Criteria for Successful Website Design

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I do not think you should start the design of a new or revised website by sitting down with the designer and coder of the website. Rather, I recommend you review the approaches, ideas, processes and other methods listed in this article to determine if they apply to your situation.

Think about your audience. Are they looking for immediate answers and solutions? I bet they are. Most likely the visitors to your website are very much like you. Chances are you use the Internet more than other types of media to search for information. If a web page does not “grab your interest” within 5 - 10 seconds after landing on it - you move on!

As a “first step” I suggest that you start by reviewing the questions listed below. I am certain that once you get to the last question you will have accumulated a list of action items that will greatly improve the overall quality of your current website. The success or failure of your site and/or business may very well depend upon the decisions you make after reading these questions and giving them a little thought.

What Do You Know About Your Clients´ and Prospects´ State of Mind?

When visitors land on your website they have very little time to read what you want to tell them. They have a need for information or a product and do not want to listen to or read wordy descriptions and comments. You have between 5 - 10 seconds to engage them and get them to take action. What is it that most visitors landing on your website want? Is it:

1. information,
2. a “quick fix”,
3. a bargain,
4. a large selection,
5. a telephone call,
6. or something else?

It is imperative to know the answers to these and many other questions BEFORE you design the pages within your website (or have them designed).

Do You Make Website Visitors Feel Like You Can Satisfy Their Wants and Needs?

Landing on any page within your website (but especially the Homepage) must make your visitors know that you understand their needs, desires, wants, and business. The more you put yourself into the mindse of the prospective visitors to your website, the better your chances of converting their visit into something you want to happen i.e. buy, complete a contact form (opt-in form), bookmark the page, pick up the phone and call you or any other method of measurable conversion.

What Approach Do You Take When Developing Pages Within Your Website?

What do you think you would want from your website if you were the prospective visitor or client? Assume you do not know as much as you want and need to in order to make an informed decision. Talk to your visitors in a language they will understand. If visitors want more insight or information, tell them to click on the more info link or give you a call. But keep in mind that they will follow your direction ONLY if you have built some level of trust or understanding.

What are You "Selling" to the Visitors of Your Website?

Are you focused on telling them about your product or service, or are you making them understand that choosing your firm will deliver that special feeling they are seeking by making the purchase? Are you sure that you communicated to the visitors that you understand their needs, wants, problems, etc.? What techniques did you implement to get your points across?

How are You Going to Get Your Visitors to Stay and Think About Your Service or Product?

Remember - they are ready to pass by your website in a blink of an eye. What are you going to do to engage them? The answer you come up with will be critical to the success you have in gaining their confidence enough to buy your product(s) or call you, etc. Make sure what you say is NOT the same old thing they are used to seeing or reading on every other website. Be boring and you lose! Address the issues that appeal to your visitors and they WILL STAY ON YOUR SITE! This is hard work – but well worth the effort.

What Kind of “Call to Action” Statements are You Placing on Your Website?

Turning a visitor into a prospect or client is one of the most critical actions of your website. How will you engage them? Once they know that you understand their needs and wants, they are more inclined to follow your CTA direction. Call to Action statements are critical to the success of any website's conversion. Guide them in a manner that is more telling, rather than just selling. Do not be afraid to be assertive.

How Does Your Website Address the “Who Are We” Issue?

Again, it is about making the website visitors feel confident that they are choosing a reputable firm or organization with which to do business. They need to read about your success. This can be done by exhibiting your affiliation with associations, awards won, satisfied client statements, client success stories, examples of your work, etc. Show them you are a “player” in your industry/expert in your field.

Are You Prepared to Answer: "What Makes You Different"?

What have clients and prospects said about you and your company? Have they applauded you for your approach to doing business? Did they say you made them feel like you understood their needs and wants? Think back to the reasons clients buy from you. How did you meet their needs and wants? Give your prospective clients reasons to do business with your firm.

A final thought...

Make it your primary goal to understand your potential clients. Look at your website from the client´s perspective. Who are they? What makes them different? What do they individually want and need? Provide information - do more telling than selling. They will “get it” and appreciate that you have made them educated buyers/ well informed visitors. Finally, tell them what you want them to do next. Get them to take the first step and be ready to deliver on the expectations you have set throughout your website!

Finally, do not be afraid to hire Internet marketing professionals to do the job if you feel that you cannot handle it by yourself. Too much is at stake to leave this part of your business to chance!

 

Related article:

How to Make Your Website Successful

 

 

Technorati-Tags: web design,successful website,more traffic,layout

How to Make Your Website Successful

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When trying to make it on the Internet, there are many ways in which you can further your bloog´s or website´s success. Although the look of your website is important, fancy websites do not automatically become successful, nor do they make sales. There is much more to creating a quality blog or website. To make a blog or website successful, you must create content that will be of interest to your target market and make them want to visit your website over and over again. In addition, your website should lead your visitors to take the action you desire, such as joining your mailing list, or making a purchase, or just visiting again.

1. Selecting a Niche

The first step towards making a website successful lies in targeting it for one specific niche. For example, if you are designing a website about cars, everything within your website should relate to cars.

2. Selecting a Keyword Phrase

You must also select the most relevant keyword phrase for each webpage. A keyword phrase consists of two or more words that best describe the specific webpage. For example, if your webpage is about ‘repairing transmissions’, your best keyword phrase would be ‘transmission repair’. You should use your keyword phrase a few times within your webpage (approximately once every 80 – 100 words), as this will enable the search engines to determine what the website is about. This is maybe the most important step on your way to making your blog or website successful.

3. Using HTML Heading Tags

When you begin writing your content, it is very important that you use the HTML H1 heading tag with your main title at the top of your webpage. In addition, use the HTML H2 tags for your sub-titles. This is very important, as some search engines place relevance on the text displayed with heading tags.

As the default text for the H1 heading tag is very large, you may want to use CSS style sheets to display the heading tags in the font style and size you prefer.

4. Using META Tags Within a Webpage

Another step to help make a website successful is to include META tags between the HEAD (<head> and </head> respectively) tags of your webpage. META tags help the search engines to find out what keywords are relevant to the webpage. They are also used to tell the search engines what the webpage is about (description tags). Most search engines will display this description within their search results.

5. Backgrounds and Text

It is always best to display a webpage with a white background and black text, as this will make the text easy to read. Distracting backgrounds will make the text hard to read. A good rule of thumb is to just use common sense and keep your website simple. This alone is a great way to help make a website successful.

6. Animated Graphics

If you are using animated graphics, it is important that you use them sparingly. Graphics that continually flash are VERY annoying and may prevent your visitors from returning to your site in the future.

7. Navigational Links

It is very important to include good navigational links on every page. They should be displayed at the top, bottom, left or right side of your webpage. In addition, your visitors should be able to get to any webpage within your website within four clicks.

8. Webpage Layout

Always be consistent with the design of your website. This is a very important if you want to make your website successful. The layout for each and every page of your website should be the same. If you make it different, your visitors will become confused. In addition, it will make your website appear to be unprofessional. Your website design should include the same layout, logo, and navigation setup on each page.

9. Spelling and Grammar

Always make sure you proof read and spell check your webpages and blog posts for errors before publishing them. It is also very important that your webpage does not have any broken images or links.

10. Important Webpages

When you launch your website, it is very important that you include the following webpages:

About - The ‘About’ page is used to tell your visitors about you and/or your companyand/or the site´s goals.

