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Tag Archive: websites

The importance of links within blogs

Written on Friday 16 July 2010 by Alice

Fairy Blog Mother

Blogs thrive on links. In fact, blogs are full of links, contained mostly in the content of the sidebars, both internal (navigation around the blog) and external (destination exits or entry from referral sites). You can tell which are links on this blog because they are coloured purple, and change to pink when you mouse over them. I’ve also made the images interactive, linking to specific posts and pages within my blog.

Both kinds of blog

Think of links as doors or portals for gaining access to elsewhere. You can see this is how search engine spiders travel through, to and from blogs and websites, and humans can too. Because links are interactive, they both allow access and attract activity to and within the blog. The power of links are such that connections with the right kind of high-ranking website or blog can boost your rankings in the search engines, tags (keywords) interact with what is up-to-date within the search engines, categories aid archiving as well as search engine optimisation, and each post’s permalink is used with subscriptions to search engine readers, and RSS feeds to social networking sites, blogs and other resources.

A blog’s links come in many guises: the blog’s domain name, the post’s headline which becomes a permalink, contextual links (keyphrases linked to relevant destinations) within posts, the tags (keywords) and categories (topics) after the post, comments (links to the commenters), the blogroll or list of links to recommended websites, and RSS feeding your new material to a subscribed audience.

• Your blog’s URL, domain name or web address is a link. People are divided whether keywords should be part of your URL or whether it should just reflect your branding, be rememberable and easy to spell. This is the main form of access to your blog.

• Each post’s headline automatically becomes a permalink, leading to the post’s individual page and URL. This is where keywords become important for search engine optimisation, as well as using marketing psychology to make the reader click on it and read the post.

• When using links within your post, creating them as ‘contextual’ is much more effective. Contextual links are when a phrase within the post is highlighted to become a link, and the relevance of the destination is paramount to increase success.

• After you’ve completed writing your post, carefully select relevant tags (keywords) and categories (topics) to boost your search engine optimisation. If you have a .org blog with the All-in-one-SEO plugin, don’t forget to fill in the extra SEO fields to aid promotion of your post.

• You should encourage comments to your blog, as they are also considered new material by the search engines as well as the links they generate. And you could increase traffic to your blog by commenting sympathetically and appropriately on other blogs within your niche.

• The blogroll is a list of links to important, relevant and recommended websites and other resources. If you can arrange a reciprocal link, then that will not only boost your search engine rankings, but increase your audience too.

• And of course, RSS, or Really Simple Syndication, works totally on links. RSS creates a subscription service to deliver new posts to email in-boxes and search engine readers as soon as they’re published. It also feeds your posts as a permalink to social networking sites, each with the post’s title and link back to your blog.

blogs and blogging, Free Wordpress blogs, online marketing, Self-hosted Wordpress blogs - Tags: attract activity, blogs and blogging, comments, contextual links, links, navigation, permalinks, portals, RSS, search engine optimisation, SEO, tags and categories, websites - 0 Comments - Why not leave a comment?

Websites and blogs: how are they different?

Written on Wednesday 1 July 2009 by Alice

Actually a blog is a kind of website, as they have many similar attributes.

They both occupy a presence on the internet, use an URL or web address, need a host server to keep them online, contain information such as text content, pictures, links and keywords, both benefit from search engine optimisation and can be tracked through Google Analytics.

But why don’t we call blogs websites? What is it that makes them different?

The difference is in their programming, and how they make use of Web2.0. The are pre-runners of social networking before Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. They thrive on interaction, new content, feeds and optimisation.

Blogs are designed to be self-editable. This means you don’t to pay a web designer to make changes or add content. You can update them through very easy access (a username and password) from any computer in the world. The programming is self-contained, and if you can write in Word, you can update a blog.

They thrive on being updated frequently and regularly, their programming is designed to attract search engine spiders who are looking for new content all the time. This is very good for web optimisation which puts blogs higher up the search engines than websites. Another consideration is that blogs are visited by spiders hourly, whereas websites could wait for months.

