Internet Marketing Tips, Tools and Strategies

Have you been thinking about writing an ebook and using it as an offer on your website? Maybe you are an avid ebook reader yourself, or you just want to have an additional tool to capture leads on your website. Whatever the case might be, an ebook is a valuable tool to leverage as a company, as well as being a valuable resource for your users.

So, what are some of the things you should be considering when attempting to write your very own company ebook?:

It isn’t all about you. Despite what you may think, an ebook is not another way to sell your services and/or product. Write for your audience, not for your sales team.

Address a pain point. This goes in line with not writing it as a sales tool only. You want to think about who is going to be reading this ebook and what will cause them to need to read it.

• What is the problem?
• What causes the problem?
• How can you fix the problem?
• Are there other alternatives?

And to really drive home the point – know who your audience is. Make sure you are really doing the research surrounding your ebook topic - ask questions of current customers and what issues led them to seek your business, review past questions from clients or potential clients, do as much virtual and physical research to understand the issue you are going to be discussing. Knowing what you are going to be writing about in your ebook from every point of view (customer, service provider, etc.) ensures you are writing as an expert.

Developing an ebook to use as a value marketing offer can increase traffic and leads for your business. As always, if you aren’t comfortable developing your own content marketing strategy – whether that is an ebook, website content, social media content, etc., there are Online Marketing Experts who can help.  

  

I find that there are two scenarios when it comes to businesses utilizing press releases online:

Scenario A. Press releases? What are those?
A press release is another way to not only get your company name out there on the web, but also can lead to valuable backlinks, increased web traffic, increased conversions, and establishment of your company as an expert in your field.

Scenario B. We publish a press release every day!
Okay, maybe that is a bit of an excessive example, but press releases can lose value if you are overusing them. You want to be sure you are putting enough press releases out there, but not over-saturating the market.

Finding the balance to press releases is only half the battle unfortunately. To really get the most benefit out of each press release make sure you are doing the following:

1. Make your press releases informative - not just a sales pitch! Users aren’t going to want to read your press releases if they don’t offer them any value, keep that in mind when you are writing.
2. Include hyperlinks back to your website - bonus points if you are linking relevant keywords.
3. Publishing the press release on your site - this goes for all of your press releases, news articles, etc. You want Google to index these pages to boost your organic search traffic.
4. Submit your press release to various distribution services - the five biggest are PRWeb, PrimeNewswire, Business Wire, Marketwire, and PR Newswire

Remember to keep a healthy balance between press release scenario A and B, plus really take full advantage of all the benefits a press release has to offer. If you do that, press releases will prove to be a valuable resource for your company’s online marketing efforts.

You might also want to consider bringing in an Online Marketing Expert. They can help you not only draft a press release (or multiple releases), but ensure that your press release is hitting the maximum amount of audience you want to target.

You probably are already running a PPC or pay-per-click campaign. You probably are getting a decent amount of traffic from your advertisements as well. So, why would I suggest you consider moving away from PPC and towards building your organic search traffic?

Well, let me start by saying that I think PPC traffic has benefits and you shouldn’t stop advertising this way completely. That being said, organic traffic has a different sort of value associated with the clicks. Let’s look at three highly valuable benefits of trying to increase your organic search traffic:

Increasing Organic Traffic or building a SEO Method makes you focus on content. When you start developing your organic search strategy you really get to focus on your website and what information you are putting out to the public.

Building a SEO strategy to increase organic traffic involves competitor analysis. By analyzing your competitors you get a better idea of what separates you apart from them, meaning you know what makes you better! Knowing the difference between you and your competition allows you to approach potential customers with ALL the information they need to make a decision.

Higher Quality Leads. According to eMarketer, only 25% of people will ever click on a Pay Per Click ad. That means that if you are heavily invested in PPC vs SEO, you may be missing 75% of your market online! Most companies will try to combat this by just investing more in PPC thinking that this will help them compete more effectively, and this does work somewhat, but the minute you turn off your PPC campaign your traffic stops. You are left with nothing but your previous leads/sales.

Also, according to Dan Zarella at Hubspot and the research they compiled recently, most people do not trust PPC ads. Organic search results are more trustworthy by a large margin. So not only are less people likely to click on your PPC ads, the leads you are going to get are not necessarily going to be the most qualified.

Now these are just a few of the many benefits associated with developing an organic search strategy. To be fair any traffic increase to your website can only be a boon, right?

Why not start increasing your organic search traffic by signing up for our free website scan? The scan will let you know where your website currently stands in search engines and how it stacks up to your competition.   

 

Whether you are already writing articles for SEO purposes, or want to start promoting your website through this popular SEO practice, be sure to consider methods that will take your web site to the next level. SEO article writing is critically important to a solid SEO strategy. Here are some key pointers to remember when doing SEO article writing and what you should avoid doing:

Don’t:

Repeat yourself for the sake of using keywords (otherwise known as keyword stuffing). You want to be sure to include your targeted keywords, but do it in a natural flow. Continually repeating your message throughout your article will just make users aware that you are writing it for SEO purposes and they won’t want to read it.