Privacy - The ‘Privacy’ page is used to let your visitors know what you do with their personal information, such as their email address.

Terms and Conditions - The ‘Terms and Conditions’ page should be displayed on your website for your own protection.

Site Map - A ‘Site Map’ is used to help the search engines index your website more easily as well as more correctly.

You can learn more about all of these pages by doing a little research on the web. They are very important and will help make a website successful.

11. Website Interactivity

Another way to make a website successful is providing interactivity. This can be done by including a targeted forum that complements your website, a form in which your visitors can subscribe to an ezine, a feedback form to enable them to give their opinion, or an informative blog in which visitors can comment.

12. Web Browsers and Screen Resolutions

When you begin designing your webpage, it is HIGHLY recommended that you install the most popular web browsers on your computer. This will enable you to see how your website will display in different browsers. You will find that your website may look great in one browser and horrible in another. It would be wise to design your website to display properly in Internet Explorer, and then it should display properly in Firefox, Opera, etc.

It is also important that you view your website through different screen resolutions. You can either open your webpage in your browser and then change your computer's screen resolution, or there are website's online that you can visit, such as Any Browser, to test your website.

If you follow these simple guidelines, you can make a website successful in no time.

 

 

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10 Essential Tips for Lauching Your Business Blog

Free Traffic and the 4 Vital Elements of a Successful Business Website

 

 

Technorati-Tags: successful website,seo,more traffic,search engine optimization,search engine friendly,website design,layout,meta tags

Free Traffic and the 4 Vital Elements of a Successful Business Website

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Anyone can build a website. Countless companies are offering a vast array of web building solutions, some good, some great, and some quite frankly are a complete waste of time! But building a decent looking website is really only part of the story, only part of the process. There are literally millions of web pages that will never be viewed and therefore stand no chance of commercial success. Some of those sites are even quite good; unfortunately their owners have misunderstood the process and have put the cart before the horse...

In the online world no one just happens by your website, credít card in hand! If you have yet to build your website, or are about to create a new site, stop! You need to consider exactly what you wish to achieve with your site before you get started. “Creating a website should follow a process proven to deliver a commercial end result - or run the risk of ending up just another pretty picture in cyberspace!”

Fortunately there is a process, and I highly recommend you take a look at it - maybe you already know it...

Content --> Traffic --> Pre-sell --> Monetize

A time tested 4 step process, proven to produce websites that deliver - commercially! Ok, let us take a brief look at each step and find out why they work in this particular order.

1. Numoro Uno, as always, Content

Very, very, very, very important. Building an information-rich site is crucial. You abolutely must have high quality, unique, relevant content on your site, a) because you want to attract visitors in the first place and b) to generate long term, search engine based free traffic.

Online, people are looking for solutions and/or information that leads to solutions (not to forget entertainment). They use the search engines to hunt for the most relevant facts to reach their end goal - a practicable solution. Your job is therefore easy: Give it to them! But do not make the mistake of just plonking down any old garbage and hoping for the best - take your time, put in the effort, provide good quality information that will over-deliver and keep your visitors interested, satisfy their needs - and you will be rewarded. Over time, gradually add new fresh, useful content and you will be one your way to creating web pages valued by humans and search engines alike. In the online world, high value content is king!

2. Traffic - The Holy Grail...

Much, too much has been written on the subject, and many are making a good living providing (?) this elusive element.

Truth is, (excluding social media) there are but two ways to get it - you either pay for it, or you optimize for it. If you take the time to understand the basics you can easily do both.

Paid search, (PPC – Pay Per Click) such as Google Adwords has its place, and can provide an immediate stream of targeted visitors to your website; it is, however, a study of its own and can, if not fully understood, become very costly very quickly! If you want to go that route learn with small amounts (of money) and do not be tempted to throw good money after bad...

Safer - and arguably better – is going the route of search engine optimization (SEO) for the organic results, as reached via Google or other search engines. This means nothing more and nothing less than intelligent website construction, a process anyone can learn. It is important to note that the optimization should be built in during the creative process, at the time of your site´s construction; you are literally building your website to principles that make it search engine friendly, thus leading to high natural positions in organic search results, hopefully leading to a significant and constant free traffic flow to your site...

3. DO NOT SELL – PRE-SELL

You have created a website with value rich content and fully optimized its pages for indexing by Google (and other search engines). Folks are arriving at your site as directed by their search results. You are keen to have them buy your goods or services, ready with your pitch - but wait! There is another vital step in the process of converting your visitors into customers, and you have done half of the work already...

Pre-selling is a warming up process that allows you to develop trust and confidence in your offering. It is well known that people are more willing to buy from those they like, trust or respect. By over-delivering relevant high value information without appearing to be forcing a sale you will, almost by default, create an atmosphere that inevitably leads to sales. It is that simple!

As far as your visitors are concerned, their needs are being met, their every wish is being fulfilled, you are providing the very information that is the solution to their problem. Pre-selling creates an open-to-buy mindset that smoothly introduces your visitors to your monetization offer.

4. Monetize

Thank you for sticking with me this long, here is the home run: This is where you make your offer enticing by introducing and highlighting the many benefits of your product or service, and detailing exactly how it provides the solution to their predicament. You have paved the way with informative, relevant content and can now look to close with persuasive sales copy.

Your call to action should be strong and concise. Tell your prospective customers exactly what they need to do to order. If you have a good product, and you should, let them know exactly how they will benefit by ordering from you - today!

This is it: A formula simple, yet highly effective. Generate targeted free traffic via your highly optimized website, provide information packed content that offers solutions, warm up or pre-sell your visitors by over-delivering on the quality of that content, then, and only then, monetize by introducing persuasive, benefit focused sales copy to convert pre-sold visitors into enthusiastic customers.

I hope you found this post helpful. Please visit again for more information about promoting your business online.

Good luck!

 

Related article:

10 Essential Tips for Launching Your Business Blog

 

Technorati-Tags: Seo,search engine optimization,more traffic,free traffic,online business

10 Essential Tips for Launching Your Business Blog

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Are you thinking about launching a blog promoting your business? You are not alone. A recent study by GuideWireGroup revealed that close to 89 percent of businesses polled use blogs as a way to communicate with their customers. In another survey, Burson-Marsteller found that 15% of the companies on the Fortune 500 list have blogs. A successful business blog can generate tens of thousands of dollars in revenue each year, with figures for large corporations typically much higher.

This is proof that business blogging is becoming a mainstream marketing tool. That does not mean, however, that blogging comes easily or naturally for many companies, their owners and employees. Blogging, like any form of content, takes up quite a lot of time and resources - namely, you have to know how to write (or have access to good writers) and you have to update your blogs with fresh, original and insightful new material on a regular basis.

This is should in no way scare you away. It should, however, inspire you to learn the basics of business blogging before you turn your baby loose on the world. Planning your blogging strategy first is a wise move, because it gives your blog a greater chance of success. However, if you do not feel up to the challenge at all, you need not worry – outsourcing is always an option. Anyway, here are 10 tips for launching your business blog:

1. Identify your readers

Before you start writing anything, make sure you understand who your target audience is. This is also known as your “buyer persona”, which marketing guru David Meerman Scott defines as “...a distinct group of potential customers, an archetypal person whom you want your marketing to reach.” Basically, you want to tailor your topics to the group(s) of people who are most interested in your Products and/or services. Otherwise, you are missing the mark and losing out on potential leads and sales. To identify these buyer personas, there are 3 important questions you should ask yourself:

· Where do your customers come from?

