What is a brand? It is your unique stamp. With big product companies like Pepsi-Cola or Nike, it is their trademark product and tag lines. But, they didn’t start that way. No one knew who either of them was or that they were solid products until they were marketed and that brand reinforced with endorsements and such from people we did know.

So, how can guest blogging help?

Well, first of all you have to have a blog or website of your own. You can’t establish a brand unless you have a place to showcase it in the first place. It may take a while, but your blog can establish a loyal following you can count on to follow you other places.

Bloggers are smart people. They will know if you are just after them for their name. Before you approach them with your request (probably one of hundreds more popular bloggers get), get involved in their blog. Post comments on a daily or weekly basis. Pose thought-provoking questions.

All of this shows that you are attempting to understand what has made them such a valuable brand on the Internet. Also, they get to know your “face” as it were because you are always around. The only thing that works better for a new blogger trying to establish them self is nepotism (and it is always welcome!).

Okay, so there is one thing that is almost as good – offering free services. If you ever want an endorsement for your brand later (and you will), offer the blog owner a free product or a trial of your services. Doing so is a courtesy that will pay off for you in the end.

Writing for another blog gives you a chance to talk about other topics in front of a new audience. If you talk about the guest spot on your own blog, many of your loyal fans will pop on over for a look see. And, through your bio blurb, the existing audience on that blog will know where to find you. This is not to steal their readership but to share it since you are not necessarily in a competing market.

In an effort to put your stamp on the world of Internet business, try guest blogging. When done correctly, you can gain increased traffic and new business connections that will serve you well into the future.

Want to join us here at Writers-Nook? We would LOVE for you to join us here at our site. Just contact Cindy and join us to make Writers-Nook THE SPOT for Christian Writers!

It is time for our “Mailbag” show again! Talk about a great show!

Join us today as I dig into your questions! We covered a TON of material today. Here are some of the topics:

About finished with my book, WHO do I get for feedback?
Been blogging, want to make money, where should I write?
Using the “MORE” tag in Wordpress
Beginning a podcast, so what do I choose–Blog Talk Radio…Feedburner…or iTunes???
How to promote a podcast
I AM writing!
Writing when the traditional publishers reject you
Ideas for domain names
What do I do with MY story???
What about shipping costs?
How to get your book in E-book format?
Finished the book, now how do I reach my market???
How to make your download pages private?
What is a conversion rate?
AND MORE! Of course!

You will LOVE this show! It does go into “overtime” but it is loaded with great information. We had a blast!

Still don’t cover your question OR need more help? Just zip me an email at cindy@cindyrushton.com and I will be sure to dig into your question next time.

Don’t miss this one!

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Jerilyn’s Website:
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Debbie Ball’s Website:
http://www.bethel-nz.blogspot.com

Beth Jones’ Website:
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Janet Eckles Website:
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CUTE PDF

Patti Handy’s Website:
http://www.TeensCashCoach.com

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Recently I asked our Blog and Podcast eGroup what their biggest struggles/needs as a blogger/podcaster were. I came away with some great feedback. One of the top questions was, “How do I get traffic to my site?”

A blog without readers is pretty much useless. If you’ve been blogging for a while and have only been getting a trickle of viewers to your posts, you need to put a traffic building plan into action. Building traffic is just as an important skill to bloggers as writing quality posts is. Many bloggers are terrific at creating content but don’t know a thing about building traffic. Here is a quick guide to the five most popular (and most effective) traffic building techniques.

1. Get SOCIAL!

Social networking and blogging go hand in hand. Your blog posts can be distributed across social networking channels in many different ways. Sign up for Twitter and tweet about your posts as soon as they are added to you blog. Update your Facebook status with a link to your new blog posts. Submit your stories to Digg.com, Reddit.com and StumbleUpon.com. Remember that in order for social networking to be effective, you need to participate with other people on your list. If you visit their links and respond to their updates, they’ll be likely to do the same for you.

2.  Get SEEN!

Find blogs in your niche and start following their posts. Make sure to add insightful and interesting comments on their posts. Not only will the blog owner take notice and visit your blog, other commenters will visit your blog to get more of your great insight into the topic. Don’t spread yourself too thin with blog commenting, but make it a point to comment on a few related blogs each week.

3.  Get SENT!

RSS feeds are a way to syndicate your blog’s content so that it is sent to many different people in their own blog readers or on their own sites. Most blogging systems have RSS feeds automatically included but you can add a lot more functionality to your feed by using a free service like FeedBurner.com. With FeedBurner you can add things like sharing the feed via e-mail so it will pull in new readers and encourage previous visitors to come back to the blog again.

