When it comes to increasing your websites traffic and building authority being consistent in your marketing efforts is like building compound interest on your website.

When you regularly create high quality content you add interest to your website in several ways

1) You give your readers a good reason to come back to your website, read your latest posts and share your content.

By having a weekly content schedule and sticking to it you train your audience to expect you to deliver your content on certain days of the week or at specific times, which helps you keep your readers interested and traffic coming to your website.

It also helps you get more tweets, likes and pins because you’ll be attracting the same readers to your website on a continues basis which helps you develop your relationship with them and get them to want to share your quality content with their friends.

2) You build authority and gain recognition in your field

The more quality content you produce the more you become an  authority in your niche which helps draw attention to you and your website.

As you continue to build your authority your website stands a better chance of being recognized by others as important, topical and useful.

Over time you may even gain the recognition of those individuals who are leaders in your field which can signficantly boost your success online.

3) You build a continually growing resource

Your website is a resource of knowledge and entertainment for those interested in your niche and as you build more content you’ll be able to better elaborate on your topics and really dig into the guts of your topic to help your readers get the best value out of their time.

Your growing library of content can also be repackaged and used to create products and services such as an e-book, 12 part (can be any number you like) email series, tutorials or even a membership site.

The more evergreen your content is the better you will be at repackaging it and reframing it for your audience.

4) You increase your chances of building links your website.

Another great aspect of developing regular content is in knowing that  some content will resonate with one part of your audience while another piece of content will resonate with a different part of the audience.

The more you develop great content the more chances you have to reach each of the various personalities of you readers, which in turn helps you by giving you the best chance of getting your content linked to by others.

5) The more content you have the more likely you are to be found from a search engine.

One of the best things about consistently creating great content is how it affects you in the search engines.

The more high quality content you produce the better your odds are of being found on the search engines.

Each article your write, video you create and podcast you release gets ranked by the search engines.

Websites that produce good content on a regular basis often gain more recognition and thus are placed higher in the search engine rankings which gives your website a much better chance of being found by individuals who are interested in what your website is about.

In addition to ranking higher for your content you also create more keywords that give you a better chance of being found in a search query.

There are many different benefits to writing content on a consistent basis but these 5 reasons alone are enough to invest your time in developing quality content that compounds the interest of your website.

Many small business have started for less than $100 which is typically the cost of a domain name and web hosting service for 1 year.

If you’re thinking of starting an online business there are many different paths you can take to generate a dependable income online.

While there are a lot of strategies you can use to make money online I will discuss 3 business models that have successfully shown their ability to generate a good income when done properly over a period of time.

The best part about these business models is the fact that each one has been proven over the years to make money if you know how they work and put in the sweat equity required to become successful.

Start a Blog

Over the years blogs have seen a huge shift from being used primarily as a social platform to becoming a highly profitable business model.

Blogs generally focus on growing an audience through content marketing, building relationships with their readers and teaching others how to achieve a goal and make money by offering services or products such as how to ebooks and videos, selling affiliate products, selling software and a host of other viable income sources.

If you posses a skill that people want to learn or are willing to pay for you can make a good income with this type of business model.

If you’re a photographer you can create a blog to show off your best work and build an online portfolio which can help you get work offline or you can sell your photographs online to make some extra cash.

If you’re a software developer you can create software and sell it to your audience.

If you have a particular skill that you can teach to you can make an income online.

Blogging is about sharing your knowledge with, building relationships and growing a large dedicated following of raving fans that can’t wait to read your latest content, buy your products or services and tell all their friends about you.

Create a Niche Site

While niche sites can also be considered a form of blogging these types of sites are often much smaller micro-sites with limited content that focus on a very narrow and specific topic.

Instead of focusing on building relationships or growing a dedicated following of raving fans niche sites usually focus on getting most their traffic from the search engines through low competition keywords that rank easily in the search engines and by building content around those keywords and linking to the website using various link building strategies.

Niche sites that generate decent traffic from the search engines may make money by having google Adsense ads (or other forms of advertisements) put on the website which allows the owner to make money every time a visitor clicks on an ad.