· What type of content will be useful to them?

· Where do your customers hang out online?

2. Create social media accounts

If you have not already done so, register accounts with Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube. Start with these four and expand later. This is important because you need places to post links to each new blog post, so that your groups, fans, and followers can read them. Posting on social media also encourages people to subscribe to your RSS feed, another great way to promote your blog.

3. Establish your social media presence

Lay the groundwork for later blog promotion by establishing relationships with your target audience. One of the best ways to do this is through social media. Now that you have accounts set up, you can join forums, listen to conversations and hear what people are saying about your industry. Add thoughtful and insightful comments whenever possible.(No spamming!) Outsource or hire employees to do this if you do not have enough time, but try to contribute every once in a while if possible.

4. Decide on a place for your blog

You can either put your blog on a page within your website or give it its own domain. Your choice depends largely on your goals. Do you want the blog to be part of your site, and linked to it directly? Or do you have plans to use your blog for other purposes, such as to earn revenue through ads or creating a secondary business from it?

A blog can help your website to rank higher, and it can also rank highly on its own. Therefore, think about your long-term objectives when deciding where to place it.

5. Choose a blogging platform

You have quite a few options here. WordPress is currently the premier choice for professional blogs, but you can also check out Joomla, Blogger, TypePad and others.

6. Use the right keywords

If you are placing your business blog on a page within your site, most likely you will be using the same keywords for your blog that you are already using for your site. If you have done good keyword research, then these are the keywords that best reflect your business. Ideally, they are also the search terms that people are using to find you. If you are placing your blog somewher else, consider if any keyword changes need to be made. You may want to take your blog site in a different direction from your site. Again, this depends on your goals for your blog.

Incidentally, if your blog does have its own domain, you will want the domain name to be brandable, easy for consumers to recognize and search engine friendly.

7. Plan your posts

Think about the direction you want your blog posts to go in. A good way to stay on track is to start with one main topic and draft a few entries in advance. Publish them on a regular schedule (can be automated!) and you will have a supply of targeted blog posts that add fresh content to your site and point back to your business each week. Coming up with topics can be a challenge, but there are a lot of helpful resources on the Web if you should get stuck.

8. Network with opinion-leaders

Once you have got your blog up and running, it is a good idea to check out other bloggers in your industry/field of expertise. See what they are doing, what they have to say, and leave insightful and helpful comments on their blogs. This kind of web networking will help you establish relationships with these people, which in turn will prompt them to help spread the word about your blog and your business. This kind of free advertising is invaluable. It connects you to credible and respected individuals within the blogosphere and markets your business for you.

9. Promote your blog

As mentioned earlier, offering a blog subscription through an RSS feed is an effective way to promote your blog. There are other ways to get the word out, as well. Write an optimized press release (PRWeb.com), submít articles to directories that link to your blog page, submit your blog to social bookmarking sites such as StumbleUpon and Digg (or set up an account with Ping.fm and have it done automatically). Make sure that you link to your blog posts in your social media posts.

10. Analyse results

If you are going to take the time to blog for marketing purposes, you will want to know how well you are doing, right? Since it relies primarily on the building of human relationships over time, blog ROI (Return Of Investment) can be tricky to measure. But there are many tools at your disposal to help you determine how much or how little your blog is contributing to the bottom line.

Free online tools like Google Analytics and Google Alerts provide you with information about how your customers are finding you online, and can tell you a lot about your blog page, in particular. Facebook Insights is a great way to track activity on your Facebook account. Many more tools are available, so look into them.

Like any project, launching your business blog is all about preparation. If you do your homework and lay a solid foundation, your blog will produce results (although it may take awhile). Keep in mind that blogging is a form of content marketing and, as such, is primarily about building relationships with customers. So, be patient, follow these tips, and watch your business grow!

Good luck!

 

P.S.: You might want to watch this highly informative video:

How to Get Better Visibility on Google

 

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Technorati-Tags: online business,make money,more traffic,business blog,marketing

Search Engine Optimization for Your Blog – 5 Tips to Get You Started

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Easy SEO Tips to Make Your Blog More Search Engine Friendly

Making your blog search engine friendly as well as easy to navigate for your visitors is at the core of SEO. Here are a few starter tips that will help you get more traffic and achieve what you want to online.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the process of making a blog or website more easily accessible to search engines and telling everybody - machines as well as people - what your site is about. This is the basic task of SEO. It is about making your website easily understandable and following certain standards and practices.

It is also about getting your blog or website ranked higher in the search engine results pages (SERPS) so that your site gets more traffic and you can more easily achieve your objectives.

Five Basic Tips for Better On-Site SEO

1. Write a Clear and Catchy Title that Includes Your Keyword(s)

This is a smart thing to do for two reasons. One, it clearly tells potential readers what your post or article is about and lets them know what they will get out of it. Two, it makes it clear to search engines that the term you use in the title is a very important one on that particular page. This will help said page rank higher in the search engine result pages for your chosen keyword(s).

2. Link to Your Homepage and Other Related Pages from New Blog Posts or Articles

When you write a new blog post you should link to related pages on the same site. Make sure to use keyword-rich anchor text that explains in a couple of words what the linked-to post is all about. This will help further strengthen the SEO of the page and will give your readers a clear path to information may also be interested in. You can also link to your homepage with the keywords you are focusing on for the site as a whole. Again, this helps your readers navigate the site with greater ease, keeps them on your site longer(hopefully), and will strengthen the SEO qualities of your homepage.

3. Use Your Chosen Keyword or Keyword Phrase in the Body of Your Content

Just like you want to use the keyword phrase in the title of your article, you want to make sure to use it in the body of your blog posts or website content. This will reinforce to search engines and website visitors alike what your content is about. If your blog is about “designer shoes for men”, you want to target that exact phrase and include it in the body of the writing. Studies have shown that you get the best results by using your chosen keyword or keyword phrase once every 80 -100 words, if possible.

4. Write Posts or Articles of Decent Length

Each piece of content you publish should be at least 250 to 500 words long. The more you write, the more material search engine bots have to work with when trying to figure out what your site is about. Longer, informative posts should increase traffic to your site over time, and the better written your work is, the more people will link to it, which will help your content in search rankings. You may also find that terms you have not thought about are bringing people to your site as well because you will have more combinations of words on every single page of your website.

5. Write Great Content that is Useful, Informative and Original

The most essential and most difficult of all SEO methods. People sometimes forget that the best way to enhance the success of a site is to write extraordinary articles that people will naturally want to link to, bookmark, and show their friends and family. Making sure your content is really good will help you more than any other search engine optimization methods every will. Focus on creating value for your readers - and you will have a successful site.

If you choose to apply only one of the methods mentioned here, this should be it: Write amazing stuff that people fall in love with.

It is very hard – if not impossible - to create a hugely successful blog overnight. The bloggers who are making a lot of money work harder than most and put in the hours to create great content. That being said, if you write something so useful, so helpful, so entertaining, or –hopefully - all of the above, you could be among the few who become successful almost overnight.

It takes work, dedication, and some promotion, but you can create a successful blog and even make money from your efforts. You can start a blog for free at Blogger.com or Wordpress.com, but you should also consider starting a blog on a private hosting service and with a domain name of your choice right away. The latter kind of blog will be more valuable in the long run since you will own it outright. Of course, you can always transfer a free blog to private hosting later on.

