Finding the middle ground to satisfy the majority of them is the main problem that web designers and programmers have to deal with, because the actual measure of the success of a site is usually gauged on the conversion rates.

Conversion could mean a variety of things to different people.

• For marketers, it could be the number of sales leads or email sign-ups.
• For online retailers, it could be the number of sales made in a day.
• For publishers, it could mean the number of new subscribers or returning visitors per day.

Regardless of what type of conversion you’re going for, one technique that can help you increase it is A/B testing.

The Deal with A/B Testing

A/B testing is a method that aims to help webmasters increase their conversions by presenting users with a site design and with content that will appeal to them. The technique involves showing two versions of the website, dubbed as “A” and “B,” to the users and noting the responses that each version generates from them.

The version that got more favorable results is deemed as the better one, and the changes from that version are then implemented on the site.

What is Product Recommendation?

A/B testing techniques are often used with product recommendation. The latter is a method that involves presenting related content to the user based on their previous browsing history and preferences.

This is used by many major sites on the web like Amazon, eBay, and Yahoo. For online retailers, the product recommendations are determined by considering the items that are currently in the buyer’s shopping cart.

Recommendations for content sites and blogs involve displaying posts and articles that are relevant to the ones that the user has already read.

What A/B Testing is For

Image from http://techblog.willshouse.com

A/B testing is used for a variety of reasons. It could be to optimize websites, improve email marketing campaigns, or come up with better advertising and marketing materials.

The main purpose of A/B tests is to figure out what your site visitors prefer, so you can create better content and modify the existing one you have to fit their needs and preferences.

Basic Steps in A/B Testing

Conducting A/B tests is relatively easy and simple, which is why it’s highly favored by many Internet marketers and webmasters.

• Evaluate your current content. The first step is to assess your entire website. It might be helpful to go over it with some other people who can point out any weak points on your design that you might not be able to spot. Rank the items on your list according to priority: which of them are more urgent or which ones need to be addressed right away?
• Design your test. After deciding which element should be tested first, it’s time to create two variations of it to use in the test. Make sure both versions are distinct from the other, although they don’t have to be extremely or drastically different.
• Run the A/B test. You can run your tests with the use of software or online tools like Google’s Website Optimizer. Google has made their service available for free, and although it has some limitations, it’s extremely useful and can be used to run A/B tests as well as other optimization testing methods.
• Implement changes. Once the test is done, it’s time to analyze the results and determine which version got more site visitors to do what you wanted them to do. In short, determine which variation gave you more conversions and implement that on your actual website. Go back to the first step and run more tests on the other elements that you’ve listed to continue optimizing your website.

This is a guest post by Ruben Corbo which writes about various topics including tech, online marketing and smartphone related topics. He’s recently been diving into Behavioral Targeting & Personalization and A/B Testing topics. When Ruben is not writing he is producing and writing music for short films and other visual arts.

Fear no more – with these tips, you should be able get your guest posts accepted into any blog!

1. A Guest Post Is More Than Just A Link-Back To Your Blog!

Some bloggers guest-post just to get a link-back to their own blogs. Their posts are 100% rubbish and readers don’t even know what they’re talking about. To become a successful guest blogger, you must think guest-posting as:

• a huge opportunity to reach a huge audience of readers
• a chance to learn from a powerful blogger
• a learning experience – especially if you haven’t guest-posted before
• a chance to get your name known.

To summarize, your guest posts must be your best work. Try hard and try your best – this way you should be able to get any posts accepted.

2. Choose A Blog Carefully

The tip is to choose only blogs that only run guest posts. Look for pages that say “Write For Us” or something similar. Also look for posts that are by “Anonymous,” “Guest Author” or something like that. Try and contact the owner of the blog if you’re interested.

Believe it or not, smaller blogs won’t accept guest posts. Those bloggers might only be interested in building their own audience with their own skills. So they decline to accept your posts – don’t get afraid because it’s not your fault.

Choose a blog that you’re interested in writing for. This way you can write what you’re skilled in which usually would lead to getting better results for the posts you write.

