How to Become an Editor (Part 2)

by Mark Bloom | Feb 13, 2018 | Editing

Three Ways to Help Writers Hit Their Messages

Read Part 1 of this series, if you haven’t already, to catch up on a few of the reasons it may be difficult to find a direct path to becoming an editor. Part 2 covers the different kinds of talents you need to become an editor. And Part 3 gives you some ways to reach your goals.

Become a writer who works well with writers

To become an editor, you must be able to take a piece of writing that already exists … and make it better. While the purpose of each piece of writing may vary, it doesn’t matter whether it’s a blog post, a newsletter article, a short story or a novel – it’s the editor’s job to make the writer’s work reach its intended audience with the right impact or angle.

There are three ways in which an editor helps the writer succeed. These three levels of editing are based on:

The writing project’s current stage of writing, per the writer
The editor’s assessment of the project’s needs
Ultimately, what the writer and editor agree to focus on

Become an Editor Who Offers Choices

Working with a writer can be a touchy situation. Writers are notoriously attached to their work. They’ve sweated over the details, wracked their brains to find the right words and poured their hearts into the writing. Criticism may even frighten them.

But approach writers with positive energy. You’re not there to destroy; you’re there to improve. Let the writer feel in control. And the best way to do that is to offer choices. Ask for a sample of the work and devise a plan to offer one or more of these three levels of editing:

Developmental editing
Copy editing
Proofreading

Developmental Editing

Developmental editing is a service usually performed near the very beginning of the project. Editors who can offer this service are in the highest demand because it’s a very specific talent. This is when you work with the writer to determine:

Who’s the intended audience?
What’s the purpose of the piece?
What are the most appropriate tone and language to use?
What’s an appropriate length for the piece?
What’s the ideal structure for the writing? Should it be written in newspaper style, dramatic style, academic style or something else?

Delve into the answers until you’re satisfied that you share the same goals with the writer. Make sure she understands each point, because the answers to these questions greatly influence the writing. When the first (or second) draft is complete, you’ll be evaluating the writing according to how closely the project hits its goals.

Copy editing takes work when you become an editor

Copy Editing

At this stage, a complete draft of the project already exists. Your job as editor, during the copy-editing phase, is to ensure that the writing flows eloquently and logically from point to point, from sentence to sentence and from section to section. When the writing is good, you have little work to do, but when there are problems, you may have to:

Question word choices
Move words, sentences, paragraphs or whole sections around
Delete words, sentences, paragraphs or whole sections
Request more information or expanded content in specific areas for specific purposes, which you must identify and convey

The point of this exercise is not to change the writer’s voice necessarily, but to make sure the piece hits its goals as identified in the developmental stage. You also need to make sure it’s easy for the intended audience to read. The danger here is inserting your own voice – intentionally or not – into the writing. You aren’t the author, and the writer has her own style. But the piece has to work.

Proofreading

This level of editing is the least intrusive and the least time-consuming. It involves reading through the piece of writing, only looking for typos, spelling mistakes and grammar errors. You don’t have to be concerned with flow, readability or word choice. It’s simply a final check before the writer can submit the piece, either for publication or approval.

While there are professional proofreaders who do nothing else, to become an editor, you must know how to proofread. And you should offer this service, not because no one else can do it, but because with proofreading, you can offer the full range of editing services.

Become an editor who knows how to do all three levels of editing. Become an editor who knows which service to perform for each piece of writing and who provides the best service to your writing clients. And remember: editing isn’t just about making a particular project as good as it can be; it’s also about making the writer as good as she can be.

Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.

How to Become an Editor (Part 1)

by Mark Bloom | Feb 5, 2018 | Editing

Going with Your Gut Isn’t a Defensible Strategy

If you want to become an editor, you have to find your own way. There’s no advanced degree program. You won’t find many mentors out there to apprentice with. In fact, depending on who you ask, there apparently isn’t any clear path into the profession.

In addition, there are few jobs with the title. You can become a magazine editor, a newspaper editor or a book editor. You can become an editor who does freelance work, but the pay is as low as the demand.

