Transform a Dull Blog into a Traffic Magnet (with Jon Clemence)

Angela Frank: 00:00:00

Welcome to The Growth Pod.

Today on the podcast, we have Jon Clemence, who is a professional proofreader, editor, and writer who helps businesses improve their written content to attract more people to their websites and convert them into new clients. John, welcome to the podcast.

Jon Clemence: 00:00:15

Hey, thanks for having me, Angela. I am excited to be here.

Angela Frank: 00:00:18

I am very excited.

We have not had anyone with your background and expertise on the show yet, and you are going to share how we can transform a dull blog into a traffic magnet. And I'm very excited to hear everything that you have to share.

But before we get started, can you share a little bit about why you're the expert that we should listen to on this topic?

Jon Clemence: 00:00:39

Yeah. So I've actually been editing documents pretty much my whole life.

I've only been paid for it for about the past three or four years, but I was always the kid in school who really liked English class and loved Shakespeare. And then later on, like in college and I went to seminary, I was always the guy who was like, hey, I will edit your paper for you.

Just let me read it. I'll fix all this stuff. Like, I just enjoyed it.

And so I had a previous career in the corporate world, but unfortunately Covid happened and I lost my job. So that was my chance to really sit back and reevaluate and say, what can I do that I enjoy that I love that provides value.

And so for me, that was proofreading and editing and writing. So I started on upwork. At the bottom is where you have to start.

And I was able to grow my services to the point where I was a top rated freelancer on the site, so top 2% of the site. I got so much work. I had actually started an agency because I had to, you know, I was saying no to people because I just didn't have the capacity.

So, yeah, I've just been very fortunate to be able to grow this business and really provide that value to my clients. And I'd like to think I know a thing or two at this point.

Angela Frank: 00:01:50

Yeah, yeah, definitely.

It sounds like you've helped so many different people edit, proofread, not only just papers like you said in school and things, but now also since you've made the transition out of corporate and into taking this full time, you've been able to have your hands in so many different types of content as well. That tees us off on our discussion today. So in your opinion, how important is it for a business to have a good blog?

Jon Clemence: 00:02:19

I. Yeah, I might be biased, but I think every business needs a blog. And here's. Here's why.

So, according to OptinMonster, if you have a blog that increases your chances of ranking higher In Google by 434%, it's common to think that we're in the age of video and that it's all about YouTube and reels and shorts. And those are important. But a blog is still very important as far as, like, search engine results go.

sense to have a blog even in: 2024

But, yeah, if nothing else, just to help your SEO and to help your search results. It's worth the time and the effort.

Angela Frank: 00:03:04

It definitely sounds like a blog is great for that search engine optimization and that search ranking. But I also love what you said about giving the information to your customers and nurturing that relationship.

So with that in mind, what are the biggest mistakes that you see clients commonly making on their blogs?

Jon Clemence: 00:03:22

Yeah, so I'm going to actually give you three mistakes I see that directly tie into this idea of this relationship with your clients or potential clients. So what I see a lot of is, number one, making the blog about you.

So to you and to your listeners, you are all wonderful, amazing people, and I love you all. And I.

And you're awesome, and you're the expert, and I know that you're the expert, but when a person comes to your blog, that's not what they're there for, right? They're there to get their problem solved, to get their question answered.

So as much as we all live in our own movie and star in our own movie, right? We all do it. Make sure that at least when you're writing your blog, you are shining that spotlight on the reader. It's their movie and not yours.

So that's one of the big mistakes I see, is making it about you and not about your customer or the reader.

The second thing is a tie into that is that a lot of people write blogs that provide information, but they don't really get into the customer journey.

So, in other words, when someone comes to your site and reads about a product or service you provide, there's some next step that you want them to take. Whether it's, you know, click on the next article or sign up for a newsletter or schedule a meeting, whatever it might be.

You need to tell us what that next step is, because we don't know, right? We don't have esp. We can't get into your mind and know what the thing is you want us to do. So make sure you just tell us.

