Content is King

March 2, 2013 by 4 Comments

content curationI’ve been to many conferences and social media camps over the last three years, and I always hear someone tell us how “content is king”.  And I believe it.  The more content you produce, the more you will produce shareable content.  The more you write for your audience, the better optimized your content will become.  And it will happen naturally.  As Guy Kawasaki said in his book, “What the Plus”, the best method for search engine optimization (SEO) is to “write good S***.”  That’s all there is to it.

And that may be.  But it isn’t enough to write great stuff.  That won’t give you enough material to share with your audiences on Twitter, Facebook, GooglePlus, Pinterest and LinkedIn.  Sure, your articles can (and should) be shared among all your networks, but what about the other days and hours?  When we should be promoting ourselves and our own content only 20% of the time (this is known as the 80/20 rule), what do we share the rest of the time?

Simple.  Other People’s Content.  Using the 80/20 rule, 80% of what you share should be links and articles from other people.

Right about now, you are asking, “why would I promote other people’s work to my networks?”  And I understand your feeling.  BUT, the biggest reason to share other people’s content is simple:  to be seen as an expert in your field.  You are the one person who finds all the relevant information and shares it.  You are on top of what’s happening within your industry, and know the changes that are coming.  You are the person I’ll look to for the answer, because I know that if you don’t have it, you can find it.

How to find content

Where do you find that great content?  There are many places to search for content, not the easiest of which is Google itself.  If you are a dentist, and want to find content about flossing, just google “benefits of flossing”, and within .28 seconds, you will have about 819,000 results.

But Google is just the beginning.

Now, check out the site, Alltop, where information and links on just about every conceivable topic is available for the searching.  A quick search of Alltop for “dentistry” has turned up links to Medical News Today, Dentistry News, MedWorm, Science Daily, and many other specific sites.

In addition, I am sure that you are also working on building a following on Twitter and Facebook, and like most small businesses, you don’t have time to read every Tweet or post.  Enter Curate Me, which is a website that offers to send you a daily e-mail of the best news from your Twitter and Facebook streams.

You can also set up Google Alerts, which will provide you with an e-mail update everytime a specific search term shows up on-line.  Everyone should have a Google Alert set up for their name and company, but why not use it to find great content?

There are many other tools that can be used to find great content, including StumbleUpon, Tumblr, LinkedIn groups, GooglePlus, Pinterest and Facebook.

Content curation is not the chore that it used to be.  There is no need to scour magazines and newspapers.  A few simple keystrokes and the content you are searching for will find you.

What tools do you use for content curation?  Why not share in the comments below?

 

Resources:

Content Curation

Best Content Curation Tools for Entrepreneurs and SMBs

Curate Me

Alltop

About Craig Yaris

Craig E. Yaris is the owner of EsquireTech Solutions, which helps small business get found on the social web, whether through Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn, he can both teach you the effective use of any social network or act as your social media manager, enabling you to reach your clients where they are and when they want to hear from you. He can teach your organization the social media best practices that can help you use the tools of today to cost-effectively increase your bottom line. EsquireTech Solutions brings the social web to your business. Visit EsquireTech Solutions or call 516-495-9107 .

Filed Under: Authors, Content Marketing, General, Social Media Tagged With: , , , , , ,

You’ve Got Comments. Now What?

December 22, 2012 by 2 Comments

Blog CommentsA client of mine asked a question the other day that got me thinking – “What should I do with all the comments on my blog and Facebook page?”  It was a question that required deeper understanding of their meaning, and when I inquired, she told me quite clearly, “We get so many comments that we don’t reply to them all.”

WOW.  That is a very important statement.  You have so many comments that you just don’t reply to them all???  After you give a presentation, do you answer questions?  If someone calls, do you not answer?

Most people are blogging to encourage participation.  I know this particular client certainly is.  She wants to be seen as an expert within her field, and often ends blog posts with questions encouraging responses.

So why, then, wouldn’t they answer each comment?  The easy answer is that they should, and for three main reasons:  comments build community, comments shows that you appreciate the readers time and effort in responding, and they encourage discussion among your readers.

