Recipe for a Blog: Your Blog's Tag Line

Yesterday we introduced the Recipe for a Good Business Blog and wrote about creating a delicious blog name.

Ingredient #2: The Blog Tag Line

After naming the blog, it is highly recommended that blog authors include a tag line to explain what the blog is about.

For example, our own blog is named Build a Better Blog. The tag line is “Tips and Tricks for Creating a Professional Business Blog, brought to you by Patsi Krakoff, Psy. D. and Denise Wakeman.” We created the tag line and had the graphic designer include it in our custom-designed blog header.

Here are 3 points you want to cover in your blog tag line:

1. Who is your ideal reader?  Who do you want to attract to your blog?
2. What is the blog about?  What is your primary topic or niche? (what's in it for the reader?)
3. Who are you? Don't forget to include your name; don't be anonymous or make the reader search for your name and credentials

Another example: Biz Book Nuggets: Notes and Quotes for Busy Folks, by Patsi Krakoff.

If you don’t have a header that permits a tag line for your blog, then you can create a side-bar item (Typepad calls these “TypeLists”) with your blog name and tag line. You can also use this side-bar list to create a marketing message or mission statement, such as how people can hire you and why they would want to.

This short message can go in one of the upper corners, such as underneath your photo and link to your About or bio page. (We have put an example of this here on this blog in the upper left corner.)

The idea is that when readers land on your blog, they should be able to identify what's in it for them, and not have to read several posts in order to understand what the blog is all about.

Comments

[Denise aka The Blog Squad]

In TypePad, the tag line is called "weblog descriptions/catchphrase" and is found under the "Configure" tab and Weblog Basics.