This is part of a series I am doing on online collaboration and fads for CEOs, small business owners, and entrepreneurs. It looks at best habits for virtual video-conferencing technology and the strategies for keeping people involved using tools from the cloud. In this Vlog I talk to Phil Montero, president of Montero Consulting and founder of YouCanWorkFromAnywhere.com and http://www.TheAnywhereOffice.com. Phil’s avocation is working with small and mid-sized business leaders in putting together the technology, coaching and tools for working virtually and leading virtually.

Trends in CEO Virtual Collaboration

Phil sees the greatest trend in digital collaboration among execs as just that there is even more of it, and it is a pattern that won’t be changing anytime soon. In many instances, virtual colleagues may collaborate for years and never meet face to face, yet still maintain an effective business connection.

Technology Advances

Virtual leadership results comes from finding instruments that satisfy the practical objective without getting in the way of people learning to know, like and trust one another. That is still critical to human beings in any job environment.

What gets you nearer that works repeatedly and shrinks the virtual distance between any virtual associates?

Cloud-based instruments such as Skype Video, Skype Screen share, Google docs and a selection of mobile applications have cheapened the price of congregating from around the world. Additionally, the always broadening scope of Wi-Fi connections and hotspots has strengthened the significance of mobile tools, and cloud application creators are trying to keep pace.

Online Meeting Best Practices

Once the technology wall is conquered, not always as effortless as you would expect, today’s CEOs and Executives need to handle the human elements during online meetings. Attendants who are on the team with even the best intentions and motivation will wander and start to multi-task during a monotonous meeting. To achieve and keep maximum engagement, Phil suggests…

Short and On Point

There is a fad in the physical meeting area to attempt to shorten meetings because of the huge time obligation needed on the part of attendants. Intensify that for online meetings. Want an hour meeting? Break it into three 20 minute meetings if you can. It’s less accommodating for you but more engaging for participants, which means they are more effective after leaving the meeting.

Advanced Notice

Send out an agenda in advance so individuals can prepare, not just for their sections but to get their heads around what is going to be covered.

Elementary Teaching Basics

Call on people randomly to validate comprehension. Only a few examples of being blind-sided will produce the shared consciousness of keeping engaged to avoid the possibility of announcing, being unprepared and enduring the slings and darts of your colleagues.

Tech Numbness

In a procedure I call Tech Deadening; the digital technology decreases the enthusiasm of leader communication in reverse proportion to how far you are from the real deal. For instance, video is the next best thing to being there, but it isn’t being there. Only teleconferencing? Your attendees are still more de-sensitized. Texting– you understand.

Leaders have to be aware of this and exaggerate tone of voice, hand movements, facial expressions and their Knut Rockne speeches in order to connect.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Leading Through the Cloud: Ideal Habits and Tools – A SPN Exclusive Article

Would You Rather Buy from a Person, or a Brand?

We thought so. Most people would rather feel like they’re engaging with real people than with a faceless, nameless “brand.” That’s especially true in social media, where people readily express their opinions and personalities.

So, how do you stay human on Twitter? Don’t be afraid to BE a human being on Twitter. Even if your company’s Twitter account has your company’s name, you can still project some personality.

Notice that TravelOregon promotes its own content, while also responding to people and re-tweeting other people’s comments. That makes TravelOregon’s Twitter stream seem like a real person is writing it, and conversing with the account’s followers. It doesn’t read like a stream of pre-scheduled, rote tweets, or automatic tweets from the organization’s blog.

Need an example of a boring, un-engaging Twitter feed? Here you go:

This is a pretty typical business-account feed. It’s just a series of automated tweets from the company’s blog – no personality, no variety, and no conversation.

You may be thinking this is unfair. How interesting can a foreign-exchange company’s tweets possibly be? Well, let’s look at another example. Groceries are kind of boring, right? Maybe, but Safeway’s Twitter feed is engaging and feels like a real person is writing it. Note the two tweets to @Jonspach at the top that clearly indicate a real conversation is going on:

Make People Laugh, or Catch them Offguard

It’s okay to be funny on Twitter, and when a big brand shows some humor, it’s refreshing. Just take a look at Southwest Air’s Twitter feed:

Note that Southwest Air attributes its tweets to actual people by using the ^ character and someone’s initials. This is a great way to show that several different people are manning the account.

Try bringing a more human touch to your tweets. I bet you’ll pick up more followers and get re-tweeted more often. That gives you a much bigger audience, and more opportunity to win new customers. And you’ll probably have more fun!

This article, originally published at AboutUs.com was contributed by Aliza Earnshaw of AboutUs.org.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Create a Personality for Your Brand on Twitter

During a presentation that I was giving at a small business owner’s boot camp, I was asked a very interesting question by one of the attendees:

“I am targeting consumers and homeowners – how can LinkedIn help me as it’s a B2B social media network? Should I be focusing just on Facebook which is more consumer oriented? And, if I should be on LinkedIn, how can I best utilize it to help me obtain more business and clients?”

