Rather than keeping you from this awesome video any further… I present to you: SEOmoz “Man on Street” - A Who’s Who in Search Marketing.
Steve (sorry - didn’t get his full name or company. If you know him, let me know!)
Written on March 6, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: marketing, seo
So you want to be a famous SEO?
You want to be a Social Media guru?
Want to rock the socks off of affiliate marketers?
Awesome! Want a little tip on how to start?? Don’t start blogging! So you might be thinking What? Don’t blog? Are you crazy? (I am not sure) But, here’s the truth. Almost every “famous” or well respected person in their industry got to where they are by doing good work, not talking about it.
Nathan Hangen tells us that all you have to do is squelch your fear and step into your role. Sorry, Nathan but honestly there are a lot confident people that give bad information and lack real substance. As a result their confident facade looks fake and untrustworthy. You have to produce a good product and be confident in its delivery.
Blogging is good for many reasons. It can help build your personal brand. It can facilitate communication with your community. It can help you develop your ideas and become more well rounded. It can build relationships and partnerships that can have lasting impact.
But none of the above will happen if you don’t know what you are talking about. If you start blogging today about SEO and you have never ranked a web site in search engines, then the industry elite will be able to tell by reading your blog. If you start blogging today about affiliate marketing and you have never made a dime, skilled affiliate marketers will read that in your words and not give you a second thought. You can’t get recognition from inexperience.
Inexperience stands out like a sore thumb. Inexperienced bloggers are unoriginal. They oftentimes spread inaccurate information. Their writing doesn’t fill a void in their niche. It becomes obvious that they are just talking for the sake of talking.
Experienced people write original content based on what they have done. Experienced people have developed intuition from having a firm grasp on a subject. Such intuition can help them predict trends and see the “big picture.” Experienced people are the ones that other industry gurus recommend (and link to).
Joe’s Power Plan For Becoming A Guru
- Setup a blog and leave it blank.
- Read blogs from industry gurus.
- Get out in the field and start applying what you have learned.
- Keep moving forward.
- Keep an offline journal and jot down everything that you are learning while in the field. Make notes of what works and what doesn’t.
- Research the ideas in your notes to see if others are experiencing the same thing.
- Compare other’s experiences with your own.
- Write your first post about your experiences. In the post compare other peoples experiences and highlight whats different about yours.
- Repeat steps 2 through 8 for your next post.
OK, so I know that there are a lot of steps above and all you want to do is get yourself out there and make a name for yourself. However, it’s a lot easier to make a name for yourself when you are providing top quality content and steps above will insure you do that. Bonus tip: Don’t rush into all of this. The longer you take to work in the field, gain experience, and develop an understanding of your subject, the better your content and exposure will be when you finally begin to blog!
Until next time, get to work and start becoming a guru today!
View original here:
Cup of Joe: 9 Steps To Go From Newbie To Guru
Tags: a-blessing-and ,a-lot-easier- ,a-sore-thumb- ,ashton-kutcher ,book ,experiences ,house ,ideas ,industry ,marketing ,post ,social ,words
No Comments
Written on March 2, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: seo
Posted by randfish
This post is short and easy to follow, just like the tactic it recommends. Most everyone who optimizes for Google Local (aka Google Maps) is familar with David Mihm’s excellent and oft-referenced Local Search Ranking Factors. In that document, and in many places where local results are analyzed, it’s clear that getting your business/website into more listings, in a consistent fashion is a very good thing.
Yet, somehow, this obvious tactic has gone missing from many GG Local optimization recommendations.
Written on February 28, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: Advertising, marketing, seo
Posted by RobOusbey
This is a graph of organic traffic for a theoretical site - they might be in an industry such as print advertising, construction equipment or VHS rental. The decline in traffic is pronounced and serious.
A critical distinction when looking at a graph like this is whether the site’s performance is increasingly worse than the competitors, or whether the whole industry is in decline. In this post I want to recommend some metrics that can be tracked to benchmark your site against competitors (independent of market behaviour) and to check the health of the industry. I’ll then make suggestions for finding opportunities to slow or reverse the trend of dropping traffic.
For the benefit of the time-poor, the post ends with a three point checklist / summary.
Competitors and Benchmarking
There are a couple of different metrics you can use track, which will demonstrate the more direct outputs of your SEO work, and expose your performance amongst competitors.
This chart tracks the Site Authority of the target domain (and some competitors) through time.