If you are looking for professional hosting, Just Host and Host Gator (and no, I am in no way affiliated with either one of them) are currently two of the best blog/web hosts and their rates are low (starting at around $ 4.95/month). You even get a free domain name for life with some of the plans. Kill two birds with one stone.

But whatever you do, always remember that the more work you put in, the better your blog will be in the long run. It can be very lonely at times when you feel like no one is interested in your work, but one day the flood gates will open and you will have a popular site.

Essential Information:

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization.

Better SEO leads to more readers, more subscribers, and making more money online.

SEO is the process of making your website more accessible to search engines. Basically, the clearer you are about the content of your site or its function, the easier people will find it and the higher it will rank in search engine result pages (SERPs).

Toyour success!

 

Related articles:

Great Content is Still the Best SEO Strategy

7 Tips for a Successful Website

 

 

Technorati-Tags: seo,search engine optimization,more traffic

7 Tips for a Successful Website

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In this post I am going to give you 7 tips that will help you make your Blog or website better and more successful. Whether you have a personal blog, a niche site, or a blog attached to your online business, these tips will surly help you make it great.

1. Write Longer Posts

A lot of “gurus” recommend writing short posts/ articles because people nowadays have short attention spans (especially online). While this may be true, there still are people who like to read detailed, informative, well-written posts. Furthermore, longer posts tend to have more of your keyword phrases in them which will help with your search engine ranking. Google is especially fond of long articles, whereas other search engines, Bing for instance, prefer articles in teh 250 – 400 word range. 

2. Make Your Blog Accessible

Use a two or three column theme which is not too cluttered. And do not make it an obstacle course for people to find out who you are. If readers get to know you better, it is easier for them to get “involved” in your site. They may even become regular visitors or subscribers. 

3. Write Strong, Catchy Titles

Try to use strong keywords related to your post in the title. And always deliver what the title promises. Also, create tags (and a tag cloud/list, if possible) that can help your visitors find what they are looking for more easily.

4. Add Images to Your Posts

Pictures are a great means for drawing your readers into the articles you write.  If nothing else, they keep the visitor´s eyes fixed on the page for an extra second or two. Do not forget to write a caption and alternate text for the images you add (which may help them get indexed by search engines). Print advertisements tend to have images for the express reason that they attract attention.

5. Promote, Promote, Promote,Promote,…

There is nothing wrong with letting people know what you are doing. There is a key though:  You should try to get in touch with people who run similarly themed blogs and websites. In general, people who write about or deal in some other way with similar stuff are more likely to be interested in what you are publishing. Of course, this is not always the case because interesting content gets noticed no matter what, but it is a good way to get started. Engage other site owners by posting comments that add to the discussion brought up by their work.

6. DO NOT QUIT

Quitting has to be the biggest reason why a blog or website fails. It may take six months or even a year before your blog or website takes off. Keep writing good, long, informative pieces and do everything in your power to connect with others. Learn a little about keywords, learn a little about link building, learn a little about internet marketing, and make sure that you enjoy what you are doing. If you are not having fun, then - and only then! - quitting probably is a good option. You can always start a new blog or website.

7. There is no #7

Oops, I just broke the promise of my title. Perhaps you feel somewhat betrayed (see #3 on this list), but I hope you see the point I am making. Always, ALWAYS deliver what you promise so that people will find what they are looking for and will want to come back.

Good luck!

 

Technorati-Tags: improve blog,internet marketing,make your website better,online business,more traffic,successful blogging

Great Content is Still the Best SEO Strategy

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SEO (search engine optimization) plays a very important part in developing a successful blog, website, or any other kind of online presence. You want the structure of your home to be solid, strong, and well-designed. 

The same is true for your website. 

When people say that SEO is not important or even a waste of time, they are terribly wrong. Making your site search engine friendly and easily navigable and findable is very important. 

But…(yes, there is a “but”)

It is NOT the most important thing. 

The CONTENT of your site is the most important thing.

It is easy to find yourself rushing through a blog post or an article so you can get to the promotion and link building part much faster. Successful bloggers know that their job isn’t done after they finish a post. It’s only the beginning–especially with a new blog.

An informative, well-written post can be pretty lonely without anyone to read it. And the truth is, people have a lot of options. There is plenty to read out there, so you have to find readers and traffic for your site. You have to promote your work.

The best thing you can do with regard to the SEO of your site, other than making sure its structure is sound and the site itself highly searchable, is to find high quality, relevant links.

And the best way to find these kinds of links is by writing original as well as useful or entertaining content that people – yes, wait for it – want to link to!

It is a much better use of your time to focus on creating amazing content than surfing the web trying to find people to trade links with. If the content you publish on your site is great, then links will be no problem. And they will all be highly desirable “one-way” links, not reciprocal!

So, when it comes to the actual content of your site, it will pay off to make it as useful, as informative, as amazing, as scandalous, as eye-catching, and as entertaining as possible.

Great content is – and will always be - the best SEO.

 

Technorati-Tags: seo,more traffic,content,one way links,free links

How to Make Money with HubPages 2: Backlinks

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This post focuses on one very effective strategy you can use to help you make money with HubPages.

HubPages, as you may know from my previous post (if you do not, just follow the link above), is a website where you can publish content and earn money for your work.

You can write just about anything you want and have the option to edit or delete your content anytime you feel like it. One of the best things about making money with HubPages is that it enables you to earn residual income for as long as the website is around, and chances are that it will be around for a long time.

There are many reasons why publishing at HubPages is worthwile if you are trying to make money online, or have a blog you want to create links to, or just want to write content for fun and earn a little pocket-money on the side.

First of all, HubPages is a well-respected site that gets a lot of love from search engines. Writing at HubPages is like having a head start in the search engine wars. This brings up an important point: One of the main factors that will allow you to make money online is traffic. Traffic is the lifeblood of internet marketing and online business.

Look at it just like the owner of a regular store would. The more people you can convince to visit your store, the more sales you will make. This can be translated into AdSense clicks, affiliate sales, or referrals in the online environment. Traffic is a key part of the game. And the more targeted this traffic is, the higher the probability of getting a conversion or having an action (click) occur. Obviously there is a lot more to making money on the internet: copywriting, branding, actually having something of value to provide, or in this case, providing useful, well-written and highly searchable content. But high traffic numbers is how websites become online money-making machines.

One of the strategies to writing on HubPages and earning money from your efforts is to publish several “hub” on the same topic. (In this respect HubPages is different from InfoBarrel, where they do not accept several articles on one subject from a single author.) The more you write about one specific topic, the more likely you will be regarded as an authority on that subject. Obviously, to be able to write a lot of “hubs” about the same thing you probably will have to be an expert on that subject. No need to worry, you can learn as you go. Writing is one of the best ways to learn things and solidify ideas in your mind.

Writing about a single topic will also give you more opportunity to increase the rankings of similar content. Say you have a 900-word authoritative hub about the best diving resorts in Australia. You spent a lot of time researching keywords, reading about the resorts, and clearly presenting the information to your readers. This can be a very good piece of content for you. If you have three, four or more related „hubs”, then you can use them to create anchor text links to give your authority „hub” little bit of a boost and create more traffic to it.

