Online Visible Web

About This Online Visible Web Blog

2012-04-08T22:20:00.002+08:00

Hi, you've arrived at one of my older blogs, the Online Visible Web blog and you'll still find great content to explore. However, Online Visible Web is no longer a blog that I regularly update because all my activities and resources and now focused into the My Forward Steps Member site at www.myforwardsteps.com

My Forward Steps is my new space brimming with daily tips, success lessons, inspiration, prompts for self development, power for life, tools, ideas for business & web wisdom.
You know, if you aren’t learning then you could be standing still…

My Forward Steps has tools & inspirations to keep you stepping forward

Once stretched by any new idea, your mind never regains its original dimensions. Every forward step enhances the value of your first and if you’re facing in the right direction, all you need to do is to keep walking

Each week, My Forward Steps Members enjoy wealth for momentum, so hop over there and take a peek.

The other place to which I direct visitors is my book's site at www.timeformylife.com. Time For My Life: 365 Stepping Stones contains 2,843 life power and personal energy boosters at your fingertips, every day for a full year.

I created this book for myself, and NOW I share it with you... 424 power pages - to use daily before the gremlins take hold!

Meantime, you can look over the resources at this blog that I had posted in the past. I won't be updating any dead links, so I'll apologize in advance if you find any posts here that are no longer relevant. Though I'm certain you'll still find many goodies you can still use well.

Cheers, Thea

P.S. Meantime, leave your details in the email form, top-right. You'll love the free bonuses that I send to you in your first few emails.

Some Tips for Writing Good Guest Posts

2011-03-29T12:43:00.001+08:00

Guest posting can be a terrific link building strategy and help to bring your own blog to a larger audience. Being able to write good guest posts is a bit different from posting on your own blog since the expectations and opinions of other bloggers may be wildly different from your own. Learning how to write good guest posts will help you to build a solid reputation, and if you’re just starting out in the blogosphere, it will help you to establish a self-brand and reach a larger audience. These tips are based on my own personal experience in writing guest posts.

Make Sure to Give the Blogger Exactly What They Want

A lot of bloggers will respond to your request for a guest post with a list of preferable topics. I always find these blogs to be the easiest to write for because I’ve already been told the topic. Other bloggers will give you carte blanche in selecting your topic, which will require a little more work on your end to come up with something useful to produce. This brings us to our next point of discussion…

Thoroughly Research the Blog You Are Posting On

Don’t just read the first few posts on the blog, but browse through the archives as well to get a feel for what kinds of posts the blogger likes to make. If you’ve been given carte blanche in selecting a topic, then once you know what you want to write about, make sure to search the site to see that your topic hasn’t already been covered.

Always Submit Unique and Useful Content

This can be tough for beginning bloggers that don’t have research experience. Writing for an internet audience is much different than writing for a teacher, and believe it or not but your peers will be much tougher on you than any teacher. Compounding this difficulty is the fact that there is already so much information out there on the web that it can be difficult to find your own slant. The strategy I personally use is to start off with a generic search term, such as “guest posting tips for bloggers”, and I will open ten or so pages to see what’s out there. After reading what others have to say, I then refine my topic from there. I figure out what I can personally add to the topic and from that general idea form the specifics of what I will write about.

Develop Your Voice

If you’re unaware of what voice refers to in terms of writing, it’s pretty simple. It’s basically the personality of your writing, which may be very different from your actual personality. For example, some people that are shy in real life drop those inhibitions once they take to the page. Developing a strong voice in your writing will help you to sell your self-brand. Although having a unique voice will be useful, don’t forget to write for your audience. There will always be a bit of a compromise in this area when you are writing guest posts. Many times the blogs you will be posting to will have a different target demographic than your own. Learning how to maintain your voice while addressing different audiences will help you to become a better writer in the long run.

View Guest Posting as a Process and Not as a Means to an End

Follow up on your article by replying to comments made about your post. If someone is being critical of your work, take it in stride. If that criticism is unwarranted just let it go, or talk to the blog owner about it. If it happens to be constructive, then use that advice to improve your writing. Don’t start any flame wars on someone else’s blog, it’s rude and will earn you a poor reputation. Try to build a professional relationship with the blogs that appreciate your writing, which will help you to establish your own blog.

Maria Rainier is a freelance writer and blog junkie. She is currently a resident blogger at First in Education where she writes about education, online degree programs, and what it takes to succeed as a student working towards an online bachelors degree from home. In her spare time, she enjoys square-foot gardening, swimming, and avoiding her laptop.

Before 3 May Collect These Free Gifts

2010-05-02T14:40:00.008+08:00

Get a full free chapter of my book Time For My Life: 365 Stepping Stones, for taking a little time to do this for me.

Plus, four days later you receive a free copy of my 55-minutes MP3 audio interview about Goal Setting Motivation and Momentum.

Those are my thank you gifts for helping to vote my book Time For My Life into Round 2 of a contest that is focused on finding authors whose book appeals to the spiritual market.

Hampton Roads Publishing offers a book contract to the winner. It is a $50,000 book publishing contract that I would love to achieve.

Voting in the first round of the contest ends on 3 May, 2010.
Will you vote for me? Go to http://forwardsteps.info/NextTopAuthor

It will take a few moments of your time, they've made it a little bit fiddly however it is something special that doesn't come around often. While you're in there, vote for Chris Cade too http://forwardsteps.info/ChrisCadeAuthor

Go to http://forwardsteps.info/NextTopAuthor before Monday 3rd May and vote.

Feel free to pass along that web link to your friends. They are sure to enjoy the gifts as my thank you for voting.

2,843 Actions, Ideas, Inspirations, and Empowering Thoughts

2009-09-28T09:18:00.000+08:00

It's Thea Westra from Forward Steps, with some very exciting news!

A short while ago I promised to let you know when my book is ready to
buy. My book is now ready and available to you.

*******************************************************************
"Time For My Life: 365 Stepping Stones"
http://www.timeformylife.com
*******************************************************************

Can you even begin to imagine, how 2,843 actions, options, ideas,
inspirations, tasks, and thoughts could transform your life if you
took up each of them, over the course of a full year?

Try it out! Go ahead and order my 420-pages of daily momentum, at...
http://www.timeformylife.com

I am so thrilled to finally have this wonderful resource ready for you.
It has taken 18-months, and I calculated that I built it at the rate
of 1.3 pages every day, all 7-days per week, for all those 18-months.

Now those are some Forward Steps!

Celebrate with me and take a look at this gift, from me to you.

Join Up At Our New Member Site, TODAY!

2009-09-11T11:07:00.000+08:00

ENTER INTO to the largest treasure trove of Forward Steps resources, free gifts, inspiring content, motivational messages, internet tools/ideas, videos, audios, programs, self improvement exercises, and so much more!

What is delivered to you goes WAY BEYOND the very low US$4.95 monthly My Forward Steps Membership. Don’t let that crazy, low price fool you! Plus, there is no fixed term, it’s pay by the month, and cancel anytime.

I have more than seven years of fantastic resources related to Increased Life Power, Self Improvement, Your Personal Success, Plus Online Business And Internet Know-How Tips.

You will have the SUPER ADVANTAGE of receiving all my years of gathered and personally created resources, as well as the benefit of my years of online experience, years of my own personal development discoveries/adventures, and years of internet knowledge.

You get all of this, and so much more, all by way of a slow release “Content Responder”.

At your own leisure, you get to delve into every inch, of ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING that I have ever put out since 2002.

SOON, My Forward Steps will be the only place at which you will be able to get your hands on my personal collections.

See you inside!

Thea

P.S. Remember, all the content at all my blogs and all the pages, books, resources I have ever created will gradually diappear behind the screen of the My Forward Steps Member site.

Are You Brand New To Twitter?

2009-07-08T14:50:00.005+08:00

There are new people coming on board at Twitter every day, so I will not assume that you already have your own Twitter account. To that end, I decided to add a quick post here that is quite useful if you are curious about Twitter and have not yet explored it's possibilities for expanding your online presence.

Once you have created your Twitter account, be sure to connect there with me at http://twitter.com/ForwardSteps

Since joining I have added my Twitter feed to places such as the home page of Forward Steps and at my Social Communities page for Forward Steps. To do this, I logged in to Twitter, then clicked the 'Apps' link right at the bottom of the Twitter page. You can see the widgets option there. I chose to see others, and then selected the html widget format. It takes on the font and css style of your web page automatically.

As well as that, I have my latests blog posts fed to my Twitter automatically by using the services provided by Friendfeed. In settings, you will see the Twitter publishing preferences.

The Ultimate Membership Software

2009-06-13T11:09:00.005+08:00

[Image via Wikipedia]

I chanced on this great find today when searching through for something else, and I was immediately impressed. It stopped me in my tracks.

I am astounded at the features, the assistance level and the ease of its use. Plus was really pleased that it could be integrated with my other three favorites - Aweber, Clickbank and Paypal (and more).

Go right now to Digital Access Pass and take a look at all the information about having your own membership site, and we all know the wonderful benefits associated with that!

As well, I had a little glitch with my password (self inflicted), and sent an email to Ravi. He was back to me within a minute. Nice to know.

I am a bit hesitant at listing just a few features here, because I won't be able to do this service justice by listing a few and therefore leaving out all the others, however, here are just some...

DigitalAccessPass is to Membership Sites, what WordPress is to Blogs.

DAP will plug seamlessly even into your existing web site - whether it is a plain ol' HTML-based web site, a WordPress blog that you already have and just wish to protect existing content, or whether it is a completely new membership site that you wish to launch.

You already know how easy it is to automate your email marketing by using an email autoresponder. Once you set up the autoresponder sequence, it keeps doing your marketing for months together, without you ever having to manually send out a single email.

Now imagine doing the same with your content.

Ravi calls it a "ContentResponder". Set up the sequence of content once - like Blog Post 1 goes out on Day #1, PDF Report 1 goes out on Day #7, Audio File 1 goes out on Day #14 - just like you would configure a pre-written sequence of emails.

You don't have to worry about purchasing a separate email autoresponder script or service. The feature is built right in. Simply set it up just like you would set it up on Aweber or Getresponse.

Of course, if you wish to continue using a service like Aweber for their higher email delivery rates, then skip this feature that comes with DAP, and just have all your members also get added to your Aweber autoresponder. So use DAP to drip content, and continue to use Aweber/Getresponse to drip your emails.

When your membership site is powered by DAP, every member is automatically enrolled as an "Affiliate".

You probably know how most membership sites work - the day you stop cancel your subscription, you suddenly go from being "dear customer" to "stingy sucker".

You get thrown out of the site, you lose access to the affiliate links, and you lose access to all those months of content that you paid for!

DAP lets you put a COMPLETELY new twist on this "screw your ex-customers" policy that most membership site owners have.

Using DAP, your members can now access the content that they paid for, even after they have cancelled their subscription!

Not only that - they retain access to their affiliate link and affiliate revenues. And since you were generous and did not screw them out of all that content that they actually paid for, they can - and probably will - continue to promote your web site, and keep bringing you new members.

And since they can also continue receiving emails from you, you can continue dripping emails on them about new content being added to your membership site, and you can slowly attract them and cajole them and excite them into coming back and becoming a member again.

And now the really cool thing that DAP lets you do is - when your members come back, they pick up right where they left off (and not where all of the other paying customers are).

So if they were a member for 3 months, and cancelled after that, and they came back after 6 months, they join back right where they left off - which is month #4 (and not month #10, where all of those other members are who continued paying you for those 6 months while this member was away).

So DAP makes sure no sneaky customer can cancel in between for a few (say 6) months, come back, and get content from those 6 months for free - which is unfair to those other paying members.

All of the above is only the tip of the iceberg with Digital Access Pass. You really must do yourself the huge favor of hopping over to the site and watch the video, plus read all the listed features.

I now need to get to work on finishing my book and getting the membership site set up with Digital Access Pass, and then with a whole bunch of my other content.

Ravi's wonderful resource has really got me quite thrilled about all the amazing possibilities and opportunities available. I am so looking forward to setting up Digital Access Pass and then distributing all my content to my visitors in this way.

It is also a fantastic way to finally organize all the material that I have, and on which I have spent hours, days, months and years. It's a fantastic way to give visitors access in an organized fashion, rather than having my readers discover bits of my great content by accident and needing to remember to revisit my site.

Digital Access Pass to me, has available what the perfect membership site would have available, both for the member and for the administrator. Thank you Ravi, (and I haven't even started using it, however I know how great programs and software should look!)

Google Wave!

2009-05-30T15:46:00.003+08:00

Google Wave is a new model for communication and collaboration on the web, coming later this year.

A wave is equal parts conversation and document. People can communicate and work together with richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more.

A wave is shared. Any participant can reply anywhere in the message, edit the content and add participants at any point in the process. Then playback lets anyone rewind the wave to see who said what and when.

A wave is live. With live transmission as you type, participants on a wave can have faster conversations, see edits and interact with extensions in real-time.

