If your internet marketing company is helping to drive traffic to your website, you may still be losing money. But how is that possible?

Getting new visitors to your website is only the half the battle; ultimately, they need to become new — and preferably loyal and repeat — customers to benefit your business and help you grow revenue.

The process of getting new visitors to become customers is called conversion, and if your internet marketing company isn’t offering conversion analysis as part of your internet marketing strategy, you need to start shopping around for a new marketing agency.

The Ins and Outs of Conversion Analysis

A good internet marketing company knows that success should not be measured solely by rankings and traffic. That’s why conversion analysis is an important tool in your internet marking campaign.

For example, if you purchased WebpageFX SEO packages, the conversion analysis would include copywriters, search engine optimizers, PPC managers, website funnel analysis and landing page designers to help bolster that conversion rate. That’s the type of comprehensive service you should be looking for in an internet marketing company.

What are the Different Types of Analysis?

There are many different types of analysis that play into conversion rates. One type is usability conversion analysis, which tracks whether your website is following the proper interface and design standards. If it’s confusing or difficult for users, a good internet marketing company will recommend a total redesign to make the website more user friendly.

An internet marketing conversion analysis addresses why your traffic quality may be high despite a well designed site. Generally, your copy is likely to blame, but many other factors can contribute to the problem. Conversion funnel analysis tracks the different ways people navigate your site. If those paths are too distracting, then visitors are likely to get off track without converting.

Consider Conversion Design Testing

One great option to encourage conversions is to have your website undergo conversion design testing, which will help change specific elements and track how those changes affect conversions.

For example, it’s possible that a certain picture on your website helps conversions, or a certain headline inspires visitors to convert more than an old headline. Playing around with different scenarios allows your internet marketing company to devise the best strategy to secure conversions.

One of the main reasons new visitors leave your website is that they find it confusing to navigate. A good internet marketing company will help you streamline your website in order to boost your conversion rate. One of the best investments you can make in your business is hiring a good internet marketing agency; we promise you won’t be disappointed by investing in your company.

Now that you’ve gotten more information about why your internet marketing company should offer conversion analysis, your next step should probably be learning more about finding a marketing agency. Post written by guest blogger Michelle.

Although the spirit of linking to another website is to show a tacit recommendation for that website, there are many ways in which this metric can be exploited. One way is to simply buy links or pay a search engine optimization company to buy links for you. The temptation of saving the time and effort of having to build relationships and court the opinions of webmasters is quite a strong one, yet many people swear off buying links for their websites, including many search engine optimization experts.

The main reason is that the search engine algorithms can somehow tell the difference between paid links and organic links and will heavily penalize sites which have paid links pointing to them. However, many people still pay for links or allow the search engine optimization companies that they hired to do the same thing. Why? Why do people go for the quick rise in metric rather than the long-term comprehensive social media and blogging strategy? And most importantly, is it worth it?

What you will find if you ask anyone who has used paid links for any significant amount of time is that the practice is not worth it. The major search engines, especially Google, make the punishment for paid linking much worse than any benefit that you would ever gain from it. The practice is known throughout expert circles to be packaged and easily found out, mostly because people tend to become lazy about where they placed their paid links, eventually placing them on irrelevant pages with low page ranks.

It should be noted that Google, or any of the other major search engines for that matter, are not strictly against paid links. It is the lack of quality that accompanies most paid links that the search engines have a problem with. Because the search engines have a responsibility to their “customers” above all, they do not want to see your paid links from your shoe website on a blog about politics just because that blog happened to be an extremely popular one.

This also tends to protect webmasters who do not have the time to police large websites, giving them a sort of quality protection over their customers. The overall quality increase is what the search engines are going for, and as they are the gatekeepers of your visibility on the web, they are the rulemakers.

All in all, paying someone to do paid links for is not worth the trouble even in the short term. The search engine algorithms are becoming more and more accurate at identifying paid links with every paid link that they find. The penalties for using paid links too often can include banishment from the major search engines, which does absolutely nothing for your business or your brand in the long term.

What search engine optimization specialists recommend is a comprehensive search engine optimization program which takes management of social media, twitter and blogs to actually reach out to and find your true audience. In the long term, this is a much more effective strategy for business that are trying to build a brand. Keeping yourself focused and your marketing strategy, intently focused on building and maintaining a brand with a target audience has long been known as a much more successful marketing technique than simply throwing spaghetti on to a wall and seeing what sticks to it.

Jeff is an internet marketing consultant, a blogger and he often writes about SEO. He likes to share his knowledge and experience with others, and helps them with their online presence. Jeff is also the owner of nPromote, a well established SEO company in NY.

While I take great pride in managing my Twitter account through user interaction, quick responses to questions and sparse sharing of my own personal posts I don’t care much for updating my background so it remains fresh upon user visits. It’s for that reason that I began using and highly recommend the program InstaBG.

The InstaBG platform connects users to their Twitter account and the Instagram photo sharing platform in order to create backgrounds based on user preference.

The program couldn’t be easier to use, simply click on the “Sign in with Twitter Account” as shown in the screenshot above, after you give the program permission to access Twitter you will be taken to the following setup screen:

The setup steps are very simple, users start with the “Target Photos” option which is the spot that allows you to pick out where your photos come from on Instagram. For example you can choose “All” at which point the newest and most popular photos will be displayed or you can use the “User ID” option to choose a specific Instagram account. I personally avoided “categories” because there are less than a dozen to choose from. Personally I recommend the “Tags” option if you don’t use the User ID option. I chose the word “Technology” but you could get very specific and put something along the lines of  ”1969 Corvette” and because of the hundreds of millions of photos you’ll likely find plenty of matches.

The next option “Auto Update”  can be set to “On” which will update your Twitter background automagically once a day or you can choose “No Update” if you would prefer to go into your InstaBG account whenever you want to preview then update your Twitter background.

Next the “Order” is selected. If you choose the “All” feature this is a great way to display the most popular Instagram photos of the moment however you can also display the “Newest” or just choose Random photos if you’re feeling lucky.

The Layout chooses photo sizes, I personally like the “small” size because it adds more photos to the Twitter account however medium, large and custom features are also made available.

Next is the “Spacing” option. I actually like “No” spacing because the photos look more like a collage however the small, medium and large options work well.

Finally users can choose to display the date of each photo (great for a portfolio type background) and even take pride in their work by showing the number of likes on each photo directly on their Twitter background.

After all options have been checked simply click “Preview” and the right side preview pane will fill with the photos that will show on your Twitter account:

The last step is simply to click the “Set this image to Twitter” button. Users be warned it took about 5 minutes for my background to change the first time I used this program, I have a feeling that had to do with the Twitter API which can be slow at times because the InstaBG program has updated in a matter of seconds every time after that point.

Here’s a quick look at my Twitter account with my new background:

I plan to continue using InstaBG because of it’s simply to setup interface and daily updates to my Twitter background so if you want a closer look at the final outcome visit @Techobsessed.

To get started visit: InstaBG.com

It is no surprise that an avalanche of free applications has been released by developers for the Mac that helps to combat the lack of productivity that sometimes occurs in our everyday lives. Whether the issue is that there isn’t enough time in a day to get it all done or you just don’t seem to know where the time is going, these apps can help.

RescueTime

You might not realize how much productivity you lose in a day just by the tiny interruptions you allow yourself. RescueTime allows you to see it all listed for you, so you can see just how much time you spend doing what and what it is costing you. It will also give you little warnings when you have exceeded a certain amount of time on any nonproductive task – for example, if you have spent an hour that day, even broken up, on Twitter.

