• Content is king because your clients/customers/site visitors expect that your site will educate them
• Content is king because clear, thoughtful and education content functions as currency and your customers will trade their time and their business for that currency
• Content is king because new content is constantly being added to the marketplace of ideas – if you put up a 10 page web site three years ago that has not been touched since, there is absolutely no reason that anyone will assign any value to that content
• Content is king because very bright people working late at night are constantly devising new distribution channels for that content – Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Digg, etc.   Content is so valuable to the publishers that the owners of these distribution channels will host your content at no cost to you because they know that the public demands fresh content.
• Content is king because the Internet is primarily an educational tool.
• Content is king because clear and concise writing is rare.
• Content is king because human beings yearn to learn and to connect and the Internet offers a place for both.
• Content is king because the Internet is like a television with tens of millions of channels – and good content helps you get found.

Almost weekly, I get emails from blog or web site owners that go something like this:

I am in the process of developing a more substantial online presence.  I noticed your blog and that it receives a lot of traffic, and am wondering whether you would be interested in a reciprocal link arrangement whereby we link to your blog and website and, in return, you link to our website on your blog.  Our site is at _____.   We will be adding a "Resources" page that will include links and brief descriptions of useful sites for bankruptcy information, and would include a reference to your blog on that page.

Here is how I read this message:   "Hello, you do not know me but I see you have an established blog that has been around for 5 years, appears regularly in the organic search results and has a high Google PageRank.  I have a new website that has a few pages of content and has not yet been indexed by Google, Yahoo or Bing.  I want you to give me a site wide blogroll link from your site to help put my site on the map.  In exchange, I'll put you on a "links" page on my site, when I get around to adding such a page.  I sincerely hope you don't know that "links" pages are ignored by the search engines, meaning that a link from a "links" page is totally worthless."

Not surprisingly, asking for a link from an established site when you have nothing to trade is a waste of your time and it is a waste of your potential link partners' as well.

Similarly, if your site still contains a "links" or "resources" page, you are shouting to the world that you do not know what you are doing and/or that your linking tactics are vintage 1990.   With very few exceptions, "links" pages have no search engine value.  Next time you see one, look at the PageRank indicator on your Google Toolbar (or at PageRankLookup) you can check for yourself.

So what should you do if you have a new site?  Here are a few suggestions that would work for me:

1. if you have another, more established site, offer a link from that site
2. offer to write an article for your target site – but make sure that your article has some relevant, meaty content.  If you really want to impress your target's editor, offer to write a second article that you will include on your site that contains a link back to your target's site
3. if you have friends or colleagues who have established blogs, ask if they will accept a post (written by you or by your target) that contains a link back to the target
4. offer to write an article for the benefit of your target for EzineArticles.com or another major article directory.  Even better, offer to write several articles for multiple article directories
5. offer to bookmark several of your target's blog posts on one or more social bookmarking sites.
6. offer to write reviews for Google local, Kudzu, Avvo if applicable
7. offer to pay for the link back to your new site
8. offer to distribute video content on behalf of your target on TubeMogul
9. offer to record and produce a screen capture video for your target
10. offer to translate (or have translated) one or more pages of your target's site into Spanish or another language
11. offer to write and set up an autoresponder series for your target on AWeber or Constant Contact
12. offer to buy 50 stock photo credits at iStockPhoto or another stock photo site
13. offer to locate 5 or 10 badges for your target's blog – badges are seals that look like awards that may help a blog's credibility
14. offer to record an interview with your target and to provide target publisher with the audio file

Generally, put yourself in the shoes of a busy blogger – what can you do to help your target blog publisher save time?  Any other ideas about what a new site owner can offer an established site owner to justify a valuable link?

These are some of the most effective strategies to get the best results with search engines:

1) Speak Your Audience’s Language – This means use the exact words and phrases that your visitors would type into search engines. Don’t use scientific or unfamiliar jargon when writing about your products or services on your site. Make your phrases simple and use common words to describe your product or service. When people use a search engine, they most commonly describe what they’re trying to achieve, or what problem they are attempting to solve rather than your specific product or service, which may not be popular yet.

2) Make Search Engines Happy – Once you speak your audience’s language, it’s important to appear high on the search engine results page to increase your visitors. Certain information can be used in your site to appeal to the search engine spiders, which will be determining your rank. Search engine spiders like keywords that are relevant, valuable, descriptive, and informative.

Spiders look at your title tag first to figure out what your site is about, and because it also appears in the actual search engine results, it’s important that your title tag appeal to both potential visitors and the search engines. Include your most important keywords in your headlines and use them again in your content to show search engines that your site’s content is all related and relevant.

