Showing posts with label blogging. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blogging. Show all posts

Sunday, April 1, 2012

Top 10 WordPress Plugins Every Blogger Should Know in 2012


How can you wow your readers when they visit your blog, so that they never want to leave again?10 Must Have WordPress Plugins Of 2012 Every Blogger Should Know About
With over 900,000 new blogposts that are freshly published every day, the competition is fierce for each and every author.
Yet, making your articles the ones that readers want to come back to check out isn’t so hard. On each and every occasion I would argue that providing amazing content is absolutely key.
For this post though, I want to focus on how you can greatly improve the number of shares and awesomeness of your blog, with some of the latest WordPress Plugins.
Here are my top 10 picks for you, to increase Social Media sharing of your articles and blog performance:

#Digg Digg – Powerful and simple social sharing buttons

The first plugin I want to introduce is the well known Digg Digg sharing bar, which recently received a major face lift. Social Proof of sharing is one of the most important things for blogpost I found. From BrightEdge’s research, it has proven to increase Social sharing by up to 7 times if included.
Digg Digg makes it super easy to add a floating share bar to your blogpost, just like Mashable for example. You can also choose to add buttons either before or after your posts with the plugin.
Best part: Digg Digg also features the latest sharing button options such as Pinterest andBuffer.
Share Bar for WordPress

#2 Hello Bar – Convert more readers with a powerful call to action

Another very powerful plugin every blogger should know about is called Hello Bar. It adds a simple line above your articles that you can fill with any message you wish. Personally, I have been using Hello Bar to promote products, events or simply evergreen blogposts.
The plugin is used and trusted by some of the biggest bloggers out there, including Tim Ferris or Eric Ries. It also offers some great customization options, to be either displayed at the top of your page or at the bottom.
Best part: What is most impressive about Hello Bar is the analytics options, allowing you to track exactly how many clicks you are getting on your promotions.
Hello Bar for WordPress Blogs

#3 WP Touch – Make your blog mobile friendly

As we are going forward in 2012, not having your blog optimized for the millions of iPhone, Android and other smartphone users is definitely not an option I found. One of the best solutions out there is definitely WP Touch.
Within a split second of installing this plugin, anyone arriving at your blog from a mobile phone will have a wonderfully formatted site in front of them. It gives you some great customization options so you can truncate titles, hide excerpts and other things that are a pain to get working on your mobile normally.
Best part: What I like best with WP Touch is that it has advertising options built in right into the plugin, so you can capitalize more on mobile traffic.
WP Touch WordPress Plugin

#4 Sexy Bookmarks – Easy sharing of all social bookmarking sites

An awesome plugin solution to add a ton of different social bookmarking buttons to your blog is Sexy Bookmarks by Shareaholic. Especially if you are looking for a plugin that covers some not so well known buttons, this one will be providing them for you.
The plugin also comes with the option to be installed for a great number of other blogging platforms such as tumblr or as a standalone for any website. It is overall a most solid solution for your blog.
Best part: What I like best is the customization option to add a small line of text, that adds that extra amount of personalization to your blog.
w3 Total Cache WordPress Plugin

#5 W3 Total Cache – Make your site 10 times faster than before

To be quite honest, I have always forgotten about the importance of performance plugins for my own blog. Yet, some great research from KISSmetrics, showing how loading times can affect visiting times of your readers. In fact, half a second of longer loading time would lead to 20% traffic decrease for Google.com.
With W3 Total Cache, you have one of the most powerful caching plugins out there, that will increase the loading time of your blog up to 10 times. It will cache each and every element of your site and readers will be able to read your posts in a split second.
Best part: What I like best is that you are able to individual turn on or off Object Caching, Database caching and other options so performance is absolutely optimized.
w3 Total Cache WordPress Plugin

#6 The Slide – Suggest related posts to your readers

There have been many attempts of products that aim to keep readers on your site after they have read one of your articles. The Slide is a simple plugin that slides into your page, halfway through an article, just like the New York Times has for example.
What I like about this plugin is that the article suggested is not just any article. The Slide uses a sophisticated algorithm to pick the most relevant and related content for your readers. You can also check out a related plugin called upPrev, as The Slide is currently in private beta.
Best part: An amazing part is that the Slide also allows you to place sharing buttons right on the widget and get more social traffic for your blog.
Slide WordPress Plugin