Time Out Free

It is easy to overwork yourself, which can cause serious problems. Headaches, painful muscles and joints, tiredness and general irritability are among the most common issues. But spending too much time working without a break can hurt your overall efficiency, as well. Time Out Free is an annoying – but effective – program that reminds you to take breaks, small and large. It is fully customizable and can really help to eliminate some of those nasty effects of staring too long at a screen.

DropCopy

To copy and send files takes some time, especially across networks or machines. This application lets you do it all with one program by simply dragging and dropping it into the Drop Zone. You can even copy on one machine and paste on another. It is so fast that you’ll be hard-pressed to know how you got along without it.

Spelga PhoneLog

Keep track of every call that comes in with this advanced phone log. It allows you to categorize calls and place notes on each one. Details go directly into the app, with a built-in reminder system. There is a professional option for a fee, but the basic call log application is free of charge.

Remind Me Later

This is an easy-to-use reminder application that runs in the background as a calendar and then pops up when you have set an event, including monthly needs like paying bills, buying groceries or keeping appointments. It was designed to quickly add tasks to save time, making it a better program over most that require a lot of initial organization.

Alfred

This is essentially an application-launching program that puts together all of your browser icons in one place, along with other applications, to let you pick and choose without going through all of your files. Unlike other launchers, this one is genuinely simple.

Evernote

One of the most popular applications ever made, Evernote lets you make notes, save web pages, attach images and PDFs, set reminders, make shopping lists and more. Then, it automatically syncs with all of your Mac products, from your computer to your iPhone and more. This makes them accessible from anywhere and links them all up in a simple-to-use way. Now, it is compatible with Windows, all Internet browsers and various mobile phone brands, such as Android, BlackBerry, Windows and Palm WebOS.

Credit Card Terminal

If you have an Inner Fence Merchant account, this is a must-have application. It works by connecting your financial account to your cell phone, turning it into a credible card terminal so you can accept payments, send invoices and more while on the go. It works very well, though if you don’t have an Inner Fence account, you will have to get one – that does cost money, though the app is free.

SketchBook Express

Sometimes you just have to sketch something, which is why many artists carry around a tablet with a stylus. With SketchBook Express (and SketchBook Pro), you can draw to your heart’s content, using professional digital tools and saving your images to your Mac. It has layers for building up a drawing, a ton of preset brushes and pens, the ability to import images and more.

StuffIt Expander

How much time would it save to just be able to compress files rather than send multiple zips? StuffIt lets you compress, decompress, share and browse other public zips. It also opens files from other zip programs, such as WinZip, RAR, Rucksack and more.

Conclusion

You don’t have to feel like you are drowning under your own lack of productivity anymore. There are plenty of tools to help you stay focused and make the best of the time you have. What are some of your own favorite apps? Let us know in the comments.

Sonia Tracy is the content editor for PsPrint and editor of PsPrint Design Blog. PsPrint is an online commercial printing company. You can follow PsPrint on Twitter @PsPrint.

These questions help you to build up a picture of those who are likely to buy your products or services online. They also give you an immediate insight into the keywords (search terms) that will be used in order to find your website online.

This is a great starting point when considering the keywords that you wish to target. Some would argue that keyword analysis and selection forms the most important part of an SEO project. It’s hard to disagree with that.

Keyword selection

You may feel that keyword analysis is all about finding the search terms that Google users look to use on the most frequent basis. It could be argued that being top for these terms will produce the best results for your business. But is this necessarily true?

The reality is that you don’t have to target these terms. In many cases, it’s actually best not to. Why should this be the case?

The answer is that you’re looking for customers, rather than visitors. Any SEO campaign can lead to increased visitor numbers, but you’re aim is to find buyers. This is where the danger lies when it comes to keyword selection. There’s a risk that you may only ever attract window shoppers.

So how do you avoid these dangers? One way is to ignore keywords that are associated with research, rather than the buying phase of the process. Phrases including words like free, information, advice, help, assistance, returns and faults are not often used by buyers. They are, however, used by individuals researching products, or by those who already own products. These probably don’t represent your target market.

Find your niche

You’ll also notice that keywords attracting large volumes of searchers will often also attract numerous competitors. Some of your rivals are likely to have significant advertising budgets. Do you want to compete with them, in a financial sense, in order to gain positioning?

It’s likely that your money would be better spent by looking to target niche areas. Within your market, you might want to think about areas where you really excel. Is it possible that you are the very best within a smaller niche?

You may realise that you offer better customer service, a wider range of products, or an increased level of expertise. All of these discoveries can be turned to your advantage.

The beauty of seeking to tackle niche areas is that you’ll find that you’re competing with fewer rivals. You’ll also realise that there’s more chance of getting targeted visitors. In other words, you’ll be able to concentrate your efforts on attracting those who are most likely to buy.

If your SEO project is already under way, then take the time to stop and consider the keyword selection. Are you targeting the words that will really produce the most cost-effective results for your business?

With his SEO consulting approach, Keith Barrett provides small businesses with advice on a wide range of search engine optimization and online marketing issues.

Panda is not all about content.

Since Panda came about and kung fu kicked everyone’s poor quality websites down the search results, all people are shouting is that ‘content is king’. No, not true. You, the person handling the overall SEO campaign, is king. The content is just part of the overall picture and really, producing quality content from the point you took over the project should have been your objective, regardless of what Google are doing. It’s basic common sense. With the focus on recent months having shifted across to blogger outreach and spending time writing high quality articles, it’s easy to start overlooking those essential on-page factors.  Don’t do it. You can have the best quality content in the world but you’ll be letting your site down if you don’t pay attention to the very basic on page factors which should be working in harmony with your off site link building.

The significance of some of the factors listed below is up for debate. I’m not saying they will dramatically improve your search rankings. But they will certainly not have an adverse affect. The true extent of these on-page search engine optimisation techniques can only be found when you’re testing, but if they are just minor tweaks that can be made to enhance the SEO of your site, then start doing them today!

5 Essential On-Page SEO Factors To Consider

Title Tags and Meta Descriptions (and Keywords!)

This is basic SEO best practice. Very basic. But you’d be amazed at the amount of sites that focus on building links yet still do not have optimal keyword titles and descriptions. Let’s hit the starting point. Each of your pages should have titles that include one or two key term targets and/or a variant term.  Do not overlook the keyword research and always ensure where possible that no page titles are targeting the same key terms.  Keep your titles at a maximum of 70 characters where possible as this is all that is shown in Google rich snippets.

The importance of meta descriptions in terms of search engine optimisation ranking factor is still questioned by many but you MUST add them in. It can do no harm to include one or two target key terms in your meta descriptions and you should always include a call to action at the end. Keep your meta descriptions snappy and at a maximum of 156 characters. Don’t use capitalisation and try and really get across your websites USP without it feeling too much of a hard sell.

Semantically Listing Header Tags

Google has obsessive compulsive disorder, it loves everything being in its rightful place and semantically ordering your header tags across pages will be positively rewarded. Try and only include one h1 tag per page which should include a target key term for that page. Then break your copy down into sections using h2 tags (1-4) and then sub sections with h3, h4, h5 and h6 as appropriate. This is just a guide though and if you have vast amount of content on your page, you may want to use header tags differently than how I’ve outlined. The key point is to separate your content sensibly and make it easier for both readers and search engines to identify the key headings of your page. Where possible, include target key terms and key term variants in heading tags.

If you run a WordPress site (like most of us do) it’s likely the theme you’ve bought hasn’t necessarily been made to be SEO friendly and may include instances of headers being used for elements which aren’t incorporate semantically. Dedicate some time to going in and changing the styling settings manually and stylise the text to replace the header tags you do not want.

