What’s in it for me?

“What’s in it for me?” This question, often abbreviated to WIIFM, is a crucial question to consider when writing your blog content.

Not what’s in it for us, the blogger, but what’s in it for our readers?

Give people what they want, the way they want it and you can get (almost) everything else wrong and still be a success.

If you’re blogging for business then it’s very easy to concentrate on features, rather than benefits. Features may well be tools that help us close a sale but they don’t answer the crucial ‘What’s in it for me?‘ question.

If I’ve got a headache then I want it to stop. I don’t particularly care that your headache remedy comes in eco friendly packaging and you operate a fair-trade policy. Sorry, but I don’t – I’m in pain, so cut me some slack here.

I don’t care that your product contains 37 natural products derived from ancient Amazonian folk-medicine, one of which can only be harvested from a yellow-spotted beetle during a full moon.

Your product makes my headache go away? Great! Now that’s the benefit I want. The rest of that stuff is just features.

The 60 million dollar question is “So What?“. Your product contains 37 natural ingredients? So what? One of these ingredients is really difficult to get hold of? So what? Your product will cure my headache, and do it faster than anything else on the market? Gimme, gimme, gimme……NOW! (Please notice, I didn’t even consider asking the price.)

Using a washing-up liquid that cleans the dishes without destroying all the wildlife in a 50 mile radius makes me feel better than one that is an eco nightmare. Me feeling better is a benefit.

How, exactly, your washing-up liquid cleans dishes without poisoning the waterways are features, not benefits. If your washing up liquid cleans dishes and makes me feel good then I will probably pay more for it – the benefit of feeling better is worth the extra pennies to me.

In other words, if you can touch it, it’s a feature. If you feel it, it’s a benefit.

If you are blogging for fun, then good for you but this doesn’t let you off the WIIFM hook. Presumably you would like people to read your blog. ‘People’ does not include your long-suffering partner or your Mum, I mean people you can’t emotionally bribe to read what you have written.

Even though you may not think you are selling a product, you are – YOU! If you’d  like people to spend some of their precious time reading your blog content always think about what’s in it for your reader.

What does your reader want from your blog content? Are they looking for a quick ‘tea-break’ from life? Are they expecting a humorous anecdote? Have you offered to answer the eternal ‘what the *^%! do I cook for the kids dinner’ question?

Make no mistake, every blog writer faces huge competition so have something to say, say it in an interesting way but above all, make sure your readers know exactly ‘what’s in it for me’!