Jan
22
There is no doubt that the internet is flooded with SEO information. Their is a Guru behind every tree, and the Guru you listen to will greatly effect the outcome of your marketing success. Their is a reason why some are whacked and others are the true gurus of online marketing. But regardless of who you listen to their are ways you can gain better SEO by paying attention to your long-tail keywrods.
Jeffery Smith recently posted this on a blog of his.
This is the short version of Optimizing the “Most Searched Keywords” to Target you Niche amply renamed Optimizing your site for the Most Searched Keywords.
Based on your link building strategy, you have the opportunity to focus on highly competitive terms with inherent high search volume, or moderately competitive short and medium-tail searches (which are known for their saturation ratios for any search conducted comprising any of the keywords that are optimized).
Two factors for consideration;
1) If your site is lean and mean, then competitive terms are a better bet, you need to funnel the right kind of traffic in order to make your online presence worthwhile.
2) If you are executing a pure content based ranking strategy (like several hundred themed pages in a blog) then you’re better off employing the long-tail approach (which means that any word on the page when paired with the right modifier/search term, can return in a less competitive/more specific search query).
A top 10 is a top 10 if it has 10,000 results or 10 million, its all about relevance to the reader and the search term, so, the objective of your link building efforts is to raise the bar and set realistic goals for long term/high search volume traffic while also reaping the rewards of the low hanging fruit to elevate readership, exposure and conversion.
To do this, the logic is, to find the “most searched keywords” of the root phrases that are pivotal to your positioning strategy. Read that again as it is the gist of this post and is the key to this method. From there make sure your on page and off page factors are synchronized.
Up-linking and getting Authority Backlinks to strengthen Trust and Phrase rank.
Since I am into blogging I am going with the long tail SEO. Not that I am against static more niche web pages, but until I get my flag ship blogs up and running I can gain some extra attention through applying long tail SEO. It is a great way to build links within your own sight and out on the web.
Here is a great lesson on link building to gain a better SEO…it is focused on long term key words…again this is from a guru and not some side street vendor…
There is nothing wrong with targeting long-tail traffic but it really depends on what you are selling, if you site is designed with additional information and resources or is a 10-20 page site. For smaller sites, it’s better to think laser-like in your approach and develop a narrow series of high ranking keywords to draw traffic.
If you have a content-rich site (hundreds of pages) with multiple categories, then long-tail optimization could maximize your conversion by delivering thousands of unique visitors as each page could be optimized for multiple terms.
As an example, have a look at your site in SEO Digger
to see just how many possible combinations of keywords your websites keyword density returns based on the the search modifiers and keywords that are optimized (most sites have 50-100 results, I have seen some with thousands, so it is a matter of keyword saturation and keyword density for both the internal links and the external links pointing at the pages from other sites).
Arguably, individuals who use “long tail search queries” are typically looking for more than just information they are closer to the end of the purchasing cycle as a result of them seeking more relevant results. Long tail searches are statistically higher up the conversion chain, as action-based queries usually have eager surfers attached with credit card in hand ready to ready to close the deal.
Similarly, each time a search is conducted, it is by the use of the keywords in the query that search engine sort, eliminate and prioritize websites with the highest relevancy for those keywords.
The role of an optimization specialist is to “raise the bar” for each of the associated keywords that a prospect might use (while conducting a search) to create a correlation between the wide range of potential terms and the optimized (most searched keywords) in question. Naturally everyone wants to rank in the top 10 for a series of the most searched keywords, but in order to accomplish this feat, you must appease search engines and their stringent on and off page criteria.
Jan
22
MSN announced last week that it will partner with WhatOnEarthIsGoingOn to create an online community for consumers who are interested in a variety of social issues and will be a place where brands can showcase their values to these connected users.
The whatonearthisgoingon.msn.com portal will utilize MSN’s existing user base to create an online community where they can learn about and act upon social issues. The site will then target these users with relevant marketing programs from “like-minded brands.”