Organization is also very important to search engines. Trying to trick search engines by including words that are not relevant but may increase your ranks will not work and will only anger the spiders. Make sure all your information and content is clear, relevant, and easy to navigate. In short, the more clearly you indicate what your site is through use of quality keywords, the better your chances are of getting higher rankings.

3) Continue to Update – It’s inevitable that search engine optimization strategies will change and search engine spiders will continue to get smarter and develop new ways to determine rankings. You must constantly keep an eye on your keywords and be flexible to making changes to make sure your site keeps its ranking.

Another good way of staying up to date is by adding a blog to your website. This is easily achieved and can have extraordinary effects on driving traffic to your site.

If you have any further questions about any of the above-mentioned techniques, please contact Rent-My-Brain or leave a comment on the blog.

People’s actions differ depending on their economic situations. During the current economic crises, people handle their money differently. With less money to spend, marketing efforts must be directed to a new type of consumer. I am going to cover three new demographics that are important to understand for effective marketing strategies.

The Newly Frugal Person – These people are comfortable financially and have not lost their jobs or their homes. However, with all the news of endless financial disasters and the overwhelming depressed mood of the country, they are smarter with their spending. Rather than making purchases without thought, the newly frugal person examines their purchases closely. They will be attracted to goods that offer significant value and quality, rather than a short-term thrill. The newly frugal person is attracted to long-term, stable investments and wants to increase their savings to counteract the depressed mood of the current economy.

The Newly Cash Rich Person – This demographic differs between ages. The older of the newly cash rich have pulled their money from their investments and now have it to put somewhere secure, such as investment in real estate. The younger of the newly cash rich are people who have recently graduated from college, and while they know they should be saving money for their future, they want to spend a little for their enjoyment.

The New Entrepreneurial Person – A natural consequence of a recession is that people lose their jobs. Of these newly laid off people, some become entrepreneurs and establish bank accounts for their business, second phone lines, inventory, and spend more time meeting potential business partners and clients.

By understanding these three new demographics and what they are looking for, it is much easier to effectively target them. Broad audiences such as “men aged 18 to 24” will no longer work when financial circumstances play such a large role in consumer’s actions.

For example, say a woman who works in Berkeley, California needs to make a copy of a key on her lunch break. She would do this by pulling up Google (or another popular search engine) and searching for “locksmith in Berkeley.” Google Maps would then show the business results that match her search in her neighborhood, where they are located, and links to their websites.

By searching in “Berkeley” the woman gets only results that are relevant to her. If she just searched for “locksmith” she would get millions of useless results from around the world that are of no help to her.

Local businesses do not need to compete with similar business worldwide, because their consumers are only in the same area as they are. Websites for locksmiths, chiropractors, flower shops, and local hardware stores only need to target their local market to have good rankings. Here are some tips to get top search engine rankings for your local market.

How to Use Keywords: If you depend on local business, using location-specific keywords throughout your site will help you get to the top of the search results in your target market area. The locksmith in Berkeley will want to include “Berkeley,” “San Francisco Bay Area,” etc. in order to get a larger audience, and also the exact neighborhood, street, and basically any term that local people may use when they make searches using location. I recommend making a directions page on your website that will use all of these location-specific keywords.

The use of location-specific keywords can even help businesses like law offices, chiropractors, dentists, you name it. Again, in such cases you will want to optimize your website with keywords such as “lawyers in Berkeley, CA,” and so on.

Show Contact Information: Make sure every page on your website includes your full street address and phone number with a local area code. This contact information not only gives search engines everything they need to pin point your location, but makes it easy for locals to find you as well. A technique I often use to make this happen is to simply put the address of my business in the footer or my website – which results in the address being seen on every page. This is because website footers often apply to every page of a website. Search engines definitely pick this kind of information up and it can contribute to your site being seen by Google as more legitimate.

Local Directories and Inbound Links: Search engines love it when you have links pointing to your website from other reliable sites. This is done by utilizing a number of techniques, including commenting on other blogs, using article marketing to market content related to your business, guest posting, and establishing relationships with other site owners who may agree to link to your site if you can provide something in return (perhaps a link from another one of your websites, for example). Local directories online – like Google’s local business center – are also a great way to satisfy this, and are also an easy way to publicize your site to local consumers.

When consumers make the decision to purchase something, they typically feel something for the product or service and then act on those feelings. Just like a woman feeling attractive in her new dress or a man feeling confident in his new car, feelings are often the overruling factor in decision-making. Here are some common emotions that are seized upon in many marketing messages today. Perhaps you can seize on some of the following to connect with your target audience and stimulate them into action.