4.  Get SYNDICATED!

You may think that by being a blogger you can ignore article marketing. However, you can get a lot  of traffic to your blog by tweaking some of your popular blog posts and adding them to article directories. You can post your popular posts as articles with a link back to your blog in many different article directories. Not only will you get a valuable backlink but your article may also be used by ezine owners which will bring you more traffic.

5.  Get SITELINKS!

Speaking of backlinks, you should work to build backlinks to your blog through several different means. By creating backlinks to your blog, you’ll improve your blog’s ranking in search engine results. You can get lots of traffic from search engines if you are within the first group of search results for your keywords.

These five ways of building traffic can be used over and over again to help build traffic to your blog and increase your readership.

Need more help?

Join our eGroup! It is FREE! Find us at Yahoo Groups!

Come and join in!
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1. Get a vision. First things first. Who are you? What are YOU all about? What is YOUR message? When others come to you, what do they ask you? Take some time to really think this one out.  Your blog will only be a success when you find YOUR voice. Pull apart and get a vision. Keep your blog simple, clear, uncluttered, and focused. Stick to who you are. Don’t change up every day. Don’t add in content that does not go along with your message. Get a vision for what you are to be all about and be ONLY that.

2. Set it up right. Don’t take short-cuts. If you want to build a successful business, invest in your “home on the web.” This is not an area to skimp by or put off. Grab your own domain and host your site yourself. The reasons are more than I can cover in an entire article, but the biggest reason is that you are building a business. Build your business with a solid foundation. If you are a writer, invest in your own name TODAY as a domain. If you are setting up a site for a particular business venture, grab your domain for it. My favorite hosting service is Mom Webs: http://www.writers-nook.com/MomWebs.html You can grab your domain and set up your hosting account in just a few minutes. Also, ask them to install Wordpress for you. They will even install an adorable theme for you for around $10. If you have a blog that is hosted by a free service, they can even help you to pull your RSS Feed (all of your past posts) into your new site–PRICELESS! They are super! Wordpress is another big MUST that will help you get started on the right track. I love that you can set up your site and add a good theme in just a few steps. Again, set it up right. A good design will take you along the path to success. It will make a huge difference in YOU and your audience. Don’t skimp on this step. Set up your site for success. Invest in a good, solid home on the web.

3. Keep growing and learning. A great site takes time to build. Keep it growing. Commit to add fresh new content to your site every day–articles, audios, videos, tip sheets, downloadables, printables, etc. Keep it growing and expanding. Stay on the cutting edge! The best way to do that is to keep on learning. Right now, I am studying through a new set on blogging. I can’t believe all of the new ideas for plug-ins, social networking options, etc that are new THIS YEAR. I set aside time each day to learn new things either through reading or listening to shows/seminars. Talk about a great way to make my site all it can be. You won’t be there immediately, but you will get there. Commit today to grow and learn. Never stop. Stay creative. Stay on the cutting edge.

4. Make sure that your site reflects YOU. Make sure that your site helps others get to know you and your heartbeat. Include your pictures, your audios, your videos, your writing, and what you love. Let them get to know YOU–your heart, your interests, your knowledge, your life, your expertise. Let your site help to build your brand. Instill in peoploe who you are and what you have to offer. Be the Google-the place people go to search–for your market. Be the place they go when they need help.

5. Don’t be shy about what you have to offer. Now, first, be mindful that some things are annoying–banners/blocks all over the page, apps all over the page, flashing letters, crazy fonts, etc. BUT, some things really work to make your site profitable–

–>  Offer Q/A–have a spot/category just for answering questions. As you answer questions, don’t shy away from linking to resources that you recommend. Hyperlink words or resources to pages with more information. Watch the responses.

–>  Post articles–not only can you link to any recommended resources/products within the article, but you can also have a nice pitch for products in your resource box at the bottom of the article. ALWAYS pitch something–one of your products, your mailing list, your radio show, etc. Give them access to other things that will help them with that topic.

–>  Link to your store–make it easy for people to find what you have to offer. Keep it neat. Keep it simple. Keep it prominent.