My Answer to How Retailers That Are B2C Companies Can Use LinkedIn Marketing

One of the biggest advantages of using LinkedIn if you are a B2B business is being able to access targeted prospects. Now, it’s quite difficult to do that if you are a B2C company as business professionals are there for these purposes:

* Build and cultivate profitable relationships
* Get the information they need to develop

However, that doesn’t mean you should not be using LinkedIn marketing and just stick to Facebook and Twitter. Use Facebook and Twitter to build your community of prospects – but use LinkedIn marketing to attract these three audiences that can double your sales guaranteed:

1. Media Professionals – A recent study showed that 92% of all journalists are on LinkedIn which is more than any other social networking site. This means that you have more access to individuals who are looking to quote experts like you or publish articles regarding your industry and how you can help your prospective clients. By reaching out to these journalists you can develop meaningful and valuable relationships as they will come to think of you as the expert in your field and ask for your information when they are putting together their next piece. This extra publicity will give you more exposure to even more prospects and enhance your credibility so prospects will want to buy from you.

2. Referral Sources – Through LinkedIn you can build and enhance relationships with key influencers who can provide you with access to prospects you would otherwise not have known, met, or done business with.

A referral source is a valuable tool because it is a third party endorsement and they can act as your sales agent as they want to give their customers and clients more value.

3. Larger companies that offer products or services that are supplementary to yours – Smart companies are always looking to increase their revenues by giving their clients and customers more value. Think of the different companies and organizations that can add your products or services to their own at a premium price – and use LinkedIn to build relationships with the different company’s executives.

Your Next Steps…

1. Figure out who would be the best referral sources, key influences, types of media and companies for you to connect with. For example, one of my newest LinkedIn Profile Makeover clients is a real estate agent who is an expert on short sells, foreclosures, and troubled properties. Before we completed her profile, we had her brainstorm who would be the best referral sources which include:

* Divorce attorneys – In a divorce couples often have a house to sell. Couples also have other traditional real estate assets that often have to be sold in a divorce. Plus, at least one of the parties in a divorce will need to relocate – meaning they’ll need to buy a new house.

* Local bankruptcy attorneys who have clients who have no other choice but to either short sell or go into foreclosure

* Florida attorneys that represent HOA’s so my client can help them with the rental of the property, property management and eventual short sell

* Accountants who can refer clients to sell their residential or commercial properties to avoid further liability and eventual foreclosure

* Financial planners, estate attorneys and probate attorneys who want to give homeowners relief from their unexpected financial burdens

* Banks who want to sell their foreclosed properties in the shortest amount of time with the highest net to them

Now, I know you are a retailer and not a real estate agent – but you get the idea!

2. Create a LinkedIn profile that is written for the referral sources and media you want to attract starting with your headline. In the headline, identify the audiences you want to connect with – and why they should want to connect with you. In your summary, explain to referral sources how you can be of value to their clients and customers and how your relationship will help them. Also, if you are trying to attract publicity, show the media that you are an expert. Use any media mentions to your advantage in your summary sections as well as having a complete media kit on your profile using the Box.net, Slideshare, and Google Presentations applications. To help you create the copy you need for your LinkedIn profile, check out my Instant LinkedIn Marketing Templates at http://www.InstantLinkedInMarketingTemplates.com

3. Stay on top of your referral sources’ and media professionals’ minds – Once you figure out who your best key influencers, referral sources and media types, start doing your research on LinkedIn and make connections.

When you make a new connection, invite the referral source or media professional to your LinkedIn group where you provide tips, tools and articles. Every time you are published, featured or quoted in the media you should be announcing it to your connections and group members. This will show them that you are a valuable resource and keep you on top of their minds. So when a referral source has a client needing your expertise, they’ll think of you. And, when the media needs an expert to
quote- they’ll come to you.

So create a strong LinkedIn profile using my Instant LinkedIn Marketing Templates, figure out who would be the best referral sources and media types and start making connections that can double your sales guaranteed.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

LinkedIn Marketing for Retailers- The Audiences on LinkedIn That Will Double Your Sales Guaranteed

Video Marketing for small business is growing in significance in the media-rich, entertain me culture we now live in. That much we know. To show your video clips on your site, there are a number of details you should take into account on how to serve up your video files, because they tend to get large and load slowly, so utilizing a service in the cloud to host your videos that has mega-capacity and specializes in streaming video is an excellent idea. It ultimately comes down to ease of use versus control, with a smidgen of quality and user-experience mixed in.

Video Streaming Services

There are virtually dozens of qualified video hosting sites available you can utilize, and this is not the place to analyze them all. Some you’ve heard of, some you haven’t. I’ll detail and link to some of the top dogs here for both free and paid video sharing services. You can click on the links and test them out and decide which is best for you.

Free Sharing Services

* YouTube – The ruler of them all. World’s premiere video sharing website. At first videos limited to 15 minutes (used to be 10) but if you put enough of them up, you can get allocated unrestricted length rights.

* Vimeo – Akin to YouTube, but less popular.

* Viddler – Free service available, a bit more customizable than YouTube; paid B2B service also.

