1. Quality Content is and always will be your number one factor for getting high rankings and keeping them. You must understand search engines are simply businesses who supply a product like any other company. That product is information. They must offer quality results to anyone using their service to solve a problem, answer a question or to buy a product. The more relevant, the more targeted the search solution they return, the higher the overall quality of their product and the more popular their search engine will become. Providing quality content is vital for SEO success.
2. Keywords are your number one tools for achieving high rankings. You must understand keywords and how they work on the web. You must know how many searches are made each day for your chosen keywords. Sites like Wordtracker and Seobook will give you a rudimentary number of searches. Design your pages around your targeted keywords and don't forget to do some deep-linking to these pages on your site. Find and build backlinks to these interior keyword pages and not just to your home page or domain URL. Picking keywords with medium to low competition has worked out well for me. So too has using the more targeted and higher converting "long-tail" keywords been very beneficial for me.
3. Onpage Factors and site design will play a major role in the spidering and indexing of your site/content. Make sure all your pages are SEO friendly, made sure all your pages can be reached from your homepage and no pages should be no more than three levels away from it - keeping a sitemap listing all your major pages makes the search engines happy. Make sure you have all your meta tags such as title, description, keywords... are all optimized. (Title = around 65 characters, Description = around 160 characters) Remember, your title and description should not only be keyword targeted but these are the first contact/impression anyone will see of your site - make sure you use them to draw and entice interested visitors to your site and content. Also make sure your title and URL are keyword matched for maximum effect. Having your major keyword in your Domain Name also helps, using a pike | to separate different elements of your title has helped my rankings, so too does having your keyword in the first and last 25 words on your pages.
4. Google will send you the most qualified traffic so concentrate the majority of your SEO efforts on Google. Don't ignore Yahoo! or MSN but Google is king of search so give it the respect it deserves. With its new browser, Google's influence will only grow stronger so you must optimize your pages for Google. Use Google's Webmaster Tools and Google Analytics to fine-tune your pages/content for Google. I also use Google Alerts to keep up on my niche keywords and for comment link-building on the newly created pages Google is indexing.
5. Link Building is still the most effective way to boost your search rankings. Make sure you get backlinks from relevant sites related to your niche market and make sure the 'anchor text' is related to your keywords but don't ignore the text and overall quality of the content linking to you. The anchor text is the underlined/clickable portion of a link. Don't forget linking is a two-way street, make sure you link out to high quality, high ranked relevant sites in your niche.
6. Article Marketing
is a well established method of getting quality backlinks and it still works. Writing short 500 - 700 word informative helpful articles with your backlinks in the resource box is still very effective for getting targeted traffic and backlinks. Longer articles have also worked for me and I use an extensive network of distribution including SubmitYourArticle, Isnare, Thephantomwriters... plus other major online sites. Don't forget the whole element of blogging and RSS feeds in your article distribution. And always remember you're also using these articles to pre-sale your content or products. Don't forget to leverage sites like Squidoo, Hubpages... to increase your rankings and traffic.
7. Onsite Traffic Hubs have worked extremely well for me. These traffic hubs are whole sections of your site devoted to one sub-division of your major theme. For example, if you have a site on Gifts, then wedding gifts could be a separate section. This would be fully fleshed out with extensive pages covering everything dealing with wedding gifts - a self-contained keyword rich portion of your site on wedding gifts. Works similar as a sub-domain but I prefer using a directory to divide it up, such as yourdomain/wedding_gifts. (Most experts suggest always using a hyphen in your urls but underscores have worked fine for me.) Search engines love these keyword/content rich hubs but keep in mind you're creating content to first satisfy your visitors.
8. WordPress blog software is extremely effective for SEO purposes. WordPress software is easy to install on your site even if you have no experience with installing server-side scripts. Besides search engines love these highly SEO friendly blogs with their well structured content and keyword tagging. I have at least one of these on all my sites to draw in the search engines and get my content indexed and ranked. I also use Blogger (owned by Google), Bloglines and other free blogs to help distribute my content.
9. Social Bookmark/Media Sites are becoming very important on the web. These include a whole range of social sites like MySpace, FaceBook, Twitter... media news sites like Digg, SlashDot, Technorati... you must get your content into this whole mix if you want to take full SEO advantage of Web 2.0 sites. You should be joining these sites and using them. It's time consuming but it will keep you in the swing of things. One simple thing you must do is to put social bookmark buttons on all your pages so that your visitors can easily bookmark your content for you. You can use a WordPress plug-in or I like using a simple free site/service from Addthis.com which gives me a simple button to put on all my content.
10. Masterplan! Many webmasters and site owners forget to develop or have an overall masterplan/strategy when it comes to SEO. You must have an understanding of what SEO is and what it can do for you and your site. More importantly, you just don't want SEO - you want effective SEO. In order to achieve effective SEO you must have three things: Relevance, Authority and Conversions.
First, your content/site must be relevant to the topic or niche area you're pursuing - your content must fit in and be related to all the other sites in your niche. That's why closely themed sites do so well in the search engines, they give only relevant content to what's been searched for or discussed.
Second, your content/site must be perceived as an authority site on your subject or niche. Establish this authority position and the search engines will love you and your content. One way is to develop this authority, besides offering superior content, is to form links/partnerships with other perceived authority sites in your field. Always strive to make your site an authority site - tops in your niche - the one site everyone has to check before drawing or forming a conclusion.
Third, conversions should be your main goal of any SEO efforts because you want to convert your targeted traffic into site members, subscribers, buyers or just repeat visitors. If you're into online marketing, conversions will be the most important element of the whole SEO process because you want buyers, not just visitors coming to your site.
Most of all, you must convince yourself Search Engine Optimization is not difficult, nor is it the equivalent of the online bogeyman as many would like you to believe. Used effectively, SEO can give you the targeted traffic you're seeking, just follow some of the outlined steps/tactics listed above and you will have SEO working for you and your site in no time at all.
Nov 1, 2009
Top 5 Website Analytics Programs
The future of most businesses has become information analysis. And being that a strong online presence is taking first position in today’s business marketing strategies, you must analyze your website aggressively to understand its contribution to current and future profit generation.
Maximum online profit generation can only occur if you take an analytical approach There are a number full website traffic statistics and analytics systems available, but are you using any of them? And aside from Web Analytics, there are also comparison resources and performance metrics that should be considered. Do you know what paths visitors are using to gain access to your website? What is the ratio of new vs. returning visitors? Which keywords are drawing visitors to your sites? Which Search Engines? What is your bounce rate? Where are most of your inquiries coming from? Is your Home Page customer-focused? How do you compare to your competition?
What exactly will keep your business mojo running? Take a look at our Top 5 Web Analytics Resources. Some offer better information than others for user behavior and some are stronger when it comes to facts and figures. With your research and once you have done your own needs analysis, it should become clear to you, which will suit your situation the best. Enjoy!
1. Google Analytics – Provides full website analysis.
It is currently a free service, but it requires that you have an account with Google and that you meet specific online criteria. Once your account has been set up, Google begins to gather data on your site(s), and reports it back to you via pages and pages of graphs, maps and stats. Everything from the number of visitors to your site; to new visits vs. repeat visits ratios; average time on site; top traffic sources; top pages; keywords; and so much more, this program is a must. My two favorites have to be the map and site overlays. The map overlay tells you exactly how many visitors are coming from each area in the world; and the site overlay pops up percentages onto each link on your web pages, to show where visitors are clicking. This is definitely worth the investment in time that it takes to get set up.