#7 Twitter Follow Button and Facebook subscribe buttons

Of course, strictly no wordpress plugins, the Twitter follow button and Facebook subscribe button are two of the most indispensable things for bloggers still though I believe.
Although mentioning the two buttons is quite an obvious tip for many, as they are quite well known, there are still a lot of blogs, who don’t make use of them. Both can easily be implemented by copy and pasting the code snippet into a sidebar text widget on your blog.
Best part: What I like best about the two buttons is that the process of following or subscribing is so seamless and doesn’t cause the reader to leave the page.
Twitter Follow and Facebook Subscribe WordPress Plugin

#8 All in one SEO Pack – The only SEO plugin you will need

Although there exist a ton of great SEO solution out there, one of the most reliable and well maintained plugins is the “All in one SEO Pack”. Especially if you aren’t too familiar with any SEO tactics, this plugin makes it dead simple to understand the most important ones.
The plugin automatically generates Meta tags, optimizes your post titles for search engines and helps you to detect and avoid duplicate content. Even if you have very little SEO knowledge, this plugin will be of great help for you.
Best part: A goodie to mention from this plugin is that it enables you to manually include META tags (title, description and keywords) for each page and post on your site.
All in One SEO

#9 Social Metrics – Track how well your posts perform on Social Networks

Another handy solution every blogger should know about is a plugin called Social Metrics. It gives you a slick dashboard inside your WordPress interface, and allows you to track and compare how well each of your posts perform on Social Media.
By being able to track each of your posts in comparision to each other, I found that I could focus a lot better on improving my content. It is also interesting to see, that some posts perform better on different social networks.
Best part: What I like best about Social Metrics is that there is no setup involved for you and you can start tracking seconds after you install the plugin.
Social Media Widget

#10 Social Media Widget – Display all your Social profiles in one place

A lot of the times, you might want to display larger amount of your different Social Media profiles, especially as Pinterest and others are being added to the mix and official buttons aren’t available yet.
With the super easy to handle Social Media widget, you will be able to do exactly that and display any Social Networking profile you can think of.
Best part: What is super handy with this plugin, is that you are even able to create your own icons of Social Media accounts and personalize the look and feel much more.
Social media widget
Those are the 10 most indispensable WordPress plugins for 2012 I believe. Each of them has definitely given my blog a huge boost. I hope some of them are helpful for you too. Which plugin is your favorite of the above?
Written By: Leo Widrich Source: JeffBullas.com

Thursday, March 29, 2012

Content Marketing Wisdom: “Any Content…Has to Be More Than Just an Occasional Exercise.”

Weidert Group is a full-service marketing firm that has established its employees as thought leaders in the field of inbound marketing via the Whole Brain Marketing Blog. The Weidert team also develops content marketing strategies for its clients, covering a range of industries that include alternative energy, healthcare, food service, and various others.

We recently spoke with the crew behind Whole Brain Marketing—editor Sean Johnson, account executive Frank Isca, and creative director Meg Hoppe—about how their content marketing program has progressed, as well as their advice for companies looking to develop their own content programs.



We blog five days a week. For this we have five regular contributors and a part-timer. When blogging so frequently, burnout is inevitable. We prevent this by having weekly meetings to talk about ideas and themes to keep the content fresh and moving. We also ask our sales department about the questions that are frequently asked by customers and compile the answers into a blog.

In the beginning, we were blogging because it seemed like it was something that should be done. We weren’t very dedicated to it and, not surprisingly, we didn’t see a lot of feedback from the blog. Now our goal is to publish information that answers a need, and to create opportunities to convert prospects into leads and eventually into customers. We regularly review our content to see what types of posts are driving reader responses.

We keep our topics to a 70/20/10 rule. Seventy percent is informational content on inbound marketing, 20 percent is geared toward tools and how-to, and the last 10 is content designed to promote us. Our content integrates a call-to-action, which we leverage through HubSpot, in order to gain new leads and new business.

We’ve had steady growth in our blog’s readership since we committed to publishing each business day. There are some topics, such a Pinterest, where we see large spikes in readership, and others that do not get much traction. We review those results regularly and are always trying to refine how we present information in our blog. We want to make sure we are providing information that is useful, as well as links to additional and more detailed information.

Content marketing and inbound marketing need a commitment if you expect to see positive results. Any content, whether it is a blog or tip sheet or a Facebook post, has to be more than just an occasional exercise. You need to provide quality information on a regular basis to keep prospects interested and see any benefits in your search results.