* Google Videos – Part of the Google collection; permits you to sell your video downloads.

* Yahoo Videos – Options include a search across hosting platforms.

* Metacafe – Highly rated free service for service and formats used.

* Daily Motion – Sorted videos into social networking.

Paid Video Sharing Sites

* Playstream – Larger volume storage video streamer.

* On Stream Media – Comparable to Playstream.

* Amazon S3 – Not a video sharing site per se, but remarkably inexpensive large cloud storage that works in combination with the EZ Player or other players for fast video streaming on your site.

* Viddler B2B – Designed for business, secure white-label, unbranded options, but begins at $ 100/month.

Options for Small Businesses

If your business is not video production but something else, in most situations you can stream video to your website using any of the cost-free video sharing options listed above, YouTube being the most popular. Many of my customers are consultants, architects, attorneys – people in white collar positions, and they use video interviews or some other format to feature their value for site viewers. There are details you should know about free and paid video streaming options and questions you should keep in mind.

What to Keep in Mind with Free Video Hosting

I’ll use YouTube for this conversation considering it is where most of my video customers store their videos for streaming on their blogs.

* It is generally simple to establish an account and load videos on free video sharing websites.

* YouTube takes most file formats and transforms them to .mp4 or .flv (flash) for playback.

* YouTube has a huge search engine and is loved by its parent, Google, so getting your public videos discovered is more likely from an SEO point of view (which also helps your site). You can also restrict access to videos e.g. available only to associates.

* Reasonable analytics and ability to style your channel.

* Easy to embed player for your blog.

* Recognizable with the YouTube icon in the corner and can literally lead to more clicks.

These are all advantages, but like all Free options, they get paid somehow in some way, and if you’re not careful can pull visitors away from your video to other videos. You also relinquish a bit of control when using a complementary service like YouTube or Vimeo.

* YouTube curbs videos to 15 minutes. Typically for power users YouTube will upgrade you to unrestricted video upload file size, but you never know when this will take place. I was fortunate and use longer videos for my Vlogs on the Smart Blog.

* As a basic feature, YouTube samples other people’s videos at the end to yours in addition to a “replay video” choice. The good news is that you can disable this in your embed code.

* If a viewer clicks through to your channel, the blog comments are outside of your control, so unsatisfied customers can post hostile comments and hurt your reputation.

* YouTube is in absolute control. Make sure all your videos are backed up on your hosting server because people have been closed down, even big users, for no clear cause. This is a rare occurrence but a risk.

The good news is, for small businesses with just a handful of videos to market products and services, these hazards are acceptable. Most people will watch the video on your site. If you correctly embed the player code (and not link away to the YouTube site), you minimize the possibility that other videos might lure users away.

Paid Video Sharing: What You Need to Know

I’ll use the increasingly popular Amazon S3 hosting service as an example, suggested to me by my friend Phil Montero of The Anywhere Office. S3 stands for Simple Storage Service and is a good alternative to free video hosting sites.

* Any size video uploads right out of the gate.

* Video is protected so it is only accessible where you provide the player and stream it. S3 is a storing option, not a video sharing website per se.

* Very inexpensive for a dedicated storage solution ($ 0.14 / GB per month).

* Your video is your video, with no links to other people’s videos, ads, etc…

However, Amazon S3 has its drawbacks also…

* S3 isn’t so simple, and there is some tech knowledge required to get set up, upload files, and install what normally is a paid player on your site. Not for the do-it-yourselfer, unless you are a tech geek.

* It’s not a search engine nor catalogued, so S3 doesn’t aid your off-site SEO.

Suggestions for Business Video Streaming

For most marketing video, you want it seen by as many people as possible. Sites like YouTube make that easy, offering fairly high-speed streaming embeds for streaming on your website. You may have to link out, however, on your social media profiles. Your YouTube channel can be searched and rated by Google, and the video clip on your page can be search engine optimized. Given its ease of use and findability, I suggest using YouTube for your marketing videos.

However, if you are creating paid video content such as course material, you may want to restrict accessibility to your paid members and get the professional, won’t link away capability offered by a service like Amazon S3, where you are in control and get the same streaming speed (or faster) as the free hosting options.

Depending on your business needs and use, a combined technique could provide you with the best of both worlds – control and public accessibility.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Internet Video Hosting Strategies and Tips – A SPN Exclusive Article

Time is precious. They say “time is money,” but I think it’s even more than that. In this post, I would like to talk about the SEO practices that are a complete waste of time.

Before writing the post, I simply sat down and penned my SEO experiences. As a beginner, I used to waste a lot of time on different SEO methods that later on turned out quite useless. So, I made a list of those. I’ve also “interviewed” some of my SEO buddies and included their piece of advice in this post, too. So, what I would like to present to you is our distilled wisdom. Enjoy!

It is NO use:

1. Hanging Out at SEO Blogs/Forums

Ironically, this is what you are doing now, aren’t you? Well, it’s not the same, and let me explain why. There is a difference between CHOOSING to read a blog post or a forum thread that looks really helpful (this is what experienced SEO’s do) and simply reading everything in sight to stay informed about everything at all times.

