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How often do you share blog posts? I've been working the social media channels hard the past few weeks and am becoming increasingly frustrated. As many of you know, I'm working on the AMMA miningoilandgasjobs.com project full-time. The focus of my online reading has been around the resources industry, career advice and recruitment. I find terrific content but often end up not sharing it with my large network. Here's why.

Part of any good content marketing strategy will involve curation the habit of finding expert and complementary content and distributing it to your network. Jay Baer at Convince and Convert reckons the sweet spot is a 40/60 split 40% of your social media activity points back to you, 60% of it is external to your business. Blogs and website pages are ideal material for this. But you know what? A lot of businesses and website owners are making it hard to distribute their material. Are you?

Sharing Blues
1. No sharing widgets If I'm pressed for time or feeling so-so about content, I won't bother to share an article or blog post if there's no widget to do it. With universal sharing widgets like Add This or Share This, I find it hard to believe anyone would park their own content but I see it happen every day.

2. No formatting of content A sharing widget isn't enough. When I click on a tweet widget and am presented with the URL and nothing else, I often get discouraged. At the very least, put the name of the page in your sharing results.

3. URL is not shortened This is less of a hassle as nearly all social media channels provide some sort of URL shortening now. Still, why not provide that service? If you use a URL shortener like bit.ly, you get the benefit of metrics on every link they shorten for you.

4. Limited widget selection If the sharing options don't include channels I use like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn I'm not likely to share something if I'm pressed for time. Remember, it's not about where you're hanging out, it's about where your readers hang out. A bunch of obscure bookmarking sites probably isn't going to bump your distribution much.

By the way, your commenting sucks
If I really like a post, I'll leave a comment. Any blogger will tell you there's nothing better than receiving a blog comment, especially if it's from someone outside your normal circle and not full of SPAM. I can't believe the number of blogs that don't have comments turned on. I've also run across plenty that give me errors on things like my name or my email address. Make sure your commenting software is easy to use and error free. (And, yes, I know my own commenting software is a hassle. I'm in the process of changing that so hang in there with me.)

The Take-Away
Have a look at your website and blog and see if any of these peeves apply to you. Approach your blog as a reader would and run a test. Can a total stranger help you distribute your content? Can they do it easily? Can they leave a comment? I often wonder if the site owner hasn't just turned everything over to a developer and assumes it's all working. Give your blog a test run and see if it needs some work. The online audience is fickle; make it tough for them and they'll go somewhere else. It's not enough to create good content, you have to make it easily accessible, too.

What bugs you about sharing content?

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