Your “support” pages should be directly related to the main authority page you are looking to link to. In the example about diving resorts I used above, these can be pieces more specific to certain resorts or diving-suits, etc. One could be about the Coral Sea Islands and another could be about the Great Barrier Reef. If the main keyword phrases (and related ones) you are working with are also strong in these pages - and even in the title - then links out from them will be even stronger.

When you create your links you want to create anchor text using the phrases you are focusing on. In the example used here, the phrase you would want to link out to your main hub would be “best diving resorts in Australia”. It is much better to be descriptive in the hotlink you create, rather than just linking with text like “see my other article about this topic here.”

You can do this with several of your hubs to create several relevant links that will give the page you want to promote more direct traffic and relevant keyword links, which in turn will help move it up the in search engine rankings. The more targeted these keywords and links are, the more likely they will be of interest to visitors and the more money you will make online.

Websites as well as web pages that adhere to web standards of copywriting, search engine optimization, and linking practices are more valuable than those that do not. If you keep in mind what potential web surfers might be searching for and do your best to create informative, well-written content that is useful, then you will be successful.

Remember that content is king and high value content will gain more natural links from other websites and more return traffic. The more effort you put into your content on the front end, the easier the entire process will be for you. When writing your hubs, take the time to make them as helpful, informative, and unique as possible.

Sign up for HubPages and start writing and earning today.

 

Related articles:

How to Make Money with InfoBarrel

How to Make Money Online with Squidoo Lenses 

Technorati-Tags: make money,hubpages,writing for money,blogging,adsense,backlinks,more traffic

12 Great Ways to Get More Inbound Links

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In today’s tough race to the top of the Google SERP’s (Search Engine Result Pages), there are a number of factors that can help you earn one of those coveted spots. While certain techniques may get you better results than others (based on your industry and level of competition), there is no questioning the power of links.

There are a number of methods, some common and some yet to be discovered, you can try out to help increase your link density and search rankings. In this post I have tried to outline some of the more common techniques webmasters and bloggers can use to increase their site’s popularity.

1. Reciprocal Links

Reciprocal links used to be a huge asset and played a significant role. Today, fewer and fewer sites are making use of this technique as it is thought by many to have no significant role in the eyes of Google. This is simply not true. While the overall value of reciprocal links may have declined over the years, they can and will still help your rankings - if done correctly.

The key with reciprocal links is very simple - relevance. If you trade links only with highly relevant sites, it will increase your site´s ranking. But there are some things you need to watch out for: ensure that the links returning to you (inbound links) are search engine spider friendly, that they are placed on pages with as few links as possible, that they are contextualized, meaning the content on the page - and preferably the site as a whole - is related to the content of your link and site.

When you contact a relevant site to ask for a link exchange, keep the email personal to help grab the attention of the blogger or webmaster. Most link exchange emails are spammy automated submissions and are deleted without being read. Write the subject as well as the entire email in such a way as to entice the user to read on, but keep it short. Offer to put their link up first, or even better yet, put it up before you contact them.

2. Purchasing Links

Google has been devaluing links, and in extreme cases, even penalizing sites for selling links, but there is no denying that this technique still works as many sites have climbed to the top of the SERP’s by way of buying links.

A lot of high profile sites such as major and local newspaper publications and magazines sell text links, yet nobody seems to be penalized for it as the publications rank well with high PageRank and the sites they link to rank well as a result.

If you choose to purchase links back to your site, check out how they are linking back, how relevant they are, and try to find out how their site is treated by Google as well as other major search engines. If you see other sites that appear to have purchased links from them, check their backlinks and see if the linking site appears (although it may not be displayed as Google offers very little of this information to the public these days).

It is assumed that if penalties will arise from the sale of links, that only the selling site will be penalized. Even if this is the case, Google’s policy could change at any moment, so be warned that this could potentially come back to bite you.

3. Quality Content

Believe it or not - it works. If you fill your site with original, valuable content, you will get some people linking to your site on their own. While you can not base your entire linking strategy around this concept, as it could take forever to get enough links, rest assured knowing that if you follow this strategy, some will link.

4. Start a Blog

Everyone and their dog seem to have a blog these days, and for good reason - they work. Blogs help you create a never ending stream of content, and if updated regularly (at least once a week) and written well, you will find people will link to it. Not only that, others may pick up your blog through your RSS or Atom feed - which can result in an increase in both links and site traffic. Be sure to utilize your Digg, StumbleUpon and other social media accounts within your blog to help gain a little extra attention.

5. Social Media

Promote your site as well as your blog using various social media tools. When someone "Diggs" or "Stumbles" your content you can not only get a link back to your site from the media platform, but you can also see additional traffic generated by this. The more people bookmark or recommend your article, the more traffic you can get, and the higher the value of the link.

Creating company profile pages on platforms such as Squidoo, Facebook, MySpace, and even uploading photos and videos to YouTube and Flickr, can all count as backlinks to your site - so be sure to utilize these platforms to the fullest extent. DO NOT use these networks to spam them full of links, just to inform and entertain. Build unique relevant content and become a member of the community, and you will find your links will become much more valuable.

6. Article Syndication

When you write highly relevant articles, submit them to any known article aggregation websites in your chosen field or major general portals such as ezinearticles.com. When submitted to the right sites you can drive traffic and increase your links. Again, be sure to include a link or two within your article so you get some backlinks (if allowed).

7. Press Releases

Press releases are still doing wonders. Whenever your business hits a milestone, releases a new product, or has anything worthy of a press release, issue one through the services of PRWeb (Unfortunately, not a cheap service. Only think of doing this if you have money to spend.) You will get a link back to your site, and you may also get some targeted traffic from interested parties.

If your press release happens to qualify as significant news, you may also find bloggers and other writers referencing it and linking to it from their articles, providing even more value. Make sure that you include deep links back to your site with every press release. Links from within the bio are helpful, but those integrated into paragraphs of the release itself are worth much more.

8. Comments

I know, I am going to get a lot of flak for this one, but if used wisely, it can help. If, after reading a relevant blog entry, you have something useful, constructive, and worthwhile to say, leave a comment and include your link if the option is provided. A comment like: "Nice post" will not do, but if you have something to add or contribute that others may find interesting then go for it. These links can add up, and they do add a bit of value. Do not stuff your comment with keywords, keep it natural - and use your real name.

9. Forum Posts and Signatures

This is an area where you may be able to grab a few links, but it is also one you need to be careful about as it can backfire quite easily. Going out and wildly posting in random forums and including your link is NOT recommended.

This method can be useful if you establish yourself as a solid contributor to a particular forum directly related to your industry. Once you are established, and people know and trust your name and understand that you are not just one of the spammers, you can consider adding your link to your signature file as well as including the odd link in your forum posts. This will allow you to get the occasional relevant, inbound link. It is advised to check with the terms and conditions of the specific forum before you start. Some do not allow links of any kind.

10. Testimonials

You see them on many sites that offer products or services, and quite often they include a link back to the submitter’s blog or website. If you have used a product or service, do not be afraid to write a testimonial for the company´s website. In many cases online businesses will post your testimonial along with a link. The testimonial helps that business instill confidence in their customers and you get the valuable backlink.

11. Directory Submissions

Yes, it is still a good idea to submit your site to the major directories. While DMOZ can be very difficult to get into, but once you are there, it is like gold and will play a part in your top rankings. Yahoo directory has a very high price ($299), but can also provide you with a valuable inbound link. Consider submitting to the major directories as well as any industry specific directories. These links add up and will contribute to your site’s ranking.