201 Free Twitter Tools

2009-05-27T09:56:00.003+08:00

201 Free Twitter Tools

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Non-fiction Books marketing web

All Free Ebooks

2009-05-17T14:09:00.005+08:00

107+ Ways to Increase Your Profits and Save Tons of Time - Michele Hanson-O'Reggio

The 7 Keys to Cost Effective Marketing - Larina Kase

Six Steps to Stress-Free Speaking - Larina Kase

You'll find the rest of these books on this page at Solo Entrepreneur See the list bewow...

The Truth about Making Money with Teleseminars Special Report - Kathleen Gage

They Need to Know: Protecting Your Family While Protecting Your Business - Lisa Preston

"Featured Articles" Collection - SalesPractice.com Compilation

How to Get the Word Out About Who You Are and What You Do: Essential Marketing Tools for Soul Proprietors - Marty Marsh

The Jackrabbit Factor: Why You Can - Terri Zwierzynski

How to Write an Effective Cold Calling Script - Wendy Weiss

5 Secrets to Attracting Everything You Want - Lorraine Cohen

Online Video Quick-Start Guide - Lou Bortone

The Great Internet Challenge: How to Get Your Business Found on the Web - Patsi Krakoff and Denise Wakeman

5 Mistakes Entrepreneurs Make That Kill Their Sales...And How To Prevent Them - Michele Pariza Wacek

6 Keys to Creating Wild Abundance in Your Business - Alicia M. Forest

8 Steps To Overcome All Your Fears of Selling - Tessa Stowe

10 Ways to Drive Traffic to Your Small Business Website - Janis Pettit

How Much Joy Can You Stand? - Suzanne Falter-Barns

Chris Knight's Top 16 of All Time Strategies to Grow Your Ezine and More - Christopher Knight

Bullet Proof Your Business with Multiple Income Streams - Marnie Pehrson

How To Use a Virtual Office Assistant - Compiled by Janice St. Germain Lloyd

The Best Thing I Ever Did... 101 Solo Entrepreneurs reveal all - Robert Gerrish

As well as 25 Ways to Capture More Clients, Get More Done in Less Time and Make More Money - in 90 Days or Less

Step Away From That Computer!

2009-05-01T00:01:00.000+08:00

Can you survive for 24 hours without your computer?

Shutdown Day announces the Annual 2009 Campaign. Just like in years past, Shutdown Day 2009 calls on every net obsessed, computer–addicted individual to SHUT DOWN their computers for 24 hours on May 2, 2009 and do something else!

Shutdown Day 2009 will be promoting several organizations that help young people suffering from computer addiction. A bunch of events are also organized for May 2, 2009, so visit their website and watch that space.

Quickie Conversion Techniques For Opt-Ins

2009-04-29T20:46:00.003+08:00

[Image via Wikipedia]

This webinar video reveals 5 little-known quickie conversion techniques and tricks for getting more opt-ins, more response and more profits in less time on any website ... with the same traffic you're already getting!

The webinar video replay is NOT about traffic or getting more eyeballs on your site. This is about MAXIMIZING the existing traffic you're getting (whether you get 10 visitors a day or 10,0000 visitors a day, these techniques will work for you!)

Now on this special LIVE, one-time-only webinar replay you’ll see and hear:

How a simple "screen shot" on your site can increase conversion by over 22% (and it's a technique you can use no matter which payment processing company you use!)...

How revealing "a dirty little secret" nobody talks about can actually increase conversion and DECREASE refunds at the same time (do this right, and the sales increase... do it wrong and you've shot yourself in the foot)...

A free tool for quickly grabbing subscribers from your sales pages without giving up the sale (in fact, you can use this tool to give subtle "commands" to website visitors to increase readership)...

How one simple graphic can increase opt-in rates to a newsletter by a whopping 18.4%! (That's right, one little 60x96 .gif file increased opt-in's to Jeff's newsletter by almost 20%)...

WHY your email "footer" is a hidden profit center you can put on complete auto-pilot! (This is truly a "set it and forget it" source of sales and opt-ins you can do once and reap the rewards over and over for weeks and months)..

... and much, MUCH More!

Due to the nature of this webinar video and the Special BONUS, they're only keeping this webinar site up, for a very limited time!

Geek University

2009-04-22T21:02:00.004+08:00

This is an event that is aiming to assist all those wishing to start a small business, already own a small business or those who would like to earn passive cash after working hours, and those who enjoy further education.

The seminar is an internet marketing event.

The event runs for two days and is currently being held in major cities across Australia. The seminar has been called refreshingly innovative, is responsible for developing new online businesses overnight. (107 new online businesses at the 18th/19th April weekend in Brisbane - from a group of 130

A little more about the event......

The event is free to attend and the internet entrepreneur Shaun Stenning runs the event and will be there to walk you through every step of the way to internet marketing success. The event is catered for those who are new to the industry to those who would just like that bit of extra assistance with their current online business, or those who would just like to know more.

The event will teach you how too:

Rank on the Google home page in under 24hrs
Build a website and market a product for FREE in just 30 minutes
Access internet traffic at a fraction of the cost that others pay
Make money even without having your own website
Maximise online earnings with proven website structures and colours
Access proven email marketing strategies and much more!

Please check out either of the following links for more information (these are links to your Free Tickets for AGSM)

Geekversity

Smart Online Profit Systems

The two events are very similar in content.

Leverage Social Media for Your Business

2009-03-26T09:58:00.004+09:00

I have not yet personally checked out this resource, however at first glance it looks good, so I am posting it here for you to explore.

HubSpot's free Social Media Marketing Kit gives you the tips and tricks you need to harness the power of the social mediasphere - facebook, digg, del.icio.us, twitter, and many others - to get found by more potential customers, develop meaningful relationships with others in your industry, and position yourself as an expert in your field. Learn:

* Why social media is important for your business
* How to start engaging in social media to reach customers and the media
* What and how to measure results from your social media marketing efforts

The Social Media Marketing Kit contains:

* Video Webinar (WMV) - "Social Media & Business Marketing" covers all the basics of how to leverage social media for your business. (60 minutes plus Q&A)
* eBook (PDF) - The eBook contains all of the charts, graphs and other materials from the video for handy reference. (49 pages, full color)

Cheers, Thea

P.S. You are also sure to love this recent post that I put up at my Wealth and Money Blog

Using Google Search Effectively And For Efficiency

2009-03-15T11:38:00.006+09:00

I love Google Search. I use it many times in a day and for all sorts of purposes.

In chatting with friends who use the internet, I am often amazed at how many of them never think to use the search engine for finding the information and answers they need.

I will get questions from readers and friends, questions for which I may not always know the answer. I'll simply do a Google search and refine the search terms till I drill down and find an appropriate response to their question.

I also learned most of what I know about online marketing and setting up my web sites, all from Google search. I will always find just what I need, for the specific task that I am looking to accomplish.

The following video shows you a few additional options that may be handy for you in using Google for your requirements.

Social Bookmarking

2009-03-09T13:21:00.004+09:00

[Image via Wikipedia]

Optimizing web pages for Google and other search engines is not enough.

A successful concept for your online marketing has to be regarded in a more comprehensive way and must include the community.

Web 2.0 is part of the community and vice versa. Social bookmarking is part of it, too.

Use the Social Bookmark Script to automatically add link icons from the best social bookmark services to your web page in order to enable your visitors to set a public bookmark for your site by mouse-click.

Here are three sample pages where I used the Social Bookmark Script at the base of each...
Inspiring And Motivational Videos
50 Free Personal Development Gifts
50 Life Power Questions

Plus, further down this Social Bookmarking page, you can see a regularly updated list of top social bookmarking sites and their rankings, and traffic performance. A very handy page to keep for future reference. It'll give you an idea of which to select for your sites.

"Small Changes = Big Results" Webcast With Dr. Joe Vitale

2009-02-26T08:53:00.005+09:00

[Image via Wikipedia]

This is a great webcast. Lot's of specific and simple tweaks you can make to your online marketing that increase your results.

It's a 60 minute webinar, and you can still register after the event date because you'll be sent a link, so you can view the webcast in your own time.

Here's the link www.NitroWebcasts.com

Towards the end it even gives away the tip that when used increases your results up to 500%! It really works.

Cheers, Thea

P.S. Did I tell you that this is free? What will be the results you will see when you start using these great free tips?

An Excellent Business Exercise

2009-02-20T19:13:00.000+09:00

[Image via Wikipedia]

If you have your own web or blog, and a product to give-away, plus you'd like to build a mailing list for yourself, then I would highly recommend that you sign up at this link...

This sounds a bit like a sales pitch, however I am being perfectly straight, when I say that I had 870+ new subscribers to join my list (in only a 2-month period), and I did no more than let visitors know about wonderful free gifts at a gift link.

It was the best business exercise in which I had ever participated and a very small investment of my time & energy. I was super surprised. Test it out for yourself with the next opportunity...

However remember, 'big lists' mean nothing. They are people who have chosen to find out more about what you offer and who you are, no different to yourself when you subscribe. This is about building a relationship and giving away much more than you receive. You can't outgive the universe! :)

Have a magnificent 2009,
Thea

P.S. Get your hands on an amazing selection of 377 free products, all are self-improvement gifts. Take your pick, from a best collection of personal development material. Choose to your heart's content.

Change Your Prospects For Growth And For Success

2009-02-19T09:50:00.002+09:00

[Image via Wikipedia]

Successful people, they see the current global financial scenario as an opportunity to grow. They see that this situation provides a way to become more financially successful than in the past.

If you've been concerned about the state of global finance situations, if you've been worrying how this may affect your ability to think clearly. I do suggest you to download the resources at 777SelfHelp

Inside, you will find many great self improvement products you can use to change your mindset as well as change your prospects for growth and for success, as well as for a happier life.

Seriously, ignore all the media news you have read!

The news presentations and the charged language used, is geared up to have you live with a limited belief system. A belief system that will stunt your chance for growth.

Change your mindset. Change your thoughts.

Download all those resources my buddy, Henry, Keith, and Joe have put up at 777SelfHelp

High achievers spot rich opportunities swiftly, make big decisions quickly and move into action immediately. Follow these principles and you can make your dreams come true. -Robert H. Schuller

Success is yours, Thea

P.S. I was told that Friday 20th February is the last day for downloading this wonderful 777SelfHelp Collection of 370+ personal development programs, books, courses, audios, videos and much more. All the gifts have been screened and are of a high quality.

Business Blogging - A Free Copy For You

2009-02-15T14:08:00.004+09:00

Michael Martine has written extensively on business blogging. In 2007, he wrote a huge 12-part series of posts on how to start a business blog. His intention from the beginning was to take these posts and expand on them in the form of a book. And that’s just what he did. At over 80 pages, this is a real, honest-to-goodness book, not some flimsy white paper mislabeled as an ebook.

Download Your Free Copy of How to Start a Business Blog

How to Start a Business Blog

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Business eBooks blogging business blogging

