The News That Should Have Won
Facebook stole the show this week with news of its initial public offering. But the news that should have been the big news didn’t quite get the same press.
Google has acquired a handful of patents and pending patents having to do with fiber optic technology. What could they possibly do with those?
Seeing as how they’ve already announced plans to introduce a fiber optic network in Kansas City, this patent transfer should have been the biggest news of the day. It has the potential to make a huge difference in how the Internet works all over the world.
Kansas City will likely be the first municipality in the world to offer high speed Internet by fiber optic as a city service. And if Google is successful with its fiber optic service in Kansas City, then they will likely introduce the same service to other cities. Eventually, there could be high speed fiber optic Internet everywhere in the world, courtesy of Google.
But who will pay for that? There are any number of ways that fiber optic Internet could be paid for. Cities and municipalities could foot the bill for local citizens. Or they may turn around and charge a fee for services in the same way that local phone companies do today. In either of those cases, fiber optic Internet service could be considered a utility.
Another way it could work is as a free service from Google. Now why would Google offer free Internet access to the entire world?
If more people are online, shopping, building businesses, etc., that will lead to more click-throughs on Google’s paid ad networks. More advertisers means more revenues for Google over the long run.
I’m not saying any of these scenarios is the right one. They’re just possibilities. But I could see any of them playing out. The real news, however, is that high speed fiber optic Internet would benefit everyone – consumers, online marketers, and Google as Internet service provider.
5 Timeless Internet Marketing Tactics
When it comes to marketing online, you can’t go wrong with what works and what continues to work. It seems that there are only a few tried and tested tactics that continue to work over and over again. Don’t listen to the gurus who try to sell you on the “latest and the greatest.” Instead, focus on what has been proven to work.
Here are 5 timeless Internet marketing tactics. They worked ten years ago (or five) and still work today.
- Pay Per Click Advertising – PPC advertising is the paid advertising part of online marketing. Google was the first company to champion PPC and it’s still going strong. As long as PPC ads continue to work, savvy Internet marketers will continue to use them.
- Search Engine Optimization – Despite rumors that Google+ has killed SEO, search engine optimization is still going strong. It changes every day, of course. But it still works today.
- Social Media Marketing – Social media is still young. It’s good and it’s only going to get better. With the rise of Facebook and now the introduction of Google+, you can’t ignore it any longer.
- Video Marketing – Video marketing just keeps getting better. Don’t give up on this new tactic just yet. Now should be when you start adopting it.
- Mobile Marketing – I know, I know. A lot of people still haven’t started doing it yet, but are you going to wait until they start. Now is the time to hop onto the mobile marketing bandwagon – before your clientele jumps on and starts looking for you.
When it comes to Internet marketing, stick to what you know works.
What’s A Quora Board?
Quora, the question & answer website that has developed quite a following, now has a new tool for serious web promoters. It’s called a Quora Board.
So what is a Quora Board?
The concept is really simple. You set up a board around a specific topic that is associated with your business. Then you post links to that board and promote it to your followers.
It’s important to note that you can go through your Quora account followers and add as many of them as you want as followers of your Quora board when you set it up. Your followers then have to opt out if they don’t want to follow your board. That’s makes it a really easy marketing tool.
But keep your board focused. Don’t post spurious links are off-topic posts. If you blog often, post your blog links. You can also post other relevant and interesting third-party content (and you should) relevant to your board. Make your board a place where people interested in your topic will want to hang out and get the latest information from.
Quora boards are yet another social media tool that you can use for your business benefit.
Write Your Blog Post In 20 Minutes
You know you need to write to your blog every day. But how do you make the time? You’re too busy.
You can fix that. Discipline and a little bit of time organization is all it takes. You can write a blog post every day in 20 minutes or less. Here are the steps to take to ensure that you can have a blog post every day and have it written in less than 20 minutes.
- Keep a running idea list – Every time you get an idea for a blog post, write it down. Keep a running list. This is easier if you create a keyword list before you set up your blog. Come up with 10-20 blog post ideas for each keyword on your list, and your keyword list should have 50-100 good keywords.
- Let good ideas sit – Instead of trying to write about something the day you come up with the idea, let it sit a few days. You’ll think of other ideas that can go with it. Write them down. Start with your running idea list and go from there.