6. Bring others in to help you. Feel overwhelmed? Let others help you. There are so many ways that you can get help as you build your site. You can bring in guest bloggers–those who love the same topics and can share their articles, audios, and videos on your site. I have many friends who are always ready to share fun freebies–they help my site to be a great spot on the web, but they also promote what they have going on. It is win-win-win! You can even get the visitors to the site to join in and share great content. I began offering what I call “Mommy Homework” years ago. “Mommy Homework” is a weekly topic of discussion on my blog. Those who participate earn credit toward our products. Of all of the things I read each week, “Mommy Homework” is my most favorite. Imagine how awesome it is for those who visit my site. Before I go on, you can also use affiliate tools/resources on your site. Many affiliate programs offer great articles, audios, and downloads to help you promote their products. If they are complimentary to your site, use them! A good example of resources that are ready-to-go is found in my affiliate program. Join me at: http://www.CindysAffiliates.com.  You don’t have to be a lone-ranger. There are lots of options for content to use on your site.

7. Build a great site. Remember that your site will grow for years to come. Keep building! Keep your content fresh and alive. The best way is to take time in solitude to brainstorm, develop your message, and pour your heart out into your writing, audios, and videos. Take that time! Pour your heart out! Make your site a place of ministry. You won’t be there immediately, but I promise that in 6 months you will look back and be so proud of your hard work.

Happy blogging!

Need more help?

Check out these great shows (and others!!) on blogging that have been featured on my Writer’s Radio Show:

Blogging and Podcasting

Mailbag: Websites, Blogs, and MORE!

Let’s Talk about Blogging

Come and join in!
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ChristianBlogandPodcast/

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What is a Blog?

A blog is actually an online journal of sorts. With a blog you can upload daily posts about anything that you want. Some people create personal blogs as a way to keep in touch with family members. Pictures, videos and other information are uploaded so your loved ones are current with what is going on with you.

Here we are going to talk about business blogs. This is a blog that you begin to attract traffic in order to sell products or services. To be interesting to others, your blog will need to:

•    Have updated content for visitors
•    Be marketed to draw traffic
•    Register with search engines so it can be found in the rankings

How to Start

If you are new to blogging or web design, there is a great option for you! Mom Webs is offering blog installation and set up services for only $10 when you host your site with them. You will be up and ready-to-go. Best of all, you will be ready for success. You don’t want to host your sites with “free” blogging options out there. You want to get started on the right track.

Before you start posting, decide what will be the theme, or niche of your blog. A jack-of-all-trades type of blog doesn’t do as well as one that is geared towards a certain niche. If you like crafts, that can be your niche. Create posts that talk about how to craft, what to craft, how to make crafting profitable and so on. Once you have decided on a path, it is time to create that great content.

How to Make Money While You Blog…

In order to make money with your blog, you need to have people visiting it. That is where marketing comes in. To draw traffic to your site, you have to get the word out about your blog. Tell all of your friends and family members that you are online with your blog for a start.

Also, begin today to include the link to your blog on each and every article that you write. Take the time to write up a bio to include at the end of each article. In that bio, tell a bit about yourself, tell what they can find at your blog, and share the link to the blog so they can find more information on that topic.

What Next???

Any money-making venture will take place once you have built your readership with interesting posts. Then you can put into play a number of profitable additions:

•    Google AdSense
•    Selling Advertising
•    Affiliate Marketing
•    EBook and Special Report Marketing

The simplest one to pursue is Google AdSense. You are using targeted advertisements to create revenue for your blog. You are paid per clicks on the ads.

There are other options where you can get paid when someone makes a sale on that website. That is more likely to happen when you join an affiliate program. Join affiliate program that work well with your website niche.

EBooks are downloadable electronic books that you can create yourself and sell on your website. They can be on a variety of subjects but in order for them to sell, you must be able to offer new information to your customers. Don’t have enough information yet for a whole book? Why not create a mini-ebook or a special report. Set it up the same way as an ebook. Do be sure to clarify exactly what the customer gets–if it is an ebook (number of pages) or a special report.

Blogs can be used to build revenue. Start with your chosen niche and market your blog to find the traffic you need. Then, utilize these ideas to turn a profit.

Show Description: Do you have a great book idea, but don’t know how to organize your thoughts? Join us as Marnie Swedberg shares “The Scatterbrain’s Method” for pulling random thoughts together into cohesive, compelling content for speeches, articles and books. As a pinch hit speaker and media guest, Marnie’s unique gift is her ability to step into last minute vacancies and speak on the predetermined topic at a professional level, sometimes within just minutes or hours of a crises call. On this show she will share with us her method for organizing hundreds of key points for quick and easy access and organization.