Page 1 of 82 This Book is Only the Beginning! Online Seminar Series Coming! ............................6 Remarkablogger Workbook: How to Start a Business Blog...........................................7 Who This Book is For........................................................................................................................8 What You’ll Find in How to Start a Business Blog ...............................................................8 Who is Remarkablogger? ............................................................................................................. 10 Why am I giving away all my best ideas in a free book?.............................................. 11 11-Step Process to Starting a Business Blog..................................................................... 12 Step 1: Understand Blogging in General............................................................................... 13 You Don’t Know What a Blog is? You’re Kidding, Right?.....................................................13 Practical Definition of a Blog and Blogging ........................................................................15 How Blogs have Changed Recently ....................................................................................16 Workbook Exercise: Understanding Blogging in General ............................................. 18 Step 2: Know the Benefits of Blogging for Business....................................................... 20 Why You Should Have a Blog .............................................................................................21 Blogs are Easy ...................................................................................................................21 Blogs are Cheap ................................................................................................................22 Choice of Designs .............................................................................................................23 Page 2 of 82 Blogs are Easily Extensible ................................................................................................23 Wealth of Help and Resources ...........................................................................................24 Better Search Findability ....................................................................................................24 Blogs Encourage Interaction ..............................................................................................25 What if You Already Have a Website? .................................................................................25 Exercise: The Benefits of Business Blogging...................................................................... 27 Step 3: Understand Who You’re Blogging For .................................................................... 28 Your Ideal Customer .........................................................................................................28 Why Bother? ......................................................................................................................31 Exercise: Create a Portrait of Your Ideal Customer......................................................... 32 Step 4: Determine the Purpose and Goals of Your Business Blog........................... 33 Purpose.............................................................................................................................33 Goals.................................................................................................................................34 Exercise: Determine the Purpose and Goals of Your Business Blog........................ 35 Step 5: Determine the Authors of your Business Blog................................................... 36 Choose the Willing ............................................................................................................37 Get Samples ......................................................................................................................37 Exercise: Choosing Authors for a Business Blog.............................................................. 38 Page 3 of 82 Step 6: Determine the Business Blog’s Policies................................................................. 39 Exercise: Draft a Company Blogging Policy ........................................................................ 41 Step 7: Determine Blog Platform and Blog / Website Integration........................... 41 Blog Platforms...................................................................................................................42 What if You Already have a Website? .................................................................................43 Exercise: Working Through Blog/Site Platform/Integration ....................................... 45 Step 8: Design Considerations.................................................................................................. 46 Exercise: Deciding Factors for Blog Design ........................................................................ 49 Step 9: Choose Blog Categories and Tags ........................................................................... 50 Categories.........................................................................................................................50 Tags..................................................................................................................................51 An Example of Categories and Tags ..................................................................................52 Step 10: Write the Initial Content............................................................................................. 53 Conventional Wisdom........................................................................................................53 How Much Initial Content?.................................................................................................54 Should You Backdate Your Initial Content? ........................................................................55 Exercise: Draft Initial Content Ideas....................................................................................... 55 Step 11: Draft a Comment Policy ............................................................................................. 57 Page 4 of 82 To Comment or Not to Comment ......................................................................................57 Problems are Opportunities...............................................................................................57 Comments and Blogging Go Together...............................................................................58 Craft a Comment Policy.....................................................................................................58 Step 12: Develop a Crisis Management Plan ...................................................................... 61 If a Crisis Hits Before You Have a Blog...............................................................................62 Creating a Blog Crisis Management Plan............................................................................62 Exercise: Draft a Crisis Management Plan........................................................................... 64 You Have a Blog. Congratulations. Now What? ................................................................. 65 Posting Frequency .............................................................................................................65 Future Publishing ..............................................................................................................66 What the Heck Do I Blog About? ........................................................................................66 The 10 Types of Freelance/Business Blog Posts.............................................................. 67 1. Customer success stories..............................................................................................67 2. Product or service tips and tutorials ..............................................................................67 3. Upcoming products or services information ..................................................................68 4. Request feedback from customers ................................................................................69 5. News and announcements.............................................................................................69 Page 5 of 82 6. Industry news................................................................................................................69 7. What to look for in a… ..................................................................................................70 8. What to watch out for from… ........................................................................................71 9. Related interests ...........................................................................................................71 10. Product, service, or process explanations and stories .................................................71 An Introduction to Gateway Blogging ................................................................................... 73 Your Business Blog is a Gateway........................................................................................74 Glossary............................................................................................................................................... 75 Page 6 of 82 NOTES This Book is Only the Beginning! Online Seminar Series Coming! I’m going to follow the release of this book with a month-long weekly series of online seminars. The seminars will cover several chapters per session. Each session will feature more in-depth explanations, followed by an extensive question-and-answer session. These will be conducted using UStream. All you need is a broadband internet connection. There will be four sessions, each one at least two hours long, once per week, for only $97! That price covers all four sessions in the series. This book is far more in-depth compared to the posts on which it’s based at Remarkablogger, but these seminars will be even more in-depth, along with the chance for you to ask specific questions and participate in the discussion. Now that you’re subscribed to the Remarkablogger feed or email, you will be notified when the next series will run. Keep an eye on your feed reader or email! PS: to get the most out of both the book and the online seminars, make sure you jot down any questions that spring to mind as you’re reading, so you can ask them in the seminars. Printing out the book is very helpful because of the notes area at the right. You can use it while you read and during the seminars. Page 7 of 82 NOTES Remarkablogger Workbook: How to Start a Business Blog Businesses of all stripes and sizes are taking the plunge into business blogging. Business blogs need to be treated differently than personal or professional blogs (where the blog itself is the revenue-earning vehicle, sometimes referred to as pro blogs or money blogs). If you’re interested in this book, that means that you are blogging currently for your business or you are considering it. I wanted to make this book something different – something, well... remarkable. There are plenty of ebooks out there that are more fluff than stuff. Not only did I want this book have some real meat on the bone, compared to many others, I also wanted it to become a real tool that you could use to implement the ideas contained within it. That’s why I’m calling this a workbook. It features a notes area on the right margin of each page and exercises you can complete to help you plan or improve your blog. It really works well if you print it out and scribble on it and mark it up. That’s pretty old-school, I know, but hey: books have their advantages. There are plenty of hyperlinks and proper features in the PDF (such as bookmarks) that make the on-screen version easy to navigate and Page 8 of 82 NOTES use. There’s also a companion audio version of the book you can listen to while you’re commuting or multitasking. Who This Book is For This book is written for the freelancer or business person who is looking into creating a blog as a marketing tool for the business. It is aimed squarely at people who know there is value to be found in having a strong web presence, but need to cut through all the buzzwords and marketing crap to get the straight info on the what, why, and how of business blogging. This book is also written for a freelancer or business person who already has a blog and wants to dramatically improve its performance and its ability to meet its objectives. What You’ll Find in How to Start a Business Blog • Plain English explanations of blogging and other terms defined from a business viewpoint. • Thorough, easy-to-understand listing of the advantages of business blogs, as well as an unflinching look at their issues and problem areas for business. • A step-by-step guide for setting up and managing a business blog. Page 9 of 82 NOTES • Guides for how to stay on track with a business blog and create content that takes into consideration the unique aspects of business blogs. • Exercises and questionnaires to help you think through and plan your blog. • An introduction to a better way to frame and understand the function and purpose of a business blog, called Gateway Blogging. • A glossary of blogging terms Page 10 of 82 NOTES Who is Remarkablogger? Remarkablogger is Michael Martine, a long-time web designer, blogger, software trainer, internet entrepreneur, and strategist. Remarkablogger is the name of my one-man consulting company. I offer blog consulting and coaching for individuals and companies. I help you wade through the blizzard of options and choices when it comes to planning, setting up, and managing a business blog. If you’re new to blogging or your blog has stalled or not delivered the expected results, I can help you start your blog right or take it to the next level, and help it fulfill its intended purpose. You can reach me most effectively by email at: michaelmartine@gmail.com You can also reach me through Skype, the world’s most popular internet phone service, at michael.martine. You can learn more about me and read my blog at http://remarkablogger.com. Page 11 of 82 NOTES Why am I giving away all my best ideas in a free book? I’m not! Not even by far. But I am giving away enough of my ideas and experience on business blogging for one simple, straightforward business reason: because it brings me business. How can you judge my experience, competence, and insight unless you can take an extended “test drive” of my thinking? And without the trust that is established from that, would you be likely to hire me? I can provide all the general information I want, but until you and I are talking about your needs and your blog, it’s still just general information. Nothing beats personalized, customized strategies and help for your blog. Page 12 of 82 NOTES 11-Step Process to Starting a Business Blog What follows after this is an step-by-step process for how to start a business blog. After each step is an exercise to help you complete this step in real life. Sometimes the exercises will help you clarify your thinking, and other times the exercises involve writing or creating actual material in the set-up and launch of a business blog. Page 13 of 82 NOTES Step 1: Understand Blogging in General A business would be ill-advised to start a blog without understanding what blogging is all about. Blogging might seem strange and foreign to a more traditionally-inclined businessperson. Some people in the company might know about blogging, read blogs daily, and have personal blogs. Others simply haven’t a clue, and may not care about blogging. If you’re contemplating a blog for your business, chances are you already know about blogging. You may need to help others understand what is a blog, and why you should have a blog. You Don’t Know What a Blog is? You’re Kidding, Right? You mean in this day and age, you don’t know what a blog is? Relax! You’re not alone. Many people still don’t really know what a blog is. The word itself, blog, is short for web log. The main feature of blogs that sets them apart from other kinds of websites is that the site’s content appears mostly on one main page in the form of posts. A post is the basic unit of content in a blog. The newest post is the first one at the top, and the next most recent post comes after the first, and so forth. Most blogs usually show only the most recent posts, with the remainder stored in accessible archives. Usually, clicking on a post’s title will take you to a page where that post in its Page 14 of 82 NOTES entirety is the main content on the page. Many home pages of blogs feature only the first few words of each post (an excerpt), and you can click a link if you’re interested in reading the rest of the post. The listing order of blog posts meets the needs of people who want to keep up with the latest news. Your email inbox does the same thing. Can you imagine how exasperating it would be to have to scroll to the bottom of your inbox just to see the latest email you received? This is why blog posts are listed newest first. About eight or nine years ago, this post format was something new—most websites consisted of a series of pages linked to from a “home” page, like how a table of contents points to pages in a book. It was difficult and timeconsuming to make changes to a website. By contrast, blogs are very easy to update, thanks to advances in the proficiency of the underlying technology. Blogs can have pages, too, like a “normal” website, but their primary feature is a series of posts. Sometimes posts can be long, but most are only a few hundred words in length. Blogs have certain common features other than posts, and it is often these features that perplex people. Two such features are categories and archives. Categories are a way to classify and group blog posts. For example, at Remarkablogger I have a category called Google. Whenever I write a post about something related to Google services and products, I assign it to the Google Page 15 of 82 NOTES category (and to other categories, if applicable). There is often a list of categories on a blog page, either in the left or right column. You can click on any category to see all the posts which are assigned to that category. If you click Google, you will see all my posts on Google collected in one place. Archives are past posts collected into groups by month. Links to a blog’s archives are also usually in a sidebar. If all that organization of material seems like a lot of work, it isn’t! That’s because what makes this possible is that all of a blog’s content is stored in a database, so that it can be retrieved and displayed in many different ways by your blogging software, which is a computer program that runs on the web server. The archiving of old posts happens automatically as a function of the blogging software. Practical Definition of a Blog and Blogging In practical terms, a blog is an internet publishing platform that’s relatively easy to use and manage. A blog is just about the easiest way going to have a website. Using a blog involves creating written content (and, more and more, audio and video). Writing blog posts is most often done in a web-based form (somewhat like writing an email) in the administration pages of the blog. You log in to the admin area of your blog with a username and password. A team blog has multiple authors, each with their own usernames and passwords. Page 16 of 82 NOTES Even if you publish more than one form of media, blogging is, essentially, writing. You write posts, assign them to categories, create a list of links to other bloggers you like (this is called a blogroll), and respond to comments left by visitors. The ability for visitors to leave comments, and for blog authors to respond to those comments, is one of the hallmark features that makes blogs different from a “regular” website. For many blogs, loyal commenting visitors can form a community based around the blog. How Blogs have Changed Recently I know there are many articles online defining what a blog is, but many of them are getting old. Blogging evolves at a rapid pace, and if you want to stay current, you have to put some effort into staying caught up. This is the reality of doing business today. The ease of use and features keeps improving with each new version of blog software such as WordPress. The advent of a combination of technologies collectively known as AJAX has brought about new levels of interactivity to blogs. Flash media in the form of embeddable video players has revolutionized how people watch video online. Other advances in technology alongside flash video have brought about the rise of the video blog. Page 17 of 82 NOTES The rise of tags has had a big impact on blogging. A tag is a descriptive word or short phrase attached to a blog post so people can find it and so that it has a context with other blog posts that use the same or similar tags. Podcasting, or using RSS (Really Simple Syndication) to send audio and video to subscribers, has also exploded in popularity. RSS itself has nearly always been associated with blogs, but it’s finally catching on with a mainstream audience. Many social and community-based services offer some kind of widget you can put on your blog to show your participation in that community. A widget is a little window or box of content that is fetched from someplace else. Finally, the most recent trend is microblogging from mobile devices, and the tools that facilitate it, such as Twitter. Microblogging is when you text short posts from a mobile device to a service which broadcasts the posts to people who are interested in receiving them from you. Page 18 of 82 NOTES Workbook Exercise: Understanding Blogging in General Test your knowledge about blogs by answering the following questions. Write your answers in the spaces below each question. If you find you don’t know the answer, go back into the previous pages and see if you can find the answer. 