If you’re having trouble finding blogs that offer guest-posting, try searching “____ Write For Us” or “____ Guest Posting”. (Eg “Technology Write For Us”.)

3. Study The Blog Before You Start Posting

Have a look at the most recent posts and find out characteristics their posts. For some example:

• On average, How long are the posts? This will give you an overall idea of how long you should write.
• Which topics have been covered recently? You’ll have to avoid writing anything similar!
• How did they attract comments? For example, did author ask interesting questions in their post which attract readers to respond?
• Where are link-backs allowed?
• Are some bad language allowed in posts?

These are just examples to guide you through. Checking out features of posts will guide you through what the blog expects you to write. It only takes minutes to check out and will help you to not waste time.

4. Check Out The Guest Posting Guidelines

Most blogs have guest posting guidelines. Most guidelines are part of pages like “Submission Guidelines,” “Write For Us” or something like that.

Guidelines usually tell you:

• How long your post should be. Many blogs would want posts with at least 500 words.
• What you’re allowed to do. Are link-backs ok? Are you allowed to post some bad language?
• How to submit your post. If you’ll get your account for publishing your posts or if you are sending the post via email, etc.
• If you’re being paid for high-quality content. Smaller blogs usually won’t be offering this feature.

Make sure you follow all of the guidelines while posting.

5. Post Interesting Topics

Come up with important and interesting topics. Jot down ideas that the blog hasn’t posted before. If you’re unsure of which topics hasn’t been posted yet, try asking the owner of the blog – he’s always the one who know the best.

6. Proof-Read Before You Publish

When you are sending in a guest post, you will need to send in your best work to create the best impression, especially if you’re guest-posting for the first time. Make sure it’s typo-free and the grammar is correct. If you’re not so good at it, get a friend to take a look and even edit it for you!

Also, don’t feel bad if your post is edited by blog owner. They know what’s good for their blog to gain a better audience.

7. Include A Bio

Remember to include a bio with your post. You can write about yourself and what you do with your blog (if you have one). You should be able to put a link or two to your own blog. (If you’re not sure if you’re allowed, check out the guest posting guidelines (as mentioned before) or find out in other posts.)

That’s it!

All you have to do now is send in the guest post. Send a short email, attach your post, take a big, deep breath then hit the send button.

Oh, and by the way, IntenseBlog (that’s us!) is offering guest-posting! We allow link-backs to your blog. In additional, if you write a high quality, in-depth tutorial, we’re willing to pay you between $20 and $50, depending on the the tutorial’s content! For more info, click here.

I’d love to hear all about your own successes (or “failures” if you don’t mind sharing!) in the comments below!

Even within blogs with a specific focus — ‘small business entrepreneurs‘ for example — there are an infinite array of topics. That reality can be daunting — with so many bloggers out there, how can one person write something new and insightful?

My biggest tip comes first:

Write From Your Own Experience

Generally speaking, our desks and work stations are not the most inspiring places, but they’re where things get done. For jobs requiring creativity, you’ll be far better off if you sit down at your desk with ideas already in place.

These days, you don’t even have to carry a notebook, since smart phones have plenty of note taking capabilities. On a bike ride, a job, the commute home, or even on Sunday afternoon, don’t let something you read or observe slip by if it could serve as fodder for a blog idea.

The best blog post ideas don’t come when you’re sitting at the desk

Remember, your life is interesting, and the observations you make and lessons you learn are relevant to your readers. That’s why they’re reading your blog! Don’t hesitate to incorporate your three-year-old’s propensity for the blue toy truck over the red toy truck into a post about using color in your marketing scheme (marketing conference).

Keep a List

You’ll hear this tip whenever anyone talks about writer’s block, because it’s so critical. Keep that notebook (or smart phone) handy, and translate your ideas into an actual list of possible blog topics. I recommend keeping eight on hand at any time, so that when it’s time to write you can choose whichever seems most relevant or inspiring to you that day. Once you’ve crossed a topic off the list, it’s time to add another (or two more).

Getting eight ideas in writing, and then diligently maintaining your list with fresh concepts, will do wonders for stymieing blogger’s block at the source.