WhatOnEarthIsGoingOn is a set of marketing initiatives proposed by Grey London’s former creative director David Alberts to create what he calls socially relevant brands. Alberts recently told Clickz News, “Nowadays, brands need to differentiate themselves through their values. Who you are as a brand is just as important to the consumer as what you make, or the services that you offer. Brands will be able to use this as a platform to demonstrate their values to consumers, and feel comfortable in doing so.”
Adding further to this theory, Gayle Troberman, head of branded entertainment at MSN has said, “There is no one place that consumers can come together to discuss socially relevant issues. This will enable us to harness the power of brands and bring together consumers and marketers with the right causes.”
MSN is no stranger to environmental causes. In July 2007, the firm sponsored the Live Earth series of international concerts in conjunction with the “Save Our Selves (SOS) - The Campaign for a Climate in Crisis” initiative. The concerts were shown on MSN, and according to the company, received a total of over 15 million video streams.
Alberts doesn’t see any reason why effective marketing and the promotion of good causes can’t go hand in hand. “We want brands to see a return on their investment, but why shouldn’t good messages be spread through good marketing? I love the fact that brands are doing well out of supporting good causes, and I think we should applaud that,” he said.
This new portal is currently still in development, but is due to be unveiled soon- we will keep you posted.
It will certainly be interesting to watch the success of this online community, to see if it is an area that MSN can really tap into and have as an advantage over Google and Yahoo!
Let us know what you think about this new project by MSN, by leaving a comment below.
Jan
22
by
As financial commentary continues to suggest a recession is inevitable, we’ve decided to run a series of blog posts detailing ways small businesses can leverage the power of search engine and online marketing to weather the recession storm.
Surviving a recession isn’t just about cutting costs - it’s about spending wisely. Far too often, small businesses make blanket cuts to their marketing budgets to save money, but therein lies the issue. If you don’t continue to attract customers then recession survival is near on impossible.
Online marketing provides the most accountable way to acquire new customers. So when times get tough, you need to make sure every marketing dollar you spend counts and is providing you a return on your investment.
Beat the Recession Tip 1: GUARANTEED ONLINE MARKETING RESULTS
The best way to ensure you are spending your money wisely is by engaging services with guarantees. Service guarantees mitigate the risks of your marketing spend in tough financial times.
So what guarantees are available in the search marketing industry?
Organic Listing (web results),
Getting your business into the web results of top search engines is vital for generating “free traffic” to your website. If you’re not listed in the organic search results of Google and Yahoo! - then you’re already behind the eight ball.
Paid inclusion programs offer website owners with guaranteed organic listing in the major search engines. Some of these programs are set up by the search engines (e.g. Yahoo! offers Search Submit Basic for guaranteed listing in 4 days), while some SEM companies will guarantee listing in other search engines (we offer Guaranteed Google Listing in 7 days).
Sponsored Listing (search advertising),
Search engine advertising involves promoting your business on the search engines in their sponsored listings area.
This is the surest way to gain exposure to vital prospects in tough times. Not only is listing possible in a rapid time frame (your search engine ads can be live in hours), but the sponsored results are keyword specific providing rapid targeting opportunities. The best part is that search engine ads are displayed at the top of the search results - in prime view of potential customers.
Local Search Listings (bricks and mortar business listings),
Local Search offers businesses the opportunity to tap into the growing number of customers using search engines to find bricks and mortar retailers and service providers in their area. Businesses are able to set-up detailed business listings which are now being displayed in standard search results thanks to the developments offered by Universal search.
There are many local search offerings available, and unlike core SEM and SEO, local reaches far beyond just Google and Yahoo! (our Local Search Listing service offers submission to 46 local search engines).
Top Rankings in the Search Results.
Unfortunately, top organic rankings are difficult to guarantee as the search engines control the algorithms that govern these results. However, just like search engine listing, some SEM companies will offer their own guaranteed ranking services, providing you some peace of mind on your SEO investment.
Jan
22
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Silicon Alley Insider is reporting that Yahoo may be on the verge of cutting 1,500 to 2,500 jobs.
