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My Top Six Link Building Strategies For Beginners

By Toby Russell in Featured

In this article I want to cover off back links, what they are, why you need them and how to get them. Now if your just starting out you’ll have heard of these but certainly I know for Sam & I when we first started out in internet marketing there’s so much info to take in, it blows your mind so I thought a brief explanation, beginners guide if you will might be handy, so here goes…

What are Links?

Broadly speaking Links are a ‘link’ between your site and another, so as an example you may find a site in the same niche as you links to you because you are not the same but complementary to one another – that’s the basics. You then get ‘one way links’ & ‘back links’- now stay with me on the detail here because One-Way links are also termed back links.

But the unique thing about one-way links is that they do not return a link to the website linking to them, in other words they are not reciprocal. One-way links convey a message to the search engines that the website is so interesting or useful that the other websites had to tell people about it. One way links are the preferred back link for any website owner, so hold onto the concept as we move on.

How Do You Get a One-Way Link?

One way links are achieved is when your website is deemed to have great information and unique content that other websites believe is worthy enough to be referenced by them and shared elsewhere – hope that’s clear and everyone understands it.

Bear in mind also a website will naturally link to another that has content that will consolidate its own site standing. Here are just a few ways you may be able to get or acquire a one-way link status. They are:

Top Tips for Obtaining Back Links

1. Submitting your site to the major online search engine directories such as Yahoo! and Dmoz.org. When you have your link in these websites, your site value will automatically increase.

2. Submit articles to articles directories. There are so many article directories you can submit your article to which will provide you with a back link to your website. Again, as I’ve commented before, if you are submitting manually, still stick to the key directories – that’s where the traffic and ultimately the links will come from.

You can be sure that if it contains quality content someone will click and link back to you. Also bear in mind that by submitting your articles many other website owners looking for quality content will have your article syndicated to them by the directories and in turn your resource box will contain your links back to your website. So, over time you could quite easily have a number of sites featuring your material all linking back to you. This is the power of article marketing.

3. Another way to get one-way links is to search for industry specific search directories and submit your websites to them. There are search directories that are tailored for specific industries e.g. Travel. Getting listed on these directories may be free or at a fee, so you’ll have to decide the worth if you need to pay for it.

4. Create e-books and short reports. When you create e-books and short reports, these can be given away free on the Internet through your website or other avenues. If the e-book has high quality information within it (e.g. Quick hints and tips), you can attract a lot of one-way links over time. You also have the opportunity of a really good report possibly going viral – being passed on to others, friends etc. To achieve that objective, you should include your website on the pages of the e-book or report and embed links within the text.

5. Use videos. Video is a great way to get one-way links to your site. A good video will move around very fast over the Internet. Many Website owners often take an already created video and embed it in their own site to add content and improve the overall design and look.

6. If you have a website that is good and you are confident that it will appeal to other website owners in a similar niche as yours, you can approach them and ask to have your link included on their site. However, the reason why this method should not always be relied on is that more times than not they will demand a reciprocal link. Now this can be ok but unfortunately human nature being what it is people don’t always keep their promises, so just a heads up there.

Top Tip – Also search engines, especially Google, frown on sites with too many reciprocal links. Therefore, although back links are good, if the basis of the link is always reciprocal, it might not achieve the desired result and can actually damage your rankings if you are not careful.

Hope this information helps to get you started with your own link building strategies. It’s important for your online success so don’t sweat it. Do a bit at a time and slowly but surely it will build.

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Toby Russell offers tried and tested methods to help you succeed on line. Find out how to generate highly targeted traffic to your own Internet Marketing business with his popular 94 page Free Special Report, “The Secrets to Starting your Own Internet Business Today” available at =>http://www.startinternetmarketingonline.com

How To Get Your Website Working For You

By Joyce Campbell in Featured

So you have your brand spanking new diploma in your hand, and you are ready to hang your shingle out and open for business. But wait – you know you need a website. So at that point you might invest several hundred pounds (at least), in getting someone to create the perfect website. The colours are stunning, the graphics are amazing. Perhaps it has a nifty little flash thing going on in the header with a montage of meaningful photography. It goes back and forward between you and your designer for weeks, tweaking it till you get it just right.