A good blog can support many other things—from tip sheets to e-books to content for your social media—and it can function like a backbone for your content marketing.
Written By: D.T. Pennington Source: Business2Community.com

Monday, March 26, 2012

Search Engines vs. News Sites - Optimizing News for Searchers

While content is central to news publishers’ value proposition, you could say that distribution is a close second. Before the Internet, consumers either got their news from a newspaper, a magazine, or a TV broadcast (and word of mouth, but for our purposes, we’ll stick with the media versions).

These media channels are essentially “push” distribution vehicles delivering, at scale, a produced and edited unit – the news – for mass consumption. Even if consumers wanted to engage with multiple news sources, it's difficult to read five newspapers in a day or watch three separate news broadcasts simultaneously.

This paradigm changed dramatically with the advent of the Internet, as readers could now easily read snippets of news from various sources with a few clicks of the mouse. You could scan the front pages of several newspapers, or even more simply, scan the headlines on a news aggregation site in a matter of seconds to get a quick feel for what is happening in the world. Furthermore, if there was a single big story that day, you could read through dozens of articles on the same subject for different angles and tidbits.

With this paradigm shift, news distribution has evolved into being more of a “pull” mechanism, where consumers are in greater control of what news they consume and how they consume it. News discovery has evolved beyond deciding which TV station to watch; consumers can request information on particular subjects and they’ll come right to your computer screen. Search plays a critical role in this discovery process, and when analyzing the data, some notable patterns emerge.


News Search Optimization – Search Engines vs. News Sites

Keeping up on news search optimization is a daunting task for any news publisher or marketer. With the news business being so dynamic, it's hard enough keeping up on all of the latest news stories, let alone optimizing your search campaigns to capitalize on breaking news at a moment’s notice.

SEO and SEM professionals at these organizations are constantly trying to come up with evergreen architecture and techniques to maximize their exposure as events unfold. Although this is often the most pressing concern with news search, there is an overlooked area worth paying attention to as well:
  • Is the way that searchers look for news on search engines any different than the way they look for news on news websites? 
  • Is there anything we can learn from this that would allow us to better prioritize our marketing efforts?
News-related searching has ballooned over the past few years, both on search engines and on news sites, but how people search on these different sites and what they search for differs greatly.

For the purposes of this research, search engines are defined as the big 5 web searches – Google web search, Yahoo web search, Bing web search, AOL web search, and Ask web search – while news site search includes the six largest news sites based on their search totals – Yahoo-ABC News Network, Google News, Bing News, NYTimes.com, CNN.com, and MSNBC.com.

In February 2012, U.S. searchers conducted 371 million news related searches on search engines, as defined by comScore’s intent categorization methodology, which accounted for 2.3 percent of all search engines searches performed during the month.

But searches performed on non-search engine news sites actually outdistanced search engines news search, totaling 581 million searches in February. Although search engines play an integral role in the news discovery process, the actual news providers and aggregators are still leading the pack.

Behaviorally speaking, it appears that consumers of news data are still more likely to go directly to a “news” specific search engine than they are to run news searches on search engines themselves. The vertical nature of these sites appears to resonate with the searchers, as news searchers are less interested in extraneous results for their news searches that they may get on the broader search engines (e.g., Whitney Houston CDs being sold right next to the news article they want to read regarding her funeral).


News Search Behavior Reflects Search Context

With a review of the actual terms that news searchers use on these different types of search sites, we can see a distinct difference in the intent of the searchers. Search engine news searches focus heavily on a particular news destination.
Within the top 25 search terms driving traffic to News/Information sites in February, half referred to specific news destinations, such as “CNN”, “TMZ”, “Fox News”, and “MSNBC.” The searchers clearly want to be taken to a news specific destination to consume their news.

search-terms-news-sites-feb-2012
Search terms driving traffic to news sites from search engines – February 2012
News site searchers, on the other hand, focus almost exclusively on the content they’re interested in because they are already at their intended news destination. The search term lists pulled from news site search isn’t cluttered with branded news destinations, they are solely about stories and topics of interest.

Celebrity name searching is a particular favorite, dominating the Top 25 list. If this data is any indication, it becomes abundantly clearly why the Paparazzi follow celebrities everywhere they go, U.S. consumers are obsessed with reading about them!

Using Search Intelligence to Win Long Term News Brand Loyalty

Based on the intelligence available, there are opportunities for news publishers and marketers to better allocate their advertising resources that could drive better click-through rates and engagement.