But, there are more subtle ways that comments and your replies will help your blog.  Your answers may encourage more people to comment and weigh in on the discussion.  After all, people aren’t commenting just to hear themselves type.   Comments will also help with search engine optimization (SEO) since it is likely that comments will be re-iterating keywords used within your blog post making you more likely to rank for those keywords.  In addition, comments may use additional keywords that you hadn’t used, thereby helping you rank for those, as well.

In addition, your responses to blog comments help you build credibility and authority, which is most likely one of the reasons that you are blogging in the first place.  By responding to comments, you will be seen as the go-to expert in your specific topic.  It also shows a willingness to debate and learn from your readers.

There are some reasons why replying to all comments is not feasible or necessary, however.  There are some comments that just don’t require a response.  They are those comments like, “I agree!”, “Thanks.”, “Great Job!”  However, I believe any other comments, including ones that are discussing the merits of the blogs, should be addressed.  If you’ve asked for a response, don’t ignore them.

What do you think?  Should all comments be addressed?  What do you do with your own blogs?  How do you handle comments?  Let’s discuss it in the comments, and I’ll make sure to answer!

 

Resources:

To Reply or Not to Reply to Blog Comments – That is the Question

Responding (Or Not) to Blog Comments

Should I reply to every blog comment?

5 Reasons Why You Should Respond to Every Comment

About Craig Yaris

Craig E. Yaris is the owner of EsquireTech Solutions, which helps small business get found on the social web, whether through Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn, he can both teach you the effective use of any social network or act as your social media manager, enabling you to reach your clients where they are and when they want to hear from you. He can teach your organization the social media best practices that can help you use the tools of today to cost-effectively increase your bottom line. EsquireTech Solutions brings the social web to your business. Visit EsquireTech Solutions or call 516-495-9107 .

Filed Under: Authors, Branding & Marketing, Business, Content Marketing, General, Social Media Tagged With: , , , , , ,

3 Design Mistakes That Kill Your Business Blog

December 5, 2012 by Leave a Comment

Many businesses are turning to blogs as an extension of their marketing collateral. Blogs are a great way to provide insight to your audience, give them an easy way to get to know you and allow them to build a relationship with you so that you can achieve brand loyalty.

Some companies have very successful blogs. They produce the content their audience wants and they have an aesthetically pleasing design that makes their site easy to navigate.

On the other hand, there are some businesses that cannot find success with their blog. Most businesses assume that the content is to blame, but oftentimes, the problem lies in the design. The following are three common design mistakes that could end up killing your blog.

1. It’s too busy.

Though you may not think that it’s fun, a busy background and busy font can make people turn away the minute they land on your blog. Bright backgrounds with bright fonts can be hard for your audience to look at. Plus, if your background is too busy, they may not be able to focus on the content, which is the most important part of your blog.

Crazy fonts can also be hard for your audience to read. If you use something other than a simple font, your audience may have a hard time figuring out the words on your blog. And along with the font, you also want to make sure that the size of your font is not too small or too big.

2. The navigation is confusing.

You don’t want your readers to simply land on a blog post, read it and leave. You want them to land on a blog post, read it, and stick around for a while perusing past blog posts and possibly even getting back to your website. This is where simple navigation is essential. If your navigation is hard to find or hard to read, your audience is not going to stick around. Don’t be cute with titles for your navigation. If the navigation is leading to a page about your company, use “About Us” as a title. If your audience doesn’t understand where a link will take them, they’ll be hesitant to click on it.

You also want to make sure that your navigation is easy to find, such as along the top or along the left-hand side. This is how most websites are set up, and this is how most Internet users expect to see a site. While placing your navigation somewhere different shows that you’re unique, it can also frustrate your audience trying to find it.