Then… oops – you need some copy. So you bang something out, get your designer to drop it in for you, and press the go live button. Then you wait. Perhaps for a very long time. I’m not saying your design and branding isn’t important. If you are selling a creative service such as web design, graphic design or photography, then probably it’s very important. Nevertheless, there are a few key things you need to check in your copy, or your website will never work as hard as it should for you.

WIIFM?

When people buy stuff, especially intangible ‘stuff’ like coaching, the question that is always in their minds is ‘What’s in it for me?’ Yet again and again websites and promotional material talk about you. It’s never about you. Just because you think you are great for coming first in the class, your client doesn’t care. They probably don’t care about all those professional organisations you are a member of either. They want to know if you understand their problem and can solve it for them. They want to know the benefits of working with you.

Use Carrots and Sticks

People have different preferences around motivation. If your personal preference is to move towards nice things, then that will be reflected in your writing. However, for a lot of people, they need to feel pain before they will take the first step. So ensure that you understand the pain that your client is facing and talk about how you can solve that – and what will happen if they carry on as they are.

Cut the Jargon

Between any group of people, jargon and abbreviations can be a useful short-hand for communicating what you mean. Your client doesn’t know it, doesn’t need to know it, and certainly doesn’t want to feel confused and patronised by it. Write normally, as if you were having a conversation.

Cut the Fluff

It’s a rare person who lies awake at night worrying that they are not in touch with their authentic selves. I’m not saying that they aren’t disconnected, and that the disconnect isn’t causing them unease – but that is not how they will describe it to themselves. Spend some time talking with your ideal client and discover how they talk about their problems. Use the same language in your website and marketing materials.

Write for the Screen, Not for Paper

People appear to read differently on screen, and you need to provide landmarks for them to hang onto. Use a clear font, at least 12 point, in a sans serif font (ie, a font without twiddly bits on the letters). Have lots of white space, use spaces rather than indents to mark paragraphs, and pick up key points with bold, bullet points, and numbering. Keep paragraphs short – if they are running over 6 lines, go back and shorten them.

Tell Them What You Want Them to Do

The very least you want every visitor to your website to do is to sign up for your free giveaway. So have a sign up box on every page of your website, along with an entry or exit pop up. Have your contact details easily accessible on the site. A contact form will help minimise spam. Don’t do a ‘click here’ link to your email address – fewer and fewer people are using Outlook these days, and it is very frustrating to be using a web based email client and discover that you have no way of discovering the email address unless you install Outlook. Tell them that if they have the problems you outline on your site, then you should talk, and tell them how to contact you.

Don’t Delay List Building

If you aren’t sure exactly what you want your website to say, simply set up a squeeze page initially, and then start list building with your free offer.

Over to you!

Go and have a look at your own website, and run through the checklist below:

1. Is your copy aligned with what you actually do?

2. Check how often you use the words ‘me’ and ‘I’ rather than you – there should be many more of the latter.

3. Cut out the corporate speak – it fools no one. You are (presumably) not a member of the British Royal Family, so there is no need to use ‘we’ when you mean ‘I’.

4. Strip out all the jargon.

5. Re-write in the words your client uses to describe their problems.

6. Have a clear call to action.

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Joyce Campbell is the creator of The Get More Clients System and http://www.TheGetMoreClientsSystem.com. She works with service-based solopreneurs to help them get more clients, make more profit and reach more people. Visit the website to get her free e-course, Six Steps to Ramp Up Your Online Presence. She is also an NLP trainer and author of How to Get Off Your Backside and Live Your Life.

Multiple Domains and SEO (Search Engine Optimization)

By Margaret Winfrey in Featured

Because the search engines, including Google, place a lot of value on the actual words in the domain itself, many people are now trying to Search Engine Optimize their web presence by buying domain names that contain their target keywords.

It’s not a bad strategy because it doesn’t hurt you – but how much does it really help you?

Let’s say you now have 30 domains, all containing your target keywords, but not including your main website. What can you do with them?

1. Keep them registered and do nothing. This prevents competitors from registering them and using them for their benefit. End result: No SEO value, for obvious reasons.

2. Within your registrar’s account, you can set up 301 Permanent Redirects for each one, redirecting them to your main website. End result: No SEO value, but if someone types in the exact domain name of one that you have registered and redirected, he/she will be taken to your main website, so you might get some traffic, but not likely and not much.

3. Use them for a mini-site buildout. This strategy is to actually use each domain on its own by building a mini-website around it. End result: Potentially a TON of SEO value.

