Gavin Bennett's Blog: Include Call to Action in Blog Post: Day 10 of the 2015 October Platform Challenge

One key to platform-building success is consistency. So for the duration of this month, we’ll be posting a new blog post each Saturday. But I’ll have a different focus each time. This week’s focus is…

Include Call to Action in Blog Post

For today’s platform-building task, make a new post on your blog and include a call to action. There are any number of calls to action, and my blog posts always include them.

Here are a few examples of calls to action:

Ask people to comment on your post. Don’t get discouraged if the comments don’t flow immediately, but getting people to communicate in the comments of your blog is a great way to foster community and engagement.
Link to other articles outside your site. Think about Day 8’s task and apply it to your blog. Of course, you’ll want to add your context to why the article is relevant on your blog, but calling people to read another article is a call to action.
Link to other posts within your blog or site. Look at what I did in the previous bullet point. I linked to a previous post in this challenge. That link is a subtle call to action that’s saying, “Click on me.” When it’s relevant, it’s a win-win for your readers and your blog/site traffic. You’ll notice that I also link previous posts at the bottom of each post, as well as linking to my Twitter handle.
Share products/services (if relevant). I should say “if relevant” at the end of everything platform-related, and it gets tricky promoting books and services. If you don’t have anything to sell (like a book you wrote or a course you teach), then I’d advise against sharing products or services at all. But part of your eventual goal is to create a platform that allows you to communicate with your target audience and find more success. There’s nothing wrong with that.

In fact, let me take a moment to do just that (as I’ve done in all the posts so far this month).

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Take Your Blogging to the Next Level!

During this month-long platform challenge, I hope to help writers develop many parts of their platform, including blogging efforts. However, writers who want to take their blogging to the next level are encouraged to take the upcoming Advanced Blogging: How to Monetize Your Blog and Build a Community course.

Writers will learn how to:

Customize a theme to suit their needs.
Add amazing functionality with plugins.
Improve SEO and get blog posts seen by more people.
And so much more!

Click to continue.

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Why include a call to action?

A call to action is good for giving readers direction and a way to engage with you and your blog or site. Links to previous posts provide readers with more helpful and/or interesting information. Links to your social media profiles give readers a way to connect with you on those sites and keep the conversation going.

So if the thought of self-promotion leaves a bad taste in your mouth, don’t think of it that way. A call to action provides your readers with a way to immerse themselves more fully into your ideas and world.

What if I’m just getting started?

Even if you’re completely new to everything, you should have an earlier blog post from last week, a Twitter account, and a Facebook account. Link to these at the end of your blog post today.

It’s a good starting place.

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Robert Lee Brewer is Senior Content Editor of the Writer’s Digest Writing Community, which includes editing Writer’s Market and Poet’s Market. He regularly blogs at the Poetic Asides blog and writes a poetry column for Writer’s Digest magazine. He also leads online education, speaks on writing and publishing at events around the country, and does other fun writing-related stuff.