3. Your audience can’t share your posts.

The more your blog content is shared, the more traffic you’ll receive. Thanks to social networks, sharing your blog content is easy, but if you don’t have share features on your blog, you’ll never see the virality that some blogs do. When a reader lands on a blog that interests them, they may be inclined to share it with their fans, friends and followers through social media. If you don’t have a share button, they’re not going to take the time to copy and paste the URL. Instead, they simply won’t share the info, which means that your blog posts aren’t reaching as wide of an audience as you possibly can.

Jacob Smith is a business owner and avid blogger.  He created his own business blog and used the wordpress themes business layouts.

About Guest Blogger

This article is a guest post provided by a third party, its content was added to Digital Ethos to help provide additional information for our readers and followers. While the Guest Blogger posts do not undergo the same scrutiny as Authors and lack sources, the content was reviewed and approved as valuable to our mission.

Filed Under: Business, General, Guest Bloggers Tagged With: , ,

Benefits and Strategies for Blogging

October 26, 2012 by 1 Comment

So, you’ve decided to heed the call and start a blog, whether for your company or yourself, but you keep asking yourself, “why?”

There are many reasons that companies begin a blog, but the most important reasons are (in no particular order) to:

  •  Attract an audienceBenefits of Blogging
  • Inform and interact
  • Motivate action
  • Respond to stories and customers
  • Become a thought leader
  • Brand advertising
  • Build organic search engine optimization (SEO) for your website

Every one of the reasons set forth are perfect in their own right, but most people begin a blog for a combination of the reasons above.  I began my own blog at EsquireTech Solutions for a combination of all the reasons above.  I wanted a forum to interact and inform, I wanted to be seen as a thought leader within the field of social marketing, and I wanted an opportunity to brand my business by sharing my blogs throughout all the social platforms I am active on.

How Do I Begin?

When setting out to create a blog for your company or yourself, it is most important to start out with a plan.  You need to lay out the WHY – why are you building this blog.  Is it as your website or the hub of your digital presence?  Is it strictly as a tool for building your search engine optimization (SEO)?  You need to decide on WHO – who to you hope to reach with this blog?  Who is your intended audience?  And, finally, you need to decide on WHAT – what will you be talking about?  What information are you trying to provide?  What story are you hoping to tell or what need are you trying to fill for your customers?  What is your audience interested in?  Most importantly, you need to make sure that you are going to satisfy your audience’s needs, wants, and motivations.

Blogging Best Practices

Once you have answered the questions laid out above, it is important to follow some best practices for blogging.

  • Establish a strategy
  • Find a voice
  • Be yourself, not what you think people want
  • Create compelling content
  • Be informative and relevant to your audience
  • Make sure to use keywords within your blog for better SEO
  • Post regularly
  • Only you can decide what that is.  Is it monthly, weekly, daily?
  • Engage with your readers
  • Make sure to encourage conversation and always respond to every comment
  • Spread your content
  • Use all of your social sites to bring your content to your audience
  • Use interesting visuals
  • Use bullets, and headings to break up the content

 Blogging Don’ts

Just as there are some “best practices” there are certain things that you should never do within your blog (or your social sites):

  • Don’t SELLBlogging and social are to help your customers and build your reputation, not sell
  • Don’t try and control the conversation
  • Don’t argue with your commenters.Everyone is entitled to their opinions
  • Don’t ignore the audienceNot responding to comments is as bad as not answering the phone
  • Don’t force conversation
  • Let it happen naturally

Finally, I think the most important rule of blogging is this:  Just do it.  We all have something to say and something to contribute to the conversation.  Find what you are passionate about and write about that.  When there is passion, or a willingness to learn, there is great content.

So, let’s get out there and blog.  Talk to your audience.  Teach.  Help.

Why did you start blogging?  Have any other best practices to share?  Any other tips to avoid?  Let’s talk!

 

Resources:

Blogging Best Practices

Corporate Blogging Best Practices

Corporate Blogging: 7 Best Practices

The 12 Dos’s and Don’ts of Writing a Blog

 

About Craig Yaris

Craig E. Yaris is the owner of EsquireTech Solutions, which helps small business get found on the social web, whether through Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn, he can both teach you the effective use of any social network or act as your social media manager, enabling you to reach your clients where they are and when they want to hear from you. He can teach your organization the social media best practices that can help you use the tools of today to cost-effectively increase your bottom line. EsquireTech Solutions brings the social web to your business. Visit EsquireTech Solutions or call 516-495-9107 .