Alt Tags

Alt tags are probably one of the most overlooked aspects in terms of on-page search engine optimisation and the only reason I can think as to why is because of the time involved in adding them, as the task itself is so damn easy. Primarily alt tags are used for those using screen reading devices, but including alt tags for each and every one of your images can also be beneficial to your SEO. Be explicit in every alt tag description you enter on a page. If you have a picture of a car, describe the colour of the car, the model, the location in which the car has been pictured and other aspects of the picture. Where appropriate, include your target key term in at least one of the images on a page. A great tool for identifying image alt tags on a page is the web developer toolbar for Firefox.

Internal Links

Try and include your target key words in internal links. Though you can’t go ‘Google Bombing’ as much these days as you may have done 18 months ago, including target key terms in internal links still can add that little extra boost to your on-page SEO. Instead of using phrases like ‘return to home’ or ‘click here’, you may want to include a key term such as ‘return to SEO home’ or ‘check this search engine optimisation tips page’ for more information. Don’t waste your time going out of your way putting key terms in every single internal link, but certainly try and identify a few which looks natural.

<strong> and <em> tag

A <strong> and <em> tag should be wrapped around your target key terms within the first 100 words of your page. But again this is only a guideline. If you have a large page of copy, the best way to use these tags is simply to wrap them around the key aspects of your copy. Whatever you make user friendly is likely to be search engine friendly too. It may also be worth experimenting with your copy to use and tags in the last 100 words of your copy too as some suggest that Google focus on the start and end of your page copy. Personally, I try and not overuse these tags for target key terms as it can come across a little too unnatural and unprofessional, but for the SEO benefit, at very least I’ll use them once each per page.

Scott is a writer whop urges people to realise that Panda is a search update, not a search attack.

Take advantage of social networking sites:

Do the obvious first and set yourself up with profiles on Facebook, LinkedIn and Google +. Import the contacts you have already made by syncing with your email contacts list. Create a list of specific keywords you need for your company. Use this list to find people that match the audience you want your brand or business to attract.

Make a networking plan:

Anything worth doing is worth doing well as the saying goes, really this couldn’t be more important than with online marketing. There are many free online tools you can use to create a networking project plan or contact list. Put this on top of your to-do list and make it a priority.

The likelyhood is, you have probably underestimated just how many contacts you already have. Start with these, and section them into different categories; friends, family, business contacts, clubs and groups you belong too. Once this step is completed you will be ready to put your plan in action.

Google places to increase your networking potential:

Check out Google’s free and extremely accessible service, Google Places. This is what Google says “Google Places brings users and their local businesses together, both online and in the real world”. This feature is great way for customers to find you online. Google takes its time to verify who you are but it’s well worth investing a small bit of time in.

Greeting and Tweeting:

Sign up to be a Tweeter, link up with those with similar interests and use that list of keywords you made earlier to network with those who could be potential customers. Take the time to get to know your followers and followees, greet users and offer feedback and advice at every opportunity. Setting yourself up as an expert in your field will make you the go-to guy they will remember. Tweeting does not have to be too time consuming and there are hundreds of apps available on the internet free of charge that will make your workload on Twitter a whole lot lighter.
Make sure you also take advantage of the free buttons all of the social networking sites offer and implement them on your website, blog, store or directory. A simple ‘like us’ on Facebook button can give you a great idea of how well your online networking is going. There are also buttons available for Twitter, LinkedIn and Google + along with other worthwhile sites, install 4-5 of your choice (or more) and make it easier for your potential and existing customers to get in touch. There are no hard and fast rules when it comes to networking online. The one thing I would say is that you don’t necessarily have to stick to the sites that we all know. Take a look around the Internet and see what works for you. Another site worth a mention is Jigsaw.com, I found this site great when I first started my business, hopefully so will you.

Ben is an SEO Consultant. London is his base, but his clients are Europe-wide and include the likes of No.1 Traveller, operators of airport lounges. Gatwick, Heathrow and Stansted are their current locations, although they plan to open more soon!

But one has never stopped being true, even if for some companies it went out of style: the customer is always right. Or, more specifically, customer satisfaction for loyalty building.

It is as true today as it ever was that getting a new customer is about ten times more costly than keeping one that you have already sold to. What you might not know is that it goes beyond that. It is also less important to make a sale than it is to ensure the happiness of that customer.

This is what we refer to as relationship marketing, and it is really what it sounds like: fostering a relationship with each consumer to ensure they are satisfied with the service they are being provided. Focusing on this element, it has been shown to increase profit by generating brand loyalty, an important part of any business model.

The main problem that companies seem to have lately is forgetting this principle. With so much competition thanks to the Internet – both a blessing and a curse for the sales world – there is too much focus on sale by sale transactions. Many think that just offering a small discount once in awhile is enough to bring people back. But this is wrong, and it ends up costing the company a lot more in the long run.

What you want is establish yourself as the brand of choice. This means making sure that each customer chooses to return for more in the future, and that is where relationship marketing comes in to play.

Unfortunately, if you are reading this now, you are probably not getting the most out of the method that you could be. In fact, you might be doing the opposite and ruining your chances. Here are some ways that you can increase your odds of properly utilizing relationship marketing for your business.

Business Transparency Is Not Necessary…Usually

Let’s say you run a multi-billion dollar organization that has dominated the business world. With the current anger over the bail outs, executive bonuses in the financial sector and an increased interest in corporate responsibility, transparency is a good idea. It will help to show customers that yours is a positive business where they can buy in confidence.

But if you are a small or mid-range business with no political ties, chances are it is unnecessary. In fact, transparency might just work against you. It might be interesting (and for some, infuriating) to see how much a Wall Street tycoon makes in a year, yes. Though it is doubtful that your meager or average salary will generate much interest.

Social Networking For Updates, Not Intercommunication

You will never be able to convince me that social networking like Twitter and Facebook (especially the latter) are not brilliant marketing platforms. There is endless potential for generating interest and keeping consumers informed of upcoming products, changes, and of course offering special discounts for those loyal enough to join your page.

But when it comes down to it, many businesses make a misstep here and use it as a chat platform. The only communication you should have is official; handling complaints, taking suggestions and providing details. Anything else is too easily misconstrued. Not to mention pointless, because who actually wants to have a conversation with a business? That is what customer service is for, and no one actually relishes calling it.

Don’t Think Of It As a Relationship, Even A Business One

Yes, it has ‘relationship’ in the name. But really what you are focusing on is building brand loyalty, which is all about the history the customer has had with your company. Which is what you need to set your eye on: how often they have bought, how they plan to buy in the future, and how you can increase the odds of that happening.

Fostering a professional relationship to this end is important, but it should not be overly personal. Which is the same mistake made with social media sites mentioned above.

In the end, the whole point is to make it so they want to come back for a long term customer relationship. Not to be buddies.

Conclusion

Alright, so this is your ultimate goal: to get the customer to keep buying. Not to buy once and walk away. Not to get five people to buy once and then walk away. But to get that one person to keep buying every time they need that item, and then do the same with the next customer, and the next. That is relationship marketing: focusing on this goal rather than just on sales alone.

After all, you could sell to a dozen people easily enough. But then you would have to find another dozen people, and then another, and it would just keep going on. Wouldn’t it be better if with each dozen, you have a constant sales pool generating new profits on a regular basis?

Personal touches are good, and they make people feel like sticking around. Making it about them is the best way to go about it, by showing each one that they are more than a number of a dollar sign. Just don’t get too hung up with the personal aspect, as it should still be more about the marketing and less about being friends with the customer.

All you have to do is show them that you are the best, and you’re golden.

Annie is a business blogger for Life Insurance Finder, the free source of insurance-related information for Australians

There are many blogs out there that are strictly dedicated to the idea of guest blogging and what it can do for your website. It is something of a huge phenomina in which whole websites were created for (like MyBlogGuest.com and BloggersLinkUp.com) to help people find better and more guest blogging opportunities. It is a marketing strategy that has taken hold of the SEO and it seems as if it might be here to stay for a while because of all the benefits it provides, not only the people that are doing the guest posting, but websites that are created from guest posting.

