Content creation in itself can sometimes be a handful and certain components of it require some sort of visual component. Some people have designers at hand to take care of any visual input required but due to one reason or another, situation dictates that others take on this component as well. Not all of us have natural design skills which makes taking on this task a little daunting. But, taking on the task of creating visuals doesn’t need to be daunting if you follow a few simple steps. This DIY design slideshow by HubSpot outlines a few tips to consider when you find yourself in a situation where you need to take visual content into your own hands.

The post The Marketers 10 Commandments of DIY Design appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

About 3 weeks ago, the following question was posed by a New Zealand based Twitter user:

Does anyone know where we can find NZ demographic stats on twitter users?? There must be somewhere?? #curious

— Dickson Lawrence Ng (@ng_dickson) March 15, 2013

I too became a bit curious and tried to hunt around for the answer but I couldn’t find anything useful and most of the responses to his question directed him towards good old Google which didn’t seem to come up with anything useful either.

I just came across some stats on the number of Kiwis signed up to various social networks (as at March 2013) that may be useful:

Source: Adcorp

The number of Facebook users came as no surprise but I would have expected the number of Twitter users to be higher than the current 308,428. One inclusion on the list that made me chuckle was Bebo and I found it surprising that people actually still use it?

Do you have any other sources for  New Zealand Social Media statistics?

The post New Zealand Social Media Statistics, March 2013 appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

Affiliate marketing is an avenue through which a number of bloggers chose to monetise their sites. A handful of them have managed to integrate affiliate marketing into their blogs and got it working to the point where it generates a considerable amount of income.

In order to get to a point where a blog is making a comfortable amount of money via affiliate marketing, the blogger needs to know what they are doing. It’s not something that happens over night and there are a few things that bloggers need to learn about affiliate marketing.

Just like with almost everything in life, there are a few basics that bloggers need to grasp before they dive in. The basics include knowing what affiliate marketing is, all the associated terminology, knowing your audience, choice of program(s), available tools and so on and so forth.

The Internet has a wealth of knowledge on the topic. Some of that content you have to pay for, some of it is free, some is good and some is bad. LinkShare, an affiliate network that I am a publisher with recently put together a presentation that covers the basics of affiliate marketing. The presentation is pretty basic and someone who has been at affiliate marketing for a while may find a little trivial but, for those who are just starting out or thinking about getting into it, it does provide some good information and tips to set you on the path to success.

Click here to join LinkShare – One network, hundreds of merchants, unlimited earning potential.

As already mentioned, it is a good start for those new to affiliate marketing but it is not the be all and end all. It takes work, a lot of educating yourself, trying and testing various methods, all of which will take time. If you stick at it long enough and get to know it inside out and implement it effectively, it will pay-off and become a viable revenue stream.

Do you have any 101 Affiliate Marketing tips not covered in the presentation that you can share?

The post Affiliate Marketing 101 Video Tutorial for Bloggers appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

I have been fortunate in my life to have travelled to various parts of the world and experienced different countries, cultures, people, foods, sights, sounds, smells and everything else that travel has to bring. This has also meant dealing with a number of travel agents in that time but on the odd occasion it has been easy enough and cheaper to do everything online.

Last Christmas my family and I travelled to Zimbabwe and booked all of our flights and accommodation through Flight Centre Botany. The whole experience of organising our travel arrangements through them had to be the best I’ve have had with any travel agent. My reasons for this (in no particular order of importance) are as follows:

Product Knowledge

One thing that I find disappointing when making purchases is dealing with a sales associate who doesn’t have a good grasp of what they are selling. I was pleasantly surprised at Flight Centre because they were knowledgeable about the products and services they are selling. Besides giving the most convenient flight options, they also provided us with other alternatives. The alternative meant spending a bit more time in the air and stopovers in 3 countries but they did allow us to break up the journey, spend a couple of days at the destinations and still come in a little cheaper than options with the most direct routing for travel at that time of the year.

I have had experiences where I have had to be the one to tell an agent to look at various routes that could be an option and when the conversation comes to that, the only thing I want to do is kindly thank them for the time, walk out the door and go somewhere else.