- Cut unsupporting ideas before you write – If you keep a running list of ideas and related ideas, you’ll start to see that some of the ideas you thought initially supported each other are actually not related enough. They could be their own blog posts. Cut them out and separate them. Remember, the goal is to write fast. A nonsupporting idea doesn’t mean it’s a bad idea.
- Use lists – You can say a lot with ordered and unordered lists.
- Keep your posts short - Remember, you’re trying to write fast. So keep your blog posts to under 500 words.
- Write in bursts – If you get stuck on a blog post and can’t think of how to finish it, save it as a draft and come back to it later, when you can think of something fresh.
- Write about your best ideas now - Why save your best ideas for later? Save time now. Just knock it out.
This blog post took 15 minutes to write. It’s less than 500 words and more than 250, so it should pass Google’s search engine optimization guidelines. Yours will too!
Does Your PR Campaign Need A Press Release?
Press releases are good for one thing – links. If you really, really want to build some inbound links to your website and hope that your public relations campaign takes off, then submit a few press releases to the press release distribution websites. But what if you really want to power up your PR campaign?
I’m not saying that you shouldn’t submit press releases. Submit them. You’ll get your inbound links and if you optimize them well you’ll likely see some inbound traffic when searchers find your press release in the search engines. You may even get a call from a reporter or see your press release re-printed somewhere – maybe even off line. But don’t expect your press releases to do all the work. Public relations goes beyond a mere press release.
Good public relations involves some level of relationship building. You need to find out what publications cover your industry. Make a list. Then find out who the person is in those publications who reports on topics that are important to you. Again, make a list.
When you’re ready to start your public relations campaign, contact those people on your list and make a personal pitch. The personal pitch is a lot more effective than a press release. It shows that you have the ambition and the incentive to go an extra step. Most of your competitors are submitting impersonal press releases. But you will be more direct, more personal, and more effective.
When you make a pitch, tailor it to the specific needs of the person and the publication you are pitching to. Is it a lone blogger in your niche? Find out what he likes to write about (you should subscribe to his blog and read it every day) and pitch to that.
Are you pitching to a national news magazine in your niche? What kind of stories do they run? What are their biases. Play to those.
Public relations is about more than building links and sending press releases. If you really want it to be effective, make it personal.
What Online Marketing Methods Are Important For 2012?
If you plan on doing any online marketing in 2012, what are the important methods of marketing that you should focus on? What should you stay away from?
First and foremost, SEO is definitely not dead. You shouldn’t give up on that yet. But it has changed in the last five years.
For instance, if you are out prowling for links and looking for high PR do-follow links, then you are probably wasting your time. But if you are focusing on placing your unique articles on high profile, high traffic websites where they will be seen, then that is a much better way to go about link building in 2012.
Social media is another online marketing tactic that isn’t going away. However, don’t just sign up for a bunch of social media websites and forgetting about them. Stick the large sites with current traction and high traffic. For most businesses, that means Facebook, LinkedIn, and Google+. If there are niche-specific sites that you can focus on, join them too.
Whichever social media websites you decide to join, stay active.
Video marketing and mobile marketing are two other online content strategies that are gaining ground and look to be effective in 2012.
Online marketing hasn’t changed much in the last five to ten years, but it has changed. Make note of the changes and keep promoting your content far and wide.
Why You Need A Gravatar
A gravatar can be a very useful tool for online content providers. It does several things for your online identity including:
- Notifying bloggers that you are not a spammer
- Making your name and website more brandable
- Easily identifies you as authentic everywhere you go
- Unifies your blogging, commenting, and social media presence across all channels
Gravatar stands for Globally Recognized Avatar. It’s easy to set up. You just head over to Gravatar.com and upload your photograph or image – the one you want to be associated with a particular e-mail address. It’s important to note that if you own several websites and have different e-mail addresses for managing those websites and often comment on blogs, forums and social media sites under your various names, then you can have more than one gravatar. You can have one for each e-mail address you own because the gravatar is associated with a single e-mail address.
Every time you enter your e-mail address into a comment form, your gravatar will appear beside your name. This makes you recognizable to other commenters while branding you online and shows that you are a legitimate poster, not a spammer.