Filed Under: Authors, Branding & Marketing, Business, Content Marketing, General, PR & Writing Tagged With: ,

How to Avoid the Google Sandbox in a New Blog

July 23, 2012 by 1 Comment

If you run a web site, which you want to be visible on the search engines, you should know about the Google sandbox and how to avoid it. The search engine giant, Google, implements measures to keep violators at bay.

What happens if you committed errors using Google’s applications and services? Well, if you incurred violations, Google may remove your web site from its search engine result pages. This is called deindexing. To find out if your web site is not indexed, visit Google and key in your web site domain in this pattern:site:yoururl.com

What Is Google Sandbox?

If you can see your web site moving from the first pages to the 10thpage or more of the SERPs, then, you are not yet deindexed. But

c/o seo-jerusalem.com

this is a possible sandbox effect. The sandbox is a place where web sites, especially the new ones, are placed until they have proven their worth in ranking. Sometimes, your web site is thrown into a sandbox if for an instance, your web site ranks for a certain keyword today, and gone from the ranking tomorrow.

What Causes Google Sandbox?

The sandbox happens if you have done something that agitates Google in matters such as SEO and backlinking. Common instances where inviting a sandbox is imminent are when you create myriads of backlinks to your web site in a very short time or create backlinks within poor quality content.

In a way, sandboxing a web site is a punishment done by Google by putting your web site down below the ranking where there is no traffic. But being in a sandbox is not permanent. It can last from a few days to a few months.

How to Avoid Google Sandbox?

Having diverse backlinks is important. If you use hundreds of backlinks by employing ScrapeBox or XRunner, then being sandboxed is very likely. New web sites are more vulnerable to being thrown in a sandbox than older web sites especially iftheir SEOis not well diversified.

For example, if you are running a new web site on diet, and have created two thousand backlinks in its first week of launching into the media buzz, you must ensure that those backlinks are from various sources like comments, articles, blog posts, forums, news releases, to mention a few. For Google, those backlinks could have been generated naturally.

How Should You Plan Your Backlinks?

One sure way to avert Google sandbox is to diversify your backlinks by creating them gradually over time. Rather than rushing in to create many backlinks in a short time, concentrate on creating several backlinks from different sources. While Bing and Yahoo give more value to quantity, Google is giving more weigh to quality of pagerank that each created backlink has.

So, the next time you begin with your SEO campaign for your weight loss web site, ensure that your backlinks are well diversified to avoid the penalty of being sandboxed.

Author:

Richie Richardson is passionate about SEO and SM. He occasionally writes on topics related to weight loss, Bistro MD diet and other diet programs like Medifast and Nutrisystem. Click here to know more about him and his blog. You can also follow him on Twitter @zarrylyms.

About Guest Blogger

This article is a guest post provided by a third party, its content was added to Digital Ethos to help provide additional information for our readers and followers. While the Guest Blogger posts do not undergo the same scrutiny as Authors and lack sources, the content was reviewed and approved as valuable to our mission.

Filed Under: General, Guest Bloggers, Search Engines, SEO Search Engine Optimization Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

The Case of Crystal Cox: the Issue of Bloggers as Journalists, Continued

December 15, 2011 by 3 Comments

INTRODUCTION
This post started as a comment to a comment on another blog that sited my post on the DBME Blog, dated December 10, 2011, in its ‘Related Articles’. As I wrote my comment, I began to feel that it contributed enough new insight into this issue that I started to consider publishing it as another blog post on this issue. I have made some minor changes to my ‘responding comment’ for this post since I’ve done additional research since commenting.