To date, trying to chart Linkscape metrics has been a bit misleading: the rapid increase in the reach of Linkscape and modifications of the tool’s algorithms have meant that month-by-month reporting of a site’s Authority wasn’t always a fair comparison. However, Nick tells me that the team are currently putting effort into tackling the challenge of tracking this data. Though you’ll have more confidence in drawing a trend chart such as this one soon, I’d still recommend collecting numbers right now to get a snapshot of where your site is amongst the competition.
Obviously, this assessment of site strength is query independent; differences in site architecture, on-page term targeting and the anchor text of external links will have a significant effect on each site’s performance and number of keywords.
In many ways, the next graph address this. The line for the target site is an ‘average ranking position’ - I’d recommend creating this by taking around twenty non-branded, representative keyphrases (eg: ten which you’re specifically targeting and ten which send a significant amount of traffic) and finding the mean of the site’s ranking for each phrase.
The competitor lines should be calculated by finding the mean ranking position of that site, for each of these keywords where the site ranks in the top 20. (We do this so that the mean isn’t artificially dragged down by keyphrases which the site isn’t trying to compete for, and where it ranks very poorly.)
Even a single month’s data points on these two graphs will provide a snapshot of your site’s position amongst the industry’s other players. Tracking the data each month will demonstrate how your standing has changed, and can directly show the impact of your SEO work - both on-site and off-site.
Industry Assessment
If you have been collecting ranking data in the past, then it can be useful to identify a term for which you’ve had a relatively static ranking over the last year or so. If your traffic from this term has declined over the same period then this provides a useful example of how market behaviour outside of your control is having an effect on the business.
If you don’t have historic ranking data, but suspect that your industry is in decline, you should compare search volume trends to organic traffic sent by some specific terms. In the example below, the site sees a decline in traffic for the single keyphrase ‘football tickets‘ but comparing this to the search volume for the term shows that the site’s performance has actually improved - they are increasing their share of that traffic.
If the industry really is declining and search volumes for all the typically valuable phrases are unlikely to return, then there can be a serious consideration about even continuing to operate in the market. If your core business was VHS rental, consider offering Blu-Ray; if you rank well for house and holiday insurance but are suffering from the decline in these markets then consider adding pet insurance
Tags: Advertising ,assessment ,current ,data ,keyword ,local ,metrics ,paginated ,post ,search ,target
No Comments
Written on February 26, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: book, marketing, seo
Relevant, Consistently Updated Content + Flawless Technical Functionality & User Experience = Perfect Blog Launch
What’s missing from the equation above? You guessed it: blog promotion.
Creating a glitch-free blog with informative content means next to nothing without attracting readers.
Start promoting your blog today with these five effective tips:
1. Involve influential industry bloggers.
By linking to popular blogs, you can gain the attention of both the influential blogger and his or her readers.
But your blog won’t be the only one to benefit. You’ll be giving the other blog a little link juice – and be paying them a compliment at the same time.
Try out a few of these ideas for leveraging other blogs:
- Create a post around an interesting concept published by an influential blogger: Be sure to attribute the information to the blogger and link to his or her post. And don’t forget to offer additional unique insight to make the post your own.
- Interview an influential blogger and turn it into a Q&A post: That blogger is sure to link to your post, and his or her readers are likely to visit your blog as a result. Side benefit: Including the insight of a thought leader will help position you as a thought leader as well.
- Create a list of influential blogs: Include popular blogs from your industry, and include a link, short description and even a screenshot. Online Marketing Blog has successfully done this with its BIGLIST of online marketing blogs. Publish a blog post each week highlighting one or two new blogs to promote the list and acquire another link to the list.
2. Promote your blog via social media.
If your organization already has a solid presence on Twitter, Facebook or other social media channel, leverage your followers or fans to promote your new blog.
For example, when a new post goes live, create a short tweet with a link back to the post – and provide the link on your Facebook fan page.
A few tips to keep in mind:
- Whenever possible (we know how quickly 140 characters can be used up!), include the blog name in tweets and other social media messages.
- Auto-feed new posts to your social media accounts with tools like FeedBurner. But if you choose this option, make sure your headlines are as compelling as possible for social media.
- Maximize promotional efforts by asking employees to add the blog URL to their signatures and personal social media accounts. Employees can also re-tweet posts that they find interesting.