When searchers are on search engines, they focus very heavily on finding a branded news destination first, before searching for a particular news story. So anything that can be done to better brand your news destination site could potentially drive much greater long term value with search engine searchers. This is not to say that optimizing your news stories to be found on search engines isn’t valuable, but the behavioral inference that they rely heavily on branded news destination search terms can impact your broader marketing efforts.

News searchers type in a news destination first, and then search for specific news stories after arriving on those news sites. Being that the branded destinations are key to the way searchers navigate to news stories from search engines, you have to allocate your marketing resources accordingly across search, display, and video. You don’t want to just be their news destination for today’s stories, but for every day’s stories.
Written By: Eli Goodman Source: SearchEngineWatch.com

3 Key Questions & Answers - Small Business Blogging should have Values

small business blogging

Earlier this week Frank J. Kenny did a Skype interview with me about small business blogging and why or why not it makes sense. Frank’s audience is the network of Chambers of Commerce across the U.S..  I think it’s a timely question considering the ongoing “blogging is dead“, “no it’s not“ debate that’s been going on for the past 5 years or so.

As a small business owner myself, I’ve been blogging here at Online Marketing Blog for over 8 years and can testify as to the pros and cons like few others can. In our case, we’ve had great success with our blog as a way to achieve industry awareness and credibility, attract new business, employees, media coverage, speaking opportunities and many other benefits.
In the interview with Frank, he asked 3 key questions about blogging and social media that I wanted to share here since it’s had such a huge impact for both our clients large and small, as well as on our own small business.


Why should small businesses blog?

Blogging is a method of creating and publishing conversational content. Blogs are an easy to use content management system. The value is in the content and ability for companies to leverage the inherent promotion and engagement capabilities of the blog publishing platform. Blogging offers a few key advantages:
  1. Easy to use platform to create sharable, linkable content that addresses specific prospect and customer interests
  2. Serves as a hub to a hub and spoke model of content marketing and promotion
  3. Creates a promotable SEO and Social Media asset – every post is a potential destination for a link and an entry point through search engines.
Through multiple channels of discovery, blog content can reach:
  • Prospects
  • Existing customers
  • Potential employees
  • Marketing partners, investors
  • The media: journalists, bloggers


What is the impact of Google+ on search and how does it affect business blog marketing?

Google+ personalization and it’s impact on search is the hot topic and any company that wants an advantage in Google search results needs to consider Google+ and other social media participation. The behaviors of content creation, sharing and engagement are incredibly rich signals that search engines can use to improve search results quality and search user experience.

The more people that have included your Google+ profile or page in their circles, the more likely content that you’ve created, shared and engaged with will appear in their Google search results while they’re logged in. Google+ optimization should be an essential part of any business blog effort.

At the same time, social media content, whether it’s text, images or video is content that can be crawled and ranked in search results. Social media optimization can improve search visibility of that social content for people that are actively looking for solutions.

When we make optimization recommendations, we go beyond search keywords and have our clients consider social topics as well. Understanding what keywords consumers are searching on as well as the topics they’re discussing on blogs, twitter, and other social networks can inform an editorial plan that does a much better job of attracting new customers because it’s focused on their language and the things they care about. Incidentally, I go deep, deep into this within Optimize.


How much emphasis should small business bloggers place on SEO vs social media?

The consumer journey through the sales funnel is increasingly weaving through a social and search experience. Our model of optimization focuses on how consumers Discover, Consume and Share content so the notion that people will come across a small business solution because of a social connection to a friend that then leads to a search on Google or Bing to get more information is entirely likely and common.

When people use specific words in a search they are segmenting or qualifying themselves to a certain degree because the words they use indicate intent to a particular purpose or outcome. Creating, optimizing and socializing blog content according to those purposes or pain points can be very powerful for any sized business that wants to be found or talked about where relevant customers are looking.
There’s so much more I can say about this (and I will – see my upcoming speaking schedule)

Here’s the video version of the interview:


Despite the success we’ve had with our own business blogging efforts at TopRank Online Marketing, we’re probably only realizing a fraction of the potential benefits from business blogging. If that’s the case, why do so many other companies with significantly greater resources fail at blogging for their business? They quit, lack vision, underestimate resources and timeframe, and fail to understand where blogging can be integrated with achieving multiple business goals.

