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Revealed: The Secret Source For Winning Google’s Love

by Paul Joseph July 28, 2011 Featured

In my last post on Entrepreneurs-Journey.com, we talked about the big fat truth – without unique, fresh, and lengthy content your blog search engine rankings are as good as dead. Check out the previous post here: Blog Writing 101: How To Satisfy Readers And Deliver Top 10 Google Rankings This time I will take it a step further and explain why, without great content, no link building campaign will take you as far with search engines as you would like to go. Some time ago, I ran a series on my blog on how to build an email list. It was only natural to discuss email autoresponder options in one of the posts in the series: after all, the emails you write to your list are only as good as the provider that delivers them or sends them to spam – depending on which autoresponder service you choose. Naturally, I wanted to rank my post for any and all possible keywords that had anything to do with Aweber , which is what I use, and autoresponders in general. Lo and behold, as I did my research on who was holding the current rankings for some of those keywords, Yaro’s blog kept popping up on the first page for almost all of them. Yes, Yaro’s AWeber Review – Email Autoresponder post was what stood between me and high search engine rankings of my own Aweber review. Naturally, a little competition never scared me away, so I started to drill in on Yaro’s links that played a huge role in ranking his post so highly. Checking Out Your Competition The best way to know what you need to do in order to rank your post for any keyword is to see which websites are currently ranking for that keyword and what their link building profile is. Since it would require a lengthy explanation as to how exactly I do competition research, I will direct you to read this post to learn more on how to use their competition link profile to outrank them: Link Building Tip: How to Do It the Smart Way . As I was doing research on Yaro’s Aweber post, I discovered that it was (and is currently) ranking for 10, what I would call, “money” keywords – the type of keywords that the potential Aweber buyers would be searching for when trying to make their final decision on their autoresponder choice. Now that I knew how many and what keywords he was ranking for, I needed to find out what links to his post allowed him to have such high rankings. And that’s what stopped me dead in my tracks. You see, as I previously mentioned, the easiest way to rank your own post for any keyword is to match and outdo your competition linking profile. Find out what their links are, in other words, get most of the same links and throw in a couple of extras. In most markets (barring you are going for some of the most competitive keywords, of course), that should do the trick and at least get you on the first page of Google . In Yaro’s case though, most of his links came from within content on other blogs . Learning that pretty much sucked, because there was no way I could get all those blogs to mention my Aweber review in their posts! The Secret Was In The Source Yaro’s Aweber post was so thorough and so good that many bloggers read it, loved it, and linked to it in their own posts, giving Yaro significant advantage in high rankings. It was HIS CONTENT itself that tipped Google scale in his favor. It is all coming together now, right? YOUR CONTENT is the single most important factor that will make or break your search engine rankings and either will bring you floods of targeted FREE search engine users or leave you with a donut whole. You can submit all the articles and videos you want, leave tons of comments on all kinds of blogs, spend some time building links through forums, but if I get a few bloggers to link to my post from within their content, as in mentioning my post because it was that good, I will have an upper hand in search engine rankings for sure. That kind of link building is what is referred to as “natural” link building and is definitely the best way to get your site ranked and swarming with search engine visitors. Link Building As A Search Engine Factor As I did in the previous post, I’d like to take you back to this recently released SEOmoz report on search engine ranking factors . After all, talk is cheap, but the collective opinion of 132 SEO experts around the world should definitely shed some light as to what are recognized as the best link building practices right now and in the future. We have already talked about your content being the cornerstone of any successful link building campaign – master that part and the links will come naturally. To further illustrate my point, allow me to quote the following from the report: “Through all this analysis of search optimization – we will always conclude that a site needs “more links, more quality links, more content, and higher quality content” – Todd Malicoat What other areas of link building should we pay close attention to? Diversity of links outweighs pure quantity : diversity of IP addresses, root domains, subdomains, linking pages where your links are coming from play a huge role – the more diverse, the better. Number of root domains linking with partial anchor text : yes, PARTIAL anchor text plays the same, if not bigger, role in successful search engine rankings than precise anchor text, as it used to be the case. If you don’t know much about anchor text or would like to learn more, I suggest reading this post: Your Ultimate Anchor Text Tutorial – from Basic to Advanced . Relevance of links . This one has been and I am sure will remain one of the most debated SEO link building factors: does it matter if the website that is linking to you is on the same subject as yours? Well, the consensus in this report says yes, it does.So don’t do link building to your cooking blog from a site that sells tractor parts. Nofollow matters : many SEOs say that nofollow links can help your rankings, which definitely goes against the very idea of Nofollow to begin with.Nofollow attribute is added to links to let Google know that, although you are willing to link to a particular website, you are not willing to vouch for them and share your site authority with them. Thus, any of your site PageRank will happily stay with your site and not be passed to the site you are linking to. To learn what Yaro thinks of Nofollow, take a look at this post: No More NoFollow . This new wave of expert SEO opinions on Nofollow links only strengthens “natural” link building point of view: you need both Dofollow and Nofollow links to have the kind of diverse linking profile Google would like to see. The Future Of Link Building What do SEOs believe will happen in the future with Google’s use of ranking features in the future? Prominence of ads vs content will remain a factor. Content usability / readability / design will increase as a factor. Analysis of perceived value to users will increase GREATLY. Social signals at domain level and page level will increase DRAMATICALLY. Marketing Takeaway Link building is here to stay, no question about it. However, the face of link building is changing and the type of CONTENT you serve to your readers is rapidly becoming the most important factor in any successful link building campaign. Ana Hoffman Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: book, online, search, words

