Entries Tagged 'content' ↓
November 18th, 2008 — Buildify, audience, blog design, content, engaging ideas, post design, research, sales, writing style
Do you want to utilize social media to the best of its capabilities with your corporate blog? Here are ten secrets that the best social media users are utilizing in order to boost the capabilities of their blogs and other websites.
1 - Do your research!
Why? Because every single successful marketing strategy is based on solid research. You cannot go blindly onto a social media site and expect to get immediate success by submitting your content. Find social media sites that work well in conjunction with your niche.
2 - Interact with the community as much as possible.
Do not completely ignore the community as many social media marketers do , but instead get involved because this is what social media is really all about. Take advantage of the social nature of the platform and interact for better success in your corporate blogging and social media endeavors.
3 - Write FOR your audience.
If you want your content to be hot, and even viral, then you need to write for your audience on these social media sites. Interact with the community and get to know its members, learning about their likes and dislikes for example. Learn what gets the most attention and cater to it the best you can.
4 - Shoot for relevancy at all times.
Relevance is the true key to effective social media marketing. Look at Digg, StumbleUpon and other social networking and social media sites for proof of this fact.
5 - Keep your writing short.
Internet users do not tend to enjoy reading long text passages, preferring instead to scan anything that they are interested in. Be accommodating by keeping your content short.
6 - Good design.
When users come to your page, are they greeted with a design that is clean and welcoming in nature? If not, they may leave! To combat this, simply focus on presenting a good design and you will go far.
7 - Stop trying to make sales.
Another rookie mistake that is commonly made in social media marketing is to try ands ell your products. Promoting your brand is a good thing, but if all you are doing is pimping your products then you are never going to get any respect in the social networking world.
8 - Create Outstanding Headlines.
Your story may be excellent, but your headline is what sells. If you want attention when it comes to social media, you need to have an absolutely killer headline otherwise users will not notice what you are posting.
9 - Help Others Out.
If you want to become a top user or a popular user, you have to help others out rather than simply submitting and promoting the content that you write.
10 - Convert the hottest content.
Capitalize on hot content as often as you can. Make the attention that you garner last for as long as you possibly can by creating more posts to follow the hot ones so visits can read not only your popular post, but also your newer content as well.
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November 17th, 2008 — bloggers, content, news, public relations, reputation, web traffic
In part one of this series we discussed a post made by Matt Cutts on corporate blogging. We went over the first point he made in his post, regarding leaving yourself wiggle room on deadlines. Now, let’s go over the second point, about how to handle yourself when dealing with or talking about a competitor. As Matt put it, never trash talk a competitor - but what does that really mean?
Most corporate bloggers are savvy enough to understand that trash talk has no place in a blog. Even if you are riding high on success and you have the world at your feet, there is no need to even mention your competitors. Trash talking them will actually end up hurting you more than them and once you leave a bad taste in your audience’s mouth, getting rid of it is nearly impossible. Let’s illustrate this point with a scenario.
Let’s say that Business Owner A has a corporate blog that gets a good deal of traffic and covers company news, as well as a few other topics. On Monday, Business Owner B decides to start an ad campaign that will directly effect the revenue of Business Owner A. The first reaction for many is to lash out and belittle the efforts of Business Owner B.
So, that’s exactly what Business Owner A does. They devote several posts of their blog to trashing B, and their product or service. Instead of getting the attention away from B’s ad campaign, all that A has managed to accomplish is giving them more traffic from readers that want to see what all of the fuss is about.
The second effect is that Business Owner A now seems a bit whiny and definitely unprofessional. Competing ad campaigns are common and their readers are savvy enough to figure out that the posts are being fueled largely by sour grapes. The overall image of Business Owner A has now been tarnished, and readers leave the blog as a result.
Now, instead of circumventing the ad campaign launched by Business Owner B, all that A has managed to do was to hand them new visitors on a platter. They managed to hurt their own business and will forever be remembered as poor sports. All of this could have been avoided by simply never mentioning Business Owner B in the first place.
No matter if a competitor is trashing you, dragging your company through the mud, or competing aggressively against you - never trash them in the public eye. The only one that will end up wearing egg on their faces is you. Remember to take the High Road, no matter what - and you’ll end up reaping the benefits. Readers are not stupid, and they do understand more about your business than you think they do.
Don’t give your readers the chance to see you in a bad light. Remember that professionalism is key if you want to establish yourself as an authority. Whining, complaining and trash talk have no place on your corporate blog.
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November 16th, 2008 — content, google page rank, networking, seo, social bookmarking sites, tools, writing style
Good morning and welcome to another Sunday edition of Buildify’s weekly roundup. From general blogging tips to articles on very specific topics there’s a lot going on. We hope they help you with your blog.