2. Google Trends – Compares key words and phrases.
We all know the importance of key words and key word phrases. Here you can input two or more key words or phrases to evaluate and compare their effectiveness against each other, with the results displayed on a graph. You can drill down further to uncover results on specific target locations, and more. This is a very useful tool to help you choose the appropriate word content within your web pages, to ultimately boost your exposure and organic ranking.
3. Compete – Identifies competitive strategies.
Compete is an online competitive service that combines intelligent site and search analytics to help you improve your online marketing initiatives by identifying competitive strategies. Knowing this information can take your SEM (search engine marketing) and SEO (search engine optimization) efforts to the next level, and help you stay on top with site metrics and audience profiles.
4. WeWe Score – Rates your website’s customer focus.
When visitors find your website, they really only care about how well you can help them meet their needs. Your focus has to be on the customer, which is conveyed through the words you use on your site. This website counts certain words on your site that are the key indicators of whether your focus is on them, or on you. This can be helpful in better understanding the impression you are making on your prospects, and where you need to make changes in order to grab and entice customers to go deeper, when they land on your home page.
5. Trace My IP – Tracks IP addresses for traffic analysis, and much more.
Is the time coming that we will actually be able to zero in on the name of the person visiting our websites, and where exactly they are from? It appears that this kind of advanced data gathering is just around the corner, but for now, just knowing more about our visitor details through the activity reports provided here, is a great way to develop strategies; monitor results and improve outcomes.
Maximum online profit generation can only occur if you take an analytical approach There are a number full website traffic statistics and analytics systems available, but are you using any of them? And aside from Web Analytics, there are also comparison resources and performance metrics that should be considered. Do you know what paths visitors are using to gain access to your website? What is the ratio of new vs. returning visitors? Which keywords are drawing visitors to your sites? Which Search Engines? What is your bounce rate? Where are most of your inquiries coming from? Is your Home Page customer-focused? How do you compare to your competition?
What exactly will keep your business mojo running? Take a look at our Top 5 Web Analytics Resources. Some offer better information than others for user behavior and some are stronger when it comes to facts and figures. With your research and once you have done your own needs analysis, it should become clear to you, which will suit your situation the best. Enjoy!
1. Google Analytics – Provides full website analysis.
It is currently a free service, but it requires that you have an account with Google and that you meet specific online criteria. Once your account has been set up, Google begins to gather data on your site(s), and reports it back to you via pages and pages of graphs, maps and stats. Everything from the number of visitors to your site; to new visits vs. repeat visits ratios; average time on site; top traffic sources; top pages; keywords; and so much more, this program is a must. My two favorites have to be the map and site overlays. The map overlay tells you exactly how many visitors are coming from each area in the world; and the site overlay pops up percentages onto each link on your web pages, to show where visitors are clicking. This is definitely worth the investment in time that it takes to get set up.
2. Google Trends – Compares key words and phrases.
We all know the importance of key words and key word phrases. Here you can input two or more key words or phrases to evaluate and compare their effectiveness against each other, with the results displayed on a graph. You can drill down further to uncover results on specific target locations, and more. This is a very useful tool to help you choose the appropriate word content within your web pages, to ultimately boost your exposure and organic ranking.
3. Compete – Identifies competitive strategies.
Compete is an online competitive service that combines intelligent site and search analytics to help you improve your online marketing initiatives by identifying competitive strategies. Knowing this information can take your SEM (search engine marketing) and SEO (search engine optimization) efforts to the next level, and help you stay on top with site metrics and audience profiles.
4. WeWe Score – Rates your website’s customer focus.
When visitors find your website, they really only care about how well you can help them meet their needs. Your focus has to be on the customer, which is conveyed through the words you use on your site. This website counts certain words on your site that are the key indicators of whether your focus is on them, or on you. This can be helpful in better understanding the impression you are making on your prospects, and where you need to make changes in order to grab and entice customers to go deeper, when they land on your home page.
5. Trace My IP – Tracks IP addresses for traffic analysis, and much more.
Is the time coming that we will actually be able to zero in on the name of the person visiting our websites, and where exactly they are from? It appears that this kind of advanced data gathering is just around the corner, but for now, just knowing more about our visitor details through the activity reports provided here, is a great way to develop strategies; monitor results and improve outcomes.
Top 10 Firefox Browser Plugins
About a year ago I fired Internet Explorer as my primary browser. Why? Because it crashed on me constantly and took forever at times to transition from one site to another. I’ve found the Firefox browser much more user friendly, especially given the number of plugins that have been developed for the browser.
The ability to customize Firefox with these plug-in extensions is what makes this open-source browser so special. However, there are so many available options for plugins, it’s tough to know what’s worth installing and what’s will be a complete waste of your time.
There are lists of Firefox plugins that have been created citing the best extensions for web developers or for a better YouTube experience. However, I wanted to create an everyday list of my best choices just for the ordinary online business owner.
Out of these, here are my top 10 Firefox extensions:
If you don’t currently use Firefox as your browser, perhaps this list will convince you to give it a try. I have liked my experience so much with Firefox that I’ll never use any other browser.
The ability to customize Firefox with these plug-in extensions is what makes this open-source browser so special. However, there are so many available options for plugins, it’s tough to know what’s worth installing and what’s will be a complete waste of your time.
There are lists of Firefox plugins that have been created citing the best extensions for web developers or for a better YouTube experience. However, I wanted to create an everyday list of my best choices just for the ordinary online business owner.
Out of these, here are my top 10 Firefox extensions:
- Adblock Plus. If you have ever been annoyed by all those ads and banners on a site that often take longer to download than everything else on the page, install Adblock Plus and get rid of them. Right-click on a banner and choose “Adblock” from the context menu, and the banner won’t be downloaded again.
- Colorful Tabs. This simple add-on that makes a strong colorful appeal. It sets each tab to a different color and makes them easy to distinguish while beautifying the overall appearance of the interface. After a long day of research when you have lots of browser windows open, this makes online page viewing easier on the eyes.
- ColorZilla. ColorZilla puts an eyedropper icon in your status bar. Click it and you’ll get a crosshair cursor. As you run this over a Web page, the RGB values of the pixel under the crosshair will display in the status bar, both as three separate values and as a hex value (e.g., R:255, G:255, B:255 | #FFFFFF). I use this all the time if I’m trying to match colors; i.e. a font color to an the primary background on an image, for example.
- GMail Manager. This Gmail notifier is great if you have multiple Gmail accounts. It allows you to receive new mail notifications along with viewing account details including unread messages, saved drafts, spam messages, labels with new mail, space used, and new mail snippets.
- MeasureIt. After installing this extension, you’ll have a small ruler icon in your left side of your status bar. When you click on it, your browser window will fade out a little, and you’ll have a crosshair cursor. Drag the cursor over a section of the screen that you want to measure. Next to the box is its height and width, measured in pixels. I use this all the time when trying to measure the size of images. When you’re finished, just hit the Escape key to turn it off and return normal viewing to the page.