• Fear is a common emotion used by insurance companies, video surveillance companies, etc. Your audience would be scared to not use your product or service. Ever seen the Brink’s Home Security commercials? These are a perfect example of this concept. Just search YouTube for “Brink’s Home Security commercial” and you will see what I mean.

• Guilt is a common emotion that nonprofit organizations use by showing suffering animals or children that would evoke their audience’s sympathy. The Sarah McLachlan PETA commercial is a perfect example of this concept.
• Trust is one of the most important emotions that will lead consumers to choose banks and credit cards with sayings like “no hidden fees.”
• Value, as in getting a good deal, is always coveted by consumers. Companies can trigger this emotion by offering matching a better price on the same product.
• Everyone wants to have a sense of belonging to a group. You can appeal to this emotion by marketing your product as offering a chance to be a part of a specific group.
• Most people also have a natural sense competition in them, where they want to be better, or at least appear better, than their peers. This emotion is commonly used by companies that sell material goods such as cars, clothing, and jewelry. Similarly, consumers want to be trendsetters, and using celebrities is a good way to trigger the emotion.
• Time-saving messages are important for today’s busier-than-ever consumers. If you’re selling a cooking tool, marketing it as a time-saving product will appeal to consumers who want to conserve their time.

This list could go on much longer, but I think these are some of the most valuable emotional triggers that can be utilized to create successful marketing messages today. No matter what the goal of your business or organization is, you can surely rely on some kind of emotional trigger to help elicit a response from your audience.

Social media and email have a strong relationship, and multiple studies have found that social media users are actually more likely to see and respond to your email marketing message.

A study by MarketingSherpa found, for example, that social media users actually check their email much more than people who do not use social media. 42% of social media users checked their email four times a day or more, compared to just 27% of non-social media users. Therefore, social media users are more likely to see, and act upon, your email marketing messages.

Another MarketingSherpa study found that 75% of daily social media users said that email is the most effective way for companies to communicate with them, compared to 65% of all email users. Also, 49% of Twitter users said they purchased something online because of an email they received, compared to 33% of all email users. This makes sense, because typically social media users are tech-savvy and more likely to understand and use all the valuable tools the internet offers.

63% of the people surveyed by MarketingSherpa said they use the same email account for social media messages as they do for email subscriptions. This is also great news for email marketers, as they know their messages are seen and their audience is more easily accessible.

In previous posts I’ve covered how to provide content that is relevant and valuable to your target audience. If you supply this content to your subscribers, they are very likely to share it within their network. When a social media user shares your email message on a social networking site, your message then has the potential to reach the user’s friends, and then their friends, and then their friends. Social media provides the ultimate viral marketing. With very little effort, your audience just increased significantly because of one valuable email. According to Silverpop, email messages that are then posted have an average increase in reach of over 24.3%. Silverpop believes this a conservative estimate, and as social network usage grows, so will the increase in reach.

The bottom line: Get involved in both social media and email marketing in order to expand your audience and get the most out of your site.

MarketingSherpa did a study which asked internet users the reasons why they have unsubscribed or stopped reading emails from one or more businesses in the last year. The results of this study have been posted as a helpful chart which can be accessed here.

The main reason is clear: people unsubscribe from email lists if they believe the emails are not relevant to them. The obvious message from this survey is that it is incredibly important to send relevant emails to your subscribers as often as possible to keep them interested.

The best way to accomplish this is organize your list so that you can better target different groups of customers with promotions and messages specific to their wants and needs. Here are some good strategies for achieving this:

• Reward your regular and best customers with special discounts or bonus offers for their next purchase to keep them coming back for more.
• If customers haven’t bought from you in awhile, or have never bought from you, attract them with a limited time offer and build your relationship by providing valuable, free information.
• For international customers, hold specials based on their holidays for them.
• Gather as much information as possible on your customers. Their gender, age, hobbies, and interests are all great ways to organize and target your email messages to make them more relevant to your subscribers.

The above are merely general suggestions and obviously may not apply to some of you. However, 2 points found within the above suggestions are always relevant: provide valuable content and get to know your readers. If you can understand what your readers want and can provide it for them, then you are on the right track to keeping their attention focused on you.

Recommended Email Marketing Software

I am just now starting to use AWeber, an affordable email marketing software which can help you set up email lists and communicate with your readers/subscribers. In the coming weeks I will be using it more heavily and will try to provide guidance and tips on how to use AWeber effectively to build and maintain an email audience.

1) Algorithm

An algorithm is a fancy word for “formula.” In this case, an algorithm is used by search engines to rank your site, by determining how relevant your site is for the people using the search engine. Factors including your web site’s content, keywords, and links pointing towards your site (aka inbound links or backlinks) are all used in the algorithm to calculate your location on the results page of the search. The more relevant the algorithm determines your site to be, the higher your site will be placed on the results page.

