In one of the Web 2.0 fairs that I visited, a group of young Social Media marketers were chatting outside the venue; about the how Blogs are passe now. It got me tuned in and offered to take them indoors for a cup of coffee - standing outside in the cold was a strain!
The discussion got intense and lasted quite a while. We concluded by agreeing that a Blog is still an integral part of any online marketing mix. In fact it has taken a all new evolved form.
So how does a blog still help?
1. For starters it reinforces the knowledge base and insight of the company, which specializes in a certain area of business. The fact that information can be twisted in favor of the company's business, makes an end user explore more before taking a decision. Only realizing to be convinced, that the business must have chose to sell or market a particular product or service based on its research and knowledge.
2. Content is still King. It hooks people who are 'exploring' for information on the Internet. The target group usually gets hooked on to reading/seeing interesting information, coming from a trusted authority on the subject. What other better way to share knowledge. Your corporate brochure (read business website) is more like a Salesman. Your blog is like a Counselor.
3. A blog helps tremendously for Search Engine Optimization (thankfully nobody questioned this being effective!). Organic top listings on Google, yahoo and other search engines are an outcome of content relevance, popularity, newness of the information and intelligent tagging. Blogs meet all these criteria. Imagine if you are offering a particular set of product or service - how often can you update your website? The answer is a Blog - it does not really disrupt your structure.
4. Consider your Blog to be your second property on the Internet. More number of sites you have the more business you are able to generate online. This is based on a simple fact that that your 'surface area' exposed to potential clients is more on the web through the second website.
5. Readers and participants of the blog form a niche community within your territory. Now why would you want this community to be nurtured on a 3rd party forum, group of blog? Think of the long run benefit of this. Social networks are no doubt good, but you don't own these communities.
Now that one can understand how useful a Blog still is, what are some of the basics that need to be kept in mind while developing one -
1. Don't boast about your company here! Remember you need to be more subtle in your expression of thoughts. This is not a Press Release section for your website where you end up highlighting the achievements of the company.
2. Preferably, use a sub domain for a blog i.e. [http://www.blog.yourdomain.com] . This will help from the SEO point of view for both the blog and your domain. Creating a blog on a 3rd Party website will not help you as much from the Organic listings viewpoint.
3. Ensure your information is Keyword rich (Density to be between 3-5%). Identify these keywords using various keyword suggestion tools which provide ideas based on past statistics. Will help get more engagements of your potential customer.
4. A faceless / nameless corporate blog is useless. Have the author of the blog post put in his/her name. Remember how you feel when you are made to interact with a voice message on the phone! Impersonal is no good.
5. Promote your blog effectively through social networks. Viral marketing take over after a while if the content is interesting.
6. Encourage people posting comments. This help you generate more content and balance viewpoints of the blog. The more participative the blog is the more effective a community it becomes.
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Real Estate Blogging - Helping You Reach A Whole New, And Wider, Audience
Most real estate brokers or agents these days might have already heard that a real estate blog can be truly helpful for their online marketing efforts.
Blogs are the shortened term for a Web log, or online journal or diary. Blogs are Web sites that have content, or entries that are generally arranged in reverse chronological order, with the most recent posts on top, and these method are fast becoming more popular these times.
However, there are some who would ask why should a hard working property market broker devote the time to write a new post once a month, once a week or every day? An individual broker needs t know that when done correctly, blogging is also a selling activity, as you will be dealing with prospective home buyers, and discussing about their queries and concerns as well. Blogging also serves as a wonderful tool for prospecting as well.
Blogging Helps With Search Engine Exposure As Well
It's a fact that most established search engines prefer Web sites with lots of content. There has also been anecdotal evidence that search engines prefer content that is fresh and updated regularly,and also prefer Web sites that have incoming and outgoing links that are related to the theme of the site. Real estate bloggers tend to link avidly, both in the text of the posts themselves and in blog rolls, which are those collections of links one usually sees on blogs.