12. Link Bait

Most of us have heard the prase thrown around for a while now, but the technique itself has worked long before the phrase "link bait" was coined. Why all the hype? Because it works.

Take a look at your website, your business, your industry. See if you can think of some way, any way, to attract people to link to your site. You could sponsor a contest, add an elaborate and unique tool, write a controversial article, provide something useful for free (ebooks are always a good choice) - whatever you do, do it well and promote your effort to the max, then people will naturally link to you.

 

General Rules:

Before you actively seek out a link from a specific site do some investigating to ensure that the site is not spamming or using any black hat techniques. If they are, stay away.

If the link you are seeking is merely an attempt to boost your link density, then do not forget to check out how they are linking to other third party sites.

Does the site use the ‘rel=nofollow’ attribute? Are the pages your link would appear on blocked by the one or all of the search engines, or do they use the robots Meta ‘nofollow’? Are they using other techniques that would not allow a spider to follow them (such as JavaScript, Flash, or frames)? If so you may want to move on.

A note on Google PR (Page Rank) - the PR you see on your toolbar or on a PageRank checker is outdated. While it can give you some insight, just because it says 0, does not mean it is. Also what has a PR of 0 or 1 today, could be a 4 or 5 tomorrow. Do not use the PageRank of a site as your sole means of deciding if you should obtain a link or not.

Summary

Using any or all of these linking methods will help you to increase your link density. There is power in diversification. Use variations on anchor text and descriptions, use inline text links within articles, and gain links in as many different venues as possible. By being diverse, your site will stand the best chance of being around well into the future.

Today, blogs are huge and can be a strong asset, but what would happen if tomorrow Google decided to ban blogs? Highly unlikely, but it could happen. And if it did, would your site survive? By being diverse, your site has the best chance to survive any change.

Good luck!

 

Technorati-Tags: inbound links,links,free links,backlinks,more traffic,pagerank,seo

6 Free Ways to DOUBLE Your Blog Traffic in Less Than a Week

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What does every blogger want? More traffic.You do your best to set up a blog with great content, but no one is visiting your blog – so why even bother? You need at least a decent amount of traffic if you want your blog to become a success in the long run – and I am not even talking about money here. Wouldn´t it be great if you could get that traffic for FREE?

These are the TOP 6 free ways to get traffic to your blog:

1. Search engines

Yes! Submitting the URL of your blog brings alot of traffic to your blog. Millions upon millions of people use the major search engines like Google,Yahoo,Bing everyday.So,if your blog has many good posts and is well indexed by Google,etc. you will get a fair amount of traffic via search engines.

2. Submitting your blog to blog directories

You may already know this, but submitting your blog to blog directories is also a very good way to attract free traffic. The link below will take you to a good list of blog directories(there are so many directories, but the ones on this list will bring you valuable traffic).Most of these blog directories ask you to register before allowing you to submit your blog. My suggestion: Create a new email account solely for this purpose so your personal emails will not be not flooded with emails sent by blog administrators,etc.

A list of essential blog directories can be found here.

3. Participate in forums, discussion groups, and the like

Just go to Google and enter your [major keyword + fourm] or [keyword+groups] and search. If your blog happens to be about blogging, then search „blogging forum”/„blogging group”. You will find a variety of forums or groups related to your site. Register in the forums and post articles,etc with a link back to your blog (as a signature). Answer questions, help solve problems – and always provide a link to your blog. But, do not SPAM.

4. Social bookmarking

Social bookmarking is another way to build good traffic to your website/blog. If you do not know what Social Bookmarking is, here a short definition: „Social Bookmarking is a practise of saving Bookmarks,tagging the posts with keywords in a website”. Bookmarking means saving a specific website URL(address) in your browser in case you wish to visit it again at a later time.There are many social bookmarking sites offering their services, the most popular probably being Del.icio.us, Digg, Diigo (formerly furl), Technorati, StumbleUpon. One good thing about these Social bookmarking sites is that you will get instant traffic. Just register with them, save your bookmarks,tags,.. and you are done. Traffic will start coming your way pretty soon.

5. Submit articles to article directories

Submitting articles to article directories is another effective way to build more traffic. By submitting to these directories your articles get massive exposure and gain you more traffic. Among the popular article directories are goarticles.com, ezinearticles.com, articlecity.com, etc. There are literally hundreds of article directories you can submit your articles to, just use the search engine of your choice to find a few that suit you. (Submitting one article per week should suffice.)

6. Leaving comments on other blogs

Leaving comments with a link back to your blog is another good thing to do. Make sure to post comments on related blogs for this will bring you targeted traffic - and it will help to increase the PageRank of your website/blog as well. Always leave helpful and relevant comments, do not SPAM.

NOTE: Forum and blog posting got a bad reputation as a link building tactic when it came under huge abuse by unethical webmasters spamming forums with useless garbage just for a link.  They even went so far (and still do) as sending out spiders to automatically submit posts.

Good luck!

 

Related Articles:

62 Ways to Get More Traffic to Your Site

5 Great Ways to Get FREE One Way Backlinks to Your Site

 

Technorati-Tags: more traffic,free traffic,successful blogging,blog directories

21 Essential Blog Directories to Submit Your Blog to

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Gaining exposure for your blog is essential to building a following, readership - and revenue. Besides the basic SEO (search engine optimization) steps of adding compelling and keyword friendly titles, URL structure and descriptions basic link building for blogs begins with listing them in quality blog directories.

Personally, I just love launching a new blog (or adding one to an existing site) and watching the highly coveted links roll in. As everybody knows: BLOG = Better Listings On Google.

There are many paths to consider when building links to your website or blog such as link baiting or blogroll link swapping, but few are as easy to implement as well as cost effective as submitting to blog directories - and good links are essential to a healthy growing blog.

Let us take a look at 21 popular directories worthy of your consideration:

1. Best of the Web Blog Directory is without a doubt the best around. Best of the Web’s Blog Directory is very selective and only lists aged and valuable blogs. A link from here is majestic and well deserved. Submissions will be reviewed within 3 days, but unfortunately this is not a free directory. They charge an annually recurring review fee of $75.00.

2. Blog Hub offers a drop down category and member blog list. With its “most recently added bloggers” list and hot topics, Blog Hub is a great directory to list your site.

3. Bloggeries has the best categories and subcategories home page on the internet. The layout is clear and concise, and readers are able to find what they are looking for in a snap! New submissions will be reviewed within 48 hours. Pricing for a regular link: $39.99 (one-time).

I am really liking the overall look of Bloggeries as well as the fast service. This is bound to become one of the premier Blog Directories on the web.

4. EatonWeb Blog Directory is a real jewel with many aged inbound links and a blog rating system. You may have to pay a fee for your blog to be reviewed, but like Yahoo, the review fee is well worth the few dollars.

5. One of the most selective Blog Directories on the web (and Wordpress powered), Blog Search Engine is owned by Performancing’s parent company and serves search results powered by IceRocket.

6. Blogged.com is an interesting mix of a blog directory and a Google News type site which fuels its news feed from the blogs listed on the site. Blogged.com is very impressive and you can submit your blog for free.

7. Blog Catalog features a vast directory of categories, from arts to technology, while offering the ability to search by language, country, or user. It has a no nonsense design, but offers convenient member access through simple blog registration. And it is free.