1. What is the one primary defining characteristic of a blog compared to a non-blog website? 2. What is the name of an article you write on a blog? Page 19 of 82 NOTES 3. What is the difference between a category and a tag? 4. What are blog archives? 5. What is a blogroll? Page 20 of 82 NOTES Step 2: Know the Benefits of Blogging for Business Blogging offers some compelling advantages for business. If it didn’t, nobody else would be doing it. But every day, more and more businesses have blogs. Here are some of the benefits: • Attracts new customers from new demographics than your company has previously serviced. People who read blogs generally spend more money online than people who don’t. Helps you answer the question: where are my next generation of customers coming from? • Provides your existing customers with a new window through which to see you–and through which you can see them, via visitor statistics and/or comments. • Provides an additional tool alongside more traditional marketing methods such as press releases, and yet also lets you bypass traditional news media so that you can speak in your own voice directly to your audience. • Increases your company’s presence and placement in search results. Blogs constantly churn out new content full of keywords your potential customers will using to search online for products and services related to your company. • Puts a human face on an abstract entity such as a company. Page 21 of 82 NOTES • • Provides your company with the best possible crisis communications channel available. Less expensive and more effective than traditional methods of marketing and public relations. Why You Should Have a Blog Why should you have a blog? Because everybody else does, and you want to be cool, right? Just kidding. Many more people are blogging now than ever before, because there are real benefits to blogging. By this time, the benefits of having a website are undeniable. As a platform for websites, blogs magnify those benefits tremendously, delivering on them better than a non-blog website can. How? Better search engine optimization, better communications with your customers, better marketing all around, and better positioning and branding for you in the marketplace. Blogs are Easy A major advantage blogs have over other forms of website is that they are so easy to work with! I’ve seen a few other Content Management Systems (CMSs) Page 22 of 82 NOTES over the years, and nearly all of them are waaaaaaaay more complicated to work with than Blogger or WordPress (I know there are other blogging systems out there, but these two are the easiest I’ve seen). Blogs aren’t that much harder to work than your email once they’re set up. Write a title, write your post, hit the publish button. Lather, rinse, repeat. The more you want to customize your blog, the more complicated things can get, but blogs are nowhere near the complexity of CMSs like Joomla or Drupal . Blogs are Cheap Bang for your buck, blogs are cheap, cheap, cheap! How cheap? How ’bout free? Blogger and WordPress are both free, as are many other blogging platforms. Blogger and WordPress offer free hosted versions, and WordPress can be downloaded for free and then installed on your own web server using your own domain name. Domain names for the free hosted blog services are like this: http://yourblogname.blogservicename.com which isn’t as desirable as: http://yourblogname.com Domain names and web hosting are dirt cheap, anymore (often only a few dollars a month). The cost of entry is very, very low. Joomla and Drupal are free, but their complexity is often beyond the skills and experience of a beginner. If you need to hire help for your site, it can get expensive. While it’s usually better to host your own blog, if you are on the absolute tightest of budgets, then it might make you feel better to know that even though self-hosted blogs are preferable, there are plenty of great Page 23 of 82 NOTES blogs that are hosted on free services. Both Blogger and WordPress feature them prominently. I’m not presuming what kind of endeavor you’re engaged in that’s causing you to consider blogging, but if you’re running a business, you should host your own blog and not use a free service. You need a professional image and you need control over your site. Choice of Designs There is an incredible selection of freely available WordPress themes to choose from when deciding on a blog’s appearance. There also are themes that cost money. Custom WordPress themes can be purchased at very fair prices. The sheer magnitude of themes available out there just numbs the mind! There are thousands of them. Blogs are Easily Extensible Plugins, widgets, or gadgets… whatever you want to call ‘em, you can extend or add extra functionality to your blog, often quite easily. Many blogs use plugins, such as the bookmark/email post feature at the bottom of each post, or the listing of recent comments in the sidebar. The contact form on my blog is powered by a plugin. Your ability to subscribe to follow-up comments via email when you leave a comment is also powered by a plugin. There are plugins doing things that you can’t see, such as helping my posts and pages Page 24 of 82 NOTES be more search optimized and fight spam comments. Nearly all such extending functions are freely available. If you’re not a programmer, you could never hope to have functionality like this in non-dynamic website. There are free scripts for sites other than blogs, but the enormous selection and ease of use of plugins or widgets is another factor that makes blogs an ideal choice as a website platform. Extensibility makes your life as a content producer easier and more fruitful. Wealth of Help and Resources In addition to the official help documentation for WordPress or Blogger, you will find that bloggers like to help each other, and that there is a wealth of information in hundreds of well-written blogs. Sites that use other CMSs are often about subjects or commercial interests that aren’t as helpful to a blogger. There are strong communities around these other platforms, but help is more likely to be found in diverse discussion forums rather than blogs. Better Search Findability There is much about a website’s design that can either help or hinder that website’s search findability. Web designers must also be search engine optimizers at the design level. Optimizing your website so that it ranks higher in search results is known as search engine optimization, or SEO. The biggest Page 25 of 82 NOTES factor in better SEO is better content—content that is naturally full of the same keywords that people would use to search online for related information. A blog about a single subject or niche is regularly pumping out new content that contains keywords, and that’s good for search ranking. There are a variety of add-ons or plugins for some blog platforms (WordPress, especially) that will help your SEO considerably, and there are some WordPress themes which have been carefully designed for better SEO. Blogs Encourage Interaction One of the primary features of blogs that sets them apart from other platforms is commenting. Blog comments are nowhere near as complex as a discussion forum. Readers can leave comments at the end of blog posts and pages. Often they respond to each other as well as to the post content. As the blog author, you can participate in and help foster the discussion. What if You Already Have a Website? Do you have to scrap your existing website in order to have a blog? Certainly not! You can integrate your blog into your existing website with either Blogger or WordPress (not the free hosted version of WordPress at wordpress.com, but the version you must install on your own server at wordpress.org). But here’s something to consider: why not bring the ease of blogging to your entire Page 26 of 82 NOTES website? WordPress, for example, specifically lets you create pages. A particular page can be set as the site’s home page. It’s just as easy to create and edit pages in WordPress as it is to create and edit posts. In most WordPress themes, adding a new page automatically adds links to that page in the theme’s navigation. If it’s been a while since you last redesigned your website, you might want to freshen things up a bit by using WordPress as the CMS for your entire site. Page 27 of 82 NOTES Exercise: The Benefits of Business Blogging Answer the questions in the spaces provided below. 1. What do you feel is the most compelling benefit to having a business blog? 2. Which benefit listed above are you the most skeptical about, and why? Page 28 of 82 NOTES Step 3: Understand Who You’re Blogging For If there’s one common mistake people make when they’re starting a new business and a new blog, it’s that they don’t have a clear understanding of who their market really is. It’s a mistake to assume that your clients or customers are going to be people like yourself. And if they’re not like you, how can you know what they want or need? Your Ideal Customer You can create a portrait of your idea customer. Your ideal customer will have certain traits that will make her or him predisposed to do business with you. You can put together a list of details about your ideal customer, such as: • • • • • • • Median age Median income Education level Political views Marital status Number of children Rent or own home Page 29 of 82 NOTES • • • • • • • Employed or self-employed (or even perhaps unemployed) Sex (majority are male or female) Computer/internet usage Operating system Monitor size/resolution Web browser Location Of course, these are “nothing more” than marketing demographics and technographics, but have you sat down to figure out what kind of person you’re looking for as your customer/blog reader? The answer is not “everybody.” The world is too big and you won’t reach anybody trying to be all things to all to people. Let’s take it a step further. Consider the following points and questions: • In one word, name this person’s strongest desire. It may one of the following: Achievement Page 30 of 82 NOTES Belonging Efficiency Productivity Reach Safety Savings • What does this person most fear? Being a copycat Being attacked Being ignored Being outmaneuvered Being undersold Disapproval Falling behind Losing customers Operating in the red Page 31 of 82 NOTES Rejection These represent only a starting point. You can delve quite deeply into this subject by studying things such as census data, internet demographics studies, personas, and the like. Quick searches online will reveal an abundance of information on these subjects. The point is, you need to know who you want to talk to. Note that I did not say that you need to know who you are talking to—I said you need to know who you want to talk to. Why Bother? Why should you do all of this? Because if you waste all your time and money focusing on the wrong people, your business will fail. The wrong people will not buy from you. They might read your blog, but they won’t become customers. If you hone and craft your blog’s content to your ideal customer, your blog will not appeal to anyone but people who match your description of the ideal customer. Others will find the content of the blog does not appeal to them, and they will leave. And that’s good, because they weren’t going to buy anything, anyway. Page 32 of 82 NOTES Exercise: Create a Portrait of Your Ideal Customer Using the points above as a framework, draft a short written document that is a portrait of your ideal customer. Page 33 of 82 NOTES Step 4: Determine the Purpose and Goals of Your Business Blog One way in which business blogs are unlike personal blogs is that they’re not… well, personal. They are personable, but they’re not personal like a diary is personal. Business blogs need to fulfill a business purpose. Or, if you turn it around to face the customer: a business blog should meet customer needs. A business has a purpose beyond just earning money. Earning money is simply the result of a business fulfilling its greater purpose. A business blog helps the business fulfill its greater purpose. Hammering out the purpose of a business blog is one of the most important early steps in the process of starting a business blog. Purpose The purpose of a business blog should be summed up in one simple statement. For example, the purpose of my Remarkablogger blog is to get consulting clients. If I sold products, the purpose of my blog might be to help me sell more products and increase customer loyalty and satisfaction regarding those products. Page 34 of 82 NOTES Goals Goals are what you need to accomplish in order to fulfill your blog’s purpose. To help you choose a direction, I’ve listed some non-mutually exclusive overarching goals a business blog can strive towards: • • • • • Convey company news and events. Demonstrate knowledge, expertise, passion, and authority in a niche or industry. Provide helpful tips and info on getting the most from company services or products. Pass along success stories from customers about how your business has helped them become more successful. Dominate a niche or industry in search results (hence market and mind share) by becoming the authoritative source for information on a subject and using good SEO. • Become a resource for the media and cottage industry about your business’ market, elevating your business’ position and brand. When I speak of a business blog, I’m not specifying any size of business. What I’ve written above could just as easily apply to a business of one as to a Fortune 500 company. Page 35 of 82 NOTES The points above can be combined in any way: all of them or some of them can be the goals of a business blog. The first one alone would make me and everyone else yawn as we reached for the back button. They aren’t exhaustive, either. Exercise: Determine the Purpose and Goals of Your Business Blog Write your business blog’s purpose: List the goals your business blog needs to meet in order to fulfill its purpose: Page 36 of 82 NOTES Step 5: Determine the Authors of your Business Blog With personal blogs, an author can choose to go it alone or join with others as a group blog. The choice is up to the author. With business blogs, there are also many possibilities, ranging from a single author to a team. Business bloggers are not necessarily company employees, who often already have plenty to do without adding blogging responsibilities. Below is a list of some business blog authorship possibilities: • Single company person, who becomes the public voice of the company. This person must be chosen with care, as they will essentially become the spokesperson for the company. Choose someone who is a people person, who is articulate, who can write well, and who can act as a bridge between customers and the company. This person can be a company leader (such as GM’s Bob Lutz) or a more front line individual (such as Robert Scoble was for many years at Microsoft). • Multiple company employees, who share a common general company blog or who can author multiple company blogs according to the company’s different service and product groups. • Ghostwriters, who do not work at the company, but blog for the company on the company’s blog. The word ghostwriter may have negative connotations for some people, but there are many professional Page 37 of 82 NOTES ghostwriters who do excellent work. There is nothing wrong with hiring ghostwriters to help busy high-level executives blog. You don’t have to hide it, but you don’t have to draw undue attention to it, either. A plain-language disclaimer page is all that’s needed. The whole point behind ghostwriters is that they don’t take direct credit and are unknown. Which option is best depends on the size of your company and whether or not company people have the skills or time to blog. There’s no reason why the second and third options couldn’t both be employed. You can always begin with just one person and grow from there as needed. Choose the Willing Only choose people who are already blogging on their own or who really want to do it. The unwilling and skeptical will make for lousy bloggers, and will harm the company’s image, not enhance it. Get Samples Ask for writing samples from your prospective bloggers. This applies to employees just as much as it does to ghostwriters. Don’t choose someone who sounds like a commercial or a lawyer. Choose someone whose writing sounds Page 38 of 82 NOTES like they’re carrying on a conversation with another human being, like they’re just being neighborly. Exercise: Choosing Authors for a Business Blog Answer the questions below in the spaces provided. 1. Who will be the author(s) of your blog, and why? 2. Would you consider hiring a ghostwriter? Why or why not? Page 39 of 82 NOTES Step 6: Determine the Business Blog’s Policies For a business of more than one person with a blog or multiple blogs, having clear blogging policies and procedures is essential. And when I say “clear,” I mean: plain English that anyone can understand, not “clearly this was written by lawyers and you have no hope of understanding it.” If you’re going to join the blogosphere, don’t go writing something that sounds like a contract from the 1700s. Business Blog Policies should: • • • Clearly state what the blog topics are to be. Clearly state what is unacceptable or out-of-bounds. Clearly state what should be done if there is any doubt whether or not a topic is acceptable (most of you might take that to automatically mean don’t publish it, but that may not be the best thing to do–risk does have its rewards, after all). • • • • Provide a mechanism for review and approval of gray area topics. State expectations for posting frequency and length. Explain the business blog’s commenting or no-commenting policy. Clearly outline the bloggers’ authority, capacity, and procedures for customer service issues that may arise through the blog if the blog allows comments. Page 40 of 82 NOTES • List what company resources the blogger has at her disposal (information, images, printers, computer, and audio/video equipment, etc.) and what, if anything, can be expensed. • Outline what should happen if bloggers temporarily cannot fulfill their obligations: who they should contact and what will be done (skip posts or employ a guest blogger, etc.). • For ghostwriters or professional company bloggers, explain the pay package and payment schedule. As you can see, there is more to this than you might first think. Many business decision-makers are coming to understand the power and benefits of blogging, but are afraid of the risks. I think the benefits far outweigh the risks, and so far the experiences of real businesses that are blogging are bearing this out 1 . Use the framework above to draft some common-sense business blog policies. The above are policy points for company blogs–not for employees’ personal blogs. 