It's not easy to become an editor

Yet editors play a vital role in shaping stories, schooling writers and making the world a more comprehensible place. This three-part series delves into the nuts and bolts for people who want to become an editor.

Who Wants to Be an Editor?

So, if demand for editors is low, why become an editor at all? It takes a special breed of person – a cross between a word nerd and a personal trainer. You need to know all the rules, and you have to know when it’s OK to break them. You have to be able to work directly with writers (not the easiest bunch to corral) and lead them to heights even they didn’t realize they could reach.

It’s a myth that editors are failed writers. Many editors are also writers. It’s also a myth that all editors are (or were) English majors when they earned their Bachelor of Arts degrees. What is true is that, to become an editor, you need:

A Bachelor’s degree in something (not necessarily English), because you need a solid educational foundation
An ear for language, which is why native speakers make the best editors
Knowledge of all the grammar rules
A passion for language, which goes above and beyond grammar rules
Lots of experience in – and a love of – reading
A comprehensive vocabulary

The Best Way to Learn Editing

Obviously, experience is the greatest teacher, but what if you have no experience, but still want to become an editor? What do you do then? The short answer is to prepare. Read a lot, especially the types of writing you want to edit. Establish a relationship with a working editor and pick her brains. There are some good books on editing that are worth reading, such as:

Self-Editing for Fiction Writers by Renni Browne and Dave King
The Forest for the Trees by Betsy Lerner
Revising Fiction by Davis Madden
100 Ways to Improve Your Writing by Gary Provost
The Elements of Style by William Strunk and E.B. White

And there are many books on writing that can help you become a better editor, too. Everyone from Ray Bradbury to Stephen King has written books on writing. But don’t forget Writing Fiction by Janet Burroway and Stein on Writing by Sol Stein.

Editing Fiction or Nonfiction

You may notice that many of the recommended titles above focus on writing fiction. While there are some differences between writing and editing fiction vs. nonfiction, there are more similarities than you may realize. That means you can learn a lot about editing nonfiction by learning how to edit fiction.

It all comes down to audience, purpose and approach. There are techniques good editors use to achieve all three, while guiding writers to improve their craft for their next project. And that’s the area where editors resemble coaches: they’re not just concerned with the current project – whether it’s a novel, a magazine article or a blog post – but they also care about writers and helping them improve.

The next installment details the three different kinds of editing that you have to understand if you want to become an editor – and the skills involved with each type. In the meantime, if you need editing, hire the team at Ray Access.

How to Be a Better Writer

by Elle Ray | Jan 30, 2018 | Writing

Expert Advice on Learning from Your Editor

Writers write.

Practice makes perfect.

The best writers are avid readers.

There are enough clichés and witticisms to fill buckets with well-intentioned advice on how to be a better writer. And since writing is one of those tasks that most people loathe – in fact, many would rather face a root canal than write a 500-word blog post – those words of wisdoms usually fall to the bottom of a dry well and stay trapped there forever. Good intentions, after all, pave the path to hell.

Be a better writer by listening to an editor

And while the best advice, cliché or not, holds plenty of truth, there are many more practical, pedantic steps that you need to take to learn how to be a better writer. So take a teaspoon of sugar to help this medicine go down a little easier, as you swallow the following tips to be a better writer:

Take writing classes from people you respect
Write for teachers, mentors or colleagues who don’t hold back criticism
Accept criticism; that’s the way you learn
Welcome criticism so you can grow as a writer
Ask for more criticism because only the dead stop learning
Lose your defenses; be vulnerable, honest and open to good advice
Drop the excuses and keep writing; you improve by doing
Hire a good editor and you’ll learn more than you’d imagine

The Magnificent Birth of a Sentence

When you put your heart and a bit of your soul – not to mention a good chunk of your valuable time – into an article, story or blog post, you feel invested. It’s natural to be protective of your chosen phrases and cool alliterations. You may even get mushy, as many writers do, and think of your prose as your children, since they were born in your brain, slid down your arms to your hands and ended up on the page.

You may have sweat over each revision until you were sure you got it exactly right. Getting up in the middle of the night with just the right opening sentence is truly a thrill that gives any writer, professional or amateur, kind of a rush. It’s a grand morning that starts out with your muse in full regalia.

