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Five SEO Strategies that Will Work in 2015

It seems that everytime Google announces an algorithm update, every site owner and SEO marketer would clasp their hands together and hope that all the time and hard work spent at ranking their sites up wouldn’t go up in smoke overnight. And before the year 2014 ended, that very same search engine provider gave everyone a Christmas present, in the form of one of its famous algo updates.

So, as Google continues to enforce their Content Creation Strategy, Content Marketing, Effective Content Strategy, Get Found Online, Off-Page SEO, On-Page SEO, social media marketinghold in search engine superiority, the site owners should also try to do their best to make sure they don’t get on its bad side. That’s why with the dawn of the new year, it’s time to make some new SEO adaptations as well.

These are the things you should look out for in your SEO strategies for 2015.

 

 

 

Broad Keywords Don’t Cut It Anymore

Using general one-word keywords have resulted in great traffics for sites that have successfully opted for them, however, the strategy of using them is slowly getting unconventional. They rank slow and take a lot of time, effort and money to do so. Now, long-tail keyword phrases are becoming the favored ones as they get the attention of the right traffic for one’s site. Ranking up these keywords will be much easier as they will obviously have lesser competition compared to short-tailed keywords.

Doing your research for the best keyword phrase before picking one will always be the optimal marketing strategy. Plan your moves ahead and try to determine which keywords will your consumers likely use when searching for your business niche.

ROI Metrics > Keyword Rankings

While showing up on the top of the rankings for relevant search queries does sound nice for your business, it won’t do anything good unless you get some cash flowing in. Focusing your efforts solely on strengthening your keyword rankings is a foolhardy move – instead, you should avert your efforts to determining how your return on investments are going. If anything else, knowing how many inbound links, leads and sales you’ve gained on your latest marketing efforts would definitely be better than hearing a report on how you’re doing on your keyword rankings.

Trying Out Other Search Engines

When it comes to search engine providers, Google is King. However, that doesn’t mean the others should just be tossed aside. There’s Yahoo and Bing to name a few major players in this game as well. The decision of Firefox to use Yahoo instead of Google as their default search engine speaks volumes of how the search engine industry might be undergoing an upheaval – this is further followed by the expiration of Google’s contract with Safari as well.

So while Google should remain as your main search engine focus, making sure your site is also visible on other search engines would also be very beneficial for you.

Organic Link Building

One truth that remained unchanged ever since SEO was introduced was the importance of links. On the first stages, a lot marketers and site owners alike managed to exploit these links to put their sites to the top of Google’s SERPs, but that only made Google pissed. When they released Panda, these unethical and downright spammy linkbuilding strategies also made their exit. Blackhat SEO still utilize the use of this, but if you’re discovered by Google, consider your site ranking gone.

What one needs to do is to build links naturally. Create posts and post them on popular sites or create great content for your viewers to link back to you. There are a lot of methods out there that you can use to those links honestly without having to get on Google’s bad side

Social Media Application

Facebook and Twitter aren’t simply sites where people interact with one another. These platforms have also become quite efficient tools when it comes to marketing. However, most of these netizens have finally wised up to various marketing strategies in social media. What you need to do this time is to make your approaches up close and personal.

Try to get to know your viewers and readers and interact with them. Don’t just shoot up some random post from your site and expect them to read all about it. Your social media outlets aren’t just a means to share your content easily – it’s an effective tool to get to know your clients better by interacting with them.

Google will continue to apply the necessary changes it sees fit in order to provide the best experience for their users so that they, in turn, will continue using them. And along with those changes, how we see and apply SEO will constantly change as well.

About the author:

Ruben Licera Jr.Ruben Licera Jr is a new media enthusiast and has written several articles on internet marketing specifically web design, search engine optimization and social media management. You can follow him via Google+ and Twitter .

 

 

 

 

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How Governments are Winning The War on Social Media and Content Marketing

content marketing, corporate blogging, whitepaper creation, ebook creation, social media content marketingWhen it comes to having an enormous amount of content online, local, State and US Federal Governments must rank high in the vast amount of information available on the world wide web. They even offer a website where you can assure yourself that social media sites advertising that they are from our government, are in fact, actually a part of the .gov family.

But these government agencies often struggle with social networking, similar to the medical and financial industries, they are bound by a completely different set of rules and regulations than the average business. Yet still, there are some notable successes when developing smart strategies for content marketing success.

Here are some examples of how our local, State and Federal governments are teaming up to keep us informed and well-educated, from sea to shining sea, during some very difficult times:

Major Construction Ordeal in San Francisco

Many years after repairs were made to the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge following the devastating damage from the Loma Prieta Earthquake, a massive project was launched to replace a huge, unsafe section of the bridge. The eastern span replacement was the largest public works project in California history, with an estimated cost at over $6.4 billion dollars, it took over eleven years to complete, eventually making it the widest bridge in the world.

This “Bay” bridge carries one-third of traffic from all the California state owned bridges combined and the resulting gridlock, traffic jams, temporary closures and detours were challenging to say the least. Although the bridge re-opened in 2013, during the decade long construction and transition, the City of San Francisco teamed up with CalTrans, Bay Area Toll Authority, California Transportation Commission, local news services and social media to keep the public informed during this harrowing process. Although minor repairs continue, it is a beautiful site on the SF Bay, comparable to many other great bridges in our nation.