Corporate
General Tips
Google Page Rank
SEO | Traffic
Microblogging
Social Bookmarking/Networking
Writing Tools and Tips
Buildify hosts a weekly carnival. Blog owners with professional blogging posts should consider sending a submission into the Carnival of Corporate Blogging.
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November 14th, 2008 — audience, comments, content, web traffic, writing style
Time and time again, if you are a corporate blogger, you’ve probably heard about the importance of compelling content. What you may not know however is what constitutes this type of content. If you’re not taking the time to craft posts that your readers will find compelling, you may be missing out on a great opportunity. Let’s take a look at a few ways that you can start utilizing these techniques to help increase readership and retain your audience.
1. What is the value of your post?
One of the easiest ways to determine whether or not you have a compelling post is by estimating just how valuable your post really is. Has the topic already been covered in thousands of different venues? Does the post contain information that will somehow help the reader accomplish something? Is your post thinly veiled promotion? Once you know the answer to these questions, you’ll be able to start working on developing content that is truly compelling.
2. How do your readers react to your posts?
If the answer is “I have readers???” you may have a problem here. If you are basically shouting in the wind and you’ve never had a single comment on your blog despite your best efforts to market it, chances are the problem may be a lack of compelling content. This is the type of post that gets people talking, sharing and will help you make the most of viral traffic.
3. Does your post somehow make an emotional connection with the reader?
This isn’t an easy task in many cases. Let’s say that the niche for your corporate blog is washing machines. It can be tough to find a way to make an emotional connection over an appliance. However, it can be accomplished. What do people really care about when it comes to washing machines? Overall price, functionality and whether or not it eats clothes are great stepping stones that can be used to emotionally manipulate your readers (in a good way.)
4. Does the post make your readers want to know more about you personally?
When you create compelling content, you create a relationship with your readers. Once they start writing you personally, you can be assured that you are developing a good audience that is engaged by what you talk about. You may not be writing hard promotional copy with your corporate blog, but what you are doing is building that friendship – the easy way.
Compelling content can be subjective, but generally, it involves an emotional response that is evoked in the reader, and that someone can benefit from, even in a small way. Whether it’s through laughter, tears, or a feeling of “I’ve been there too” compelling content is the secret to success with corporate blogging, especially when you are first starting out.
You’ll be building a reputation as a corporate blogger that can be incredibly useful in the future, no matter what industry you may be working or writing in.
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November 11th, 2008 — Buildify, audience, content, research
The concept of viral content is something that you need to have a firm grasp on if you are trying to get your corporate blog out there. The question of whether or not your corporate blog is viral enough really comes down to what is happening when people visit. What kinds of content are you sharing with your readers? Are you writing content that your readers want to pass around? If you are writing content that is worthwhile to read but does not go very far beyond that, then no, your corporate blog is probably not giving off the feeling of being very viral in nature, which is going to prevent your readers from wanting to share your content with absolutely everyone they know.
In order to make your corporate blog more viral, you need to have a firm understanding of what people find to be viral on the internet. What are the hot subjects within your niche or the industry that your company operates within? Let us say that you are operating within an industry that has to do with working from home, working at a desk, or otherwise working in an office setting. Posting blog entries about productivity in the workplace, a subject that everyone concerns themselves with is something that will get the attention of your readers. Articles regarding being productive while working from home, stretches to do in the office to stay awake, and how to prepare a good cup of coffee using your department’s bland blend are all excellent topics that could become viral in the minds of the right readers.
If you know what it takes to bring your content to a more viral level, then readers will pick up on this excellent copy and want to pass it around. Making something viral is all about turning your blog content into something that is going to inspire feelings like, “My boss would love to read this.” And “I think my sister-in-law will benefit from some of the suggestions here.” And if the first recipients enjoy what they read and see merit in sending it elsewhere, that is when it will continue to be passed around, taking on a truly viral nature as people continue to find reasons to pass it on to someone else in their circle. Imagine if each of your readers send your blog link to a friend, a family member and a colleague every time you posted something noteworthy. Can you imagine the burst in traffic that you would be experiencing on a fairly regular basis at that point? This concept is completely attainable, as long as you learn how to produce noteworthy content that is going to become viral as your readers find it and find reasons to pass it on to people all over the globe. This is the true way to create viral media, and it really is not as difficult as you might imagine as long as you have something to say.
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November 10th, 2008 — RSS Feed, advertisment, content, keywords, links, ping, search engine, web traffic
In many people’s opinion, organic traffic is the best. It’s free, it’s targeted and nine times out of ten, you’ll get a much better response, whether it’s for a company promotion, getting readers to your blog and building up solid relationships. Let’s take a look at just a few easy ways that you can start taking advantage of organic traffic and visitors, right now.
