Mike Brown is a strategic innovation consultant who helps organizations develop branding, marketing, and social media strategies through his company Brainzooming. He gives presentations on topics like innovation, strategic thinking, and branding fundamentals. Through these sessions, he has shared the Brainzooming approach with thousands of business people. In this document, he provides a seven-lesson guide for businesses to link their strategy to effective blogging content. The lessons cover deciding on blog goals and audience, establishing guidelines, generating topic ideas, creating a publishing schedule, editing for impact, reducing reliance on other platforms, and avoiding common social media mistakes.

1. "Linking Business Strategy and Blogging Content"
Mike Brown
Brainzooming™
Mike Brown is a Strategic Innovation Catalyst at Brainzooming™ which helps organizations more
successfully develop and implement branding, marketing, and social media strategies. Using a tested
process combining lateral thinking, strategic planning, project management, humor, and an
appreciation of diverse perspectives, Brainzooming is the catalyst for organizations to think and
succeed strategically, innovatively, and quickly.
Mike is a frequent keynote presenter and facilitator in marketing best practices, innovation, and
strategic thinking. Specific topics covered include:
 Taking the NO Out of InNOvation (Perspectives & techniques to awaken creativity.)
 Cultivating a Strategic Business Perspective (Approaches to challenge strategic thinking
stereotypes and create stronger strategic alignment & results.)
 Branding Fundamentals (Branding lessons for putting businesses, departments, and projects
on track.)
 Creative Instigation (Growing your own creative talents and those of your team.)
Through these sessions, he has shared the Brainzooming approach with thousands of business
people, helping them adapt it to a wide variety of organizational and personal opportunities. He
shares his extensive experience through daily articles on the website, BrainZooming.com.
Additionally, he’s written an e‐book called “Taking the NO Out of InNOvation.”
Daily Innovation & Strategy Blog: www.Brainzooming.com
Contact Information ‐ Mike Brown: brainzooming@gmail.com
Twitter @brainzooming
Lesson #1 _________ Decide to Start a Blog
Ask and answer:
 What am I trying to achieve?
 Who is my target audience, and what's important to them?
 What do I want the target audience to do or believe?
"Linking Business Strategy and Blogging Content" 1 © Mike Brown, 2010

2. Lesson #2 Start with a _________. #2b ____________________________.
Establish rules– Guiding principles simplify decisions on topics, schedule, post structure, etc.
Blogging is a social medium. Personality is an important part of deciding who we socialize with in the
physical world. Think about how your blog personality fits in the virtual world:
 What characteristics would make your blog personality rewarding to be with?
 What will you do to create those characteristics in your blog?
 Who's one person you don't want to get stuck with at a cocktail party? _________________
Important questions can help manage your time and effort:
 Which social media outlets fit with my objectives?
 How much time will I be able to invest?
Social Media by Thirds ‐ An approach to Social Media Efforts (Adapted from @toddschnick ‐
http://intrepid‐llc.com):
1/3 _________________________________________
1/3 _________________________________________
1/3 _________________________________________
Lesson #3 ‐ Topics? Think _____________________.
Audience Needs & Interests + Your Brand = Great Topics
3 Ways to Create Lots of Topic Ideas:
1. Mind Mapping ‐ List your primary themes in the circles & begin identifying ways to carry them out.
"Linking Business Strategy and Blogging Content" 2 © Mike Brown, 2010

3. 2. Trait Transformation ‐ Using "Creating Relevant Blog Topics" as your objective, list elements of
your primary themes (down the left side of the page), and then apply the transformers on the top of
the grid to each element to generate topic ideas. Try to generate 3 ‐ 5 possibilities for each cell.
3. Borrow Ideas ‐ Select random words, phrases, and images from an unfamiliar magazine and ask,
“What does this word, phrase, or image suggest about possible blog topics?” Stuck for a good
magazine to use? Try “Real Simple” or any other big, picture‐rich magazine outside your field.
Great Topics + Compelling Communication = Great Posts
25 Types of Posts
• Share Your Opinions • Make a List • Speculate About the Future • Review Something
• React to Others’ Opinions • Teach Something • Summarize a Topic • Organize Information in
• Report News • Provide Background Info • Cover a Topic in Depth New Ways
• Report News with Your • Provide Reference Info • Relate an Anecdote • Revisit a Topic
Opinion • Do a Demonstration • Report on a Conference / Event • Combine Two of These
• Ask a Question • Issue a Challenge / Task • Interview Yourself Posts
• Answer a Question • Make an Offer • Interview Someone Else • REPEAT
• Reflect on Past Events
 "Made to Stick" Keys ‐ Stories, Unexpectedness, Concreteness, Credibility, Emotion, Simplicity
"Linking Business Strategy and Blogging Content" 3 © Mike Brown, 2010

4. Lesson #4 ‐ Get a _____________ and Build a _____________.
 Create an editorial calendar – Plan out topics. Knowing where you’re headed is helpful.
 Before you publish, figure out how often you'll post per week, then do a month's worth of posts
in advance ‐ you'll understand the time commitment and improve your writing.
 Always capture ideas – Never lose a potentially viable idea. Ask daily, "What happened that might
have blog potential?"
 Keep a hidden blog to experiment with graphics, pre‐publish posts to see how they’ll look, and
work out bugs as you experiment with blogging.
Lesson #5 ‐ _________ at _________.
 Have a writer on your formal (or informal) creative team.
 Run a spelling / grammar check to check a post's word count and help catch typos.
 Reduce a post's word count by 10 to 20% on the final edit. It's challenging, but the result is
invariably stronger.
Lesson #6 ‐ Reduce Your ___________ 90% or More.
 Twitter ‐ A great source for alternative content.
 What else can you share that's of interest to your audience?
 For visuals, check out istockphoto.com and Flickr.com. Consider how you can link to videos.
Better yet, create your own unique images and videos.
 Actively solicit and respond to reader comments. Use a Plus, Minus, Interesting, Recommendation
approach.
Lesson #7 ‐ Avoid the 2 Biggest Social Media Mistakes: Thinking everyone
sees your content and thinking no one sees your content.
"Linking Business Strategy and Blogging Content" 4 © Mike Brown, 2010

5. Post Session References
Brainzooming Blog ‐ Brainzooming.com (Daily articles on strategy, creativity, and innovation)
“Taking the NO Out of InNOvation” by Mike Brown. (Perspectives & techniques to awaken the
creativity in each of us.) Available for free download at Brainzooming.com under the "Resources" tab.
"Blogging for Dummies" by Susannah Gardner and Shane Birley, Wiley Publishing, Inc. ISBN:
9780470230176 (Basic overview of multiple elements of blogging.)
“Made to Stick” by Chip Heath & Dan Heath, Random House, ISBN‐10: 1400064287. (Great insights
on the key elements to incorporate to make your ideas take off and continue to live.)
“Why Business People Speak Like Idiots” by Brian Fugere, Chelsea Hardaway, Jon Warshawsky, Free
Press, ISBN: 0743269098 (Making sure you're communicating like a real person.)
Google: "31 days" "better blogging" for resources on improving your blogging effort.
http://creativeinstigation.blogspot.com (Daily Creativity Blog by Jan Harness)
"Linking Business Strategy and Blogging Content" 5 © Mike Brown, 2010