The First Lady’s Nationwide Campaign

Mrs. Michelle Obama has been very busy promoting her “Let’s Move” campaign against childhood obesity and endorsing her platform for a more active, health-conscious, future for our nation’s children. Initially, upon launch back in 2010, she was quoted as saying, “The physical and emotional health of an entire generation and the economic health and security of our nation is at stake.”

The First Lady has been effectively utilizing Facebook, Instagram and Twitter to promote a healthier, more active lifestyle for our children. Posting recipes, videos and pictures from her campaign across multiple channels, Mrs. Obama has also gained celebrity endorsements from famous chefs, comedians and actors across the nation.

Federal Assistance

Our federal government is often there to lend a helping hand, especially during times of tragedy, but there are also over 120 agencies listed on the fed’s website that show their connection to social media, everything from agriculture to The White House. Here our nation’s citizens and small businesses can get assistance from a variety of different branches of our government and see which social media platforms they are utilizing:

  • Consumer Financial Protection
  • Consumer Product Safety
  • Energy Efficiency
  • Federal Housing Financing
  • Medicare and Medicaid
  • Minority Business Development
  • Securities and Exchange Commission
  • Small Business Administration
  • Veterans Health and Benefits

 

While awards are commonly given for big government contracts, perhaps the City by the Bay and our First Lady are worthy of consideration for their achievements with a different kind of recognition. They have both overcome tremendous challenges using content marketing and social media to reach their important audience and ultimately their goals.

 

Megan RitterAuthors Bio:

Megan Ritter is a proud graduate of Marketing from The University of California. Since then she has been working at various Marketing agencies while always submitting informative articles on websites, drawing from her research and experience. Get in touch with Megan on Facebook, Google+ and Twitter.

 

 

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5 Critical Steps for Creating a Lead Generation Strategy

 If you want to make sure you reach all your lead generation goals, you need to make sure you have a good strategy in place.

The good news is that it doesn’t take a lot of work to make sure you’re doing the best job possible.

We have collected a list of the five critical steps you need to create a lead generation strategy that will work wonders for you and allow you to excel no matter what industry you’re working in. Keep reading if you want to learn how to make sure you see results.

Photo credits: CreateNWE – European Project

Creating a Lead Generation Strategy

Here’s a look at five specific steps you need to take to increase your lead generation numbers and get better results no matter what industry you’re in currently.

  1. Identify Target Market – The first step you want to take is to clearly identify your target market. Who are you going after? This can be further subdivided into smaller groups of people – and should be – but you want to start with a general overview of your target.

  2. Build Your List – After you know who you’re targeting, you’ll want to come up with a list of leads from various sources. This may entail researching online or learning about potential leads from people in your network.

  3. Offer Value – Before you approach people, it’s a good idea to think about how you’re going to be offering them value. If you skip this step, you’re going to find that it’s harder to get people interested in your pitch. Take the time to really think about how you can offer your different targets real value for their time or money.

  4. Create the Offers – Next, you want to make sure you come up with several different ways of pitching your offer depending on who you’re talking to on your list of potential targets. Having this information before you start trying to generate leads can make all the difference in the world. If you want to avoid wasting time, this is something that needs to be done.

  5. Target Demographic – Knowing as much as you can about your target demographic is important. For example, if you’re trying to generate leads for a six sigma green belt training class, you’re going to want to make sure you target the right people. In most cases, they’re going to fall into an age range that will make it easier to identify and target them online.

By using the five step process listed above, you’re going to have a lot better chance of actually converting leads into sales, which should be your main goal in the first place. No matter what industry you’re in, taking the time to come up with a proper lead generation strategy beforehand is essential for your success. If you have any tips or advice to add, feel free to leave a comment below and let us know what you do to increase your chances of converting leads whether they’re cold or hot.

About the author:

SEO in 2050: The Future is...Adam Prattler is a consultant for search engine optimization ny and has been working since the last 6 years. With a degree in engineering and a graduation in design, he believes he has the ability to look at from every aspect, be it technology, content or design. You can connect with Adam on LinkedIn, Google Plus, Facebook  and Twitter.

 

 

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SEO in 2050: The Future is…

content marketing, corporate blogging, whitepaper creation, ebook creation, social media content marketing

Photo credits: Thos Ballantyne

Search engine optimization has been around since the very early days of the world wide web. Having said that, it’s gone through many changes over the years. In fact, SEO in 2014 may be unlike anything that has come before. While the basics still apply – like quality over quantity – there are a lot of other things that are necessary in order to compete. Rather than another boring 2014 predictions post, we thought we’d get out the time machine and make some long range predictions for the SEO industry.

SEO in 2050

This is not your grandfather’s SEO by any means. Here’s a peek at some of what might be happening in the SEO world in 2050 and beyond.

  • SEO Robots – While ‘bots exist online now, in the future Google and other companies will likely let real life robots loose into the world. Whether it’s their car that drives itself or something else they invent with all the robotics companies they’re buying up quickly, there’s a good chance that Google’s index will start to invade the “real world” before 2050.

  • Real Names – Anonymity on the web – truly being anonymous – is becoming more difficult with each passing year. By 2050, there’s a good chance that the only SEO that will work will be tied to a verifiable human. Perhaps Google’s army of robots will actually come to your house to make sure you are who you say you are online – and then rank you appropriately.

  • SEO Hobbyists – In the very early days of search engine optimization, it was easy for anyone who spent a little time studying to be able to see results on their own. That has changed over the years, however. Today, many SEO professionals have concentrated on one single area. The era of a jack of all trades SEO approach is over as it takes a team of dedicated people to get anything done.