Then the Evil Editor Pounces

But the feeling doesn’t last. By the time you turn in your beloved “masterpiece,” a sense of dread hovers over you like a dark cloud you can’t shake. You may even hit the Send button believing, at least deep down, that it isn’t quite your very best work. But you love it anyway. It’s all yours and no one can take that away from you.

Until your editor does exactly that. That evil writer-wannabe sits all high and mighty on her throne, just waiting to cut your work to shreds. You have a feeling that she just loves to pick it apart, to rip your precious babies into a mish-mash of obscurity that you don’t even recognize. With your ego screaming in denial and your sense of self-worth lying in tatters on the floor, you think that the last thing your editor ever wants to do is to help you be a better writer.

Feedback Feeds Your Talent

Whether your editor does just a word-by-word line edit, correcting your grammar and deleting clichés, or rearranges your copy so that it flows better, it’s feedback you need to listen to. Instead of throwing a tantrum and whining like a baby, take it like a professional. Swallow your pride, and force your ego to pay attention. Those characteristics are merely protecting you, not helping you be a better writer.

In actuality, pride and ego are the enemies of greatness. You can practice all day, every day. You can surround yourself with readers who feed your ego and tell you only good things about your writing. And one day you’ll realize that you’ll never be a better writer. You need criticism. You need someone telling you to improve. If you don’t want to learn, then stop now. If you accept mediocrity, then don’t use a skilled editor.

Be a Better Writer … with Help and Humility

But without an editor willing to tear your work apart, any raw talent you have will remain undeveloped. It’s like walking around with your skirt tucked into your panties and not listening to anyone trying to tell you. It’s like going on stage with spinach in your front teeth and not understanding why people are laughing at you.

Read the acknowledgements in most best-sellers, and you’ll notice that even famous authors always mention their editors. Good editors are those selfless professionals who have only one goal: to create the best reading experience possible. And by succeeding, they help create a better writer.

An experienced editor knows: you will rise to the occasion if you have the talent; you will write the next book better if you have the drive; and you will be a better writer today than you were yesterday if you have the inclination to learn. When you rely on your scolding, caring, prodding, exacting editor – one who doesn’t hesitate to wield her axe to mold your message and massage your babies until they sing with joy – you’ll not only fashion a story that moves your readers, but you’ll also be a better writer.

The Best Website Content Writing Tip You’ll Ever Read

by Mark Bloom | Jan 22, 2018 | Website Content

Website Pages Have to Connect with Visitors

Everyone in the internet industry has their own opinion about what makes effective content for a website. Some SEO experts have insisted that, to rank high, a web page needs at least 1,000 targeted, carefully crafted words on a particular subject. Others have put the number at 800. Still others claim that length doesn’t matter at all.

Of course, the use of keywords still counts in website content writing — at least until artificial intelligence makes them obsolete, a day that is getting all too close. But there’s more to writing engaging website content than relying on multiple keywords. And keyword stuffing is a bad practice anyway. (So use keywords, but don’t overuse them.)

No matter where you write, use good website content writing tactics

But that’s still not the answer, since keywords are designed only to attract people to your website. Once they’ve arrived, keywords are unnecessary and superfluous. Something more is required if you want an effective website.

What Website Content Writing Is Supposed to Do

The Holy Grail of websites is persuading visitors to take action. That’s it, really. The conversion of a website visitor into a customer begins with a single mouse click. When people find their way to your website, which is in itself a remarkable feat, the website’s goal is getting them to:

Want to learn more, which means visiting other pages on your website
Contact your company through a contact form, a phone call or an email
Sign up for your newsletter to stay in touch and maybe get special deals
Order your product or service, ideally, but that rarely happens on the first visit

If your website content connects with visitors, it’s done its job. It’s generated a sales lead. The rest is up to you and your team.

But What’s the Best Way to Engage Visitors?

Now it gets down to the nitty gritty of websites. What separates the websites of successful companies from those of less successful companies? It’s all about engagement, getting visitors to stay on your website longer because they want to, because you’re giving them what they’ve been searching the internet for. And this is the crux of the best website content writing tip you’ll ever read.