Because ads generally have a low pay-per-click these websites often rely on topics or niches that are likely to receive a lot of clicks from their visitors.

Another way niche sites make money is by selling affiliate products.

In this case the content that is created on the niche site is often related to the affiliate products being sold on that website.

Whenever a visitor clicks on an affiliate product and makes a purchase the owner of the website makes a commission on that purchase.

Starting a niche site often requires doing lots of keyword research and looking for low competition – high traffic keywords that can rank easily in the search engines and using various link building strategies.

Build a Membership Site

Membership sites are another popular way to make money online because these types of websites can generate a monthly recurring income from their members and can be very profitable with just a small audience.

Instead of hoping and relying on many individuals to make a one time purchase on a product or service that you offer you can enjoy repeated income from your members each and every month.

Most membership sites focus on creating a solution to a particular problem and offer highly valuable information, tools, services and resources to help their members succeed.

Some offer a consistently growing library how to video’s, audio podcasts, special reports and/or detailed training aimed at helping their members improve a particular area of their lives.

While offer special mentoring programs with a step by step action plan for getting from  A to Z.

And some membership sites focus on providing their members with some form of entertainment to keep them interested.

Because membership websites enjoy monthly recurring income it is important to provide your members with high quality content and/or services on a consistent basis.

Whichever path you choose to take for your online business remember that you are doing it for your audience.

They are the ones who will help you succeed.

Keep it simple, informative and entertaining and you’ll have a much better chance of succeeding online.

There are various methods and business models you can use to help you make money, but in the end it’s the audience that often determines your success.

While these steps are simple the work that’s required to become successful takes time, energy, focus and knowledge, however if you continue to focus on the core elements and build your blog it’s very likely that can make some money!

By focusing on building your relationships and providing value you can grow an audience that will help you build your blog.

If you already created a website and chosen a theme you can skip the first step.

Let’s get started!

Step 1. Create your website

If you already have a website you can skip this part!

If you don’t have a website yet the first step would be to set one up.

In order to do that you need to choose a domain name for you website, choose a hosting service to house your website, and pick a theme for your blog.

If you need help creating your first website than check out this post and come back after you’re done: 8 simple steps for creating your first website.

Step 2. Decide on the focus of your website

Decide what your website is going to be about and what topics you will be discussing on your blog.

The more you can narrow down on whats important the better you will be at finding your target audience.

This is extremely important because in order to attract an audience to your website it needs to have a focus that’s related to their wants and needs, and your content has to be able to help them reach their goals.

If you’re having trouble thinking of what you want to do than you can do some reasearch to find an existing market that is in high demand and choose one that matches you skills and abilities or develop the skills you need to teach a specific topic to a proven market.

By finding a market that has already proven that it has wants and needs, and is willing to pay for a solution you can get a better grasp of how you’ll build your business and what area’s you have the best chance of impacting based on the skills you possess. 

Step 3. Create highly useful content for your target audience

 After you’ve narrowed down your focus the next step is to begin creating content for your target audience.

Create highly useful content that gives your readers inspiration, teaches them how to better at a skill or reach a goal and helps them find success in their own life.

As the saying goes teaching sells and by teaching others what you know you’ll have a much easier time building an audience and helping them reach their goals.

If it’s a review site give them some good advice on the best choices they can make.

If it’s about comedy than make your best stuff stand out.

If it’s about a service you provide show them samples that will catch their interest.

The point is that you narrow down on whats important to them, highlight it and give them the best information so that they can implement it into their own lives or at least get enjoyment out of what you have to say or show them.

Step 4. Grow your audience one person at a time

In the beginning growing an audience takes time.

Unless you have some connections or you’ve created something that’s so good people can’t ignore it building an audience is going to take some time.

Respond to your readers whenever possible, listen to their wants and needs and focus on them.

Your audience is the reason for your blog so their opinions matter.

Don’t try to be a hero to everyone, just focus on those who can provide the best results.

You can only do so much, but those who are at the heart of your blog are the ones who will help you grow it.