Lowest Airfare Guarantee

As mentioned earlier, I will hunt around for a bargain before letting go of my hard earned cash. That said, I’m a proponent for scouring the web for deals because more often than not, you are bound to find a good deal on an online booking site. But, in situations where I’m travelling to Zimbabwe and making multiple stopovers on the way, I feel more comfortable dealing with a person in a brick and mortar store and someone I can easily contact for help with any travel related issues that may arise en-route.

That said, Flight Centre has a price beat guarantee so if I do find a fair that beats what they are offering they will beat. In my last interaction with them, they matched a fair I found online which meant a couple of hundred extra dollars per person of spending money for our stopovers.

Exceptional Customer Service

Attentive and friendly consultants who paid attention to and listened to our travel needs made the decision of giving them a considerable amount of money easier. They answered all of our questions, some of which were difficult and some which might have seemed silly to the best of their knowledge and if they didn’t know the answer, they set out to find it and got back to us with a quick phone call or via email.

To add to that, we paid for part of the travel using a 12 month interest free finance offer they were running. Unfortunately, this was not automatically applied to our account and we only realised it after we got back to NZ and when the offer had since expired. After explaining the situation to them, they did a considerable amount of leg work to find a solution and fortunately enough (for us), they we able to apply the interest free facility. That for me was them having gone above and beyond my expectations.

The list above isn’t extensive but the service we received was more than enough for me to not only go back to book our next getaway with them but to also recommend them to others.

So, if you are thinking of booking flights and accommodation and live close enough to Flight Centre Botany, I would recommend you visiting Paul, Hashika and the rest of them team to see what sort of a package they can put together for you.

The post Why I Recommend Flight Centre Botany For Your Travel Needs appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

When formulating any sort of strategy, there are various elements that need to be put together in order for it to work. The same goes for content marketing which entails having to make use of various elements such as the content itself, audience and channels you use to drive traffic (just to name a few) in order for it to be effective.

Using a burger as an analogy, Mark Smiciklas put together a simple graphic to show the necessary components needed for successful content marketing. The components have been broken down into 5 elements which include, AUDIENCE, CONTENT THEME, VOICE & TONE, CONTENT FORMAT and a BUN (CHANNELS).

What I like about it is that it shows how all of the elements fit together to form a burger (STRATEGY) and get you thinking about how if one component was missing; the sauce for example (voice and tone) then the burger won’t quite be a burger!

The post The Content Marketing Strategy Burger [INFOGRAPHIC] appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

Everyday, people and companies dive into the world of social media be it for brand awareness, generating leads, engaging with people, spying on competitors and the list goes on. Some people (more so businesses) sign up to various platforms without any sort of plan or thought about what they want to achieve and how they are going to achieve it. This can see them signing up to every single social network out there that they can think of. But, as a business or brand, you don’t have to be on every network because they all work in different ways and serve different purposes. That said, one network will garner better results than another and with all of that information at hand you won’t waste your time on a network that really isn’t worth your while.

What networks to choose to use is an example of some of the things that need to be considered when getting into social media and could or probably should be looked at as part of your social media strategy. Various strategies are formulated at various levels within a business and for social media efforts to be effective, there needs to be a discussion about “strategy“!

I recently came across this short video where Michael Stelzner (Founder of Social Media Examiner) interviewed Dave Fleet (Vice President of Digital at Edelman) about the use of social media by businesses. Amongst other things, the interview touches on taking a look at it from a strategic point of view. All in all, it is a good watch that gets your mind thinking about what you are doing, why you are doing it, how you are doing it, what you are hoping to get out of it and your definition of success!

Did the interview get you thinking about your approach to social media?

The post What Is Your Social Media Strategy? appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

Black Friday just started in the USA and most people living in New Zealand who know about it can only wish that they could take advantage of all the crazy deals being offered by all sorts of retailers on all sorts of items. But, New Zealand Post just introduced a service (YouShop) that gives Kiwis a US delivery address which then allows them to shop online from retailers that for example only ship within the US. All purchases are shipped to that address and NZ Post ships those items to you in NZ at a pretty reasonable cost.

