Build a Blog: Center Your Content Focus

Welcome to the next installment of my Build a Blog series where I teach you how to create a blog specifically for Salesforce Admins.

I want us to start thinking about our content focus. Now, if you’re just getting started with this series and want to catch up, you can read the first post about defining your audience here. And you can get a complete overview of the series by reading the introduction post.

I’m willing to bet that more than a few of you have caught on that this series follows something called a positioning statement. A positioning statement is a description of how a product or service, in this case, your admin blog, fills the need of a particular market or segment. Have lunch with someone in your company who works in marketing sometime this month, and I promise you they’ll at some point talk about a positioning statement. So with that in mind, let’s start filling out our positioning statement so far and I’ll provide you with a completed example at the end of this post.

This whole series is based on building a blog for Salesforce Admins, so in the “For” line in the positioning statement below, we’ll put that. The second line defines who our audience is for the blog. After reading last month’s post about this topic, and based on the reader profile you created, fill in the “Who” line in your statement. The line we’ll focus on for this post is the third line, “And consume information,” which is the kind of content we’re going to focus on.

But before I start, I need you to divorce the idea that content focus will equal a certain platform. By that I mean, we’re going to talk about what type of content you’ll create that you want your audience to consume irrespective of the platform you’ll publish it in. So video doesn’t mean YouTube and copy doesn’t mean WordPress. We’ll cover platforms next month.

Content creation is a lot of writing

The first thing that comes to mind when launching a blog or becoming a content creator is the dread of having to do all that writing. Blogging is typically associated with a lot of writing and there’s a good reason for that.

When I first started a blog back in 2006, the average length of a post was around 2,000–3,000 words. Now, if you think about it, the average for a book is about 70,000–120,000 words, which means bloggers were writing a book every 6 months.

I’ll say that thankfully the average word count has come down to about 800–1,000, but that’s still quite a few words.
However, many content creators will tell you that writing is a core component of everything they do. And traditionally many people start by writing blog posts because it’s easy to convey information, and editing doesn’t require any more equipment than the creation process.

Written blog posts have a sense of permanency, much like a book. Many platforms cater to longer forms of text, text with images, etc., so deciding to write blog posts is a good sturdy vehicle for transferring knowledge.

The internet still rewards text as a medium. Now, granted in a few years or even sooner this will change, but search engines still crawl over sites and blogs and can index written text much more accurately than other media forms. So as you’re deciding what form you want your content to take, think about the benefits of written text over other forms as your primary medium. Will the content you want to create work well with written text? Are you comfortable or willing to get comfortable with writing or even typing for that matter? And based on the profile you created last month, are admins like you consuming written content?

Content creation is more than writing

Over the past decade, video content has grown in popularity at an astounding scale. It’s really not surprising given how much we try to cram into our lives and how short on time we often find ourselves. Reading takes concentration; it’s pretty challenging to do something else besides read. Yes, you’ve seen people do stuff while reading but let’s be honest—it’s so much easier to watch a video than read a book on a treadmill.

With video, you have a whole new world of possibilities that just didn’t exist with written text. For example, as you explain something there can be animation on the screen. Also, it’s you that your audience gets to hear from directly. They get to see you, and your emotion, passion, and excitement about what you’re talking about. In writing, the individual reader has only their own voice so you can’t really control how they consumed that last sentence. But video gives you tone, inflection, and sounds!

Video also comes with a lot things to control that are sometimes out of your control. First, there’s just the cost associated with video. Even with the best mobile phone, you’ll need some sort of stand, lighting, and microphone, all of which are not requirements of the written word.

Video also means practicing what you’re going to say versus just rewriting a paragraph. The prework for video is also a lot greater; it’s not unheard of to spend at least 1–2 hours of planning and scripting for every 1 minute of video. Video also includes sound, so finding a quiet room or a quiet time in your house is necessary; whereas writing doesn’t care how loud it is.

Here’s a great example of video content:

Now, absent of publishing platform, the questions to ask yourself when considering if video is the content form to lean into are the following: Do I want to be on camera? Is the content I want to create conducive to video? How long do I want to spend creating this content?

Content creation is more than video

I’ve joked on more than one occasion that “I have a face made for radio” and despite doing a lot of public speaking, to watch myself on video is just about the least enjoyable thing for me. And maybe you feel the same way? Great, then let’s explore the world of audio podcasts.

Relatively new to the content space is podcasting. Arguably starting in 2004, it’s really gotten more mainstream in the last 5–10 years. Audio podcasts are a lot like a video but without the visual element, which means if you’re not a fan of being on camera then this is a great medium for sharing ideas. Audio podcasts work a lot like a radio program; they’re fantastic for capturing thoughts, opinions, insights, and interviews.

Unlike the written word or video, there’s no visual element that consumes a person’s attention. For example, I listen to podcasts while mowing the yard, walking the dog, driving somewhere, and the list goes on. And compared to video, audio is a bit more editing-friendly but does still carry costs like video in that you’ll need some sort of audio editing program. Now for the tough part of audio podcasts and I bet you can guess it. There’s no visual element. So if you’ve listened to an episode of the Salesforce Admins Podcast (I’ve included our latest one below) you notice that we talk about ideas, concepts, and lines of thinking.

So the question for you when thinking about audio content creation is the following: “Does what I want to cover work well without a visual element?”

Content creation is many choices

For each of the three main content types, I addressed them as their own individual element with some pros and cons. But to be honest, you may choose more than one. In that example of video content I shared previously, it’s actually a video embedded in a blog post, so it’s both written and video. Podcasts are often published as blog posts and audio files. For example, here’s the post for that podcast I shared.

As we look at our positioning statement from earlier in the post, let’s fill in that third line with the primary medium to which we want to create content.

Let’s recap the series

Doing something new can have many starts and stops. My goal is that by August you’ll have found your passion for sharing.

The Build a Blog series has a goal to inspire you to create your own admin blog by Dreamforce 2023. You can catch up on the series with these posts:

• Build a Blog: A New Series to Help You Jump-Start Your Own Admin Blog
• Build a Blog: Define Your Audience

And you can join the previous conversations in the Admin Trailblazers Group:

• Jump-Start Your Own Blog Discussion
• Define Your Audience Discussion

Also in the Admin Trailblazers Group, I’ve started a discussion about this post.

Let’s talk about your worries, concerns, or things you’d like me to address. We’re in this together.

I want to see what you’re building and help where I can, and I want you to feel like you’re part of a group of new bloggers who are building something special—because you are. You’re building a channel to share your most valuable asset—your voice and your perspective.