I highly recommend that you set up your own gravatar – especially if you blog regularly and comment on other blogs regularly.
How Integrative Marketing Works
Companies who have been spending money on marketing and advertising off line for years are often reticent to join the online marketing party, especially if their off line marketing is continuing to be effective. That’s understandable. But Reciprocal Consulting has been watching the Internet marketing space for several years now and we’re seeing some interesting trends.
First, more and more companies are moving some of their marketing budgets to online marketing tactics and strategies. Those companies that are already using online marketing channels are beginning to spend more on those channels. There is a reason for these trends. Online marketing works.
However, there are quite a few online marketing channels that may or may not work for your business. It’s important to focus on the tactics and strategies that have the greatest potential.
When you plan your Internet marketing strategy, focus first on the least expensive tactics that historically have the greatest return on investment. Obviously, if you don’t have a website, then you’ll need to focus on website design before anything else. But then what?
Your next step should be to improve your website’s search engine optimization. A well optimized website can give your business a boost that lasts for years.
Pay per click marketing is another online marketing channel that delivers results. It might cost more in the short term than other marketing tactics, but you’ll often see more immediate results, which can be very encouraging if you are new to Internet marketing.
The idea is not to make a big bold leap from off line marketing to online marketing, but to gradually shift your marketing dollars from staid old ineffective strategies off line to better, more effective strategies online. By integrating your online marketing efforts with your successful off line marketing efforts, your overall marketing strategy should be stronger and more effective.
The Best Online Marketing Is Local
Here’s a great article on local online marketing. I have three comments to make about the content in the article.
- Paid search still packs a powerful punch – I don’t care where you live, paid search has the greatest potential to drive targeted traffic to your website fast. And then you can reap an ROI that is difficult to match anywhere else. I’d say paid search is better than TV and radio – especially for effective local marketing.
- You can’t separate local from mobile – Mobile marketing has arrived in full force and if you think about it you’ve likely seen people use their cell phones to find businesses to shop in as well as to find products to purchase locally. While people may use the Internet to research purchases, they still would rather purchase locally. Mobile marketing makes that so much easier.
- Localization and local awareness - The big trend is for big businesses to customize their marketing for local geographic markets. Modern online technology makes that possible. A huge part of that effort is with local smartphone apps. Location-based apps make local marketing easier and local shopping better.
Online marketing is getting a lot better for small businesses and making the world a better place for consumers.
What Is A Robots.txt File Good For?
A robots.txt file is a file you put on your server to give specific instructions to web robots. These are also called crawlers, or spiders. All the major search engines have them. Most spammers and malware hawkers have them too. They’re all over the place, honestly.
But there are a couple of things you should know about the robots.txt file.
- It’s a public document, meaning anyone can open the file and see which sections of your website you don’t want the search engines to see or index. In other words, you can’t use it to hide information.
- Robots can ignore your robots.txt file, and many do.
So if robots can ignore the file, then what good is it?
That’s a good question. I’ll answer that by saying that good robots typically obey the commands you give in your robots.txt file while bad robots don’t. So if your intention is to create a file that prevents bad robots from accessing your website, then it’s probably pointless.
If your intention, however, is to communicate specific instructions to good robots – for example, search engine robots – then it’s a safe bet that those commands will be obeyed.
The most common use of the robots.txt file is to prevent search engines from indexing a website, or portions of the website. It’s not the only use, however.
The robots.txt file is a useful tool for webmasters, but it has its weaknesses. Do some additional reading to learn more about how you can use the robots.txt file for your website, or whether you need it at all.
8 Ways To Conduct Keyword Research
Keyword selection is one of the most important aspects of online marketing. When you complete your keyword list you’ll use your keywords for SEO, social media, reputation management, article marketing, blogging, pay per click marketing, and a host of other online activities. So making sure you have a good keyword list is necessary to increase your marketing advantage.
Here are eight ways you can conduct keyword research to find the best keywords for your business.
- PPC – Run a limited PPC campaign to test keywords that you can also use on organic search, social media, and other online marketing campaigns.
- Blogging - Write a few blog posts to target specific keywords you might be interested in. See how well they rank and whether or not they draw traffic.
- Competitive Research – Go on a scouring expedition to analyze keywords used by your competition on their websites. Check meta tags, content, and links, particularly inbound links.