Get Your Blood Flowing

The first two tips are great and all, but you Googled ‘blogger’s block’ looking for help right now, and those require planning. Today, you’re still stuck at your desk and late on deadline.

If you’ve got blogger’s block, chances are that you’re frustrated. It’s difficult to focus and your heart’s just not in it today.

Stand up – right now – and walk outside. Take a lap around the building. Touch your toes to stretch out, or even jump up and down a little bit if you can do so without freaking out co-workers (or scaring your boss). Fill your lungs with a few slow deep breathes and think about the trip to the beach you took last year, or the Saturday you spent hiking with your family recently.

Remember how your kids were negotiating the treats from their bag lunches, then rewarding themselves with a bite of their chocolate bar for every thousand steps up the mountain they took?

Look to your own experiences for inspiration

There’s the intro for your post about savings and self-regulation. If you’re feeling uninspired, relax for a minute and focus on something that makes you happy. Let the ideas come to you.

Call For Help

Journalists don’t write front page newspaper stories based solely on Internet research and their own experience. Even if you don’t have blogger’s block, it’s smart to bring in an expert to comment and quote in your blog. Maybe you’ve got a post idea about ‘The Psychology of Sales’ for some specific product, be it cereal or riding lawnmowers.

Call a psychologist! Look up one in your town, explain to the secretary that you’re a local blogger (with a nationally read blog, of course) and you’d love to get a quick quote from an expert. Chances are, your source will be honored and pleased to have their knowledge called upon. You’ll be left with a post that virtually writes itself through the quotes you collect, and your blog will stand out among others in the same category for its unique content and real perspective.

Chances are, if you’ve got blogger’s block, trudging through uninspired won’t result in a post that’s worth reading. Instead, take a break. Take your mind off of the task at hand and let your memories wander to a relevant experience you can tie into your post. In the future, let those experiences suggest posts as you’re living them, and you’ll nix blogger’s block before it ever appears.

About the author: Christopher Wallace is Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Amsterdam Printing, a leading provider of personalized pens and other promotional products such as imprinted apparel, mugs and customized calendars. He regularly contributes to Promo & Marketing Wall blog.

So what to do if you have just launched a blog and want to attract eyeballs and visitors or even if you have been in the online blogging arena but want to increase your traffic and visitor count.  You need to be creative and keep churning out regular content that makes the wheels of traffic rolling.

Here are some tips that will help you in the overcrowded online blogging sphere:

1. Keep it Simple and Natural

Use simple and plain language that the potential visitor understands and is not overwhelmed by difficult words and long sentences. The content should flow naturally and should normally be short and concise.

The online visitor is fickle and has a short attention span and long posts may force them to shift. If you need to write a long post, break it into two or three posts. This will keep the user engagement levels high as well.

You can also create bullet lists of the various points to be covered in the post to break it down. Paragraphs should be short as you need to break the monotony.

The blog post should normally be about one topic and not cover the whole universe of topics. You have other posts where you can cover the next topic.  The content should be focused. Create a natural style of writing and do not copy others. You will find your own style. It should not sound forced and put on.

Enhance the post with images and video if possible. It makes them interesting. The post can have questions, anecdotes, stories and statistics to keep the user engagement levels high.

2. Check the spelling and grammar

The post should have simple and plain language and should not have basic spelling and grammatical errors. They spoil the user experience and put off visitors. Always proof read before publishing and use a word processor or editor to write.

3. Title , Keywords and Linking

The post should have a clear and meaningful Title that covers the topic. The Title is not only your attention grabber but is very important from an SEO perspective as well.

The post should have clear sub- headings and should be linked to other pages or other informative sources like Wikipedia if required. Don’t stuff keywords but use them judiciously. Don’t go overboard with the internal and external linking in a post.

4. Social Media

With the advent and boom in Social Media, the post should be focused on creating a conversation rather than preaching in a Formal tone. You need to engage the visitor.

They should leave comments on the post and you can reply to them. Speak to the visitors and the conversation will flow.

The post should have the various Social Media icons like Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus, LinkedIn so that the user can promote it to other online friends and you can have the maximum impact with a viral effect.

The last but not the least important tip is to be regular and keep updating the blog.

