1.
1
BLOGGING
As a Tool for
GROWTH
Kyle Fugere
@kfugere

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2
Investor at dunnhumby Ventures (dhV),
the investment arm of dunnhumby. Prior
to my work at dunnhumby, I was the
founder of the content marketing firm
WaterMyBlog and am a frequent writer
on subject of startups, venture capital,
and design thinking. You can follow me
on Twitter @kfugere
Bio

3.
3
Identify a repeatable
process for generating
and disseminating
great content.
GOAL

4.
4
STEP
1
What Problem are you Solving?
 When your potential customers are
trying to solve this problem, what
are they typing here?
Understand Your (Potential)
Audience
Task
Write down 5-10 searches
a client might perform
when looking to solve the
particular problem you
solve!
Example: Blue Apron
The Obvious
“Meal delivery service”
The Less Obvious
“Dinner ideas for two”

5.
5
STEP
2 Identify Your Target Platform
Blogging isn’t reserved solely
for your “Blog”
 Editorials (Big & Broad)
 Guest Blogs (Highly Targeted)
 MyWebsite.com/blog (High Quality)
Task 1
Google - “(Publication) op-
ed guidelines”
Start a spreadsheet and
track the email address
and format for each
publication. Try to get to
20.
Task 2
Start a spreadsheet of
industry related blogs that
potential clients might
read.

6.
6
STEP
2 Identify Your Target Platform
Case Study:
 Founder of Buffer acquired 100,000 customers via an aggressive guest
blogging strategy before writing anything for their own blog.
Hi guys,
As a guy just starting out with a few basic webdesign lessons, I found onextrapixel
extremely helpful, so just a quick thank you on that note.
I wanted to ask if you are interested in a guest post that I have drafted, which I titled "10
Tools To Make The Most of Twitter". It covers a few of the latest Twitter Tools, which help me
a lot to stay productive.
I hope you can let me know if you think the post could be interesting for you. For reference of
my writing style, I published recently on:Six Revisions SocialMediaExaminer Inspiredm
Best,
Leo
http://searchenginewatch.com/sew/how-to/2194396/how-guest-posting-propelled-one-site-from-0-to-100-000-customers#
Cont.

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7
STEP
3 Display Thought Leadership
Don’t be Afraid to Have an Opinion!!
 You know more about your industry
than most people and need to remove
the fear of being criticized.
Forget your generalized audience. In the first place, the
nameless, faceless audience will scare you to death and in
the second place, unlike the theater, it doesn't exist. In
writing, your audience is one single reader. I have found that
sometimes it helps to pick out one person—a real person
you know, or an imagined person and write to that one.
- John Steinbeck
http://lifehacker.com/focus-on-an-audience-of-one-to-avoid-creative-fear-
1582679569
“

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STEP
4 Identify & Duplicate Proven
Strategies
Task
Come up with 10 lists
related to your industry
that could be the basis for
an article.
Be creative!
Example:
The Periodic Table of
Venture Capital Blogs
https://www.cbinsights.com/blog/venture
-capital-blogs-periodic-table/
1 million most-shared articles
during the first half of 2014.
http://marketingland.com/heres-2-7-billion-social-shares-say-state-online-publishing-
99572?utm_content=bufferd8519&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_ca
mpaign=buffer

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9
STEP
5 Optimize Your Headline!
 Simplicity: If you are vague about the
value of reading your copy, your reader
will be too.
 Helpfulness: For your reader to see value
in your copy, you must show how it will
help him.
 Immediacy: Your headline should be so
interesting that your reader cannot help
but read on immediately.
 Newsworthiness: Your headline must say
something he hasn’t heard before.
 Entertainment: Headlines which promise
some entertainment in the copy succeed
more often than those which don’t.
Task
Come up with a Headline
for each article topic you
created in Step 4.
Suggestion:
Usability research shows
that people tend to take in
only the first and last 3
words. This suggests the
perfect length for a
headline is 6 words.
MUST READ: https://blog.kissmetrics.com/how-to-write-headlines/

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10
STEP
6 Optimize Your Body Content
How Long Should My Post Be?
 The ideal length of a blog post is 7 minutes, 1,600 words
https://medium.com/data-lab/the-optimal-post-is-7-minutes-
74b9f41509b
https://moz.com/blog/what-makes-a-link-worthy-post-part-1

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STEP
6 Optimize Your Body Content
Content + Media
https://moz.com/blog/what-makes-a-link-worthy-post-part-1 https://blog.bufferapp.com/the-power-of-twitters-new-
expanded-images-and-how-to-make-the-most-of-it
Cont.

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12
STEP
6 Optimize Your Body Content
Resources:
 53 Free Image Resources!
 Adding Text to Images
 Best Practices for Marrying Text
and Images
 The Ideal Length of Everything!
 What headlines and topics yield
the most social shares
 How to Write a Headline
Cont.

13.
13
STEP
7 Implement Your Plan
-REPEAT-
Plan:
 Target to customer
 Write a post from your list of topics
 Write a killer headline
 Add some media
 Start sending to Publishers,
industry specific blogs, or publish
to your Website