Hopefully you’ll find the advice above useful to help your business blogging effort. If you have specific biz blogging questions, please ask them in the comments.
Written By: Lee Odden  Source: TopRankBlog.com

Friday, March 9, 2012

50 Social Media Marketing Tips You Must Follow


Social media marketing has at  its core the foundation of valuable, shareable content in all the various forms of rich media whether that be text, video or images.


social media networks

People watch YouTube videos because they are entertaining, educational or just plain funny. Viewers turn up to your Slideshare account and take the time to view a presentation because the content is compelling. LinkedIn works well for personal branding because you are providing answers to your peers to questions in the Q&A section and providing updates that answers problems, informs and educates.
Twitter teases you to click on links that are engaging blog posts or news that is topical and timely. The knowledge economy is all about the content. Facebook is where your audience is online so content needs to be posted and updated to the social giants ecosystem.
So here are 50 synergistic social media marketing tips and tactics to market your content and ideas and help them to spread to a global audience. Apply some of these tips and you maybe surprised in the journey that unfolds as you and your company are discovered and shared and your goods and services are purchased
because you were ‘found’.

The secret sauce behind these tips is to allow you to create a ‘social media synergy’ that totals a sum far greater than the individual parts. This approach is to guide you to go beyond being just ‘Facebook Centric’ and provide substance, endurance and longevity to your on-line presence and digital assets. These tips are also about assisting you in optimizing and integrating the multiple social media platforms listed below
Some of these tips are basic for some but this is a checklist that may assist you in synergizing your online presence and bring traffic and viewers to your global digital properties.

50 Social Media Marketing Tips and Tactics

Blog

  1. Produce inspiring, educational and awesome content that is so compelling that people want to share it, this is the foundation of your marketing. All media is about good content and social media is no different
  2. Write regularly and consistently, people will then come and visit regularly and keep coming back because they know it will be new and topical (that is why magazines have regular publishing time frames)
  3. Learn to write a headlines that make people want to read the rest of your article
  4. Use ‘list’ posts (eg 50 Fascinating Facebook Facts and Figures) regularly. They may be a bit passe for some, but they work and tend to get passed around online
  5. Place a Retweet button on your blog at the top of the posts (WordPress plugins make this really easy to do)
  6. Place a Facebook share  button at the top of all posts
  7. Include a Facebook ‘like box’ near the top right side of the blog so people can ‘like’ your Facebook page even while they are on your blog
  8. Place a LinkedIn share button on your blog (LinkedIn has over 100 million users and they are typically high earners and influential)
  9. Comment regularly on other bloggers in your niche
  10. As you grow your traffic and followers, highlight this on your blog and demonstrate some ‘social proof’. This could even include the number of Twitter followers you have or awards you have won or your website grade or even your Twitter grade
  11. Make it easy for people to subscribe via email (email marketing may be perceived as old school but it works big time!)
  12. Offer to guest post on a another influential bloggers blogs and provide a link back to your blog as part of the agreement
  13. Provide subscribe buttons so people can follow you on your other web properties (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc)
  14. Provide a subscription button via RSS so people can have your posts pushed to them in their  ’Google Reader’ account after they are published
More reading

Facebook

  1. Update your Facebook ‘Page’ with your blog posts straight after publishing
  2. Provide content and links on your Facebook page that will make them want to share and like your updates
  3. Include Twitter in your menu (This is available as a standard setting on your Facebook fan page)
  4. Run polls using the standard Facebook ‘Question’ feature (above the ‘Write something’ box) to engage your audience and involve them
  5. Link to your Facebook page in your email newsletter
  6. Run a competition on Facebook
  7. Use a reveal tab that is set up as your landing page that provides access to unique content, this could be a video a content or even a voucher
  8. Respond to all comments on your Facebook page in a timely fashion
More reading

Twitter

  1. Acquire  Twitter followers – quantity is important
  2. Engage and develop Twitter followers within your niche using Tweepi (Tweepi.com makes it easy to follow followers of influential bloggers on Twitter) or Twellow.com (Twellow provides a tool that enables you to find powerful Twitter follower lists in your niche) – this is the quality part of the Twitter equation
  3. Share the content of  influential Twitter people and let them know by including their Twitter name eg @Jeffbullas
  4. Automate the tweeting of other bloggers content that you trust and add value to your followers with other peoples articles and content
  5. Tweet regularly and consistently the posts of other influential bloggers in your topic category
  6. Automate the retweeting of your great content so it is not forgotten and buried in the archives (SocialOomph professional can be setup to do this)
  7. When tweeting your posts include # tags that deliver the Tweet to # groups/lists eg #SocialMedia
More reading

