We’re scanners. Our eyes move fast and furious trying to capture all we can in a short amount of time.  Just as the best road trips have rest stops along the way, the best blog posts have eye rests along the way.

Give your audience one (or more) eye rest stops in your blog posts.

• Images – I always encourage placing the image to the right. Why?  We read left-to-right. Unless the image IS the story, let it be an eye rest. It will enhance – and maybe even compel more readership.
• Bold Text – As scanners, we’re flying through text. Especially with longer paragraphs, publish a money quote in bold text.
• Hyperlinks – Hyperlinks are valuable to everyone involved, and the value for your reader is twofold: 1) They can dig deeper into the subject and 2) the change in text is an eye rest
• Lists – Short bullet or numbered lists are always good for an eye rest.

Which article are you more likely to read and remember?

This one:

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Pellentesque
molestie neque nec ante. Pellentesque dui ipsum, porttitor vel,
placerat sollicitudin, venenatis ut, dui. Praesent erat arcu, molestie
sit amet, interdum in, nonummy pulvinar, nibh. Mauris imperdiet
condimentum nisi. Donec eu turpis non leo nonummy sollicitudin.
Vestibulum ante ipsum primis in faucibus orci luctus et ultrices
posuere cubilia Curae; Integer justo lorem, sodales sed, mollis at,
gravida viverra, diam. Donec nibh leo, scelerisque sed, cursus et,
venenatis scelerisque, erat.

Or this one:

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Pellentesque
molestie neque nec ante. Pellentesque dui ipsum, my money is on the second one, venenatis ut, dui. Praesent erat arcu, molestie
sit amet, interdum in, nonummy pulvinar, nibh.

• Mauris imperdiet
  condimentum nisi.
• Donec eu turpis non leo nonummy sollicitudin.
• Vestibulum ante ipsum primis in faucibus orci luctus et ultrices
  posuere cubilia

Curae; Integer justo lorem, sodales sed, mollis at,
gravida viverra, diam. Donec nibh leo, scelerisque sed, cursus et,
venenatis scelerisque, erat.

Give your readers an eye rest. They’re more likely to remember what you wrote – and therefore spread your words.

Photo on Flickr by imadoofus123

In the Michael Michalko’s Thinkertoys, we find how Ray Kroc may have used the SCAMPER method to build the McDonald’s empire.

In O’Reilly’s Mind-Performance Hacks, Ron Hale-Evans shows how he applies SCAMPER to develop the card-dice game, Scrummy.

SCAMPER can a creative thinking technique to jump-start your blog posting:

• Substitute – Remember the Z-List? Sandy substituted text for images and extended its viral life.
• Combine – Consider combining text and audio (sound bytes) in a post.
• Adapt – I’ve written before about emulating an idea to make it your own. Recently, I was inspired by Adam’s brilliant post to toy with this scene about RSS feeds.
• Modify – Todd Andrlik modified the idea of the Z-List, created the Power 150 and recently partnered it with AdAge
• Put to Other Use – One more example from the Z-List: Gavin gave it permanent life on the Z-List Wiki
• Eliminate – Television.  You’ll find more time to blog.
• Rearrange – Turning statements into questions could be one way, right?

It’s okay to experiment. As my buddy Zane Safrit says, "I’m in beta."

Old-time preachers used to enunciate words-uh with an emphasis-uh on the last consonant-eh.  We still (see) some of this style today, but with microphones available, I fear it’s more for show and sell.

Back in the day, preachers had to make sure the back of the church could hear all the dots and tittles. The over-enunciation was one way to do that. Of course, you could imagine that sometimes the front row got re-baptised…right from the preacher’s lips-ah.

What in the world does this have to do with business blogging? Sometimes you need to speak to the back of the church to baptise the front row.

• Want to build your business regionally? Engage with bloggers nationally.
• Want to build a national reach? Build relationships globally.

In these days of a flat business world, you just might build a global business either way. Even if you don’t plan on doing business with folks outside of your target, engage in the conversation by extending your voice and reach. The relationships and idea-sharing will improve your business skills and bottom line.

Photo of Billy Sunday, preacher, ballplayer and Iowa native

As you employ Search Once and Subscribe for search strings important to you and your blogging efforts, remember to use personal pronouns.

One example:

A real estate agent in Michigan is looking for new prospects. Search Once and Subscribe to this string: "we’re thinking about selling our house" Michigan or something similar ("I’m selling my house" Michigan or "we’re looking for a new house" Michigan)

If nothing comes up, subscribe to the search anyway (that’s why we call it Search Once and Subscribe). When something does come up, engage in a conversation. Yep – right there on their blog (it’s a conversation station!).

Another example:

A pizzeria in Tulsa is looking to build business. They Search Once and Subscribe to this string: "their pizza sucks" Tulsa or "we order from <insert competitor’s name>" Tulsa

From there, the pizzeria owner can comment on that post (talk about what the blogger said, not that you have fantastic pizza – a comment isn’t a commercial). The pizzeria owner could also read other posts in the blog. Who knows, maybe they both ride motorcycles. Point is, by leaving a comment, the pizzeria owner has the opportunity to point back to his website (blog or no blog).

One last example (for now):

A recruiter is looking for someone in <pick a profession>, Search Once and Subscribe for "my wife lost her job" <profession> or "my husband is looking" <profession>

If HR pros and Head Hunters aren’t using Search Once and Subscribe — they’ll be writing the post above instead of finding it.

Okay, so why use pronouns?  If you don’t, you’ll get tons of splogs or spam…Internet Litter. A search string of "looking for a new house" will get you everything but signal. But using a personal pronoun (such as we in "we’re) brings up much better signals.

By the way, in none of the examples above did I hint that the company was publishing a blog. They were simply listening to the blogosphere.

If you haven’t seen it yet, you just might want to read Search Once and Subscribe.

Other Related Posts:
– How Do I Find a Blog About…?
– How Do I Subscribe to a Feed?
– Putting Your Ear to the Blogosphere
– Jim Foster Doesn’t Blog — Or Does He?
– A Single Feed Creates a Lifetime of Loyalty