What is Black Friday?

That said, there are countless numbers of online stores offering an array of deals on anything from electronics to beauty products, domain names, clothing, shoes and the list goes on, whatever you are looking for, you are bound to find it somewhere.

Here is short list of sites to visit to start your Black Friday bargain hunt:

• Amazon.com - the world’s largest online retailer that sells a wide range of items. Amazon is available in just about every country in the world but there are shipping restrictions on some items such as electronics to New Zealand.

• Buy.com – they pride themselves as being the The Internet Superstore™. Just like Amazon, they offer a wide range of products at  affordable prices.

• Newegg.com – an e-retailer that caters mostly to tech-enthusiats and offers a wide range electronics products at very reasonable prices.

If you want to take advantage of these offers, you better get in quick because they are only going to be there for a very short period of time!

The post Black Friday Deals Are Now More Accessible To New Zealanders appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

There are so many upsides to living in New Zealand and just like everywhere else in the world, there are downsides. One of the downsides for those who love a bargain and want to get their hands on all sorts of sales items (mostly from US based e-tailers) is that a number of them DO NOT ship to New Zealand.

To counter that problem, a handful of companies such as BuyUSA set up shop to provide an avenue through which Kiwis can set up a US shipping address, buy whatever they need, get these items sent to that address after which they would be forwarded to NZ by BuyUSA.

New Zealand Post has just announced a new service, YouShop which offers a similar service to what is already out there BUT, there are some points of difference that make it more appealing.

The Benefits of YouShop

• Cost – their rates start at NZ$17.25 for 500g. The postage is calculated at NZ$12.50 per parcel plus NZ$4.75 per 500g with the minimum chargeable weight being 500g. These rates are very competitive especially when you look at the fact that you could see yourself paying about NZ$60 with other shipping service providers

• Trust - Kiwis have come to know and trust NZ Post to deliver their mail over the years and who better to have handle your purchases and ship them to you in NZ?

• Quick Delivery and Tracking – the target delivery dates for packages are set at 7 – 11 business days and an added advantage is that you can track the progress of your parcel along the way.

• Insurance – each parcel is covered up to NZ$250 by NZ Post and additional cover of up to NZ$1500 can be purchased for only NZ$6.

With a number of the consumer goods being sold in NZ costing a lot more than what you can get them for in other countries such as the United States, this will be a welcome service to a number of Kiwis. It has also come at the perfect time of the year with Christmas being just around the corner. That said, they are running a promotion that will see you saving 10% on postage costs by entering the code YouShopBF1 up until 9 December 2012 (just make sure to ship your item before 12 December to get them in time for Christmas).

What are your thoughts on this service and do you see yourself using it any time soon?

The post Get A USA Delivery Address With YouShop & Ship To New Zealand appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

Over the last few years, social media has taken off in a big way and this has seen a number of businesses of all shapes and sizes taking to various social networks in an effort generate more leads. The number of people signing up to the various networks has grown exponentially with Facebook alone recently hitting the 1 billion user mark and Twitter passing the 500 million user mark earlier in the year.

Having so many people signed up to and using various social networks presents opportunities for business to market themselves. But, the vast number of users creates a problem of “noise”. People share anything and everything on social media and this can make it challenging for businesses when prospecting for leads.

That said, “noise” could put businesses off social media but this doesn’t need to be the case because there are technologies that can be employed that comb through the web and look for targeted leads.

NeedTagger is one such technology that helps you search for new leads on Twitter. It works in such a way where you set up a custom stream of opportunities based on audience, location and need (based on keywords). It then goes on to monitor and detect Twitter users based on your specifications. An email is then sent out to on a daily basis with a list of these opportunities to whom you can respond to accordingly be it answering questions or directing them to your landing pages and so on.

An added bonus with NeedTagger is that it is available in the HootSuite App Directory. This means that not only do can you manage your social media efforts in one dashboard, you can also prospect for leads within HootSuite.