- Quirk Search Status. Search Status allows you to see how any web site you visit is performing. When you land on a page, SearchStatus lets you view its Google PageRank, Google Category, Alexa popularity ranking, Compete.com ranking, SEOmoz Linkscape mozRank, Alexa incoming links, Alexa related links and backward links from Google, Yahoo! and MSN. This combined search-related information means you can view not only the link importance of a site (according to Google and Linkscape), but also its traffic importance (according to Alexa and Compete), so providing a balanced view of site efficacy. I use this all the time to determine whether a site has enough traffic to warrant accepting a joint venture opportunity.
- Scrapbook. ScrapBook helps you to save Web pages and easily manage your saved collections. Major features are: saving web pages or snippets of a page, saving a web site, organize the collection in the same way you do bookmarks, full text search and quick filtering search of the collection, and editing of your collected pages.
- Session Manager. Session Manager helps you manage your Firefox tabs. If you visit the same sites every day, all you need do is open all the sites in separate tabs and/or windows, and then use Session Manager to save the session with a distinct name. Then, you simply go to Tools > Session Manager, pick your session, and all the windows and tabs open up just as you saved them. And, Session Manager tracks your sessions as you surf, and if Firefox (or your system) crashes, you can recover the selection of tabs you had open when it crashed.
- Tabs Open Relative. Tabs Open Relative makes all new tabs open to the right of the current tab, rather than at the far right of the tab bar. This reduced a huge annoyance I had with how the Firefox browser worked.
- XMarks, XMarks (formerly Foxmarks)provides seamless bookmark synchronization between your computers and browsers via their synchronization server. Your bookmark (and optionally password) data is securely stored and backed up on our servers and is available online, as well. After you install the add-on, click on the notification to set up Xmarks and start backing up and synchronizing your bookmarks. Install Xmarks on each computer you use, and it seamlessly integrates with your web browser and keeps your bookmarks safely backed up and in sync across all of your computers. Secure Password Sync is an optional Xmarks feature.
If you don’t currently use Firefox as your browser, perhaps this list will convince you to give it a try. I have liked my experience so much with Firefox that I’ll never use any other browser.
Oct 18, 2009
5 Key Steps To Increase Web Sales
No matter how experienced you are there are some key ways to easily, quickly and effectively increase sales that you may be overlooking. In the current climate you can’t afford to miss a trick so check you are fully utilising each of these important steps.Step 1 – Set Up A Shopping Cart
You can have the best product in the world but unless you make it easy for the customer to buy it you are shooting yourself in the foot. You must create a shopping cart page where the customer is led through an automatic process to buy your product.
Today there are many different options for shopping carts from a simple sales page that is easy to construct and design through to a more sophisticated system that tracks and records your customers and allows you to regularly email and update them on your latest offers.
Look around and find the product that suits you best and don’t neglect free resources like articles that will give you ideas and information on shopping cart systems.
Step 2 – Write A Review For Your Product
People want good, reliable information and you are in an ideal place to provide it. No one can write a better review of your product than you because you are the one who created it.
Your review should include:
- a description of the product
- an honest evaluation
- an explanation of the benefits
- where possible have some social proof of others using it (not made up testimonials but real life examples)
- and have a link to your shopping cart page.
Step 3 – Set Up A Google AdWords Campaign
Google AdWords are probably the quickest way to get traffic and generate sales but some people get nervous about using them. There is nothing to be afraid of if you have not set up a Google AdWords campaign as they make it simple for you to do, and guide you through the process.
There are free resources to help you do this from Google themselves so just go and input Google Adwords and do some research. Almost immediately you can have your campaign up and running, it is that easy n.
Once you have set up your campaign you are going to want to include the most words and phrases most likely searched in your niche. Point the AdWord to the product review page you have created in step 2 above.
Step 4 – Get It On eBay Placing
There are two reasons for doing this: first you will get a real kick out of seeing your product listed and getting active bids and you need to keep an active auction for the item going at all times.
Secondly, your auction listing on eBay also gives you high visibility in Google and personally I have noticed some good results on Google because of eBay auctions.
Please note, you have to have a physical product to list on ebay at the time of writing, so have something like a CD or DVD to offer as well as an ebook product.
Step 5 – Amazon Listing
You have probably bought things yourself from Amazon because it is where people go to find books, DVDs, videos, and other products. You buy from Amazon and so do your potential customers. Getting listed there puts you right in front of them, and alerts any potential product distributors for you too.
Once your product is on listed, Amazon will promote the product, take the order, process the credit card payment, ship the item, and then send you a payment. What could be simpler for you?
All of these methods will help you achieve high visibility in the marketplace and that means that you’ll have a higher chance of successfully selling your product.
These five steps will get your product high visibility in Google, eBay, and Amazon, and will give your potential customer three different ways to instantly find and buy your product.
Being found on their sites also means your product will be found in the places the majority of web users search first to find products, or answers to questions. And that is the first and most important step in marketing on the Internet: being easily found when customers are looking for you.
Source: sitepronews.com
How to Protect Your Search Engine Rankings
If you have a web site that you have been maintaining and updating on a consistent basis for several years, chances are, you have acquired some decent traffic from the search engines. The thing that most webmasters don’t consider is that once they have that search engine traffic, it doesn’t mean it will stay forever. There are things that can happen with your web site that can cause it to drop out of the search engine rankings. So what is a web master to do in order to keep their search engine rankings?
Some very legitimate high quality sites are being hurt by some of the actions taken by the search engines to ban the spammy sites created by less than above-board webmasters. There are some things a webmaster can do to reduce their chances of their legitimate site being mistaken for a spam site.
1) Take care in who you are linking to on your website.
While it is good to have links that are helpful to your web visitors, you need to be careful who you are linking to. If you link to sites that are considered “bad neighborhoods”, you will certainly see a drop in your search engine results. This is because the search engines will assume that you are linking just to increase your search engine ranking. Avoid linking to sites and pages that are mostly a list of links. Many of these sites are somewhat spammy and also link to many other “questionable” sites. If you want to put your link in a link directory, go for high quality link directories, especially if these directories require a reciprocal link back to their site. Sometimes paying the few bucks they ask for to get listed could be worth it as it will filter out all of the spammers. The penalty hit is from an action on your part of linking to the bad neighborhood so you can control it by not linking to one in the first place. If you aren’t sure if the sites are in bad neighborhoods or not, you can easily check it out by using online tools that tell you if your website is linking to a bad neighborhood. Tools like bad-neighborhood.com give you detailed information about the websites you are linking to.
2) Make sure your keyword density isn’t too high
Your keyword density is also a factor that affects your search engine rankings. Search engines determine the relevance of your website to a particular subject by the use of keywords in your web page text. The higher the density of the keyword, the more relevant the web page for that keyword subject. However too high a keyword density, and the search engines will consider you trying to spam the search engines and will penalize your website for keyword stuffing, or keyword spamming. Content with a conversational tone or a natural editorial flavor can produce a premium keyword density and leave you with good quality content. The old rule of thumb is that your keyword should never appear in more than half of the sentences on the page. A better approach is to have your keyword not appear in more than 1/3 of the sentences, yet use synonyms and other related keywords on the page as well to add relevance. In total, you don’t want your keyword density to be above 3%. Tools like keyworddensity.com can give you a quick reference to web page keyword density.