Happy blogging!

 About Guest Author: Sofia Williams writes for http://www.toyotaplace.com. She likes to contribute to the online sphere by blogging on a vast variety of topics.

If a renegade comment-poster has you feeling down, or is even compromising the look or reputation of your blog, it’s time to find a way to smooth over the discord.

Here are some great steps to figuring out what to do when suffering from a comment section explosion:

1. Honestly consider the comments’ merits.

Let’s admit. Most of the time, people who rant and rave in comment sections are either on a soapbox or have an ulterior motive and are generally going to be impossible to reason with, no matter what you do. But, it’s also important to realize that this is a real user on your site, and you have to take what they say with at least some level of objectivity.

Even if you don’t agree with what this commenter has to say, take some time to recognize the possible merits in what he or she has posted. This will allow you to deal with the situation as impartially as possible.

2. Know when to stay quiet.

If you’ve objectively reviewed the comments and have decided that this person is beyond reason or is simply ranting for the fun of it, then it may be best to refrain from engaging.

When a commenter is worked up, any response from you, no matter how objective, will only add fuel to their fire and make the discord last even longer. If a commenter seems out of line, simply let them talk to themselves, and they will eventually tire of chasing their own tail.

3. If you do respond, do so with respect.

Maybe, after taking stock of the situation, you feel that some sort of response is necessary from the webmaster (you).

Maybe not as a direct reply to the negative comments, but as a way to let your regular readers know that you’ve seen the comments and will deal with the situation accordingly. Or, maybe you want to acknowledge whatever truth is in the negative comments and offer your own perspective.

Whatever you choose to say, be respectful of all parties involved. Post one respectful, but assertive, response, and, if you continue to get negativity back, simply disengage.

4. Publish new distractions.

Instead of placing more and more emphasis on a particular comment section when things go awry, one of the best things to do is publish new and different content as soon as possible. This will push those negative comments further down the tube, making them less obvious, and it will distract your readers from the situation.

Try to choose a subject matter very different from the posts with negative comments so the commenter will not feel compelled to continue the conversation into your new posts.

5. If all else fails, use your right to moderate.

At the end of the day, this is your blog. You have the right to publish and edit comment sections as you see fit. If you feel that a particular commenter is having an unnecessary heyday with your comment section and feel it is truly disrupting the quality of your blog, you can and should exercise your right to simply block that user and delete the posts.

Because open discourse online is so important, this should be a last recourse, but the people who avidly follow your blog will surely agree with and support the decision.

Author Bio: This is a guest post by Susan Wells. Susan is from insurance quote guide, she writes on topics including health/car/life insurance, mortgage, real estate. 

Below are some tips which can help you get maximum benefits from your social media profiles by SEO optimizing them:

Connect All your Social Media Profiles

There are many social networking sites where we can build our social media profiles. To get the most benefits from each of them, we should connect the profiles with each other.

Connecting the profiles enhances the visitors to know about your other profiles. It increases the interaction between the users and company to large extent. The more the users are engaged with the company more is the likeliness of them to convert in sales.

Moreover, connecting several social media profiles gives you the variety in platforms and methods in connecting with their audience, which helps in increasing your audience or online user base. Like on twitter you can attract visitors by tweeting interesting and useful updates about your company and in Facebook you can engage your users by posting cool images, selling them offers running on your site.

Linking social media profiles ensures that all the news of your business is spread on several platforms and will reach wider range of audience.

One thing is common that the motive behind all the online promotion efforts is to drive traffic to your site or business. Eventually all the traffic coming to your site is converted into a lead or a sale.

Highlight Your Content

With changing time many new online promotion methodologies and strategies have evolved but one rule remain constant is that “Content is King”.

Yes, all the efforts can be fruitful only if your content is good and valuable. But just creating good content is not enough it is useful only when there is someone to read it or gain something from it. Here social networks play vital role in promoting your content.

Fresh, unique and valuable content helps in engaging more people to your social media profiles. Promoting your content on social media is also a medium of getting valuable backlinks for your site. Search engines gives value to these links and increase your search engine rankings.