This tip involves three parts:

Know your audience. You have to know who you’re trying to attract with your website. You’re in business to serve your customers. You have to know who they are. Define your demographic and develop some personas.
Understand what they want. When this target group of people come to your website, what is it they’re looking for? Information? Your phone number? Tips about your industry, products or services? You have to know what they want and make it all easy to find. That’s part website design, but it also involves good website content writing.
Deliver it all in a responsive way. Even if you satisfy the first two requirements, if you don’t nail this one, your visitors click away to find your competitors who are doing all three. This is where presentation matters. This is where language matters. This is what so many businesses get wrong.

The Ray Access Vision for Website Content Writing

One of the factors that sets Ray Access projects apart from the rest of the internet — in addition to the careful editing process we employ — is the language and tone of the websites we write. It’s not enough to present clear, concise, easy-to-find information on your website, although that certainly helps make a website inviting.

To bring it home, you have to present your information in a way that speaks to your visitors. It’s an important distinction that demands a careful choice of words. Don’t use stilted language and passive voice. Write your website like you’re talking to a friend — because that’s what you want your website visitors to become.

Detailed Advice

Explain unusual or industry terms that come up because you know people will ask. Write in simple sentence structures and short paragraphs. Break up your page with easy-to-scan headings and relevant images. These things help people read and find what they’re looking for.

Short sentences and short paragraphs make a page more readable, more person-friendly. Concise words and phrases engage readers who are interested in the subject as well as readers who are new to your site. Simple website content writing — which is often the most difficult way to write — is the most engaging. Content that connects with your visitors gets readers to make that one click that matters most: on the Buy Now button.

When the Well Runs Dry

by Elle Ray | Jan 16, 2018 | Writing

How to Kickstart Your Creativity with 10 Tips

Whether you’re a cabinetmaker, a writer, a photographer or painter, you’ve probably run into some version of writer’s block, when it seems like nothing is working and there’s no way to kickstart your creativity. Creative types rely on an inner muse or drive that provides the fodder for that next novel, painting, wooden bowl or sunset picture.

Kickstart your creativity by imagining this scene or one of your own

But when the muse is asleep or when it feels like she’s on an extended vacation, creative people often have to turn to the same motivators as the rest of the world: inner drive and previous experience. And when you make a living from your creative pursuits, usually you can’t afford to join your muse lying around lazily in the clouds. Instead, you’ve got to produce. You have to find a way to kickstart your creativity … no matter what.

You’re in Good Company

No creative personality runs on 24/7/365 creative juices. As author Philip Roth put it: “The road to hell is paved with works-in-progress.” There’s nary a man or woman alive who hasn’t run into a dry spell. It happens, and when it does, it feels nigh impossible to produce anything even close to bordering on original.

That doesn’t mean you’re no good at what you do — which is something your ego may be shouting. And it certainly doesn’t mean you need to find a new line of work … at least, that shouldn’t be your first impulse necessarily. If you let Nellie Negativity ruin your show, then maybe you can’t cut it as a professional creative.

10 Tips to Kickstart Your Creativity

If you prefer to knock Negative Nellie off her perch and wade through those dark days when your muse flies the coop — whether you do it for a paycheck or just to save your integrity — try a few of these tips, sure to kickstart your creativity, or at least save you from sinking deeper in the mire of mediocrity:

Listen to Salvador Dali, who said: “Have no fear of perfection; you’ll never reach it.” And let go of any illusions that you can, or even have to be, perfect.
Walk away. Take a day off. Walk away for a couple hours if that’s all the time you have. Sometimes, just moving your body can kickstart your creativity by mixing up your endorphins that make you normally so creativity productive.
Change your mind. Leave a project that seems to have you stuck and move on to one that continues to hold your attention. It’s just a matter of priming the pump. After a bit, when you can go back to that dry hole, you’ll find it’s not so empty after all.
Close your eyes and take a head trip back to a time when you were cranking out the poetry or painting up a fury of beautiful canvasses. Remember who you are, and your muse will come running back to be by your side as you kickstart your creativity right off the charts.
Let your fingers do the work. Get your mind out of the way and just start typing, drawing, molding, whatever it is you do. Your hands have muscle memory; they’ll go about creating whatever they do best. Trust your body to take your creative mind where it needs to be.
Forget about the money for a minute. Sure, you need to pay the bills, but you know in your heart, you’ll do that. Instead, kickstart your creativity with a joke on your muse. Laughter is good for the soul and for your creativity. Remember what Robert Benchley says: “The freelance writer is a man who is paid per piece or per word or perhaps.”
Call a good friend. You’ve got at least a couple friends or family members who love you and support what you do. They also love to see your finished products, so call them and ask them to remind you how talented you really are and how much they — and the whole world — need you.
Cruise the internet. Set a time limit because you know how time can just get lost when you dive deep into web searches. Just troll around your favorite sites or search for lists like this one. Kickstart your creativity with someone else’s ideas; it’s OK to get inspiration from others. You’re not the only one with a muse.
Look to the heavens and to whichever higher power you pray to. Meditate. Turn off all the voices in your head that want to enter the void left by your muse. They do not have your best interests in mind. When you empty your head, your heart has room to expand.
Get outside. This one works especially well if your creative work keeps you locked in a room or studio. The air, sunlight, stars, wind, cold or heat … the birds, smells and all the sensations of the outdoors … nature itself can awaken a sleeping muse.

Whatever you choose to do to kickstart your creativity, do it with a carefree attitude. Do it as if no one is watching. Actually try doing it when no one is watching. It’s the ego who steals the muse from you; she’s really never far from your heart. You just have to dig deep to find her. Now that you have, go create something only you can!

The Joy of Writing

by Mark Bloom | Jan 9, 2018 | Writing

The Joy of Writing Exists, But Not for Everyone

Among writers, both amateur and professional, there’s a common saying that’s built on half-truths and lazy innuendoes. The paraphrased saying goes like this: “It’s much better to have written than to be writing.” The insinuation is that the act of writing, of putting words into a document one after the other, is no fun at all. so how can there be a joy of writing?

The joy of writing does happen, but mostly in writers.

Businesspeople who don’t consider themselves writers certainly agree. Writing for them is a sisyphean task. One simple blog post can take hours on end, hours better spent doing anything else — even accounting. And the end result may turn out to be a fragmented account of a semi-satisfied customer. In other words, all that effort produced something of little or no value.

The Joy of Writing for Writers

People who identify themselves as writers — and that may include you — usually find some satisfaction in the act of writing. For some, an original turn of phrase is what kindles that warm, glowing feeling. For example, we once wrote a blog post for a client about mountain biking on steep and dangerous terrain. In writing that article, a phrase appeared, as if by magic, a phrase that became the title of the piece: “Trails and Tribulations.”

For others, the joy of writing occurs during that period after the start, when a blank page gradually gets filled with a first draft. This is the euphoria we’re feeling while writing this blog post right now! Then there are those whose joy comes only at the end. The accomplishment, having written, imbues the writer with that warm, glowing feeling. No matter where it comes, all writers chase that feeling like spiritual seekers after enlightenment. It can become all-consuming.

Writing Is Hard Work

While everyone with a high school diploma can write, the art and science of writing a coherent story, essay or article takes work. Finding the right word, to paraphrase Mark Twain, means the difference between lightning and the Tampa Bay Lightning. And then there’s the grammar, spelling and punctuation to deal with.

Additionally, when writing something for your business, you may need to do some research to make sure you get your facts straight, and many people haven’t had to do research since their college years. But you can’t just publish anything. Your customers may see it, find an error or get the meaning wrong, and suddenly, your painstakingly written article is going viral for all the wrong reasons.

Get Help from Real Writers

If the joy of writing actually exists, then good writers actually feel it. If you’re struggling with a writing task, you need to find one of these magical creatures to do your writing for you. Your joy of writing may come from delegating the whole task. And that’s OK. Just as there are accountants to handle your books and plumbers to fix your leaks, there are writers to produce your content.