There are some simple things you can do to keep your legitimate web site above board and not have it mistaken for a spam site so it doesn’t lose rank in the search engines. These 2 are some of the easiest and quickest things you can do to keep your website above board and ranking well in the search engines
Some very legitimate high quality sites are being hurt by some of the actions taken by the search engines to ban the spammy sites created by less than above-board webmasters. There are some things a webmaster can do to reduce their chances of their legitimate site being mistaken for a spam site.
1) Take care in who you are linking to on your website.
While it is good to have links that are helpful to your web visitors, you need to be careful who you are linking to. If you link to sites that are considered “bad neighborhoods”, you will certainly see a drop in your search engine results. This is because the search engines will assume that you are linking just to increase your search engine ranking. Avoid linking to sites and pages that are mostly a list of links. Many of these sites are somewhat spammy and also link to many other “questionable” sites. If you want to put your link in a link directory, go for high quality link directories, especially if these directories require a reciprocal link back to their site. Sometimes paying the few bucks they ask for to get listed could be worth it as it will filter out all of the spammers. The penalty hit is from an action on your part of linking to the bad neighborhood so you can control it by not linking to one in the first place. If you aren’t sure if the sites are in bad neighborhoods or not, you can easily check it out by using online tools that tell you if your website is linking to a bad neighborhood. Tools like bad-neighborhood.com give you detailed information about the websites you are linking to.
2) Make sure your keyword density isn’t too high
Your keyword density is also a factor that affects your search engine rankings. Search engines determine the relevance of your website to a particular subject by the use of keywords in your web page text. The higher the density of the keyword, the more relevant the web page for that keyword subject. However too high a keyword density, and the search engines will consider you trying to spam the search engines and will penalize your website for keyword stuffing, or keyword spamming. Content with a conversational tone or a natural editorial flavor can produce a premium keyword density and leave you with good quality content. The old rule of thumb is that your keyword should never appear in more than half of the sentences on the page. A better approach is to have your keyword not appear in more than 1/3 of the sentences, yet use synonyms and other related keywords on the page as well to add relevance. In total, you don’t want your keyword density to be above 3%. Tools like keyworddensity.com can give you a quick reference to web page keyword density.
There are some simple things you can do to keep your legitimate web site above board and not have it mistaken for a spam site so it doesn’t lose rank in the search engines. These 2 are some of the easiest and quickest things you can do to keep your website above board and ranking well in the search engines
Oct 8, 2009
How To Monitor Search Engine Positions
Since search engines are the first stop for people on the Internet looking for goods or services, the position your website appears in search results is an important factor. If your URL shows up far down the results list, the chances of the consumer never finding you increase incrementally. Once you achieve a high search engine position, it is essential that you make sure you maintain the high ranking you have worked so hard to achieve.This means you must come up with a strategy to monitor your search engines positions. This strategy is crucial to the success of any marketing campaign. Think of your search engine positions as your online portfolio. Would you let your stock portfolio be ruled by chance and market fluctuations, or would you keep close tabs on your stocks so you could buy and sell when the time is right? This is the way you must consider your search engines positions.
Be aware that at first, after you have launched your search engine campaign and done all the right things to increase your rankings, you will most likely see a continual upward climb. What you need to be on the lookout for is the moment that upward climb reaches a plateau. When this happens, your search engine position campaign moves into stage two, the monitoring and protecting stage.
In stage two, do not be concerned about the short-term fluctuations in your positions. These are similar to the subtle rising and falling of stocks in a portfolio. Short-term movement is an integral part of the whole process. It’s the long-term changes that you must watch for and prepare to act on immediately.
Analyzing the long-term trends of search engines positions is imperative. The way in which search engines rank websites may change at the drop of hat. If you are unaware of these changes—many of which are subtle yet can be deadly to your ranking—your position may drop to the bottom of the list before you can get your bearings. To prevent this kind of precipitous drop, you must create a system to monitor your positions on a monthly basis. Devise a chart to keep tabs on your top ranking positions or your top pages, and make sure to watch “the market” closely.
Each search engine uses a formula to compute website rankings. When a search engine changes this formula in any way, it may raise or lower your ranking. Some search engines use a number of different formulas, rotating them so that a formula doesn’t become overused or outdated. Depending on which formula is being applied, your search engine position may suddenly drop or rise in rank significantly. Therefore, you must check your positions frequently in order to catch when a search engine changes formulas and what effect it has on your positions.
You must also deal with your competition—a crucial factor you must always be vigilant about. Your competitor’s position may suddenly rise, automatically lowering your position. Or their position may drop, pushing your position higher. Each month, expect position changes due to the continual changes that are occurring in your competitor’s position, and be prepared to adjust your marketing strategy to compensate for decreased rankings. Monitoring these fluctuations will also give you vital information about how to improve your website to increase your position in search results.
Of course, you must discern what the most popular search engines are in order for your monitoring efforts to be effective. Right now, there are ten popular search engines that direct most of Internet traffic to your sites. The challenge you face is that these top ten may change from month to month.
This means that your must not only monitor your search engine positions, but you must also keep track of the ranking popularity of the search engines you are monitoring. Find out which search engines people use most frequently every month and be sure to live in the present! People are fickle about their favorite search engines, and it takes constant vigilance to follow their dalliances. The search engines they loved when you first launched your campaign may be old news in the next few months. You must adjust your list of engines according to the whims of the Internet users. Check out http://www.searchenginewatch.com/reports/netratings.html for a current list of website favorites.
Another factor to monitor carefully is a sudden drop of your positions in all search engines. This is not the same as monthly fluctuations—this is a neon red warning sign! It could mean a number of different things.
It all your search engine positions have plummeted, it may indicate that search engines spiders—those sneaky programs that seek out your site and rank their positions—have found some type of problem with your website. If you have recently changed the code, for instance, the spider may become utterly confused and consequently drop your positions disastrously. If a spider creeps up on your website when it is down for adjustments or changes, you may actually disappear from a search engine index entirely. Or a search engine may drastically change its formula, and suddenly all of your websites come up as irrelevant. If that search engine is a current favorite, it may create a domino effect, causing all of your position to drop in all search engines.
Some search engines rely on the results from other search engines, and it is vital that you know which engines these are and keep track of all the engines they influence. The biggest problem here is that search engines will sometimes change affiliations, and this can create a major shift in the geography of the Internet. For example, recently Yahoo decided to display only results gleaned from Google. So you must not only monitor your own positions, but you must keep abreast of seismic shifts in the landscape of the Internet as a whole.
Finally, pay attention to your keywords. Keywords are the foundation bricks of the entire search engine system, and they demand individual scrutiny in your monitoring efforts. If you have found that a number of your positions have plummeted, it may mean that a page of your website has become invisible or inaccessible to search engine spiders. Or the competition for that particular keyword or phrase has recently rocketed into outer space. In either case, you must act quickly and efficiently to regain lost ground.