Step 5. Create a marketing strategy for your blog

There’s a saying that goes “in the beginning you should spend %80 of your time outside of your blog (marketing and building relationships) and 20% working on your blog (such as communicating with your audience or writing content)”.

In some ways I agree with this idea.

In order to get noticed you’ll have to get yourself out there.

Communicate with as many people as possible and use whatever opportunities are available to you to get yourself heard.

Some of the things you can do to get yourself out there include writing for other blogs, interacting with people on a variety of social media platforms, partnering up with other bloggers to create a webinar or start a project, create how to video’s and upload them to YouTube and start a podcast.

As your blog begins to grow you’ll need to shift your focus and spend more time on your existing audience.

If you work hard enough your marketing efforts will eventually pay off and help you build a sustainable audience of raving fans.

Step 6. Build an email list

Email lists are extremely important for those who are serious about succeeding with their blogs.

Having an email list allows you to proactively interact with and engage your audience without them having to search for you or go to your website by giving you the ability to send them an email whenever you have something important to say.

While some of your visitors may not think to proactively visit your website they’ll automatically be reminded when you send them an email.

It keeps your readers engaged and since they’ve given you permission to send them emails you have a large advantage over others who do not email their readers.

Not only are email lists great for simple communication and giving your readers value they’re also great for announcing product/service launches, getting feedback on ways to improve your website and content and letting your readers know of any new changes you’ve made to your business.

Email lists are also a great way to secure your audience in case something happens to your website.

Even if you lose your website or shut it down you can take your email list with you wherever you go.

In fact some businesses take email marketing so seriously that the entire focus of their business is to build and grow their email list.

Step 7. Create a product or service to sell to your audience

As your website begins to grow and take shape it’s likely that your readers will have a want or need that they are willing to pay for in order to find a solution.

By connecting with them and learning about what is most important to them you’ll be able to create products and services that meet their needs.

By help your audience successes you also create a sustainable income for yourself.

It’s a win/win situation.

If you don’t have any products or services or you lack the desire to create one you can always sell affiliate products.

It’s a great way to get started because all of the hard work is done in creating the product is done.

All  you have to do is teach your audience how the affiliate product will help them reach their own goals and if they decide to purchase your affiliate product you make a commission.

If possible try to start selling your products or services as quickly as possible so that you can get feedback and improve your strategy. 

Step 8. Get feedback

Feedback is extremely important.

When your audience gives you feedback you can use it to improve a number of things related to your business such as whether your content resonates with them or not, if your website is easy to navigate and gives them the value they are looking for, whether you’re sending them emails at the right time or using the right forms of multimedia to communicate with them and whether or not they have an interest in your products/services and if it’s improving their lives.

Without feedback it’s almost impossible to know if you’re heading in the right direction.

By using analytics you can also gain lots of helpful feedback on the interests of your visitors.

What they spend the most time on, where they’re coming from and if they are sharing your content or buying your products.

All of this information (analytics + visitor feedback) can be used to help you shape and grow your website in the right direction.

Step 9. Improve your content, products and services over time

As you continue to build your blog it’s important that you keep expanding your education so that you can provide your readers with what they want.

The more knowledgeable you have about your field the more you can contribute to solving the wants and needs of your audience and the more they will value your opinion when they need help with something.

By focusing on the core elements of your blog you can consistently increase the value of what you’ve built and you can take your mistakes as lessons and improve upon them until you reach the success you’ve been searching for.

Step 10. Wash, Rinse, Repeat

As your website grows and your money and knowledge increases it’s important to go back and remind yourself of the basics.

Understanding how you got from A to B and being able to repeat it and do it better than you did previously is the best way to ensure you’ll continue to grow and get better.

Whether you decide on starting another small business or you simply want to continue building your existing one you need to continue to focus on the core strategies that got you there and if possible find ways to improve and automate them.

Go through each step of your business from creating your website to writing quality content, building an audience, selling products and getting feedback and find out how you can make it better next time and improve it now.

The more clarity you can bring to what you’re doing the better you will be at foolproofing your business and yourself.

In reality setting up a website is fairly easy and can be done in less than 10 minutes if you know what you’re doing.