- Social Media – You can also test your keywords on social media sites. Build a Facebook page, use them in your Twitter message, and see what kind of responses you get on your links.
- Build Microsites - Test your keywords with microsites. If they rank well and draw traffic, you can build new landing pages on your company website.
- Landing Pages – Just the reverse of the previous suggestion, test your keywords on landing pages. If they work well, build a microsite.
- Video Marketing – You can also test keywords with videos on video sharing websites.
- Conduct A Survey – Ask your website visitors and social media friends. Ask them if they’d respond more favorably to “X” or “Y.”
Keyword research is one of the most important aspects of the online marketing process. Don’t leave it out.
The Web In 25 Years
Veteran journalist and Web entrepreneur John Battelle is writing a book about what the Web might look like a generation from now. He has some very interesting ideas and he will often give a little glimpse into what he is thinking along those lines on his blog. His latest post is about the Internet’s “Big Five” – the key players in the Web to come.
It’s easy to see where he is coming from in choosing these companies to represent what the world may look like 25 years from now. But that’s a long time in Internet time. Remember, it only took a decade for any of these companies to make an impact on the world as it is now.
But his blog post does make me question some things about the direction that the Web is moving in. Here are a few that come to mind.
- Will Apple primarily become a mobile app company?
- Why hasn’t Microsoft leveraged its core products by hosting them in the cloud? It seems that this could be a key area of competitive advantage given the popularity of services like Google Docs, Zoho, and Salesforce.
- Can Google succeed in becoming the core reputation management platform online? Has it already?
- Is Amazon the Wal-Mart of the Web? Can it put Wal-Mart “out of business?”
- Can Amazon position itself as the premier cloud service for the Web in the next 20 years?
- Would a public IPO push Facebook higher in the rankings, perhaps past Amazon, or Google?
- Who will emerge as the Internet’s most prominent icon for the next generation? Will it be Google, Facebook, Amazon, or some company we haven’t heard of yet?
- Can Google win as long as it maintains confidence in the Open Source Web given that none of the other four companies do?
The interesting thing about this list is that Apple, Google, Facebook, and Amazon all have core online businesses. Apple is integrated heavily into mobile apps. Google, of course, is the leading search engine. Facebook is the leading social network. Amazon is the leading e-commerce website. Only Microsoft has a core business that is not an online business – its Office suite of products. How will that affect the Internet for the next generation. If Microsoft doesn’t take its core product online, will it become obsolete?
What are your thoughts?
7 Ways A Blog Can Boost Your Business
You’ve likely heard of blogs. There’s nothing really magical about them, but you can use a blog for your business to increase your market and talk to your customers. Here are 7 ways you can use a blog to boost your business and your brand online.
- Search engine optimization – Well optimized blog posts can increase your standing in the search engines.
- Social media optimization – Promote your blog through the popular social networks to increase your traffic and brand exposure.
- Field questions about your business – A blog allows your customers and potential customers to communicate with you. You can answer their questions and build your brand.
- Network with others in your industry – A blog is a conversation. Your market is a conversation. Why not join the two?
- Increased search engine rankings - Not only can each individual blog post be optimized, but the more blog posts you have the more chances you have of being ranked in the search engines.
- Close more sales – You can use your blog to close sales simply by putting links to your landing pages in high profile locations on the blog.
- Customer service – Handle customer service issues on your blog in less time and with fewer expenses.
You no longer have to sit on the sidelines and watch while your competitors steal the market. You can use a blog to drive more business to your website and increase your search engine and social media exposure.
Isn’t Killing Knol Pages Fun?
Google has announced that Google Knol is going away. But not for good.
In actuality, they’re just changing form. But there may be more to it than simply a metamorphosis. It looks like a complete branding job and Google is getting out of the picture.
It appears that Annotum intends to keep the basic format of Knol while changing its platform to WordPress. But it’s unclear what else will change beyond that. Currently, Knol pages provide a link building benefit for authors – the few – who use them. But will Annotum continue that? Will Google place a higher priority on content published on Annotum? Those questions have yet to remain unanswered.