Your search engine marketing campaign is an investment. If costs you time and money on a continual basis. Protect this investment as diligently as you would your financial portfolio. In the same way, track your positions from an objective perspective, and monitor your positions on a regular basis. Make sure your time and effort reap rewards by keeping your eye on the big picture—your long-term marketing campaign.
SEO is no place for amateurs
How Come everybody is nowadays an SEO Expert?
Let’s face it; not a day goes by where we don’t see someone offering their services as a Search Engine Optimization specialist. The strange thing is however, many of the people offering such services on the various forums tend to have no runs on the board themselves. Of course, I’m not saying there aren’t a great deal of reputable internet marketing services out there, but they are becoming increasingly outnumbered by those with little or no experience at all, and it is these people and their companies which are highly unlikely to ever produce satisfactory results for their clients.
Perhaps one should bear in mind that there is no difference between investing your money in internet marketing, and investing your money in a regular market. In both cases you need to measure your results just as you need to target the correct audience. For example, you wouldn’t even consider wasting your money by advertising your product or your service in a newspaper that is completely irrelevant to your target market. Advertising is done for one purpose and one purpose only, and that is to bring in a return on your investment, irrespective of whether the advertising is done online or offline.
Why you Should Avoid the Amateurs
Essentially, you need to bear in mind that while any Tom, Dick, and Harry can learn about search engine optimization, it takes several years of dedication, practice, and careful analysis, in order to fully understand the different techniques, and how to apply different techniques to different types of business.
The bottom line is; a SEO campaign is in fact a highly intensive process that starts out with intense keyword research in order to establish which keywords are the most likely to produce maximum results for a website. Once the ideal keywords have been established, it can be incredibly tempting to simply spread them around on your website and hope for the best. However, in most cases you’ll find that the most popular keywords also have the most competition. As such, why bother targeting particular key words, irrespective of how popular they are, if there’s virtually no chance they are going to help in terms of ranking? In fact, you could end up waiting for several months before the major search engines start recognizing your website.
On the other hand, a specialist who is highly skilled in internet marketing will be aware of which relevant keywords and keyword phrases will help to improve a website’s ranking. Likewise, a true professional will also know where the keywords and keyword phrases should be placed on a website in order for them to have the maximum amount of impact, without being penalized for keyword stuffing.
Onsite optimization of keywords is notoriously time consuming if it’s being done properly. But if your goal is to give a website a boost in search engine ranking, then this optimization process needs to be continued off-site as well. Here again, a competent SEO professional will know exactly how to go about implementing a successful link building campaign, including article marketing, submitting articles to directories, taking advantage of several social networking sites, and also social book marking.
Furthermore, because a professional SEO specialist appreciates the importance of being able to get a good return on investment, they will also make use of Analytics tools in order to track conversions and monitor the success of an internet marketing campaign. Bear in mind, that these tools are essential in order to fine tune any good SEO campaign.
Steer Clear of Internet Marketing Fraudsters
Unfortunately, but also as is to be expected, the internet is full of undesirable people who focus entirely on targeting honorable businesses by means of providing them with false promises regarding guaranteed results. These people will more often than not guarantee that they will get your website to the top of the search rankings by using specific keywords. However, in most cases, they simply use keywords which are so rarely used, they show at the top of search rankings simply because they have no competition – nobody uses them. Obviously, if nobody is ever typing that keyword into the search box, then why waste money on it? One of the easiest ways to determine whether or not an internet marketing expert is in fact legitimate, is that the legitimate ones never offer any guarantees with regards to getting you in the top spot on search results. This is because they know that nobody can guarantee such results due to a number of reasons, such as algorithms which change continuously.
How to Avoid the Wrong Internet Marketing Service
First and foremost, you need to ask the right questions:
Let’s face it; not a day goes by where we don’t see someone offering their services as a Search Engine Optimization specialist. The strange thing is however, many of the people offering such services on the various forums tend to have no runs on the board themselves. Of course, I’m not saying there aren’t a great deal of reputable internet marketing services out there, but they are becoming increasingly outnumbered by those with little or no experience at all, and it is these people and their companies which are highly unlikely to ever produce satisfactory results for their clients.
Perhaps one should bear in mind that there is no difference between investing your money in internet marketing, and investing your money in a regular market. In both cases you need to measure your results just as you need to target the correct audience. For example, you wouldn’t even consider wasting your money by advertising your product or your service in a newspaper that is completely irrelevant to your target market. Advertising is done for one purpose and one purpose only, and that is to bring in a return on your investment, irrespective of whether the advertising is done online or offline.
Why you Should Avoid the Amateurs
Essentially, you need to bear in mind that while any Tom, Dick, and Harry can learn about search engine optimization, it takes several years of dedication, practice, and careful analysis, in order to fully understand the different techniques, and how to apply different techniques to different types of business.
The bottom line is; a SEO campaign is in fact a highly intensive process that starts out with intense keyword research in order to establish which keywords are the most likely to produce maximum results for a website. Once the ideal keywords have been established, it can be incredibly tempting to simply spread them around on your website and hope for the best. However, in most cases you’ll find that the most popular keywords also have the most competition. As such, why bother targeting particular key words, irrespective of how popular they are, if there’s virtually no chance they are going to help in terms of ranking? In fact, you could end up waiting for several months before the major search engines start recognizing your website.
On the other hand, a specialist who is highly skilled in internet marketing will be aware of which relevant keywords and keyword phrases will help to improve a website’s ranking. Likewise, a true professional will also know where the keywords and keyword phrases should be placed on a website in order for them to have the maximum amount of impact, without being penalized for keyword stuffing.
Onsite optimization of keywords is notoriously time consuming if it’s being done properly. But if your goal is to give a website a boost in search engine ranking, then this optimization process needs to be continued off-site as well. Here again, a competent SEO professional will know exactly how to go about implementing a successful link building campaign, including article marketing, submitting articles to directories, taking advantage of several social networking sites, and also social book marking.
Furthermore, because a professional SEO specialist appreciates the importance of being able to get a good return on investment, they will also make use of Analytics tools in order to track conversions and monitor the success of an internet marketing campaign. Bear in mind, that these tools are essential in order to fine tune any good SEO campaign.
Steer Clear of Internet Marketing Fraudsters
Unfortunately, but also as is to be expected, the internet is full of undesirable people who focus entirely on targeting honorable businesses by means of providing them with false promises regarding guaranteed results. These people will more often than not guarantee that they will get your website to the top of the search rankings by using specific keywords. However, in most cases, they simply use keywords which are so rarely used, they show at the top of search rankings simply because they have no competition – nobody uses them. Obviously, if nobody is ever typing that keyword into the search box, then why waste money on it? One of the easiest ways to determine whether or not an internet marketing expert is in fact legitimate, is that the legitimate ones never offer any guarantees with regards to getting you in the top spot on search results. This is because they know that nobody can guarantee such results due to a number of reasons, such as algorithms which change continuously.
How to Avoid the Wrong Internet Marketing Service
First and foremost, you need to ask the right questions:
- You need to determine how long the company has been involved with Internet marketing.
- You should ask to see testimonials from past clients.