Blogging Will Introduce You To A New And Wider Audience
Aside from getting a bigger boost from traditional search engines, the art of blogging will help to introduce a real estate broker's name and types of services offered, to wider audience of prospective customers and online searchers who may not have found you any other way. The wider blogosphere has its own directories, and its own unique subculture as well. Today,there are specialized search engines like Technorati that are updated in real time as new posts are written. Most of all, the blogging world is also inhabited and frequently visited by lots of readers, and those who have the best and most interesting real estate posts and content would surely benefit attaining more online visitors.
For beginning bloggers, experts advise that you should not start blogging unless you're ready to spend the necessary amount of time to regularly post content. In most instances, you will need to regularly post new content weekly, as this helps to produce the best results with regards both readers and search engines.
There are currently a lot of real estate industry topics and items of interest to write and focus on, as most advice that it would be great to make a blog that also discusses interesting and funny which are not directly related to real estate. With regards to the cost of starting s blog, it's quite inexpensive, as there are free blogging platforms on the Web as well, and some who charge relatively affordable rates.
http://realestatepr.org - Real Estate Blogging
Blogs are the shortened term for a Web log, or online journal or diary. Blogs are Web sites that have content, or entries that are generally arranged in reverse chronological order, with the most recent posts on top, and these method are fast becoming more popular these times.
However, there are some who would ask why should a hard working property market broker devote the time to write a new post once a month, once a week or every day? An individual broker needs t know that when done correctly, blogging is also a selling activity, as you will be dealing with prospective home buyers, and discussing about their queries and concerns as well. Blogging also serves as a wonderful tool for prospecting as well.
Blogging Helps With Search Engine Exposure As Well
It's a fact that most established search engines prefer Web sites with lots of content. There has also been anecdotal evidence that search engines prefer content that is fresh and updated regularly,and also prefer Web sites that have incoming and outgoing links that are related to the theme of the site. Real estate bloggers tend to link avidly, both in the text of the posts themselves and in blog rolls, which are those collections of links one usually sees on blogs.
Blogging Will Introduce You To A New And Wider Audience
Aside from getting a bigger boost from traditional search engines, the art of blogging will help to introduce a real estate broker's name and types of services offered, to wider audience of prospective customers and online searchers who may not have found you any other way. The wider blogosphere has its own directories, and its own unique subculture as well. Today,there are specialized search engines like Technorati that are updated in real time as new posts are written. Most of all, the blogging world is also inhabited and frequently visited by lots of readers, and those who have the best and most interesting real estate posts and content would surely benefit attaining more online visitors.
For beginning bloggers, experts advise that you should not start blogging unless you're ready to spend the necessary amount of time to regularly post content. In most instances, you will need to regularly post new content weekly, as this helps to produce the best results with regards both readers and search engines.
There are currently a lot of real estate industry topics and items of interest to write and focus on, as most advice that it would be great to make a blog that also discusses interesting and funny which are not directly related to real estate. With regards to the cost of starting s blog, it's quite inexpensive, as there are free blogging platforms on the Web as well, and some who charge relatively affordable rates.
http://realestatepr.org - Real Estate Blogging
Blogging Helps Business Beat the Recession Blues
The economic slowdown of recent times has triggered panic across industry verticals. Developed economies such as the USA, UK and several other countries of Western Europe have found it hard to retain competitiveness and revive domestic demand. While this adverse scenario has led to bankruptcy and job loss it has also helped more and more business enterprises to become more cautious to mitigate losses. These firms have also realised that ignoring potential signs of declining sales can lead to an uncertain future.
One of the most prominent trends in the developed economies during this period of economic upheaval has been blogging which has caught the attention of business enterprises across all industry verticals. There are several benefits associated with corporate blogging which has become more evident in recent times. Some of the key benefits extended by blogging to corporate firms are as follows:
· Brand promotion at a low cost
Rising expenditures has added to the woes of several business enterprises, prompting them to look for alternate channels of promotion and marketing. Enterprises facing credit crunch have taken up blogging at a wide scale because the expenses involved in this communication medium is quite minimal.
· Reaching out to a wider audience
Blogging has opened new avenues for smaller firms looking at expanding their base and catering to the needs of customers in various parts of the world. A number of firms have established strong trade linkages with distributors and suppliers in the Asian and African markets to increase sales considerably.