I remember the days when I used to read every reply in a forum thread that I started, even when I already knew the answer to the question I had asked in the thread. I was just curious! So, guess what, I don’t have the time for curiosity anymore.

Also, one of my SEO buddies had volunteered to moderate an SEO forum. He thought it was gonna be fun, but it turned out to be extremely time-consuming. Well, if you have nothing better to do, you might as well do that.

2. Commenting on SEO Blogs/Forums

First, let me make myself clear and say that I do NOT mean using blog/forum commenting for SEO purposes, I mean using it for commenting purposes. Like, sometimes you’d get caught up in a heated discussion, especially when the “wow, I didn’t know that” stage is over, and you can give your opinion on different SEO matters, and you don’t hesitate to do it. So, this just eats up your valuable time and doesn’t really do anything for you.

3. Thinking That Manual is Better

To all of you perfectionists, double-checkers and sure-makers out there, I’d like to say that manual is seldom better. At least not when it comes to SEO. Many of my SEO friends, including me, say that, as SEO newbies, they had tried to do everything by hand. Partially, that was striving for better quality, and, partially, it was not trusting the SEO tools.

Anyhow, once they did try SEO software, they never got back to the olden do-it-yourself ways, ever. The general principle here is, if there IS a tool that can do it FOR you (like, a rank checker), go for it. Will save you loads of time.

4. Submitting to Crappy Article Directories

One of the SEO managers I know admitted that she used to spend a lot of time submitting to crappy article directories. Later on, she discovered that article marketing was all about quality, not quantity; that it was better to find fewer better-targeted, perhaps even paid directories and submit there.

5. Spinning Content

Another friend of mine did a lot of article submission, too. But those were not unique articles, but spun articles that were being submitted to hundreds of directories on the Web. At some point, he realized that writing and promoting one unique and useful article had a much bigger impact on site rankings, than spamming the Web with hundreds of “clones.”

6. Doing Manual Link Exchange

When I was still a beginner, the way I used to do link building was one link at a time. I would find a site, offer to exchange links, write “best regards” at the end of each email – Hah, now, when I think about it, it seems just so ridiculous.

I don’t do that any longer, of course. I now use SEO tools like LinkAssistant and SEO SpyGlass to build links. I now sometimes build 100 backlinks a day, with very little effort on my part.

7. Keyword Stuffing

One of the SEO’s, who I have great respect for said that he used to engage in keyword stuffing at the beginning of his career. He just wanted to rank faster for his major keywords, you see.

Well, of course, that affected content quality. His bounce rates went up, and the rankings went down. So, my acquaintance decided to work on interlinking instead! He provided useful links between different pages of his site. This worked both ways: to help SEO and to improve user experience. Users began following those links and, as the result, were staying longer on the site.

So, this is it. Are you practicing any of the above-mentioned techniques? If you are, take our word, they are not worth it! There is a saying that goes like ‘a smart man learns from his mistakes; a wise man learns from the mistakes of others.’ So, be wise and save your precious time!

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

7 Things NOT to Waste Your Time On When Doing SEO – A SEO-News Exclusive Article

Once you’ve done the keyword research for your website, you can then use those keywords strategically in your article submission campaign. By creating keyword focused articles, you’ll get much better results from your article marketing efforts by helping search engines to associate your website with particular keyword terms.

This article gives some quick article marketing tips on how to appropriately use your keywords in your article submissions:

1 – The Headline:

The purpose of your headline is to indicate the topic of your article.

Try to place the keyword phrase that you’re targeting at the beginning of your headline. This takes some thought – the goal is to create a headline that would capture the attention of your potential reader, but that also prominently displays the keyword phrase. The title also has to be grammatically correct and contain correct spelling.

The best SEO-friendly titles just look like a great title – no one should be able to tell that you have specifically crafted it with your keywords in mind.

Please note: In addition to the keywords you researched for your website, it’s a good idea to also do keyword research for the topics of your articles. The phrases associated with your article topics will naturally be longer, say 3-8 words long. They are more specific than the keywords that are associated with your website, but that makes them perfectly suited for article topics.

The main difference between these two types of keywords is that the ones you use in your title and article body are what you’d like the article to rank for, and the keywords you use in your resource box are the ones you’d like your website to rank for.

2 – The Article:

The topic of the article is determined by the title.

Try to repeat your keyword phrase in the first 5 sentences or so of the article, in a natural sounding way of course.

Then, just write naturally about your topic. Since the keyword phrase is closely related to the topic of your article, then variations of the phrase should appear naturally in your article. Don’t try to force it too much, and by all means don’t pepper your article with the keyword phrase.

The most important part about the article is that it is easy for a reader to understand and that it provides helpful information. So, focus on writing a well-written article that teaches your reader something. After carefully placing your keyword phrase in the 5 lines, don’t worry too much about how many times the keyword phrase appears in the article. It will show up every once in a while as you naturally write about your topic.