Furthermore, Annotum seems interested in targeting the scientific and scholarly communities, which is how Knol started out. But because Google didn’t put strict guidelines on the content, much of it became commercial. And that appeared to be by design. Some people suspect that Google encouraged commercial content. Whether they did or not is neither here nor there since the Knol domain will no longer be active after May 1, 2012.
Change is something Internet marketers have come to expect. And Google giving up on products not doing well is another. There’s no real surprise here. But if you have Knol pages, then you should either import them to Annotum or download them for other uses.
It’s Cyber Monday, Know Where Your Website Is?
Cyber Monday has been billed as the biggest shopping day of the season. But one pundit isn’t buying it.
Nevermind the myth-busting tone on that last one, does it really matter whether online merchants have “sold” consumers on the idea of shopping online on this particular day or if it truly indeed is the preferred day for shoppers? The fact is, last year, Cyber Monday was a record-setting day for online sales. And it looks like today could top that.
One reason could be that consumers are getting more comfortable shopping online. So what are you going to do about it?
If you are a brick-and-mortar retailer, then I’d say you need to start thinking about your own website, your own online store. Online sales will only go up from here. I don’t think we’ve even begun to see the scale of where online consumers will go. But if you aren’t online, then you can’t take part in the party. So get your website design plans underway.
It may be too late for this year, but there’s always next year. And the year after that. And then the year after that. Your plan now should be to grow along with the Internet. Don’t wait until you’re left on the outside looking in.
Small Business Saturday – Are You Celebrating?
It might be too late to make the announcement, but did you know that today is Small Business Saturday? You can learn a little bit more about it on the Small Business Saturday Facebook page.
The sponsors of this movement – American Express – are offering free in-store signage and e-marketing materials. Of course, today is the day so it might be too late to take advantage of some of these offers. But there’s always next year.
Meanwhile, the page was set up to help small businesses take advantage of holiday shopping. Other resources available through the page include:
- Share An Offer – Which allows you to create an offer for your small business that shoppers can take advantage of.
- Create A Facebook Page – Free.
- Create A Video
- Get Twitter Followers
- Create A Buzz On LinkedIn – One of the best bets for small business owners.
You can also join the Small Business Saturday e-mail list and forum. That might be a good way to promote your business today, especially if you do any online marketing.
The event is sponsored by American Express. If you accept American Express, why not take advantage of Small Business Saturday. If not this year, then look for it next year.
Is Article Marketing Or Social Media More Effective?
Define “more effective.”
Article marketing has been around a long time. At one time it was the preferred link building method of savvy online marketers. Then social media came along.
Social media has never really been about building links, per se. It was about making connections, but it had the side benefit of helping you build great links – if you did it right. And article marketing could lead to great connections that increased your bottom line.
So which one is more effective?
If you’re talking about sheer marketing power, I’d have to say article marketing. Only, today we do it differently.
If you write great articles and get them published on high traffic websites with a lot of authority, not only can you build great inbound links for your website, but you can also drive loads of targeted traffic to your website. The key is to target the right venues for your articles. And if you do that right, those articles will be online for years allowing you to reap the benefits of article marketing for a long time.
Social media has its benefits too. Reputation management, authority, relationships. But you have to keep your marketing in perspective. What works best for you?
5 Incredible Sources For Website Traffic
You cannot manage a website without traffic. It is the lifeblood of any online business. So how do you drive traffic to your website? How do you ensure that your website is profitable when you are building your business?
Here are 5 incredible sources for website traffic no matter what kind of business you are running online:
- Search Engines – Search engines are still the No. 1 driver of traffic to most websites online today. That’s why we always recommend that you dedicate a portion of your online marketing budget to search engine optimization.
- Pay Per Click Advertising – PPC ads are immediate. You can start a campaign today and see business results today. Yes, you pay for the clicks. But if you do it right, it will be profitable. And the results are instant.
- Newsletter - An e-mail newsletter is one of the most profitable investments you can make. After more than 20 years, it’s still one of the most effective online marketing tools. You can take e-mail subscriptions right from your website and deliver your newsletter electronically more cost efficiently than any other kind of online marketing.
- Videos – Online video marketing is just as effective as TV advertising and much more cost effective.
- Social Media Marketing - The best thing about social media is it allows you to build relationships off site, then you can drive that traffic to your website for the close.