By following these 8 simple steps you’ll be able to easily start your first website and begin your journey into the world of the internet.

Lets get started!

Step 1. Choose a domain name

Before creating a website you have to decide on what the name of your website and URL (domain name) will be.

This is one of the most important steps you will make because as you begin to build content on your website everything you create will be linked to your websites domain name (URL) and your visitors will also know you by the domain name you choose.

Some people choose a domain name that relates closely to the main topic of their website and is likely to be searched for under a specific keyword.

Others choose a URL that helps people identify what their brand is about and what it stands for.

In the end you’ll have to choose a name that you’ll be happy with as this will determine what the search engines and your visitors think about your website.

Take your time and think about what you are trying to do with your website and what it will be about to help you decide on choosing the right domain name for your website.

Step 2. Register your domain name

There are a number of registering services that will allow you to register your chosen domain name often for very little cost $10 – $20 per year.

Finding a registering service is extremely easy and can be done simply by doing a search for the best domain registrars.

Tip: Some hosting services such as BlueHost give you a free domain name with your hosting account which can make setting up your website easier and save you a few dollars.

Step 3. Choose a hosting service

After deciding on your domain name and getting it registered the next step you’ll need to take is finding a hosting service that will host your website.

One of the best hosting services I have found and use for my websites is BlueHost which offers unlimited hosting space, a free domain name for your first site, good customer service and a 99.9% uptime guarantee.

If you decide to go with another hosting service here are some useful tips to help you choose a good service.

1. Make sure the hosting service offers good reliability and speed.

2. Find out how you can contact them if you need help and make sure they offer excellent customer service.

3. Check to see if the hosting service allows you to access your website through a control panel so you can manage the back-end of your website.

4. Make sure the hosting service gives you lots of storage space.

Step 4. Connect your domain name to your web host

If you have chosen a web host that offers a domain name with their hosting service than you can skip this step.

If you have chosen a registrar that is different from your web hosting service you’ll need to connect your domain name with your web host.

In order to connect your domain name with your web host all you have to do is ask your web host for your server name or DNS and plug your DNS into your domain name registrar account.

You can also contact your domain name registrar and have them walk you through it.

Step 5. Install WordPress

Not only is WordPress free, it’s also one of the best all around software platforms available for creating websites on.

Whether you want to create a blog or build an e-commerce website WordPress is a great choice.

There are thousands of themes and plugins available t help you get your site looking and running just the way you want.

Depending on your hosting service they may offer a simple one click set up for installing WordPress on your site right from their dashboard.

If this is not an option you can visit WordPress.org and download their software for free.

Step 6. Choose a theme for your website

There are a ton of both free and premium (paid) themes available for WordPress that allow you to choose a design that suits the look and functionality of your website.

While many of the free themes available offer you a degree of design and functionality the premium themes are often more professional looking and give you much more flexibility in customizing your website and can often be purchased for less than $100.

In fact StudioPress offers some of the best premium themes available for WordPress.

You can also read this post on choosing a premium theme: Designing a website on the cheap and why WordPress premium themes rock

Step 7. Configure your website

Now that your website is up and running and you’ve chosen your theme you’ll want to configure your website so that you provide the best experience for your visitors.

Set up your navigation and make it easy for your visitors to know what your website is about and give them easy access to the most important parts of your website.

Choose two or three primary colors to represent your site but don’t go overboard as too many colors can turn off your visitors or detract them from what is important.

Organize, separate and highlight the important areas of your site to provide additional clarity.

Install any plugins that you may need to get your website functioning just the way you want an add any final touches that you may want on your website.

Step 8. Add content

If you’ve made it to this part congratulations you’re all set.

Now you get to have fun and start adding content to your website!

Mentioned in this post:

• BlueHost
• WordPress
• StudioPress
• Additional WordPress Themes

With the development and growth of social media everyone is connected together regardless of their income status or geography.

Weather you’re rich or poor you now have the ability to share your skills and connect with people all over the world for free.

And for those looking to build an online business it’s extremely inexpensive and very easy to get started.