A tipster believes Yahoo has created a list of 1,500-2,500 jobs that may be eliminated in the next two weeks. CEO Jerry Yang will reportedly make the decision to go forward with these layoffs–or not–next week. Jerry reportedly wants to announce the cuts with or before earnings (January 29th), but may not make them if the stock price recovers.
Yahoo has been one of the companies acquiring social media websites over the past few years including Del.icio.us, Flickr and MyBlogLog. If the economy continues to tank this year then there will likely be many more layoffs at various tech companies to come this year. Those who saw the fallout after 2000 have been through this before. The companies with the highest burn rates are often the first to cut jobs.
Jan
21
Posted on January 19th, 2008 by Tony Bradley
If you have visited a web site recently, it is a virtual certainty that you have seen pay-per-click advertising links. Actually, you are here on my site reading this post, and I have pay-per-click advertising links, so it is an absolute certainty. Most likely, they were from the current king of the pay-per-click advertising hill, Google. Google’s AdSense program allows marketers to choose the keywords they want to target (the more popular the keywords, the more expensive they are to target), and the amount of money they want to spend, and voila! Instant marketing campaign. Others want a piece of that action as well- including Yahoo and Microsoft. Microsoft just unveiled their Microsoft adCenter program. It is very similar to Google AdSense. You can also target your marketing for specific genders, regions, or days of the week to maximize your return. The beauty of pay-per-click marketing is that you don’t pay for the ad being shown, but only for the times that someone actually clicks on your ad to see what you have to offer. Microsoft adCenter keywords are generally cheaper than their Google AdSense counterparts, and allow you to target 99 million MSN Search and Live Search users. You can start an account with as little as $5, and Microsoft is running a promotion right now that provides $50 in free marketing, so your $5 can get you $55 and you can test out pay-per-click marketing for your product or service. Microsoft adCenter $50 in free adCenter Credits Offer.
Jan
20
When it comes to online marketing there are a lot of “gurus”out there. There are a lot of self proclaimed guys and gals that state that they are the best or the millionaires. They will tell you almost anything to get you to buy a product.
When I started I found myself subscribing to almost every newsletter I came across that prompted me to buy a load of junk. And let me say this now…there is a load of junk on the market. What these self proclaimed gurus will do is take misinformation and rehashed ideas and attempt to resell it in a e-book or other form of media to either get your email address or credit card number.
Now not all products are worthless and not all information is bad. Like the saying goes there are nuggets of truth in almost any line of information you hear. Even from those people you don’t trust they will still have something of worth…or put in another way…even a broken clock is right twice a day.
But when it comes to you spending your cash and working off a budget to grow your business, you really need to buy the stuff that will work. The stuff that will produce cash. You need to learn from those who have gone before us and made tons of money.
The first hard lesson I learned in online marketing is that there are different grades of gurus. There are those lower end gurus. Those that i picture as peddling there wares on the side of the street. They remind me on those people you see selling movies on the side of the street in NY. They take a camera into the theater and video tape the show. Then they sell it for a buck or so to those who pass by.
Then we have the high end gurus. Those who have gone before us and made some serious cash and practice good ethics in our field. They have solid information and usually preach a different message then all the lower end guys. They would be the guys who own a storefront (not literally) rather than selling there wares on the streets.
What is funny is that the lower end “gurus”…those that i refer to as selling on the streets rather than owning a store. Will sell you rehashed information that is usually out of date and not even tested, but they continue to preach the same message hoping for the next sucker to come by. You have to beware of these guys. They will nickel and dime you to death.
But then there are those who will give you good information. Those that have bank accounts to prove what they are speaking is true. And for what ever reason they see themselves as teachers or those wanting to pass on information.
It is those people who I want to highlight in this post. The True Gurus of Online Marketing. And trust me this is not an exhaustive list or nor did I get everyone. But here are some of the people I have watched and learned from…and as people show me other gurus I will add them to this list.