The first step is to make sure that your blog is fully optimized. One of the best platforms for quick indexing is WordPress, but depending on your content, it may not work quite well enough for you. Once you have your SEO portion of your campaign completed, you will need to keep going, making small changes, testing conversion rates and seeing just how much traffic your efforts are bringing in.
This optimization should extend not only to your content, but also to your post titles, headers, image alt-links, and literally everything else on your site. If you want a lot of organic traffic and you are in a competitive niche, you’ll need to go all out to make sure that you are getting the results you want.
Now, once you have your corporate blog fully optimized, it’s time to think about what you are actually going to be writing and whether or not it will help you increase the amount of organic visitors to your site. While placing keywords in your post is important, it should never outweigh good content that people can actually use, learn from and connect with.
Good content gets around, and that means more organic visitors for you. Word of mouth is still one of the most popular and profitable forms of advertising and there is no reason that your corporate blog cannot benefit. Since you’re not paying for these visitors through PPC ads or other means, you’re getting a chance to actually develop a relationship with your visitors and that all important motivation to keep going.
Promote your RSS feed. One of the easiest ways to get backlinks to your site, and to increase awareness about your products is through an RSS feed. Whenever you post on your corporate blog, take the time to ping your feed using a service like Pingomatic, or Pingoat. These will submit your RSS feed to numerous places and you can easily start to see results right away. As a bonus, indexed RSS content can be picked up by search engine spiders very quickly.
So, now you have your corporate blog optimized, you’re starting to develop relationships with your readers and you are getting your feet wet with RSS promotion. It may take a few tries to get results, but if you can stick with it, chances are you’ll start to notice a big increase in the amount of your daily traffic.
Try a few methods today to help you get more organic visitors and see how well the techniques work for you. With a little hard work, and smart promotional tips, you can get noticed by your audience.
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November 3rd, 2008 — audience, content, search engine, writing style
When you first start your corporate blog, it’s easy to get caught up in the excitement of coming across a new marketing medium. You suddenly have access to millions of readers that are just dying to know about your products, right? Wrong! Your readers are out there, but they don’t just want to read about what you have to sell. They want to read content that enriches them, makes them laugh, makes them think or simply informs them.
There is a fine line to walk when you are corporate blogging for marketing purposes, and with practice, you can become a pro. There will a few bumps along the road, there always are, but with time, you can develop a solid method of marketing that works on your corporate blog. The key is knowing what to do, and what not to do.
Do: Provide your readers with a resource that will enrich them in some way
Don’t: Post endless commercials about your products that provide no actual value to a reader.
Do: Find ways to integrate your products into posts that readers enjoy.
Don’t: Spam your readers with endless product pitches and hard sells.
Do: Develop a balance of selling products, telling a story, and reporting news
Don’t: Ignore the fact that no one likes a blog that is nothing more than an endless commercial.
There is a trend that is obvious right off the bat with these do’s and don’ts. First, the key is knowing how to market to your audience. Second, you have to find a way to quietly market your products while still providing interesting content. Third, you have to avoid coming off like you are actually marketing your products – even if that is precisely what you are doing.
It can take some time to develop that balance, and there are a few ways to know when you are striking the right chord. Watch your site analytics, pay attention to comments and feedback. If your traffic goes down, or your comments drop off, chances are you are either selling too hard, or not providing your readers with what they want to hear.
Another don’t that bears mentioning is writing your blog solely for the purpose of search engine optimization. Yes, SEO is vital. Yes, SEO will benefit your site, increase traffic and has the potential to increase your sales.
What SEO cannot do is force people to buy your products. Search engines don’t have wallets. Search engines will not buy your products – but people will. You need to write for them – not for the search engines. Find ways to enrich your content with keywords, but keep it readable by human beings. Avoid practices like keyword stuffing, auto generated content, and gibberish. It may take a little longer to get that ranking you want, but along the way you will be appealing to humans, not machines, and it is the humans that you need to reach first and foremost.
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November 2nd, 2008 — Buildify, content, google page rank, marketing, seo, social bookmarking sites, tools, web traffic, writing style
Happy All Saints Day, one day late, from Buildify. We hope your weekend has been productive and if it hasn’t been yet, well we have another list of links for you to read through for some blogging ideas to help you get started.
Corporate
Google Page Rank
Affiliate Marketing
SEO | Traffic
Microblogging
Social Bookmarking/Networking
Writing Tools and Tips
Buildify is also running a weekly carnival. Blog owners with professional blogging posts should consider sending a submission into the Carnival of Corporate Blogging.