  • Search Engine Wars – By 2050, there’s a good chance that the search engine wars will finally be over, with one company – probably Google – being the sole survivor. By this time, Google may have swallowed Microsoft and other companies to become a massive monopoly on a scale never before seen on the planet. Sound crazy? Wait and see what happens. Remember Demolition Man.

No one can know the future for certain, but it’s a lot of fun to make predictions – especially so far into the future. We’d like to get your input as well – something that will be very important for SEO in 2050. So leave your thoughts below and share your predictions with the rest of us. Depending on how old you are currently, you may be around long enough to come back in 36 years to see if we were correct or not.

When it comes to SEO, business professionals like Leonard Albanese are constantly learning about new methods and techniques. This helps him and others make sure their professional image online isn’t tarnished at all.

About the author:

5 Things you must know About BloggingAdam Prattler is a consultant for search engine optimization ny and has been working since the last 6 years. With a degree in engineering and a graduation in design, he believes he has the ability to look at from every aspect, be it technology, content or design. You can connect with Adam on LinkedIn, Google Plus, Facebook  and Twitter.

 

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Do You Panic When Facebook Goes Down?

Is-Facebook-DownIf you’re a basic Facebook user and find that dreaded “Maintenance” or “Page cannot be displayed” message when logging onto the site, you might get a bit frustrated after multiple attempts to refresh. However, you’ll ultimately just go over to YouTube or Twitter to bide your time. Though what if you’re a marketer using Facebook? When you hear those two dreaded words, Facebook down, how do you handle it?

Many marketers begin to panic, and maybe for good reason. There’s a lot of time and money tied up in the site, and you can never be sure if it’s just down for a few minutes or if it will be down for days or weeks. However, there’s a lesson to be learned from the basic user out there. Don’t fly into a panic. Just bide your time and do other things. Here are a few things you can try if you find a Facebook crash in the future.

How to Handle Business When Facebook is Down

1: Vent Via Social Media

Take your frustrations to social media and use the downtime to your advantage. For instance, if you have a Twitter following, the odds are great that many of them also use Facebook and are also frustrated that it’s down. You don’t have to bash or curse the site, but you can float some tweets out there gauging the atmosphere and voicing your personal dislike of the situation. “What do you guys think about the Facebook crash?” There will probably be trending hashtags you can use, if you’re not creating them yourself, like, for example, “#FacebooksDead” or “#ConstantCrash.”

2: Track Your Data

Instead of twiddling your thumbs as if your collective hopes and dreams are tied up in one social media site, take this opportunity to perform some analytics checks and see if you need to tweak anything when the site comes back online. Take a loot at how your campaign is going, how your ads have been performing, and other key aspects of your campaign. You have a chance here to come back stronger.

3: Try Your Facebook Material on an Alternative Outlet

The reason some marketers get very angry and end up in a panic is that they had plans to use Facebook that instant but can’t now because it’s down. For instance, they may have created a new detailed post that they were sure would draw engagement. If this is a situation you find yourself in, you can wait for Facebook to come back, or you could try your luck with an alternate outlet. You might be able to draw more buzz and engagement by releasing the material elsewhere. At least think about releasing it in another location first.

4: Plan Your Reentry

When Facebook is down, you also have a good opportunity to take your time to plan your reentry. Using the tip above and assuming you had a great post ready to be launched, rethink your approach. You could create a lot of buzz by being the first page your fans see with an entertaining post about Facebook’s crash. For instance, creating a poll about how aggravated people are or something along those lines can really draw a big crowd ready to engage.

5: Speak to Your Fans Personally

If you have the contact information of some of your fans, like their email addresses or mobile information, you could send out a quick message to them and use Facebook’s status as a great talking point to start an ongoing dialogue. It also endears you more to your fans by showing a real side and a real interest in social media interactions. Facebook being down doesn’t have to be a waste in any fashion.

Facebook has great up time, solid servers, and they’re usually able to handle even the biggest updates while the site is still functioning. However, every site experiences crashes and downtime, and Facebook will be no exception in the future. So if you ever manage to encounter a crash, just remember not to panic. Use the time to engage with fans in a different way.

About the author: 

simon campbell Simon Campbell, a writer from a Facebook ad campaign tool – Qwaya. He loves to write different topics about social media and participates in some communities and forums. You can connect with Simon on  Twitter.

 

 

 

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Primary Research: An Effective Content Strategy for Building Brand Authority

content marketingContent marketing professionals are continually trying to find the most effective strategies for reaching their target audiences, building brand authority and establishing a strong presence on the Web.

Many digital marketers rely on tactics like search engine optimization (SEO), traditional blog posts, articles, case-studies, videos and Podcasts to disseminate their messaging and earn the attention of their potential customers. The purpose of these tactics is to provide your audience with useful information that they could not find elsewhere.

However, with so many organizations turning to content marketing, it has been increasingly difficult to stay ahead of the curve and keep the attention of your target audiences.

One creative way to avoid this growing problem is to conduct your own high-quality primary research. This strategy takes effort and time, but it could be the determining factor that raises your brand’s authority over that of your competitor. By conducting original market research, you have a way to provide unique information that is relevant to your customers and is not available elsewhere. This primary research not only has the potential to earn social shares and links, it also holds the promise of building your brand’s credibility and trustworthiness within your market.