And it doesn't have to be super forward, but just, hey, if you're interested in more, you know, here's the next thing.

So that's the second mistake I see, is not including that customer journey part and then finally forgetting that a lot of people who come to your website are either on their phone or they're just skimming your article before they read it.

So there are things you can do to format your blogs and your website to make it more mobile friendly, to give even people who just skim your article value and get them to get connected with you on a deeper level. And it's not writing a wall of text.

And we can go into some of those keys if we want, but those are the three big mistakes I see is just making it about you and not them.

Forgetting about that customer journey piece and then not realizing the number of people who are looking at your website on their phone or who are just skimming it for information.

Angela Frank: 00:05:34

So I love what you're saying there. I think all three of those mistakes are critical.

So if we're listening and we're realizing, like, I am, like, maybe I don't have enough CTAs sprinkled throughout my blog post, how can we go and fix each of those to set our blogs up for success?

Jon Clemence: 00:05:50

Yeah, I can definitely tell you that it's not hard, it just requires doing it. So I'm going to give you actually three things that will tie into each of the things I just mentioned.

So first of all, how do you make it more about your customer or more about the reader? Get them engaged. And one thing that's really easy to do is to just go back and look at your introductions. Do they resonate?

Do they have a hook in them? So what do I mean by that? Maybe you start with a story, a personal tie in to what you're going to talk about. Maybe you start with a statistic.

So you notice I started our interview with a statistic about Google and ranking. Right? That's going to hook someone. Now they're interested. So you can do the same thing with your blog posts.

Uh, so rewrite your intros to hook the reader to really get them bought into what you're trying to say. And especially in an attention economy, that's super important.

And as far as the customer journey goes, one of the best things you can do, whether it's a blog post or a Newsletter or a social media post is always end with a call to action. And make sure that call to action is to a product or service you currently sell.

And where this comes in handy is let's say you have a blog post that's three years old and three years ago you sold a product that you don't sell anymore. Well, if you still have that in that blog post and someone visits your site and they click on that link and they get a 404, that's a problem. Right.

You're probably going to lose that sale. So that strong call to action that is current and up to date is a key.

And then as far as the mobile users and the skimmers go, super easy way to fix that is to just add more white space. So don't have a wall of text. Don't have a paragraph that's ten sentences long. Make that into five paragraphs of two sentences long. Right?

We're not in high school English class. It's okay if you don't follow exactly what your high school English teacher said to do.

Just break it up, more white space, a couple sentences and then a new paragraph.

And then on top of that, if you don't have headers or call outs or things that people can easily grab onto to get an idea of the flow and logic and importance of that article, that's another good thing to go back and just add. So those are three quick things that anybody can do.

And if you will just do those three things consistently, that's going to put you ahead of so many other blogs and so many other companies out there who don't do those things.

Angela Frank: 00:08:04

Yeah, I love that. Very straightforward advice. And I want to go back to the thing that you mentioned about using a statistic to hook.

I think that a lot of people think that, oh well, that's going to alienate a large portion of my audience.

But your example in the beginning, sharing how important a blog is for web traffic, nobody listening is going to say, well, I don't want more organic traffic that I don't have to pay for. So you can use these tools in a way that is inclusive but still really interesting and juicy for the people who are landing on your blog posts.

So maybe we're listening and we're realizing that our blog is going in a different direction than we want it to go in. Or maybe we're listening and we're realizing that we don't have a blog at all.

So what is your advice for getting things on the right track or starting a new blog from Scratch?

Jon Clemence: 00:08:52

Yeah. You know, the easiest way to do it is to reach out to an expert. Right.

So, like, for instance, I have a CPA because I don't know the first thing about taxes. I also have a virtual assistant because I have things that I would like to do that I don't have the time to do.

So it makes sense sometimes to just outsource that problem. So to call a guy like me and say, hey, my blog performance stinks and I don't know what to do about it.

