You remember the last time you channel surfed? We all do it when there’s nothing good on TV — nothing that holds our attention.

Well, you can’t channel surf with a book. You can skip pages, put the book down, or stare off into space, but that book isn’t changing (unless you have something to write with or a pair of scissors in hand).

That gives the book power. The book controls how you pay attention to it, in a way television can’t.

Because of the links in hypertext, web content is vulnerable, just like television, to channel surfing.

Your content doesn’t have the final say in how it’s structured, because the user chooses which web pages to visit, and what order to visit them. One web page doesn’t necessarily demand her attention all at once.

Your blog is a lot like a television channel, except the net has more channels than cable (meaning there’s lots more competition). You have very little time to make a good impression, keep your reader hooked, and direct her to your call to action. Your reader’s mouse is a remote control, and the instant you lose her attention, she’ll channel surf away.

You have to fight that remote

Anne Mangen, an academic who studies how people read digital texts, explains:

“A click with the mouse immediately changes the visual input so that our attentional focus can be maintained. Thus, our urge to click and the consequent impatient mode of reading can be at least partly explained by reference to psychobiologically hardwired dispositions of ours.”

In simpler terms, channel surfing taps into our innate instinct to change the scenery the moment we get bored. Unfortunately for you, that training translates to the web.

Your reader’s mouse (your blog’s remote control) puts millions of web pages at her fingertips. And that trains her to get bored more easily with your content.

So you need to write and design in a way that will keep your reader so engaged that any urges to click will have to wait until she finishes your beloved content first.

10 ways to make your blog channel-surf-proof

Here are ten helpful ways to keep your reader’s hands off that remote:

1. Give your reader the low-down right at the start. Think about the most popular TV channels. Their content either gives them away in the first few seconds (as being a source for news, celebrity gossip, cooking, nature), or their branding tells the story for them (big-money dramas and sitcoms, mainstream news, Leno). The viewer always knows what to expect. Make sure your brand is just as clear. Your reader always needs to know just what she’s here for.
2. Don’t sound like a chimp. When professionals goof up on TV, it’s easy to gloss over it and follow their next move. But when typos glare at your reader, she’s wondering if she’s on the right channel.
3. Make sure your blog has more to offer than the most recent programming (your last blog post, testimonials page, or sales pitch). That way, you can entice a little internal channel surfing, to the rest of your great content. Ditch the old school reverse-chronological style, and design your blog architecture so that your readers have plenty of cool stuff to do.
4. Keep your programming fresh by writing magnetic headlines, using compelling pictures, and appealing to your readers’ emotions.
5. Keep your writing simple, fast-paced, and dramatic. The final season of “Lost” will attract a lot more viewers than a public access channel featuring lectures from dull, verbose professors.
6. Keep the flow logical. If your plot doesn’t make sense, your blog reader will change to a program that does. So go over all of your transitions and self-edit, edit, edit.
7. Offer cookies to your reader so she has a reason to stick around.
8. Don’t follow the lead of TV commercials. (Your reader is too smart to fall for those anyway.) If you’re going to engage your reader’s insecurities, make sure it’s to offer a solution and mobilize her for success. It’s ok to use a little pain in your copywriting, but do it in an honest and win-win way.
9. Think carefully before you put up ads. Will they add to or detract from the attraction value of your channel? And don’t let excessive ads clutter up your site. The only clutter you find on TV is in the bedroom of a so-called “reality” star.
10. If you have to take commercial breaks (by embedding advertisements, affiliate links, and/or endorsements in content), at least make them infomercials. That is, make them informative, short, and humorous if you can — then get right back to the scheduled programming.

Don’t give up

You have to fight hard for your air time, because as a blog owner you deal in hypertext, which grants your reader tremendous control over what she consumes. She’ll leave the minute she gets bored, so do everything you can to keep her engaged.

Battling that remote forces you to become a better messenger. When you get it right, the connection you make with your readers can be immediate and powerful in ways that aren’t possible with a book or television.

If you’ve got more ways to keep your readers away from your blog’s remote control — share them in the comments below!

About the Author: Melissa Karnaze writes about the intelligence of emotions on Mindful Construct and Twitter.

Think it’s the lack of advanced techniques that’s been holding you back?

Think your blog isn’t finding readers because you don’t have the coolest plugins? Or that your sales page doesn’t convert because you couldn’t afford the 1,999 Secrets of Ninja Marketing Masters product that got released last month?

Think the secret to successful marketing and running a profitable online business is some piece of Jedi mastery that you would need to study for years to learn?

Not even close.

Most businesses (online and off) just get the basics wrong.

So here’s what works. Get these right and you’ll be ahead of 98% of your competition.

And if you’re just getting started, you’re in luck, because you don’t have a lot of bad habits to unlearn.

Describe benefits, not features

I know you’re rolling your eyes. This gets covered on the first page of Marketing for Blithering Idiots, but we don’t do it.

We get wrapped up in what we do, and we forget to translate that into what our customers get out of it.

The insanely simple and direct way to handle this is just to put a bulleted list on your sales page (or About page or Hire Us page, wherever it’s relevant) under the title:

Here’s What [My Product] Will Do For You

List out the seven most important wonderful things that your customer will experience as a result of doing business with you. Make sure this list can be seen “above the fold” on the screen — in other words, without the viewer needing to scroll.

Make them a nice mix of logical and emotional benefits.

Benefits are the little black dress of marketing: always appropriate. Try tucking them into your headlines, or writing entire blog posts around key benefits.

Don’t forget that testimonials and case studies are a great way to show benefits rather than just telling people about them.

Make your advertising too valuable to throw away

I got this from copywriting legend Gary Bencivenga, and it’s even more applicable today than it was when he used it. Since he made millions of dollars as one of the most successful copywriters in history, I pay special attention to what he has to say.

Advertising is, almost by definition, junk. Direct mail, infomercials, billboards — we see these as garbage, even though they do sometimes influence us to buy.

Bencivenga instead positioned his direct mail advertising as valuable content. He perfected the art of the “magalog” — a commercial mail piece that looks like a magazine. His magalogs contained valuable stock tips, health information, or expert financial advice.

Many of the products Bencivenga promoted were early versions of information products — specifically, books and newsletters. He didn’t pull the “B” material from those books and newsletters to give away in his marketing. He found the very best tips, the juiciest and most beneficial advice, and sent it to prospects for free.

Sound familiar?

(What can I say, I only steal from the best.)

Bencivenga’s technique works perfectly with content and email marketing. The more genuine value you create in your marketing materials (which includes your blog, your Twitter stream, and your forum posts), the tighter relationship you build with your customers.

Address objections

It’s hard to keep your cool when you create a business. You put so much work and care into it, the idea that anyone doesn’t love it as much as you do can be hard to fathom.

You need to get over this.

Most people who see your marketing messages won’t buy from you. But many of those would buy from you, if not for some unanswered question in their minds.

Objections are all the reasons prospects think your product might not be for them.

Objections boil down to fear — fear of feeling dumb, fear of making a mistake, fear of wasting money. Give your copy enough time to address those fears and overcome them.

And one super-secret technique

OK, this one really is a ninja trick. Check out this Copyblogger post on the sneaky, ultra-advanced sales technique that most marketers miss.

But shhhh, don’t tell anyone. Otherwise any newbie could do it.

About the Author: Sonia Simone is Senior Editor of Copyblogger and the founder of Remarkable Communication.