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How To Keep Your Finger On Your Market’s Pulse (And Why You Have Probably Already Fallen Behind)

by Paul Joseph July 27, 2011 Featured

Keeping “your finger on the pulse” is a phrase I use to describe how entrepreneurs should keep in touch with their niche markets or keep up-to-date with market trends in general. This is vitally important especially if you are working online. At times, when we work online, it is very easy to get caught up in your own little bubble and forget what the rest of the world is doing. That is a big mistake . If you are operating in a particular niche, you may not realize how quickly you can lose touch with your target audience. You get so caught up with running your business, and if you are not dealing with customers on a daily basis, very soon you can lose touch with their core values and forget who you are speaking to. This can be disastrous because if you lose touch with your target audience’s dreams, wants, needs and desires, then your whole marketing approach has just gone out the window. The John Carlton Mentality Famous marketer and copywriter, John Carlton , has often said when he is researching to write copy for a company he never talks much to the head people in charge of the company. He knows they are way too far removed from the target audience. Their focus is often concerned about what they want, how they think they should be promoting the product and what they think is important. You may remember from one of my previous articles this is classic thinking like a fisherman and not like a fish mentality . Carlton would commonly go searching way down the company ladder to get a better insight about the product. He wanted to talk to the people taking the phone call orders or dealing with product returns – more grassroots level information. He always knew he had written a good piece of copy when the top company people did not want to run the piece because it made them uncomfortable. He knew he had bombed and had to go back to the drawing board if they loved his piece and it was exactly what they wanted. I’m Not Shopping – I’m Doing Research! Last weekend I went to the shopping mall with an entrepreneur friend of mine who sells physical products. This type of “people watching” is great market research for two reasons: To keep a finger on the pulse of the current physical product niche To keep a finger on the pulse of society and general trends for new product ideas (physical or digital). My friend wanted to make sure they were still in touch with their niche market because they had been busy running their business. They wanted to see how the competition was promoting, packaging, pricing and marketing their product. Was there anything new or that had changed in any of those areas? For example, a new marketing angle, different price point, etc. Most importantly, we paid attention to what people were buying in the niche. If you have been living in your online world, don’t underestimate how quickly you can lose touch with your target audience, especially if you are no longer a member of your target audience. If you were once a poor university student and you design cheap and trendy clothing for students, but since then your company has gone crazy and this is now your full-time job and has been for the last year and half. And long gone are the days of cramming for exams, getting no sleep and surviving for a week on half a bag of rice, two cans of tuna and a celery stick. Then you may need to get back in touch with your target market, because you have lost touch with your target market . People Watching To Find A New Product Or Niche While people watching is great to keep up-to-date with a current niche you may be in, it is also great at stimulating new ideas . Your ideas can come from what you see people buying, how you see people behaving or the types and groups of people you may notice. You can gather your new ideas and come home and do some keyword research and market research on them and investigate the market online. Is there possibility for an information product? Are their affiliate products? Could you release your own product? Look At Trends One trend I noticed was that of stationary. Within the shopping mall there were three individually branded stationary shops. Keep in mind that you can also buy generic stationary at the grocery stores, department stores and newsagents within the mall. One stationary store, Kikki K , has exploded in Australia. I remember walking past these stores and I used to think: “How on earth are they making money? How many notepads would they have to sell to pay rent?” Obviously they can do the math, because Kikki K is the 18 th top female owned business in Australia earning $30 million a year . That’s a lot of pens and notepads! Getting A Piece Of The Market Obviously, some other “people watchers” saw that the stationary market was booming and jumped on board. Now if you went head to head with Kikki K you would get slaughtered. You need a unique selling proposition ( USP ). The other two stationary stores had their USPs sorted. One had a grungy, more edgy feel to it. From the look of the store, to the music they were playing, to the stuff they were selling, it screamed “coolness”. In fact, so cool, I nearly didn’t go in to the store cause I didn’t think I was cool enough! Talk about a barrier of entry and only wanting to speak to your target audience. These guys had it down pat. The last stationary store had aimed its niche at the kids market. Selling fun and brightly colored stationary sets of everything imaginable. Although as an adult male it didn’t really tickle my fancy, I saw many a father pulling out his wallet for his young daughter. And the funniest thing, the upsell potential is huge and the staff probably don’t even have to do it. Why wouldn’t you want a whole matching set of stationary? I can imagine the young daughter saying to her dad, “Well Dad, now that I have the hot pink pencil case, you know I will need the matching hot pink pencils, pens, notebook, diary, eraser….” It’s Time To Go Shopping! So turn off the computer for a few hours and get back into the real world . You will be surprised at what you can learn and the ideas you can get. Leevi Romanik Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: ideas, kids, music, online, trends, young

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Asia’s largest online wholesaler Bigshoebazaar raises Rs 40 crore From Catamaran Ventures and Nexus Venture Partners

by Paul Joseph July 25, 2011 Featured

Bigshoebazaar India Pvt. Ltd. (BSB), South Asia’s largest online wholesaler of shoes, apparel, bags, accessories and gift items announced that it has received a Rs 40 crore investment from Catamaran Ventures and Nexus Venture Partners in its second round of funding. Bigshoebazaar sells branded footwear to retailers across the country through the online cash and carry platform,… (Visit Yourstory.in for full news, other content, and much more!)