- You should search online for their services. In fact, you should attempt to find their website by using keywords and keyword phrases which are relevant to the services they offer. Obviously, if you fail to find them on the first page of Google search results, then your alarm bells should start ringing. For example, if you were considering using the services of Sunshine Coast Internet Marketing Company, you could do a search for Sunshine Coast Internet marketing, internet marketing Sunshine Coast, and etc.
Social Media Optimization- Four Rules for Success
Social media optimization is a way for organizations and individuals to generate publicity through social networking tools like Twitter and LinkedIn, online communities like Facebook, and automated tools like TwitterFeed and Ping.fm. The term “social media optimization” was originally coined by SEO consultant extraordinaire, Rohit Bhargava, the senior vice president of Ogilvy 360 Digital Influence and author of the Influential Marketing Blog. (Bhargava’s work was so groundbreaking, Jeremiah Owyang, another social media optimization expert, even dovetailed a few of his own rules to the original work.)
Social media optimization is basically a way to promote your blog, website, or even your company’s brand, through social media, without being obnoxious or overtly commercial. Sure, you can blanket sites like Twitter with “Want to lose weight? Download my free report, ‘19 Ways to Lose Weight Fast’” repeatedly, or brag about your latest affiliate paycheck, but that’s not going to get you any followers. At least none worth talking to.
Bhargava terms these people”Twankers” (people who use Twitter for one-way broadcasts about their own greatness) and “Twidiots” (people who only tweet insignificant things like their latest press release or what they had for breakfast). If you’re just having one-way conversations and telling people about the minor, mundane details of your company, you’re not providing any value, and your SMO efforts will be wasted.
Whether you are an SEO consultant or you are new to social media marketing, there are a few rules you need to follow in order to be effective. Bhargava’s five rules of social media optimization included important things like increasing your linkability, helping your content travel, and encouraging the mash up. To that, we would add our own four rules.
Social media optimization is basically a way to promote your blog, website, or even your company’s brand, through social media, without being obnoxious or overtly commercial. Sure, you can blanket sites like Twitter with “Want to lose weight? Download my free report, ‘19 Ways to Lose Weight Fast’” repeatedly, or brag about your latest affiliate paycheck, but that’s not going to get you any followers. At least none worth talking to.
Bhargava terms these people”Twankers” (people who use Twitter for one-way broadcasts about their own greatness) and “Twidiots” (people who only tweet insignificant things like their latest press release or what they had for breakfast). If you’re just having one-way conversations and telling people about the minor, mundane details of your company, you’re not providing any value, and your SMO efforts will be wasted.
Whether you are an SEO consultant or you are new to social media marketing, there are a few rules you need to follow in order to be effective. Bhargava’s five rules of social media optimization included important things like increasing your linkability, helping your content travel, and encouraging the mash up. To that, we would add our own four rules.
- Focus on a few networks, not many. Many social media optimization beginners make the mistake of joining as many social networks as they can, and getting a few followers in each. The problem is you’re getting 10 or 20 followers in 10 networks, rather than 400 or 500 in 2 networks. If you take this narrow route, chances are you will attract the same followers in each one.
- Find people in allied fields, not just your own, to improve your social media optimization. Think referrals, not customers. If you’re in the financial services industry, don’t just focus on finding people who need to invest. Connect with people who can refer those same people to you, like lawyers, real estate agents, bankers, and anyone else who has clients who will need the financial services you offer.
- Provide real value to others. Telling people how they can earn money while they sleep, or “Lose Weight Fast!!!” is not valuable. Steering people to a site that features recipes for people who are trying a low-carb diet, or writing a blog post about the top three fat-burning foods is valuable social media optimization. Refer people to helpful websites, even if they’re not your own. And don’t be nervous about asking questions of your own. It makes you look like a real person, and not just a know-it-all.
- Commit to a social media optimization program for the long haul. It’s not enough to just use it a few times and be done with it. This is an ongoing process. You wouldn’t take the time to cultivate a new friend and then never hang out with them, would you? Some of these contacts will become your friends online. Ignore them, and you’ll waste all the effort you put into your social media optimization and developing those relationships. Remember, social media marketing is actually about building real relationships, not just broadcasting one-way information. That’s what a TV is for.
Get Your Company Link Building With These 5 Simple Tips
As the online market place continues to warm up to the idea of SEO, link building has become center stage as it tends to be the most time consuming and crucial part of any internet marketing strategy. Link building services are the most commonly outsourced aspect of SEO. This process involves finding qualified and thematically relevant one-way linking partners who will link back to your website. At first glance this sounds easy and there are hundreds of automated products out there that claim to add thousands of back links overnight. The truth is there are no short cuts in cultivating authoritative back links for a site. Link building companies spend many hours link building by hand in order to get the best results. Spammy automated products often never cultivate valuable links and tend to do more harm than good. Here are a couple quick suggestions to help you get started.1. Know What Keywords You’re Targeting
Link building strategies are an extension of your current SEO practice. You’ll want to reference the list of keywords you have selected to optimize your site. Make sure that the anchor text of the link lists the keyword you are targeting. For example, if you’re targeting the keyword “baby names” you’ll want to place that keyword in the anchor text of the link. I’ve seen many companies go after links by using their company name. Although this does increase link popularity it fails to pass popularity for a specific keyword and can be seen as a failed attempt.
2. Develop a link building strategy
There are many strategies link building companies use to source qualified back links to their clients. The most tedious but often most rewarding method is manual linking requests also known as “cherry picking”. This method allows you to obtain exceptionally qualified links which can really help boost your position in the search engine results page (SERPS). A good place to start with manual link building is to look at your suppliers, vendors, clients, related organizations associations and more. Besides manual link requests other well known tactics include:
- directory submission (Dmoz, Yahoo Directory, Joe Ant)
- article submission (ezine aritlces.com, goarticles.com)
- optimized press releases (PRWeb.com)
- social media outlets (FaceBook, Linked In)
- bookmarking sites (Digg, Reddit,Furl)
- Blogs (niche blogs)
- Forums (niche forums)
- Classifieds (niche classifieds)
Search engines see links as votes of confidence for your site. The more relevant and authoritative the site, the more consideration is given to the link and the subsequent keyword in the anchor text. It really pays off to focus on the quality of your links rather than the quantity. It is also important for your link building to look natural and not an attempt to deceive search engine spiders in search of links. Try looking for sites within your industry rather than general, unrelated sites to get links from. A good example of this would be content creation and distribution. Try creating content on a relevant subject of which you can speak authoritatively. A good example of this would be a SEO company writing a short article on 5 simple ways companies can start link building and placing it on an authoritative, industry relevant site like this one. Remember, before placing a link on a site (or making a request), ask yourself three questions:
- Does a link to my website belong here (does it look natural)?
- Is this site relevant and authoritative?
- Is there are benefit to my potential customers?
Once you’ve nailed down a potential linking partner that represents the overall quality and thematic authority that your site deserves you’ll need to see where your link will be present. Here are a couple guidelines that I look for when placing links on a site. I try to get my links no more than a few clicks away from the homepage. The page must be thematically relevant and recently cached by Google’s search engine (this let me know that the page has been indexed by Google). I also take a look at the number of external (outbound) links leaving that page. I try to keep the number of external links below 50 as it will dilute the effect of the page. Lastly, I look at the page the link will be placed on. For some sites this is harder to control, but if you have the option you should know where the most valuable locations are. I always try to get my links in line with thematically relevant content, like an article or blog post. I’ve found this produces some of the best results. Try to avoid placing your links on a “sponsored” or advertisers section that runs throughout the entire site. Also avoid footer links as rumor has it Google has devalued links buried in the footer of the site. Links placed at the top of the page or inserted into the site’s navigation also tend to do quite well. Bottom line is that your links need to look like they belong and provide value to the user and the site it is published on.