SEO Optimize Your Social Media Profiles

Search engines gives ranking to your social media profiles just like they do with any other web pages. There to get high ranking they can be SEO optimized. Add your targeted and relevant keywords to your profile titles, description and tag section.

Keywords can be also be added to your info section, biography of the profile. They can also be added in the titles of the post you can make.

 About the Author: Kelly Jones writes for Tustin Auto Center. She is a freelance blogger and likes to write about various topics like social media, latest technology trends.

And after a while, you might get a little envious of all of these bloggers who get to try out new things, most of the time for free, all in exchange for a review on their blog. Curious how they got those products to review?

That can all depend on the maturity and popularity of their blog, but it’s likely that most bloggers started in the same general ways.

Stick to a specific blog audience

Tailor your blog to a specific niche market instead of trying to span all avenues of blogging. It’s easier to attract a solid set of readers and to eventually branch into product reviews if your blog has a definitive focus, such as technology or cooking.

But trying to combine two unrelated topics, such as technology and cooking, can make it harder to retain a consistent readership, and most PR people looking for bloggers to review items want the blogger to have a steady readership in place.

Review products on your own accord

When you’re just starting out include regular reviews of products you use on your blog so that you can become a trusted source for truthful product reviews. Your readers will like that they can count on you to test things out first, and companies will be able to see how you review products to determine if you’ll be a good fit for reviewing their products.

Reach out to companies you’re interested in promoting

There’s nothing wrong with pitching yourself to companies if you can give them a good reason to utilize you. Contact companies to see if they’d be interested in partnering with you to review a product in exchange for an open and honest review on your part.

If there’s a mutual benefit then there’s no reason for the company to not be interested in doing so. The worst situation is that they say no and then you’re no worse off than before.

Be candid in your posts

Maintaining a very honest position with your readers is more appealing to readers and companies alike, and you shouldn’t be afraid to point out the pros and cons of whatever product you’re reviewing.

You will be a much more credible source if you’re willing to honestly review something then if everything you review is seemingly perfect.

Get involved

There are plenty of blog networks out there for just about every niche that will put bloggers in touch with potential product reviews that they can do. You can then pick and choose which products you’re interested in, respond, and they’ll send you the product for free… all you have to do is provide the review.

Make contact easy

The only way that companies are going to contact you is if they can easily find your contact information. Have an “about me” page on your blog which details who you are and essentially pitches your blog’s brand to anyone reading. Make your contact information easy to find so that people don’t have to search for how to get in touch with you.

Product reviews aren’t exclusive to the bigger bloggers out there, you just have to know how to market yourself and your blog so that companies want to work with you. So what are you waiting for? Get out there and start reviewing!

Author Bio: Kate Croston is a freelance writer, holds a bachelors degree in Journalism and Mass Communication. She writes guest posts for different sites and loves contributing business internet service related topics. Questions or comments can be sent to:  katecroston.croston09 @ gmail.com.

However, business can suffer when these two components are out of line and off track. Luckily, we have compiled a few tips that will explain how to keep the efforts of your designers and marketing team aligned:

Encourage Two-way Communications

Meetings are generally boring, but when it comes to getting your app design and marketing teams on the same page, they tend to get the job done.

It is the responsibility of leaders to not only bring these two essential departments together, but bring them together in an environment where both can stand on equal footing. This means that either side can step up and let their voice be heard.

Because the mere thought of a meeting or anything close it often makes workers cringe, you may have to get a little creative in terms of setting the mood with the right environment. It will all be worth it when everyone walks out with a clear understanding of what needs to be done.

Review on a Regular

Getting the members of your app design and marketing teams together for a meeting is great. However, getting them to meet on a regular basis is even better. This is the opportunity for these two important units to review and “make sure” everyone is on the same page.

After all, what’s the sense in meeting if everyone either forgets what they are supposed to be doing or worse, aren’t living up to the established expectations? What takes place in these follow-ups may vary from session to session.

Just make sure both teams understand the importance of staying in-tune and updated. That initial meeting is vital, but communication needs to be an ongoing process.