In fact there are many websites out there that get 100% of their content strictly from outside sources such as guest posting. Guest posting has affected the Internet world like nothing we have ever seen before. Here are a concepts of what guest posting actually is and what guest posting actually does for your web site.

• Branding
• High Powered Networking
• Gains Exposure
• Link building
• Traffic Building

When Should You Guest Post and When You Shouldn’t

Not all guest posts, not all blogs, and not all networks were created equal. One of the “golden rules” of link building is that if you can receive traffic from a link, then it is probably best to build that link. The same can be said with guest posting but I would argue that you should take it a little bit farther and only guest post if you get substantial traffic from that guest post.

Now, substantial traffic can mean many different things. It all really depends on where you are at in terms of the strength of your web site at the moment, and if you are barely getting traffic in the first place, then getting more guest posts whenever you have the opportunity to obviously will make a little more sense.

How Do You Get the Most Traffic From Your Guest Posts?

Your guest posts, since you are posting on another website, and in a lot of cases a website that may perhaps get A LOT more traffic than your website, have to be some of the best content you can come up with. If you are going to want to convert a lot of the traffic you get, into normal and frequent visitors, then you need to make sure that your guest posts are top notch quality.

First thing is first. Do not look at blogs solely as metrics that your SEO Quake Bar feeds you. There are many Page Rank 2 (and even 1 in some cases) blogs and websites out their that can provide amazing benefits to your website out their and there are also many different PageRank 3,4 and even 5 blogs out there that would not provide as much value to your website. PageRank is not a magic number – I try to stress this fact as much as possible.

There are many different other factors when picking and choosing yuor guest posting opportunities other than page rank.

• Is your article going to have a chance to rank at the top of the SERPs?
• Does the website have a solid base of readership?
• Is the website getting a lot comments on each blog post?
• When was the last time the website got updated?
• How is the quality of the content on the blog? Is the web site actually providing value on the Internet or is it more of a content farm?
• How relevant is the web site? Are these the types of visitors that you are going to be able to turn in to frequent visitors?
• Is the site a good target for cross promotional strategies?

As you can see, there are many different reasons that you should do a guest post on a web site. To get the best results, you should look for websites that have very positive results in terms of the criteria mentioned above. You should also do a lot of research for what it is that you would like the article to rank for.

When approaching guests posts from this angle, you should definitely approach each and every one like you approach your own web site. You should get a set of keywords that you would like to aim at ranking for and then you should sprinkle them throughout your content.

If you can maximize the amount of traffic your guest posts gets, you can maximize the traffic you will get, and also the amount of people that link to your site and that guest pot naturally – will add a lot of “link juice” to your site. Like posting on your own site however – it all starts with the quality of your content.

This article was contributed by Philip Russell. In his spare time, Philip loves to join the online world in discussion about SEO, Internet marketing, and the newest and coolest way to make money online. By day, he helps to provide a white label link building service over at www.inetzeal.com – an established a reputable white label SEO Company. He also enjoys computer programming, basketball, and music.

What sort of personal branding have you done as a blogger to enhance your equity in other spheres apart from the online space? Have you gone crazy with the idea or are you happy with the way your blog is now? Is your blog ubiquitous, allowing it to take on many shapes even off the Internet?

I write this in reference to the resurrection of UK’s Ask Jeeves — based on surveys, despite Jeeves’ departure from the Internet in 2006, he still brings forth a lot of brand recall as “Jeeves” is easier and more fondly remembered than a corporate logo. And in Asia, just look at the brand recognition Ajinomoto has achieved with it’s “Dapur Umami” online cooking class.

This publicity will surely help you in many ways so you can surely get the most of it from that will make you different from the crowd. Normally video blogging is the most convenient way to spread our views to the world that is why they are used by many people and is helping them lot. The video blogging is the most common in the search engine that helps in the marketing perspective, so you can easily put your comments about the products and videos.

There are 5 main reasons why you should consider the video blogging:

It is Personal: The video blogging has a huge advantage when the blogs are written; they are the personal views, which are direct from the public opinion. There is not only the facility to comment on the video but there many kinds of passion and expression, which are available to express by the single person.

Random thoughts: Video blogging is the way by which you can easily express your feeling without thinking anything in mind. You can also talk to the other members, which has posted the comments on the video that also increases the popularity of the Video blogging.

Search engine marketing: It is a great skill of the SEO; they are the future of the video blogging as they help in many ways to express the way by which the video is normally blog posted. If you think that video, blogging is just the waste of the think about the Google employees that are just paid for blogging purpose.

Presentations: If you have increased the presentation skills, then surely you will get more benefits from the video blogging. If the video quality is great then your presentation skills will be significant in front of the big groups that will increase the popularity of the video.

Demonstration: If you are using simple text to demonstrate your ideas then many will not understand what you want to express, but if you use the video for that purpose then surely you would get the best results. The only thing is required is the way of expressing the points and how you are presenting it in front of the people.

Today video blogging has been the most advanced way to express everything, which is in your mind. It can be considered as the future of the organic search marketing, because in today’s world you can imagine your life without videos they are the most important part of the one’s life. Therefore, video blogging should be used by the common to express their feelings and their problems to those who can at least forward their problem at greater level.

They have the potential to do anything that is they are most popular nowadays and people are using the powerful media that has helped many people, which were not able to put forward the points before the people. According to a research, 78 percentage people are finding the social network sites are best for the Recruitment.

Social network sites are the most powerful recruitment tool as it has several reasons:

1. Social networks normally connect the relationship from those people, which we even do not know and that helps in many ways. The person is free to express their opinion with posting them in their social sites with more questions, viewing it becomes common to all the people who read it, and thus it becomes popular in the social networking. There you can easily post the recruitment options and there only you can easily get the details of the qualified person. Normally people a good relation by becoming the friend and then easily you can trust the person whom you think is suitable for the right place. You can easily use the resume to give to the people whom are applying and nowadays every person has a detailed social networking site.

2. By social networking sites, you can easily find the right candidate that can match the position or the required post. The skills of the candidate can be easily used for the recruitment that will help both the person.

3. If you are using the social network sites then you can easily gain the brand value for the company that will surely help to advertise your company.

4. The most important thing is that the potential of the candidate can be tested only the social networking sites by their connections. The personal connections of the candidate tell the whole story of the recruiting.

5. Jobs boards are now turning towards the social networking recruitment because they are easily done without any problem. A fact suggests that 78% of HR are recruited by the social media, and if you want to use this facility then you must use the social media. Start being the active member of the social networking site that can provide you the list of the unemployed people waiting for your right job.

In Israel, the most people are recruited by the social networks, which have the leading power. Therefore, you can easily obtain the maximum from the social networking sites and according to the majority the social networking; sites are the best way for recruitment.

By properly formatting the content area of your web property you can build a website that users find enjoyable to browse on a regular basis.

Here are several tips that will help your content area stand out from the rest of your websites design, placing the focus on the most important part of your website, the content.

1. Content Area Should Dominate The Website

The content area on your website should be larger than the other combined areas of the site. For example if you feature a left sidebar that is 200px and a right sidebar that is 250px you have already capitalized on 450px of space, at which point your content area should be larger than 450px.

2. Don’t Over Enlarge Your Content Title

A popular mistake found on many websites occurs when the title for each post is over enlarged. While you want to provide your readers with a quick understanding of your article an overly large font means taking up more space which in turn pushes your actual content further down the page. I typically make a general rule of thumb that titles are highlighted with the <h1> tag and are no more than 4px-6px larger than the main content font.