YouTube

  1. Interview influential people in your topic category on video and post them to YouTube
  2. Include your website/blog link in your profile
  3. Automate sharing after posting (available under ‘Account settings” then ‘Activity Sharing’ , then choose the social accounts and as a minimum select Facebook and Twitter (Reader, Orkut and MySpace are also able to be enabled)
  4. Write a headline that is ‘keyword’ rich for your industry and niche
  5. Write a tempting and teasing headline that makes the potential viewer want to ‘hit’ the play button
  6. Place a link to your blog at the beginning of each description for each video and make sure you write a description that includes keywords and inviting description
  7. Include keyword tags for each video
More reading

LinkedIn

  1. Use all three website or links that LinkedIn allows in your profile (these can point to your website, blog and Facebook)
  2. Make your LinkedIn profile ‘Public’ in your settings
  3. Pose questions in the Q&A section of LinkedIn with links to your possible answer as a post link
  4. Setup a LinkedIn profile for your blog (not just your personal profile)
  5. Integrate your Slideshare into your LinkedIn account using the ‘Add an Application’ button at the bottom right of your home page
  6. Integrate your Blog post feed into your LinkedIn account using the ‘Add an Application’ button at the bottom right of your home page
  7. Add your Twitter feed into your LinkedIn account using the ‘Add an Application’

Slideshare

  1. Turn your posts into PowerPoint presentations and post them to Slideshare
  2. Write a good headline both on the presentation itself and the Title area
  3. Include keyword tags that would be used to find the presentation
  4. Promote your presentations on Twitter
  5. Allow viewers to download your presentation to assist in making it easy for people to share
  6. Post them to your Facebook page
  7. In choose a license make it  CC (Creative Commons) License so people can use your content and then attribute and link to your blog
What other social media marketing tips and tactics have I left out.
By: Source: JeffBullas.com

Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Top 10 Secrets to Writing Popular Posts - Kevin Jorgensen

Do you wish you knew the secret to writing popular blog posts? You know, the posts that get over 200 comments, 20 backlinks, and hundreds of shares on social networking sites?

Use Simple Words

The first thing you’ll probably observe when you look at popular blog posts is they’re easy to understand. And that’s true regardless of the subject matter.
Why? The reason popular blog posts are easy to read is because the author choses to write with simple words.
I try to write my content using 8th grade vocabulary (like Time magazine), rather than writing like a highly educated person. I’d rather you be able to read and understand quickly what I wrote, than use my writing to convince you I may know more than you do about a particular subject.
The interesting thing is you will still come across as an expert – perhaps even more so. Even better – readers are more likely to share content that they think other people will understand. Use simple words, not fancy ones.
In addition to simple language, there are some words that seem to attract attention better than others (source Hubspot). You might consider these words for your subheads (don’t over do it).
Most viewed words e1319174304814

Use the Word “you”

Really great content sounds like it was written specifically for you. Do you know why? Often because the writer simply used the word “you” instead of “we” or “them.”
When I write in this manner, what I’m doing is trying give you the sense that it’s just you and me, as if we were sitting down at Starbucks for a cup of coffee.
A simple method to help you do this is to think of someone you know and write your blog posts as if you are writing just for them. Some writers will even keep a picture of a person on the side of their monitor to remind them that they are writing for just one person.

Write “how-to” Posts

People want useful information. You want to be popular. Write useful information and you’ll be popular.
The formula for writing a “how-to” post is simple. Sit down and write out all of the steps involved in doing something in particular. Map each step into a sub-head and then write in that ‘you’ style, using simple language, how to accomplish each step.
Let’s say you want to show your reader how to subscribe to your blog with an RSS reader. Your headings might be “Choose a Reader,” “Sign Up,” “Click on the RSS button,” and “Subscribe.” Under each heading you would give more information, explaining what to look for, the pros and cons, and pointing out issues that might be confusing.

Not Too Long But Not Too Short…Just Right

Goldilocks was on to something. She only wanted things that were just right to resolve her immediate problem. Taking her queue, your content should be just long enough to completely address the issue you’re writing about. Some content will be longer than others but in order to be popular, no content should be fluff and likewise, it shouldn’t read like War and Peace either.
People love details – as long as the details make a point. Fill your how-to content with statistic, facts and information a reader will want to reference. Charts and graphs are great and add to visual appeal as well as increase appeal. Those references often end up being inbound links back to your content.