Unlike websites, blogs only update new material each time it is posted. Every time a website is updated the new stuff supersedes the old content, whereas blogs store previous entries like a news-roll, each post dated accordingly and assigned it’s own URL for access at a later date.

Blogs are designed to encourage interactive communication between author and readers. Those who comment can link back to their own sites, and this content is also considered as new material by internet spiders. This concept is not available in ordinary websites, except through sign up forms, and then contributors cannot view afterwards what they have written.

And another consideration to note: blogs are much cheaper to create and maintain!

OK, so what else makes blogs better?

Blogs are created to help businesses to spread their expertise, explain what their business does in different ways, maintain a relationship with their visitors and customers, offer subscription services for regular contact, channel traffic back to relevant websites, and can be fed to other websites like social networking for a higher readership.

Most websites, especially ‘brochure style’ ones, are static and once created are rarely updated, and can’t provide an opportunity to explain everything as space is often limited. In fact, over cluttering your pages with too much information can be counter-productive. Visitors will not return for new content, websites are unlikely to get bookmarked, and only through a sign up form to a newsletter can the business maintain a relationship with potential customers.

But this is only my opinion, what do you think about this subject? Since this a blog, leave a comment in the box below to share your views.

blogs and blogging - Tags: blogging, blogs and blogging, comments, content, internet, new material, readers, search engines, SEO, social networking, spiders, URL, Web2.0, websites - 0 Comments - Why not leave a comment?

New business? Want a website? My advice is: don’t!

Written on Friday 26 June 2009 by Alice

You’re an entrepreneur and you want to start up a business. Great.

The first reaction to getting a slot on the internet is to get a website. Wrong!

Why wrong? This is because websites are notoriously expensive things! How much cash do you have? I suggest you should have a good think before you go throwing it away on unnecessary, inappropriate, uncostworthy things such as a website.

But surely everybody needs a website, or they won’t be taken seriously by prospective customers?

Of course you need a presence on the internet – it’s a requisite requirement nowadays. But not a website. What you need is a blog, and a good grasp of social networking. That’s how you get yourself known on the web. Only when you’ve made it, got a load of followers, built up your list of contacts, made some money, then you can go ahead and get yourself a website. By then you will know exactly what you want it for, and will build it with a proper purpose.

The trouble is, so many people get themselves a website, and it just sits there, looking pretty, and doing nothing. Absolutely nothing. They haven’t got the money to update it, because unless they have built it themselves they will have to pay a fortune to their webmaster to make any changes.

Now, if you have a blog, that’s exactly what you can, and should, do. This is because blogs are self-editable; they thrive on new material because they are designed for it. They are also little web magnets for internet traffic, as the search engine spiders are programmed to visit blogs extremely frequently, just in case there is something new for them to ‘read’. If they like what they find, and there are lots of keywords and key-phrases that match up to what is ‘hot’ at that moment, then you can get really high in the search engines!

And the other side of the coin is to get into social networking. The beauty of the web is that you can link and ‘feed’ all your blog content into social networking, so a lot more people can start reading about exactly what your business does – as long as you have written about it. And blogs are the place to write about your business: frequently, easily and regularly.

Don’t hide under a bushel – reach out and network. Tell the world about what you do. If people like what they read, you can start to make friends, contacts, business, liaisons, strategic alliances or whatever, all on the internet, through a relatively inexpensive blog – not by wasting your money on a website!

And does it work? There are plenty of businesses who are extremely successful today and have all started with just a blog, even before social networking got off the ground. Blogs are the beginnings of social networking, it’s just that the interactive side of the web (Web2.0) has developed a bit more recently…

blogs and blogging - Tags: blogging, blogs and blogging, business, content, internet traffic, keywords, marketing methods, new businesses, new material, search engines, SEO, social networking, spiders, success, websites - 7 Comments - Why not leave a comment?