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http://www.Marnie.com

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How you add a button to your sidebar depends in large part on the type of site you have.  For example if you have a WordPress blog then it’s going to be a different process than if you have a HTML site.

Here it is in a nutshell –

First you’ll want to click on the button image and save it on your desktop.  If you’re using Blogger then you’ll have to upload the image into an image host like Photobucket or Flickr.

WordPress Blog
1. From the admin panel choose “write new post.”
2. Upload the picture/button image you’re using
3. Go to “Manage” and then “Uploads” and click on the picture you want.
4. Copy the URL by highlighting the URL and hitting the control button on your keyboard and the letter C.
5. In the same ‘manage’ screen now go to ‘Presentation,’ and then ‘Sidebar Widgets.’
6. Add a text widget and enter your code.  It will look something like this.
7. <a href=”www.insertbuttonlinkURLhere.com”>
<img src=”past your URL here”></a>
8.   Close the text widget and save it.  You’re good to go.

Typepad Blog
1. Login and access your files through your control panel.
2. Choose to upload a new file, find your saved image, and copy the URL.
3. Click the “Typelists” tab.  Note if you do not already have a typelist follow the instructions on Typepad to create one.
4. Click “Add a new item” to your typlist and past the URL you copied in step two.  It should look something like this.
5. <img src=”http://example.typepad.com/image.jpg”>
6. Enter the URL to the website you’d like the image linked to in the “link URL” box
7. Save and you’re good to go.
Blogger Blog
1. Login and click on “Layout”
2. Choose “Template” tab, then “Page Elements”
3. Click on “Add a Page Element”
4. Choose the “HTML/JavaScript” option and click the “Add to Blog” option.
5. Type the link code (found where your image is being hosted) into the “Content” field. Your code will look like this:
<a href=”http://websiteyourimageislinkingto.com”><img src=”http://www.yourimage.jpg”></a>
6. Save and your button should be in the sidebar and linkable to the relevant website.

HTML website code
1. If you’re adding a sidebar button to the HTML code on your website the code will look something like this:
2. <div align=”center”>
<a href=”http://yoursiteURL.com” target=”_blank”><img src=”http://yoursitename/images/banner125×125.jpg” alt=”Imagelocation?”></a>
</div>

Adding a button to your sidebar is typically a pretty straightforward process.  If you have any questions or difficulties, check with your website hosting documentation or blog developer documentation for clarification and FAQs.

To get TwitterBar installed on your browser you will first need to be a Firefox user.  Firefox is a free web browser like Internet Explorer by Mozilla.  To grab and install TwitterBar visit:

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/4664

Go ahead and click on the green Add to Firefox button in the middle of the screen.  If you do not presently use Firefox then you’ll first want to go to: http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/ and download it for free.  Again, simply click on the green button in the middle of the page and follow the installation instructions.

Now…How Do You Get Started Using TwitterBar???

There are two basic ways to use TwitterBar.  The first is to go to your address bar in your browser – the place where you normally type a URL or website address.  Type your post, for example, learning to use TwitterBar, and then click on the little grey dot at the right hand side of your address bar.  When you hover your cursor over this dot it will tell you how many characters you have left.  For example, if you type learning to use TwitterBar, then it will say 69 left.

You can also post by typing “–post” at the end of your tweet.   For example, learning to use twitterbar “–post”

But wait, there’s more!  When you visit a webpage that you want to post, all you have to do is click the little grey dot and it will send a tweet with the URL.

Twitterbar is a quick and easy way to post on Twitter and take advantage of this popular and growing social networking and marketing tool.  It’s a great way to share valuable information and keep in touch with fellow Twitter friends.

Twitter allows users to post messages via their website or from the user’s cell phone.  Demand for an easier way to post online was great and out of that demand, several applications were born.  Some were based on desktop applications, while others resided in the browser’s sidebar.  And some, like Twitterbar, were altogether different.

What Is Twitterbar?

Twitterbar is a very simple browser extension.  It installs quickly and easily.  At first glance, it looks like it hasn’t added anything to your browser window.  But if you look to the right of the address bar, you’ll see a tiny gray icon.

So why is there an icon next to the address bar?  Because that’s where you type in your post.  That’s right, you simply type your post in where you would normally type a Web address, click the icon or type -post and hit enter, and your post is sent to Twitter.  It doesn’t get much simpler than that.