Also, it’s okay for the phrase to appear in different forms, for example, ‘race cars,’ ‘racing cars,’ ‘race car gear’, etc.

3 – The Resource Box:

The resource box is where you can tell a little about yourself and your business and where you can encourage the reader to click the link leading back to your website. This is also a great spot to put one of the keyword phrases that you’d like your website to rank highly for.

Many directories will allow you to create an anchor text link in your resource box. With an anchor text link, you can use your keyword phrase to form the link that leads back to your website. This helps search engines to associate that phrase with the topic of your website and can influence the search engine ranking for your site for that phrase.

Be sure not to use the same phrase each time though – you should have a list of keyword phrases for your website, and you can alternate those in your resource boxes. If you use the same phrase as anchor text each time, it can look suspicious to search engines, which could have negative SEO consequences for your website.

Let’s recap the main things to remember when creating an SEO friendly article:

=> Do your keyword research, and find phrases to target in your articles as well as phrases that you’d like your website to rank for.

=> Write naturally. The phrases that appear in your article should not be conspicuous or awkward sounding. They should just be a natural part of a helpful article.

=> Be sure to use proper spelling and grammar. This is necessary for the article to be published and also for readers to be able to understand what the article is saying.

After doing this a few times, writing an SEO-friendly article will be like second nature. You’ll become very skilled at creating content that’s useful to your readers, while at the same time crafting an article that will attract the attention of search engines.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

How To Write An SEO-Friendly Article

What is a guru?

Literally, a guru is a teacher. The word guru means “heavy” or “deep,” thus a guru is a person “heavy” or “deep” in knowledge. In this sense, a schoolteacher is a guru, a coach or athletic instructor is a guru, a fine-arts, or even a dance teacher is a guru. One’s parents are also gurus. In the religious field, where the word is most commonly used, a guru is a Hindu religious teacher. So a priest or any person learned in Hindu lore may be a guru. The main purpose of the guru is to teach. (Source: What is a Guru?)

Personally, I don’t believe in so-called “gurus” – whether they’re self-proclaimed or anointed. Never have. But I do believe in teachers and mentors. And I’m all for free enterprise – for everyone making as much money as they possibly can, with this caveat: Not off the backs of the desperate, naive, and people who can least afford it.

That’s taking advantage of people. I have a problem with that.

They’re Like Vampires

And that’s why I have a problem with some Internet Marketing (IM) gurus. Not all, but some. They’re like vampires… they stick their fangs into your neck, with no concern for your regard, and they just keep sucking your blood (i.e., money), until there’s nothing left but a trail of bodies of the broke, wounded, and disenfranchised.

That being said, if you have disposable income and want to give it to some guru, I don’t have a problem with that, as long as you’re not taking food off your family’s table.

Guru Groupies

Marketers who are gurus – self-proclaimed or anointed, often wear the label “guru” like it’s a badge of honor. That’s their prerogative, of course. And while I’m an expert in my field, as well as a teacher, I don’t consider myself a guru, and I don’t consider it an honor to be called one. I just don’t like the term “guru.” Despite my business success, and years of marketing knowledge and expertise, I don’t place myself above other people. I’m not better than you or anyone else.

Conversely, I don’t place anyone else on a pedestal either. I’ve never been into hero worship. For example, I’ve always been a huge Michael Jackson fan – all the way back to the days when he was “Little” Michael Jackson of the Jackson 5.

I have every single one of his albums/CD’s. But there was always a limit to my devotion – a reasonableness, if you will. I did not spend thousands of dollars to go see him in concert. I did not follow him around like a groupie, and I did not stand in line clamoring for his autograph, or bid outrageous sums of money for his sequined gloves.

This is the kind of irrational behavior I see exhibited toward IM gurus. They are treated like rock stars. Their fans follow them around like groupies, spending thousands of dollars on endless new product launches and expensive seminars. It’s beyond insane.

My Experience With Gurus

Let me tell you about my own personal experience with gurus. A few years ago, I purchased a couple of e-books and a software product from three different IM gurus.

The blood-sucking started almost immediately. Non-stop e-mails… one right after the other. Welcome e-mails, tutorial e-mails, new products launches, past seminars, upcoming seminars, etc., etc., etc.

I received over twenty e-mails from these guys in a period of only 48 hours. It was extremely irritating, to say the least.

Anyway, to make a long story short, that experience so disgusted me, I unsubscribed from their lists, and I actually requested a refund on two of the three products that I ordered.

I requested a refund because the products didn’t come close to living up to the hype – and that’s exactly the point: More often than not, gurus’ products DON’T live up to the considerable hype.

Don’t Believe The Hype

Gurus make everything sound so easy, don’t they? Just follow their “magic” blueprint, and you will “get rich in 90 days!” As a result of these outrageous and unrealistic claims, too many people approach IM thinking that it’s easy and doesn’t require any effort – other than to place a few Adwords ads, kick back, relax, and watch the money roll into their PayPal account. And while a rare few realize success quickly, the vast majority get hit with a brutal dose of reality. That’s right, the vast majority fail. What a surprise.

