We wrote on Tuesday about the importance of service over selling in business blogging. A blog for business should be an expression of servant leadership far more than sales exuberance. Offering readers insights they can take away and use will bring them back, but huckstering on a blog is a turnoff.

We can turn now to Chris Brogan, a master blogger/communicator, for specifics on what makes a blog appealing. In a post, "Go the Distance," on his own blog, Brogan offers three succinct, helpful principles that apply to all blogs, those for business purposes being no exception. (Brogan, after all, is in business himself, as himself.)

"Make every post a story," he suggests. Then "always write with service in mind," and "wrap up a post by giving the reader something to do," if that's merely to comment on the post itself. If you're recommending that the reader sample or experience something, provide a link to that space.  

Again, we'd say, avoid overt selling in you blog content.

To give his post added heft, Brogan includes a link to a 2008 post of his, "40 Ways to Deliver Killer Blog Content." This post is linked to another on his "best advice about blogging."

Digest all this material, and you're ready to start blogging in earnest, or at least to start listing topics you might develop to share with prospective customers or community leaders. Keep always in mind the difference between providing insight and selling products. Unlike what you might do in a showroom, the former is your primary blogging aim.