The only down side that I have come across (for someone like me who lives outside the US) is that the location targeting option is limited to US cities. All in all, it looks like a tool that could make lead generation a whole lot easier.

The post Prospecting For Leads On Twitter With NeedTagger appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

Kris Jones is an entrepreneur who is no stranger to making money online with the internet seeing him become a millionaire. Over the years he has worked on a number of projects which include starting Pepperjam which was bought by GSI Commerce (now owned by eBay), a best selling book and an investment fund KBJ Capital which has interests in a number of internet based companies.

A little while ago I came across a presentation (video below) that he gave at NEPA BlogCon, “Monetizing Your Blog and Internet Presence”. During the presentation he not only talks about 4 ways of making money online, he also talks about his start in the online world, lessons he has learned along the way and strategies to making a lot of money.

The 4 Ways of Monetising Your Blog

1. Sell Placements (Advertising Space)

• focus on a niche and sell placements on your site to people who want to get in front of your audience
• create opportunities on your blog for placements
• devise a strategy for reaching out to people who may be interested in placements on your site

2. Affiliate Marketing

• post affiliate links within content from networks such as PepperJam, CJ, Shareasale, Linkshare and Google Affiliate Network
• this can be seen as being more risky as you are getting paid on a performance basis versus a fixed placement payment where you could for example get paid $500/month from an advertiser
• traffic is a factor on how much you can make via affiliate marketing

3. Display Advertising/Google AdSense

• contextual based advertising that usual pays on a per click basis (revenue share)
• can add value to your readers by displaying relevant ads
• a good supplemental tool to paid placements and affiliate marketing
• it is not recommended as the number one way of making money online

4. Subscriptions

• charging readers a monthly fee for access to premium content
• a good way of making money if you can crack it because it is continuity based

What are your thoughts about Kris’s 4 ways on monetising your blog and do you have any other methods that have worked for you?

The post Kris Jones On 4 Sure-fire Ways of Monetising Your Blog appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

Expedia recently launched their “Find Yours” marketing campaign which is a little different to what you would expect from a company that helps people plan and purchase anything to do with travel and providing them with the best deals from across the globe. As part of the campaign, they use a short film that features a man struggling to come to terms with his daughter’s pending marriage to a woman (video below).

It is not everyday that you see Expedia send out an LGBT (Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) themed brand message that Expedia Vice President & General Manager, Joe Megibow says is not targeted at the LGBT community but at “everyone” with the “Find Yours” page stating the following:

Since the release of the video at the start of October, it has had well over 2 million views so there is no denying that it was an excellent piece of content marketing. But given the sensitivities associated with the content they chose to feature, it may leave some people with questions.

Even though the LGBT travel industry is worth an estimated $65 billion per year, do you think such a brand message could backfire on them? Was it worth it for them to take such a stance and create this kind of content for their marketing campaign?

The post Expedia’s “Find Yours” Marketing Campaign appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

One today’s top stories in New Zealand news is the Ministry of Social Development privacy breach where it was discovered that private details of thousands of clients were left openly accessibly on public kiosks in Work and Income (WINZ) offices. The story was broken by blogger Keith Ng who was tipped off about the security flaws. He went into a WINZ office himself and accessed supposedly “secure” files, blogged about it and then alerted the Acting Privacy Commissioner about the issue.

One thing that he wrote at the end of the post was how long it took him to compile the story and asked for a donation by writing the following:

The link directs readers to his Givealittle (an online giving platform) donation page ‘MSD’s Leaky Servers’ where he set a target of $1,500 NZD. As of writing this post, the donations made have gone past his target with a total of $3,921 NZD donated so far.

His article is a classic example of valuable content, content that readers have been willing to pay for and have paid for to the point were he is $4,000 richer. It just goes to show that providing valuable content pays off!