Let me tell you something, despite what some gurus tell you, success in IM is neither quick or easy. It requires time, patience, discipline and hard work. There are no shortcuts. Or, in the words of famous philanthropist, Andrew Carnegie…

“Anything in life worth having is worth working for.”

Hard work starts with education – learning your craft. If you’re truly serious about succeeding in IM, put in the work. In addition to reading articles like this one, read as many quality, online and offline small business publications as you possibly can.

A few of my online favorites include SiteProNews, WebProNews, ClickZ and MarketingProfs. My favorite offline small business publication is Entrepreneur. Buy books. Buy lots and lots of books. Learn as much as you can about sales and marketing. More importantly, apply what you learn. It can make all the difference in the world to your success or lack thereof.

10 Of My All-Time Favorite Marketing Books

1. Advertising Secrets of the Written Word by Joe Sugarman

2. Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini

3. Cash Copy by Dr. Jeffrey Lant

4. Cashvertising by Drew Eric Whitman

5. Tested Advertising Methods by John Caples

6. Ogilvy on Advertising by David Ogilvy

7. Scientific Advertising by Claude Hopkins

8. The Ultimate Sales Letter by Dan Kennedy

9. How to Write a Good Advertisement by Victor Schwab

10. Breakthrough Advertising by Eugene Schwartz

There are, of course, many, many more outstanding marketing books that I could name, but the one’s listed above are classics and should be part of every serious marketer’s library.

Good Gurus, Bad Gurus

Despite my rant, I want to strongly emphasize, I’m not painting all gurus with one broad brush. Like with everything in life, there is good and bad. That applies to gurus as well. There are good gurus and bad gurus. There are some good, responsible gurus out there who give back generously – who aren’t taking advantage of people – who provide excellent value for the dollar – who don’t promise results that they know they can’t possibly deliver. They are conscientious, honest and responsible marketers.

And then there are the bad gurus who rip people off by selling over-priced, inferior products, and promising “pie-in-the-sky” results that they can’t possibly deliver. They never give back, they just take and take and take. They give IM and gurus a bad name.

I’ll say it again. Success takes time, and it requires hard work. Always has, always will. There are no shortcuts, and if someone tells you otherwise… they’re probably trying to sell you something.

The Tortoise and the Hare

Are you familiar with the story “The Tortoise and the Hare?”

It’s a classic Aesop fable about a hare who one day ridiculed a slow-moving tortoise. In response, the prideful tortoise challenged his much faster mocker to a race.

Not unexpectedly, the hare soon left the tortoise in the dust. In fact, the hare was so far ahead and confident of winning, he decided to take a nap halfway to the finish line.

Alas, when he awoke, he found that the competitor he had mocked, crawling slowly but steadily, had already won the race.

The moral of the story is…

“Slow and steady wins the race.”

Conclusion

I learned a long time ago that you can give people advice that’s in their best interest, but invariably, they’re going to do what they want to do. But do yourself a favor. If you’re a guru groupie – if you’ve been drinking the kool-aid, as it were, take a discerning look at the amount of money you’ve invested in guru e-books, courses and seminars, then look at the amount of your return and ask yourself… has the money that you’ve spent been worth the investment?… Or anywhere close?

If you’re honest with yourself – really honest, more often than not, I think you’ll discover that it hasn’t.

Then the question becomes, what are you going to do about it?

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Guru Kool-Aid: Are You Drinking It? – A SPN Exclusive Article

Imagine – a platform of only business owners and business professionals that has over 140 million members and is growing daily; where the average income per member is $120,000 US.

And the best part? Almost no-one is using this to its full potential.

What is LinkedIn?

LinkedIn is a business directory that specializes in finding businesses, talent, and opportunities. It is therefore a place to discover businesses and for others to discover you. A place to discover talent; for recruiting, outsourcing, partnering with, or consulting. In short, people who can help your business.

It is a place where you can see credentials, build a relationship first then trust. It is a place where you should be able to generate 4 – 5 leads per day for your business. 75% of your business should come from LinkedIn.

In short – you are the talent that others are looking for.

But are they finding you?

LinkedIn has a record number of searches per day for SEO, Reputation Management, Mobile Marketing, List Management, Web Development, PPC, Lead Generation, YouTube management, and many others.

Why is LinkedIn so Popular for Business?

The main reason is that it is a search engine where you can search for people rather than information. You can see their credentials, and get to know them first before you commit to anything.

You also get geographically targeted search results so you can search for local people.

LinkedIn is perfect for you if you have the skills that are searched for, or if you want to outsource to people with those skills.

Benefits of Using LinkedIn

- You can only have one profile.

- You can generate leads all over the country and even the world even if you have a free account.

- You can use apps on your profile which help you to showcase yourself and your business.

How to Use LinkedIn:

You need to have a well written and well-presented profile that is SEO optimized with keywords. It is best to have a salesletter or similar copywriting for best results. Only talk about what you do for your clients and how you do it. Your past is irrelevant, unless it shows your experience in your current position. Use apps to help you. Slideshare is a good one to use as you can upload powerpoint presentations or YouTube videos to slideshare which will then show on your profile.