Provide the Tools

You can make the communing between your app designers and marketing crew much easier by providing them with the tools they need to communicate with efficiency. Besides, this is the 21st century, so there is no reason to do without. So what type of tools should you deliver? Well, that all depends, but here are a few to give you an idea of what is available:

Project management software – Basecamp and other project management programs are very useful for setting up projects and delegating tasks to individual team members.

CMS software – Content management system or CMS software is also ideal for project management and collaboration tasks. Many of these programs can be customized to fit the needs of your app design and marketing teams.

Cloud-based software – There are also a variety of cloud-based tools you can use to keep the objectives of your teams aligned. For instance, a simple application like Google Docs can help both parties keep track of campaigns and their respective responsibilities.

Getting your app design and marketing teams on the same level can be the key to continuous business success. Feel free to give these pointers a try when things start sliding off the track.

Here are more than 10 tips of how to increase traffic to your website:

Note: not all tips may work for your website.

1. Write Well And Write Often

Updating your blog with hot content frequently is the best way to get readers to actually read your content. If the content you write is interesting, readers would want to come back to read more!

You then have to write more often so you don’t disappoint your readers! Make sure you ask for their opinions at the end of every posts you write. Include social networking buttons for easy sharing.

2. Submit Your Blog To Search Engines!

This is one of the most important step to increase traffic – and that’s submitting your blog to search engines! Many blog services like WordPress and BlogSpot already include an option for your site – whether if you want your blog to be searched or not. But the negative thing is that search engines crawl around the web – not human. This means that it could take up to months for search engines to finally find you!

However, we could speed up the process. You could start by submitting your blog’s URL to Google (or other search engines). They would then crawl your blog and include your pages and posts in their search results.

Although submitting your blog doesn’t mean your pages and posts would appear at the top of search results, at least your pages are included and hopefully readers can finally find your posts. Posting more “hot” and interesting content would be useful.

3. Use SEO

Many users search up latest and hot news on search engines like Google. Google received over 3 billion daily searches from around the world in 2011. People often visit websites that are at the top of the list.

To help your posts to be on top of the list, websites often use SEO. SEO is one of the best ways to get traffic to your website. In many cases, it can improve your Google page rank.

Here are a few sources for more information about SEO: SEO Book, SEOMOZ, Yoast

4. Use Social Networks To Share Your Contents

Many readers actually go into their social networking accounts to see the latest updates. This could range from their friends’ status updates, to posts they share! Research shows that users click links that they are relevant from two sources:

• pages that they liked (on Facebook) and followed (on Twitter)
• posts that were shared by their friends

With over 465 million accounts on Twitter and 850 million users, you can see why having social networks for your website is a great idea. There are also applications that are specially created to automatically post content to social networks whenever a post is published on your website.

Another tip is to integrate social networking buttons (eg “like” and “tweet”) into every single page/post you published on your website.

5. Add Graphics To Your Posts

A lot of times, websites actually get around 30-50% of the views from Image Searches. This also shows that not all users are interested in searching for the content, but it’s the images they’re looking for! Research has shown that around 40% of the users would read about the actual post while trying to find the image!

If you use your own images, you could ask people to link-back to their post (or website) so your website could actually gain traffic hopefully!

6. Enable Email Subscription

When someone drops by at your website and thinks that they would drop by again later when your website has more posts, there’s a high possibility that he would forget. After all, all of us have busy lives! But there’s a way to solve this – and you guessed it! – email subscription.

You can easily get simple and great email subscription like Google Feedburner, to custom animated, pop-ups with full html, paid email subscription. Get it all set up – then check how many subscribers you’ve got every couple of days. Check which sort of posts the readers are interested in more – and try to post more of that type.

If you are using WordPress, you must try WPSubscribers!

7. Advertisements

This one usually require some money to be spent. Pay-per-click advertising is the one of the most common way to increase website traffic.

Basically, the advertisement’s owner has to pay a certain fee whenever a person clicks on the advertisement which would redirect the person to another website. Though this pay-per-click advertisement service is usually more expensive, it’s however one of the most effective way to increase traffic.