Janna Finch, Managing Editor at Software Advice, a company that researches marketing software applications and trends, recently published an article that provides four quality examples of companies who have successfully implemented this strategy. Here is a short summary of Finch’s report:

“2013 Email Marketing Metrics Benchmark Study”

Silverpop is one of the premier marketing automation platforms on the market. It helps marketers personalize their mobile, email and social interactions with their customers. Silverpop is already considered one of the most authoritative and trustworthy brands in its market, but its “2013 Email Marketing Metrics Benchmark Study” helped solidify its leadership. This report analyzed all the email correspondence sent by 2,787 brands in 40 countries. The report looks at important email marketing metrics like click-through rates, open rates, message sizes and list churn metrics.

Silverpop not only calculated the averages, their team also included mean, median and quartile states by industry and region. This breakdown of their data made it easy for marketers to benchmark their own performance. By publishing an in-depth study on key marketing metrics, Silverpop is providing a clear signal to their customers that its brand is an authority in the market, and that it can be trusted. The company’s report also earned a great detail of social and Web exposure. The report was linked to 206 times on 48 different domains.

“2013 Search Engine Ranking Factors Survey”

For over a decade, Moz.com has been an authority on all things SEO. Their customers have come to expect high-quality research and content on a regular basis. Moz recently undertook a primary research project to help maintain its reputation and leadership in the SEO community. The team at Moz surveyed more than 120 search marketers and collected their responses on more than 80 search engine ranking factors. This survey helped build a comprehensive picture of what characteristics were most likely (or not likely) to affect the ranking of a URL on a search engine results page.

Moz presented its findings in easy-to-read graphs with filtering features that help digital marketers easily digest their research, and share their findings. They also provided easy-to-understand written summaries to further make the survey easily accessible. Moz’s report was well-executed and provides digital marketers with content they could not easily find on their own. This made it an extremely popular report that was shared extensively over the Web and social media. The Moz report earned 693 links from 199 different root domains, and more than 3,000 social shares. This level of coverage helped reinforce Moz’s authority with search marketers, and helped keep the brand at the top of its market.

“2013 Digital Marketing Optimization Survey Results”

Adobe helps digital marketers measure and optimize their content at every step of the process. It is essential that its brand distinguish itself as a leader in the marketing industry. Adobe’s report “2013 Digital Marketing Optimization Survey Results” is a great example of how their team used primary research to build their brand’s authority.

The report analyzed the responses from over 1,858 digital markets from North America, Asia and Europe. Their report highlights what digital markets think are essential to achieving success in their field. Adobe’s findings were consolidated into easy-to-read graphs and narrative summaries.

This survey was spread extensively on the Web and social media, which helped promote the brand’s authority and trustworthiness. According to a LinkedIn case study, Adobe’s report had a profound impact on its reputation with marketers. The case study found that after reviewing the report, marketing professionals were “50 percent more likely to agree that Adobe is shaping the future of digital marketing.” This case study provides great evidence that primary research can be an effective branding tool, and can help raise your company’s market leadership above the competition.

These three examples help showcase how primary research is an effective content marketing and branding tool at the disposal of marketing professionals. Undertaking a high-quality primary research project is not an easy task, but it could be what separates your brand from the rest of the pack.

Have you ever used primary research to build your brand’s authority and trustworthiness? Please leave a comment below and share your experience with us.

 

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The Best SEO Tools For Keyword Research

One of the most important factors, determining the success of your website, is the so-called SEO (or Search Engine Optimization). When developing your business website, one of the first things that you need to consider is its SEO. In the field of Internet marketing, SEO is what gives you the opportunity to spread your business. It allows you to target your customers and concentrate all of your marketing strategy on the right group of visitors. This is extremely important, since you will be able to understand all their needs. You will know what their interests are; what they want to read more or less about and how to satisfy their needs.
SEO Tools For Keyword Research
When it comes to SEO, there are several things that need to be said. If you want to achieve some positive results, you will have to give your visitors unique content. Useful information, that will make them visit your website over and over again.
In this article we will provide for you some further information about another very important step in the process of SEO optimization – Keyword research.
When searching for a certain service, product or information on the Internet, people tend to write the shortest description of this particular product. Usually this description is limited in one or two key words or some key phrase. In order to get in the first pages of Google, you will have to be familiar with these words. Here are some of the best Keyword Research Tools:

Keyword Discovery

This is the first tool in our list. Keyword Discovery allows you to pull data from the most popular search engines and discover the best keywords. You can see the historical trends of these words and find out how effective they were. It is among the most useful tools for keyword research.

Google AdWords Tool

Google AdWords Tool
Here is another very useful tool. This fantastic Keyword Research Tool gives you the great opportunity to discover the most effective and currently popular keywords. You can write a certain keyword into the search bar and see a list of other popular keywords that are related to yours. This can be very useful if you want to brodaen your keyword research.

WordStream’s Keyword Tool

This great tool is suitable not only for making your SEO keyword research, but also for your PPC research. With WordStream’s Tool you can easily write some certain groups of keywords and it will immediately give you some useful suggestions. And the best part is that it is completely free!

YouTube Keyword Research Tool

Here is our last suggestion. Did you know that after Google, YouTube is the second biggest search engine? Millions of people all over the world use YouTube to watch, upload, comment and share videos. If you are a really good marketer, then you definitely know that YouTube can become a really big part of your marketing strategy. YouTube Keyword Tool is similar to the previous ones. It can give you plenty of useful information about the best keywords. It can give some really creative and functional ideas on how for your video marketing.

 

Rose Finchley 298x300 Create Effective Action Button Following These GuidelinesAuthor Bio: Rose Finchley is freelance blogger and writer. Her current interests include finance.