3. Properly Highlighting Links

When a website owner realizes you have linked to their content they may visit your website to see how you have chosen to link into their content, for that reason it’s important that you don’t hide your external links. Some website users use light highlighting to make links hard to see, therefore making it less likely that visitors will leave their website. When optimizing links I think of them as relationship building with other webmasters, the more they see clearly defined links to their web properties the more likely they will be to link back into my own unique content. If you use Kontera, Infolinks or other contextual link programs I suggest using a different link highlight color than those advertising programs to define your own links compared to adverts.

4. Padding The Margins On Your Content

While your content area should dominate the landscape of each page on your website in terms of space occupied it’s also important that you clearly define the content area. The easiest way to define your content is to provide at least some margin space around your content and other areas. When using padding I make sure my left and right side areas are evenly spaced to create a consistent content area. For example if a left and right sidebar setup is used I will implement 5px of padding for the left side and 5 px of padding for the right side. It’s also a smart idea to pad your top and bottom areas equally. By defining your padding the user receives a consistent viewing experience.

5. Avoid crowding The Content Area With Ads and Related Links

Some well known entertainment and “how-to” websites love to crowd their content with block ads and even “related links” in the middle of paragraphs. While those sites are able to crowd their content because of reader trust it’s not a good idea when attempting to build an audience. The content area should be free of obtrusive ads and feature only the content you are attempting to deliver. If you want to use ads place them directly before or directly after your content to avoid distracting new viewers who are receiving a first impression.

Building an effective content section is simply about isolating your content, keeping it free of “ad and related links” debris and understanding that the content must always come first, if you make a clean content area that users enjoy reading you’ll be one step closer to building an effective and successful website.

Social media is growing exponentially and has almost revolutionized the mode or promotion and advertising. It has now become the most wonderful mode of expression between business to costumers as well as business to business. The very popular social media sites such as twitter, facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn and Digg have engaged more than 300 million business people. However, not all of these know how to exactly use the social media to promote the business worldwide through these amazing social networking websites. On the other hand some are doing really a fantastic job at using social media and have taken their business to a new horizon.

There are endless options of business promotion available, what makes the difference is the right choice of the option. Identifying the best option is must to touch the horizons. Before starting with the social media promotion the goals and targets must be clearly established and identified. Using the right mix of social media is the next priority to attain the success in social media marketing. Commitment and dedication comes next.

The social media is effective in all sectors of business, whether you are selling some goods, providing services or running an NGO. Moreover under any circumstances if you are unable to use the social media marketing in an appropriate way it is better to hire a professional to get the thing on right track.

Social Media Manager is the person who can help you out in this context.

Who actually is a social media manager?

An advisor who keeps an eye on the networking tools of any business promotion and implements those tools in a right way to promote a company is the Social Media Manager. Social media manager could work as an organization or even as an individual. Hiring a social media manager though would be a foreign concept for some, but trust me; this is what you need to promote your business worldwide.

What is the work social media manager do?

The social media manager handles the advertising, marketing and networking of a company. The role of a social media manager basically includes creating a social profile of your company and promoting it through the social networking websites. They also keep updating your company profile on a regular basis to include the latest offers, discounts, products and much more.

How will hiring a social media manager help your business grow-

A social media manager first of all takes the advertising work from your plate and be there for social profiling and networking.

1. He is the one who expands the market capabilities and reach to the potential customer globally.
2. He promotes your business and also maintains the reputation of your company by being in touch with the potential customers regularly on your behalf.
3. A social media manager designs the banners, brochures and other promotional material used to market your business.
4. Social media manager implements the social media techniques and tools within your company and business such as the facebook likes, Google + votes, tweets, maintaining twitter followers, stumbles etc.
5. If your company owns a website, it is the duty of the social media manager to promote it and to bring more and more potential traffic to your company website.
6. He maintains the official blog of your company, with regular updates about your business organization. Blogging is a very useful social media tool and makes the customer feel free to get in touch with the company officials.
7. One very important task that a social media manager does is to take the feedbacks and complaints of your customer and resolve them by consulting the relevant department. This makes customers trust your company more than any other.

In all, hiring a social media manager means starting up with a tool to generate more revenue for the company. If your social media managers works well the wages you spend on him/her will be returned tenfold.

The degree of skills and knowhow that a social media manager possesses may however vary from person to person as their parameters of job are not predefined. Thus one must employ an experienced, skillful and dedicated social media manager.

How to select the right Social Media Manager for your company?

Hiring a competent and capable social media manager is a great start. Below are a few tips to keep in mind while selecting the social media manager for your company-

1. Test out their prior projects- A competent social media manager is the one who proudly show their previous work. Make sure that he can illustrate how to attain the company ROI goals using the social media strategy.
2. Make sure you hire an experienced one- More they work, more they learn. A social media manager with broad experience will be the right choice for your company. He must also boast the traditional marketing experience.
3. Strong social influence is the key- Make sure that the contender you are hiring has a strong social influence. If he donít have good ranking at social influence, he may not be the right person for your business.
4. Social grace is must- social media manager has to connect with the society and thus he must be socially graceful. Interacting with customers and handling their problem gracefully must be the main quality of the man you are employing as your social media manager.

Get smart and create a smart team who can manage your social media promotion digitally and do not rely just on the facebook likes to drive your sales. A team working together hand-in-hand to boost your in-house promotion is what you and your business actually need.

Bill is a geek from Canada, father of two beautiful daughters, loves to click photos in free time. Other than that, you will find him looking for temp staffing services.

WordPress websites are often targeted by hackers due to a lack of security. The problem, however, is that there are dozens of great security plugins you could be using to ensure the safety of your layout and contents. Here are 7 to keep in mind.

Stealth Login

Stealth Login is one of the coolest plugins you can use to deter hackers who simply want to figure out your password. The plugin allows you to create a custom URL you can use to log in and out of your site. WordPress usually gives you a very standard. With this plugin you can replace the wp-login.php with a customization of your choice.

WP-DB-Backup

The WP-DB-Backup plugin will automatically create backups of your main database as well as other tables within your blog. You can set the plugin to automatically make a backup hourly, daily, twice daily, or once weekly and then save it to your server, download it to your computer, or email it to a specific address. If something does go wrong, you’ll have no excuse for not being able to get your site back online.

Better WP Security

Better WP Security is a great tool for catching and helping you to fix problems with your blog. You can use it to limit login to your backend from certain IP addresses, ban bots and IP addresses, and check security. The plugin offers fixes for security issues, though you should always make a back-up before you attempt to apply a patch – just in case.

Firewall 2

Firewall 2 creates whitelists and blacklists and can block certain types of common web attacks based on where the attack is coming from. While you still have to make sure your site is properly upgraded and secured, this firewall is designed to allow you to sleep soundly knowing that your site is protected from brand new threats. You’ll even get an email notification as soon as an attack is detected.

AntiVirus

Sounds silly, doesn’t it? The AntiVirus plugin protects your WordPress site just as your computer’s anti-virus suite protects it from web attacks. The plugin will monitor for spam, worms, and other nasty intrusions, can test suspected infections, and can clean up problems. Why wouldn’t you protect your website the same way you protect your PC?

These are just a handful of samples of the security plugins available for WordPress blogs. Take a look at your site, assess your needs, and ask your web developer for help determining what type of protection you should have installed. There’s no excuse for not protecting your blog.

About the Author: Robin Fandrich is a full-time writer who specializes in web security. She also enjoys writing about communications and the effective use of the tablet pc in mobile computing.

In a bid to try to simplify things, dentists should understand that there are really just four elements in any successful marketing campaign – audience, timing, offer and message.