Use these five online marketing strategies together for incredible traffic generation results.
Where Are Your Phone Calls Coming From?
Phone call tracking is one of the useful metrics for companies who want, and need, a phone number on their website. You’ve spent a lot of money on that website. Wouldn’t you like to know if it’s working for you?
With phone call tracking, you can track your incoming phone calls no matter where they come from. You’ll never miss another phone call. You can block the calls you don’t want to get. And you can calculate your ROI, record your phone calls, and track local as well as international calls. All at no additional cost to you.
Never wonder how effective your Internet marketing campaign was ever again. Whether you want to implement a PPC campaign, a social media campaign, or a video marketing campaign, you can track your incoming phone calls.
Inbound call tracking allows you to measure the results of your Internet marketing campaigns and determine if they are successful or not. If your marketing efforts succeed, then you can re-run them another time. Or learn from your mistakes.
Try inbound phone call tracking today. Use an 800 number and measure your total ROI so that your online marketing efforts can be more effective.
Comic Ditches Traditional Media
Here’s a story for you. Famous stand up comedian Louis CK ditches traditional media and decides to deliver his own comedy routines through his website for $5 per download. Either that is genius of the highest order or sheer folly. What do you think?
Here’s what I think: He’s paving a new path for others to follow. And they will.
In every field there are innovators. The innovators come first. They meet with mild success, or sometimes wild success, while others watch and learn. Then, the second wave hits. Others pick up where the innovators left off and take that success to a new level.
I think we’re entering a new era. Creators have realized they no longer need a publisher or a large benefactor to increase their market share and visibility. Louis CK built his reputation on the backs of large companies who gave him a platform. Now that he has his platform he can take it out on his own. And he’ll likely succeed because he’s creative, good with business and has attainable goals.
What about you? Can you take your business on its own? Can you innovate? Should you?
Entrepreneurs can learn from the creative geniuses among us. Internet marketing is changing the playing field. Have you noticed?
The Rise Of The Google Business
Google is not just a search engine. In fact, for many businesses it’s a life source. There are many ways that Google as a company helps small businesses, or can. Here are some of the best services that Google offers for small businesses looking to establish a presence on the Internet.
- Sites – Need a website? Google Sites allows small business owners to establish a basic website without having to pay for hosting.
- Gmail – Gmail provides e-mail addresses for millions of online marketers and business owners.
- Blogger – Google’s Blogger service allows anyone to establish a blog online – even for business.
- Images – If you use images on your blog or website, you can get unlimited hosting with Picasa.
- Image Editing – Edit your images with Picnik.
- Video Marketing – Start your own channel, host and market your videos (and your business) with YouTube.
- Offers – Promote your business through Google Offers.
- Reader – Keep tabs on your competition and other important industry news blogs with Google Reader.
- Alerts – Monitor your reputation and important topics with Google Alerts.
- Code - Create awesome products with Google Code.
- Trends – Research popular search trends you can respond to within your niche.
- Custom Search – Create your own search engine and use it for your website.
- Google+ – Go social with Google+, Google’s own social networking website.
- Checkout – Take payments on your website with Google Checkout.
- Calendar – Stay organized with Google Calendar.
- Documents – Create and share your business documents with Google Docs.
I’m certain these are not the only Google services you can use for your business. You can find more through Google’s service listing page.
I’m also not saying that I recommend all of these services. In some cases there is a better alternative. For instance, PayPal is a much better payment service than Google Checkout, but if you were so inclined you could feasibly run your business using Google Checkout and take credit card payments through your website (you can do the same thing with PayPal).
In this century, Google provides small business owners with many services that allows you to run your business entirely on Google.
What’s Your Authority Rank?
Do you know your authority rank? How about your popularity rank? They aren’t the same thing, you know.
There are plenty of ways online you can measure your popularity. Alexa ranking is based, in part, on a measure of popularity. Klout scores are somewhat based on popularity. And even your search rankings are partly based on a now antiquated model of popularity – link popularity, a special brand of popularity, at best.
Authority is a different matter. While popularity can be informative about whether or not a person is trusted. It doesn’t say anything about whether or not a person should be trusted.