There’s no need to worry about going over Twitter’s character limit when using Twitterbar.  All you need to do is hover your mouse over the Twitterbar icon, and the number of characters left will appear in the address bar.

Another neat feature of Twitterbar is the ability to automatically post the URL you’re currently visiting.  To do this, just leave the URL in the address bar and click the gray icon.  “Currently browsing” will be added before the URL, and it will be posted instantly.  The URL will be shortened if necessary, just like it would be if you posted on Twitter’s website or from your cell phone.

As simple as Twitterbar is, it includes several customization options.  You can hide the icon next to the address bar if you like.  You can change the “currently browsing” text that’s automatically added before URL tweets to anything you like.  And you can set it to automatically open the Twitter website in a new tab after you’ve posted.

Twitterbar is available for Firefox and Flock browsers.  Unfortunately, it’s no longer under development by the original developer, so versions for other browsers may or may not be created.  But for Firefox and Flock users, this extension can make posting to Twitter even quicker and easier than it already is.

There are several different places where you can advertise your blog. Some will cost a small amount and others won’t cost you a penny.  Start with the free options and as you begin to see a return on your investment of time, you can invest some profits back into marketing your blog with paid options.

A Few Free Options…

1.    Join message board communities. This is a simple way to advertise your blog. Interact with your fellow users and advertise your blog in your signature line, if it’s allowed. If it’s not allowed, there’s usually a folder available within that forum that does allow you to advertise your sites. Use them. Be sure you are respectful of community rules. Then, you can spread the word about your blog respectfully.
2.    Join a social networking site. These sites are a good way to network with like-minded people who are interested in the same subject your blog is about. Join the community and get to know the other members and then you can supply them with a link to your blog. Many in social networking circles provide cross-promotions, so you’ll probably accumulate a lot of valuable backlinks to your blog.
3.    Utilize social bookmarking sites. Write a great thought provoking post on your blog and submit it to sites like Digg.com or del.icio.us. There are hundreds of people who spend hours at these sites searching for good websites to check out. Your blog can get a surge of traffic through this strategic and viral sharing method.
4.    Join a blogging community like Blog Explosion. This offers you a way of connecting with other bloggers who may do a review of your blog on theirs, which would help drive more traffic to your site.

A Few Paid Options…

1.    Use advertising campaigns like Google AdWords. Place an ad on the search engine result pages and pay only when someone clicks on the link. Make sure you use the best keywords to get the ad noticed, so that you can drive more traffic to your blog.
2.    Use text link advertising. Contact some of the more popular blogs in your niche and see if they would be willing to sell you some advertising space through text links. If the price is right, take the chance to have traffic driven to your site from theirs. Not all sites will be willing to do this, so keep trying different ones until you get one to say yes.

There are certainly more ways to accomplish effective advertising for your blog. You can market it the same way you would any other website online.  The key is to keep costs down while maximizing your selling potential within the blog.

A dead link, also known as a dangling link and a broken link, is defined as a link which leads to an error page or a web page or server which is unavailable.  While the occasional dead link may not seem like too much of a big deal all it takes is a single dead link to lose a customer.

A website visitor’s attention span is typically limited to about twenty seconds.  If you can’t capture their attention in those first twenty seconds – click, they’re gone.  They’re onto the next website or gasp – your competition.

Now imagine you’ve done your job as a webmaster and captured the attention of a visitor.  They’re reading your content and liking what they see.  A link or button captures their attention, they click it and oops, there’s an error page.  Some patient folks will go back to the page they were on and continue browsing however the majority will simply click away.  You’ve lost them and any potential profits which may have been gleaned from their wallets.

Unfortunately most webmasters are completely unaware that their links are broken – dead.  What is an unaware webmaster to do?

Fortunately when there’s an issue on the internet, there are many people and companies who jump in to help you solve the problem.  Dead links are no exception.

You can, of course, check all your links yourself.  If you have a single page brochure site this is probably the best and most economical decision to make.  You can click on each of your links on a monthly basis simply to make sure they’re still working.  Perhaps you link to an order form, a map or even other websites.  A few clicks and you’ll know whether your links are breathing or have kicked the bucket and need to be fixed.

However many websites have hundreds of pages, each with their own internal links.  One dead link can break a very important chain.  Checking a site like this manually can take way more time than you have.  You could hire an administrative assistant to weed through page after page of links trusting that they’re not going to miss any or you can use one of the many dead link checkers available online.  Most of these tools work by simply typing in your URL and generating a report.  Depending on the size of your website this process can take anywhere from five seconds to five minutes.  The result is a nice list of links to update.