Let’s take a look at this “mini-site buildout” strategy; the one with the most SEO value.

One by one, you take each domain and host a site for it. If you have a hosting account for your main website, chances are you can just add on new sites to that same hosting account. This is very common and you can easily find out if you can do this and how you can do this by calling your hosting company to inquire.

Once you have your hosting set up and each domain pointing towards its own mini-site, you then want to build each site.

To build each site most easily, you should do two things: first, plan all the content around your main keyword (the keyword that is in the domain name) to include both articles and videos; and second, develop the site using some type of ready-to-go website template with a built-in CMS (Content Management System). Probably the best CMS to use in this case would be WordPress because it is very user friendly, search engine friendly, easy to set up, and there are a ton of free (and well-designed) templates out there.

OK, so now you’ve got your domains pointing to their own respective mini-sites, you have created all the content for them, developed the sites, and finally published all that content you created on to the sites, hopefully using a CMS like WordPress to do it.

Now, keeping your main website in mind, you’ll want to make sure you drive traffic from your mini-sites to your main website. To do this, simply include content about your main website in those mini-sites and include links going back to your main website. Furthermore, if you have a business phone number and operate over the phone, make sure to include your main business phone number on all those mini-sites.

There are more advanced SEO techniques you should employ but that is way beyond the scope of this information piece.

In conclusion, if you have already invested, or want to invest, in buying multiple domains for SEO purposes, then put them to good use. Keeping them “locked up” unused or simply redirecting them to your main website is not an effective strategy. You want to use them to build out an “Internet empire” with a lot of “Internet real estate” all focused on your target keywords and eventually leading people to your main website and business.

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This article is by TopLine Media Group and Solar Web Tools. TopLine Media Group, located at www.TopLineMediaGroup.com, has 4 distinct service areas: Website Design & Development, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Internet Marketing, and Online Reputation Management.

Solar Web Tools, located at http://www.SolarWebTools.com, provides Domain Registration and Website Hosting services, among many other Internet-related services.

10 Valuable Aspects of a Successful Homepage

By Terri Seymour in Featured

The homepage of your website is often the landing page and is critical to the success of your online business. When people land on this page, you have just a few seconds to capture their interest. This page will be a giant factor in your conversion rate which is the ratio of visitors that respond to your goal action. This goal action can be subscribing to your newsletter, signing up for your ecourse, ordering your products, etc.

Your homepage needs to contain certain elements to be successful in raising your conversion rate. Read the list carefully and check to see if your homepage meets all of the following criteria.

1. Color – The color you choose for your website can have a big effect on your visitors. The type of site you have should be a factor in the colors you choose. There are essentially two types of colors – cool and warm.

Browns, blues and greens are cool colors and can make you feel relaxed, calm and assured. These colors are good for sites pertaining to medicine, relaxation and other sites that have reassuring answers to your problems.

Yellows, reds and oranges are warm colors that bring out feelings of energy, excitement and happiness. These colors work well for exercise sites, sports sites and other energetic type sites.

Purple is a good color for fashion and jewelry sites. It emulates sophistication, royalty, and luxury, but it is also feminine and romantic.

Write A Press Release and Get Backlinks

By Nick Thorne in Featured

Your aim, by crafting a press release, is to get publicity. But there is a way of doing this while ensuring that you get something else that can be valuable to you. I am talking about pushing your website up the search engine rankings. So here is a fantastic marketer’s tip: Always make sure that you send your press release out to the online press release websites. The extra bonus that you can gain from doing this is that while you are displaying your press release to the media, in the hope that they decide to run a story based on it, should they not bother to do so you still win! You see you will be spreading backlinks on the web that are great for SEO and loved by the search engines. Your website needs all sorts of links coming into it and these sort are well worth having in the scheme of things.

The press release should always be a major component of your public relations strategy and as such it should be used wisely. When you begin to plan your piece start by thinking of the five “Ws” that you are going to write about. I am referring to the Who, the What, the When, the Where and the Why. These are so important to the success of the press release because failing to consider them can make the whole exercise a total waste of your time.

Most press pieces are written and distributed by talented PR professionals; but don’t let this put you off as it is certainly not beyond the ability of someone with a good command of English to write one for themselves. Simply aim to keep the following key points in mind as you write.