· Generating innovative business ideas
Social networking has become the latest buzzword in the business world with a growing number of enterprises using this medium to find innovative ideas from fellow entrepreneurs. It is also helping them to establish business relations that are mutually beneficial for both parties.
One of the most prominent trends in the developed economies during this period of economic upheaval has been blogging which has caught the attention of business enterprises across all industry verticals. There are several benefits associated with corporate blogging which has become more evident in recent times. Some of the key benefits extended by blogging to corporate firms are as follows:
· Brand promotion at a low cost
Rising expenditures has added to the woes of several business enterprises, prompting them to look for alternate channels of promotion and marketing. Enterprises facing credit crunch have taken up blogging at a wide scale because the expenses involved in this communication medium is quite minimal.
· Reaching out to a wider audience
Blogging has opened new avenues for smaller firms looking at expanding their base and catering to the needs of customers in various parts of the world. A number of firms have established strong trade linkages with distributors and suppliers in the Asian and African markets to increase sales considerably.
· Generating innovative business ideas
Social networking has become the latest buzzword in the business world with a growing number of enterprises using this medium to find innovative ideas from fellow entrepreneurs. It is also helping them to establish business relations that are mutually beneficial for both parties.
How a Blog Help Me Quit My Day Job
It wasn't all that long ago that I was still working at a 9-to-5 job, barely making ends meet. As a matter of fact, I was almost the poster child for the person that lived paycheck to paycheck. Unfortunately, my paychecks were so small at times that it was difficult to make it stretch until the next one came in. Like most people, I started looking for a way to earn a little bit of extra money and the Internet seemed like the perfect opportunity. After all, I had a little bit of free time in the evening, even though I was limited to a certain extent.
I had heard about how a lot of people were making extra money on the Internet without putting any effort into it at all. Unfortunately, those rumors turned out to be a little bit skewed but the simple fact of the matter is, it is possible to make money on the Internet. You need to understand that doing so is a business, much the same as any other business where you earn money. If you work at your Internet marketing business, you're going to make money. If you just sit back and wait for the money to come to you, you're going to end up disappointed.
Fortunately, I started out on the right foot and the first thing that I did was to put up a WordPress blog on my own domain. It was a little bit of a risk, but to tell you the honest truth, I only spent about $20 in order to get the whole thing done so it wasn't as if I was really putting my neck out on the line. I joined an online tutorial website that helped to walk me through the entire process of setting my WordPress blog up properly from the start. I am really glad that I took the time to do this because I couldn't imagine going in and making all of those changes after I had already been posting information for quite some time.
By teaching me the right way to go, the website that I had joined help me to get traffic to my website on the very first day that I began posting information. This was amazing to me and my first sale came within 24 hours of starting. If you want to make money on the Internet as well, put a little bit of work into getting your WordPress blog set up. Just make sure that you have it set up properly from the start so you can begin making money quickly instead of waiting for it.
I had heard about how a lot of people were making extra money on the Internet without putting any effort into it at all. Unfortunately, those rumors turned out to be a little bit skewed but the simple fact of the matter is, it is possible to make money on the Internet. You need to understand that doing so is a business, much the same as any other business where you earn money. If you work at your Internet marketing business, you're going to make money. If you just sit back and wait for the money to come to you, you're going to end up disappointed.
Fortunately, I started out on the right foot and the first thing that I did was to put up a WordPress blog on my own domain. It was a little bit of a risk, but to tell you the honest truth, I only spent about $20 in order to get the whole thing done so it wasn't as if I was really putting my neck out on the line. I joined an online tutorial website that helped to walk me through the entire process of setting my WordPress blog up properly from the start. I am really glad that I took the time to do this because I couldn't imagine going in and making all of those changes after I had already been posting information for quite some time.
By teaching me the right way to go, the website that I had joined help me to get traffic to my website on the very first day that I began posting information. This was amazing to me and my first sale came within 24 hours of starting. If you want to make money on the Internet as well, put a little bit of work into getting your WordPress blog set up. Just make sure that you have it set up properly from the start so you can begin making money quickly instead of waiting for it.