Sacrifice quality for content. This is sort of a repeat of the last don’t (going against my own suggestion, huh?), but bear with me. Not only should you not keyword stuff and repeat content in your article, but be sure that what you are writing is actually useful. Also, don’t post an article on a website if it has nothing to do with what that website is about (example: an article about SEO Content Writing on a cooking website).

Ramble or be unclear. You want concise messaging that gets your point across. However, that doesn’t mean you can’t be personable…use your voice.

Forget who you are writing to/for. Well yes, you are writing to boost some traffic to your site and hopefully improve your websites search rankings. But remember, actual users will be reading this not just Google bots.

Forget that there are professionals who can help you. Don’t feel comfortable writing your own SEO content and articles? Well, luckily there are experts out there that can help you.

Forget to promote it. You have spent some time creating and posting your quality article on your site, but it just sits there collecting dust. Make sure you are promoting your articles on top quality content and social sites like Scribd, Digg, LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter Hubpages, etc. Some require 100% unique content, so you may have to rewrite your article a bit, but these site are great ways to spread the word about your content and drive natural links back to your articles.

So there you go, keep these don’ts in mind next time you go to write your own article and you should see the traffic you were hoping for in no time.

Find It Hard To Focus On Web Content Writing?
These 6 Tips Will Help You Stay On Task.

When you write a blog for your business you are performing a crucial asset building role in your organization and it's extremely important that you deliver high value, good quality content. Web content writing is valuable because it sets your business apart from competitors and helps you build your expertise in your industry. It also aids in SEO or Organic Marketing while improving your search engine ranking.

For even the most devoted blogger there comes a time when you feel you can't focus or organize the ideas that are swimming around in your head. Here are 6 tips to get you into a productive article writing state of mind and environment.

1. Go Elsewhere - Find a spot in your office home or anywhere nearby where you have no other options but to write when you go there.

2. Turn Off The TV - Sometimes writers believe they can get their writing done while enjoying your favorite programs. Writing requires focus and concentration. Save TV watching for multi-tasking like folding laundry or exercising.

3. Close Your Email - Maybe your email makes a dinging noise when you receive a new email or a little box pops up in the bottom corner with the senders name and subject line. Whatever happens knowing your email inbox is waiting for you can be a distraction. Check your email so you know what's there and then close it out. Keep it closed until you're done writing content.

4. Exit Social Media - Twitter and Facebook can be an obsession for some of us. Checking into these sites while you're trying to do your web content writing can be problematic. You can get sucked into these sites and before you know it you're out of time to work on this project.

5. Turn Off Your Phone - We all have our cell phone on us at all times. The problem with this is that many cell phones are also access points for social media and email. You may also get a phone call while you're in the middle of writing an article that interrupts you. Return calls when you are finished writing.

6. Leave Technology Behind - If you do your writing at a computer it may be too tempting to have social media and email just a click away. Consider using a good old pen and paper or even a typewriter to organize the words for your article marketing.

Following these tips will help you create the perfect writing environment. Once you're there you'll be able to better organize your thoughts and produce excellent content for your website.

Everyone gets writers block. Even if your article marketing focuses on the things you are most passionate about, there will still come a day when you simply cannot think of anything to write.

Believe it or not there are brilliant content ideas all over. You just need to know where to look.

1. Blog Comments

Have your followers asked questions on your blog posts before? Expressed confusion over a certain topic? If your writing has sparked feedback it might be time to capitalize on a previous discussion. Spin a blog comment into a post and answer a question that may be top of mind for a lot of your customers.

2. Look Back At Email Campaigns

A big benefit of email marketing is that you can monitor results of each campaign. Look at past campaigns and find one that performed particularly well. Re-purpose the content in that email into a blog post. If the content interested email subscribers then it is likely to be a popular blo post.

3. Steal Ideas from Your Own Website

Your company website is full of ideas for blog posts. For example, look at your frequently asked questions section. There might be a question and answer that could be expanded upon and turned into an entire post or article. Additionally, if you have any videos posted on your site watch them and try to turn those into a blog post.

4. Read Other Blogs

A writer's best inspiration may come from another writer's blog. This doesn't mean that you should steal someone's post word for word, that would be plagiarism, but let yourself be inspired. In fact, it's the tone of the writing that could inspire. A great post from a mommy blogger might inspire a great article or blog for a CEO of a successful business.

5. Think about Yourself 

What do you want to learn about your industry? What headlines make you turn your head. If you would read it, chances are someone else is looking for that information too. If there's something you've been wondering about research it share the information.

6. Think about Your Audience

What questions come up first when you meet with a new client? What do they need to know before they feel comfortable doing business? Take these questions and turn them into blog posts giving you audience the information they've been looking for.

When writers block is getting you down just remember, a great article marketing idea is within your reach. Think outside of the box and produce some excellent web content writing.

Want to know how your content stacks up against the competition? Try our revamped WSI WebScan Tool and see how your site content is working for you!