My Top 12 Tips for Writing a Killer Press Release

1. Capture the media’s attention with a short and punchy first paragraph. It must communicate the ’5 ‘Ws’ and the rest of the press release should be used to expand on them. The main purpose of any press release should be to inform the media about something newsworthy. It should never be used as simply a means of selling your product, that is the job of an advert. Of course, making sales is a wholly honourable by-product of the press release, but not its main function.

2. Always use your keywords in the title because this is what will give you the SEO juice as it duly spreads across the internet.

3. Avoid, however, any temptation to go after longtail keywords in the title.

4. When writing, always use the third person and never ever use “I”.

5. To add some weight to the press release use quotations to communicate your key message in a lively way. Advice that I was given was to quote in a tone that conveys how ‘thrilled’ or ‘excited’ you are to be announcing the news.

6. Verbosity is a killer – write only between 300 and 800 words as a rule.

7. Compose a press release that is newsworthy and not simply a page of hype. Are you sure that what you are writing about can be considered as news? If it’s not really interesting, or exciting news, then don’t bother the press with it because they are certainly not going to be amused. Also, make sure that you can always back up any claims that you have made in the press release.

8. Everyone loves a story, whether it’s about your business or specific people.

9. Target your audience or niche by personalizing your press release.

10. If you are able to, use hyperlinked anchor text in the body. The search engines like this type of backlink.

11. Add images, videos and audio that relate to your product to give it an edge.

12. Lastly, at the bottom of the press release do remember to include your full name, phone number, mobile and email
address so that the media can contact you. This strategy should get you backlinks and the chance of media interest in your newsworthy item.

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Nick Thorne reviews systems and software to help you succeed in your online business. Find out more about how to have your own successful information marketing business and get free mini-course at: =>http://www.informationvideoproducts.com/info/478/how-to-have-your-own-online-business

Why Use Social Media As Part Of Your Marketing Plan

By Cathy Quel in Featured

You most likely are making use of social media to keep in touch with your friends and family but did you know that you can use social media as part of your marketing plan? Do you know the benefits of using social media as part of your marketing plan?

As a small business owner, this type of marketing can certainly draw traffic to your site and then clients to your business. It is a great tool for building a targeted, responsive list. And yet, where do you start with social media and exactly how involved do you need to get?

If you want to grow your business and start increasing your client database, social media is your least expensive and fastest approach to take. Here are three quick ways to get you started in your social media marketing plan.

Utilize LinkedIn to Develop Your Client Base

- First, you should create a real interesting profile for your company and in the interests section, you will want to use your best keyword phrases.

- Make sure that should you have a blog and put the link to your blog in your profile. This is a good method for people to find out just who you are as well as what your company is all about.

- Put your client list into relevant groups and start communicating with them.

- Utilize LinkedIn as a way to recruit clients for your business and also to get your message out there.

Utilize Facebook to Promote Your Business

- Create groups in Facebook and interact with those groups regularly.

- If you are submitting content to article submission sites, some of these directories have areas where you can place your Facebook and Twitter facts. Then, every time you submit an article to the directory, the directory will instantly publish your post on your Facebook and Twitter accounts.

- If your group members and clients have Facebook pages, make comments on their pages. Assist and address their inquiries.

- Make “friends” with others in your niche topic area

Just keep in mind, when you are making use of social media sites for business, building a very good relationship with your friends is more crucial compared to the quantity of friends you have. As you increase your Facebook friends list and converse with your clients frequently, you will see internet traffic increase to your internet site.

Make use of Twitter to Increase Your Business Presence in Social Media

- Utilizing Twitter, you’ll want to generate lists which are specific to particular topics and you’ll need to join lists that have to do with your topic.

- A good suggestion for Twitter exposure is to give away a weekly report on your theme. Don’t forget to include a “Please Re-Tweet” or an RT so that people will spread your information throughout the web.

- Utilize the # hashtags and follow people where appropriate.

Some recommendations when starting to use your social media marketing plan:

1. Don’t invest a great deal of time on the social media sites. Only spend about 15 minutes or so on each site.

2. Your daily approach should be to make good and related comments on good and related posts. Remember to use images.

3. Grow relationships with your followers and gather your own friends with your opt-in pages.

4. Don’t neglect your picture, a professional picture, on your pages. Those who use social media sites want to see who they are corresponding with.

In summary, social media sites should be part of your business marketing plan. The thing to remember is to build strong relationships with people but not to invest lots of time doing it. Just begin small and let go from there.