Audience

Before you can come up with an effective campaign, you first need to know who your audience is. Since you’re marketing your services to them, you need to know what their motivations are for availing of dental services. What are your target market’s demographics? Are they young or old? Will they respond more to a marketing campaign which is traditional or online-based? The more that you know about your audience, the easier it will be for you to tailor your marketing campaign to suit their preferences.

Timing

No matter how convincing your marketing campaign is, it might not work to its full advantage just because of the timing. For instance, it’s always more convenient for kids to get their braces fitted during the summer especially since the first few days can result in general discomfort. So you might not be able to attract as many patients if you launch a campaign involving braces in the middle of the school term.

Offer

A huge factor for ensuring the success of your campaign is coming up with right offer. Of course, you’ll need to whip up an offer which pleases those in your target market. For instance, younger patients with higher salaries may be more receptive to trying cosmetic procedures so you can always use that to come up with a suitable offer. Then again, the only way for you to really know if an offer works or not is to test it.

Messaging

In theory, your campaign might be great but somehow your prospects and patients aren’t buying. So what’s wrong? It could be that you’re not creative enough in getting the offer across to your audience. You need to come up with a message which stirs the curiosity of your prospects and entices them to take up your offer.

Elliot likes writing and is interested in Dental Marketing and Dental Website Design. Please take care of your teeth.

Blogs are about information; it is one of its key elements. Providing good, relevant information takes work and dedication on your part. For example, providing relevant and up to date information means knowing where to go online to get the latest news and information. To do this, a good idea will be to identify the major players in the field you are writing about and follow their own feeds.

Go to the communication venues where these industry players an top industry sources provide their information. This could be their web sites, various social media accounts like Twitter, or podcasts. Subscribe to their RSS feeds so you’re sure to get new information or the latest news as it arrives. This ensures that you’re always on top of the latest happenings in the industry you write for in your blog.

So you’re already in the loop. You have the latest information at your disposal. How do you make your blog content unique from what is being generated by these industry players and sources? Simple. Give your own unique take on the hottest topics. You can make a critique on the issue, an op-ed piece or talk about the issue from a different perspective. These are unique ways of presenting a topic that is popular and sure to get the hits you need to increase blog traffic.

Let’s start by going through a quick list of tasks that a top class SEO will be involved in and the skills that will be needed:

• Competitor Analysis (Analytics)
• On page optimisation (HTML and technical proficiency)
• Outreach (Creative writing and social skills)
• Creation of Link Bait (Design and creative conceptualisation)
• Content Creation (Creative and technical writing)
• Client and Team management (Social and management skills)

So, essentially this tells us that we’re looking for a mathematician who is keen on data analysis. At the same time they’re a web designer and developer who are able to do basic site updates and, when required, have the know-how to manage a developer and ensure they make any required changes. They’ll also be an excellent writer at a technical and creative level, but also have an understand of the psychology of site owners and be able to use this to write fantastic outreach emails – something I’ve had to do a huge amount recently when building links to the dog coats section of Pet365.

While all this is going on this person will be able to come up with ideas for things like infographics, research and analyse the facts that are needed, and be able to tell a designer exactly what it is that they need. This all goes on whilst working within a team, coming up with new ideas and, most importantly of all, managing at least one (but probably multiple) client(s).

That’s quite vast. In fact, when you think about it, this is a very rare set of skills indeed.

Maybe that’s why a good SEO is so hard to come by. Yes, there are hundreds of people that you can outsource some of these tasks to, but for someone to add true long term value they’ll need to get involved in every aspect of the optimisation process. Whether it be building a brand or generating leads for an e-commerce site, search engine optimisation is a long term and time consuming task. There are loads of shortcuts, many of which with risks far too high to be worth taking.

Let’s take link building as an example. The mental stamina required to build link after link, day after day, is simply immense. You’re talking to site owners, coming up with ideas on how to get them to link to you, sweet talking and designing content that you just know (hope) they’ll love. Then you get the link. You celebrate. You start all over again.

SEO is a new industry that’s changing at an incredibly fast rate. There are those out there trying to make an honest living from it, and there are those trying to manipulate the system. As time goes one the latter will die out and, for the most part, we’ll be left with the talent that is currently driving the industry. Do you have the skills to hack it?

Matt Beswick runs a number of e-commerce sites, distributes brands like Hamish McBeth throughout the UK, and loves to blog about all things SEO.

Start by searching a particular person or for a group from a dozen of social networks. There is for instance the kgbpeople which is used to search people names as well as other alphanumeric combinations in a vast of social networks. This should be able to lead you through the searching process where the destined country of the search is selected.  These should be able to capture all the results from all possible social sites and give results. Another common way of search the wide society of social sites is by using the Whos Talkin where the keyword is inserted on the right hard corner and then you can search the desired results from as many as sixty social sites.

Another way of searching for results in multiple social media is by using the 48ers which operates just fine when it comes to looking  for results from multiple sites. The person or the group to be looked for can be searched from a single place and results  can be displayed.

There is another way of searching and analyzing the social media properties by using the Socialmention which allows one to search over  a hundred social media properties which include the blogs, comments, images, and so on.  The benefit with this kind of search is the fact that, it is able to analyze the information that has been found.

One can also opt to use the other renowned search option of using the Kurrently. This one is able to conduct some  real time searches on twitter and Facebook. There are other tools which are available for carrying out these searches and they include using a tool known as a spy which is able to carry out searches on twitter, Facebook, Flickr and Backtype. It has  the advantage of offering some real time updates.

All these tools makes it possible to be able to carry out multiple social media searches using one of the look up tools suggested above.

Jimmy Adams works at RebatesValley, a Coupon Website. RebatesValley Provides Drugstore.com coupon code, bodybuilding.com coupons and coupons for various online stores. Please visit rebatesvalley.com

Server problems

You may think that it will never happen to you, but servers do crash.  And your webhost may not have all those files backup for you.  I have heard many stories of those who have had dedicated servers that have crashed and they lost everything that was on their site.  Don’t think this can’t happen to you.  All of the hard work you put into your blog can be lost in a moment and it usually happens without any warning to prepare you for it.  But by having a simple backup of your blog you can make sure that even if your server completely melts down, you will be able to get your site up and running again in a matter of minutes instead of days and weeks.

Security Attacks

This one is more common in today’s world.  Because WordPress is so popular, making up almost 15% of the top million websites in the world, more hackers are targeting WordPress blogs.  By the way, this is another reason that you need to keep your blog’s software up to date.  These updates usually include some kind of security fix that you don’t want to be without.  The older versions of WordPress are more susceptible to being attacked and hacked into, so if you have a lot of sites you will want to take the time to update each one, even though it is a little annoying.

There are also a lot of brute force attacks out there that use programs to cycle through different password combinations to your blog, trying to guess the right one.  A simple plugin like Login Lockdown can block any IP address that continually tries to guess your password.  You can also protect against these threats by changing your username from admin to something else and choosing harder passwords with numbers, characters, and symbols in them.

Since security threats are the most common way people lose their blogs, it’s the biggest reason you should have some kind of backup system in place.  You can use a simple plugin like Backup Buddy that will email you the backup on a daily basis or send it to another server, and this way it’s taken care of every day without you having to do anything extra.

Viruses and Malware

I had a virus on my WordPress blog one time, and it got there through a vulnerability in my FTP software.  This caused all kinds of problems on multiple blogs since I was using a shared account with different sites.  Fortunately I was able to contact customer support for my webhost and get everything up and running again after they got rid of the virus, but it could have wiped me out completely.  Having a backup system for your blogs will make sure you are safe in case you have some kind of virus on your site or server as well.  You can usually contact your webhost if you think you might have a virus and they should be able to run a scan for you if you have any reason for concern.