Always keep Search Engine Optimization in mind as people need to find you. Also, make your email address visible on your profile.

A systematic approach to networking works best. So decide first what you’re going to offer, and make sure it will pre-close clients for you, and generate relationships with your prospects. It should help you find business, and generate value for your leads.

In our case study, a start-up business approached his target market and asked them if they knew a good accountant in their area. They had one of three responses: No, I don’t know an accountant; yes I know an accountant; or no response.

He mentioned his business only in his signature with a keyword rich sentence and a link. He contacted 100 prospects. Of those 100, 22 responded that yes, they did know an accountant and made a referral. 43 responded that they didn’t know an accountant, and 35 gave no response. He then wrote to the accountants, told them that they came highly recommended and asked if he could recommend them to others.

The results: one accountant offered him $500 to buy his list of people in his area who needed an accountant. And 21 people wrote back and asked about his SEO services. He made five sales resulting in $4300 income.

Now you don’t have to offer the same, but you need to offer something of value. This way you will build excellent relationships and trust with your prospects.

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How to Generate Leads With Linkedin

Economic uncertainty has created the need for swift, responsive and highly secured IT infrastructures that are also environmentally friendly and more business focused. Organizations are struggling to find the competitive edge, turning to the bounty of opportunities technology provides. Cautious to jump at the latest buzz phrases and hyped solutions, many have cautiously investigated recent technology breakthroughs, many of which have one thing in common: redistribution of IT roles. There is no better time than the present to revamp technology strategy focused on hosted solutions.

Clouds are gathering…

Cloud computing has emerged as one of the major ways to secure an upper hand in today’s highly competitive market. Minutes of downtime means the loss of vital sales as businesses with prolonged data loss find themselves in a real position of collapsing. Cloud computing changes the traditional corporate data center structure that resides on company premises. Instead, systems are moved to secure outsourced data centers, either in a private or public configuration. Private clouds are dedicated servers used exclusively for a single company, whereas public clouds have multiple companies sharing the same resources. Additional research is, therefore, essential in deciding which cloud configuration best meets your needs, most importantly regarding legal and privacy requirements.

Technology departments across all industries are met with similar issues including budget cuts, personnel downsizing and mounting pressure for technology to prove its worth in answering key business issues. A great number of IT departments run with a vague, or possibly blind, vision into the future, focusing on day-to-day network upkeep and expending great amounts of money keeping core
systems operational. This approach leaves no time for innovation, process improvements or meeting business strategic objectives. Competitive advantage can be gained by moving day-to-day operations out, allowing execution of strategic initiatives.

The diverse and seemingly endless potential of cloud computing make it a very attractive solution to some of today’s most important business issues. Whether it’s upgrading data entry applications, launching new collaboration portals or overhauling demanding e-mail systems, all is possible and occurring today within the cloud. Historically, engineers of all sorts, including database, security, applications and integrations were needed on staff in order to begin new initiatives. Hosted solutions provide all that information without the heavy staffing costs. Building a partnership with a reliable IT solutions provider will deeply impact the success of your initiatives. A good hosting provider will act as a direct extension of your IT department, offering solutions to the business issues you discover in the renewed IT strategic approach. Your success has a direct effect on their success.

E-mail is the number one communication medium used in the 21st century workplace, and it grows more complex on a daily basis. It is an integral workflow component and is an excellent means for automating communication, increasing information flow to customers and employees, without the need to drain employee time sending reports and updates. An increased number of applications have been developed specifically to integrate with the company messaging system, some of which automatically generate bills, and others send out vital project warnings and notifications. Without expertise for each one of its many parts, integration opportunities may be lost, leaving businesses in danger of lost internal and external communication, which translates into poor customer service and decreased profit.

Overwhelmingly, the cloud has been a proven success for replacing traditional business e-mail environments. Software costs, server replacements and constant applications training make it an expensive system to maintain. Again, time spent tending to IT infrastructure takes away from valuable time streamlining old and costly systems. If you don’t become more efficient, your competition will.

One mid-sized organization was faced with a difficult situation. Operating on an aging Microsoft Exchange platform, the mailbox database had grown to its maximum size without the possibility of adding additional message stores. Three servers that were the backbone of the Exchange system were approaching 10 years in age and experiencing hardware malfunctions. An expensive investment in hardware and software seemed like the only answer. However, IT management realized the benefits of a Microsoft Exchange hosting solution, and therefore sought out a reputable hosting provider to address their growth issues. After careful planning and execution, local servers were migrated to the outsourced data center, and the results were nothing short of impressive.

Within the first month of the transition, help desk calls dropped by more than 10 percent, and e-mail availability became higher than ever, greatly attributed to the team of systems experts at their disposal. Critical systems updates and maintenance were performed regularly by the new Exchange hosting team, and key performance indicators were actively monitored. Discrepancies were resolved immediately. Such dedication and proactive response time would have been impossible to do with the previous e-mail infrastructure and company IT staff.