Why is 2009 is the year of the question?

Written on Thursday 4 June 2009 by Alice

I’m going to put forward a concept that has revolutionalised the internet world during 2009.

Start thinking in questions!

Why? There’s a question. Google constantly researches into how it can provide a better service for its customers (in fact, how it can make more money), and it has found out that people are now thinking of the internet in questions.

When people search on Google, they don’t type in single words into the search fields any more, they type in questions. This is because there are so many websites now on the net (several billion), single keywords are not enough to find out what you want. Questions which contain lots of keywords achieve a better result, because it increases the chance of getting what you are looking for.

Therefore you need to adjust your way of thinking on your websites into questions. Change your headlines on your webpages into questions, it may just tally with a search request; this can become a very simple SEO (search engine optimisation) method.

Questions actually focus more succinctly with the needs and wants of the customer. They also strike a chord with the reader, especially if the response is ‘Yes!’. Adapt the headlines of your blog posts and articles too, it makes the subject more conversational and is more likely to be noticed and read. And this is important for RSS (the subscription feed service) reasons, because it will encourage a higher readership and therefore more exposure, especially within social networking sites.

Ask questions, strike a chord, create an affinity, understand your customer, start to succeed!

marketing methods - Tags: blogs and blogging, customers, Google, keywords, questions, RSS, SEO, social networking, websites - 2 Comments - Why not leave a comment?

Would you like to learn how blogs aren't scary?

Written on Wednesday 6 May 2009 by Alice

Live teleseminar: Thursday 14 May

• Have you been thinking about setting up a blog recently but have been putting it off?

• Do you want to know how a blog can help your business?

• Do you already have a blog but want some more tips on how to improve it?

Would having a blog help you market your business better?

Sometimes just having a website is not enough – you need to have somewhere where you can express yourself, providing on-going news about your business, educate your customers, promote new events or products – all in an environment that is publicly seen throughout the net.

A ‘brochure style’ website is far more difficult to update, needs the use of a webmaster and is seldom visited by the internet spiders. It’s a space on the web that just sits there, looking pretty, but doesn’t encourage interaction from your customers.

So what is different about a blog?

A blog is self-editing, thrives on regular input and spiders visit blogs hourly. It also uses applications to spread your word around the web easily, efficiently and automatically.

It encourages and succeeds on feedback and input from your readers, and can also be used as an archive for your articles and other information, as each post is allocated its individual URL.

The free software provided by the blogging platform is excellent for search engine optimisation, too.

So if you are interested in finding out more about blogs, then join me live for an hour’s teleseminar class (or if you can’t make the day a recording will be available).

You will discover how to:

• publicise your business to a wider audience

• increase your expert status

• let customers check you out before they buy

• bring more traffic to your website

• interact with potential customers

• provide an archive for your newsletter material

• work better with search engine optimisation

• help link you to social networking sites

But above all I want you to realise that blogs aren’t difficult technology to master, and that everybody can and should have one!

I will reassure you how unscary blogs are, and there will be a chance for those on the call to ask questions and provide their own opinions.

When is it? Thursday 14 May

What time is it? 8pm – 9pm (GMT+1)

What happens if you’re not free at this time? Register, and you will be automatically sent a recording of the teleseminar for you to listen at your leisure. Don’t forget if you have any questions, you are welcome to email them to me before the event.

What else is included? I will also send a pdf of the teleseminar’s notes and resource information so you won’t have to write everything down.

How much is it? The initial cost of this seminar is £27 -

but wait – if you book before Friday 8 May at 8pm you can register for only £17!

You will also be eligible for a competition to win my first two blogging packages for free!

• Book before 8pm on Friday 8 May to get the call for only £17 plus the recording

• Enter your name into a draw to receive first two blogging packages f*ree!

Click here NOW to register and reserve your place – and begin your journey to blogging success!

I really look forward to hearing you on this call.

Alice

What's the similarity between blogging and twittering?