8. Globe of Blogs has too many features to list. In order to be listed on the site, the blog must not be commercial. The site may appear to be a bit to busy, but I like the features of being able to search by title, location, topic or author (by name or birthday!). Narrowing the search becomes easy on this blog directory.

9. Blog Universe is the perfect place to promote your video, photo or podcast themed blog. Its layout is easy to navigate. Although the content is limited, it is an all around good directory site worthy of submission. One-time review fee of $4.99.(Blog Universe is one of the few major directories to list adult oriented blogs.)

10. BritBlog - The Original British Blog Directory connotes all things British. It is not directed by location, but by the culture! It is asked that bloggers be genuinely “british.” Being listed in this blog reaches readers in the whole of Britain.

11. Upon visiting Bloggernity, you find a crisp, clean, and easy to navigate site. Scrolling down, you find the last 20 newly listed blogs. As there is little advertising on the home page, it is pleasant to look at and loads fast.

12. Bigger Blogs is one of the newer blog directory with relatively few blogs registered. This has its advantages since the earlier you are accepted on a blog directory, the more exposure your blog will obtain. In addition, a backlink is indeed a backlink, so this can help with your search engine placement.

13. Spillbean is a well-designed blog directory site with categories such as health & fitness, society, internet, regional, and personal webpages. The site is aesthetically pleasing, but there are not many listings yet. The listings display the PageRank of each blog.

14. Blogging Fusion is a blog directory with over sixty categories. These categories include photo blogs and family focused blogs. Blogging Fusion has a good amount of blog listings within the directory, and it also has visitor stats available. It is extremely easy to navigate and currently lists close to 3000 blogs. Listings from $1.99.

15. Bloggapedia has an interesting and eye catching homepage. Readers are easily connected to the top blogs and newest posts. Innovative categories and a colorful design make this blog directory a hit.

16. Blogflux is not only a tool for bloggers, but a directory that has the listings in alphabetic order. The blog listings are organized and clear. It is definitely an effective blog directory in which to be listed. Currently listing over 150,000 blogs.

17. Blogio may be a small blog directory with few listings (31 categories around 150 blogs listed), but it is worthy of a submission. Despite its small size, there are quality blogs and a solid ability to search on this site. You are asked to provide a backlink.

18. The blogs on the top listings of Bloglisting are fun, colourful, and catch the attention of the reader. Bloglisting displays the blogs along with their number of hits, which is a helpful tool when determining with whom you want to exchange links. Rather slow-loading.

19. Blog Explosion claims to be the largest blog promoter on the internet. They have a vast directory but do not seem to have direct links. However, the listing in the directory can still show up in SERP’s, so keep this in mind. You should consider adding a banner along with your listing in order to promote your blog.

20. Topblogging is definitely worth a try. It lists blogs in 25 categories and displays the 50 top ranked ones right on the homepage. Submission is free and blogs tend to get quite a number of hits through this directory.

21. My New Blog is a blogging service as well as a free blog directory. You have to register to submit your blog. Although My New Blog is a relatively new directory it is worth checking out.

The above listings are a glimpse inside the large and vast world of blog directories and the valuable inbound links that your can build for your blog and your business.

There are countless more directories at your disposal, all of which are just a Google, Yahoo, Bing or Ask.com search away.

What is your favorite blog directory? Leave a comment below :)

Good luck!

Related Article:

6 Free Ways to DOUBLE Your Blog Traffic in Less Than a Week

Technorati-Tags: backlinks,blog directories,submit,free traffic,more traffic

12 Steps to Successful Blogging

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A blog can be a very marketable and profitable tool if used correctly. Successful blogging is a matter of grabbing the attention of a possibly worldwide audience and has almost nothing in common with the work of your average salesperson. In this article I shall point out to you the 12 most essential steps to a successful blogging career.

1. Getting Started

You should consider starting your blogging career at a free blog hosting service such as Blogger or Wordpress. This way you you can just jump in and try out blogging without having to worry about knowledge of scripts, hosting, domains and programming. It allows you to focus on creating interesting content and honing your writing skills while leaving the internal maintenance of your blog to professionals. The best thing about starting with a free service is that there is no risk of losing money if your blog does not become successful or you just happen to find out that blogging is not your cup of tea (just make sure to choose a service that lets you export your content whenever you want). A blog is the simplest form of a website and is organized in chronological order; your latest entry will always be displayed first. When your blog traffic grows considerably you should consider upgrading to your own domain. In this case your last blog entry should be the announcement of your "move". Do not forget to provide the URL address of your new site together with a link that will re-direct your visitors to the new site, thereby enabling you to keep your following without causing a major inconvenience to anyone. Upgrade...but only when you need to!

2. Finding Your Niche

A niche is a targeted product, service, or topic. You should first decide on a product, service, or topic which interests you. Choose an area which you can enthusiastically write about on a daily or at least weekly basis. You can use keyword research services like Google Zeitgeist or Yahoo! Buzz Index to find out what topics people are currently searching for. But keep in mind that it does NOT matter if your topic is popular; as long as there is a audience for your topic and the topic is precisely focused then your blog should be successful – it just may take a little longer. Anything anyone can think of can become a viable niche - as long as it has a target audience (no matter how large or how small that audience might be). A blog about your cat will obviously be a much smaller niche than a blog about domestic cats in general ...you can even choose to build an audience for a market which as yet does not exist, but first you must build your blog.

3. Update Regularly (2-3 times a week should suffice)

This step is a must, not just a suggestion. Updating your blog regularly not only keeps readers coming back for more, but it also gives your site fresh content on a day to day basis thereby making it more appealing to search engines. It is only understandable that you may not have the time or the inspiration to update your blog daily, but letting days or even weeks pass by without posting anything is unacceptable and will most likely result in your blog being unsuccessful. In order to keep your visitors interested as well as traffic to your blog high it is simply a must to add content to your blog regularly. If possible you should update your blog every day, maybe even try to post a couple of entries daily. The best way to accomplish this is to set aside 1-2 hours a day for tending to your blog and adding new entries. It may even be wise to schedule a set time which you dedicate to working on your blog each day. Treat your blog as a job (but as a job you really like!). What happens if you do not come to work for days or weeks...you lose income and/ or get fired! The same applies here...if you do not update your blog regularly you will lose visitors.

4. Generating Traffic

This one is a no-brainer. You have to have traffic to be able to profit from your blog or site. There are numerous ways to build traffic. Advertising (paid as well as free), search engine marketing, feeds (RSS or Atom), viral marketing, usage of social networks (Facebook, MySpace, Digg, etc.), and word-of-mouth. For starters, you should always use your blog URL address in the signature of your emails, forum discussions, message boards, or any other form of online communication. Submit your blog URL address to search engines and blog directories. Also be sure to submit your RSS/XML URL feed to blog ping services like Technorati, Ping-O-Matic and Blogdigger. You should confidently share your blog with family, friends, co-workers, associates, and business professionals when it relates. If your blog (like so many others) can be described as a collection of articles you should consider submitting your blog entries (only those that are valuable and lengthy) to content syndicators/article directories like GoArticles.com, ArticleCity.com or DropJack.com. Once submitted, your articles can be picked up and published by others. The important thing is to make sure you include your Blog URL address in the "About the Author" passage. This creates link popularity and backlinks for your blog. When someone picks up your article from the syndication site and then publishes it on his or her website the "About the Author" passage is included with each publication and the link you included will be followed, crawled, and indexed by search engines. Just imagine what will happen if your article is popular enough or controversial enough to produce 5.000 or even 10.000 publications across the web. All the search engines are bound to find your site in no time with that many publications and will regard you as an authority on the subject, which will in turn increase your rank on search engines. The relatively small effort of writing an interesting and helpful article can be very rewarding. You should try to write at least one full length article every week for syndication and submit your article to as many article directories as possible.