Transitioning to the Microsoft Exchange hosted service eliminated the need to purchase brand new servers or invest in the latest software upgrades. No longer will the company be faced with huge, unexpected hardware replacement costs. Instead, the fixed monthly hosting costs help keep the IT budget balanced and funds spent more wisely. Packaged with the Microsoft Exchange hosted solution was an e-compliant archiving system and a leading anti-spam solution; one more way the company saved money.

All the technology endeavors translated into better service for the customer. Now, the business stands strong with a robust, adaptive e-mail system and comprehensive electronic audit trail. The tier four data center where the e-mail service resides has been a welcome addition to the company disaster recovery plan. Capping out the many benefits is the approximately $50,000 saved annually along with lower carbon emissions through retirement of old servers.

As technology leaders and innovators, we must avoid the trap of judging success on traditional measurements, such as network uptime and backup reliability. Instead, creating an IT strategic plan with input from company executives opens our eyes to new possibilities. Technology can be a true business enabler, and cloud computing is one way to yield measurable business results, molding information technology into business technology.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Technology Solutions: Cloud Computing

A website’s title tags are very important for several reasons:

1) The title tag shows up in search results as the blue link, and a good one helps the site get more clicks and visitors from
search results.

2) Title tags are a crucial SEO element that can help the website show up higher when people search for the words in it.

3) Title tags show up when web pages are shared on social media sites like Facebook. This is important because social media mentions are now a ranking factor in Google search results.

So if you have the time to optimize one thing on your website, title tags are it.

Here are some of the top mistakes and missed opportunities I’ve seen in title tags. Avoid these and you’ll be ahead of the game. You’ll rank higher in search results and entice more people to click on your site.

9 Signs of a Bad Title Tag:

1. “Home” or “Home Page” in Title Tag

It may be logical or helpful to the website owner, but including “Home” or “Home Page” does not help visitors or search engines. All we really care about is what the page is about, and what it offers us. Why take up space with this non-information? You surely don’t want to rank for the terms “home” or “home page.”

2. Domain Name in Title Tag

Including the domain name (like example.com) in the title tag is redundant and takes up prime SEO real estate.

If a searcher cares what site they’ll be taken to, they can look at the green URL that’s visible in the search result before they click. And web pages are automatically going to rank very high (at the top unless something is wrong with your SEO) when people search for your domain name, whether it’s in the title tag or not.

Put another way – Is it more important to tell people your website address, or to tell them about what you offer and show search engines a keyword?

3. Too Long

Search engines display only the first 70 characters (about) of a web page’s title tag. The rest gets chopped off and replaced with ellipses.

4. Too Short

Short and sweet can be nice, but you might as well use all the space available to tell people and search engines about the web page. Making your title tags close to – but not exceeding – 70 characters is a good way to get the most out of your title tags and optimize your chances of showing up for different keyword searches.

5. No Keywords

The purpose of your title tag is to tell people and search engines what your web page is about. If it doesn’t include keywords, you’re doing it wrong.

6. Just the Business Name

I know it’s tempting to make your title tags be just your business name, especially on your home page. But your business name is 70+ characters long or contains several of your important keywords already, you should really include more so that you’ll be found – and clicked on – by people who aren’t familiar with your business yet.

For example, if you were searching for a local business that sold widgets, how likely would you be to click on a search result that just said a generic business name like “Jones & Jones, Inc.”? You probably wouldn’t waste your time clicking on a search result that doesn’t make it clear the company is in your city and, or that it sells what you’re looking for. Because the title tag doesn’t make it clear what Jones & Jones sells, or where they’re located, search engines are less likely to rank that result high in search results.

7. First Few Words Aren’t Important or Eye-Catching

Research shows that people scan search results quickly. Searchers pay the most attention to the first few words in search results, and the first few results on the page. This heat map shows you where people tend to click in a page of Google search results.

Make the first few words of your title tags count by including the keywords you think will be most relevant to searchers. Or write something that will catch people’s attention. Put your best foot forward, and cut the meaningless fluff.

For example, I searched for “cat toilet training” and found this search result. It did catch my attention and make me read the whole search entry to see if it was really what I was looking for. But many people would just skip it, and focus on the search results that mention their search terms right up front.

8. Doesn’t Include Geographic Location – if Location is Important

If you have a physical retail location, or if you want to target customers in a specific region, you should make it clear to searchers and search engines where you’re located. Include your neighborhood, city, state, or county – whatever makes most sense for your business – in your title tag and in other website content.

9. Too Many Keywords (spammy looking)

If your title tag is just a long string of keywords, it might rank well for those keywords, but the real, live people searching for those words will probably be less likely to click that result.

Here are two examples of keyword-filled title tags in a search result:

Example 1

Example 2

Kristina is a community manager for AboutUs.org who talks with a lot of website owners who are trying to promote their business online. Have a question? Kristina Weis, @KristinaWeis.

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9 Common Title Tag Mistakes and How to Avoid Them