You can connect with Rose on LinkedIn, Pinterest and Google+

 

 

 

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Create Effective Action Button Following These Guidelines

call to action buttonWhen it comes to WordPress optimization, people often tend to neglect the benefits of the so called ‘call to cation buttons’. These are buttons, that solicit actions from your website visitors. Usually they either lead to another page of the same website, or link to a signup, sale or download.

If you have decided to create such buttons for your website, there are a few simple steps that you will need to follow. Steps, which will make these buttons much more attractive and efficient. In this article we will provide you a short guide containing a few easy steps for creating action buttons. But first – What are the main types of ‘call to action’ buttons?

  • ‘Add to cart’ buttons – These buttons are very commonly used in e-commerce websites. Very typical for this type of buttons is the use of simple wordings such as ‘Add to cart’ and ‘Buy Now’ as well as the use of icons (in most cases a cart or a bag);
  • ‘Download’ buttons – It is pretty clear what these buttons are all about;
  • ‘Learn More’ buttons – Such buttons are usually linked to another page of the same website, tempting visitors to look for some further information on the topic they are interested in;
  • ‘Signup’ buttons – Once again, the title explains their main functions.

Of course, there are plenty of other types of ‘call to action’ buttons, but these four are considered as the most common ones. So, if you want to optimize your website by adding such buttons to its overall layout, the first thing that you will have to do is consider the best type for you. Are you trying to sell your products? Do you offer some other type of web services, that require a website registration? All this matters when it comes to creating ‘call to action’ buttons.

Tips on how to create effective ‘call to action’ buttons!

1. Make it big!


The size of your call to action button has to be considered very carefully. It has to be notable and big (in fact, the biggest on the webpage). However, be careful not to overcrowd the page. Otherwise you will achieve just the opposite effect.

2.

Make it colourful

The colour of the button is another very important thing. It has to stand by so perhaps the best solution is to choose some contrasting colour to the background. Of course, you will have to consider it according to the overall colour scheme of the page. Otherwise it can spoil its good look.

3.

Keep it clear and simple

Once you have chosen the basic colour and size characteristics of your ‘call to action’ button, you will have to consider the word (or phrase) that you will place inside of them. Remember – simplicity is the key to success. Try to choose something, which will be both attractive to your visitors and will give them enough information.

4.

Whitespace


This is our last tip. Whitespace is an essential element when comes to making your button notable. Especially if it is small or pale coloured. It works as a frame for the eyes, separating the button from the main colour of the background.

 

Rose Finchley 298x300 Internet Advertising – a New Dimension of Business PromotionAuthor Bio: Rose Finchley is passionate freelance blogger keen on topics about technologies, Internet and blogging. She currently maintains the site of Sparklingcarpets and she loves her love.

You can connect with Rose on LinkedIn, Pinterest and Google+

 

 

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Internet Advertising – a New Dimension of Business Promotion

Internet advertising has come a long way since its first steps, made by using some ad banners at the end of 1994. The Internet was almost unknown over a decade and a half, and now it is an integral part of our lives.

On one hand, advertising is any paid form of promotion of an organization, product, service or idea of a particular sponsor or advertiser. At first, advertising was mainly established in the print media, such as newspapers and magazines and then on the television and radio media. However, in the last few years, the advertising has been pretty much focused on the Internet, which on the other hand was turned in an entirely different environment used by advertisers when looking for new potential customers.

These changes occurred as a result of technology development, which led to a dramatic increase in the use of the Internet for the purposes of advertising. Internet advertising is rapidly evolving in the last few years. Some recent research have shown that in the next few years online advertising will develop three times faster than traditional media advertising.

We must confess that the Internet provides almost inexhaustible resources of opportunities when used as an advertising environment. This means that you can use different approach in order to send a specific message to your target groups. That is the reason why more and more companies have been recently transferring a great part of their budget to online advertising and marketing.

What are the advantages of Internet advertising?

Internet advertising combines different aspects that make it so popular and successful:

  • it is easily handled;
  • it gives you the opportunity to determine exactly which target groups you are going to attack;
  • you can send more concrete messages to your potential and current customers;
  • it gives you more rapidly growing audience;
  • you can be more accurate when measuring the results;
  • it usually gives great results.

Internet advertising also combines the advantages of the TV and print ads and even gives you the opportunity to have an extremely high-quality graphic image. Unlike TV, radio and print ads, online ads provide users with great variety of ways to learn more about the certain product or service you offer. In addition, online advertising is more informative also for the advertisers because they know exactly where they money go.

What are the main types of Internet advertisements?

Web banners

Web banners are the oldest type of Internet advertisements. The very first banner ads were released on the Internet at the end of 1994. Web banners are most commonly promotional images in GIF, JPEG or PNG format that are usually placed on a certain website. When a user clicks on some of these banners, they are transferred to the advertiser’s website, where there is more detailed information about the product or the service that are being advertised. Web banners may be either static or animated.

Text links

Text links are usually a slogan or a name of a certain organization that contains a hyperlink to the advertiser’s website. This is actually one of the cheapest forms of online advertising, which is also extremely efficient. However, when you are planning to use this type of Internet advertising you need to carefully select the websites where you are going to put some advertising text links of your company.

E-mail footers

These are advertising messages that are added in the bottom of every e-mail you send.

Paid articles or publications

These articles and publications can be a description or your company or an interview with its manager or one of the specialists working for you. The publications can also be a news or interesting information that will be useful to your current and potential customers.