Tagged as: content, country, frontpage, india, nexus-venture, online, partners, the-country, yourstory-in

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My Top 10 List Of TED Talks On Creativity

by Paul Joseph July 25, 2011 Featured

Hello again. I’m off on a new tangent this week, it’s been inspired by Yaro’s last post . Actually, I’ve had this niggling feeling I needed to take his advice since receiving the email in my inbox several weeks ago with tips on writing great articles – I just have so much spinning in my head that it often takes a while to action everything that’s fighting for my attention. The Master Plan Yaro’s great idea is to make top 10 lists of things related to my topic. He suggested a top 10 list of my favorite books on creativity. Whilst that’s a brilliant idea, there’s one small problem … for some terrible reason, most likely due to my own scattered brain, I’ve stopped reading books to completion. I get part way through them and charge off on other tangents. This is a considerable problem when it comes to making top 10 lists of my favorite books on creativity. So I did what all good creatives do when faced with an impasse and I improvised . Whilst I spend the next few weeks finishing reading all the books on my top 10 list, I decided to make a top 10 list of something else. The “something else” is largely responsible for why I don’t finish books anymore! Details Of My Ongoing Love Affair I have an ongoing love affair with TED . At the end of the day, when I’m sick of dealing with black text on a white computer screen, I crawl into bed with TED and let the world’s most inspiring, informative, ingenious and innovative people take me on adventures into their worlds. I don’t watch TV these days. I watch TED. Somehow, because I’m learning new things and being inspired by what I see, I can sneak past that feeling of guilt I get from watching mind numbing entertainment because it’s not productive. So my first ever “top 10 list” is my top 10 TED talks on creativity . The Master Plan Explained This is how it’s going to look. I’m going to show in order of 1 to 10, the talks I have found to be most inspiring and also practically useful in regards to creativity. I want to explain to you how each clip made the cut and why it’s ranked as it is. So each week, I’ll cover two or three clips, and try to explain why they’re important and a give summary of the magnificence within them. Some of the talks are directly related to creativity. Others are great examples of someone being creative. And others are expressions of crucial elements of creativity, like Isabel Allende’s talk on passion. There’s one talk in here that isn’t so much about creativity. But I realized it’s possibly the most useful way to overcome one of the biggest stumbling blocks to realizing your potential, and take the risks needed to explore and express your creativity. Even though it’s not necessarily pitched as being about creativity, it could be the most important clip of them all if it moves you to action. Drum Roll… Here’s The Top 10 List Sir Ken Robinson “ Schools Kill Creativity ” Sir Ken Robinson “ Bring On The Revolution ” Tim Brown “ Creativity and Play ” Isabel Allende “ Passion ” Ross Lovegrove “ Organic Designs ” Tim Harford “ Trial, Error and the God Complex ” Matt Cutts “ Try Something New For 30 Days ” Joshua Walters “ Being Just Crazy Enough ” Larry Lessig “ The Law Is Strangling Creativity ” Elizabeth Gilbert “ About Genius ” As you can see, I’ve got a bit of a thing for Sir Ken , I have an ongoing love affair with his work to rival the one I have for TED talks. Sir Ken even tops my TOP 10 book list and hogs the first few places : / I think this is for a number of reasons. Details Of My Other Love Affair Ken’s talks are educational, insightful, beautifully articulated and they make me laugh. This combination is a bit like holding the ace of spades as far as I’m concerned, especially that last element. Another reason they top the list is because Sir Ken’s talks set a great foundation for the rest. Sir Ken deals with the starting point of the problem of dislocated creativity, our schooling. We waste a good twelve years of our lives learning how to do things that don’t energize and inspire us… learning how to stuff our dreams away and stamp out our creativity so we can endure those years of schooling. Really, it’s just like twelve years in training for what to expect for the rest of our lives… Unless we’re blessed to have held onto enough hope and determination to do what we love anyway… or unless by some stroke of luck, the schooling system actually did steer us in the direction of living the life that speaks to our deepest truth . Sadly, Sir Ken says during his second talk, of the many people he meets, very few have been able to find this place within themselves to live from. If you have the time and inclination to watch these first two talks in my top 10, I assure you it will be a great foundation for us to launch into the ones that follow in the list next week. Once again, I’d love to hear any comments you have at the end, and I’m going to leave you with a fabulous Sir Ken quote about creativity. “If you’re not prepared to be wrong, you’ll never come up with anything original.” Cheers, Neroli. Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: advice, attention, books, life, mindset, online

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Discover EXACTLY What Your Audience Wants With This Clever Google Analytics Hack