5. Tracking Your Blog

How do you know if your blog has traffic? Just because no one is leaving comments does not mean your blog is not becoming popular. Many visitors just like to read or watch and do not care about comments – but they still may be returning visitors. Most people following blogs simply are more interested in what "you" have to say! Many readers do not comment till they are quite familiar with a blog, and some will never comment at all although they are devoted fllowers of your blog.

Tracking your blog does not require knowledge in statistics or any other fancy sciences. A simple free page counter like StatCounter, FeeStats, SiteMeter or Active Meter will do the trick. Just install (copy/paste) the code you will be given after registering into the HTML of your blog template and start tracking your visitors. If you really want to use tracking to your advantage you should choose a service that gives you advanced traffic analysis, such as keyword tracking information, referral information, and search engine information. Hit counter, unique and returning visitors, visitor path and visit lenght, and keyword analysis should be standard features no matter what page counter service you choose.

6. Listen to Your Audience

When using the proper page counter you should soon be able to see which pages your visitors are coming from and where they are going. If they find your site through search engines then keyword analysis will show you which keywords are being used to find your blog. If your blog should happen to be constantly found by just one or a few select keywords then you should focus your blog around those keywords to generate even more traffic. When writing entry titles and entries use the keywords as often as possible while keeping your blog readable and interesting.

7. Branching Out - Multiple Blogs

Use multiple blogs and bloggging accounts to attract more people. You should consider having blogs at a variety of popular blog hosting services like Blogger, Wordpress, LiveJournal, JournalHome, Blog-City, etc. The more blog accounts you are able to manage, the better. You can copy/paste from one blog to all others. Having different blog accounts is like having a publication in different newspapers. This will enable you to attract more visitors and increase the chances that one of your blogs will show in the search engine results for the keywords you are focusing on.

8. Short & Concise Posts

Aside from the one lengthy article a week for syndication and publication your blog entries should be short and concise (if possible). Sometimes your topic may warrant or even require a wordy blog entry, but try to avoid this as much as possible. You do not want your blog entries to become hours of reading. Most visitors tend to skim through your entries and like to find what they are looking for on first glance. If you make them read through hundreds or even thousands of words they will not come back for another visit. It is good to provide detailed and useful information, but do not stray from your topic and do not include filler or useless chunks of information to make your entries look more interesting.

9. Pictures & Graphics

Try to include non-advertising graphics, pictures, photos, and art in your blog entries (if it fits in with the overall content). But do not overdo it. Once in awhile is fine. Graphics can be a suitable tool for bringing your blog to life. Of course, the content has to remain the most important aspect of your blog, and you do not want to overshadow this content with graphics, but displaying graphics and photos can add a bit of spice to the blog. Be choosy about the graphics you choose and make sure they fit the topic of your entry. You should always add content along with the graphic, at least a caption. Original graphics, photos, pictures, and art are recommended. But keep in mind that graphics take up more server space than words which in turn means that the loading time for your page or blog will be longer. Therefore you should not use more than 50kb of graphics per page. And always ask the copyright owner for permission before using pictures other than your own.

For copyright-free and copyright-friendly graphics and photos you might want to check out WebQuest.org or Free-Stuff-Me.uk, among others.

10. Keep It Personal

A blog is most successful when it is kept personal. Try to include personal experiences and anecdotes relating to your blog´s topic. Stay away from business style writing. Be courageous and find your personal style - and include first-person narratives whenever they fit in. Do not post anything in the style of sales letters, share product reviews and personal opinions instead.

11. Interact With Your Visitors

You should now have the amount of traffic you deserve. In order to keep traffic up while at the same time trying to attract even more you should now start interacting with your visitors. Create a regular theme such as: "Tip of the Week" or "Picture of the Day" which entices your readers to visit your blog regularly.

Give your readers an advance notice about a product, service, or topic which you are going to review and/or talk about later. If an important football/baseball/baketball game is scheduled to take place then you should state in your blog that you "will discuss the game and give your opinion as soon as the game is over. Comments will be appreciated".

Try everything you can to find and present exclusive information. Do not – ever!! - disclose any confidential or secret information which is deemed illegal or has the potential to get you into trouble, but try to get the inside scoop before everyone else does. For instance: If your blog was about a famous actress and you had a blog entry about "She (name) Is Getting Married" then it would be of utmost interest to your readers if you could provide an actual picture of the engagement ring on her finger. Give your best effort to dig and search more than just the internet for exclusive information, because if it is on the net a lot of other people will have found the information as well. Your readers will appreciate your zeal and show their appreciation through word-of-mouth referrals and/or links to your site. Imagine how many readers will tell their friends, family, and others about information they find at your blog first.

12. Make a Profit

Once your blog has gained some real momentum and your blog traffic is increasing then it is time to start thinking about turning that traffic into profit. The easiest way to do so is by using contextual advertising like Google Adsense or Chitika. Contextual advertising means that these services analyze the content of your blog and then publish ads aimed specifically at your audience. The payout is usually based on some kind of pay-per-click (PPC) model, meaning for ever click an ad receives you will be paid a small percentage of the profits. In addition to contextual advertising you also might want to consider using graphical advertising such as: BlogAds, Amazon.com, MammaMedia, etc.. But make sure that the ads do not overshadow your blog´s content. Pop-ups, especially, should be used sparingly. Nobody likes them. They will only increase the loading time of your page and annoy your visitors.

CONGRATULATIONS, You Are a Professional Blogger!

You have done it! You are now a true internet professional! Now may be the time to upgrade from your free blog hosting service to a domain hosted solution. You need to choose a domain name for your blog, check its availability and the find a suitable web host. Select the blogging software you wish to use: WordPress, MovableType (open source), Squarespace, ... When you have your new blog domain set up and ready for traffic then it is time for you to announce your move on all your previous blog accounts by posting a "move" announcement as your last entry. The title should be "Moved" and the blog entry should read something like "My Blog has been moved to a new site, please follow and bookmark this link for future reference: http://www.YourNewBlogDomainName.com". This way all returning visitors and new readers should not have any problem finding your new blog domain.

As a professional blogger you might want to team up with one or more other bloggers. This will enable you to create a more interesting and more powerful blog. More authors mean more advertising and exposure because each author will have a vested interest in the blog and his or her writing will probably appeal to a different type of reader, thereby creating a larger following for the blog as a whole. The idea of a team blog is to make it profitable and rewarding for all authors, while continuing to target the blog topic and keeping the blog interesting for visitors. To spare yourself trouble and headaches later on you should settle important issues like who contributes how much and how to split revenues beforehand.

Applying these simple blogging techniques should make your blogging experience much more rewarding. There is no guarantee that your blog will become popular or even a household name, but your effort should at least increase your chances. Making money online is not an overnight experience like many people think, but making money online is definitely a foreseeable possibility. Likewise, increasing your popularity on the internet is not an overnight experience, but through time, dedication, and persistence you will be rewarded with enough royalties to make your blog a considerable source of income.

Good luck!

 

Related article:

Things to Consider Before Blogging for Money

 

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