5. Be aware of “No-Follow” Links
Within the last 5 years Google developed the concept of the “no-follow” link. The “no-follow” code is inserted into your link and instructs the Google spider to ignore it. The “no-follow” link can be seen used most commonly in blog comments and forum posts. This initiative was set forth to combat spam and automated linking mechanisms that would throw links automatically on blog comments and forum posts. There are a lot of SEO professionals that will only place a link if it is a “do-follow” link, meaning it doesn’t have the “no-follow” attribute. I tend to disagree with this notion especially when the link in question is on a highly trafficked authority site. If it makes sense for the link to be there, then add your link. Even though Google won’t give you any credit for it, it will be seen by thousands of people who may visit your site and link to you themselves because your site is highly relevant. I call this concept indirect link building. You are influencing and promoting your site to potential linking partners.
Link Building is a very time consuming process and link building companies spend a lot of time researching, testing and improving their techniques. Link building services are available for companies that don’t have the time to invest in manual link building. The bottom line is that with a little help anyone can link build and move their site up the SERPS.
How To Create An Effective Newsletter
The typical form of newsletter is a one-way communication where you provide information to customers, such as product updates and announcements. Creating a successful newsletter can be extremely rewarding. Subscribers and customers respond with glowing feedback, online sales jump and your customer relationships and brand loyalty deepens. Here are some useful tips that might help in creating a successful newsletter.
Define Success
Ask yourself “What is the purpose of your newsletter?” A newsletter is a substantial investment of company resources in terms of time and energy, and you need to define in as tangible terms as possible the purpose of your Newsletter.
Voice and Personality
Establish a voice or editorial personality—whether newsy, serious, gossipy or funny—that is synergistic with the image you want to portray and connects with your audience. Remember that e-mail newsletters aren’t e-mail promotions designed to stimulate immediate action. Sales and promotional copy don’t suit e-newsletters. Nor does the traditional tone of broadcast corporate communications. Think of your newsletter as a one-on-one conversation. Just imagine sitting in a coffee shop talking informally with a customer. That’s the starting point for your approach—a more personable and appropriate “human” voice will come naturally. Drop the jargon, drop the sales pitch, be as honest as you can, and talk like a human being. You can have as much or as little personality as is appropriate. Consider adding a brief editorial, a comment or two, an editor’s note, a couple of lines of commentary, a touch of opinion; adding a little human element here and there. Sign editorials, give authors a byline, or list some names down in the administrative section of each issue to which your readers can relate to.
“From” Line
Whether it’s a person’s name, name of the newsletter or company name, determine what will resonate best with your readers and stay with it.
“Subject” Line
“Vol. 1, Issue #8″ or “Company News” are not enticing subject lines. They are certainly consistent and simple, but they don’t tell your readers anything that will motivate them to open your e-mail. Your subject line is your calling card—entice your readers with the most interesting or intriguing information in your Newsletter. Use attractive headlines as a means to summarize a section of content.
Style/Format
Establish a format and layout of your Newsletter that is clean and simple, with elements of the Newsletter (table of contents, “Tips”, subscription information, etc. located in the same spot each issue).
Content and Relevancy
Figure out what your readers want and give it to them. Seek continuous improvement by obtaining reader feedback and monitoring click-through rates to determine what types of articles are most popular. Another dilemma that we all confront is too much information and too little time. The newsletter’s job is to keep readers on top of trends and the latest developments in the industry. Aim for articles and feature stories to meet one of the following criteria by including either: major industry occurrences, forward thinking industry ideas, education on issues or new techniques, or business opportunities.
Whether your customers work out of a corporate or home office, or employees need answers to questions and tips for improving business activities, e-newsletters provide you with an opportunity to point out work inefficiencies, and share relevant best practice. When you create a newsletter, try changing your focus from selling products and services to solving your customers’ problems. Think about what they need and give options they don’t know exist.
The greatest thing about the electronic medium is that you can quickly add new hyperlinks and include updates on old material should new information surface without incurring another round of cost for a new issue (that happens in the real world).
Don’t Wait Till the Last Minute
Begin compiling newsletter information in advance. Ask fellow marketers to contribute articles. One great source of information is none other than your inbox where you can quickly search for worthy nuggets from the past week and relay the same essence in your own words.
Quality Sources
Where can you get quality content for your newsletter?
Use graphics that print well on your printer. Using a good mix of photographs and art work makes for interesting copy. Too many graphics can leave the newsletter looking cluttered.
Frequency
Determine how frequently your readers want to hear from you/receive your newsletter—and what you can commit to. As a rule, a weekly newsletter is ideal. However, don’t launch a weekly newsletter if you are not absolutely certain that you can distribute a quality Newsletter every week. A fortnightly newsletter is a good option too.
Length
A newsletter should be a quick read. Readers expect to finish reading it in 4 to 5 minutes. Short articles increase the probability that your reader will find something of interest to them.
Timing
Test and pick a day and time that works best…and stick to it. Readers should almost be able to set their watches by the receipt time of your Newsletter.
Penetration
You have the option of formatting your e-mail by including colorized text and a variety of fonts, but not all e-mail software supports HTML mail. Consider writing your newsletter in plain text or offer two mailing lists—one for plain text mailings and the other for HTML e-mail.
Make it Viral
Provide information readers can act on or that stimulates reaction—forwarding it to friends and peers, stimulating purchases or requests for additional information. Make it easy for readers to forward articles and information to peers and friends. Provide a “Tell a Friend” link that enables readers to forward the Newsletter with a personalized note.
Search
Make it easy to find articles of interest and back issues. Provide a table of contents and links to articles within the newsletter and to resources and past articles on your site.
Printability
If you want to give readers an option to print, consider providing “printer-friendly formats” on your website. Make sure your newsletter is physically readable. Avoid anything less than 12 point fonts for the article text. Fancy fonts may look good but can be hard to read when printed. Heading and text fonts should be consistent throughout the newsletter.
If you lack experience in print media, seek out assistance if you know someone in the field. If not, don’t worry—the abovementioned basic principles apply. Plan to research your material thoroughly and avoid factual or editing errors, as they will make you seem less credible.
Personalize
At the very least, address the reader by name. The most successful newsletters have a human being associated with them…and a personality. If possible, your Newsletter should be “written by a person” at your company…not the company.
Language
Not everyone has the range and depth of vocabulary as teachers and linguists do. Use words that are easy to understand, and if you do use technical terms, provide a definition that people can relate to. There is nothing more frustrating then a definition that makes less sense than the word itself. Just write in layman terms and keep it short, simple and straightforward.
Spelling and Grammar Check
Sending out copy with numerous errors creates a negative image to your readers. Aside from using a spell checker, have an outsider edit your final copy for readability, grammar and content.