When a person becomes a model of authority, he or she is respected for their knowledge in a certain subject area, which is often based on some or all of the following characteristics:
- Education level obtained
- Extent of knowledge
- Professional certifications
- Track record of successes
- Demonstrated proficiency
- Respect among peers, especially those with high authority ratings themselves
Search engines have been real adept at measuring popularity over the years. More and more, they are beginning to measure authority. Google has ways to determine whether particular web pages are based on authority, and the search engine is getting better at doing this.
The future of search marketing will be based largely on one’s authority rank as opposed to one’s popularity rank. Have you started building your authority yet? If not, you should get on the ball.
What Does ‘Content Is King’ Mean?
Does “content is king” mean the same thing in 2011 as it meant in 1995? Is content still king?
This is a question that pervades almost every single discussion on web design, Internet marketing, and search engine optimization. What is content and what makes it king?
Traditionally, content referred specifically to your on-page content – keywords, text, images, etc. But the broader view is that content is anything you produce that is tangible in an online environment and that produces intangible results. In essence, content is both on page and off page. It includes links, videos, and might even in some situation refer to code.
Content moves beyond design elements. Simply having a website with a pretty header and a nice layout is not content. Filling it with images that pop, content that sells, and videos that rip roar and demand attention, that’s count. Writing articles and guest blog posts for other Web properties that link back to yours and drive steady traffic to your site, that’s content too. Bookmarking your pages and networking with others through Facebook and LinkedIn, that’s content too. And content IS king.
It’s important that webmasters not get too wrapped up in definitions, but you should take a broader view of content. And crown the king.
5 Things That Are More Important Than SEO
It might seem strange for an SEO company to mention anything that is more important than SEO, but the truth is there are things that are more important. We’ve identified 5 very important things about online marketing that are much more important than SEO.
- Reputation Management – Without a good reputation, all the SEO in the world is for naught. Good products and services, customer service, and the ability to solve your customer’s needs are the building blocks to good reputation management.
- Conversion Optimization – Bottom line, if you aren’t closing sales, then nothing else matters. Drive traffic and convert it – by any means possible.
- Market Research – Successful online marketing begins with market research, and that includes competitive intelligence.
- Relationships – Business is all about building relationships. Maintain good, solid relations with your prospects and you’ll take care of #1.
- Targeted Marketing – Who do you serve? The best marketing in the world reaches out to the market you serve and let’s everyone else go.
If you want to build a solid online business, make sure you focus on these 5 key areas. To the degree that you succeed at these and that your search engine optimization efforts support them, you’ll do well online. Forget these and it won’t matter how good you can optimize a web page.
How To Use PPC To Increase E-mail Subscriptions
The key to a successful PPC campaign is in your landing page. That’s true whether you are talking about driving traffic to increase your e-mail subscriptions or to sell your downloads. Pay-per-click advertising is only successful if you can get traffic to your landing page and then convert that traffic with a good call to action.
The components to a successful PPC campaign are:
- Your PPC ad headline
- Your PPC ad text
- Your landing page
All three of these components have to add up and when they do you’ll see your conversions increase.
Let’s start with your ad’s headline. It’s got to be an attention grabber. Optimize it with the correct keyword so that it appears on the correct search results page, then make sure it gets the attention of your prospect.
The ad text itself is what will get your prospect to click through to your landing.
But it’s the landing page itself that will close the sale, or get the subscription. It doesn’t have to be long. Sell the benefits, not the features. In other words, include your opt-in box in a prominent location on the page and tell your reader concisely why they should opt in to your newsletter or e-mail list.
When it comes to PPC advertising, sell the benefits and you’ll see your conversions increase.
Is It Really All About SEO?
Online marketing is becoming less and less about SEO all the time. That doesn’t mean you should give up on SEO. What I’m really saying is that SEO is not the be all-end all of Internet marketing.
In the early days of online marketing, you had directories and search engines. There were these things called web rings, which on one uses any more. And there were display ads and articles, which was mostly about SEO. But that’s about it.
Around 1998, things began to change. Google was born. SEO took on greater prominence – for about five years.
In 2003, things began to change again. Blogs were becoming popular, social media was gaining ground, and PPC was big and strong. PPC was not about SEO It was about reaching your target market quickly and effectively. It still is.