John Phillips is a writer for www.SafeIdentityProtection.com which reviews some of the best identity theft protection services available and offers articles like Trusted ID reviews to reveal unbiased reports on these companies.

One of the best ways of create blog traffic is taking care of content obviously. You should ensure that the content you push from your blog is exciting and will entice your readers to actually read it. You should take the time to think up of interesting topics for your blog and then do enough research so that when you write your article what you have is an article with a lot of value added to it. At the very least, you should release one great article a week on your blog. If a weekly commitment is too tough, then one article every fifteen days is sufficient. This doesn’t mean that you should only publish these great articles on your blog. A blog that will only publish two to four articles a month (even if it is killer content) is too few. It may work, but chances are it really won’t be sufficient. The better schedule is to have regular content that you publish daily and then have that one killer content once a week or every fifteen days. It’s the perfect mix of content that will ensure readers will go back and have new content to read every day.

Google Analytics is a free service from Google that provides complete statistics about all website visitors. It is useful in monitoring the impact of new initiatives undertaken for website promotion in terms of returns on investments. Google Analytics has now added social data to its reports and provides all the social media related data people could want. For those wanting figures of the number of Facebook ‘like’ clicks and Twitter tweets, can get them by changing some of the settings and using an additional tracking code available. All buttons like Facebook ‘like’, Twitter ‘tweet’ and Google +1 are called social sharing buttons which can be used by simply clicking on the specific social sharing buttons.

Google uses terms like “social engagement”, ‘social pages” and “social actions”, and it is all these social statistics that are made available in the report through Google Analytics.   

Google Analytics Social Engagement Report

This social engagement report provides a comparison of visitors’ behavior by analyzing the behavior of those who click on the social sharing buttons with those who do not. The comparison is highly beneficial for site owners since they are able to check whether the click actually helps or hastens the conversion and they also visit other similar pages, or does it actually hamper the conversion process. In the case of the latter, site owners have reason to worry and find ways to circumvent this eventuality.

 The new version of Google Analytics includes figures for the Google +1 clicks, but other social network buttons would need some modifications of settings before they can be assessed.

Google Analytics Social Actions

Social actions are taken to include the number of clicks for sharing site information through social sharing buttons. The social Actions report provides details about the number of visitors who clicked on social sharing buttons within a specified date range. By default Google Analytics takes into account only the Google+1 clicks, but it offers valuable insights into site visitor behavior and the potential for conversions through the data received. This definitive measure helps site owners find ways to enhance these numbers and also look for ways to increase conversions.

Social actions reports can also be checked with other dimensions of Google Analytics to get an idea about the other factors responsible for visitor behavior. The dimensions that can be analyzed include the source of traffic, bounces, conversions and pay-per-click advertisements.

Google Analytics Social Pages

Social Pages is the last Google Analytics report that gives details about which pages of the site got the actual social sharing clicks for a specific duration of time. This is extremely helpful to site owners since they are then able to gauge which parts of the site is appealing to visitors, and which parts actually trigger the maximum social activity. Finding the most appealing aspects of those parts and modifying the rest of the site accordingly will help to improve social sharing from other site pages as well.

Changing Defaults to Include Facebook, Twitter and Others

By default it is only Google +1 that is included for Google Analytics reports. However, some site development will enable the integration of Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites, and then reports will include figures which are a sum total of all the social sharing buttons. Detailed instructions for developing this site are provided by Google but it helps to have technical expertise and familiarity with JavaScript to be able to accomplish this flawlessly. The Google Analytics Software Development Kit (SDK) is needed along with the SDK of the networking sites in question.

 Thus Google Analytics provides vital clues which can be used for the betterment of the business by ensuring higher visitor clicks and conversions as well.  

This is a guest post by eMobileScan. Which is one of Europe’s leading suppliers of handheld computers like the Motorola MC9090  and the Symbol Mc70. With 18 sites around Europe they can offer their customers the best value

If there is one buzzword in marketing circles in recent years, it is “social media.” Social media, meaning interactive online communities like Facebook, Twitter, and even YouTube, is transforming the landscape of the Web, and with it, altering the way companies large and small interact with their consumers and with their target demographic. Luckily for small business owners, social media marketing is one of the cheapest and most democratic ways to reach a new audience. A well-crafted social media campaign can go a long way towards bringing your company name recognition and media attention. But as easy as it is to use social networking to benefit your company, it is unfortunately also easy to fall victim to any of the potential pitfalls that face the first-time social media marketer. When planning your next Facebook or Twitter campaign, avoid these ten mistakes.

10. Not understanding your target audience. People of every age, income level, and political affiliation are on the Web, but not all social networks are created equal. In order to craft a campaign most likely to appeal to your target market, you have to understand who they are and where on the Internet they are likely to hang out. The more focused and directed your plan is, the more likely you are to find that small, but passionate, market that is looking for a product just like yours. Don’t waste your time and money creating a huge campaign that doesn’t appeal directly to your target audience. Last year, Kohl’s launched a campaign through Facebook in which communities were able to nominate and vote for local schools to receive funding from the clothing store for extracurricular activities. The campaign took off like wildfire, boosting the mid-priced family-oriented clothing chain’s profile in the suburban soccer mom demographic.

9. Not monitoring your profile. Once you’ve established a social media presence, you have to defend it from hackers and trolls just like you would protect your physical store from vandals and shoplifters. You must monitor your profile constantly to detect and deal with any unsavory activity, so that your profile remains a clean and friendly place for people to visit. While you do want to encourage commenting, and even polite disagreement, on your page, be vigilant about deleting comments that are inappropriate, impolite or overtly commercial. If hackers do use your profile for anything unsavory, be upfront about it and apologize to your fans immediately.

8. Not using restraint. A popular social media profile, a viral marketing campaign, and a couple thousand fans can be enough to make any marketer giddy, but acting without restraint can destroy your credibility. Just like you wouldn’t overwhelm your customers with a deluge of print marketing, you shouldn’t spam their inboxes with promotions, testimonials, and “have a nice day” messages. The right amount of communication will vary depending on your audience and your industry, but finding the right balance between spamming your fans and losing touch with them altogether is key to a successful social media presence.

7. Not being personally involved in your social media presence. Even at small companies, many CEO’s and marketing executives tend to look at social media marketing as the kid sister to the “real” advertising efforts in print and TV formats. As a result, social media marketing is often left to junior employees and interns. Additionally, some older executives assume that these younger employees are more tech-savvy and knowledgeable about social media trends than they are. While this may be true, and it is definitely a good idea to capitalize on the social media comfort and ease that younger employees may bring, it is still important to be personally involved in a campaign that can make a huge different to the company’s online presence. For example, a company that sells certified diamonds and engagement rings began its social media campaign by tasking a brand-new employee with creating a Facebook page and communicating with customers. Only months later did the CEO realize that the employee was making unauthorized assessments of the value of fans’ wedding rings as well as posting jokes and language that were not up to the company’s standards of professionalism.

6. Not responding quickly to changing events. In the online world, speed is everything. While you may spend months crafting the perfect advertisement to run in a national magazine, and weeks putting together a booth for a local business fair, time is measured much more quickly online. You should be ready to refer to current events within a day or two, respond to comments or questions the same day, and deal with unpleasant allegations or accusations as soon as you possibly can.

5. Not being completely honest. Just like in print advertising, you should not expect to get away with an advertising message that is not 100% true. Online more than anywhere else, people have their guard up about being duped or lied to, and they will detect it if you are being evasive or vague. Promise only what you can deliver, and leave your customers happy. With Facebook now connected to social consumer review sites like Yelp, one negative review can have a lasting impact! If you hype a promotion and then fail to deliver the promised discount, your legions of fans will turn on you faster than you can say “Twitter trending topic” ten times fast.