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Would you like to learn more about using Social Media to increase your business? If that is the case, download my free Social Marketing Guide here: http://workonlinesuccess.com/Free-Reports/Socialmarketing.html Visit my website at http://workonlinesuccess.com

The Google+ Promise

By Tamara Jacobs in Featured

With the recent launch of Google’s social network there has been a lot of discussion over whether this Google venture will actually take off, and whether it has the ability to supersede the biggest social network on the planet, Facebook.

In many ways Google+ has advantages over Facebook. For starters it can use Facebook as its blueprint for what to do and what not to do. While Facebook saw a fast evolution of success, it still took a couple of years for brands to catch on to the commercial potential of the platform and for it to become an open platform (previously was exclusively for university students).

Another main advantage Google has over Facebook is that it’s the world’s largest search engine. Google currently accounts for two-thirds of every internet search. These features will be integrated into the social platform to expand its reach as well as what it can offer its users.

Many of Google+’s features will be the same as Facebook’s which begs the question, why would people want to change platforms? Facebook, in many ways, has become a social home for its users. People have been on in since 2004, and have connected with hundreds of new and old friends. Their photos and personal information are all there, so why would they start from scratch? Knowing this, Google+ has to differentiate their offering in as many ways as they can. A few unique features it has are:

1. Circles: ‘The easiest way to share things with college buddies, others with your parents and almost nothing with your boss.’ Divide people into circles ie. ski crew, San Diego peeps, Nan & Grandpa and communicate with them in a relevant, organised and focused way.

2. Hangouts: ‘Let friends know that you’re free for a video hangout any time, anywhere. Then catch up, watch YouTube or just hang out. With hangouts, the unplanned meet-up comes to the web for the first time. Let specific buddies (or entire circles) know you’re hanging out and then see who drops by for a face-to-face chat.’

3. Sparks: ‘A feed of only the things that you’re really into, so when you’re free, there’s always something waiting to be watched, read or shared.’ If you’re into fashion, tell Sparks and it will send you stuff it thinks you’ll like.

Moreover, Google+ offers:

– Integrated Google advertising
– Excellent data and analytics
– Integration with Google Apps
– Customer sign up for specific channels
– Video chat and hangouts

– Segmenting and organizing brand customers/fans/influencers for insight

– Business user appeal
– Extension of SEO
– Encouragement for users to +1 search listings

– Could offer customized skin options for brands – like YouTube, unlike Facebook

– Hangout + YouTube Live integration (in progress) – watch and chat simultaneously

– future Maps and Places integration

– Search – Google’s universal search will be stronger than Facebook

– Users the option to subscribe to official Google blog, G+ developers and Google Labs

It’ll be interesting to see what’s in store for Google+.

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Article by Tamara Jacobs. Adaptive Consultancy is a London-based digital agency specializing in web development, design, ecommerce and internet marketing. Services include search engine optimization, paid search, email and social media marketing. For more on online marketing companies visit http://www.adaptiveconsultancy.com/

Four Types of Blogs and How To Use Them

By Enzo F. Cesario in Featured

Blogging clearly has arrived and is here to stay, according to the buzzword-slinging set. It’s the “next big thing” or the “wave of the future” – even a “revolution.” Still, most of the people commenting on the blogging trend aren’t sure exactly what it is, how it works or even what the different kinds of blogs are. Blogging already has taken a myriad of forms. Born when dial-up was still the standard, it came of age during the rise of broadband and now its text-based roots are giving way to podcasts and video blogging. To that end, here are a handful of blogging types and what sets them apart from the others.

Type 1 – Classic/Personal

This most basic blog type harkens back to the earliest days of Livejournal. These blogs serve as simple, personal accounts of thoughts and experiences. They’re records of the user’s life, things that interest him or appeal to her. They can record personal journeys both physical and mental, as in the case of blogging an exciting road trip or a reader’s attempt to get through the entire canon of a particular author.

Brand It: The real value of personal blogs is twofold. In our increasingly online culture, people have expressed feelings of isolation and disconnect from society. Thus, the thirst for personal information and details is growing. People want to hear personal stories from folks they are interested in, and these blogs give them a window into the humanity of others. Secondly, personal blogs that persist more than a year or two grow over time, maturing with the author. They change focus and grow more refined as time goes on, allowing the readers to have a sense of growing along with the subject of their reading. Thus, personal blogs can serve to help an established or even a growing brand make a personal connection right with its audience.