Google AdWords

Google is undoubtedly one of the most efficient and popular search engines on the Internet. This is actually the type of advertisement that currently brings bigger profits to advertisers who have tried it. The advertisements on Google are called Google AdWords and give great variety of opportunities.

There is a simple truth, which is that advertisers must go where their potential customers are in order to have success. More and more people go online and have accounts on some social networks. The Internet is the new environment that helps business develop and improve, which gives advertisers the opportunity to make their companies more popular and also show some innovative, original and useful products to a larger auditorium.

Rose Finchley 298x300 3 Most Common Mistakes People Make When Optimizing Their SitesAuthor Bio: Rose Finchley is passionate writer and blogger. She works a part time job at company which offers quality end oftenancy cleaning. In her spare time she loves to read and write articles for different blogs.

You can connect with Rose on LinkedIn, Pinterest and Google+

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3 Most Common Mistakes People Make When Optimizing Their Sites


In the online world search engines are gods and we merely follow the rules they set for us, mortal beings. No matter how visited your site is, if it were to suddenly disappear from all search engines, that would strike a mortal wound in the heart of your success and your online prosperity will become a thing of the past.

The same is true for the other way around – if your site appears on the first page of a search engine, then you will definitely start getting more visitors and consequently your chance of improving your financial state will grow exponentially.

That’s why many people try to optimize their sites according the requirements of search engines. This process is known as SEO (search engine optimization) and is becoming significantly more complex as search algorithms develop and become more complicated. However, performing SEO means walking on a thin ice.

Search engines want to display only relevant and organic content and they hate it when people try to deceive them. You can easily bury your site if you get too many black points. There are three popular mistakes people tend to make when looking for a shortcut to the first page and we will explore them below.

#3. Spinning Articles

Article spinning is the process of writing the same article over and over again, but using different words. It’s an SEO technique that used to be more successful in the past but with the last few updates, search engines have started catching up to the deception. Realistically speaking, spinning articles means you are betting on quantity instead of quality. None of the articles are truly unique and original.

The problem is that search engines want to present new and fresh content and they abhor the use recycled texts. Of course, you can still hope to run a popular website and bet on quantity instead of quality but you can be sure that your hopes will never become reality.

What you need to do is use truly unique and original content. The more diverse it is, the better. After all, how much time readers spend on your site matters as well, and you can be sure that nobody would spend more than a few minutes on a site that has 500 almost identical articles.

#2. Keyword Bloating

The only thing worse than a poorly written, spun article, is a poorly written, spun article bloated with keywords. You can’t use the same word over and over again in the hopes that your site will rank better, because it won’t. If your content is bad, no matter how much you try to artificially inflate it won’t be beneficial. You’re hurting your site more than you are helping it rank. Keywords need to be used organically, naturally.

#1. Irrelevant Anchor Texts

It’s honestly surprising to me how people can get this one wrong but it happens more often than not. Using a good anchor text is crucial for your links. Anchor text is the name you give the clickable hyperlink text on your website. I’m sure you’ve read different texts on a variety of topics and you’ve seen “click here” on numerous occasions. “Click here” is your anchor text in this case and it’s a terrible one.

If you want to make people browse your site some more, you always need to create smart, original and engaging anchor texts. You want people to stay on your site as much as possible, not bore them to death and make them leave. Even if they like the content they’ve just read “click here for more” is hardly attractive, so the person is very likely to leave.

Those are the three most common ways in which people unintentionally deviate from the established rules. If you manage to avoid those mistakes, then you will be well on your way to the first page of search engines. Keep in mind that SEO is dynamic field what is true today might not be accurate tomorrow so don’t forget to keep an eye on changes and new updates.

Guest BloggerAuthor Bio: Rose Finchley is keen on business, marketing and technology. 

You can connect with Rose on LinkedIn, Pinterest and Google+

 

 

 

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Is Content Marketing the New Home for PR Professionals?

content marketing, corporate blogging, whitepaper creation, ebook creation, social media content marketingThe rapid growth of content marketing is increasing demand for PR professionals. As a result, many are asking what skills they need to capitalize on this industry trend.

For those of you that are unfamiliar, content marketing is the process of generating high-quality online content with the goal of building trust and community among your brand’s target audience, and to establish your brand as an industry thought leader.

A content marketer combines the investigative and content production skills traditionally held by journalists with the outreach skills and promotion skills of PR professionals. This is what Holly Regan of Software Advice recently referred to as the convergence of PR and journalism. This convergence is forcing PR specialists to expand their skill sets and implement new tactics.

In years past, PR professionals relied heavily on producing a press release, developing a pitch, and reaching out to big media outlets. However, the growth of digital content and content marketing has revolutionized how a PR professional can promote a product or brand. Nowadays, shares, tweets, “likes,” links and blog posts can actually be more effective than pitching a big media reporter. Using these digital media strategies allows PR professionals and content marketers directly reach their target audience.

Matt Braun, Director of Public Relations at Hanson Dodge Creative, says: “Organizations now use Twitter to break news versus a press release…and it’s forced people like me to use tools like Facebook, Twitter and blogs as vehicles by which we can get others to publicize products and clients.”

As more companies develop content marketing strategies, they will also need PR professionals who can do more than plan an event and pitch a reporter. These companies will need people who can effectively use search engine optimization (SEO) strategies, social media networks, Google Analytics, and email outreach to reach their target audiences.

Is the Growth in Content Marketing Driving Demand for PR Specialists?

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the number of PR specialist and manager jobs rose by nearly 63 percent between 2000 and 2010, and is expected to rise another 21 percent between 2010 and 2020.