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October 30th, 2008 — Buildify, content, marketing, networking, social bookmarking sites, web traffic, writing style
In this day and age, if you want to get the most out of your blog, then you need to do more than simply write in it. Many bloggers are finding that they can get a lot more out of their corporate blogs if they choose to combine their blogging efforts with other means of advertisement or marketing. For example, combining social networking with blogging is becoming a popular way to get the word out about a blog. Is your corporate blog getting enough exposure? Are you using social networking enough for your corporate blog? Consider the following:
One of the first things that you will learn when joining the blogging world is that networking is absolutely vital.
Blogs generally cannot be successful without some semblance of a deliberate and well calculated formula to help them connect with customers. If you are maintaining a corporate blog, you probably are also already aware of what social networking websites like YouNoodle, Twitter, StartUpNation and LinkedIn can do for you and your business. Social network is a vital and invaluable tool than can help startups and existing businesses thrive in many ways.
Social networking sites can create a phenomenal amount of return on the investment of your talent, time and creativity, as well as anything else that you regularly pour into your corporate blog. If you want to get something real and tangible out of your hard work and the time you put into your corporate blog, then this is the way to do it.
If you join social networking sites that complement the purpose of your business, you will go far.
Find social networking sites that respond well to the products that you sell, or the information that you share. Target the right traffic and you will surely notice a steep increase in potential customers to your corporate blog and website.
If you want to drive traffic to your blog, you need to visit other blogs within your niche area and you need to participate in them. Read and comment on a daily basis, and you will surely drive new traffic to your blog as well.
Your content should be compelling and crafty.
This includes the content that you write for your website and for your blog. Readers are not just looking for content, but rather they are looking for content that has value to them in some way. Make sure to update your blog as often as possible, with at least three new entries per week.
Social networking is quickly becoming a vital element to corporate blogging. If you want to attract the right audiences in large numbers to your corporate blog, you need to implement techniques for social networking, which includes creating profiles on social networking sites like YouNoodle, Twitter, StartUpNation and LinkedIn. By implementing social networking techniques in your corporate blogging plan, you can attract the right traffic to your blog by networking in the most efficient and effective ways on the internet.
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October 28th, 2008 — RSS Feed, content, customer trust, social bookmarking sites
If you are putting together an RSS feed for your corporate blog, you may be wondering what way is the best way to deliver that RSS Feed. Should you use full text so that your subscribers can read the entire post in their feed reader without having to click on any links, or should you use a post excerpt so that readers are forced to visit your corporate blog for the rest of the story?
If you subscribe to RSS feeds that relate to blogging or internet marketing subjects, then you will probably discover that the full text feed philosophy is the one that wins a lot of debates on the subject. On the other hand, you may have noticed that many popular news sites like ESPN, AP News and CNN are using the excerpt method instead. Some of these news sites only display the headlines in their RSS feed and do not show any of the story until you visit the actual website. So which method is the right method for your corporate blog?
The real answer to this question is that the best method is whatever best suits your business model.
For example:
Major news websites and sports websites have the same business model that they have always used. The more people they have reading their articles and content, the more they can end up charging for advertising. For this reason, their primary objective is simply to drive people into their websites so that they can retain the highest readership numbers possible to reach the highest possible advertising rates in the process. By offering only a short excerpt or only a headline forces the reader to either click to come in and read more, or to move on.
Is this how you want to regard your readers?
One of the number one goals for most internet marketers and bloggers is to gain the trust of the largest possible audience. Your readers are not only potential customers, but they are also your supporters. Because it is so difficult to obtain high readership numbers, doesn’t it make sense to try to retain your readers at any cost? Most people like to read all of their websites in a single place which is what RSS aggregators are really all about. If you make reading easier for your readers, they will appreciate it more than you realize.
Does the monetization strategy for your corporate blogging effort depend on attracting viewers to your website? The excerpt feed method may be best if you depend on people actually coming to your website, but it takes a lot of traffic to make a living in this manner so you should not necessarily depend on it.
Another consideration to make is this:
Does your website have enough authority to draw people in just based on headlines or small excerpts alone? Even if you are an authority in the field, it is unlikely that your blog has gained enough experience, credibility and exposure to rival the attraction websites like CNN can generate. You should not hold anything back from your readers, so give them everything that you can in your RSS feed. If you give your readers exactly what they subscribed to, you will benefit from an increase in RSS subscribers, more posts getting bookmarks on sites like Digg, Delicio.us, Technorati and StumbleUpon, more viewer comments, and more viewers talking about your blog in theirs.
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