Written on Tuesday 21 April 2009 by Alice

Hi Alice

I am new to all this twittering and blogging and I need some help. I have my business and have been told that blogging and twittering are a great form of marketing my business. So I have a blogger and twitter account but am unsure of how these work. I know that you post your little blurbs but how does that send people to my site? Can you help me please?

Kerry

–oo00oo–

Hi Kerry,

Blogging and twittering are similar that they are both a medium for you to express yourself, except that blogging allows a bit more than 140 characters to do so. Twitter is also called ‘microblogging’.

Twitter works on the question ‘what are you doing?’, and you shouldn’t tweet mundane things like what you had for breakfast, but snippets of information about your business that people will want to know more about. Your link in your bio should either lead to a special landing page all about you, or to a relevant page on your website or your blog. Each Twitter post can also link back to your website or whatever (use tinyurls for this purpose) so that your traffic will increase. If you tweet questions or leading statements this will also increase any interested parties.

If you’re starting out I suggest you get blogging under your belt, and then you progress to Twitter. But as you already have an account (mine’s @alicedesigns) you can feed each new post you make on your blog onto Twitter through the RSS feed I’ve been talking about. There are lots of applications to do this, but I expect Twitterfeed.com is the most well known.

Why do this? You want a many people as possible to read your posts, hence why you should also have a well publicised link from your website to your blog. Search engine optimisation thrives on links, and if you can create as many links as possible to both your blog, Twitter and website, your traffic will increase and so will your followers if they like what they see.

Alice

blogs and blogging, marketing methods - Tags: blogging, blogs and blogging, business, communication, customers, information, links, marketing methods, micro-blogging, RSS, social networking, Twitter, websites - 0 Comments - Why not leave a comment?

How does a blog add value to your business?

Written on Wednesday 15 April 2009 by Alice

To gather feedback on business blogging, I subscribed to a number of forums and asked how many people had a blog. This is one of the responses and my answer to it:

Hi Alice

I have just started my business and I’m still going through the process of designing a website, etc.

I am thinking about adding a blog to my site, but I want to know how to do this so that it adds value rather than potentially damaging my image when I am just starting out.

I have been in property for a number of years now so the business model is investment properties both commercial and residential in the UK and overseas. This is primarily targeted at pension fund managers, IFAs as well as largely investors. Obviously a great deal of negativity surrounds the property market currently.

What would you suggest?

Lindsey

–oo00oo–

Hi Lindsey

A blog is an essential piece of kit if you want to a) make yourself more visible to the outside world, b) communicate effectively with your existing customers, c) show your expertise to potentially new customers, and d) gain more followers and therefore a larger audience for your business.

Use a blog to counteract the negativity you speak of, punctuated with valuable advice and golden nuggets of information. Blog posts should be short and sweet, regular, relevant and of value, and focused on an end result like targeting your readers to your website or to a special landing pages to facilitate an economic response.

Increase your readership by adding RSS feeds (facilities that enable readers to follow your blog, and allows your posts to be automatically transferred to other social networking sites for a wider audience) to increase the visual exposure of your business.

Your blog could either become part of your website or stand alone with its own URL, and its special programming language assists with search engine optimisation and therefore increased traffic to wherever you want it.

Take a look at my blogging pages and join my newsletter to be the first to know of any new developments!

Alice

blogs and blogging - Tags: advertising, blog, blogging, business, customers, exposure, gain business, increased traffic, information, marketing methods, publicity, RSS, search engine optimisation, valuable advice, websites - 1 Comment - Why not leave a comment?

So how can you make money through a blog?

Written on Tuesday 7 April 2009 by Alice

blogmoney Think of your blog as another platform to advertise from. Call it promoting yourself, your product and your company. But you could write endless posts providing valuable insights and top tips about your business, and even though they would be interesting reading, they are missing a vital element.