In fact many people have started their own business for less than $100 (the cost purchasing a domain name and a hosting service).

If you can connect with others you can start a business.

There are so many benefits to starting your own online business, but in order to keep things simple I will only list four of the many wonderful benefits here.

1) Starting an online business is extremely inexpensive

As I stated earlier many small business have started building their empire with nothing more than a domain name and a hosting service to house their website.

Once you have everything set up and you’ve done your due diligence to begin gaining traffic and building an audience you can create products and/or services to sell to your targeted audience.

Digital products and information products are extremely popular amongst bloggers and small start-ups because you can create them for little to no cost and they are available for download 24/7.

What makes this type of business so great is the fact that you don’t have to ship any products and you have virtually an unlimited supply since everything is digital.

If you’re a programmer you can sell your latest programs to your targeted audience or work as a freelancer doing programming for other people.

If you’re a graphic designer you can create graphics for other websites or clients.

If you’re a photographer you can showcase your work online and grow a customer base or frame and sell your photography online.

If you’re knowledgable about a specific topic you can create a digital information product such as an e-book, audiobook, how-to-video or start a membership site.

If you’re a consultant you can use the internet to help you market your business so you can gain recognition for possible clients and those interested in your industry.

The possibilities are endless, and you can start with very little money.

There are no overhead costs, you don’t have to pay for rent or monthly expenses in the beginning (except maybe for email marketing) and you aren’t locked down to a single location, so there is very little reason for you not to try to build your very own internet business.

2) You have more flexibility of your time

Depending on the type of online business you choose to set up you generally have more flexibility in creating your schedule.

You can choose what time of the day you want to work, how many hours you want to work and what days of the week you want to work as long as you set your business in an efficient way.

This doesn’t mean that you can simply relax all of the time, but you have more choices in choosing when to focus on being productive whether it’s Monday – Friday or just the weekends, and whether it’s early in the morning, late at night or in the middle of the day.

You aren’t limited by an hourly wage because your income is often determined by how productive you are with your time, not the number of hours you work.

Having more flexibility in your schedule means being able to spend your life focusing on other important activities outside of your business and being able to make time for the things that truly matter (aside from your business that is).

3) You have the freedom of choosing your location

In an online business you aren’t tied down to a desk or a single location.

As long as you have an internet connection and a laptop you can run your business from anywhere in the world.

You have the freedom to travel and choose where you want to work on any given day and that’s extremely liberating.

Whether you want to visit your family in another state or take a trip somewhere exotic your business will always be with you.

4) Unlimited income potential

In an online business your income isn’t determined by the number of hours you work but the level of productivity you can produce during the hours you work.

By spending your time on marketing and income producing activities you can significantly reduce the number of hours you have to work in order to bring in a sustainable income.

Your business is open 24/7 365 and keeps running even when you sleep.

You don’t have to be present in order for a transaction to occur, you just have to be consistent with your efforts and focus on the right things to grow and sustain your business.

As you can see starting an online business can be extremely fun and liberating.

You can start for very little with very little and grow your website over time to fit your audiences needs and your schedule, so why not take a chance and try.

Try for the sake of fun and adventure, and the possibility of making a difference that could change your life.

One the best ways for small businesses to gain awareness without spending lots of money on marketing is to have their content marketed by others for free.

Many large businesses however end up hiring a marketing team or virtual assistants to do the marketing for them and that cost money.

Money most small start-ups don’t have.

But what if you didn’t have to hire a single person to market your content?

What if you’re raving fans did all of the marketing for you?

What if you built a loyal, loving fan base of 1,000 or more people who think your content is absolutely amazing and want share everything you do with their friends and the world?

Think about it.

Imagine the level of influence you could have by tapping into a small dedicated audience.

Imagine each of them bringing 5 to 10 of their closest friends, colleagues or family members to your blog or business.

By using a content marketing strategy that focuses on building a loyal, raving fan base that can’t wait to tell everyone about your content you greatly enhance your chances for success and recognition.

By growing your business through word of mouth you not only bring in those who are most interested in your content you also gain free traffic from your raving fans who are more than willing to help you build your business by marketing it for you.