The post Make Money Blogging By Asking For Donations Like Keith Ng appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

HootSuite is the main tool I choose to use to manage my social media accounts because it has a number of features which make the whole process a lot easier. A functionality that they recently added to the Hootlet browser extension is auto scheduling which they aptly named AutoSchedule. The AutoSchedule feature allows you to schedule social media messages without you having to manually set the times at which they go out. It determines the optimal time to send out messages to maximise reach and impact; see it in action in the video below:

Some the content I share is from blogs I follow via Google Reader. In the past I almost always used to use Buffer to schedule them (and still do on occasion) but with the introduction of AutoSchedule, I find myself using it more and more. If you have Buffer’s browser extension installed, it will be automatically added to Google Reader. HootSuite has not yet added this functionality which makes the process of sharing reader content a multi-step process which can get tedious. But, if you do want to share Google Reader content via Hootlet, there is a work around that reduces the steps and makes it easier to schedule posts.

ADDING HOOTSUITE TO GOOGLE READER

1. Click on “Reader Settings” which is under “Options” in the top right corner

2. Click on the “Send To” tab

3. Click on “Create a custom link” at the bottom of the page

4. Enter the HootSuite parameters (below) in the fields provided and save

• Name: HootSuite Hootlet (You can name it whatever you like)
• URL: http://hootsuite.com/twitter/bookmark-tool-v2?address=${url}&title=${title}
• URL UPDATE (you can also use the following):

http://hootsuite.com/hootlet/load?address=${url}&title=${title}

• Icon URL: http://hootsuite.com/favicon.ico

SCHEDULING MESSAGES FROM GOOGLE READER TO HOOTLET

Now that a custom HootSuite Hootlet Send To link has been saved, it will appear within your Google Reader where you will be able to share and schedule updates. By clicking in the “Send To” tab at the bottom of each post, the link created above will appear as an option in the drop down menu.

Clicking on “Hootsuite Hootlet” will open a new page containing the post title and link to the post where you can select the network(s) to post to, edit the message and auto-schedule. When you click to schedule the message the window will automatically close with you message set to go out from HootSuite at an optimal time.

What do you think about using this HootSuite functionality via Google Reader in this way?

If you haven’t tried HootSuite, sign up for a Free 30 Day Trial of HootSuite Pro.

The post How To Integrate HootSuite Hootlet Into Google Reader & AutoSchedule Messages appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

It’s not hard to go online and find email marketing over social media marketing advocates as well as those who say no to email marketing and are pro social media marketing. As far as marketing goes, both of these mediums have different offerings and will garner different results. For that reason, some people may chose to use one over the other but, is there any harm in integrating them?

Michael Stelzner (founder and CEO of Social Media Examiner) recently interviewed Christopher Penn (director of inbound marketing at What Counts) who explained how email and social media marketing can work well together to leverage content. In the video he covers a number of points which include why you need to use both, how to integrate them to get what he calls the new media trinity of content (such as your blog), conversation (social media) and distribution (email) to get the most out of your marketing efforts. He also goes on to share some insights into podcasting and what it means for business as well as the importance of going mobile and especially so in this day in age.

Email and Social Media Marketing Integration.

Which form of marketing do you use?

The post Email Marketing or Social Media Marketing or Integration? appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

At the end of last month as part of a ‘spring cleaning’ drive, Google announced that they would be retiring Adsense for feeds. This means that if you currently aren’t using the product, as of October 2nd, you won’t have the option of selecting it and if you are serving ads on your RSS feeds via Adsense, on December 3rd, Adsense ads will stop serving on feeds.

Given the close relation between Adsense for feeds and FeedBurner and the ‘neglect’ that FeedBurner has been experiencing over the months and possibly even years, a number of online authorities are speculating that FeedBurner will soon follow suite and be retired. But, Feedburner being retired is all just speculation for now and only time will tell what Google does with it.

In the meanwhile, there will be a few publishers out there looking for an Adsense for Feeds alternative and here are a couple of options to take into consideration:

1. BuySellAds RSS Feed Ads

BuySellAds is an ad marketplace that connects advertisers and publishers. Besides the traditional method of serving ads on sites, they offer solutions covering a range of mediums with one of them being RSS. They have a tool which allows publishers to monetise their feeds by offering ad spots to interested advertisers (watch the video below for a brief description).