Don’t forget to post with a purpose. Is there a motive for your blogging? As well as providing something of value, guide your readers to your website, especially specific pages of your website that relate to the subject of your posts, where they can find more information.

Blogging without a focus will not make money. Structure your posts into a series, culminating into a purpose, promotion, event or special deal. Get your readers to do something in return for all this wonderful information you’ve given them!

Just like advertising, take advantage of your post’s purpose and include a call to action. Make it incentive-laden and time-dependent, with clear links or buttons to enable your readers to sign up for more information or see where to pay.

Guide your readers to specific landing pages, or squeeze pages, on your website, which must be relevant to your blog posts. There you can convert your customers into achieving a sale or signing up to an event. You could also provide special codes to particular readers to gain access to protected squeeze pages in exchange for their email addresses, and then use these permission based details to send focused communications for specific projects culminating in a sale.

Use the advantages of a blog to write varied posts with alternative persuasive text in order to attract different audiences to your squeeze pages, so you can increase your customer base. And the practicality of RSS will feed these posts to various social networking sites, giving you access to different kinds of customers.

Ask your friends through social networking either to respond favourably, recommend, forward on or retweet your promotion to increase your exposure. Test and measure to find out which posts work on specific target markets, so you can improve your next marketing campaign.

Remember marketing works with multiple messages driven home over a period of time. Communicate your expertise to a wider audience to achieve recognition, as it takes anything from 7-21 times to get results. Hence why it’s good to blog frequently in order to promote your business in as many different ways as possible.

Want to know more? Read the blogging pages to find out more, and sign up to my blogging newsletter to keep yourself in the loop.

blogs and blogging, marketing methods - Tags: blog posts, blogging, blogs and blogging, business, call to action, customers, focus, incentives, marketing methods, money, purpose, RSS, sales, social networking, squeeze pages, websites - 1 Comment - Why not leave a comment?

Does your business need a visual aid?

Written on Tuesday 31 March 2009 by Alice

icebergicon Would your business like more exposure?

Would it benefit from a wider audience?

Do you feel your existing website is too restricted in selling your company to potential customers?

I would like you to imagine your business as an iceberg. What is visible, what your customers get to see and understand, is like the area above the waterline: only a tiny proportion.

And under the water lies the remainder: the cogs and wheels, the inner workings, the nitty-gritty, what your business is really like. Packed full of examples, stories, good news, new ideas, all the things your website hasn’t the room to include.

And so it shouldn’t: a ‘brochure style’ like website should not be cluttered with all this extra stuff. In today’s busy world people haven’t the time and inclination to sit and read loads of text and description, they need quick-fire facts and figures, features and benefits, to show the appropriate impression of your business. In fact, each webpage has just three seconds to get their message across…

So how can you communicate the ‘other bits that we do?’ How do you invite customers below the waterline to view the remainder of your business?

The answer is: a blog.

Imagine somewhere that could archive additional relevant information about your company.

A medium that can be regularly updated with the latest news, stories, testimonials, special offers, new ventures or whatever.

Another space on the net that can be edited without a webmaster, so anyone can easily make regular contributions.

Like an on-line newspaper (or diary if you wish), a blog provides continuous material for its readers, both present and past. This also contributes to search engine optimisation, assisted by links to your website, to and from commenters providing feedback, and to other resource material – in fact, the key is to get as many links included as possible.

And don’t forget that spiders visit blogs far more frequently than websites.

Don’t just create your blog and neglect it. Use RSS (really simple syndication) to feed into other locations on the net, such as social networking sites, search engine reader pages, Twitter (which feed into Facebook and other similar sites), and application widgets that provide links of past and present posts on your and other websites/blogs. All valuable towards attracting a passing audience as well as keeping your existing followers informed.

Visit our blogging pages to find out more >>>

blogs and blogging, increasing business visibility - Tags: audience, blog, business, campaigns, customers, information, links, marketing methods, message, posts, RSS, SEO, social networking, visible, websites - 0 Comments - Why not leave a comment?