Type 2 – The Watchblog

It has been mentioned before, but blogging has some of the greatest potential to undermine corruption and totalitarianism ever seen. During the recent elections in Iran, bloggers brought out stories of abuse and corruption. Bloggers and their quick dissemination of information have exposed stories of police brutality, corporate misconduct and government gaffes overnight. There are entire blogs dedicated to exactly this kind of effort, carrying nothing but stories that expose the indefensible actions of those who cannot abide in a lawful society.

Brand It: The real power of this kind of blog in brand building is in the building up of public trust. Trust is fundamental to all business and branding. If there’s no trust in a brand, people simply won’t buy. Thus, people who expose breaches of this trust gain a certain level of credibility themselves. Similarly, this kind of blog can promote good conduct as well as expose bad conduct, creating a web of trusted providers that becomes mutually validating and prosperous.

Type 3 – Satire and Snark

Laughter is all-powerful. If a man argues with his opponent, he grants that opponent a certain level of respect; obviously the two viewpoints must be equal, or at least commensurate, or there would be no argument. However, if a man can get people to laugh at his opponent, then there need be no argument… ridicule does the work for him. Such is the power of a satirical blog. Whether done through biting and clever writing, simple sarcastic commentary or just posting ridiculous videos of politicians who betray their own ignorance, this kind of blog allows people to laugh at the matters presented and bring out a message by implication rather than overt pounding.

Brand It: One of the most powerful tools available in the world of blogging is the ability to laugh at oneself. People who have a sense of humor about their own failings are often conversely taken quite seriously. Point out a foible or two that popped up in recent meetings. Discuss hilarious absurdities in your industry. Take a famous mistake your advertising department made and have a laugh at it. Harness peoples’ desire to laugh, and you will genuinely have an audience worth keeping.

Type 4 – Interviewing

This is where blogging best shows its roots in classic journalism. An interview with an authority on some subject lends credibility to an article, and builds trust in the publication. As said above, people want to hear what others are thinking; they want that connection with the world around them. Having a more human element, interviews can provide this connection if handled well.

Brand it: The trick with interview-oriented blogs is to keep the material interesting for your audience. If a blog focusing on fashionable apparel were to interview an engineer on the scientific stresses that go into clothing fibers and manufacturing, most of the audience would probably fall asleep. On the other hand, if that same engineer were to explain in simple terms that the use of one fiber allows for thinner thread and thus smaller seams, and show the difference in two fashion photo spreads, that might interest the target audience more.

A Last Thought – It was touched on only briefly, but always remember that the blog is driven by audience expectations as much as by the focus of the brand itself. The brand exists in the mind of the audience or it doesn’t exist, so the blog must reflect that in tone and content. It’s also advisable to pick a type or even mix among the types in order to best capture these expectations, rather than choosing a type based solely on the projections of the brand.

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Enzo F. Cesario is an online branding specialist and co-founder of Brandsplat, a digital content agency. Brandsplat creates blogs, articles, videos and social media in the “voice” of our client’s brand. It makes sites more findable and brands more recognizable. For the free Brandcasting Report go to http://www.BrandSplat.com/ or visit our blog at http://www.iBrandCasting.com/

Deceptive Marketing: A Necessary Evil for Search Marketers?

By Jill Whalen in Featured

A few years ago, I read a good article by Canadian SEO Melanie Nathan called “The Reciprocity Link Building Method” in which she outlined a technique she sometimes used to build up high-quality links for her clients’ websites. The gist, as I understood it, was to first find a website that would be good for your client’s site to link to. Then you’d click around to see if any of their current links were broken (went to dead pages or sites). If you found some, you’d use this information as an opening to start a dialogue with the site owner or webmaster, and eventually mention your client’s site as a substitute for one of the broken links. I thought it was a very clever idea, a great way to make contacts in your client’s industry, and a win-win for everyone involved.

More recently I saw another article on this topic by Nick LeRoy, a search marketer in the Minneapolis area. Nick talked about the same basic technique Melanie had mentioned, and added a real-life example email he had used. In his example email, he mentioned to the webmaster that he had a favorite site from which he liked to buy stuff for his son on birthdays and holidays. Nick again mentioned “his son” in a follow-up email, saying that he liked the products at this particular website because they made his son think.

All sounds good so far, right? Except that Nick doesn’t have a son!