How Can A Blog Help Me Make Money?
The internet revolution has opened many opportunities to earn money online. There are many people who are using various internet methods to earn extra money. There are many ways that can help you to earn extra money. However, the most preferred method to earn money is from a blogging. You can use your writing skills to earn decent cash monthly. However, you require certain understanding such as monetizing a blog, keywords, Search engine optimization, etc. These understandings will help you to get huge traffic of visitors, which certainly is a main goal that helps to earn money. Moreover, another important thing is the precise implementation of these methods.
The first step to start the blogging is to start writing about your experiences and learning's. It is important to write about subjects that readers will find both valuable and interesting. At first, it is advocated that writing a blog requires the understanding of keywords. A keyword is set a word, which people usually type in a search engine to find the information. Researching and using right keywords is essential to get a good page ranking. A good page ranking will keep the content of your page visible at the first page of search engine.
A good search engine ranking will help to generate traffic, which is crucial for making money from blogging. After writing a good content with the keywords, it is time that you must monetize the blog. Monetizing requires signing up with the advertising network. There are few types of advertising network such as contextual marketing, text marketing and affiliate marketing. The contextual marketing and text marketing networks pay the money to display the relevant ads. The affiliate marketing network is a commission based network, which pay when you induce sales of their products or services.
In conclusion, a consistent and interesting blog can attract traffic to your web-site, build solid relationships with your readers, and therefore provide a platform on which to sell your services and products.
The first step to start the blogging is to start writing about your experiences and learning's. It is important to write about subjects that readers will find both valuable and interesting. At first, it is advocated that writing a blog requires the understanding of keywords. A keyword is set a word, which people usually type in a search engine to find the information. Researching and using right keywords is essential to get a good page ranking. A good page ranking will keep the content of your page visible at the first page of search engine.
A good search engine ranking will help to generate traffic, which is crucial for making money from blogging. After writing a good content with the keywords, it is time that you must monetize the blog. Monetizing requires signing up with the advertising network. There are few types of advertising network such as contextual marketing, text marketing and affiliate marketing. The contextual marketing and text marketing networks pay the money to display the relevant ads. The affiliate marketing network is a commission based network, which pay when you induce sales of their products or services.
In conclusion, a consistent and interesting blog can attract traffic to your web-site, build solid relationships with your readers, and therefore provide a platform on which to sell your services and products.
Does SEO Blogging Help?
A blog is normally used by a web marketer to promote their website and this is the more convenient way for them to do because it can be published easily and quickly. A blog is an online journal which is used to be primarily for online use of people only and not for business or marketing purposes.
While it is used to be only for personal use and for communication purposes, it is now used by marketers as a promotional tool for their business. Blogs are the same as articles with contents in it, but the big difference is you don't need web codes for blogs and you can publish it immediately, unlike with websites where HTML codes are necessary.
With a blog you just need to put contents and when you submit this to the blog directories you can have it published right away. With blogs your contents will automatically be converted into HTML codes and it can then be viewed as a web page.
Because a blog is easier to publish since it doesn't need codes, unlike a website, you can post blog contents more often and easily. On the other hand the search engines like websites that are more frequently updated because the search engines love fresh website contents.
Due to these individual qualities blogs can be used for marketing purposes because of its ease in having it published quickly. And because the search engines love fresh updating of contents, your blogs will serve this purpose, but you need to implement SEO strategies in order for these to get top placements in the results pages.
So what are the things you need to do to your blog posts, to make it occupy the top spots in the search engines? These are the SEO things that you need to implement.
When you write your blog posts, have the valuable contents, as the search engines love optimized contents. Like the adage "contents are king" this also applies in blogs, to let it stand in search engine optimization.
Make your blog contents keyword-rich, for SEO effects. This strategy will help in your SEO efforts of your blogs.
With the valuable and useful contents of your blogs, people will be more inclined to link to these and adding more SEO value. As we know, the search engines love links, and with the links you can get you will have more chances to be listed on the top search results pages.
With your blogs you can have more link popularity. This in turn will be of more value to the search engines.
A blog can be used to help a website rank high in the search results pages. By linking your blog to your main website you will be adding more SEO value.