Most importantly, I would like to thank the commenter (on the article on eff.org) who used my post as part of his/her ‘Related Articles‘, (Posted on December 14, 2011 by zandocomm). This commenter’s feedback and insights inspired me to research this issue further and  put my thoughts to post on this issue once again.

legal Guide for Blogger © eff.org

Legal Guide for Blogger © eff.org

MY COMMENT AND A BIT MORE
I appreciate the expansion upon the blog post I wrote initially, The Daring Digital Decision: Bloggers Are NOT Journalists, that is listed in the ‘Related Articles‘ from a comment on the blog post, The Crystal Cox Case and Bloggers as Journalists. It clarifies what I feel are some of the more germain issues to this case. There are some very valid points made by the commenter and everyone else in my follow up research.

In particular, what I find most important are the fact that, (from the commenter) “Two important things appear to be going on in this case. First, courts occasionally identify a reluctance to extend journalistic protections to non-traditional “media” sources such as bloggers because of a perceived lack of a limiting principle. How can everyone potentially be a journalist? courts seemingly ask. This sentiment is frequently echoed by mainstream journalists who, rightly or wrongly, balk at the perceived threat of dilution of legal protections for traditional journalists posed when (as here) self-proclaimed journalists might go too far and risk protections for established media. As EFF and many others have pointed out, the proper approach to this question is to focus on what amounts to journalism, not who is a journalist. Journalism is not limited to a particular medium; instead, it focuses on whether someone is engaged in gathering information and disseminating it to the public. To the extent that laws are unclear or out of date – such as Oregon’s retraction statute which does not clearly include (or exclude) Internet journalism – legislatures should be encouraged to expansively update them to ensure the protection of individuals seeking to communicate information to the public.

“Second, and lost in much of the discussion about this case over the past week, Cox’s case seems to have much to do with an underlying discomfort and concern about how information is distributed online, whether or not it is actionable. David Carr’s recent article in the New York Times illustrates the phenomenon well. In it, Carr quotes plaintiff Kevin Padrick as lamenting the effect of Cox’s “long-running series of hyperbolic posts” and telling Carr that “his business as a financial adviser had dropped by half since Ms. Cox started in on him, and any search of his name or his company turned up page after page on Google detailing his supposed skullduggery, showing up under a variety of sites.”

THE BIGGER ISSUE
Both points lead to what I feel is the bigger issue. Traditional media journalism does not, per se, have the viral affect that blogged information can. Therefore, veracity of information or the lack of it can be magnified exponentially. As a result, the information posted can spread like wild fire and have a previously unseen impact on the parties involved. As we have already seen, social media has outdated the need for traditional war as the medium for a national revolution. The implications of what blogging can do, as a part of ‘journalistic’ media, reach beyond our imagination.

I totally agree that there seems to be something askew in this case. The issue of shield law has to do with protection of confidentiality of sources. The judges ruling skirts the real issue. This is about the Internet and whether or not to deal with it as part of the present  definition of journalism (which is confined to traditional media) rather than focusing on the journalist, Crystal Cox in particular as the Supreme Court case decision did.

The commenter continues, ” . . . the proper approach to this question is to focus on what amounts to journalism, not who is a journalist. Journalism is not limited to a particular medium; instead, it focuses on whether someone is engaged in gathering information and disseminating it to the public. To the extent that laws are unclear or out of date – such as Oregon’s retraction statute which does not clearly include (or exclude) Internet journalism – legislatures should be encouraged to expansively update them to ensure the protection of individuals seeking to communicate information to the public.”

CONCLUSION
We have not heard the end of this issue. In fact, we have only seen the beginning. Blogging as a form of ‘journalism’ is NOT going away. More and more individuals will increasingly use this form of new media to voice their opinion and report what they consider newsworhty. In my opinion, the standards required for traditional journalists need more than ever to be upheld, (education, credentials, and ethics). But it will become increasingly difficult to monitor and distinguish truth from fiction when so many individuals blog and posted information can go viral before a retraction of error or slander can possibly undo the damage.