2) Page Rank

The value of your site is a calculation made by Google known as Page Rank. To calculate your Page Rank, which is measured on a scale of 0 to 10 with the average being 3 or 4, several factors are used. One of the most important factors in your Page Rank is the amount of one-way links (again, aka inbound links or backlinks) pointing to your site. A high number of links shows that other sites consider your web site to be a quality, relevant resource, and therefore Google should too. You can download the Google Toolbar to see your Page Rank by clicking on the link.

3) Link Popularity

It is not very well known that some types of links can help your search engine placement while others may actually hurt it. For example, a “reciprocal link,” which is when you link to a site and that site links back to you, is frowned upon by search engines. This is because people used to try and cheat the system by adding as many links as possible to improve their ranking. Search engines have become more intelligent, and their algorithms are able to ignore reciprocal links. The best kind of link today is the “one-way link” that I covered above under the Page Rank subheading.

4) Keyword Phrase

You could say “keyword phrases” are the new “keywords.” Because the internet has been around for awhile, most single word “keywords” have been used so much that they lose value. For example, if I wanted to learn how to poach an egg, I would search for the keyword phrase “how to poach an egg” rather than just the keyword “egg.” Searching for “egg” would produce thousands of irrelevant results. By using keyword phrases you can be much more specific about what your pages are about and cater to specific audiences. For more on choosing relevant keywords for your website, please click on the link to see my most recent post.

5) Site Structure

The way your website is organized, such as how the pages are linked together and the way your menu works, is referred to as site structure. Good site structure helps visitors move freely and easily through the pages and effortlessly find relevant and related content. The better your site structure, the higher your search engine ranking.

A few extra comments on Site Structure

Before I build a website, I typically try to outline the site structure. This involves determining what topics will be covered and how, whether there will be subtopics, how my readers will be able to access/view these topics, and what it will all look like upon first glance at my site.

For example, let’s say I want to build a site promoting a rock band. I may want to have a “home" page (or landing page), an “about" page featuring the band’s members, an “upcoming shows” page, a “downloads" page, and perhaps a “contact us” page. These pages may or may not have subheadings, and that is what I try to think about before I actually start working on the site. Then I think about whether the individual pages will link to each other and whether the individual pages will look different than one another. Adding a "blog" page may be another consideration. These are just examples of things to think about when thinking about site structure. After all, getting people to your site using the methods mentioned above is one thing, but getting them to stay is another. You want to make the visiting experience as intuitive as possible if you want great results.

While search engines no longer care as much about keyword meta tags, it is still important to make yours are well-written and relevant – or your site could get penalized. Keyword meta tags are used to quickly and easily identify the relevance of your site. These days, Google's algorithm, which is used to figure out where to rank pages on the search results, is much more complex due to years of dealing with people trying to cheat the system. Google’s algorithm will not respond to outdated tricks such as typing keywords multiple times or using “invisible” keywords (white text on a white background). If you attempt these tricks, your site will not only be frowned upon, but may get banned from Google altogether.

Another big mistake is including keywords that are irrelevant to your site to attract more traffic. By including a hot-topic article on your website that is irrelevant to your subject matter, you will loose your credibility and your audience. Once a visitor to your site realizes your trick; they’ll leave immediately. Why would anyone bother visiting your site if it is filled with incohesive, random content?

Since navigating the internet for quality information is already difficult, it’s important to stand out from the sites that are created for no other reason than to get better rankings. You can do this by providing useful content and keep from making typical mistakes such as trying to trick search engines via the methods mentioned above.

Tips on choosing relevant keywords

So you have determined what your site’s content will be about but now you are at a loss as to what keywords to choose and begin using. A good place to start is Google’s keyword tool. There, you can simply type in the keyword (or search term) that you think the people who you want to visit your site would theoretically be searching for. Then, this useful tool will tell you how many searches people make per month on that particular keyword, what the competition is for that keyword, and will even provide similar keywords which may be more effective and that you hadn’t thought of. For example, say you are trying to make a website all about old outlaw ballads. Well, according to the Google Keyword tool, people rarely search for the keyword “outlaw ballads.” However, it will tell you that the keywords “outlaw songs” and “outlaw music” are far more popular and will show roughly how many others are trying to use those same keywords to market their sites.

For more on how to use the Google keyword tool, I recommend checking out this handy video on how to use articles to build SEO found at IdeaMarketers.com. There is a section of this 20-minute video devoted to the topic of using Google’s keyword tool – I recommend you check it out for more tips on using it and finding the right keywords for your site.