8. Guest Post On Popular Websites

If you write something on your website that is practically not getting any readers reading it, then there’s not really a point. Posting on popular websites, however, does help. You can start by looking for websites that offer guest posting, usually they would even reward with link-back to your website, or even money, if the content you write about is really good.

If you write for a website that would allow you to link-back to your website, then it’s a good start. Most websites now would include author-bio for guest authors where you can put one or two links there. Remember not to over-introduce yourself in the bio – a few sentences about you will do.

Oh, Intense Blog (that’s us!) also allows guest-posting! We allow link-backs to your website. In additional, if you write a high quality, in-depth tutorial, we’re willing to pay you between $20 and $50, depending on the the tutorial’s content! For more info, click here.

9. Link To Your Site From Your Social Networks

Nowadays, many of us already have social networks like Facebook, Twitter, LinkIn and more. In fact, you might be more popular on your social network than to your own website! This is why you should put links into your “About” sections in your profiles.

Another great way is to share your content on your own accounts. Write a few sentences about the post then finally include a link. Putting questions in your sentences like “do you want to know…” and “wouldn’t it be great if you could…” would make your friends think!

However, never share your content more than twice on your social networks. The next second, your friends could be unfriending you!

10. Write A Free eBook

Writing a free eBook can also increase your website traffic! This might be hard for people as this usually takes some time to finish, but if you have the writing skills and have some kind of knowledge about a topic, then I encourage you to start.

After you’re done, try to encourage people to download your free eBook. Most likely, people would click on links (in the eBook) to your site and read more about it.

Just a few tips in the eBook – use text that is moderately large and easy-to-read font. Remember to include lots of pictures and graphs where necessary!

If you often share videos on YouTube, remember to put one or two links in your video!

11. Tag Your Posts!

It only take a few seconds to add tags to your posts! Like links, search engines search for tags to find out the best posts for people! They help readers to find your blog when they search search engines, especially search engines.

Any more tips you want to include? Did you find the tips helpful? Let us know all of your opinions in the comments below!

Kind of. A big mistake that a lot of bloggers make is that they get so caught up in marketing that they end up hurting their blog instead of helping it. Overkill is a very real thing. So how do you determine if you’re doing too much marketing?

1. You’re only focused on getting links

The focus of your blog should be to provide readers with relevant and pertinent information that benefits them in hopes that they will then link to you.

When your focus shifts to only acquiring links around the web the quality of your blog immediately lessens, and over time this can be to the detriment of your blog. Links are important, but they aren’t the only thing.

2. You’re losing readership

Once your blog posts shift to more promotional and less valuable content you inevitably start to lose readers.

This has a lot to do with the fact that your readers don’t want it slammed in their face that you’re making money off of them. Subtlety is a better approach to keeping readers around and expanding your audience.

3. Your posts have taken on a robot-like tone

When each post written is fueled by ulterior motives such as dropping links, pushing products, or inserting SEO keywords, then your posts start to take on a more robot-like tone instead of the conversational one that most readers enjoy.

Blog for your audience; they’re the ones that are going to provide you with the best organic links, and they want to feel valued.

4. You’re attempting every marketing tactic in the book

This is called overkill. Instead of trying to do a little bit of everything in terms of marketing and promotions, try focusing on a few key marketing tactics and doing them well.

You’ll be much more effective when you’re whole-heartedly doing one or two methods then when you’re half-way doing ten. Remember: quality over quantity, always.

 5. You ignore tried and true practices

Interacting with your readers on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter are great ways to market without it coming across as marketing and to give your blog some life. Don’t just link to new posts on these sites either, but actually talk to readers.

By giving your blog a likeable personality – both on and off the blog – you become a resource that is infinitely more appealing, and people want to interact with your blog and share it. Be human.

Blog marketing is tricky business, especially when you’re making your income from your blog. Don’t make the mistake of doing too much marketing and thus turning away your readers. They want to feel like they’re the driving force behind your blog, not that making money is what fuels your writing. Sometimes less really is more.

Author Bio: This is a guest post from Laura Backes, she enjoys writing about all kinds of subjects and also topics related to internet service providers in my area.  You can reach her at: laurabackes8 @ gmail.com.