While it is used to be only for personal use and for communication purposes, it is now used by marketers as a promotional tool for their business. Blogs are the same as articles with contents in it, but the big difference is you don't need web codes for blogs and you can publish it immediately, unlike with websites where HTML codes are necessary.
With a blog you just need to put contents and when you submit this to the blog directories you can have it published right away. With blogs your contents will automatically be converted into HTML codes and it can then be viewed as a web page.
Because a blog is easier to publish since it doesn't need codes, unlike a website, you can post blog contents more often and easily. On the other hand the search engines like websites that are more frequently updated because the search engines love fresh website contents.
Due to these individual qualities blogs can be used for marketing purposes because of its ease in having it published quickly. And because the search engines love fresh updating of contents, your blogs will serve this purpose, but you need to implement SEO strategies in order for these to get top placements in the results pages.
So what are the things you need to do to your blog posts, to make it occupy the top spots in the search engines? These are the SEO things that you need to implement.
When you write your blog posts, have the valuable contents, as the search engines love optimized contents. Like the adage "contents are king" this also applies in blogs, to let it stand in search engine optimization.
Make your blog contents keyword-rich, for SEO effects. This strategy will help in your SEO efforts of your blogs.
With the valuable and useful contents of your blogs, people will be more inclined to link to these and adding more SEO value. As we know, the search engines love links, and with the links you can get you will have more chances to be listed on the top search results pages.
With your blogs you can have more link popularity. This in turn will be of more value to the search engines.
A blog can be used to help a website rank high in the search results pages. By linking your blog to your main website you will be adding more SEO value.
Keyword Research Blog Help
Your FAILURE or SUCCESS online depends on keywords. I can show you why they're more important than any content you'll ever write, more important than any domain you'll ever buy, and how all of your success hinges on finding the best keywords for you.
The web is filled with content and hundreds of millions of blogs, and yet to get an Alexa rating in the top 100,000 sites you only need a little more than 1,000 unique visitors per day or so. And yet you need at least 1,000 visits per day or more to become mildly successful making money online. Wouldn't you like to be part of that 1% and not in the 99% of unsuccessful bloggers?
It's the same as the reason 99% of America is dirt poor and 1% are wealthy. All you need is opportunity, and through hard work and determination you can be wealthy too. Well, working online doing keyword research reveals opportunities that are available. How will anyone find your site in search if you're not using keywords that people search for everyday? And if you don't put those keyword in all the right places, you will never unlock the magic combination required to get a high placement in search engine results!
I'm about to teach you the 6 MAGIC KEYWORD AREAS you need to know about!
Keywords in a URL: For the most part, successful bloggers still agree that keywords in a URL helps. When I do google searches I see words in domain names highlighted all the time - so I see it working in action. Some people believe that google favors keyword rich domains over MSN and Yahoo!. When creating posts and pages you also need relevant keywords there, but try to be as natural (language) as possible.
HTML Title Tag: Most blogging software creates this automatically from the post or page title you enter. You need to make sure that it's not more than 75-85 characters (optimally), and usually 6-8 words or less is best (with just a few important keywords).
Meta description: The description of your web page in a search engine listing is taken from the meta description tag in web page html code. Fortunately is you're using blogging software or any modern content management system (CMS) you really don't have to worry about that nowadays. I use a Wordpress plugin in my blog to use the first few sentences of my post or page in the meta description. If you don't have a meta description tag - the search engines will just use the first 30-odd words of text on your page as the description for a search result. Your best best is to summarize every post or page by starting out with a synopsis at the top peppered with relevant keywords.
H1 and other html heading tags: Just like in a book, the index, chapter, or section titles are most important. In a web page they organize and structure the document - so keywords used in these headers are of more importance than in the content text itself.
Image alt (attribute) tags: Within an image tag is an "alt" attribute where you can specify some text. The text is supposed to be used to describe the image for people that can't see it. Search engines of course index alt text for images because it's a description. Too many keywords is spammy, just enough is good SEO. One thing I can tell you for sure is that good image alt keywords are like gold for things like google images. You would be surprised how many new visitors you can get from google images with lots of good descriptions.