by Paul Joseph July 22, 2011 Featured

Are you a married man? I am! Happily married now for five years, one month, and seven days at the time that I’m sitting down to write this. In the five years of my very happy marriage, and my dating years that came before, it has become quite obvious to me that, in many situations, guys can’t read girls’ minds . I know, it sounds strange, but follow me on this one. Have you ever been in a situation where your significant other expects you to know what they are thinking, and you have absolutely NO IDEA that they are even thinking about something? If you are a guy, you’ve probably encountered this at least once in your life In my Many years of marriage (ok, I know. I’m still a newbie), my wife and I have come to realize that if we want to know what each other are thinking, asking can be a very valuable skill that is often overlooked. So what in the world does this have to do with Internet Marketing, Online business, blogging, etc? Well, in a past article, I showed how my 5 Question Survey saved me time and resources in product development . It’s a very clear example of how asking your audience the right questions can help you accomplish your goals for your online business. But what if you could read the mind of your significant other? What if you knew exactly what he/she was thinking without even having to ask? How awesome would it be if you could wake up in the morning, sit at your laptop and get a detailed report of everything your wife thought the day before, and throughout your entire relationship? How AWESOME would that be? (On a side note: Have you seen the Movie “What Women Want” with Mel Gibson? That’s EXACTLY what I’m talking about) Well, unfortunately for you and I, that won’t happen. My wife and I will just have to go through the long, and sometimes painful, process of getting to know each other. Fortunately, for my online business, this is something that’s very easily accomplished – Thanks to Google Analytics ‘ Site search Feature. What Is Site Search And How To Benefit From It? If you’re a blogger, you probably have a search function on your site. If not, you should definitely add it. It’s an easy way for your website visitors to search the contents of your site. It basically functions as an internal Search Engine . Most WordPress themes have a search function built in, and if yours doesn’t, WordPress has a widget that you can add to your sidebar. Here’s the thing – most bloggers have site search on their website, but don’t use it to their advantage. Whenever someone does a search on your site, they are telling you exactly what they are looking for, without even intending to do so. However, you will never know what they are looking for if you don’t have a system to report what their searches are. It’s like having the ability to read the mind of your significant other, but not taking advantage of it. Fortunately for you and I, Google analytics gives you the option to Track Site Search. How To Set Up Site Search Before you can track site search on your site, you need to set it up in Google analytics . It’s quite a simple process. Here it goes: Go to your site and do a search for anything using your site search function. When you reach the results page, take a look at the URL in the address bar. For example, when I go to my Interactive Biology Website and do a search for the term “Kidney”, the url in the address bar is http://www.interactive-biology.com/?s=kidney Take note of the Query Parameter. In my case, my query parameter is the letter “ s ” (? s =kidney). In your Google Analytics Profile Settings, you will see a Site Search section that gives you the option to Track Site Search. Select “ Do Track Site Search ” and enter the query Parameter as shown below. Select the option that says “ Yes, strip query parameters out of URL “. This will clean up your reports and make it easier to analyze. Click on “ Save Changes “. That’s pretty much it. Now you are ready to use your mind-reading powers. However, make sure you use your powers for good and not for evil How To Analyze Your Site Search Report Now that you have your superpowers, it’s time to start making the magic happen. Of course, it will take some time for data to start accumulating. Hopefully, you have enough visitors by now and they are actively doing searches on your site. If so, the rest is super easy. Allow me to illustrate by giving an example. Let’s take a look at my Site Search Report . When I look at the report above, it gives me some very useful details. Not only that, but it shows me that a number of the things people are searching for are very closely related to the content I have on my site. This makes me happy, and gives me actionable data. The term that is searched most often on my site is “ kidney “. Obviously, some of the people that are using my site are looking for information on the kidney. And when they do that search, they don’t find any results. Approximately 67% of people leave after not finding what they are looking for. The average user that searches for “kidney” on my site only spends 1 minute and 25 seconds on the site. If I were to make a few videos on the kidney, that should increase the amount of time they spend on my site, and that would increase the likelihood of them coming back for more . The next most frequently searched term on my site is “ Action Potential “. Fortunately, I have a bunch of videos on my site that deals with the concept of the Action potential. As a result of that, only 11% of people who do that search leave the site, and the average person who searches for that spends 6 minutes and 39 seconds on the site. Do you notice a difference? I sure do. So the take home message here is simple: If people are searching for something that is very relevant, but you don’t have it – start making some of that content and increase the amount of time they spend on your site, and the likelihood that they will return (and even share your site). My Next Steps Seeing that this gives such valuable info, there are two things that I plan on doing. The first should be extremely obvious. I plan on making more of the content that people are searching for. It’s easy to do, and is very relevant. In other words, it’s a win-win situation. Secondly, I plan on making a search box that’s more prominent on my website, to highlight the fact that you can actually search for what you are looking for. That will accomplish two things: It will make it easier for my visitors to find what they are looking for It will enhance my mind-reading capability (if you know what I mean). Are YOU reading your audience’s minds? If not, then you should start. Set up the Site Search reporting capabilities in Google Analytics . Have you done this already? If so, how are you using this information? Let me know what you think below. Until Next Time! Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: goals, internet, laptop, mind, online, search, search-engine, time, wife

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Blog Writing 101: How To Satisfy Readers And Deliver Top 10 Google Rankings