And because your fans have close friends who trust them you acquire more authority and trustworthiness with their friends, which can help you build strong relationships with people who otherwise might not have been interested in you.

In the beginning you will have to put in the effort to get the word out and build your audience one by one, but as your audience grows they’ll begin to share your content for you.

To show you the value of having a small raving fan base let’s do a little math.

1 person (you) marketing your content several hours a day = 1 person (you) spreading the word to gain potential visitors and traffic.

1000 people (your adoring fans) marketing your content for you all day and night  = 1000 more opportunities (and many additional marketing hours) to bring in new visitors, which can substantially grow your traffic and business!

Now I can hear you saying to yourself, “ Patrick that all sounds great, but how do I get visitors to begin with and how do I build a relationship with them?”

Great questions.

Let’s take a look into some of the questions you may be asking yourself (or me) and see if we can shed a little light on this topic.

1) Finding people who share your values and interests

The key word here is “find”.

Before anyone shares your content you need to find people who are actually interested in what you have to say.

In many cases this means doing some research.

Look for other websites that already have an active audience that share similar values and/or interests with you and your content.

Social websites such as YouTube, Facebook and Twitter already have millions of daily visitors who may be interested in what you have to say.

Podcasting is becoming another highly viable method for attracting new visitors to your blog or website.

There are tons of highly successful and authoritative blogs that have regular readers who may find what you have to say worth listening to.

You can also participate in group discussions and forums to build your audience.

In the beginning though it’s a good idea to look at a few successful bloggers in your niche or related niche who have similar views and personality traits so you can study how they built their audience.

Some of the best blogs are the ones that teach you how to do what they do and obtain the results they’ve obtained.

Over time you’ll begin to learn how to adapt their strategies to your own website and you’ll develop your own writing personality as well.

The important thing for you is to find out where your viable audience is and then proactively communicate with them regularly and create an emotional bond and/or interest with them and what you have to say.

The speed of your success often depends on the social medium you use to connect with your audience, the quality of your content, the level of influence your fans have and the amount of effort you put into it.

2) Focus on being proactive instead of reactive

As I stated earlier, everyone starts at zero when they first start out so you’ll need to be very proactive in the beginning to build your audience.

Being proactive means you are actively taking steps to find and build your audience instead of waiting for them to just show up.

Some of these activities include sending useful emails to your subscribers on a regular basis, writing guest posts for other websites to increase your traffic and awareness, actively participating in social networks or gatherings, commenting on other blogs, being interviewed by other blogs (to build awareness), using multimedia to engage more people, and communicating with others through various social media platforms.

Don’t wait for visitors to arrive, be proactive and give them a reason to want to visit your website.

Being reactive means that you are responding to a visitor after they’ve taken the initial step to make contact with you.

This is an important step as well, but most people aren’t going to actively look for you or find out about you if you aren’t taking the steps necessary to inform and educate or entertain them.

Being reactive may include activities such as responding to comments, answering emails, waiting for visitors to come to your website before you engage them and trying to get back fans or customers after they’ve decided to go elsewhere.

The more you focus on being proactive the more likely you will be to grow your audience.

3) Build your raving fan base one person at a time

There tends to be a multiplier affect in marketing.

In the beginning you build your fan base one person at a time, but as that fan base begins to grow so does your awareness and your audience.

Don’t underestimate their value because your audience will likely determine the success of your business and each of your fans has the potential to help you grow your market significantly beyond its present state.

When writing content there should be a balance between what you feel is important for your website and what your fans feel is important to them.

By tapping into the minds of your audience you can find out whether or not the content you’re writing is of value to them and eventually you’ll be able to create products and services that meet exceed their wants and needs.

It’s also important to understand that you don’t need as big an audience as you may think you need in order to be successful.

For example if 1000 of your fans purchased a $100 product/service from you then you’ve generated $100,000.

Even if you only sell 1000 products over the course of a year you’ve brought in a significant amount of money.

Here are some of the things you can do to make money online: 16 popular ways to generate income using content marketing.