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Aaron Wall is the author of SEO Book, the Bible of the search marketing industry. Aaron is the former owner of Threadwatch as well as a frequent conference speaker and SEO tool creator. He blogs at seobook.com. |
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Andy Beal,of Marketing Pilgrim, has been featured in many publications and media outlets, including NPR, CNBC, Business Week, and the Wall Street Journal. |
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Bill Slawski (SEO by the Sea) has been involved in search engine optimization since the mid-1990’s. Bill is one of the founders of the Cre8asite Forums and is a correspondent for Search Engine Land. He specializes in search engine algorithms and patents |
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Christine Churchill, president of KeyRelevance, has been involved in the Internet marketing Industry for over 10 years. Christine is a regular speaker at industry conferences and a recognized expert in PPC campaigns and web usability. |
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Cameron Olthuis is an independent search marketing consultant who specializes in social media marketing, usability, reputation management, and community building. Cameron is a frequent speaker at industry events. |
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Jim Boykin, CEO of We Build Pages, has been involved in Internet marketing since 1999, When he began the company as a sole proprietorship. Since then, it has expanded into one of the top Internet marketing agencies in the industry, running successful linkbuilding campaigns for clients in a wide variety of industries. |
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Jim Gilbert is Vice President of KeyRelevance and a Google Certified PPC Professional. With a background in statistics and math, Jim has conducted many analytical research studies of pay-per-click campaigns. |
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Jeremy Schoemaker (better known as ShoeMoney after his popular blog) is an expert at the art of monetizing websites. Jeremy has been involved in creating websites and SEO strategies since the mid-1990’s. He talks about how he got his first big check and how to monetize websites. |
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Jill Whalen, founder and CEO of High Rankings, has been involved in Internet marketing since the early ’90’s. Jill hosts the High Rankings Advisor newsletter and is the author of “The Nitty-Gritty of Writing for Search Engines.” |
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Lee Odden is President of TopRank Online Marketing, one of the leading search marketing agencies. Lee has developed successful marketing strategies for hundreds of companies, specializing in SEO, online public relations, and blog marketing. Lee provides tips on blogging, social media marketing, and networks of distribution. |
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Neil Patel, author of the Pronet Advertising blog, is one of the sharpest social media minds in the industry. Neil has implemented successful strategies for a wide variety of social media venues. |
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Todd Malicoat, better known as Stuntdubl, has been creating websites since 1997 and began doing SEO and Internet marketing in 2001. Todd has been involved in all aspects of Internet marketing, including traffic acquisition, affiliate marketing, and pay-per-click management. |
Jonathan Leger has been online since before the World Wide Web was born. He has been writing commercial software since he was 14, and spent 8 years in the corporate world as a software developer before striking out on his own. He’s the creator of a number of well known and respected AdSense software products
Jeffrey L. Smith is an seasoned search engine optimization strategist and founder of Seo Design Solutions SEO Web Design Company in Chicago. Jeffrey has been involved in internet marketing since 1995 and brings fresh optimization methods and solutions for businesses seeking long-tail organic search engine placement.
Jan
20
Ok I found a great new sight…this is one of their posts.
Small business is challenged by a series of formidable circumstances and decisions that harbor perilous pitfalls and equally promising rewards. Internet branding is one of such quandaries.
Are you seeking higher sales conversions from your advertising and marketing efforts? Try building value intrinsically by developing a distinct brand image for internet exposure. One example is the Internet Marketing Ninjas from We Build Pages, others such as the Sumo from heavy.com are viral marketing icons. Brand imaging can truly assist your company by distinguishing your website from your competition and provide an added incentive for others to spread the word, based upon the viral nature of your campaign.
While getting there may be half the battle, arriving unscathed is highly unlikely. We are not suggesting that you don an online mascot, but visual aids (and other branding tactics) can assist tremendously and create contextual relevance for your message (such as the images we use in our blogs).
Tactics like these are where link bait, promotions, competitions/challenges or other strategies like giving away plug-ins, widgets, offering free SEO tools, informative e-books or other online incentives can spark a chain-reaction to put your business on the map.
Internet marketing methods differ distinctly from traditional marketing methods. So, how can you expect to leverage your online brand if you are using the wrong or outdated tools for the job. The value of SEO and social media promotion as vital part of your overall internet branding strategy speaks for itself.