by Paul Joseph July 21, 2011 Featured

My name is Ana Hoffman , and if I learned anything after many years of building an online empire, it’s this: the online business industry is a scary place. A place where many a mighty business owner has fallen. Including me. That’s right, I’ve had some online business flops in the past, until one day I realized that my business was only as good as the number of eyes that saw it on a daily basis. That’s why I started the Traffic Generation Cafe blog, focusing on various free traffic generation methods like search engine traffic, social media traffic, networking, as well as how to convert that traffic into subscribers and buyers. In six quick months, my blog grew to be an authority on traffic generation. My blog’s traffic (I was ranked under 15K on Alexa ), reader engagement, and sales showed me that I was on the right track. This might all seem foreign to you. Stick with me and it will soon become second nature. Now let’s get down to business. Content is the main driving force behind any blog’s success. That’s it? That’s the premise for my post? You bet. And if all of us already know that and are putting it into practice back on your blogs, then why are so many blogs still failing? Why are so many blogs not generating even measly amounts of traffic? Why are you here looking for answers or pearls of wisdom to take back to your business? Your content is the single most important driving force that will determine whether your readers stay, share, and convert into buyers or subscribers, period. But that’s not the only thing that matters. Your readers are the ones to determine if your content is up to par, but the search engines, Google in particular, are the ones to decide if your content is good enough to bring you those readers to begin with. So you see, our goal as bloggers should clearly be to always serve two masters: Google and our readers . I can already hear the objections coming in. Isn’t it an oxymoron, you say? Writing personable content that attracts human interest, brings about discussions, connects with the reader on a deep personal level and keyword-stuffed metric-based content that would rank highly on Google? I agree this used to be the case. However, in the new post-Panda world Google tells us louder and more clear than ever: it wants to serve its searchers the kind of content the searchers want to read – unique, beneficial, and productive. When Google sends you organic search engine traffic, it wants to make sure that the search engine visitors are happy with what they find on your blog and don’t come back to Google searching for the same query. Thus, you do your job of delivering superb content right and satisfy the searchers looking for answers, and Google will happily send you even more traffic. Turns out that serving two masters in this particular case goes hand in hand. Killing two birds with one stone – how much more efficient can it get? So let’s take a look at what specifically we, the bloggers, need to pay attention to when writing that new killer post of ours. I am basing my conclusions on this SEOmoz report on search engine ranking factors . If it isn’t the holy grail of search engine rankings and how to draw the most traffic from it, then it’s as close as we can ever get to it. Uniqueness Of Content This might’ve not been as strong of a factor in pre-Panda times. (If you need more information on what on earth I refer to as “ Panda Update “, here’s the most coherent resource on the subject: Finding more high-quality sites in search – and it’d better be since it comes from the official Google blog). According to the above-mentioned SEOmoz report, the collective opinion of 132 SEO experts polled assign the uniqueness of content across the whole site 89 points out of 100 . Unique content was the most original marketing tool back in the 1990s and it’s, once again, taking its well-deserved place as one of the most significant positive indicators of the quality of the entire site. While many bloggers continued to stand firm on the principle of consistently producing unique content, many took the easier way of jumping on the bandwagon of flavor-of-the-month promotion techniques, thus diluting the core principle that goes to the heart of blogging “ Thou shall not produce the kind of content thou wouldn’t want to read yourself “. What would one refer to as “ unique content “? What might be the characteristics both your readers and the search engines are looking to find on your site? In the broadest terms, it’s the kind of content not found on the multitude of other sites . If I see another post on “ 15 Ways to Get Facebook Fans ” or “ How to Guest Post “, I am going to scream. I am not saying you have to invent something new every time you write a post, but a new angle on the old tired topic is in order at the very least. Onsite Duplicate Content: When Google crawls your site and sees that two out of three pages are duplicates of the first one, they will drop those two pages from rankings and will assume your site has a lot less unique content to offer than it actually does. Read Duplicate Content Phantom: Don’t Be Duped, Be Informed for more information and fix whatever issues you might have on your blog. Advertising: Yes, the amount of advertising on your site does matter – both to Google and your readers. The larger your Adsense and other advertisement blocks are, the less space you devote to your content = the less unique content you’ll appear to have. That’s precisely why some sites suffered in Panda update – not because they didn’t have unique content, but because their content to advertising ratio was too low. Freshness Of Content Freshness of content on the site got 75 points out of 100 – the second most significant signal among non-keyword related on-page factors. This signal also happens to have a direct affect on how much traffic your website gets. Want to see your blog traffic double? Double the number of your posts . ( Disclosure: don’t hold me to the exact number. ) That’s exactly what I did at my Traffic Generation Cafe blog back in October and I saw for myself what wonders it did for my traffic generation. I, since then, decided to take a little summer break and cut down to posting only three – four times a week and watched my traffic take a hit. It makes sense, right? The more fresh posts you have, the more reason your readers will have to come back on a regular, even daily basis – provided that you are meeting the threshold of unique content on your site. So if you are currently posting two times per week, try to post at least four times; if you are posting four times, try to publish everyday. It might sound like a lot, but remember: your brain is a muscle and, with due practice, it’ll be spitting out the needed amount of posts in no time. Length Of Content Aha – here comes a surprising factor. It appears that the majority of the 132 SEO experts think that the longer your posts are , the better chance they have to rank higher , thus bringing you more search engine traffic. Length of content on the page got 57 out of 100 . Once again, it makes perfect sense. The longer the post is, the more potential value it will deliver to the readers. So what to do if your primary methods of communication with your readers include videos, audios, cartoons, infographs, etc.? Try to beef it up by including scripts, captions, and explanations. And no, it’s not a concession to Google and other search engines – you’ll be providing a valuable alternative to those readers who still prefer to… well, read. I know, I am one of them, and I always appreciate it when a video is followed by a script. Marketing Takeaway I hate cliches, and I am sure I am not alone on this one, but in this particular case I have to resort to the old and true “ Content is (still) king ” motto. Yes, we all know it, but now we also have reasons to actually do it. And in the end, wouldn’t it be a win-win situation for everybody? Stay tuned for my future posts where we will be discussing why your content is the cornerstone of social media sharing and link building, and how to improve it to get more of both. Ana Hoffman Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: book, business, content, internet, online, reader, search engines, search-engine, seo, small-business, traffic

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A Simple Tip To Raise Your Profile And Get You Lots Of Attention