However, we wanted to find out how the growth in PR jobs compared to the rising trend of content marketing. To develop a more accurate picture we decided to search through New York City’s Craiglist page and look for the most common job titles in PR and content marketing. Here’s what we found:

Clearly demand for content marketers is growing. The question you should be asking yourself is how can a PR professional capitalize on this growing trend?

Five Tips for PR Specialists in the Age of Content Marketing

Here are five tips for PR specialists who are looking to capitalize on the growth of content marketing:

  1. Reach your audience directly. The days of rocking out a press release, pitching a bid media report, and calling it a job well done are over. PR specialists must now learn how to directly speak to their target audience from digital platforms like blogs and social media networks.
  2. Develop new skills. Nowadays, PR professionals need to know more than how plan an event and send out a press release. It is imperative that you diversify your arsenal by developing skills in disciplines like: SEO, graphic design and digital marketing.
  3. Sing your own song. PR professionals are usually good storytellers. It is time for you to start using your expertise and skills to develop your own content strategies, such as social profiles and blogs.
  4. Be ready for anything and everything. Real-time digital platforms like Twitter and Facebook, have forced PR professionals to be ready for anything at all times. That means you should have “post ready” materials ready to go before you reach out.
  5. Think beyond the press release. In the past, many PR professionals relied on sending out a press release and pitching a big media reporter to generate high-quality coverage. With the rise of digital marketing, you now need to figure out new ways to engage your audience like, Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin, or blog.

PR professionals, if you plan to ride this wave of content marketing opportunity, make sure you skills and tactics are up-to-date.

About the author:

Ashley Furness Expert Video: How to Create Your Future Customer Engagement Strategy Ashley Verrill is a Market Analyst for research firm Software Advice. Her professional experience spans journalism, sales, advertising and SEO marketing. She’s a seasoned writer having produced copy for business journals, a sports magazine, daily deals advertising and industry blogs. She can be contacted at ashleyverrill[@]softwareadvice.com, or by calling 512-582-2314512-582-2314. LinkedIn – Twitter – Google +
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5 Tips for Content that Crosses Cultural and Linguistic Borders

Whcontent marketingen creating content, it pays to think big. Publishing online gives us access to a readership that’s almost too large to imagine. Do it right and your words could be read by people in places you might never even have heard of.

While a global readership might seem like something most of us dream of, with a little know-how it’s something that you too can achieve.

Decide Who You Are Talking To

When you write for the web, you aren’t just pushing out content at random. You are engaging with others, convincing them to buy into your idea or product. With this in mind, it helps to know who you are trying to reach and which parts of the world you want to expand to.

For example, your ideal reader could be a female entrepreneur, or you might want to address a young music lover. Going global makes your pool of readers much larger, so your female entrepreneurs might include women in Brazil, and your music loving youth could be reading in East Asia.

Keeping a tight focus on your target demographic as you go global will let you reach more of the kind of people that interest you. It also helps your budget go further. Are you looking to connect with female entrepreneurs in South America but less so with similar women in China? Then make your content culturally and linguistically suited to the South American readers, instead of spending time and money trying to reach everyone.

Embrace the Multilingual Web

Forget the idea that everyone online speaks English. Although English is often used in the corporate world as a linguistic go-between, internet users are a far more diverse crowd. The web is also more informal and driven by social connections.

Even people in countries who have strong English skills as a second language will prefer to engage with others in their native tongue. In fact, a 2011 survey by the European Commission found that although 48% of non-English speaking Europeans occasionally read English-language content, 9 out of 10 users preferred to visit sites in their own language.

This makes translation of your content a priority. Make good use of your budget by first figuring out which languages need to be top of your list. In our South American example, Spanish and Portuguese would be essential for getting your message across. If Europe is your key market, you’re likely to find German or French better languages to start with.

Take Languages Seriously

If you don’t get serious about translation, your foreign-language readers won’t get serious about your content. They will be too busy laughing at your language slips, if they stick around at all.

We all know of corporate giants who managed to offend or became a laughing stock thanks to poorly-translated slogans. The rest of us needn’t think we will do any better. Unless you are genuinely bilingual and up to date with current usage, you will miss hidden meanings. It’s also easy to opt for what seems the right word choice, when in fact it means something entirely different (for example, in German the word Gift means poison).

Native speaker knowledge will make sure you don’t sound out of touch or leave readers confused. Accurate linguistic choices will also help your SEO by keeping your keywords relevant. Cutting corners here, on the other hand, could leave search engines as confused as your foreign-language readers.

Understand Cultural Differences

The 2012 Edelman Trust Barometer reveals that while people worldwide are becoming less trusting of what they read, ‘a person like yourself’ has become the most trusted source of information. Your job is to be that trusted person to your reader, no matter where in the world he or she is.

Localization is an essential part of becoming ‘one of us’ in another culture. Using words and expressions that local people use makes your content more accessible. Being in touch with important cultural events or hot topics can be useful too. Of course, offending people is never a good idea and cultural knowledge also can guide us around dangerous topics or inappropriate language.

Show You Care

Now that you’ve opened up your content to overseas readers, make them feel welcome. Avoid anything that places your English speaking crowd above foreign-language speakers. For example, aim to respond to all comments, not just those in English. If you offer a way for people to contact you, make sure it doesn’t exclude certain time zones or languages. Showing you care about all your readers helps you to build a good online reputation.

Write with other cultures and languages in mind and you’ll be saying Wilkommen, bienvenido and yōkoso to international readers in no time!