4. Not having actual fans. On a similar note, don’t get caught planting company employees as fake fans to make your profile seem more popular than it is. Just like audiences at a magic show feel duped when the “audience volunteer” turns out to be the magician’s secret accomplice, if it is uncovered that half of your enthusiastic fans are actually paid spokespeople or, worse yet, fake profiles, your online reputation will be seriously damaged. Earlier this month, it was discovered that nearly 80% of Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich’s 1,300,000 Twitter followers were fake accounts created by his campaign, severely damaging his reputation as a serious candidate.

3. Don’t disappear. Once you’ve spent valuable time and effort creating a dynamic social media presence, don’t waste that potential by letting your profile stagnate and deteriorate. Set a pace of communication and new content that you think you can reasonably meet, and then be vigilant in ensuring that you don’t let too much time go by without communicating with your fans and followers. A profile that sits untended is like an abandoned storefront—within weeks, you will be dealing with the online equivalent of graffiti. Plus, your fans and followers will quickly migrate to more interesting sites, instead of remaining connected to you.

2. Not figuring out what works for you. Social media is a constantly-evolving concept, and it seems that every week brings a new innovation. Google+, the recently launched social networking site from Google, promises to change the social media landscape as we know it, while Facebook and Twitter constantly offer updates and changes to their services. While it’s tempting to jump on the bandwagon with every new product, it is important to evaluate every social network and tool to determine whether or not it will truly benefit your company, or just be a waste of time. Do you really need a Tumblr page, a LinkedIn profile, a FourSquare check-in, a Google+ account, a YouTube account, a Facebook page, a Twitter feed, a Flickr stream, an Instagram page, and a blog?

1. Not building your business using social media. Despite all these pitfalls and potential mistakes, the social media community is too large to be ignored. Sticking to traditional print and Web 1.0 based marketing just isn’t going to work anymore. No matter what product or service your business provides, you need the exposure and networking opportunities that only social media can provide. Don’t be the last one out in the cold.

This article was provided by Whiteflash.com .

Your original blog content may, therefore, wind up becoming your biggest career asset. I firmly believe that every job seeker should blog, and continue to blog even after getting hired.

But getting started is hard. The biggest obstacle I see from people looking for a job  is indecision about what to blog about. Here is a quick exercise to help you figure that out.

Identifying Your Topic

The first step is to brainstorm a list of three potential topics. Remember, your blog topic is like the title of a book. The categories of the posts are like the chapters of the book. So when you look through the following questions, pick answers can be expanded into several sub-topics.

• What is a topic I can talk about for hours without ever getting bored?
• What is something I do that makes me lose track of time when I do it?
• What subject do I tend to have strong opinions about (apart from politics or religion)?
• What have I done for years, and maybe not realize, that I have amassed more experience than most people?
• Do I have a new interpretation of a concept or a new method of doing something that may benefit others? If so, what is that?
• When others come to me for advice, what do they ask? In other words, what can I write about that will resonate with others.
• Are there objects I like to collect and react to, such as funny ads, new products, or something else that relates to my career?

Mindmap Your Blog Topics

Now that you have a list of three possible topics, you need to know which one is going to really sustain you.

1. Take out a blank piece of paper and write down one of your blog ideas right in the middle.

2. Draw a circle around that idea and draw five lines coming out from it. (most blogs have at least five categories)

3. Think about five subtopics, chapters, or categories that may further expand the main topic.

4. Within each of those five subtopics, write down as many possible article titles you can think of.

Think from your reader’s perspective when you do this. A good title is what makes people read the rest of the article.

If you do this exercise for several blog ideas, you’ll notice that some ideas are easier to fill up than others. The blog topic with more ideas for articles in the fewest amount of time is the one you really have a voice about.

For more great advice on how to start and run a blog for your career, check out my new book, JobSearchingwithSocialMediaforDummies.

Guest Bio: Joshua Waldman helps frustrated job seekers leverage social media to find work FAST!  He is the founder of CareerEnlightenment.com and the author of the new book, Job Searching with Social Media for Dummies.  Sign-up for his newsletter today and get access to his exclusive training videos for free.

Jumping to conclusions has been the common response to Google’s latest entry into the world of social media. Comparisons to you-know-what are legion as are dire predictions of failure linked to previous false starts by Google, Wave and Buzz to name the last two. More cynically, others have assumed that the companion +1 button is nothing more than a rip off of the Facebook “like” button, again comparing Google+ to the dominant social media site, with the sole, rudimentary utility of upping rankings. These exercises in overlooking the subtleties that make Google+ very unique and innovative are not the stuff of sound analysis.

To be sure, Google+ will be competing with Facebook. Just as Google’s free e-mail service, Gmail, with just under 200,000,000 users worldwide at present, tend to be held by a comparatively more tech savvy base, Google+ is likely to share with and sometimes capture from Facebook a similarly more sophisticated user, as in Gmail, there’s no reason to presuppose that Google has any intention of directly competing for any form of dominance. Just to point out the obvious, Google+ will certainly draw from those Facebook account holders currently burned out on Facebook and who are looking for an alternative social media site – and that’s not unintentional on the part of Google.

Amid months of speculation of what then should have been apparent, Google has a site making it unequivocal as to the ranking implications of Google+’s attendant “+1 button.  Sadly, some SEO firms have ignored the available information and are actually charging their client blog owners money for the purchase of +1 buttons hits—bad idea because audience counts.

Just as Google+ allows its social media users to select groups called circles differentiating access to content shared, Google’s +1 button hit are analyzed, in part, according to profile characteristics of the users. If your +1 hits come from a random pattern of worldwide hits with no discernable connection, don’t expect a bump in ranking, and don’t be surprised if those hits are recognized by Google for the likely spam they are. Google’s webmaster tools link allows a web owner to actually analyze the audience characteristics of site visits, made anonymous, but otherwise very telling. As always, length of time spent on a site, with or without a +1 hit, helps move rankings up. This speaks to the second thrust of Google+’s primary focus: content counts.

Let’s briefly revisit the dubious, self-defeating practice of an SEO customer purchasing +1 hits. In the celebrated algorithm known but to God and a Google statistician, frequently changed without notice, one thing that has been known for some time is that length of view is tracked in any analysis of a site. Now, add to the mix a +1 hit for a given site. Those with hits, but little time spent by a viewer will, at best, not improve the stature of a blog or other internet site. Those with hits and a significant duration of a visit will correctly be assessed as having quality content, again, a well-known factor in improving search standings.

Google+ is neither, as a myriad of “reviewers” have pronounced, either a direct development from their notable flops involving social media, nor a FB wannabe. If speculation is to be done with any degree of informed reflection, Google’s temporary suspension of new requests for Google+ accounts, (invitation only initial account holders were given free reign to invite others to join, an unlimited privilege that caused millions of second degree invitees to apply for accounts), should be highly suspect. Not new to the business, it’s hard to imagine that allowing unlimited invitations would produce anything more that enhanced demand and that a well-publicized suspension of processing, temporary barely in name only, would simply add to the feeding frenzy.

Time will be the only true test as to whether or not Google+ was a flawed effort at playing ball on Facebook’s field or a revolutionary innovation that changed SEO practices. So far, the evidence, both circumstantial and empirical, suggests the latter. More significantly, if Google+ provides incentives for better quality content, a penalty for spamming patterns of behavior and a distinct focus on audience, it’s unlikely that anyone will remember much about Buzz, Wave, and to a certain degree, Facebook.

Guest Bio: Jesse Langley lives near Chicago.  He divides his time among work, writing and family life.  He writes on behalf of Colorado Technical University and has a keen interest in blogging and social media.  He also writes for www.professionalintern.com.