Test and Track
Test the Newsletter on few e-mail addresses to check for errors and other issues before sending to the entire distribution list. Keep track of results and reactions to your newsletter to come to an understanding for further tweaks and corrections.
Lastly, to summarize the key fundamental features of an e-newsletter, make sure you include:
In conclusion, your newsletter can serve as an extension of your business that will reach out to your customers. It will allow you to maintain regular contact with them and serve as an effective and rewarding addition to your marketing arsenal. These tips should help you put it all together and help you create an exceptional newsletter.
Define Success
Ask yourself “What is the purpose of your newsletter?” A newsletter is a substantial investment of company resources in terms of time and energy, and you need to define in as tangible terms as possible the purpose of your Newsletter.
Voice and Personality
Establish a voice or editorial personality—whether newsy, serious, gossipy or funny—that is synergistic with the image you want to portray and connects with your audience. Remember that e-mail newsletters aren’t e-mail promotions designed to stimulate immediate action. Sales and promotional copy don’t suit e-newsletters. Nor does the traditional tone of broadcast corporate communications. Think of your newsletter as a one-on-one conversation. Just imagine sitting in a coffee shop talking informally with a customer. That’s the starting point for your approach—a more personable and appropriate “human” voice will come naturally. Drop the jargon, drop the sales pitch, be as honest as you can, and talk like a human being. You can have as much or as little personality as is appropriate. Consider adding a brief editorial, a comment or two, an editor’s note, a couple of lines of commentary, a touch of opinion; adding a little human element here and there. Sign editorials, give authors a byline, or list some names down in the administrative section of each issue to which your readers can relate to.
“From” Line
Whether it’s a person’s name, name of the newsletter or company name, determine what will resonate best with your readers and stay with it.
“Subject” Line
“Vol. 1, Issue #8″ or “Company News” are not enticing subject lines. They are certainly consistent and simple, but they don’t tell your readers anything that will motivate them to open your e-mail. Your subject line is your calling card—entice your readers with the most interesting or intriguing information in your Newsletter. Use attractive headlines as a means to summarize a section of content.
Style/Format
Establish a format and layout of your Newsletter that is clean and simple, with elements of the Newsletter (table of contents, “Tips”, subscription information, etc. located in the same spot each issue).
Content and Relevancy
Figure out what your readers want and give it to them. Seek continuous improvement by obtaining reader feedback and monitoring click-through rates to determine what types of articles are most popular. Another dilemma that we all confront is too much information and too little time. The newsletter’s job is to keep readers on top of trends and the latest developments in the industry. Aim for articles and feature stories to meet one of the following criteria by including either: major industry occurrences, forward thinking industry ideas, education on issues or new techniques, or business opportunities.
Whether your customers work out of a corporate or home office, or employees need answers to questions and tips for improving business activities, e-newsletters provide you with an opportunity to point out work inefficiencies, and share relevant best practice. When you create a newsletter, try changing your focus from selling products and services to solving your customers’ problems. Think about what they need and give options they don’t know exist.
The greatest thing about the electronic medium is that you can quickly add new hyperlinks and include updates on old material should new information surface without incurring another round of cost for a new issue (that happens in the real world).
Don’t Wait Till the Last Minute
Begin compiling newsletter information in advance. Ask fellow marketers to contribute articles. One great source of information is none other than your inbox where you can quickly search for worthy nuggets from the past week and relay the same essence in your own words.
Quality Sources
Where can you get quality content for your newsletter?
- Article directories like ezinearticles.com or findarticles.com. Also get articles from yahoogroups. The downside to this is that you need to include the author’s signature or resource box.
- Forums. One of the most dynamic and updated places on the Internet is where people write off the cuff and in real-time. Thread after thread, reply after reply of the latest information comes off the minds of forum participants. Combine interesting topics and reword them into an original article.
- Again, your own inbox right under your nose. Whatever other marketers are writing or selling about, use them to your own advantage and recreate them as your own.
- Your own insights are really your best resources. When you have passion, you will never stop talking about what you know. Be consistent at no. 4 and soon enough you will find a way to mold yourself into an expert. Continue to expand your knowledge database and add value to it.
Use graphics that print well on your printer. Using a good mix of photographs and art work makes for interesting copy. Too many graphics can leave the newsletter looking cluttered.
Frequency
Determine how frequently your readers want to hear from you/receive your newsletter—and what you can commit to. As a rule, a weekly newsletter is ideal. However, don’t launch a weekly newsletter if you are not absolutely certain that you can distribute a quality Newsletter every week. A fortnightly newsletter is a good option too.
Length
A newsletter should be a quick read. Readers expect to finish reading it in 4 to 5 minutes. Short articles increase the probability that your reader will find something of interest to them.
Timing
Test and pick a day and time that works best…and stick to it. Readers should almost be able to set their watches by the receipt time of your Newsletter.
Penetration
You have the option of formatting your e-mail by including colorized text and a variety of fonts, but not all e-mail software supports HTML mail. Consider writing your newsletter in plain text or offer two mailing lists—one for plain text mailings and the other for HTML e-mail.
Make it Viral
Provide information readers can act on or that stimulates reaction—forwarding it to friends and peers, stimulating purchases or requests for additional information. Make it easy for readers to forward articles and information to peers and friends. Provide a “Tell a Friend” link that enables readers to forward the Newsletter with a personalized note.
Search
Make it easy to find articles of interest and back issues. Provide a table of contents and links to articles within the newsletter and to resources and past articles on your site.
Printability
If you want to give readers an option to print, consider providing “printer-friendly formats” on your website. Make sure your newsletter is physically readable. Avoid anything less than 12 point fonts for the article text. Fancy fonts may look good but can be hard to read when printed. Heading and text fonts should be consistent throughout the newsletter.
If you lack experience in print media, seek out assistance if you know someone in the field. If not, don’t worry—the abovementioned basic principles apply. Plan to research your material thoroughly and avoid factual or editing errors, as they will make you seem less credible.
Personalize
At the very least, address the reader by name. The most successful newsletters have a human being associated with them…and a personality. If possible, your Newsletter should be “written by a person” at your company…not the company.
Language
Not everyone has the range and depth of vocabulary as teachers and linguists do. Use words that are easy to understand, and if you do use technical terms, provide a definition that people can relate to. There is nothing more frustrating then a definition that makes less sense than the word itself. Just write in layman terms and keep it short, simple and straightforward.
Spelling and Grammar Check
Sending out copy with numerous errors creates a negative image to your readers. Aside from using a spell checker, have an outsider edit your final copy for readability, grammar and content.
Test and Track
Test the Newsletter on few e-mail addresses to check for errors and other issues before sending to the entire distribution list. Keep track of results and reactions to your newsletter to come to an understanding for further tweaks and corrections.
Lastly, to summarize the key fundamental features of an e-newsletter, make sure you include:
- Table of Contents
- Hyperlinks for customers who want more information for a featured topic
- Exciting secrets or tips related to your product or service
- Contact information
In conclusion, your newsletter can serve as an extension of your business that will reach out to your customers. It will allow you to maintain regular contact with them and serve as an effective and rewarding addition to your marketing arsenal. These tips should help you put it all together and help you create an exceptional newsletter.
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