That is, if you are interested in the long-term organic placement for your site (as a result of the traffic and links they produce). Search engine optimization is just one piece of the internet branding equation, yet it is not the crowning achievement that can solve all of your marketing dilemmas. Just as social media is great for creating a stampede of traffic, but without the right bait, some argue that it rarely converts.
The scope of the definition of conversion is based on your predication, for some sites a subscription to an RSS feed is the goal, for others they are seeking an immediate sale, while for other sites, just observing click behavior can be the purpose of the analysis.
Brand Analysis
Like anything, it is a tool that has it’s place in the grand scheme of things (sometimes you need a hammer, other times you need a screwdriver) so knowing how and when to employ it, can be more pertinent than that the defining motive of why.
You can walk the beaten path using known/tested fundamentals for ensuring that search engines and visitors alike can benefit from your advertising and marketing efforts, or you can take your machete and toil away until you find higher ground in which to plan your next grass roots campaign. Aside from content, visual appeal and the it factor play a role in the success of your companies online identity.
Developing Value for your Internet Brand Image
Branding is synonymous with a embedding a particular modality in the psyche of the consumer such as being “more reliable than the competition, faster, more effective, more affordable,”Solid as a Rock” etc.”, uniqueness is a must. Therefore having the most compelling, yet inviting brand strategy is crucial in order to quickly communicate your prime directive to potential prospects.
In a nutshell it’s all about shock value (making a memorable impression), referrals, and managing your exposure to yield the ideal brand image. That image in turn is what sells others to sell your company, it’s products or services. They say bad news travels fast, but good news travels faster. So think about positioning and grass roots word of mouth advertising x 1000 and then you can start to grasp the power of a well executed viral marketing campaign that spreads on it’s own accord like “The Whopper Freak Out” or “Elf Yourself” from the Christmas season of 2007.
Brand Development
Your “internet brand” may not always be synonymous with your “off line brand” as each respective market is unique, as the methods used to convey urgency differ greatly as the audiences are often from two schools of thought.
The first school is the “break em down through repetition” crowd who is used to passively being coerced into purchasing decisions (the typical Television watching Consumer). The other (from the new school of behavior) is a new breed of technologically-savvy super consumers who knows specifically what they want, how much they are willing to pay for it and don’t mind performing some comparative analysis in order to find the best value proposition (The Nimble / Instant Gratification Based Cyber-Shopper).
In this instance when you considering your brand identity and brand value online, you should consider this internet savvy consumer and be able to cater to their attention and their needs (quickly and without the fuss) as corporate brands are gravely losing market share to smaller, more ambitious companies who embrace this exponentially growing breed of credit card wielding consumers “from The Hannah Montana Generation to the Gadget Hounds, who have to have the latest and greatest gizmos”.
Brand Value
In this way, small businesses (utilizing aggressive internet marketing) have a distinct marketing advantage, they can quickly make changes, implement entirely new facets on a whim for an enhanced marketing campaign or target a new direction entirely with less bureaucracy than their corporate competitors. Granted, small businesses have to be more creative and value-conscious in their pursuits, but with the ability to leverage social media and create a lead generation or sales campaign at a fraction of the costs, it is only a matter of research and targeting the appropriate niche.
Internet marketing is leveling the playing field that was previously leveraged by large corporations with deep pockets using traditional marketing channels (TV, Print, Radio) that they essentially funded (from the onset) into the booming categories and industries they are today.
Ambitious smaller businesses however are poised to dove-tail on the successes of such established category leaders (every industry has one). These smaller more nimble businesses can essentially carve out niche-specific revenue generating business model as a result of narrow-casting vs. broadcasting and become profitable by services a specific need. The internet is truly fertile ground for this type of positioning, with the implications of niche marketing encompassing so many facets.