3. Create “link-bait” posts and “sticky” headlines.
Creating compelling headlines or posts that resonate with social web users is another way to garner attention for your new blog.
Try some of these ideas:
- Write counter-intuitive posts – i.e, “The 10 Worst Online Marketing Ideas” or “The 5 Quickest Ways to Get Caught in the Spam Filter.”
- Incorporate celebrities into posts (if appropriate for your industry) – i.e., “Top 10 Celebrity Tweets of the Week”
- Leverage the sticky headline formula, “number + adjective + sticky message” – i.e., Lee’s recent post, “10 Must Read Tips to Start a Small Business Blog” (see image below)
4. Promote the blog on your corporate website.
It’s important to gain some valuable real estate on the homepage of your corporate site – particularly in the early stages of getting a new blog up and running. Create a button with a link to the blog to appear on the homepage, or at the least provide a link to the blog in the nav. The Otter Group does a good job of promoting its blog on the homepage of its corporate website (see image below).
In addition to the homepage, ensure the blog is included in the upper and right-hand nav on all website pages. The goal is to make it as easy as possible for visitors to find your blog.
5. Promote the blog offline.
For all of the online channels available to promote your blog, there are just as many offline channels to leverage. Don’t limit yourself to the online world. Instead:
- Add your blog URL to business cards.
- Promote your blog at industry events.
- Get print publications to pick up blog posts.
- Use word of mouth to let customers and business partners know of the new blog.
- Include the blog URL in the boilerplate of press releases (and in online releases, too).
Of course, these five tips are just a few of many ways to promote and market business blogs. Whatever promotional efforts you choose, look for tactics that will help you reach business goals whether they are increasing awareness, garnering buzz in the media or driving additional website traffic.
What tactics have you used to promote your blog?
Written on February 23, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: searchengineguide
by Mike Moran
As a small business, you probably pride yourself on being customer friendly. Even though you might work with large companies as your suppliers and partners, you go the extra mile for your customers when something goes wrong. You make your site search friendly. You put the information on it that customers need. And you stand behind what you sell. Except when that big company partner makes it impossible.
And that’s the problem. As a small business, you must be extremely careful about the big companies you work with, because sometimes you can’t paper over their big company ways. And when that happens, you get hurt. You can lose business and you can lose your good reputation.
All this was brought to mind from a purchase we made not long ago, buying a refurbished Microsoft Xbox 360 from a small business online. Now, you might say to yourself–there’s your mistake, buying some crappy refurbished model instead of a new one–but we frequently buy refurbished technology and have never had a problem. The site we purchased from was well done, clearly explained everything, provided a manufacturer’s warranty, and seemed entirely reputable. I still think that small business is entirely reputable, so I am not naming them in what might appear to be a negative story.
The problem wasn’t the small business. We searched for Xbox 360s and that site came up near the top of the list. We checked them out several different ways and they came up clean. The site looked good and the purchase experience was easy and we received the console quickly. Everything worked.
We had a minor problem that we called Microsoft about and they cheerfully verified our warranty was in force and sent us a replacement part for free. My son is happily playing with his Xbox and it’s another happy story about a small business that helps out consumers by selling refurbished units and a large business that services its customers.
But you know the story doesn’t end there, because that would be the most boring blog post of all time. Instead, the Xbox suddenly starts throwing the dreaded E73 and E74 errors, so we followed the troubleshooting procedures and were informed by the Microsoft support site that we needed to get the unit repaired, and we could do that online.
Except we couldn’t. We dutifully followed the instructions to register with Xbox Live to report our “Xbox dead.” We put in the serial number and pressed the “Request a repair” button, but it always provided an error message telling me that the service is temporarily unavailable. (It’s been temprarily unavailable for over a week now, which makes you wonder what a permanent outage would look like.)
So, I got on the phone and requested the repair and the technician verified that we were covered and promised to send us an empty box (and Xbox box, I guess) for us to return the unit to be fixed, which takes four business days. After five business days went by with no box, I called back and was told that we were ineligible for service (the technician actually said we were “illegible” for service, but I decided not to squawk about how neat my handwriting can be) because we had viloated the terms and conditions.
I won’t take you through the literally hours of phone calls with technicians and supervisors that ensued. There was a multitude of times that I was told that they had no record or only a partial record of my last call, that the person I talked to the last time was mistaken–all the usual big company support crap. But the bottom line is that Microsoft had banned our console from service, voided the warranty, because they claimed that we violated their terms of service. They refused to say how or when we had done this, and claimed that it could have been something the previous owner did.