Hook Your Readers

The first rule of hooking readers is to write a great headline. Great headlines have four qualities. They are:
  • Unique: Unique headlines can only be used for your blog post, like this post I’m writing right now. It’s unique because there is only one Kevin Jorgensen!
  • Useful: A headline is useful when it promises practical information. The reason “how-to” guides are popular is because they give answers to problems.
  • Ultra-specific: Adding numbers or stats to a headline makes it ultra-specific.
  • Urgent: The best way to create urgency is to put some kind of deadline into your headline. “6 Days until the Next Stock Market Boom” or “Your Last Chance to Get a Free Copy of My Book” are good examples.
The best headlines have three or four of these features in them. This formula is called the Four Us.
After the headline, you hook readers by writing a great first sentence. How do you do that? Asking questions works really well. So does making a crazy statement that simply can’t be true, but then you promise to show your readers that it is. The point is to write a first sentence that people can’t resist. Quotes also make good first sentences, as do statistics.
Next, your reader will probably skim your post, especially if it is long, looking at all of your sub-headlines. This is why your sub-headlines need to also hook the reader.
Readers should be able to scan your sub-headlines and get a summary of what the post is about. Try writing your sub-headlines like normal headlines, using the Four Us formula. That way, you read them and say, “I’ve got to read that!”

Create a Conversation

One of the most important parts of writing popular blog posts is writing conversationally.
Have you noticed all the questions in this article? How about the italicized phrases? There’s a reason for this style. People forget that blogging is social media, and being social means knowing how to carry on a good conversation.
If you were having this conversation in-person the way to make it a great conversation is to listen and ask the other person questions. It shows the other person that you care about what they are thinking, and that it’s not all about you—because it’s not.
The same is true for a blog. Monologs are boring.
Creating a conversation also means you exchange words with each other after the blog post is done, usually in the comments, though some people prefer to email privately.
If there isn’t a dialog then it’s a monolog, and that’s no fun. So at the end of your post, always ask people what they think and tell them to leave their thoughts in the comments.

Prove Your Points

It’s important in your post to prove any claims that you make. For example, in the section where I said that graphs and stats in a post get more backlinks, I actually linked to another blog post that backed up what I was saying.
If you don’t do this, you’re likely to lose credibility and people won’t believe what you say.
Another benefit to proving your points by linking to other posts is that you are sharing with your audience another good source of information. And the chances are, the appreciative author you link to will probably link back to your blog at some point.

Show You’re an Expert

Lots of bloggers can get uncomfortable with this one because they feel like they’re tooting their own horn. Actually tooting your own horn rarely works.
To show you’re an authority on a subject means you have to get other people or organizations to say that you are an authority. Then you simply point out what they said.
Following this approach, you’re not bragging, just pointing out what others claim. Of course, it matters how you say it, so be humble.
There are also some words that seem to generate more inbound links (the proxy for authority) according to Hubspot:
 Most linked to words e1319174372888
You’ll see blogs with “As Seen In” sections displaying the logos of important companies and media sources, like the New York Times, underneath. This is an endorsement—another way of showing you have authority.
Testimonials from readers and clients are also a form of authority. If you’re interested, here’s a post on how to effectively use testimonials that explains more on this topic.

Care About Your Readers

I’ve discovered that if you truly care about people—including your readers—you will naturally try to write a popular blog post, because you are always looking for ways to write better. In other words, you’ll constantly try to learn new ways to improve your posts so you help more people. And that’s the Golden Rule for success blog posts!

Pay Attention to Search Optimization

In your blog posts, focus on the keywords for which you want to be found. Use one keyword in a post and keep the frequency between 1 use in 50 to 1 in 100 words. Improve the context of your keywords for on-page search: page title is the most effective place for keywords, use keywords in headings and content, and use the blog post description to convince searchers to read your content. Another place that writers often overlook for keyword use is the alternative text for images.
Source: IMRCorp.com

Tuesday, February 28, 2012

50 Qualities of the Best Business Blogs in the World

Every day I get emails from all over the world of business owners and marketers asking me one simple question:
“Marcus, will you take a quick look at my blog?”
And to the best of my ability, I always try to take a look. Yes, I’m feeling the time crunch more and more, but I still find so much joy in having someone in Europe put enough trust in a “pool guy from Virginia” to give him or her blogging advice. :-)

Doing It Right

I mention this because over the last 2 years I’ve looked at and analyzed hundreds of business blogs. Some companies were big. Others were small. Some had an army of content producers and curators. Others had an army of one. Some had an unlimited budget for blogging and social media while others couldn’t rub two nickels together. Some sold soap. Other sold jet engines.