by Paul Joseph July 18, 2011 Featured

Last week, I was asked a series of very interesting and valid questions by one our readers, Malik Mirza . Malik wanted to know about ways to deal with continuity and consistency , marketing and competition in blogging . Because there’s such a wealth of experience among the different writers on this blog, I suggested asking some of the other writers the same questions to get a variety of answers and options for tackling these issues. One thing I know for sure, is that what works for one person, doesn’t always work for another, but there’s always a way to get what you want if you keep looking. In this blog post, I’m going to look at some of the things I’ve learned from my own experience of marketing and attracting attention to my work. Success By Association Marketing is interesting… from my experience so far, one of the most effective kinds of marketing seems to come through association with someone who is high profile in my niche. Even if they aren’t in my niche, but are somewhat related to my work, this still works. Leveraging my profile by association is something I would never have paid any attention to before it consistently proved to be a great generator of interest and attention. When people associate me with someone they already hold in high esteem, then they start to take more notice of me. It consistently shows up that being associated with a “big name” or recognized “authority” generates more interest and attention even though I’m the same person sharing the same information as before. I Always Thought This Was Weird This has been a very weird thing for me to reconcile with. I never used to get photos of myself with well-known people I met, and I didn’t understand why other people did. I used to think, “ Why do people do that? Having a photo of yourself next to someone important doesn’t change who you are – having them next to you in a picture doesn’t make you any more valuable than you already are.” But having seen how effective it is for leveraging my own profile or even just to get people’s attention, I’ve started doing it as well. Why Does It Work? Malik wanted to know why this works, it seems that both of us can be somewhat perplexed by this phenomenon. Reason 1: One of the reasons leveraging profile by association works is that people are so bombarded with so much information fighting for attention, I think they just can’t give an in depth appraisal of everyone’s work. Taking a recognized authority’s reference is just faster & easier. Reason 2 : Another reason is that people do generally want to be seen as part of the “pack”, we’re wired to want to fit in as part of a survival mechanism. So if person “A” is a trusted authority, and person “A” says person “B” is worth listening to, people will agree if it looks like that’s the general consensus. Reason 3: A third reason is related to your values and filters. You have a unique set of values through which you filter the world and these same values direct your actions in life. You’re constantly screening people and events through these filters. Recognized and trusted authorities have already been passed through the filters and you trust them because they align with your own value system and have demonstrated their value. Because the trusted authority has your stamp of approval, people who are associated with them are given a more streamlined passage through your filters. Profile leverage by association gives you a jump-start on everyone else who is vie-ing for attention. It’s important to note, just because you associate with a high profile person, it doesn’t mean you are immediately accepted as someone who has something valuable and valid to share. What You Need To Do To Make It Work It’s completely pointless to run around getting associated with high profile people unless you’re doing something that adds value to them and gives value to others. High profile people have massive demands on their attention and the key is to focus on how you can help them rather than what they can do for you. I’ve found that my writing skills are a highly valuable resource . I can offer them to add value to people I want to be associated with and give value to others as well. Writing for Yaro is a great example of this. I’m also getting to spend a day interviewing one of my favorite businessmen in August. Nobody gets to spend a day with this man for free, he is flat out and in great demand. I offered to take transcripts of the interviews, write up some articles for his PR team to use, and depending on what content we uncover, I may be able to put together a few chapters to go in a book for him. If you want to make use of leveraging your profile by association, the golden rule is look at how you can add value to the person you want to be associated with, and how you can give value to others . Two More Ways To Get Extra Attention There’s a myriad other ways to generate interest and draw attention to what you’re doing. Before I sign off, I’ll mention a couple more things I know have worked. I have two friends, Fran and Gideon who have found YouTube videos to be the holy grail for building business. Another friend, Leonie , was recently featured on the Word Press Freshly Pressed page. Leonie was on day 4 of a 30 day writing challenge when her blog was selected for the Freshly Pressed page. This generated around 3000 page views and nearly 90 comments, very exciting traffic for a newbie blogger! I’d better buzz and get some other work done! Hope this has been useful and I’d love to hear your comments at the end. Cheers, Neroli Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: attention, Featured, online, people, person, work

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3 Steps To Avert Disaster When Things Go Wrong

by Paul Joseph July 14, 2011 Featured

Sometimes, no matter how carefully you plan and prepare to execute a client engagement, things just go wrong. Big things, small things, crazy things, ridiculous things. Things just go wrong. I know because ALL of the following have happened to me at some point over the last four years: An irreplaceable file was accidentally deleted by an associate An unrevised and horribly incorrect draft was sent out to 13 executives at a client site The WebEx link refused to work during a major sales presentation My server was hacked by internet terrorists and my site was replaced by a picture of a squirrel holding a gun on the day of an e-book product release I’m willing to bet that you have had experiences like this in the past. Why? Because in any business – whether you sell goods online, offer a service, or build a product – there will be things, both outside your control and within your control, that just don’t go according to plan. But savvy entrepreneurs know there are a set of simple steps that can be taken in just about any gone-wrong scenario to help get – whatever disaster has befallen – back on track. Let’s explore those steps together. Step 1: Let Common Sense Prevail The biggest mistake people make when something important goes wrong with a client is to panic.  And while panicking is often the most natural response, it is also the most counter-intuitive because panic clouds commonsense , and commonsense is usually the way to get whatever is wrong back to good. Last year, I was coordinating a coaching presentation for one of my clients. I had built the slide deck, organized the meeting, prepared their talking points, and set up a WebEx link for easy use.  Not two minutes after the presentation was supposed to start did I get a call from my client, irate because the presentation link wouldn’t connect. My first instinct was panic. My client was yelling at me, something that I had checked had failed to work, and all seemed totally lost. I put the call on hold and desperately clicked around on the WebEx website trying to figure out what had gone wrong. As I frantically tried the link over and over, only one blinding thought went through my mind: I was going to lose my client over this . Then, a surprising thing happened – a little bit of common sense peaked through my panic. I realized that what looks even more bush league than having a broken WebEx link is keeping the client on hold for ten minutes whilst trying to fix it. What made more sense was to simply send all parties on the meeting a copy of the slide deck via email, apologize for the issue, and let the meeting continue as scheduled. I took a deep breath, took the call off hold, and proceeded to compose my email. If you happen to be on the receiving end of some evil twist of fate, common sense prevailing is also a wise idea. Instead of becoming enraged or upset, it behooves you to realize that whoever you are dealing with: might not be responsible (think customer service rep, etc.) OR is responsible, but acted without malice. In either situation, you will likely need the offending party to rectify the wrong, and you catch more flies (aka: get to the bottom of your problem) with honey rather than vinegar. Step 2: Maintain The Appearance Of Calm I took dance lessons all through my childhood and early teens, and never realized that they were teaching me an important business skill: people only notice mistakes if you act like a mistake has happened. I can remember being up on the stage for the final performance of the year, staring into the dark auditorium looking for my parents during my ballet routine and feeling absolute dread crawl over me as I realized I had no idea what the next steps were. I had two choices: freeze like a deer in the headlights or improvise until I could think of what to do next. So I improvised . After a few tense seconds of moving across stage with the music, I remembered my place in the routine and burst with confidence into the final minute of performance. I finished, took my bow, and walked off stage wondering if anyone noticed my cover-up. It shocked me to realize that no one knew I had missed a chunk of choreographed steps. Lesson learned. I had the same experience ten years later when WebEx was down… after I improvised and sent a professional email with the slides attached, the meeting carried on without issue and by the end of the call, all participants – including my client – had forgotten about the link-blunder. If you’ve been dealt a bad-luck blow (think about how I felt when a well-meaning associate deleted a vital client file permanently), then maintaining calm – even if you don’t feel calm – is key for maintaining business relationships and not burning bridges in a state of upset or alarm. Step 3: Don’t Focus On Apologies, Focus On Correction There is a time for apologies, and a time for moving on. When something goes wrong with clients, many of us default into apologetic mode. We want to share how sorry we are, how embarrassed we are, how upset we are, on behalf of the outrage done to the client. The only problem is that nine times out of ten, the client doesn’t want an obsequious apology, and they certainly don’t want to hear whose fault it is – they want the problem corrected competently and to move on. If you’ve ever had someone hack into your site and replace it with pictures of violent rodents, you’ll understand that this step applies to both sides of the coin. My initial instinct was to demand apologies from every member of the server support team, until I realized that all the time I would insist they spend grovelling at my feet would be better used restoring my site. Focusing on correction, not seeking apologies, was what helped get the site restored in under ten minutes . I’ve found there are a couple of key phrases that can be used in a variety of situations to get things back to good and forward-looking when things go wrong. If you tackle their issue right off the bat with one of these, you can keep yourself from panicking, maintain the appearance of calm, and let common sense prevail: “I am sorry to hear about this, how can I help?” “Thank you for sharing that feedback, what do you see as the next steps?” “I apologize for this inconvenience, why don’t we do this instead?” Sometimes, stuff just happens. We get overworked and make mistakes , or the people we work with get overworked and make mistakes. Technology will fail . Clients will cause issues due to user error. And things that are completely impersonal to you or your work will cause disruptions , distractions , and deletions that can be critical. Such is the nature of life and the nature of the entrepreneurial path. We all need to know how to get it right when things going wrong not only for our success, but also for our peace of mind. How do you get back on track when things go wrong? Here’s to your Entrepreneur’s Journey, Nacie Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: clients, entrepreneur, internet, mind, nature, online, small-business, time, young