But you’ll find a big difference between hiring a plumber and hiring a writer: A plumber can save you money by protecting your home or office, but a writer, a real writer who lives for the joy of writing, can actually make you money. If your blog posts are engaging, informative and thought-provoking, your customers will read them. If your website is direct and helpful, readers will actually contact you about your products or services.

Let someone else fret over the right word choice and revel in the placement of a comma. Let someone else craft perfect sentences that speak directly to your audience with style, wit and erudition. It won’t even cost that much. Meanwhile, you get to go back to doing what you do best: satisfying the customers you already have.

Ray Access. We’re here when you need us
because good online content can make the difference
between a sale and a fail.

Looking Back at 2017

by Elle Ray | Jan 1, 2018 | Announcement

It Was the Best of Times … Well, in Some Ways

Ah, the great look-back. Everyone is doing it. You have your top news stories of 2017, the most popular movies, songs and books. Business stories, tech, banking and retail all have their own set of top 10 or 20 best stories looking back at 2017. And who can leave out politics from the year just passed? No one, that’s who.

Ray access, looking back at 2017

Looking back at 2017, the staff at Ray Access experienced a range of emotions and experiences. From serious health scares to rampant writer turnover, the principals at this online writing firm wondered sometimes if they would survive the year intact.

But Big Business Ruled the Day

Health became the front-of-mind issue, as the partners had to pull together to make the business run. While the team recruited and trained a new set of (even better) writers, work at Ray Access not only exceeded expectations, it blew more than a few minds. Looking back at 2017, the highlights at Ray Access included:

Gross receipts were nearly 10 times as much as 2014, the first year Ray Access was in business.
Ray Access went international with two stunningly beautiful clients: a transcreation agency in Singapore and a drug rehabilitation facility outside Tel Aviv.
Our proprietary Style Guide was completed, giving writers and editors succinct direction and solidifying the successful Ray Access style of writing.
Substantial paychecks were written to freelance writers across the country for their excellent work.
Relationships with a few national web development agencies were solidified.
Planned more focused marketing directives to reach out to more marketing, SEO and web development agencies.

Who Knew?

As journalists, tech writers and book editors, we always knew that we brought a broad range of talents to bear at Ray Access. And looking back at 2017 only verifies that. Being able to research any topic has always been one of the hallmarks of the writing team — and something we felt proud to advertise.

But who knew, upon reflection while looking back at 2017, that we would actually become experts in such disparate industries as:

Dental — one dentist told us he actually learned new things from the pages we created for his website!
Super high tech for 2017 and way beyond, concerning the Internet of Things (IoT) industry
Pet preferences, tea parties, yoga positions and much more

It’s Better in the Mountains

Not to toot our horn — well, maybe there’s a little tooting going on here — the Ray Access team keep on top of what’s trending the world over, all from the small mountain city of Asheville, North Carolina. This progressive, artsy community that we call home may someday fall to the lords of fashion and trendy living, but for the time being, it does its own thing. And we’re happily inspired to be here.

From this marvelous place, the muse is alive and well for the Ray Access leadership. And she keeps us tight with the trends too. Consider that looking back at 2017 brought these woodsy wordsmiths writing gigs on topics such as:

The latest environmentally friendly way to collect and reuse rainwater
Trendy fashion wear for the elite pooches of Manhattan
What Chinese travelers value most from their hosts
How reusing your own blood can cure many previously incurable conditions
And of course, how a smile makeover can change your life

What will 2018 bring? We can’t say for certain, but like the mountains themselves, the future has us looking up. When you need help writing content for your website — whether you need complete content, several blog posts or merely editing services (which always make a big difference) — contact the experts at Ray Access.

‘Tis the Season of Giving

by Mark Bloom | Dec 25, 2017 | Small Business Advice

The Only Way to Receive Is to Give Generously

Give not just during the season of giving, but all year round

Since it’s the season of giving, we thought we’d share this little bit of wisdom: you have to give to receive. It’s cliché, but like all time-honored sayings, so very true, and especially timely during this season of giving. You know it’s true. And it’s easy to come up with examples:

To attract holiday shoppers, you might have to give away a discount.
To get good karma on your side, you need to do good deeds.
If you want people to be nice to you, you have to be nice to them first. You have to give kindness to get it.
To get a paycheck, you have to give a good day’s work.
The first point of attraction is your smile. You have to take a chance and project your smile out into the world if you hope to receive a smile back.