1 Businesses such as Microsoft, Dell, and Google all have blogs. Businesses not in the computer/internet/software tech industries that have blogs include GM, McDonald’s, and Stonyfield Farms. Page 41 of 82 NOTES Exercise: Draft a Company Blogging Policy Using the guidelines above, write a company blogging policy in a word processor. Step 7: Determine Blog Platform and Blog / Website Integration For a business, deciding to blog opens the doorway to many possibilities and questions. Some of these possibilities mean taking a hard look at the way things have been done in the past, with an eye towards doing things in a new way that better serve the company’s future. There are several business website configurations, and your business site will likely conform to one of these: • • • • Single domain, static site Multiple domains or subdomains, static sites Single domain, dynamic site Multiple domains or subdomains, dynamic sites all on the same platform Page 42 of 82 NOTES • Multiple domains or subdomains, dynamic sites all on different platforms Domains are the website address names, such as yourcompany.com. Subdomains are a way to have multiple sites on a single address, such as finances.yourcompany.com or products.yourcompany.com. Static sites are comprised of web pages written only in HTML (hypertext markup language) by a person, page by page. This is how all websites were once created, and many are still static sites. Dynamic sites store all their content in a database. Software on the web server called a content management system (CMS) puts the content together as HTML and sends the dynamically generated web page to a visitor’s web browser. Company employees can add and modify website content using the CMS with little to no technical skills. Most new websites created now are dynamic. Blogs are the dynamic type of website. Blog Platforms There are a great many blogging platforms. By “platform,” I mean any kind of software or service, regardless of where that software is located (your Page 43 of 82 NOTES company’s servers or hosted by a third party). However, there are really only a few that you would want to go with. This is due to their capabilities and their widespread support by extensive, knowledgeable communities. It’s important to go with a winner in business blogging just as in many other endeavors, so that your company blog is taken seriously. They are: • • • • WordPress TypePad Moveable Type Blogging add-ins for other CMS’s, such as Drupal or Joomla. Some of these are native to the CMS, others allow for integration of WordPress or TypePad blogs into the site. What if You Already have a Website? Another issue to consider when starting a business blog is what do with the existing site. Here are your choices: • Create a blog as an entirely separate site on its own domain. This allows you to have a different look for the blog compared to the main business site. If the blog doesn’t work out, you can easily “cut it off” since it never was deeply intertwined with the main site. Disadvantages are that your online presence just got a split personality Page 44 of 82 NOTES which may confuse some customers, and you still have to figure out a way to link to the blog from the main site. • Create a blog as a subdomain or directory of the existing site. This shows a greater dedication to blogging, which your blog-savvy customers will appreciate. You’ll have to get the blog and the main site to play nice with each other, though. You’ll want visual consistency between the blog and the main site. You’ll have to figure out how to add links to the blog from the main site where appropriate without making it look like you duct-taped your site. This is a common option, and for good reason: it makes sense from all points of view, from blogger, to company, to visitor. • Replace your current site with the blog’s CMS. This option gives you the chance to do that redesign of the old site that probably needed to be done, anyway (hey, it’s not 2001, anymore). The WordPress blog system, in particular, makes an excellent content management system. You don’t even have to have the blog on the home page, if that’s your preference. The win-win in this situation is that not only did you get blogging, but your company’s entire website just got insanely easier to manage. There’s even a secret bonus for doing this: with only a few tweaks, your new WordPress-powered site will probably be far more optimized for search engines than your old site was before. Page 45 of 82 NOTES As you can probably tell, I’m strongly in favor of the last option. The people behind WordPress have plans to continue ah… pressing forward (sorry!) with WordPress’ CMS capabilities, making it even more powerful in future releases. Exercise: Working Through Blog/Site Platform/Integration 1. Who would you consult with in order to decide what blog platform to use and how to deal with your current website? 2. What are this person’s qualifications for dealing with blogs? Page 46 of 82 NOTES Step 8: Design Considerations One aspect of personal blogging that doesn’t translate into business blogging is blog design. Personal blogs are like kitchen junk drawers, overflowing with widgets, advertising, blogrolls 2 , shoutboxes 3 , music lists, phases of the moon, and all other kinds of junk. It’s one of the things that makes personal blogging personal, but nearly all of these things have no business being on a business blog. There is still a large percentage of the general population who may be your customers that do not know what a blog is when they see it. People tend to ignore that which they don’t understand. Leave out all those blog-specific items and focus on the content and fulfilling the purpose of the blog. All you generally need are the following: • • Subscription tools for visitors, both RSS and Email, with the email more visible and prominent than RSS. Categories 2 A blogroll is a list of links to other blogs the blog author likes or reads regularly. A shoutbox is a small box on a web page in which visitors can type short public messages 3 (“shouts” or “shout outs”) that appear in a running list of messages in the box. Page 47 of 82 NOTES • • Archives About or author information Make sure your business blog carries your brand. Do not just get an off-theshelf or free template. That’s not you. It’s somebody else. Have your blog theme or template professionally designed, or for goodness’ sake at least customize a free theme enough to “make it yours.” If you’re redesigning your entire site to use the blog CMS, have your theme professionally designed. A WordPress custom theme design doesn’t cost any less than any other professional web design. Expect to pay well over $1,000 for a good one. There are plenty of good designers out there. Some final tips: • • • Pay for a good stock photography and let your blogger(s) use it to add visual interest to posts. Make sure your blog looks great in all common browsers: Internet Explorer 6 and 7, Firefox, and Safari for the Mac. If you’re going to really use it as a blog, and not just as a light CMS, make it clear that it’s a blog. Use the word “blog” or “weblog” prominently at the top. Page 48 of 82 NOTES • Consider using non-bloggy terms, like “permanent link” instead of “permalink 4 ” and “links to this post” instead of “trackbacks 5 .” 4 Permalink is the permanently available hyperlink to dynamically generated content stored in a blog’s database. Because old posts “fall off” the home page of a blog and go into the archives, a term that communicated the idea of an unchanging link to a post had to be created, thus permalink was born. When a post enters the archives, the permalink for it will still work. 5 Trackback is when another blogger links to one of your posts or cites one of your posts as the inspiration for their post. Trackback links to these posts often appear along with comments in a blog. Page 49 of 82 NOTES Exercise: Deciding Factors for Blog Design 1. Is your current web designer knowledgeable and experienced in designing blogs? 2. How web-savvy do you consider your customers and audience? How do you know? If you don’t know, how will you find out? Page 50 of 82 NOTES Step 9: Choose Blog Categories and Tags Categories Nearly all blogs have categories and/or tags as a means of organizing and classifying blog content. Categories are high-level general classifications of your blog’s content. Business blogs should have categories, and at some point, you’ll need to decide what they are. Most business blogs seem to divide their content into the following general categories: • • • • Company news and announcements Tips or information on specific product/service lines, with one category for each particular product or service Customer success stories Relevant industry news and opinion A business blog doesn’t need a lot of categories. Even for specific products or services, you only would want categories for the ones that warrant it. When you see what kind of traffic and comment activity your blog gets for certain categories, you will have a greater understanding of how your business is perceived. You can leverage your knowledge of that perception in the market to strengthen and build on your position. Page 51 of 82 NOTES Another reason to keep your initial list of categories small is to give it room to grow over time. Significant events (for good or ill) may occur in the future and might warrant their own categories. New products and services will go online and might need their own categories. You really shouldn’t remove any categories, but if you have to, make sure to have your web people redirect the old addresses to relevant new ones. It’s very likely you’ll add some new categories down the road. Tags Tags are a more recent method for labeling blog posts. Tags are more specific and granular than categories. One of the primary tenets of book The Cluetrain Manifesto is that hyperlinks subvert hierarchies. It’s true: in physical media a hierarchical system is critical to finding what you want in the material. But on the internet, where everything is only a click or a search away, hierarchies are less valuable. In fact, with tags, things can be quite disorganized and messy, and people can still find what they need. You can think of categories as quasi-hierarchical, but tags are “bottom up” rather than “top down”. That doesn’t mean you should put any forethought into tags on your blog. Because every tag is a hyperlink to the other posts with the same tag, each tag acts like a little doorway to grouped information Page 52 of 82 NOTES An Example of Categories and Tags Say you’re an organization coach – you help people organize their workspaces, their homes, and their lives. Your primary web vehicle is your blog. On your blog you write a post called “Top Ten Tips for Keeping Your Desk Clean”. In the post, you write about not having a “tickler” file allows for things to pile up on your desk. You also mention that not making immediate decisions leads to clutter, so you describe a fast way to make a decision about any thing you put on your desk. You have a blog category called Office Organization, so you assign the post to that category. That’s a broadly defined bucket to put the post in. But for tags, any or all of the following could apply: • • • • • • Top ten Tips Procrastination Tickler file Decision-making Reducing clutter If, on your organization blog, you have written about tickler files before and tagged those posts in which tickler files are mentioned with the tag “tickler Page 53 of 82 NOTES file”, a reader who hasn’t heard of a tickler file before can click on the tag, see the other posts with the same tag, and learn more about tickler files. Step 10: Write the Initial Content Conventional Wisdom It’s been given out as good advice that a blog should have something more than a few measly posts for people to read if you’re going to make a big production out of announcing the blog’s existence. If you’re not going to make a big noise about starting a blog, then this isn’t as crucial. But if you’re an established business with a bit of longevity and presence in the market, then when you announce the launch of your blog, the standard good advice really is pretty good: there had better be something to read. Many companies have one foot in the old-school world of business management, and the other foot is testing the waters of technological empowerment and its consequences. A good old-fashioned press release can drive an initial surge of traffic to the new blog, so there had better be something of substance there to create a good first impression. Page 54 of 82 NOTES What are you going to offer your new readers that will impress them and convert them into RSS subscribers and long-term readers? Many other great bloggers have written plenty of excellent material on creating initial content for a blog. Yaro Starak calls it pillar articles, Chris Garrett calls it flagship content. Whatever you want to call it, it needs to be written before the blog launches. How Much Initial Content? How much initial content should your blog have? There’s no single answer to this. There’s no formula you can apply. But you can answer a question for yourself: when you visit a blog and see there’s hardly any posts older than a month, what’s your gut reaction about the blog? It depends! Some blogs (like Skelliewag) didn’t have much content when starting but what was there was great and the newborn status of the blog didn’t matter. But think about how much content you’d want to see at a blog before you would ever consider trusting it or subscribing to it. My own personal threshold for this sort of thing is usually more than a couple months, but compelling content can make for an exception. Page 55 of 82 NOTES Should You Backdate Your Initial Content? In blogging software, it’s a simple matter to give your posts date/time stamps from earlier than when they were written and posted. Some bloggers are tempted to backdate posts on a new blog to give the appearance of longevity. Don’t do it. You cannot fool people by backdating your content. This sort of thing can easily be exposed on the internet, so don’t even think about it. You will be found out. And then what kind of business relationships is that going to make for? Instead, do a soft launch. A soft launch is when you make the blog public and you begin posting, but you don’t blare the trumpets from the mountaintops about it. Some of your customers might naturally discover the blog before you’ve launched it officially. That’s fine, think of these people as allies to help you get started. Recruit them. Write them personal emails thanking them for any feedback they might care to give. Once you’ve built up some material then you show yourself to the world officially. Exercise: Draft Initial Content Ideas Here are some initial content ideas to help you get started. Use some or all of these as a basis for creating the initial content for your blog: • Why we’re starting this blog Page 56 of 82 NOTES • • • • • Write the About page The number one piece of advice you can give to your customers Tips for getting the most out of your products/services What customers should do if there is a problem with a product/service Convey the vision of your company: what problems are you solving, and how? (Write it like a manifesto) • • • • A list of links to frequently searched-for pages on the main website Industry news, but with your spin on it Why people need a (your product or service) What to watch out for in a (product or service in your industry, use this type of post to differentiate your product or service) • • Where the company’s going in the future (heh... you had better know!) Little-known killer uses for your product/service You get the idea. The list above should give some ideas on how to get started. Even if you don’t have a blog, yet, you can fire up the ol’ word processor and start writing. Page 57 of 82 NOTES Step 11: Draft a Comment Policy To Comment or Not to Comment One of the most hand-wringing decisions a company has to make if it’s going to blog is how to handle comments. The thought of random people (some of whom are trolls and idiots) or even the competition showing up and leaving comments gives c-level types and lawyers hives. The first decision is whether to allow comments at all. There are many reasons not to, but absolutely none of them are as strong as the reasons why you should allow comments. Yes, there will be idiots who leave dumb comments. There will be trolls (people who deliberately leave nasty comments to incite you). There may be spies from your competitors. There will be unhappy customers. Problems are Opportunities None of these are reasons not to allow comments. Every one of them is an opportunity to show the world what great stuff your company is made of. Every customer service problem is an opportunity to prove yourself and cement your relationship with that customer further, which will cause positive word-of-mouth and lead to increased sales and loyalty. I know that there are some customers who will never be satisfied, no matter what, and they are a Page 58 of 82 NOTES drain on your time and resources. Those customers should be “fired.” But for the most part, problems are opportunities to impress. And if you don’t believe that, then hang up your hat and go home, because you have no business being in business. Comments and Blogging Go Together My take is that if you’re going to blog, then you’re going to allow comments. Otherwise, don’t blog. Comments are a large part of what makes blogging special and appealing. Many companies have bravely entered the blogosphere allowing comments and reaped the benefits. Having comments shows you are listening. It shows that you care. And if you are smart, you will indeed listen and care and take some of those comments right to the bank in the form of fantastic suggestions and information that you would never get any other way. If anything, it is the lack of communication which has ruined reputations and sunk sales. Craft a Comment Policy But you’re going to need a comment policy. A comment policy informs your blog’s readers what is acceptable in comments and what is not. Comments which do not abide by the policy are to be rejected, and those that do–even if you don’t like what the commenter says–should be allowed. Page 59 of 82 NOTES You absolutely must allow people to say negative things about your company and/or its products! If you don’t, nobody will trust you. And customer trust is your most valuable asset. Trust is one of the main forms of currency on the internet (attention is the other). Only allowing pleasant and praising comments or no comments at all kills trust in a business. What does a comment policy look like? You can use the one below as an example: Comment Policy All comments are moderated 6 . Comments will be rejected for the following: • • • • • Spam Blatant self-promotion Contains foul language, inappropriate sexual content, or hate speech Not relevant to the subject of the blog post Contains excessive links 6 Moderated means that comments are held until they can be reviewed by a blogger and approved or rejected. Page 60 of 82 NOTES • Is a customer service request or a question about your bill While you are welcome and encouraged to comment on the blog and we value your participation, this blog is not a customer service center. We have avenues for customer service issues and billing. You can check out the FAQ or go to our help site for customer service issues. Note that the above sample comment policy states that comments are moderated. Moderated comments do not appear on the blog until someone approves them. This gives you an opportunity to screen comments for violations of your policy before they appear on the blog. The usual points about spam, hate speech, and self-promotion are included in the policy. The last point about customer service and billing requests/issues is something that is specific to a business blog. If your company already has service and billing methods in place, then you don’t want the blog to be used for those purposes. If you’re going to blog, you had better have decent customer service available and easy billing resolution (see how blogging helps everything?). Page 61 of 82 NOTES Step 12: Develop a Crisis Management Plan Sooner or later, your company will experience a crisis. It could be a customer service crisis. It could be a financial crisis. It could be a natural disaster in your region. Whatever it is, tell me: where will people go in order to learn what’s going on? That’s right: your website. And what will they see when they arrive at your website, hoping for the latest information freshly posted only minutes ago just like they get on so many other websites? A company blog is probably the best crisis management tool you will ever have. During any kind of crisis, people will eagerly wait for every post that updates them on the situation. Stony silence and traditional communications channels are going to hurt you. Big time. Dell learned this the hard way when they started handing out grenades cleverly disguised as latptop batteries. Kryptonite bike locks learned this the hard way when it was discovered that their locks could be compromised with a simple ball point pen, and video of it spread across the internet. Kryptonite’s response was to shove its collective head further into the sand. Their reputation was ruined, not by their badly designed bike locks, but by the way they so poorly handled the crisis. Page 62 of 82 NOTES If a Crisis Hits Before You Have a Blog Even if your company has never had a blog before, if a crisis hits, whip through the decisions I’m going to outline below and set up a blog immediately. Put a big fat link to it from your home page. Manage the crisis through to the end, and then you can figure out what to do with the blog and your site. Creating a Blog Crisis Management Plan • Decide who is going to do the crisis blogging. If your company has multiple bloggers, but you want only one voice to be the official source during the crisis, then have the other bloggers link to the main source of crisis information and then defer to that source. If you want your multiple bloggers to cover the crisis, then make sure they have access to information so that nobody is posting at cross-purposes with each other or with the company. Set up a central information hub for your bloggers through email or RSS. • Decide what you’re going to say and, just as importantly, what you’re not going to say. Normally, I’m adverse to bringing lawyers into anything about blogging, but in a crisis you may want their advice. That doesn’t mean it will be any good or that you have to follow it. Especially if their advice will