Brand Strategy
For the sake of your internet brand, consider that playing it safe and conservative may not be your best move. Not everyone thinks the same way as you do or uses common queries to reach your pages (as more than 30% of all search queries are unique). Hence, you should have enough depth (with your keywords) and your internet brand image to use modifiers (variants) to supplement the core message using a variety of established advertising clichés. Examples like “when one top 10 ranking is just not enough” with a picture of a basket of eggs is a perfect example of risk vs. reward (as it drives the message home with a simple tag line), while still making the point of a solution oriented proposition.
Our brand (for example) is targeted at small businesses who are seeking competitive search engine optimization services. Most of the businesses we deal with are seeking to gain traction in search engines to compete with larger more established corporate brands (not through PPC or some other variant of internet marketing) through strictly organic means.
Why then would we give away so much information about organic SEO on our blog for free? Because we know that positioning ourselves and our brand image as an authority (through actions which are traceable through the press and are known to produce results – our own rankings in search engines) are far greater than just relying on promises (we will rank your website in the top 10 and rule the world yada, yada, yada) or make presumptions of top 10 placement through simple mood making. The premise of being able to rank our own site amidst the arguably most competitive market online (the SEO industry) that optimization for most markets is a cake walk in contrast to the competition.
We also know that when it’s time to “get your click on”, that actions speak louder than words and there is no stronger method that using a variety of marketing mediums to increase exposure and popularity to attract the largest potential clients for your brand, which is why adding an image or playing on words sometimes is enough to “stand out in the crowd” (another popular cliché) to leverage your business online.
To reinforce our brand value we use visual aids, targeted keywords that are themed in nature and function. This is why our brand image (on our blog) oftentimes incorporates images of hip, younger urban business professionals challenged by competitive circumstances and situations, hence the name SEO Design Solutions is reinforced.
Not to mention, the fact that our company (for example) offers custom designs and programming to create optimized websites, as well as provides strategic search engine positioning services is encapsulated in the name (as well) to produce well-rounded internet brand development, which is important in attracting the right customer base (decision makers with competition chomping at the bit).
So, are you taking full advantage of your online advertising and marketing strategies that could yield tremendous exposure for your business? What about a clever link-baiting campaign (using Stumble Upon or Digg) where a play on words and the right image could potentially toggle a stampede of traffic to your pages. Social media fused with a strong organic SEO campaign can increase link popularity, toggle significant spidering activity from search engines and produce lot of referrals for your business.
It’s not always about making a killing the first time around, depending on your business model, trust is a key ingredient and unless you have spent time investing in components that convey that, your best bet is to establish it through mediums that are cost-effective (such as a Blog to bridge the gap between your industry and your prospects).
Aside from that, if you have tens of thousands of dollars lying around, you could always create brand awareness through traditional means such as newspapers via PR, radio or television advertising, but why look a gift horse in the mouth when it comes to internet marketing and the potential it has to lead qualified traffic to your door.
It’s not always who you know, it’s who knows someone that is looking for a service like yours (a friend of a friend told your cousin’s brothers sister about a website who then told you). Rest assured, when someone in need requires a service similar to yours (from their social circle) then that is where brand value is established and referrals occur as a result of exposure through press releases, articles, social media, PPC or organic search results.
In closing, you can never count out any one of those blips on your stat counters or analytics tools when attempting to distinguish ROI and just how such equity may yield a favorable return from using internet brand imaging and internet brand development over time.
Jan
19
Incentive Marketing is a relatively new entity on the web however, it has been rumored that incentive marketing is actually declining. In reality though, Incentive marketing is spreading like wildfire on the internet. This increasingly popular entity provides many great benefits for consumers and marketers alike.
Just one such benefit for savvy marketers who utilize incentive marketing is that it is an excellent way to increase customer loyalty. When you offer your customers or potential customers valuable incentives as rewards or enticements for participation they are by nature appreciative, and also tend to become a bit more relaxed in an otherwise sometimes skeptical situation.
Yet another powerful benefit of incentive marketing when done correctly would be brand awareness for you, your site and your products. Everyone likes getting something for nothing, or next to nothing and when you are the provider of such, you are remembered. It is that memory which often spawns return customers.