4) Be consistent

Consistency is something I talk about often because it’s so important to your success.

Creating content on a regular basis and following up with your audience is vital to your businesses success.

Continually produce new, quality content for your blog, email your subscribers on a regular basis and contribute outside of your blog with guest posts and through the use of social media platforms.

In the beginning you’ll only want to focus on one or two ways to connect with your audience until you’ve built up enough knowledge, practice and energy before you begin focusing on adding more ways to connect with them.

The more consistent you are the more likely you are to be found, talked about and shared online.

You also become much more educated and specialized about your field through your consistent efforts to create new, useful content.

Step 1. Write content that people can’t ignore

Have you ever watched a YouTube video or read an article that was so good you couldn’t help but share it with all your friends because if you didn’t you’d feel like they’d miss out something great and you know you’d regret it if you didn’t tell them?

That’s what viral content is.

It’s something that’s so irresistible you can’t help but tell all of your friends about it.

In some cases it’s something that’s so funny your stomach cramps from laughing.

Other times it’s something that changes your perspective on a deeply held view or something that is extremely important to you.

And sometimes it’s an article or a piece of advise that gets you to take action, move forward and achieve something you’ve wanted to accomplish for a long time.

These are the types of content that go viral and spread like a wild-fire through the internet.

When you’re writing for your audience try to think of a way to really make an impact in at least one of these 4 ways. 

1. Make it hilarious (make it so funny that they end up crying and want to tell everyone about how funny you are)

2. Make it thought-provoking and meaningful (make it something that changes their perspective on something that’s important to them, get them to question something they value or help them strengthen a belief they hold deeply.)

3. Make it polarizing (take a strong stance on an important issue that people are debating)

4. Make it easily actionable and help them get results quickly (such as a step by step formula for getting from A to Z)

Examples of viral content:

Have you ever heard of Jenna Marbles?

Well Jenna Marbles has a Vlog (video blog) on YouTube which generates millions of hits every time she releases a video.

While her video’s may not be highly informative they’re extremely funny and because of this almost all of her videos end up going viral.

Currently her Vlog has generated over half a billion views! Not bad for a website that focuses solely on entertainment from an otherwise unknown person.

Part of her success comes from having a large number subscribers that can’t wait to see what she posts next, and part of it has to do with the hilarious nature of her content which people can’t seem to get enough of and makes them want to tell everyone they know about it.

She listens to her audience and creates the content they want to see, and because of this her subscribers and viewers know that when she puts something out they are going to love it, tweet it, like it, share it and so on.

In fact you can find all of Jenna Marbles funny internet videos here: Jenna Marbles on YouTube

Another great example is Brian Clarks blog Copybogger.

This website is dedicated to teaching people how to write better content and market it effectively.

Brian and those who run the website only permit content that is of the highest quality and extremely useful.

It’s informative, it’s actionable, it’s entertaining and it’s thought-provoking.

They focus on helping people get results instead of simply making them laugh, and because their readers get results from the content Copyblogger provides they share it with the world.

Here is the link to Brian Clarks website if you want to check it out: Copyblogger

Step 2. Follow the four “must have” rules on getting people to read and share your content before you hit that publish button.

You followed the 1st step for creating your amazing “must read” content and now your ready to share it with the world, but before you hit that “publish” button there’s four critical steps you need to take in order to make sure it gets clicked on, read and shared.

1. The headline – Your headline is one of the most important parts of getting people to read your content.

It’s the difference between whether a potential reader skims past your article or whether he/she hits the read more button.

Magazines know this and that’s why their headlines are always so dramatic.

In many cases the best headline wins and the winners are determined by whether the headline compels a person to pick up the magazine, read it and buy it or just walk away.

Study popular blogs, read news sites and watch magazines that know how to write attention grabbing headlines.

Their headlines may be controversial, entertaining, emotion/desire driven or just flat-out shocking, but they get people’s interest, catch them off guard and get them to read more.

Learn as much as you can about crafting great headlines and your content will stand a much better chance of getting read.

Don’t put all your effort into writing great content just to have it ignored.

