored and take notes. When the conference was finished, I was the highest rated presenter. They invited me to come back immediately for the next year.

Summing Up

Visual aids are powerful. They can be the icing on your cake or the rain on your parade. To ensure visual aids are not undermining your presentation, use words sparingly and find fresh graphics. Even have the courage to present without, if your visual aids are not truly aiding you.

© ProEdge Skills, Inc.