SOURCES AND OTHER INFORMATION:

The Crystal Cox Case and Bloggers as Journalists

Crystal Cox and Bloggers as Journalists

Kevin Padrick

Related Articles

When Truth Survives Free Speech

Legal Guide for Bloggers

Are All Bloggers Journalists?

The Problem with Pre-Internet Laws

Should We Rethink Shield Law?

According to the Law

A Broader Definition of ‘Journalism’

The facebook page, Room for Debate

About Alison Gilbert

Through decades as an entrepreneur, I developed ventures in over a half a dozen industries including HEALTH FOOD | GRAPHIC DESIGN | BUSINESS PROMOTION | HOLISTIC HEALTH | DECORATIVE PAINTING | SOCIAL MEDIA | PUBLIC SPEAKING | WRITING. Eventually under the umbrella of ALISON*S ART, INC, they evolved into the dba MARKETING BYTES, a hybrid company specializing marketing small business using social media marketing and traditional graphic design services. Currently retired, I am focusing on teaching social media marketing graphic design and visual journalism. I can be messaged through www.facebook.com/alisondgilbert and tweeted @MktngBytesMaven and @AlisonsArt.

Filed Under: Business, General, Publishing, Social Media Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

How Do You Do It? – My Super-Secret (shh!) 6 Tips for Blogging Success

October 22, 2011 by 1 Comment

Check out these mind-blowing statistics on this blog:

  • 1,085 Posts
  • Over 72,000 viewers to date
  • In nationwide syndication
  • Publishes on the Kindle
  • Publishes 7 days a week and mostly twice on weekdays (but not on holidays)

Those stats are for the extremely popular blog, Fearless Competitor. Then the question invariably comes up. “We struggle to post once a week. How many writers do you have for Fearless Competitor?” – most expect 8 or more.

The answer is One. One man. The Fearless Competitor!

The next comment is something we hear frequently. How the Hell does one person create so many great posts? I struggle to post once a week!

How Do You Do It?

(In fact, Mike Volpe, Chief Marketing Officer at Hubspot said to me “Jeff, at Hubspot we have many writers for our blog and it publishes frequently. But you are almost as prolific and you’re just one person. I have no idea how you do it.” When you can stump Mike Volpe, you’re doing something right. And Mike invited me to appear on HubspotTV, now called Marketing Update.)

In this post, I’ll share 6 tips on how YOU can learn to be a VERY prolific blogger too. And for each tip, we share an example post from Fearless Competitor, so you can see how it is done.

1. Create one or more weekly events, shows, etc.
Create a regular weekly show – same day, same time each week. Keep doing it. We created the B2B marketing show “Laugh and Learn with Find New Customers“. It runs every Friday at 11am ET. If you post 5 times a week, you’re 20% done.

2. Find inspiration in everything
Read a great article or find a great TV show? Read an interesting blog article? Is there a lesson in it? Then write about your thoughts. Check out ‘5 Lessons a B2B Marketer Can Learn from “Breaking Bad.”’

3. Report on the news
What’s happening in your industry? (Act-On Software buys MarketBridge; Eloqua files to go public.) Something else happening? Share what you think about the news. Check out “The Life Lesson from Plaxico Burress“

4. Invite guest posts
Have top experts in your industry? Contact them and invite them to write guest posts for you. Check out “Developing an Integrated Content Marketing Strategy That Works” by Joe Pulizzi, co-author of Get Content, Get Customers.

5. Re-energize old posts
A very cool feature of WordPress.com is the ability to copy posts. Find a really good post you wrote in 2009 and copy it. Then edit it and freshen it up. Bingo. Brand new post! Check out “How to Gain Customer Trust – Insights by Guy Kawasaki” – which I published a couple of times.

6. Use Slideshare.
Take a presentation you did, upload it to Slideshare and record an audio track for it. Then match your audio up in Slideshare. (Contact me if you don’t know how to do this.) Slideshare has a very cool embed feature, so the viewer can see your slideshare right in the blog post. Check out “The Power of B2B Lead Nurturing.” for a great example of embedding a presentation in a blog article.