2. RevResponse RSS to Email

RevResponse is a platform that allows publishers to earn money by offering free ebooks, magazines and white papers which can see them earning $1.50 to $20 per lead. They have a tool that automatically converts RSS feeds into email newsletters in which they include the resources mentioned above from publishers to earn revenue on any downloads.

Would you consider any of the options mentioned above or do you have a better alternative?

The post Life After Adsense For Feeds; What Are The Alternatives appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

Business cards have been around for a very long time serving as networking and marketing tools for businesses and individuals. In the digital age that we now live in, there has been a rapid increase in the number of people who have smartphones. A number of these smartphone users may prefer to store the contact details of an individual or business on their device rather then receiving a card. An easy way of getting around this could be to add a QR to a business card so that all that the person with whom you want share your details with has to do is scan the code.

MOO, one of the leading providers of customised business cards, minicards and postcards has taken it a step further with the introduction of an NFC (near field communication) enabled business card. This means that all you need to do to share information is touch your business card to an NFC-enabled smartphone which couldn’t be any easier (watch the video below).

As of Thursday, the first 150,000 to place an order of MOO Business Cards will receive a free NFC-enabled card. The cards will come preprogrammed with the users contact information but the cards can be rewritten. MOO are also working on an Android App to make it easier for users to get their cards to do what they want them to do.

If you don’t want to wait until 2013 to get your hands on an NFC Business Card, make sure to order your MOO Business Cards TODAY; before they hit the 150,000 limit.

The post MOO NFC-enabled Business Cards; Making Networking & Marketing Easier appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

My brother flew to Zimbabwe a few days ago and during the process of preparing for his departure he estimated that he would have about 80 to 100 kgs of luggage in total. This presented him with a little challenge that he had to solve. His flights were booked with Emirates who offer a 30 kilograms standard checked baggage allowance in economy but that wasn’t anywhere near enough allowance to allow him to get everything across to his destination.

With that in mind, he was aware of the fact that he was going to need to find a service to get the bulk of his luggage to Harare. The first option that came to mind was paying for excess baggage with Emirates but that idea was quickly scrapped because more often that not, majority of the airlines charge ridiculous rates. To humor himself, he took a look at what they would charge and; Yup!, the rates were ridiculous! The following are the rates for additional baggage with Emirates:

Online purchase of additional allowance:
- 5 kgs or less: NZD 360
- 10 kgs or less: NZD 720
- 15 kgs or less: NZD 1080
- 20 kgs or less: NZD 1440
- 25 kgs or less: NZD 1800

Excess baggage rates at the airport
- Price per kilogram: NZD 90

The final weight for his excess baggage came up to 52 kgs and by looking at the rates above, you can do the math and see that; that option was not at all viable. The only other option that came to mind was shipping the luggage off via a freight forwarder or excess baggage shipping provider.

After doing a bit of research, the best option seemed to be shipping via an excess baggage provider. The most economical option that he could find quoted him $9.50 per kilo plus a documentation fee of about $125. That seemed a lot more reasonable and he was about to take up the offer until he remember reading an article about Emirates SkyCargo increasing it’s dedicated freighter services into Harare. This prompted him to get in touch with them to see if they had anything to offer and to his delight, they did.

Not only did they have an option, their service turned out to be the most economical at $7 per kilogram plus a $101 documentation fee to cover incidentals such customs and security clearance. The grand total to ship 52 kgs from Auckland to Harare with SkyCargo came up to $465.

The Benefits of Emirates SkyCargo

• You don’t have to be flying Emirates to use their services: you just need to provide them with a copy of your ticket
• You can drop your luggage off to the at airport on day of departure (in his case we dropped it off on our way to International Departures [and allowed 30 minutes processing time])
• It only takes 3 to 4 days for your items to reach their destination
• You can track your items every step of the way

All three pieces that he shipped off got to Harare as promised, in a timely manner and nothing was damaged! My brother’s comments on the service, “I couldn’t have asked for anything more”.

The next time you are travelling and have a lot of luggage that could see you paying a lot more than you need to or maybe even afford, think about giving Emirates SkyCargo a call to see if they can make you an offer that could see you saving hundreds and maybe even thousands of dollars.