Page 63 of 82 NOTES cause you to lose customers and create an even worse public relations nightmare. If they tell you not to say anything at all, get new lawyers who understand the internet and the new rules. The most important thing is to talk to people through your blog like you are a human being and your audience members are, too. If someone pushes you to speak to something you’ve decided not talk about, be polite but firm and ask for their understanding and patience. • Decide whether you’re going to allow comments during the crisis. If you really get blogging, you will of course allow comments on your company blog. Depending on the nature of the crisis situation, you may want to temporarily turn off commenting. There may be perfectly good reasons to do so, time and manpower being two of them. However, you will be missing out on the greatest opportunity to really show your customers how awesome you can be by how you respond to and handle comments on crisis blog posts. When the shit hits the fan is your biggest chance to impress, to win people over, to win them for life. I suggest you take that chance. • Use traditional media to your advantage. Inform your traditional media contacts that crisis information will be available from the blog, and that they can treat each post as a press release. Page 64 of 82 NOTES • Make sure your web servers can handle the traffic surge. You may not have had all that much traffic before, but a crisis can send a tsunami of traffic that will crash your web servers in no time flat. Make sure you’re prepared: upgrade your hosting service or your own equipment if you maintain in-house. If you pay for hosting, contact your hosting representative immediately when the crisis starts and let them know they’ll need to be able to handle a spike. If you think all of this sounds overly serious, I have one word for you: Mattel. Here is their recall page. What a bunch of corporate crap. Don’t you feel safer already for your kids? Me neither. Can you imagine how powerful a blog would be for this? How it could win people’s trust back even stronger than before? Apparently, Mattel can’t. Exercise: Draft a Crisis Management Plan Write your business blog’s crisis management plan according the guidelines above. Doing this often forces people to think about things they don’t want to. Ride the discomfort—it won’t last long. Most importantly, resist the urge to write a crisis management plan that locks down communications. It may seem counterintuitive, but open communications during a crisis are your friend, and silence is your enemy. Page 65 of 82 NOTES You Have a Blog. Congratulations. Now What? You’ve followed the 11-step plan (there were originally going to be 12 steps, but that too much like quitting something, not starting!). Now you have a blog with some initial core content. What next? Posting Frequency You or your bloggers keep writing. Keep blogging. If you have hired professional bloggers, you should expect them to post as often as your contract with them specifies. If you and/or a few compatriots are doing that particular bit of heavy lifting yourselves, posting every day may not be possible. A big team blog can offer quantity and quality, but a small one can usually only offer one or the other. Go for quality. The stronger the offline component of your business is, the less frequently you need to post. You could get away with once a week, if necessary, but three times a week would be much better. The stronger the online component of your business is, the more frequently you need to post. It’s best if you can post every day. Page 66 of 82 NOTES Future Publishing Some blogging platforms (such as WordPress) offer the ability to write a post and publish it at a predetermined date and time in the future. This way, you can publish on weekends, holidays, or even during the blogger’s vacation. If your blog relies heavily on current events and timely news, this isn’t an option you’ll be using much. What the Heck Do I Blog About? This is so important it gets a whole section, which just so happens to be the next section, so please, keep reading... Page 67 of 82 NOTES The 10 Types of Freelance/Business Blog Posts Business blog posts generally fall into one of 10 types. When you’re trying to write for your business blog and you feel a little stuck (or if you’re new to business blogging), you can just pick one of these 10 types of business blog posts to use as a guide. 1. Customer success stories One of the most powerful types of posts you can write for a business blog is the customer success story, because it sells without the “hard” sell. As far as other people are concerned, you are in business to help them. In fact, you could go as far as to say that your business helps others do their business faster, better, or cheaper. So you want to tell stories about how your business has helped others do their business faster, better, or cheaper than without you. 2. Product or service tips and tutorials Keep your customers informed with your blog. Chances are, you and others in your company are the foremost experts on your own products or services. You Page 68 of 82 NOTES want your customers to be loyal, informed, and prone to brag about you. Keeping them educated with constant tutorials and tips helps you do that. It also helps you create scenarios in which customer success stories can happen. Microsoft has become very good at this, lately. 3. Upcoming products or services information Use your business blog to provide your readers with sneak previews, teasers, beta invites, focus group/survey invites, and other buzz-builders. Customers who frequent your blog — especially those who frequently comment — may very well be early adopters of your company’s products or services. These are people whom Seth Godin calls “sneezers”. They are the ones who can do word of mouth marketing without even being asked to. They spread your “ideavirus” to others. Providing some information on upcoming products and services makes your business blog a place of excitement and anticipation. It helps reward loyalty and spread your marketing message and brand at the same time. Again, we can look to Microsoft as an example. Before Office 2007 was publicly available, it was available as a beta (test) version. Office 2007 developers at Microsoft previewed the new interface and new functionality, which helped to build buzz about Office 2007 before it was released. Page 69 of 82 NOTES 4. Request feedback from customers Your business blog is a much better avenue than surveys and focus groups for getting feedback. Why? Precisely because of the reasons most people would say “no way” to such an idea: it’s messy and impossible to graph. You can use blog polling services or plugins to provide some graph-able structure to the feedback, but likely your most valuable insights will come from comments to the post. People who feel strongly enough to take the time to leave a comment (good or bad) are a precious resource for your business, because it costs nothing to get what may be the most intelligent, valuable feedback you can have. 5. News and announcements Reporting news and announcements is often the first type of business blog post that comes to most people’s minds, and that’s why I deliberately did not place it high on the list. I wanted to you get some exposure to other post ideas and get you thinking about them. 6. Industry news Position yourself as a leader in your industry by relating industry news to your customers. Tell them why it’s important for them to know this, how it affects Page 70 of 82 NOTES them. Your customers want to know that you are aware of the big picture and that you’re looking out for them. That helps reinforce the notion that they made the right decision by going with your products or services. With type of post, being opinionated is okay, but remember some important points: don’t bash your competition — say nice things about them, and don’t sell in these posts. Objectivity is not possible and most people know this, but trust is. You want your readers to trust you. You need to show modesty and humility and refrain from bragging or selling. 7. What to look for in a… This is a classic educated customer type of post. There’s an old saying: an educated customer is our best customer. In the so-called information age we live in, the better-educated you are about something, the smarter your decisions will be. Educating your customers (as opposed to bombarding them with your unwanted “marketing messages”) puts them in control of a purchase process that engenders confidence by being knowledgeable. If you sold aftermarket performance parts for cars, you can’t sell to someone who doesn’t understand what’s so great about your products unless you can educate them about performance and quality. Don’t go for the hard sell. Educated people sell themselves on your products because you deal with them more as equals who are experts. Page 71 of 82 NOTES 8. What to watch out for from… Used judiciously, this type of business blog post implies that you’re not doing these things — and others might be. Helps to build trust because you’re looking out for your customers. You can only use a post of this type occasionally, because its effect quickly wears off with repetition, and you will look like you’re just fear-mongering. You will see this type of post from someone who sells higher end products and services. For instance, if you sold expensive, custom-built computer workstations, you cold write a post called “What to Watch Out for from Cheap Parts Computer Companies.” 9. Related interests If you sell outdoor gear then you should blog about trips you take. If you sell diapers then you should blog about parenting and your own experiences as a parent. You’re relating to your customers by blogging about related interests you have in common with them. This is a benefit you get when you target a niche demographic rather than just a niche product. 10. Product, service, or process explanations and stories Consumers want to know your process because they want to trust you. They really do, and they will if you give a reason. This is part of the new Page 72 of 82 NOTES transparency and openness in business. Consumers want to know where what they buy comes from and how it’s made. Tell your customers where your materials come from, how things are made, how your service processes are structured. Inform, inform, inform. Educated customers really are the best customers. And yet, you can do a great job with the story and anyone will “see” increased value in the product or service. For example, I could show you a plain spice jar labeled Cinnamon. And I could show you an unusually shaped and designed jar that contained Moroccan cinnamon from a particular region where the soil is the best possible for growing amazing cinnamon and this cinnamon is processed by the same family for generation after generation and blah, blah, blah. Which one would cost more? Nearly everyone would say the second jar would cost more. How do you know the first jar didn’t have the same kind of cinnamon in it? It depends on the story I tell. Now, I am not suggesting for even a moment that you make things up that aren’t true. Think about it this way: if your products or services don’t have any good stories behind them, maybe there’s something else deeply wrong with your business that a blog ain’t gonna fix anyway. But otherwise, a blog is one of the best ways you have to tell the best stories about your products. And here’s what is especially amazing about this: your customers will tell great stories, too, in the form of comments and in some cases even on their own blogs. Page 73 of 82 NOTES The previous 10 types of business blog posts will serve you in good stead for a long time. You can literally just pick one and start writing. It’s a formula for always having something to blog about. But to really make your business blog do what it was designed to do, which is further your business, we need to reframe how business blogging is done in a way that recognizes the differences between business blogging and other kinds of blogging and that serves the needs of a business blogger. To do this, I have coined the term Gateway Blogging. An Introduction to Gateway Blogging Gateway blogging is a term I created that helps to frame business blogging activities so that the blog supports the business, and not the other way around. Those of us who are running small companies, micro-businesses, micro-ISVs 7 , and the like are more likely to have a blog as our main website than larger companies. We understand the importance of blogging generally, but it’s easy to get lost in the minutia and distractions of blogging. We forget that the blog 7 Micro-ISV is a micro independent software vendor, which is a very small company (often only a handful of people at the most) who develop custom software solutions for their clients. Page 74 of 82 NOTES is really the tip of a wedge of paid products or services. Because directly selling or pushing product on the blog is a turn-off, it’s easy to let the indirect nature of blogging lead us away from the purpose of the blog. Your Business Blog is a Gateway So I’ve constructed this analogy: a business blog is the gateway through which customers and future customers enter, enticed by the information, skills for hire, or products/services they see just inside the gate. Once inside the gate, there are more rewards for going deeper beyond the gate. It’s at this point where your sales funnel takes over. Gateway blogs don’t replace sales/conversion funnels. Gateway blogs are the pointed, relationshipbuilding add-on to that process. To learn more, check out our new site, Gateway Blogging. I say “our” because this is a joint venture project between myself and long-time business coach and author Greg Balanko-Dickson. Page 75 of 82 NOTES Glossary Archive When blog posts go below the cutoff threshold for being displayed on the home page (usually 10 posts, but the number can vary) they are automatically placed in the archive. Archives are often grouped by month. Blog A web publishing platform that displays content in reverse chronological order. Blogger One who blogs. Also, a blogging platform owned by Google at http://blogger.com. Blogging Writing on a blog. Can be used as a substitute for the word “writing” when applied to a blog. For example, “I’m blogging about our new product.” Blogosphere The world of blogs and bloggers. For example, commenting is a common occurrence in the blogosphere. Another example: transparency and openness are highly valued in the blogosphere. Another example: the news shot across the blogosphere, and was all the buzz. Blogroll A list of links to other blogs a blogger reads or admires. Page 76 of 82 NOTES Category A broad label for the various subjects for a blog’s content. Clicking on a category takes you to a page that collects all the posts assigned to that category. CMS Content Management System. A program on a web server that uses a database to store website content and information. Allows people to create and update website content themselves. Comment A reaction or opinion written by a visitor and reader of a blog, and attached to the post so that all of a post’s comments come after the end of the post. Comments are one of the unique aspects of blogging that makes blogging different than other kinds of websites. Comment moderation Submitted comments are held until they can be reviewed by a blogger and approved or rejected. Comment policy A set of guidelines for what kind of comments on a blog are acceptable and what kind of comments might be disallowed. Comment spam Comments left by software programs or by real humans for purpose of creating links back to sites that have heavy advertising or affiliate sales content which is unrelated to the blog post. Comment troll A person who deliberately attempts to incite anger or a reaction from the blogger in comments. Page 77 of 82 NOTES Database A system to store and organize information (data) electronically on a computer. The most popular database system for blogs is MySQL. Domain Draft A website name, such as remarkablogger.com. A blog post that has been started but which hasn’t been published. Drupal Dynamic site A CMS that is more complex than most blogging platforms. A website whose content is stored in a database and served via a program that converts the data into web pages and sends them to a web browser. Feed reader Software that receives and allows a user to consume information via RSS feeds, such as blog posts and podcasts. Examples of feed readers are: Internet Explorer 7, Firefox, Microsoft Outlook 2007, Google Reader, and Bloglines. Future publishing Setting a blog post to automatically publish at a future date and time. Allows you to write posts in advance. Ghostwriter For blogging, a paid professional blogger who blogs as another person in a company. HTML Hypertext Markup Language is the computer language that web Page 78 of 82 NOTES pages are written in. Joomla Microblog A CMS that is more complex than most blogging platforms. A newer form of blog that features very short posts, often from mobile devices. Microblogging services include Twitter and Pownce. Micro-ISV A micro independent software vendor, which is a very small company (often only a handful of people at the most) who develop custom software solutions for their clients. Money blog A blog about how to make money, usually online via affiliate sales programs, advertising, and internet marketing. MoveableType Niche Permalink A blog software platform. In blogging, a niche is a very specific overall topic for a blog. Combination of the words permanent link. Because blog posts move off the home page and end up in an archive, the only way to link on a blog post in a way that stays correct after time passes is to link to a post’s permalink. Pingback A trackback that is created when a blogger links to another blog’s post. The blogging software does this automatically. What most people call trackbacks are, in fact, pingbacks. Page 79 of 82 NOTES Plugin A small program that extends or enhances the functionality of a WordPress blog. Podcasting A combination of the words iPod and broadcasting. Although podcasting has little to do with Apple’s iPod media player, the name has stuck. Podcasting is a way to make audio or video media available to subscribers. People subscribe using software such as iTunes or Google Reader. Podcasting uses RSS to send updates to subscribers (see the entry on RSS). Post The main unit of content on a blog. The act of making a post available for everyone to read is called posting. Comments are also sometimes said to be posted. Pro blog Blog that makes money through internet advertising sales, paid reviews/posts, or marketing. Problogger Person who earns a living blogging: Pro, as in professional, and blogger. RSS Really Simple Syndication. RSS is a way to send updates to people who subscribe to them using special software that receives RSS updates (called feeds). Google Reader is an example of such software (see the entry for Feed reader). SEO Search Engine Optimization. The practice of designing websites and content to rank better in search results. Page 80 of 82 NOTES Shoutbox A small box on a web page in which visitors can type short public messages (“shouts” or “shout outs”) that appear in a running list of messages in the box. SMO Social Media Optimization. The practice of designing websites to make it easy for people to spread word about content they like through various social media services, such as http://digg.com and http://stumbleupon.com. Soft launch Making a blog publicly available but not announcing it. This gives you a way to build content and get feedback from the small number of initial visitors. Splog A combination of spam and blog. Splogs are automated blogs that make money for their owners via advertising or affiliate sales, and often have stolen (scraped) content from other blogs. Static site Website made up of HTML pages on the server which are delivered to web browsers as they are. Subdomain A way to have multiple sites on a single address, such as finances.yourcompany.com or products.yourcompany.com. Tag Short descriptor for content in a blog post. Clicking on a tag usually shows all posts with the same tag. Tags are similar to categories, but are more granular in detail. Page 81 of 82 NOTES Trackback When another blogger links back to a post on your blog and manually pastes in the URL of your blog post into the trackback field. Transparency A business value growing in popularity, in which full disclosure and a lack of any deception are the rule. TypePad Vlog A blog software service. Learn more at http://typepad.com. Combination of Video and Blog (itself a combination of web and log). Vlogs feature video as their primary form of content, rather than written posts. A person who runs a vlog is a vlogger. Many people don’t like the words vlog or vlogger and prefer video blog instead. Widget A small unit of content that often fetches data from another website. On a WordPress blog, widgets are units of content in the sidebar of the blog that can easily be created and managed via drag and drop. WordPress A blog software platform. Learn more at http://wordpress.org.