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How Showing Vulnerability Makes You A Better Blogger

by Paul Joseph July 11, 2011 Featured

I have an ongoing fascination with how technology has changed the way we do business and affects how we connect and communicate, and this fascination was peaked after reading Yaro’s last article . Having only started my adventure into this online world in the last two years, I’m always learning so much from reading the articles posted here. As I spend time on this blog, and the more I see of the connection between Yaro and the readers, I get to see how Yaro models running a successful business in the new economy. Today’s economy is a technology-based economy. It’s constantly evolving through the Internet, nanotechnologies, information and telecommunication technology and bionics. I’d like to share with you my observations of some of the elements I see that make up a successful model. They’re elements that are often unspoken, yet crucial to success in today’s hyper-connected world. These elements are: Blurring the lines between business and the rest of your life Transparency The Gift of Vulnerability and Connection I couldn’t think of a more succinct way to say, “blurring the lines between business and the rest of your life” but I think you get the idea. I’m referring to the ever-present element in business nowadays where your customers want to know more about you, they want to know who you are beyond just the business persona . This isn’t something new. When you think about it, humans once lived in small, local communities and traded with people within these small communities. Everyone did know a lot about the people they did business with. There were no clear lines between business and every other part of life. This served a very handy function, because you were able to gauge the level of integrity and value of a person in business by observing and interacting with them outside of their business persona. (Rural communities are still like this; I grew up in one and I’m currently writing this blog post from a property in rural Australia where I’m looking after my brother’s animals whilst the family are away.) Transparency The blurring of the lines between your business persona and who you are in other areas of life is a crucial element in today’s economy because it’s needed to build trust and create connection . What this does essentially is create more transparency and allows your customers to have a personal experience of you in your personal life, which helps them gauge the level of your integrity and authenticity. Even more importantly, it facilitates our primary need for human interaction and relatedness. Today’s economy is global and runs largely online, so your clients can’t get a good sense of who you are outside of business unless you share it with them. Most of us have a common preconception that people will put on certain “appearances” if they want to be perceived in a particular way. This isn’t an unfounded belief, it’s precisely how we often behave. So we’re wired to be somewhat distrustful and sceptical about other people’s business personas, because we know they’re not necessarily a complete representation of who they are. This is why it’s so important to allow your customers to see more of you than just your business persona, because it’s those aspects of the rest of your life that will create the greatest level of trust and connection between you and your clients . I read Yaro’s recent post , and was amazed and touched at how many people responded to his very open appraisal of what’s been happening in his personal life lately. Yaro’s article gives a great example of how to walk the line between remaining professional yet still communicate with others in an open and candid way that facilitates a greater sense of connectedness and relatedness . And reading peoples comments shows how much this is valued by his audience. Of course, transparency doesn’t mean sharing the most intimate details of your personal life with your clients. Even in the days when humans lived in small local communities, this didn’t happen unless you were married to the town gossip who would broadcast the family secrets daily : /  Transparency simply means sharing some of who you are in your personal life, including and especially the challenging experiences, so that clients can have a greater sense of connection and relatedness to you. The Gift Of Vulnerability I say “ especially the challenging experiences” because it’s those experiences that show others our vulnerability . If you want to know what creates connection more than anything else, it’s showing some vulnerability. Again, I don’t mean becoming a bleeding heart that pours out its troubles endlessly. Simply showing others that you have real struggles and challenges in life and things are not always perfect is one of the greatest gifts of humanity you can give, and it has a powerful impact on others. Social media, like Twitter , Facebook and YouTube and blogging are the most commonly used channels of communication that blur the boundaries of business and life. All of them are highly effective if you know how to balance being professional whilst still sharing openly and authentically from other areas of your life. Living in small local communities has morphed into living online in communities we’ve chosen. The online communities we choose create the space for us to have a variety of interactions and connections; much of it comes down to fulfilling our primary human need for connection and relatedness. It’s a different version of connecting and communicating, but essentially serves the same function. The intricacies of human connection go a lot further than this. There’s a great TED talk by a research professor named Brene Brown if you want to look into it more. The main thing to remember as a blogger, is that you have a gift you can give your audience that will have a far greater impact on their perception of you than anything else you say. This is your ability to share aspects of your life (like personal challenges and difficulties) that facilitate a level of connection that we rarely give ourselves permission to experience. And the rarity of this in life is part of what makes it so appreciated. Cheers, Neroli. Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: book, business, family, internet, life, online, perception