But in the last couple of years we’ve seen the growth of mobile apps, QR codes, e-book readers, and a number of other emerging technologies that threaten to expand the Internet marketer’s reach outside of traditional online strategies like SEO, link building and social media. And I believe these opportunities are going to grow more prominent.
When it comes to online marketing, focus on what’s important for reaching your target market. SEO is important, but it’s one channel. Don’t get wrapped around a tree looking for the forest.
How To Do Content Marketing
Online marketers have recently begun using a different kind of language. It used to be that you’d hear a lot about link building, social media marketing, and the use of other terms to give a fragmented impression of Internet marketing strategies. But there is one term that draws all of these concepts together under one impressive term.
That one term is “content marketing.” So what is it?
Content marketing includes the full span of content that you produce to promote your brand. It begins with your own website content, but it doesn’t end there.
Beyond your own website you have your blog, your social media profiles, directory submissions, video content, links, articles, Knol pages, Squidoo lenses, guest blog posts and anything that involves promoting your content in hopes of drawing attention to it.
All content marketing is really about one thing – drawing attention to yourself. Anything you use that does that falls into the category of content marketing. That even includes press releases, forum content and comments on other people’s blogs.
So here’s the question you have to answer about your own content marketing efforts: Are all of your efforts consistent in terms of your message and brand? If not, what do you need to do to get it there?
Content marketing is as much as creating perceptions as it is anything else. What are you doing to make your content sell your business?
What’s Killing E-mail?
Here’s a question for you: What’s killing e-mail marketing?
Is it PPC? Search engine optimization? Video marketing? Social media?
Answer: None of the above! E-mail isn’t dying.
It’s fashionable to proclaim the death of old media when new media arrives. Those who remember the early advent of DVDs will remember how they were supposed to kill the movie theater. But the box office is still going strong and some of the biggest box office openings in history have occurred after DVDs.
The Internet hasn’t killed radio or TV. Search didn’t kill directories. Social media didn’t kill search. Nor will it, or anything else, kill e-mail marketing.
E-mail is a private space that people will allow you to enter if you’ve built their trust. You can use other media – search, social media, and videos – to build that trust. Then you use your website to get people to give your their private e-mail address, which you can then use to send them invitations and marketing messages that close the sale or seal the deal. E-mail is where the transaction is solidified.
E-mail marketing is far from dead. The best Internet marketers are using it to make their dough. You should too.
5 Ways To Build A Web Business
Most people, when they think about doing business online, think of it in terms of online marketing. Of course, you are marketing your business online. There’s no doubt about that. But what you are really doing is building a Web business.
The big question is, what exactly does it take to build a Web business? What components are necessary?
Here are 5 necessary components to building a Web business in 2011.
- A website – It can be a simple website or a huge monolith. Either way, you need a website. Your first step in building a Web business is to design a powerful website.
- Search engine marketing - SEM is a multi-component endeavor that includes paid search marketing and organic search marketing. With organic search you could be building links, which we call off-site SEO, or you could be increasing your on-site content value through blogging, articles, or other on-page content.
- Social media – Promote your content through social media where you’ll build inbound links and your relationship.
- Video marketing – Video marketing has become a mainstay of building an online business too. If you do it right, it will pay huge dividends.
- App development – App development can refer to iphone and other mobile apps or social media apps like those you find on Facebook. Either way, app development is becoming a huge marketing channel online.
What ways do you use for building your Web business? Do weigh in.
What Do You Give Away For Free?
Do you have free giveaways on your website? If not, why not?
Free giveaways, if you give it some thought, actually aren’t free. They do cost you money and you should get something of value in return. So what does that mean exactly?
Let’s say you own an auto body shop. You provide dent and pain repair and also perform basic automotive services like tire rotations, tune ups, oil changes, and fixing flats. What if you wanted to increase your business over the long term? What could you provide for free in exchange for something of value that you receive in return?
You could give away a free tune up in exchange for an e-mail address so that you could send out your weekly auto maintenance newsletter. Or you could give away a coupon for a fixing a flat tire free of charge when a new customer purchases a more expensive service like getting their vehicle painted. The coupon could be delivered by e-mail upon payment through your website when the new customer schedules their appointment.
There are all kinds of ways to make giving away free products and services work for you. You just have to think creatively. But the truth is, it works. And you should be doing what works.