Email marketing tips

2009-02-12T11:17:00.013+09:00

Can You Have More Sales, Too?

Helping over 49,000 businesses like yours raise profits and build customer relationships using AWeber's opt-in email marketing software for over 10 years.

Take a Free Test Drive today!

Online Nine Month Education Program

2009-01-10T21:21:00.001+09:00

Do you want to know how YOU can earn royalties from virtual property in seven days or less?

Well, you can!

My friend Christopher Westra is the creator of Royalties University, an online nine month education program that teaches you how to earn royalties.

Learning how you can earn royalties is perhaps the BEST education you can receive. Just imagine the ultimate benefits you get -

You create or obtain a valuable resource ONCE and then you continue selling it over and over again, for years to come!

You can learn how by enrolling at Royalties University

This is the only University in the entire world devoted to perpetual income generation through royalties.

You get 40 weekly lessons that build on one another to guarantee your success.

Experience the FREEDOM Lifestyle with your family.

Beyond just vacations, the freedom lifestyle means you can work on the projects you want to. You can wear what you want and eat when you want.

You can design your own high-energy working environment!

Christopher lives completely off of the royalties from his books and online programs, so he teaches from experience.

Read more fantastic benefits by going to the Royalties University site.

There is a limit on enrollment. He's only taking a manageable number of people into the program.

So I'd encourage you to look into enrolling now so you don't miss out on the opportunity. Just like other Universities, there's a cap on enrollment.

Here's the link to check out Royalties University for yourself.

At the link above there are a few quick stories about some of his friends who earn royalties also.

Some Free Gifts To Kick Off With 2009

2008-12-25T23:35:00.003+09:00

Here is my Forward Steps New Year Card, with my greeting for you all.

What will be accomplished in your life during the next twelve months. Remember, there is no such thing as “failure”; there is only “feedback”. List your 100 achievements over the last 12-months. You will feel so much more invigorated in creating your next year.

As well as writing down my 100 accomplishments for 2008, I recorded the 100 things I will achieve during 2009. Where I most often fall down with that, is the 'staying focused' part. My first port of call will be to create personal environments that consistently remind me of my original purpose and of my intended, ultimate outcomes.

************************

THIS You Do Not Want To Miss!...
It is my personal link for you to get your hands on this amazing
Free Collection Of Self Improvement Gifts!
Just take your pick, from this select assortment of personal growth material. All are terrific new year starters, from which you can choose to your heart's content. :)

************************
Enjoy the break if you are having a spell from work over the next few days, or weeks.

See you again in 2009! :) Plus, remember to Set Your Intentions for the new year ahead, it is the very least you could do for yourself and those who are close to you.

Guy Kawasaki Gives A Reality Check

2008-12-12T14:40:00.002+09:00

One of our favorite business thinkers is Guy Kawasaki. He's been a Silicon Valley insider for a long time and his latest book, Reality Check, doles out tons of great advice for entrepreneurs. Here we sit down with him in his home office to learn all sorts of stuff like why he would rather have Twitter than a cell phone

Sourced from www.fastcompany.tv

Markets Are Conversations

2008-12-06T08:45:00.004+09:00

A powerful global conversation has begun. Through the Internet, people are discovering and inventing new ways to share relevant knowledge with blinding speed. As a direct result, markets are getting smarter—and getting smarter faster than most companies.

These markets are conversations. Their members communicate in language that is natural, open, honest, direct, funny and often shocking. Whether explaining or complaining, joking or serious, the human voice is unmistakably genuine. It can't be faked.

Most corporations, on the other hand, only know how to talk in the soothing, humorless monotone of the mission statement, marketing brochure, and your-call-is-important-to-us busy signal. Same old tone, same old lies. No wonder networked markets have no respect for companies unable or unwilling to speak as they do.

But learning to speak in a human voice is not some trick, nor will corporations convince us they are human with lip service about "listening to customers." They will only sound human when they empower real human beings to speak on their behalf.

Read for yourself The Cluetrain Manifesto: The End of Business as Usual

DocDownload Free Business Templates

2008-12-03T10:34:00.006+09:00

No matter the size of your business, the following is very useful as a resource and something to consider creating for your personal use and for anyone associated with your business venture.

The code of ethics is a set of principles adopted by the company governing "right and wrong conduct" by the company and its directors, shareholders, management and staff. It can be extended to include the expectations of the company regarding "right and wrong conduct" by joint venture partners and contractors and suppliers to the company and maybe a restraint of trade based on moral principles. It can also be extended to include expectation of "right conduct" by customers (which might also include a restraint of trade based on moral principles). It might even extend to expectations of "right conduct" from politicians and members of the public. A code of ethics is backed by morals and moral philosophy. It is important to note that a code of ethics can only be based upon a theory or an agreed way of viewing the world that is used to generate a "system of moral values". Only after the company has agreed on this system of moral values can it generate a set of specific moral choices to be made by a person in particular circumstances or to achieve specific objectives which are included in or are compatible with the mission of the company. If such a system is not used, the choices dictated tend to be arbitrary, moralising, condescending, platitudinous and meaningless in their impact.

A code of ethics is at a very high level. It usually takes the form of a declaration made by the board of directors and made freely available to the public. It differs from the code of practice of a profession or the code of conduct signed off by the director, manager or worker of a company when they take up their employment. The code of practice contains the rules or standards governing the conduct of a member of a profession. It tells you what you must and must not do to remain as a member of the profession or trade; i.e. how you must act if you want to retain your certificate of membership or licence to practice. The code of conduct contains the rules or standards governing the conduct of an employee of a company. The code of conduct tells you how you must act if you want to remain as a member of the company. The practical "code of practice" and "code of conduct" are based on a higher level code of ethics which tells you why it is right to act in this manner.

Read more about this, and download the free templates provided at DocDownload

Adwords Wrapper Tool

2008-11-23T19:05:00.000+09:00

Google AdWords is a quick and simple way to advertise on Google and its ad partners, regardless of your budget. AdWords ads are displayed along with search results on Google, as well as on search and content sites in the growing Google Network, which includes websites like AOL, EarthLink, HowStuffWorks, & Blogger. With searches on Google and page views on the Google Network each day, your Google AdWords ads reach a vast audience.

When you create an AdWords ad to run on Google and its search partners, you can choose keywords for which your ad will appear and specify the maximum amount you’re willing to pay for each click. You pay only when someone clicks on your ad.

Save money and time by using this Adwords Wrapper tool.

University Of Business And Marketing Interviews

2008-11-04T23:36:00.001+09:00

Hard To Find Seminars is the world’s leading free digital audio business library that uses the power of personal interviews and storytelling to capture and relay the advice of world-class business experts.

To help you get the most out of the Hard To Find Seminars site, they've assembled a concise tour to the information resources and assistance available through the site.