If your headline is dull then chances are you’ll be the magazine that sits on the shelf.

Note to the wise. Don’t write headlines that are misleading and don’t relate to what your content is about.

Not only is it unethical, it could get you in trouble.

2. The image(s)

Besides your title the images in your content are extremely important for compelling potential readers to look at and read your content.

While the images aren’t going to sell the content by themselves they do create an emotional response and gain the interest of readers which helps you get more people interested in reading your content.

The best images are the ones that engage the readers feelings, beliefs, desires and views and makes them stop in their tracks to find out more about your content.

Images that create feelings such as love, desire, fear, despair, rage, excitement, inspiration, disgust (optional), ecstasy, intrigue, seduction and embarrassment are often great for getting people’s attention.

Depending on your content and your personality the images you use to create emotional responses from your readers may change.

The important thing is to keep your readers emotionally engaged from your headline to your images to the content you’ve created and get them to take action (such as sharing your content with their friends or getting them to take a step towards accomplishing a goal) by the time they finish reading your content.

3. The content

I’m not going to elaborate on this one as I explained this part in the 1st step but your content needs to be so good that your readers can’t ignore it.

Give them as little reason as possible to browse past your content and make it unbelievably useful, emotional, polarizing and/or entertaining to your readers.

Make it original, make it great, make it memorable!

4. The call to action

Your content should have a clear call to action.

While reading your content or at the very end of it you should have a call to action to tell your readers what they should do next.

Should they tweet it, share it or like it?

Should they email it to two of their best friends?

Should they write a comment or subscriber to your newsletter?

Should they take action on one of your steps so they can start seeing results?

Make it clear what you want your readers to do in order to get them to take some sort of action.

Don’t over do it or be aggressive but give them some feedback on how they should use your content so that they can get the most out of it.

BTW if you find this article to be extremely useful please spread the word by liking, tweeting or sharing it with your friends. ;)

Step 3. Create exposure by implementing a good content marketing strategy

After you’ve created and published your amazing content (the type your readers can’t ignore) the next step is to get it out there.

There’s a reason bloggers say that in the beginning you should spend 80% of your time outside of your website.

When you first start out no one knows about you and no one is likely to find you even if you try.

Until you’ve established a presence and proved yourself Google isn’t going to list you on the first page, bloggers aren’t going to talk about your website and people aren’t going to share your content.

You have to put yourself out there.

Once you’ve followed the steps in the previous section the next step you’ll want to take is to get people to find and like your content.

There are several things you can do to help with this process.

1. Contact your subscribers – If you have subscribers than contact them about your new and amazing content. This isn’t something you’ll want to do with every piece of content you write, but if you know it’s going to be a must read then let your readers and subscribers know about it and ask them to share it with their friends and audience.

2. Write guest posts that link to your content – If you haven’t built an audience yet think about writing a few guest posts for several popular blogs and linking it to the viral content you created. A well written guest post to a popular blog could get you several hundred visitors overnight. Plus the links you get from these popular blogs are likely to be high quality which can help give your content a boost in the search engines.

3. Email your influencers –  Email your friends, fellow bloggers and other social media outlets that you’ve written something important and that it’s likely to appeal to them and their interests. If they like what you’ve written then there’s a good chance that they’ll talk about it on their blog, email their friends and tweet about it to their followers. That’s why it’s so important to reach out to others and grow your social network. These are the people who are going to get your name out there and into the blogosphere.

4. Create a series – Add your viral content to part of a “how to” or “must read” series. This enables you to get the most out of your viral content and hopefully your entire series will go viral which can help your website get a lot of eye’s, ears and traffic. The more content you can get to go viral the better.

5. Use other social media platforms – Create additional buzz by talking about it on your podcast, YouTube channel, Facebook wall, twitter feed and so on. This gives you a chance to reach out to a larger, already existing network of potential readers. By tapping into the millions of people who use these social platforms everyday you give yourself a much better opportunity for getting your ideas spread.

 Lastly it is extremely important to think of your content as an idea that’s worth spreading.

If ” enough”other people feel the same way about your content than there is a very good chance that it will go viral.