I made the following comment on the post:

Blog Management – Go Blog Wild

By Enzo F. Cesario in Featured

Maintaining a blog is about much more than simply presenting the latest news in the life of a person or a brand. A good blog is about conveying the writer’s personality and interests to his audience. To that end, the comments section should be one of the liveliest parts of a blog. In addition, there should be an array of links available to promote similar or interesting sites for the readers, and the content should be on-topic and creative.

One of the most interesting things about the web is the ease with which people can organize events. Flash mobs are a great example of this: A quick handful of tweets or SMS messages, and kids show up at a public school to perform an elaborate dance routine in protest against bullying. Blogging can take advantage of this same phenomenon, using the web to advocate causes or interests that appeal to their readers, increasing readership by making waves in the online pool.

Blog-a-Thon

The original signature blogging event, and likely the one that did the most work in bringing blogging to the mainstream that it now enjoys, Blog-a-Thon is an annual, 24-hour event. Bloggers sign up, then write posts continuously for 24 hours in order to raise money for charity. Rules vary, such as writing a post per hour, or having to write a guest post on another blog every third hour. Donation schemes also vary, with some readers contributing set amounts and others paying per post.

Above all, this is a charity event. But at the heart of it, Blog-a-Thon is also a significant publicity tool. People used to coming by a blog just a few times a week can check in constantly with their favorite blogger. It’s a creative challenge for the writer, as well, both physically and mentally. It can do wonderful things for a blogger’s career, allowing them to exercise their mind in unique ways and open up a kind of pressure valve that overwhelms writer’s block in a wave of pure content.

Blog-a-Thon took a hiatus in 2010, but is slated to return this summer.

Blogging Circles

A blogging circle is very similar to a writing circle. A handful of bloggers, typically at least 5 but potentially many more, get together and agree to write on a particular topic. One begins the chain, putting together the initial post on the topic, and “tags” the next blogger at the end of the post. They pick up the chain and run with it, and it goes on and on as the thought evolves.

This is a great way to develop some cross-audience interest between blogs, encouraging the readers of various blogs to look into new places and grow the audiences of each. That’s one of the interesting things about blog audiences — they aren’t like political party members, only able to help one entity. If the same 500 people read 4 blogs, each of those blogs has an audience of 500. So share those readers, and try out a blogging circle.

NaNoWriMo

National Novel Writing Month is an interesting event. For 30 days in November, participants are expected to write continuously, about 1,700 words a day, until 50,000 words are reached. Depending on the focus of your blog, taking advantage of NaNo can be an interesting change of pace for your audience. It is particularly popular among creatively minded blogs, though brands focusing on activism of some stripe may also find it enlightening to participate as the blogger crafts a story about the topic the readers are interested in.

The idea here is to post either excerpts from or the entire contents of the day’s writing output. This brings the audience along in the formation of the story, very similar to the serial format of novels Charles Dickens was so famous for.

Again, this isn’t for everyone. Nuts and bolts blogs about home repair or market analysis will probably find little overlap with NaNo’s mission.

Inside the Box, Outside the Box — Whatever You Do, Think!

The idea isn’t that all or any of these events is necessarily appropriate to any given blog. Each one has its merits, but our aforementioned market analysis blog may not find any of them particularly useful. However, most blogs will, and even those that don’t can find some manner of event to participate in that can gather the attention and promote new interest from its readers.

The key is to be willing to innovate and try new things. Blogging isn’t a hard-and-fast science; as said above, it’s largely personality-driven. Talk to other bloggers and gain their insights about such events. Consider organizing a miniature blog-off of your own, or try out the writing circle idea every Friday for a month. If someone suggests a different type of event you haven’t heard of, give it a try.

The audiences on the web have a reputation for being unforgiving, but that’s only half the picture. People like routine and will stick around for their favorite sources of information even if they try a few experiments that don’t quite work out. The key is to be honest about things, and to always try to engage your audience with any particular experiment.

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Enzo F. Cesario is an online branding specialist and co-founder of Brandsplat, a digital content agency. Brandsplat creates blogs, articles, videos and social media in the “voice” of our client’s brand. It makes sites more findable and brands more recognizable. For the free Brandcasting Report go to http://www.BrandSplat.com/ or visit our blog at http://www.iBrandCasting.com/

© Copyright 2012 All rights reserved. Jayde Online, Inc.

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