And it turns out, like, I actually have a service that can help with that, with that exact problem. So there are people out there who are more than willing to come alongside you and help you in your journey.

And so I also understand that sometimes maybe that's not financially feasible and that's okay too. So, you know, there's a ton of research out there. If you start just doing some searches on how do I improve my SEO, how do I write a good blog post?

You know, it's just a rabbit hole of information that you can go down.

So it kind of depends on your financial situation, it depends on your skillset and your desire to maybe do some things that are outside of your core comfort zone or your core tasks that you do. So it's really going to be an individual response, but at the end of the day, the help is out there.

There's more information at our fingertips now than there ever has been before.

So, yeah, it's just a matter of going out and finding the answer, looking into SEO, learning about it, or if you don't want to do that or can't, contracting with a guy like me, and we can come alongside you and help you in that endeavor.

Angela Frank: 00:10:16

Yes, I love that.

It ties back to an episode we did with Richard Walsh, who mentioned that, you know, in the first year or two of your business, you're going to be doing a lot, but there comes a point in your business where you really should be outsourcing things that are not in your core competencies so you can free up your bandwidth and focus on the areas of your business where you have the most impact. So I love that you shared for both routes. If you are in that situation where you are doing everything, then there's resources for you.

And if you're in that stage of your business where you're outsourcing, or maybe you have a much larger business and you have a team, but you don't want to bring a full person, full time person in house to deal with that, then working with someone like you, Jon would be a huge asset.

So you have an agency, you've done all of these great things since transitioning out of the corporate world, but it sounds like even before, I want to know what's next for. For you.

Jon Clemence: 00:11:15

You know, my mission right now is to grow my agency. So I am definitely on the hunt for great clients who do amazing things and want to help tons of people. Because I want to get in on that.

I want to start getting to the point where I'm able to outsource some more of my own tasks. Right. And be more on the business than in the business. So that's, that's my next step personally.

But as an agency, yeah, we're just looking for those great partners that we can come alongside and make the world a better place.

Angela Frank: 00:11:44

I love that. And when you're looking for new partners to help with your agency, do you specialize in any sort of niche?

If somebody's listening and they're wondering if you're the right fit for them, what types of people do you help?

Jon Clemence: 00:11:57

Yeah, we help all kinds of people. So as it happens, we do have a specialty in the functional medicine industry. So that's not the only people we work with.

But if you are in that kind of functional medicine field or nutrition or something along those lines, we definitely have expertise in that area. But, you know, we work with a wide range of people and a wide range of tasks too.

So anything from I just need someone to do a light copy edit of my blog posts all the way up to, I need someone to edit my book all the way up to. We need someone to just write our blog post for us. We can cover all of that stuff.

Angela Frank: 00:12:36

Amazing. So it sounds like if writing is really a pain in your side, John's the guy for you.

If somebody's listening and they want to learn more about your services or just keep up with you online, where's the best place for them to do that?

Jon Clemence: 00:12:49

Yeah, there's two ways that you can do that. So the first place is you can go to my website, which is cedarpressproofreading.com and you can read some blog posts.

You can learn more about us and what we do. If you'd like to take the next step, you can book a call right on my website and have a conversation just like we're having right now.

You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. You can search for me, Jon Clemence or Cedar Press proofreading. I'll come up either way. And again, send me a connection request. Send me a dm.

Let's start a conversation.

Angela Frank: 00:13:18

Amazing. And all of those links will be in the show notes. So if you're listening and any of that sounds good to you, it's right there for you.

John, thank you so much for joining us today. I got a lot out of our conversation and I know our listeners did as well. Well.

Jon Clemence: 00:13:32

Oh, thank you for having me. Had a blast.

Angela Frank: 00:13:34

If you enjoyed this episode of the Growth Pod, please leave us a review. It helps us reach other founders, entrepreneurs and corporate leaders just like you.

Thank you so much for listening and I will look forward to seeing you in the next one.