There are actually several forms of incentivised marketing and the techniques can vary greatly from one type of market to next. For certain businesses, incentive marketing can actually mean the difference between success and failure. The increase in customer response related to the opportunity to receive free gifts and/or other types of free stuff such as name brand merchandise, travel vouchers, gift cards or other promotional items can be a tremendous boost for an otherwise failing or stagnate business.
On an overall basis, incentivised marketing put simply is the practice of motivating consumers to a higher level of performance by offering them rewards in return for reaching predetermined goals. This not only provides a higher level of user participation for an existing website/business, but can also provide new and aspiring businesses a very powerful and effective means of building rather quickly a level of success that by other means would take much longer.
Incentivised marketing can be an extremely effective way to drive millions of potential customers and therefore potential sales transactions to your web site and the best part is, when it is structured properly this can be accomplished with very little effort on you your part.
There has been a more recent widespread increase of what is generally known as “freebie” sites popping up around the www. The success of these sites is without a doubt directly related to the fact that nearly everyone has things that they would love to own but cannot afford to just go out and buy. For instance, that brand new computer system that you’ve been looking at, or maybe that 52″ wide screen TV you saw that nearly floored you when you saw the price tag. The rewards offered through these sites vary widely and at times are even left to the consumers choice.
These “freebie” sites, operate purely as incentivised marketing entities. They provide major brand name product advertisers with potential clients through website introduction using incentives to stimulate participation. In return, these advertisers pay them very well indeed for their services. This provides the site owners the capital to provide their users with such extravagant rewards as the “big ticket” items above, or even generous amounts of cash for their participation.
This scenario creates a very unique and beneficial situation for everyone involved. It is actually a true win, win, win situation where the advertisers gain the prospective clients they are looking for, the website operators gain not only monetary rewards but also a virally growing client list that in reality builds itself, and the end user/consumer gains not only the “gift” they wanted, but also is introduced to some of the worlds newest products and services available. The process by design is very smooth and at the end, everyone goes away happy.
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One of the most effective and cost efficient means of generating website exposure and targeted traffic is article marketing. Riley Bennett operates a PR3 article directory at: http://www.articlexplosion.com
Jan
19
by David Futrelle
Like many things in this world–Bill Gates, the Internet, Sandra Bullock’s character in Love Potion #9–blogs started out humble and nerdy. Ten years ago, a man named Jorn Barger launched something he called a “Web log,” entitled Robot Wisdom. It was–and still is–a “log of the best Web reading,” Barger says. “Hardly anyone seems to remember that.”
The Bigs
of Blogs |
These are most popular places in the blogosphere, according to Technorati, as measured by the number of links to those blogs during the past six months:
1. Engadget
This gearhead blog is in AOL’s Weblogs Inc. network, along with Autoblog and Luxist. 2. Gizmodo
Gawker Media’s top blog, the tech-centric Gizmodo tallied nearly 50 million page views in October ‘07, up 158% from October ‘06, according to SiteMeter.
3. Boing Boing
This gee-whiz indie blog calls itself a “directory of wonderful things”–from a short story written only with words from The Cat in the Hat to artful Japanese manhole covers.
4. TechCrunch
Web 2.0-centric Techcrunch has spawned an eponymous global network that includes French, Japanese, and British editions.
5. The Huffington Post
The No. 1 political site’s starry roster includes Bill Maher, Valerie Plame, Alec Baldwin, Naomi Klein, and Charlie Rose.
6. Lifehacker
Gawker Media–owned Lifehacker gathers Heloise-like hints for the wired generation.
7. Ars Technica
Its name invokes Hippocrates (”Life is short, art is long”), and its commentary focuses on the “art of technology,” strolling from gadgets to government regulation to tech-biz news.
8.Mashable!
This nexus of social-networking news is for those who can’t get enough of Facebook.
9. Blog di Beppe Grillo
Basta!
On his bilingual (English/Italian) blog, comic/activist Beppe Grillo comments on current affairs, especially corruption in Italian business and politics.
10 Icanhascheezburger.com
This definitely-not-corporate site specializing in zany cat photos was inspired by a pic of a cat with the caption: “I can has cheezburger?”