We also suggest you use your keywords (Like lead generation company) and use them in your blog posts. (Google loves frequently updated blogs.) so it really helps with Search Engine Optimization (SEO). And Hubspot found an active blog gives a company 57% more leads.

We hope you found these tips helpful. What do you think? We love your comments and sharing. Good luck with your blog.

Sources:

Laugh and Learn with Find New Customers

The Power of B2B Lead Nurturing

How to Gain Customer Trust – Insights by Guy Kawasaki

Developing an Integrated Content Marketing Strategy That Works

The Life Lesson from Plaxico Burress

5 Lessons a B2B Marketer Can Learn from Breaking Bad

About Jeff Ogden

Jeff Ogden (@fearlesscomp) is the President of the B2B lead generation consultancyFind New Customers. Find New Customers helps companies dramatically improve revenue results by transforming the way they attract, engage and win new customers. Contact Find New Customers by calling (516) 495-9350 or sending an email to sales at findnewcustomers.com.

Filed Under: Branding & Marketing, Content Marketing, Digital & Internet Marketing, General, PR & Writing, Publishing Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

6 of the Best Guest Posting Tips

September 21, 2011 by 4 Comments

Guest posting can be a very lucrative venture for all parties involved. The owner of the blog is provided with free content, and the writer of the content is given acknowledgement of their wisdom on the chosen topic. In this aspect, guest posting seems to benefit both parties equally. However, it can be just as difficult to find high-quality blog owners who will allow guest posting, as it is to find high-quality writers to make guest appearances on your blog.

Keeping in mind a few helpful guest-posting tips can be beneficial for all involved and will help to produce the highest quality content that will reflect well on both the blog owner and the content creator.

Posting Tips for Guest Bloggers

  1. Aim High – Look for highly traveled blogs or those with impressive page rankings. These links will also be highly valuable portfolio material.
  2. Research the Blog – In order to create what is fresh content for the blog, you will need to know what content has already been created. If the blog is a lengthy one, check for tag clouds or keywords on the topics that are the same as your posting idea.
  3. Catchy Title – Catchier content. Be sure that you supply an eye catching title for your content, and make just as certain that the content lives up to the title. A good blogger knows that even the most boring topic can be made interesting with the right language.
  4. Give Your Best Stuff Away – This may be a hard concept to swallow for some bloggers but you want your guest posts on any blogs to be the most shining examples of your work. Not only will this garner the blog owner increased traffic or interest in their site, but it may also cause others to take notice, and perhaps even offer you paying gigs.
  5. Interact – Reply to commenters and pay attention to your re-tweeters. Get involved and make sure that you are available to ponder any issues about your blog posts with others who may be doing the same. Building a rapport with readers is valuable regardless of the blog posted on. Thanks to social media, people with similar interest or interest in you, can find you with a simple click once you have engaged them on site.
  6. Promote Your Posts – Promoting your own post is never more important than it is when posting on someone else’s site. Show them that their effort to give you a great link in exchange for great content has not gone unnoticed. Tweet, share, Digg, and do all you can to make sure the posts receives all of the coverage that is in your power to create.

Sources:

About Basil Puglisi

@BasilPuglisi is a Content Contributor and the Chairman of the Board for Digital Ethos. Basil C. Puglisi is also the Digital Marketing Manager for PMG Interactive. As the Digital Marketing Manager he provides oversight and support to Digital Campaigns, from Website Development to Search and Social Reach.

Filed Under: Content Marketing, PR & Writing, Publishing Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

VACATION: Escape from Digital World

August 2, 2011 by Leave a Comment

Although my recent vacation to Colorado was not intended to be for this reason, it did turn out to be something of an escape from the digital world. I actually wondered if I would be able to go two weeks without the tremors of withdrawal from daily facebook contacts, exchange of e-mails, online bookkeeping, blogging, etc.

Escape

Escape from the Digital World © Beso.com

I am delighted to report that I did abstain without incident or discomfort. But I do have a confession to make. I had at my disposal both an iPad and an iPhone. They proved themselves to be essential traveling companions. In addition, the situation necessitated my learning how to use them. I now can text, download apps, do banking and enjoy their benefits.