About the author:

Christian Arno the founder of Lingo24, Inc.Christian Arno is the founder of Lingo24, Inc., one of the world’s fastest growing translation services. Launched in 2001, Lingo24, Inc. now has over 180 employees spanning three continents and clients in over sixty countries. In the past twelve months, they have translated over 60 million words for businesses in every industry sector, including the likes of MTV, World Bank and American Express. Follow Lingo24, Inc. on Twitter: @Lingo24. Cont@ct Christian here.

 

 

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5 Smart Ways to Build a Content Machine and Increase Revenue by up to 40%

SEO-Content, Content Marketing, Boosts SEO, Content Curation,Engage Customers, business lead generationDid you asked yourself what future customers will find when they research your industry for products and services you also have to offer, will they find you or your competitor?

Millions of businesses competing for paying customers and it have become a difficult task for most of them to stand out of the crowd and to make future customers aware about their offers.

Content and social media have become successful ways to get attention from future buyers.

On the web you are what you publish… What are you?

–David Meerman Scott

Original content builds you trust, customer loyalty and can position your business as trusted experts in your field.

Content marketing has established as a powerful way to engage customers. An increasing number of B2C and B2B marketer are faced with the challenge to produce and publish buyer persona oriented interesting and remarkable content to attract customers to their products and services.

There is no question content is king! And Remarkable and helpful content brings customers and business direct to your front door the smart and cost effective way, this is for sure!

New studies show that companies utilizing the content marketing strategy in a serious manor report an up to 2,000% lift in blog traffic and 40% boost in revenue!

Infographic: A Brief History of Content Marketing

CMI CM History medium Original Content builds you Trust and Customer Loyalty

 

Moreover remarkable and helpful content is also a great way to build trust and customer loyalty. It offers the so called value ad for customers.

An open minded communication culture and authenticity mixed with credibility beats any old school – yesteryear nonsense marketing and saves your business a truckload of marketing cash!

The great success of content marketing is the result of giving away valuable information – remarkable content for free to attract the RIGHT people to your business like a magnet in an ongoing and steady growing stream.

Content marketing works 100% for any industry and business!

Content marketing can also work for you to attract new customers to your business like a magnet is you are willing to do it right!

The best way to start content marketing for business is to start a corporate blog.

But how and where to get the ideas to write remarkable blog articles who drive visitors to your business?

Here are five ways you should use to get blog content ideas:

1. Set up Google Alerts with your industry keywords
2. Search Blog Directories for your industries topics
3. Subscribe to other industry related blogs and on articles there
4. Go through your customers email communication, especially service, product and support questions
5. Participate in industry related social media groups and forums

These five points will bring you a ton of content ides to write helpful articles for your recent and future customers.

And yes, this is additional work but it is worth every minute you invest in your content marketing.

By taking this challenge you can expect these advantages for your business:

– Blogging companies get up to 55% more Traffic
– Blogging companies get up to 97% more Inbound Links
– Blogging companies get up to 434% more indexed pages in search engines
– Blogging companies get up to 25x times more business leads

…and more LEADS mean more revenue! It’s up on you.

 

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How Content Marketing helps to generate up to 40% more Revenue

Millions of businesses competing for paying customers and it have become a difficult task for most of them to stand out of the crowd and to make future customers aware about their offers.

The customer chooses by himself through research on search engines like Google, with the help of friends, relatives and his social networks which product to buy and which not.

Did you asked yourself what future customers will find when they research your industry for products and services you also have to offer, will they find you or your competitor?

How many people hit your site and how many business leads do generate daily?

Businesses who publish and share content on the web do not only increase the number of “digital outpost” but moreover increase their visibility and build trust with the future customers. Trust is the main motivation to buy. When your audience trusts you, then you they are willing to do business with you.

Actually the best way to increase visibility is content marketing. With content marketing businesses demonstrate thought leadership; prove themselves Trustworthy and Boosts SEO by increase Backlinks to their website.

Remarkable and helpful content is also a great to build customer loyalty. It offers the so called value ad for customers

Content marketing has established as a powerful way to engage customers. An increasing number of B2C and B2B marketer are faced with the challenge to produce and publish buyer persona oriented interesting and remarkable content to attract customers to their products and services.

A seriously executed content marketing strategy can be responsible for 25x times more business leads and boosts your revenue by up to 40%!

With great content you position your business and the people of your business who create the content as trusted experts in your field. Content Marketing is great to build your online reputation.

Here are some marketing tips you can use right away.

Give away free content

Give away free content in form of a corporate blog where you write about topics your audience is most interested in. You can get great ideas for blog articles when you go through email and support requests. This will give you a ton of possible blog article topics.

You can also take a camera and explain a task, for example how to use one of your machines and what to take care of. Or you can use photos and testimonials of satisfied customers and publish them too.

You need to invest time/ money to produce content

To find the time to produce remarkable content is the most common problem business face. But as you need to spend time for your business you also need to understand that marketing and content creation is an important part of your lead generation. Therefore you need to set time free to produce remarkable content which will attract new customers to your business.

No matter if you do it by your own or you hire an Inbound Marketing Agency, content marketing is not free. You have the choice, do you want to invest your time or do you want to set a marketing budget and hire a professional Inbound Marketing Agency.

Give away GREAT content

Great content is valuable. It is worth reading and sharing it. Therefore you need to be specific with information which should benefit your future customers. Don’t be afraid to give away “secrets” because this kind of content attracts the most people. And be the end you are the professionals and the future customer will turn to you when he is ready to buy.

 

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