I know, I know, none of this makes any sense. If the previous owner had done it, you’d think they would have known about when we had the minor repair done months ago, but they were unmoved by such logic. They even have a page posted on their Web site that explains that there is no appeal process for console bans. So, even if they make a mistake, you’re screwed. That is really their official policy. The support technicians won’t talk to you about it and their online forums have a policy that any posts about console bans are deleted without response.
So, at this point, I thought that this must be some weird situation that rarely happens. Hardly. I found similar stories of people banned here and here. Now, for all I know, Microsoft has never made an error in banning someone before they banned us. But because they won’t tell us why we were banned, I have no trust in their process. They know why they banned us, but they just won’t tell us. And they won’t tell us why they won’t tell us.
The moral of the story for small businesses is that you must choose your partners carefully. The small business did everything right, but Microsoft ruined the customer experience. I know enough about business to place the blame where it is due, so I am not running around online giving this poor small business bad reviews. But someone else might. And I can totally understand why. Microsoft threw the small business under the bus, intimating that it was because we purchased a refurbished console that all of this happened.
But that isn’t so. What’s really true is that Microsoft has a set of policies designed to protect Microsoft, rather than its customers. The refurbished story is just a ruse trotted out in this situation. The truth is that Microsoft does not tell people why they were banned, what they did, or when it happened. And they don’t have any process to appeal if Microsoft makes an error. That is a set of policies that no small business can live with, if they want to safeguard their reputation of caring for customers.
And sad to say, I won’t ever buy a refurbished Microsoft product again. We’re going to buy a brand-spanking-new Xbox 360 because we don’t want to punish our son by throwing away his Christmas present. It kills me to do this, because I am giving more money to Microsoft, precisely the company that is at fault in this entire mess. I’d rather say I’ll never buy a Microsoft product again, but I know I will.
I am hoping that if enough people speak out, that Microsoft will change its ridiculously secretive policies and enter the age of open information. If Microsoft has such iron-clad evidence that something was done to void the warranty, they could present that evidence, but they refuse.
So, small businesses get hurt because their sales drop off and their reputations are endangered, all because they are working with a big company that has policies they’d never adopt with their own customers. Beware the partners you keep, because they will end up reflecting on you in ways that you can’t control. Being in the refurbishing business is perfectly fine, as long as you can count on your partners to stand behind the products that you sell. If you can’t, then it’s your business that will likely take the fall.
Be sure and visit our small business news site.
The rest is here:
Small Businesses Must Choose Partners Carefully
Written on February 12, 2010 by admin
Filed Under: marketing
Bing has a lot to learn about sharing big news on its blog.
Take this post for example: spatial search: the next frontier
Cute title, but doesn’t tell me anything about the announcement.
Or take the actual post. 1300+ words and you have to read 628 of them, before you get to the announcment. Talk about burying the lead!
Fortunately, I have a man on the inside (hi Scott) that makes sure I don’t miss important news from Bing. Such as, the awesomeness of the forthcoming Streetside Photos in Bing Maps.
Watch this 2:35 video and you’ll see this cool technology integrates with Flickr images:
>
What, you don’t have a couple of minutes? Here’s the summary:
Streetside Photos application (in technology preview): Available today, this tech preview mines geo-tagged photos from Flickr, and relates them to the Streetside imagery in Bing Maps. As more people contribute and share imagery, we can reunite those photos with the location where they were taken. This application will also enable the layering of historical imagery, so people can go back in time and see a location as it existed decades prior.
Awesome news, that was almost missed.
Pilgrim’s Partners: SponsoredReviews.com – Bloggers earn cash, Advertisers build buzz!
See the original post:
Bing Maps Announces Awesome Flickr Intergration in JUST 1300 Words!
![[StumbleUpon]](http://www.toprankblog.com/wp-content/themes/TopRank06/images/stumble-big.png)
![[Google]](http://www.toprankblog.com/wp-content/themes/TopRank06/images/google-bookmark-big.png)
![[Facebook]](http://www.toprankblog.com/wp-content/themes/TopRank06/images/facebook-icon.gif){kind=icon}
![[Twitter]](http://www.toprankblog.com/wp-content/themes/TopRank06/images/twitter.png)
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=b5c7bf02-8633-4519-8ea2-42a62efba0d9)