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What Do Microsoft, Tim Ferriss, Donald Trump and Katy Perry Have In Common?

by Paul Joseph July 8, 2011 Featured

I know most of us will agree that Microsoft does not make the best products. Competitors with better products have smaller market share and less influence. The operating system market was monopolized by Windows for many years while Linux and Apple had single digit market share. (Of course today it’s different with Apple coming in strong with its Apple OS .) Now here is the question that pops up in my mind – How did Microsoft become a giant while producing less impressive products than its competitors? How did Microsoft dominate many markets ingeniously and remain strong, while its competitors put their heart, soul, sweat and blood into producing better products and not getting any closer to beating this giant? The answer to my question is one single word: Leverage . Let me explain by shedding some light on history. Microsoft recognized early on that the industry was going to shift from hardware focus to software focus. The hardware provided the base processing ability that would improve with time, while the software logic gave infinite capability for a programmer to produce softwares that performed any task the mind desired. At that point in time, Microsoft joint forces with IBM , the industry giant at that time, to provide Operating System software for all of its machines. The second strategic move Microsoft made was to charge IBM a small license fee per unit sold. Now, if you think about it, Microsoft did a joint venture with IBM, and leveraged their mass distribution and deep market penetration to reach the entire industry while getting paid for it. This is holy smokes smart! Not revolutionary, just strategic . It was not a marketing plan, it was a business strategy . Today, Microsoft is Microsoft not because of some marketing campaigns, but only because of their ability to command the distribution through multiple mediums in multiple markets consistently. I don’t think that things just worked out for them every time they tried something. They probably had to try ten things to come across this idea. But they were willing to take shot after shot that most of us are not willing to take. A recap on Microsoft moves: Recognition of the industry trend before it was apparent to others Forming a deal with a giant that gave them access to massive distribution I think you got my point! As entrepreneurs, we strive to grow our businesses as fast as possible, and in the blur of feverish activity, we loose the ability to look at the bigger picture . We focus on day to day activities and begin to micro-manage projects. Soon the business runs us. Sad. The reason for this is lack of perspective and business strategy . If you are somewhat active in the Internet Marketing Courses industry, you know that many gurus have built their business purely through joint venture partnerships. That is through partnering up with multiple businesses that complement or compete with theirs and then cross promoting each other’s products in exchange for a sales commission. Sounds sweet, right? Paying only per sale. The Timothy Ferriss Strategy This idea is not limited to the Microsoft or the more familiar Internet Marketing Guru industry. Let me give you a more recent and unconventional example: Timothy Ferriss , the author of two best selling books, “ The 4-Hour Workweek ”, and “ The 4-Hour Body ”, openly holds blogging responsible for his mega success. Now of course Tim had the goods ( solid content ) in his books, but he built his community and following by appearing in numerous leading blogs throughout the Internet (including Entrepreneurs-Journey.com). He spread his message, one blog at a time and one media outlet at a time, while he attributes his success more to the blog partnerships he did as apposed to any other media outlet. Donald Trump & Robert Kiyosaki I know you are convinced already, but how about another unconventional example, Donald Trump . As you know Donald Trump is expanding his business in diverse markets, many of which he is not experienced in. One example is the “financial awareness industry”. Although Trump has many resources at his disposal to become successful in this market, he decided to partner up with best selling author, Robert Kiyosaki , to co-author the book “ Why We Want You to Be Rich ”. Trump knows that Kiyosaki’s book “Rich Dad, Poor Dad” has been on the best seller list for many years and anyone looking to become financially educated, more than likely knows about Kiyosaki. Co-authoring a book with Kiyosaki is a strong leverage for Trump to penetrate this market in a big way. Katy Perry Realize this, it’s unconventional; Katy Perry became enormously famous after her album “ Teenage Dream “. I don’t know about you, but I didn’t even know her before this album, and this is not her first album. Her first music video for this album, “California Gurls”, featured Snoop Dogg . Talk about leverage of association. I agree, Snoop Dogg’s appearance was not the only reason for her success, Katy is a talented artist indeed, but there are many other talented artists in the world who do not receive the kind of attention they would like. Snoop Dogg’s appearance in her video is more of a marketing play than a business strategy, but again it’s leverage. Here Are The Rules The rules are that there are no rules. There are no clearly defined rules or a secret formula to creating such joint ventures that pay big time and for the long term. At least I don’t know of any yet. I was having a conversation with Perry Marshall one day and he said “Aziz, I have tried many things in my business, but the Google Adwords stuff worked for me the best”. If you think about it, when you think of Perry Marshall, the one thing that comes to mind is AdWords. I know just a year ago Perry attempted to dominate the Facebook Ads market by launching his Facebook Ads training course. Still when you think of Perry today, Google AdWords comes to mind. This is just to reiterate the point that there is no ONE SECRET FORMULA, therefore stop looking for one. I believe in noticing patterns that appear in multiple business successes and developing my business strategy and marketing plans accordingly. It is crucial to notice that such partnerships are unconventional , out of the box, and not as common as they should be – since they create massive successes for entrepreneurs. This is good news for the few of us who are literally going to take this message to heart and do something with it. For the vast majority (80% +), this message will serve only as entertainment value and nothing more. Sad, but true. Aziz Ali Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: apple, facebook, Featured, marketing, microsoft, mind, online, small-business, video

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