Yep, by this point, I’ve seen some of the best, worst, and most diverse the blogosphere has to offer.
This being said, I’m always impressed with businesses doing it right. I love it when success is achieved and when folks are getting positive results through the incredible medium that is blogging.
But results don’t just come naturally. There are certain actions and qualities that one must take in order to rise above the chatter and receive the love from their readers, their industry, and the other master of all—Google.
So that’s what this post is about, 50 of the most essential qualities of some of the greatest business blogs in the world. Here goes…

50 Qualities of the Best Business Blogs in the World

1. They answer the basic consumer questions first and foremost.
2. They don’t suffer from the curse of knowledge.
3. They don’t try to impress readers because they know that happens naturally with great teaching.
4. They don’t brag about themselves, their company, and why they’re so awesome.
5. They are willing to have a conversation below the post (in the comments section) or behind the scenes via email.
6. They don’t waste words, and if they can state it shorter, they do.
7. The owner/CEO of the company is involved and also is a blog contributor.
8. They include at least one image on every post.
9. They make it readable by using short paragraphs, bullets, headers, etc.
10. They include video as much as possible.
11. They address subjects no one else in their industry is willing to address.
12. If they see something wrong in their industry, they tactfully call-out the action, person, or company doing it.
13. They leverage as many employees as they can in the content curation process, and see every member of their staff as a “blog contributor.”
14. They don’t have a bunch of frivolous red tape, filters, and stupid management teams holding up every blog article that’s written.
15. They have thick skin and don’t back down as soon as someone doesn’t like what they have to say.
16. They are very consistent in their writing schedule, and most post at least twice per week.
17. They recognize the importance of great content combined with solid SEO, and don’t turn their back on either one of the two.
18. They don’t like to waste the time of their readers.
19. They never talk about their silly company picnic, employee retreat, etc.
20. They look to shine light on others “doing it right” in their industry.
21. They don’t try to make everyone happy.
22. In fact, they push customers out of the sales funnel as much as they push customers down the sales funnel, all for the pursuit of building the right tribe and creating the right clients.
23. They don’t care about their competitors stealing their “secret sauce” because, well, it’s likely not a secret anyway.
24. Their writing has personality, flair, and passion—the opposite of a college lecture hall.
25. They don’t give a rip about metrics that don’t mean a dang thing…like Klout.
26. They don’t bury their head in the sand when it comes to addressing issues (good, bad, and ugly) their readers are thinking about.
27. They are the best listeners in the world because they understand that listening to customers is all they really need to do in order to have unlimited ideas for blog content.
28. They are master storytellers.
29. They talk about their customers way more than they talk about themselves.
30. They write with passion and clarity.
31. They know their shtick.
32. They’re not afraid to make you laugh or make you cry.
33. They see themselves as “teachers” and “educators.” This is not just a blog thing, it’s a cultural shift within the company.
34. They quickly get rid of employees that don’t share this vision.
35. They see everything their business does, every service it renders, and ever product it carries, as a content opportunity.
36. They stay on the cutting-edge of their industry.
37. They run stories and articles when no one else will…because it’s the right thing to do and they’ve got guts.
38. They know by “giving it away” they will receive way more in the long run than their competitors who hoard information, thought, and industry best-practices.
39. They make the time to blog when there is none.
40. They understand the need for community, but also realize community is nothing unless their business doors are actually open and they’re turning a profit.
41. They invest money into their blogging platform so it doesn’t look cheap.
42. Even though their goal is to educate, they still understand the power of subtle selling, calls-to-action, etc.
43. They focus on numbers that matter the most—visits, leads, and conversions…and not on stats that don’t always equal profits—likes, tweets, shares, etc.
44. They are willing to be imperfect, make mistakes, and learn as they go.
45. They track their blog’s ROI (return on investment) and realize which articles are generating the most revenue and which ones are not.
46. They think wayyyy outside the box.
47. They show gratitude, support, and sincere appreciation to those readers, fans, and other companies that support them.
48. They don’t strive for “awards” or “best-of lists” or anything of that matter, understanding that such accolades will come naturally if they just do their part.
49. They understand complaining for the sake of complaining is a stupid business model and eventually, if done too much, will turn them into “the boy who cried wolf.”
50. They love what they do. They do it well. And they are relentless in their pursuit of excellence.

Your Turn

What’s funny about this list is that even though I’ve listed 50, there are many more I’ve not mentioned, which is why I’d love to know your thoughts. What qualities would you add to the list? Which ones do you disagree with? Which ones have you had the toughest time with?
Written By:
  Source: TheSalesLion.com