Keyword Density: Keyword density is the different between quality content and spam. The search crawlers are getting smarter by the day. If your content is keyword this, keyword that, keyword(s), keyworded, keywording, keyword keyword - the crawler will probably pickup pretty quick that you're a keyword spammer. You could even do this by accident. Make sure your content reads like natural conversation (with relevant keywords). It should be obvious if you're getting spammy. If you want to check your home page or other posts for keyword density, you can use the free Webjectives Keyword Density Analyzer.
Now that you know where to place the keyword, you need to know where to do the best keyword research. You should check out the Google Adwords Keyword and Trellian Keyword Discovery tool (both free - just google them) which will not only give you great keyword suggestions, but also you'll get a sense of how many searches there are for keywords and phrases (in addition to the competition for them in the adwords tool). You need to know what your top keyword are for your blog before you even write the first post. Have you done your research?
The web is filled with content and hundreds of millions of blogs, and yet to get an Alexa rating in the top 100,000 sites you only need a little more than 1,000 unique visitors per day or so. And yet you need at least 1,000 visits per day or more to become mildly successful making money online. Wouldn't you like to be part of that 1% and not in the 99% of unsuccessful bloggers?
It's the same as the reason 99% of America is dirt poor and 1% are wealthy. All you need is opportunity, and through hard work and determination you can be wealthy too. Well, working online doing keyword research reveals opportunities that are available. How will anyone find your site in search if you're not using keywords that people search for everyday? And if you don't put those keyword in all the right places, you will never unlock the magic combination required to get a high placement in search engine results!
I'm about to teach you the 6 MAGIC KEYWORD AREAS you need to know about!
Keywords in a URL: For the most part, successful bloggers still agree that keywords in a URL helps. When I do google searches I see words in domain names highlighted all the time - so I see it working in action. Some people believe that google favors keyword rich domains over MSN and Yahoo!. When creating posts and pages you also need relevant keywords there, but try to be as natural (language) as possible.
HTML Title Tag: Most blogging software creates this automatically from the post or page title you enter. You need to make sure that it's not more than 75-85 characters (optimally), and usually 6-8 words or less is best (with just a few important keywords).
Meta description: The description of your web page in a search engine listing is taken from the meta description tag in web page html code. Fortunately is you're using blogging software or any modern content management system (CMS) you really don't have to worry about that nowadays. I use a Wordpress plugin in my blog to use the first few sentences of my post or page in the meta description. If you don't have a meta description tag - the search engines will just use the first 30-odd words of text on your page as the description for a search result. Your best best is to summarize every post or page by starting out with a synopsis at the top peppered with relevant keywords.
H1 and other html heading tags: Just like in a book, the index, chapter, or section titles are most important. In a web page they organize and structure the document - so keywords used in these headers are of more importance than in the content text itself.
Image alt (attribute) tags: Within an image tag is an "alt" attribute where you can specify some text. The text is supposed to be used to describe the image for people that can't see it. Search engines of course index alt text for images because it's a description. Too many keywords is spammy, just enough is good SEO. One thing I can tell you for sure is that good image alt keywords are like gold for things like google images. You would be surprised how many new visitors you can get from google images with lots of good descriptions.
Keyword Density: Keyword density is the different between quality content and spam. The search crawlers are getting smarter by the day. If your content is keyword this, keyword that, keyword(s), keyworded, keywording, keyword keyword - the crawler will probably pickup pretty quick that you're a keyword spammer. You could even do this by accident. Make sure your content reads like natural conversation (with relevant keywords). It should be obvious if you're getting spammy. If you want to check your home page or other posts for keyword density, you can use the free Webjectives Keyword Density Analyzer.
Now that you know where to place the keyword, you need to know where to do the best keyword research. You should check out the Google Adwords Keyword and Trellian Keyword Discovery tool (both free - just google them) which will not only give you great keyword suggestions, but also you'll get a sense of how many searches there are for keywords and phrases (in addition to the competition for them in the adwords tool). You need to know what your top keyword are for your blog before you even write the first post. Have you done your research?
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