Hard To Find Seminars want to make it as easy as possible for you to find what you need. Take a few moments to review the links that appear at their special Hard To Find Seminars Tour plus get your 18 Free Resources You Can Start Using Today. The tour links will take you directly to the resources you are most interested in and are designed to help you use the site to its fullest potential.

Grab your free 117 hours of business audio interviews from the greatest masters of selling, internet marketing, advertising, web site and network marketing from experts like Tom Hopkins, Vic Conant, Michael Senoff, Art Hamel, Bill Bartmann, Jay Conrad Levinson, Mark Joyner, Joe Vitale, Dan Kennedy, Tom Hopkins, and Kevin Hogan.

Update From Blog's Author

2008-10-28T08:59:00.001+09:00

While you wait for me to resume blogging...

I give you these gifts from my other sites:

-ONE-
~ With increased costs and financial uncertainty there are still some great things available for free - please accept this Forward Steps October Birthday Present This gift is time-sensitive and it is something that I WILL NOT be offering to my readers again. True!~

-TWO-
~ If you don't like the look of the cheques that you currently receive, why not write your own? Here is access to your personalized Wealth Attraction Abundance Cheque ~

-THREE-
~ Rather than listening to negative messages thrown at us via mainstream media, and to have a mini-break from all the hype - take some personal time-out for a Daily Meditation ~

If you would like to receive periodical emails from me, then I recommend choosing from one of my varied selections:

A. Triggers is a bumper issue, sent 1st of each month since 2002... (Note: See the first gift at this post)
B. Samples of Triggers are short snippets, sent weekly...
C. Forward Steps Daily are mid-sized & for 1-year only...
D. Power Questions, a power question sent for 52 weeks...
E. Forward Steps Master List, a brief note sent monthly...
F. Online Visible Web, an online tool or gift monthly...

Enjoy a productive week and a relaxing weekend.

Remember to share this post. Spread these gifts by sharing them with a friend, or two. You CAN make a difference, and imagine the impact if every visitor here today shared with just one other! :) Pay it forward...

P.S. Share this message by using an easy Tell-A-Friend

'Elevate 2008' With Joel Comm In Colorado

2008-10-02T17:39:00.005+08:00

The Internet offers opportunity for absolutely anyone who is willing to seize it and build their own online business!

When I want to learn something, I look for people who have gone before me and achieved the kind of success I desire.

Joel Comm is one of those people.

In the 14 years that Joel has done business online, he's made millions of dollars. He sold a site to Yahoo!, wrote dozens of books and reports (including a New York Times Best seller), produced a reality show and build tons of profitable sites.

Now, Joel is inviting a select number of people to join him in Colorado for a one-of-a-kind three-day event unlike any other.

It's called "Elevate 2008", and it is a chance for anyone who wants to build a successful business online to learn from Joel Comm and his team of experts in a hands-on atmosphere.

Honestly, this is an incredible opportunity... BUT...

Joel has informed me that there are fewer than ten (10) seats left for this event! It truly is first-come, first-serve, so I hope you read this blog post on time and are able to take quick action.

Joel is offering this seminar at a fraction of his regular coaching fees...

AND, he is even going to cover the hotel costs for his guests!

If you know that you need to take steps to become financially independent and live your dreams, don't pass this by.

Visit the Elevate 2008 website right away and reserve your seat for Joel Comm's Live Seminar!

To your success,
Thea Westra

P. S. - I expect these remaining seats to fill up fast. I apologize if I didn't get this email to you fast enough.

10 day Free Trial And Special Bonus For Limited Time

2008-09-29T11:37:00.000+08:00

What is this Freedom Lifestyle? Get your ten day free trial below:

Have you ever read the book Pride and Prejudice, or seen the movie? Jane Austen's novels are filled with people who don't have to work for a living. Why don't they work?

The "upper class" in England, France and other countries owned all the land, and received a continuous passive income from the "rent" of the tenants. This is where the word "Royalties" comes from.

Now you can learn how to generate a residual income from property, and it doesn't have to be real estate.

You can also get royalties from books, audios, inventions, movies, and even ideas and processes.

Discover for yourself how to create or obtain valuable intellectual property that you can sell over and over again, yet still own!

Christopher and Josh make it even easier by buying your web domain for you, hosting it for you, and then giving you videos showing you what to do.

See this short video about the freedom lifestyle here.

My friends Christopher and Josh told me I could give a special free offer to all my subscribers. They also are allowing me to pass on a lower membership price for a short time.

I've seen their 100 step program and know personally the value these instructional videos provide.

This special offer will only run from 1 to 10 October 2008, so be sure and take a look so you don't miss out!

Cheers, Thea

P. S. The 100 step program starts from the very basic steps and progresses from there. Even if you've never published on a website before, now is your chance to make residual income from your own product.

Act like royalty and start earning royalties for yourself.
Here's the link one more time.

Christopher said he really wants people to use the free trial. That way, you can watch the videos and start the steps and see if you can make money this way.

If it's not for you, and you want to cancel before the ten day trial is done, then do it. You won't hurt their feelings. In fact, you don't have to even contact them to cancel. You just do it.

See for yourself...

The Uncertainty Syndrome: Entrepreneurial Emergency

2008-09-28T16:28:00.005+08:00

In his record-setting Internet Business Manifesto Teleseminar... Rich Schefren blew away everyone by revealing this one startling fact...

The most successful Internet gurus make the same mistakes that everyone does. They experience the same obstacles. They feel the same pain and self-doubt. They face the same challenges all business owners face.

Only they have all discovered the KEY connection that makes everything you've been doing WORK...

There Is No Reason Why You Can't Have The Success That Gurus Have, By Dealing With The Same Simple Factor.
And it's even easier than you think, because it's just ONE simple factor that's getting between you and the success you deserve.

See, the gurus do NOT know everything, contrary to popular opinion. When it comes down to it, we are all the same. We all make the same mistakes. And we all need a good "kick-in-the-pants" some time to get us over the hump and push us to where we want to be.

And this process isn't difficult, doesn't take a long time (actually it can happen almost instantly), and is not reserved for Internet marketing gurus.

You can follow in their footsteps... and make the same simple discovery they have... when you grab your FREE copy of my newest Internet business report... "The Uncertainty Syndrome"... right now.

You don't have to know everything. You don't need super-powers. But you must know these critical factors for success in the changing world of online business.

Which Is Exactly What You'll Get When You Grab A Copy Of "The Uncertainty Syndrome: Entrepreneurial Emergency"

Start Treating Your Business Like A Real Business Now

2008-09-28T16:22:00.000+08:00

Whether your brand new to making money online... or already have an Internet business, you'll discover the critical keys to building a prosperous business... essential concepts most people miss completely.

And if you're like most people that have devoured "The Manifesto" you'll experience many "ah-ha" moments about what you've been doing online...

... plus many more that will increase the money you make online to new levels you may have never thought possible.

Just enter your name and email to get INSTANT ACCESS to this special one-time-only "Internet Business Manifesto" Teleseminar with Rich Schefren... for FREE. You'll hear from an all-star group of smart business owners who used his message to make millions online...

And you'll even get your own copy of the original Internet Business Manifesto report for FREE...

"The Manifesto" has been downloaded more than 100,000 times. In fact, the marketers you know as the upper 1% followed the concepts contained in it to get where they are today. I guarantee as you devour this material you'll experience your "ah-ha" moment... just like they did

Complete The Form To Get FREE INSTANT Access... And To Get Your Copy Of The Internet Business Manifesto... FREE. If You Don't Start Treating Your Business Like A Real Business Now... Then When?

Get the eMarketing Book

2008-09-17T23:02:00.000+08:00

I have not read through this book myself, however it looked comprehensive and informative enough to pass forward to you. If you read it, I'd love to hear your views in the comments area below.

eMarketing: The Essential Guide to Online Marketing is available in two formats.

Students have the option of either purchasing the book online or from one of the many book stores that are stocking it, or downloading a free full text pdf version of it from this website.

This marketing ebook download illustrates Quirk eMarketing's commitment to the Open Education Declaration which aims to make educational resources available to all students.

Students wanting to download the free emarketing ebook will have to decide whether to do it chapter by chapter or to download a complete version of the book in one go.

Download the eMarketing textbook and learn holistic and integrated eMarketing tactics from the team at Quirk.

Google Chrome

2008-09-07T21:49:00.005+08:00

Want to know more about Google Chrome and how/why it was developed? Watch this video and also visit the Google Chrome home site itself, of course.

P.S. After writing this post and watching the video, I downloaded Chrome. Wow! That's all I can say. It's magnificent. :)

Headlines In Advertising

2008-09-03T12:31:00.003+08:00

This is a terrific little video with a few great pointers for advertising headlines. You will also find many more ideas and resources at Lawton Chiles' ChilesAdvertising

'Social Media Marketing Beginner’s Guide' by Jon Rognerud

2008-09-01T11:51:00.002+08:00

“Social media marketing (SMM) is a form of internet marketing which seeks to achieve branding and marketing communication goals through the participation in various social media networks”. Social Media is a shorter top level term that describes the space overall, and covers the activities around social interaction, content, videos, images and audio exposure.

Where to start?

Many of us are so excited about the technology and web (hence my somewhat trite opening), that we forget key pieces to success: definition of business goals, objectives and overall process for execution. The old “fail to plan, plan to fail” comes to mind. While you need to create the roadmap for your online business - you must certainly decide on what goals and resulting metrics you want to attain.

Social media marketing can help you increase the activity around these top goals:

* Website traffic and user behavior (external and internal tracking)
* Conversion and sales tracking
* Page views, ad exposure
* Growing brand awareness (a softer value, takes longer to build)
* Creating a positive brand association and keeping it there (see also reputation management)
* Business development and a broader customer reach

Jon Rognerud Introduction #1 from jon rognerud on Vimeo.
How can you create and convert all this activity with social media?

Since the social web allows you to interact with others, create and promote content that can get links and viral attraction, you can - with the right strategy - reach key influencers using this medium. We all know what blogs alone can do, and they are pretty search engine friendly out of the box.

Social media expansion is important because this provides foundations for broader / faster mindshare, along with supporting your search engine marketing objectives. You *can* convert traffic if you target appropriately (research needed), and do not spam.

Read more of this brilliant article by Jon Rognerud at Social Media Marketing Beginner’s Guide

Two Free Internet Marketing Gifts For You

2008-08-24T21:51:00.010+08:00

There is so much more that could be written about each of the 35 tips listed in this free report for you. However, it was best to keep this short and easy to skim, so there are only the nutshell descriptions for each item on this list.

Every one of these tips could be expanded to fill the contents of a book.

Also note, these tips are not in any particular order of priority, or in order of effectiveness with regard returns & results that these activities will produce.

Please accept my free gift to you, of
Online Visibility: 35 Free Online Promotion Ideas

If you enjoy that free report, then you will also appreciate the information presented by Jinger Jarrett
Internet Marketing for Free: The Guide

You are more than welcome to pass both these resources forward to your friends, or to give them away at your site.
I do ask that you keep the domain links as they are, therefore not host the pdf's at your domain, and also please do not change any content.

Thank you,
Thea

Training Videos With Help To Get You Online

2008-08-23T14:24:00.002+08:00

"I know if I’m gonna have any life anymore, it’s because I’m still willin' to fight and die for that inch. Because that’s what livin' is! The six inches in front of your face!!

Now I can’t make you do it. You got to look at the guy next to you. Look into his eyes! Now I think you’re gonna see a guy who will go that inch with you. You're gonna see a guy who will sacrifice himself for this team because he knows, when it comes down to it, you’re gonna do the same for him!
That’s a team, gentleman! And, either we heal, now, as a team, or we will die as individuals. Source: www.alpacino.in

When it comes to jumping into creating your own online presence and profits, you don't have to take one giant leap!
You also don't have to go it alone, there's a team just like the one Al describes, already waiting for you. We've designed 100 forward steps that you can take one-by-one, so you aren't overwhelmed.
Read my testimonial about this wonderful opportunity for you, at I Create Profits

Receive my 9 funny messages for just 3-weeks, about the regimentation of a 'job'. You'll enjoy passing these to your friends!

What It Takes To Build A Successful Startup

2008-08-22T21:37:00.002+08:00

The Churchill Club's annual look at what it takes to build a successful startup.

This panel of five Silicon Valley entrepreneurs discussed the challenges and critical success factors necessary to reach the promised land.

Moderator: Guy Kawasaki, Managing Director, Garage Technology Ventures. Speakers: Lauren Elliott, Founder, Third Rock Mining; Reid Hoffman, Co-Founder and CEO, LinkedIn; Joe Kraus, Co-Founder and CEO, JotSpot; Daniel Mattes, Co-Founder and CTO, Jajah; Alex Welch, Co-Founder and CEO, Photobucket.

I am certain that you will enjoy this video very much.

Welcome and thank you for visiting

2008-08-21T10:40:00.005+08:00

This is one of my latest and newest blogs.
It is still a work in progress, however it won't be long before I'm back with lots of great information, videos, ideas and tools to support you with increasing your online visibility.
I'll do my very best to keep all my resources to the free ones that are available out there. See you again, very soon.