11. Daily Kos
Markos Moulitsas Zuniga’s liberal political blog inspired the annual Netroots Nation convention (formerly YearlyKos).
12. TMZ.com
From A-list to Z, Time Warner’s celeb-obsessed TMZ has the dirt and the photos. |
Perhaps that’s because, over the past decade, the blog has morphed into something much louder–and more lucrative. Barger never planned to make any money from his Web log, and he never did. But today’s blogosphere is a more mammon-driven place. Viewed through the lens of business, one might say that blogs are even coming of age.
Steve King, a senior fellow at the Society of New Communications Research, estimates that blogs attract between $50 million and $100 million of ad money a year, a figure that’s multiplying rapidly.
The blogging ranks at big-media companies have swelled; The New York Times, whose parent company now draws more than 10% of revenue from online operations, had upward of 40 blogs at last count.
And interest in buying up blogs has grown–along with the dowries. Two years ago, AOL paid about $25 million for Weblogs Inc. Were Nick Denton to want to sell his Gawker Media empire (Gawker for media types, Defamer for Hollywood watchers, Wonkette for political junkies) today, some bloggers–jealous, we’re sure–have speculated that he could get up to $100 million for the lot.
Such a value on your head (and on your words) inevitably changes the way you talk about yourself.
Arianna Huffington may still refer to her eponymous Post with words such as “community,” though by Web standards it’s more a metropolis; what Barger described in 2005 as “100 different windbags with no common voice” is now 1,800 strong. HuffPo’s recently hired CEO, Betsy Morgan, a Web veteran poached from CBSNews.com, is introducing a new word to the business: She prefers to talk about the “brand.”
The increasingly corporatized blog is now behaving differently. Whereas a family of blogs might simply seek a new voice or five, a blogging brand acts more like Britney Spears’s slowly-growing-back head of hair: It’s desperately seeking extensions. What new revenue streams are available? How else can it pump up visibility? For Gawker, it’s books. For TMZ.com, it’s TV. For TechCrunch, it’s conferences that charge participants $2,000 and up to attend.
As these brands expand, an online parlor game has developed. One blog comments on another’s potential buyout value, which might have the effect of inflating the price tags (and certainly the imaginations) of them all. That ever-reliable Henry Blodget, writing on his Silicon Alley Insider blog, valued HuffPo at around $60 million; economics blogger Felix Salmon rustled up the $100 million number for Gawker Media and wrote, “Imagine: the first blog IPO.”
The desire for growth–toward whatever end–is driving these nascent media empires into interesting territory. While Huffington claims to be operating on the fly–”we’ve never had a five-year plan,” she says–she has strong ideas about where her site should go in the near future. Those include adding more investigative journalism: “Blogs need to do the hard work of breaking more stories,” she says. She’s hiring reporters, and also diversifying her readers’ heavily political diet, adding sections on business, entertainment, and lifestyle.
What she is describing seems a very different creature than the baby she brought into the world two years ago, but it’s often said that babies grow up more quickly than you realize. What she envisions feels quaintly familiar–like a bits-and-bytes version of something we’ve seen before. In fact, there may be a word for it: newspapers. And we all know how well they’re doing.
Jan
19
The American Marketing Association has taken upon itself to redefine the word ‘marketing.’ I’ve always thought of marketing as a corporates peak for selling. Silly me!
Before the “upgrade,” the word marketing was defined as:
“Marketing is an organizational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers and for managing customer relationships in ways that benefit the organization and its stakeholders.”
Got it? Now, scratch that, because there is a new definition:
“Marketing is the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large.”
The AMA has this to say for the re-definition:
The new definition includes the role marketing plays within society at large, and defines marketing as a science, educational process and a philosophy — not just a management system. It also expands the previous scope of the term to incorporate the concept that one can market something to “do good.”
“One of the most important changes to American Marketing Association’s new definition for marketing is that marketing is presented as a broader activity,” says Nancy Costopulos, Chief Marketing Officer of the American Marketing Association. “Marketing is no longer a function — it is an educational process.”