You could apply this concept to any endeavor and every activity. If you bring nothing to the table, you’ll often leave it empty-handed. But if you join in a lively conversation with insight and regard, you’ll learn something new or meet someone new.

Give with an Open Heart

While giving to receive is a popular sentiment these days, your intention matters a great deal when you set out to give. Now, we’re not implying that it’s better to give than to receive, although we believe that. But don’t just give — give of yourself. Share your presence, not just your presents, and the world will respond.

And while giving inherently is its own reward, we do believe that what goes around comes around. Even when you give with no thought of what you’ll get in return, you’re often rewarded from some other source. It’s strange how it works, but it does work.

The Season of Giving for Businesses

It’s the same with your business. You don’t have to give away your trade secrets just to drum up customers. But give away your insight. Give freely of your industry knowledge, no matter what industry you’re in. Educate your clients, and they’ll become more discerning buyers.

Everyone faces choices when they want to buy, whether it’s a product, a service or an adventure. If you’re selling products, services or adventures, you can provide inside information to help people make better choices. Here are some examples:

If you’re a plumber, explain the pros and cons of all the different varieties of water heaters.
If you sell auto leases, definitely share all the ways you can help car shoppers.
If you’re a medical specialist, share insights into your experience with keeping your patients healthy.

Share Your Knowledge in a Blog

It doesn’t have to be the season of giving for you to give away advice, tips and insights. When you blog on your business website, you can share every week or even more often. That’s what we do here at Ray Access with this blog. It’s what you can do on yours.

Blogs reach out to people searching for answers. The people you attract are already interested in your goods, services or adventures. Whatever your business does, you can share information about it to educate your customers. Do it for free. Make it valuable. Give of your knowledge, and people will remember. What goes around, comes around.

Happy holidays from your writing and editing friends at Ray Access, where it’s always the season of giving.

2018 Blog Predictions

by Elle Ray | Dec 19, 2017 | Blog Writing

Blogging Follows Trends; Here’s Some for 2018

You may wonder, as do we, which is more productive:

To live in the moment, one day at a time
To live for a time in the future when everything finally falls into place

At Ray Access, we teeter somewhere in between on most days. While numerous blog predictions across the country could have us celebrating prematurely at the notion that small business is going to boom under the Trump admiration’s tax bill and pro-business agenda, we’re just grateful for what we already have. Some blog predictions say this is a business-minded president if ever there was one, while others beg to differ about who he really cares about.

Besides, most of us aren’t in the same bracket as those business people running the country anyway. Like millions of small business owners, we think in terms of thousands, not billions. Still, we’d like to venture out as 2017 draws to a close and make a few bold 2018 blog predictions. We can dream, after all, even when we embrace the many gifts of today.

Enjoy the gift of our blog predictions

And the Beat Goes On

The blog writing team at Ray Access is acutely aware of what’s hot in the blog marketplace — in other words, those topics readers will be looking for as they browse the internet. When you can hop into current events, get ahead of trends and excite and energize internet readers with your topics, you gain credibility — and more traffic to your site. Hopefully, you garner some new business in the process as well.

As we create lists of topics for our blog clients, we have to think ahead. And when we develop our own blog topic lists and acquire new customers because of our exceptional originality, we like to think we tap into something special. So here are a few of the topics we think will trend heavily as 2018 starts:

All things Trump. The 45th President isn’t going away. While the calls for his impeachment may gather steam, they will for the most part whither out as bigger challenges develop in the United States. So go ahead and refer to The Donald in a few blog posts as you prepare your 2018 content marketing plan.
Privacy as tech continues to invade our lives. Smart homes often are occupied by not-so-smart families who open themselves up for enormous probing just so they can get access to the latest talking refrigerator or pre-heated bathroom. Smart homes are here now, and they’re going to get more popular. Just make sure you don’t skimp on the privacy upgrades for every addition you make.
Drones — and the range of options, issues and challenges they pose. As Christmas gift lists were being bombarded with toy and amateur drones in Christmas 2017, 2018 blog predictions include plenty of room to incorporate the growing trend into your own corporate copy. In other words, think of ways drones will impact your business or your customers’ lives.
Spicing it up in the kitchen. One of the big trends in “foodie utopia” in 2018 will be the use of spices to make your meals healthier. Spices like turmeric have long been known to increase circulation. Expect this spice to get an even bigger boon in the next year, right along with cinnamon, cumin, ginger and garlic.
All things mobile. Our blog predictions for 2018 include a spot for mobile connectivity. This will be the year that mobile surpasses laptops and desktops as the primary device for the internet of things (IoT). If your website isn’t mobile friendly by the end of 2018, you may as well close it down and install a fax machine. This also means that your blogs and e-newsletters must be totally readable on mobile devices, too.

Short, sweet, easy-to-digest and interesting enough to repost — that’s exactly what your blog should be. And include some of these blog predictions to increase your click-through rate. Stop using your blog to send ads to your followers! It’s time to join the 21st century, where you’ll find a slew of new friends and followers. They’ll matter to your business in 2018.

Why Your Clients Need a Blog

by Mark Bloom | Dec 12, 2017 | Agency Advice

Businesses Look to Web Developers for Advice

Your clients spend thousands of dollars to design and develop an attractive, effective website. They spend hundreds more a month on search engine optimization. Commissioning a website from scratch — or even a website redesign — can be a significant capital investment. And it’s especially true for small businesses. That’s why they need a blog.

Your clients need a blog for traffic

So it’s vital that businesses get it right. Design, functionality and content all play important roles in how effective a website is at engaging visitors. And the website needs to show up in searches to draw traffic. That’s SEO’s job — and while fresh content doesn’t replace SEO, it does make SEO work better. Adding blog posts on a regular basis engages your audience and brings more people to your website. That’s also why they need a blog.

Business Websites Need a Blog

By adding a blog to their websites, your clients actually accomplish two things:

Builds depth and breadth to their website, which gives visitors even more useful information about the company, industry, products and services.
Provides more keywords for search engines to find, which allows them to point more (and different) searches back to the website, potentially capturing more traffic.

A website by itself can only do so much. There’s the landing page (or Home page) and the About page. There are pages for each product or service, as well as pages for related information. But the website you build for your client can’t cover every conceivable way their products or services are better. It can’t deliver every possible benefit the company offers. That’s why your clients need a blog.

It’s Up to You

As the internet expert for your clients, it’s up to you to advise them how to get the best results from their new websites. You may offer SEO services or recommend agencies that offer it. In this competitive era, SEO is a required service for businesses that want to gain attention by ranking high in searches.

And that’s the same reason to recommend to your clients that they need a blog. Blogs reach out to their customers to offer information and tips, not deals and promotions. That’s advertising. The saying “an educated consumer is the best consumer” holds true online, too. Blogs fill that niche.

How Blogs Work

The reason your clients need a blog is to indirectly capture related keywords and topics that don’t currently exist on their websites. Blogs increase the variety of keywords and topics their websites cover, and that can be as broad as they want. Let’s say the business is located in Asheville, NC. If the website features a blog post about the fun things to do in Asheville or the benefits of working in Asheville, that post may find an audience beyond the narrow target market.

That one blog post may make the website more popular, bringing more people to the website. Once there, visitors may look around to see what else the website has to offer. It’s a benefit to the business and to the visitor, if the interests align.

Value Above and Beyond an Online Storefront

Not all business websites directly sell products online. Some websites are marketing tools geared to get visitors to contact the company, either through a phone call, an email or a contact form. That’s the beginning of a relationship that may end in a sale. That’s the ultimate purpose of a website.

If your clients’ websites aren’t working for their businesses, they’ve just wasted a bunch of money. If they’re not happy with their website, they won’t be very likely to use your agency again or recommend you to others. If you recommend that they need a blog, they’ll benefit from the exposure and you’ll benefit from their success.

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