Do you know of any other options that could see you saving more?

The post Emirates SkyCargo, An Economical Excess Baggage Option From New Zealand To The World appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

I recently came across this infographic that clearly outlines the inbound marketing process in a step by step fashion. As more and more people come to realise the importance of inbound marketing in generating more customer leads, more and more people are putting out material on the topic. The information out there can all get a little overwhelming and what I like about this illustration is that it gives a good, brief overview of the process from start to finish and the main actions that need to be carried out to create an effective campaign.

This graphic was designed by IMPACT Branding & Design using data from HubSpot, a leading Inbound Marketing System.

The post The Inbound Marketing Process [Infographic] appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

I for one am a person who would easily say that there just aren’t enough hours in the day to deal with everything that life throws at you and then add some marketing into that mix as well. For others, this sentiment may extend into not having the required budget and/or resources for that matter and these probably are valid concerns to have.

But, if you fall into the above, you might rethink those sentiments after watching this very short video where C.C. Chapman gives some quick and valuable insight into the world of content marketing:

C.C. Chapman ~ @cc_chapman is amongst other things, the author of: Content Rules: How to Create Killer Blogs, Podcasts, Videos, Ebooks, Webinars (and More) That Engage Customers and Ignite Your Business (New Rules Social Media Series) and Amazing Things Will Happen: A Real World Guide on Achieving Success and Happiness

This was an interview was done by Mark Schaefer ~ @markwschaefer, who is amongst other things the author of: Return On Influence: The Revolutionary Power of Klout, Social Scoring, and Influence Marketing

Has this 3:30min video convinced you that there is no excuse to not getting into content marketing?

The post C.C. Chapman & No Excuses For Not Doing Content Marketing appeared first on Ninetynine Ways.

Once a blog is up and running, some site administrators get to work on setting up and growing an email list.They employ various methods which include sign-up forms strategically placed on various parts of the site, pop-ups, toolbars and the list goes on and on. One question that some may ask is “why have a list?”; which can be simply answered by saying that the list presents a marketing opportunity for your site, product(s) or business.

As far as blogs go, one thing that a lot of them have is commenters. If they aren’t already subscribers, there are a couple of methods that can be implemented to encourage them to sign-up to your list when they leave a comment. These are as follows:

1. Comment Redirect

I recently left a comment on a blog and after clicking the submit button, I was taken through to a thank-you page and one where I was encouraged to subscribe to an email list. I ended up subscribing to the list and after which I emailed the blogger to find out how he managed to set that up; the answer, via a plugin!

Comment Redirect is a plugin that directs first time commenters to any page of your liking. As in the case of the example above, the easiest and probably most effective thing to do would be to set-up a page with a short thank-you message and directly under that encourage the commenter to sign-up to list and of course add a signup form to make the process nice and easy for them.

What I like about this plugin (besides the fact that you are taken through to a thank-you page) is that commenters are only redirected the first time that they leave a comment. They are not redirected to the page for subsequent comments they may make which is a good thing because it could get annoying for those leaving multiple comments on a site.

2. Subscribe Checkbox

Another method to encourage commenters to subscribe is by placing a check box underneath the comments box. This method makes it easy for commenters to subscribe as they have already entered their name and email address as part of the commenting process. When they leave a comment with the box checked, their details are automatically added to your list.

There are a couple of ways through which you can add this extra checkbox to your blog.

The first being via the use of the WP-Leads plugin (free). It is a simple plugin to use but is somewhat limited as it only integrates with MailChimp, Constant Contact and SalesForce.com.

The second is by using the Subscribers Magnet plugin (paid) by Maxblogpress. One plus about using this plugin is that it integrates with any email marketing software versus the 3 that WP-Leads offers. To add to that, Subscribers Magnet also provides a variety of other channels through which you can grow your list and these include footer forms, sidebar opt-in forms and personal emails to commenters just to name a few; and best of all, all of this can be achieved using only one plugin.

If you haven’t already done so, you could give these simple methods a try to see if they can boost your subscriber numbers.

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