There were many incidents when both proved themselves to be not only indispensable but also assets to our enjoyment. Let me elaborate. We spent a week in Denver, a lovely cosmopolitan area that has a downtown that has married the best of old and new architecture, is culturally rich and diverse, and because of my knowledge of Google searches, we were able to partake in quite a few of Denver’s offerings.

iPhone

iPhone, named 'Minnie Me' photo © Apple

We had met an Ethiopian gentleman at a 7-11 where we made our daily morning walk coffee stop. We got to talking and I inquired about Ethiopian food. Since I have an adventurous and curious palette, I was excited about experiencing Ethiopian food.

A simple Google search for ‘Ethiopian restaurant in Denver, Colorado’ took me to a list of places in Denver. After reading the reviews on several listings, it was easy to decide where to go. The food was fantastic. The service was excellent. The price was very reasonable.

Habesha Ethiopian Restaurant

Habesha Ethiopian Restaurant

They make bread that is like nothing I have ever tasted before in my life. It is in the shape of a pancake but has a spongy consistency with the taste of sour dough. One of these ‘pancakes’ is placed beneath the platter of food and several others are served on the side rolled up like cigars.

Reviews of Habesha Restaurant

Reviews of Habesha Restaurant

The food is eaten by hand in the same tradition of Indian food. One rips a piece of the bread from the platter benefiting from the contents atop it, vegetables and or meat as ordered. It is as delicious as it sounds.

Habesha Restaurant found on Google Places

Habesha Restaurant found on Google Places

Also in Denver, I needed to find some Asian foodstuffs as I had run out of seaweed and other treats. Once again a Google search did the trick. I found the largest Asian foods store in Denver. I could rival many in the NY area.

Pacific Merchantile Company

Pacific Merchantile Company

Pacific Merchantile Company's Google Place page

Pacific Merchantile Company's Google Place page

One minor but crucial search was for a Bank of America. That was a bit more challenging since the Google search did not reveal one essential factor. There are no actual branches. There are only kiosks within shopping centers or office buildings and much harder to locate.

The most significant use of our digital companions involved our fly fishing trip to Basalt in the mountains near Aspen. No search for where to go was necessary since we had found fly fish heaven the year before on the introduction to my beloved sport.

Fly Fishing in Basalt, Colorado

Frying Pan Angler is the best place to go for all your fly fishing needs.

But when I went online to review the place I go to for guides and equipment, I noticed only two reviews. One of them was less than glowing. It was listed first even though it was from 2009. That was easy enough to resolve. I added my own review(s) and made the owner of the Frying Pan Angler aware of the situation and suggested how they could easily overcome that outdated and unflattering review.

Frying Pan Angler reviewed as it should be.

Frying Pan Angler reviewed as it should be.

All told, I did manage not to read any e-mail. I had left an auto responder message saying that I had gone fishing. I did not check to see if there had been phone calls on my business number. I had given the same ‘gone fishing message’ there as well.

In conclusion, not only did I escape from my daily addiction to hours on the computer but also for a change, the digital world served me. I was not its slave.

Sources:
Google Searches
Google Maps
Google Places
Local Online Business Directories

About Alison Gilbert

Through decades as an entrepreneur, I developed ventures in over a half a dozen industries including HEALTH FOOD | GRAPHIC DESIGN | BUSINESS PROMOTION | HOLISTIC HEALTH | DECORATIVE PAINTING | SOCIAL MEDIA | PUBLIC SPEAKING | WRITING. Eventually under the umbrella of ALISON*S ART, INC, they evolved into the dba MARKETING BYTES, a hybrid company specializing marketing small business using social media marketing and traditional graphic design services. Currently retired, I am focusing on teaching social media marketing graphic design and visual journalism. I can be messaged through www.facebook.com/alisondgilbert and tweeted @MktngBytesMaven and @AlisonsArt.

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