Once you have a list of links to update, the sooner you can fix them the better.  Remember, each dead link may be a lost customer.  While it isn’t necessary to check for dead links weekly or even monthly it pays to schedule a quarterly dead link check into your calendar.  All it takes is a few hot minutes and your website stays fresh and up to day.

There are lots of ways to get them there, but the question is – how do you keep them returning? If a reader isn’t impressed by your blog at all, then they’ll leave your blog, never to return again.

With them goes their blog’s traffic that you could’ve benefited from if they’d linked to you. Here are some tips to make your blog appealing enough to keep the traffic there to earn you some money.

Evaluate Your Design!

The most common mistake some bloggers make is in their blog’s design. Blog readers not only look for interesting and informative content – they also want to come to an inviting space to read it.

The blog’s design needs to be inviting to them and comforting. It’s crucial not to have anything that would annoy them to the point of leaving because they can’t stand it. Make sure you’re not annoying them with colored font that’s hard to read or a bunch of graphics that are too distracting.

A few animated graphics are fine, but don’t have flashing ads and glittering graphics detracting from your blog’s message – or your strategically-placed advertisements. It’s fine to use colored font for your posts, but make sure it’s easy to read.

A pale yellow font color against a pure white background may be too difficult for the visitors to read. They shouldn’t clash with the background color either. Clashing colors can give visitors headaches, so they’ll leave your site without bookmarking it for a later visit.
Content! Content! Content!

The other common mistake bloggers tend to make is with their content. Some bloggers don’t update very often. If you only post once a month, your readers will forget you’re there and won’t return to your site. Post to your blog at least three times a week to keep human visitors and search engine spiders coming back.

Some bloggers also make the mistake of only providing text content to their blogs. Text posts are great, but mix it up a little every once in awhile with multi-media formats. Provide some interesting pictures, audio files and videos. Offer a little variety and your visitors will come back to check and see what else you’ve been up to.

Stay Focused!

It’s also important to stick to your blog’s niche topic. If you’re blogging about homeschooling, then stick to that topic. Providing information about a celebrity’s latest excursion will turn off your readers unless it somehow relates to homeschooling.

To make your blog successful in bringing you money, make sure you make the blog appealing to your readers. If your readers keep coming back, your chances of making money from your ads and offers will increase.

Designing a company web site is cheap and effective, not to mention essential because the world wide web is the only medium that offers instantaneous information access to millions of users around the globe.

Any web developer worth his salt should know about search engine optimization or SEO.

This is the key towards building an effective web site that would get a lot of hits and visitors. A web site that nobody visits is useless so the challenge lies in leading Internet users to visit your web site.

Thus, your web site need to be “found” when users type in keywords in search engines such as Google, Yahoo, MSN, Altavista, AOL and others.

Once a keyword relating to the products or services that you offer is keyed into a search engine, a direct link to your web site should emerge on top of the list.

You should employ search engine optimization techniques to lead traffic your way, and get more hits that would later on lead to more profit for your company, which is your goal in the first place.

Here are some tips on how you can make it to the top of the list of search engines, and use your SEO techniques to benefit your web site and your company:

1. If you have an existing web site and domain, just optimize the one that you currently have instead of purchasing a new domain.

It will take some time before your web site will show up in a particular search engine, like Google, so it better to use the one that you currently have instead of switching to a new one. Don’t “re-do” all of your pages. Tune up those that you have.

2. Know who your target audience is and aim for them.

If you are in the manufacturing industry and a user types in your product in a search engine, then you would immediately have your target right in front of you.

As soon as the user hits the “Enter” button or clicks on “Search,” then the person will be lead to your web site.

Make sure that your target market will get ‘hooked’ on your web site. Once the search engines show the link to your web site, their job is done.

What you should do next is to make sure that your visitor will not leave your web site without them trying out your products or services, or at least leaving some pertinent information so that you can contact them in the future for marketing and advertising purposes.

When hitting a particular target market, learn about their interests, location and age to have an idea of what you can offer them in return.

Also, you can somehow link their interests to your products and services.

3. Search for the right keyword.

You should be creative, persistent and flexible when looking for the keyword or keyword phrases to use in optimizing your web site.

Google and Yahoo offer some tools and tips on how you can come up with keywords  that will yield results.

Do not settle for just one keyword. You can also vary the words and phrases that you use for each page on your web site so that you can have more hits.

4. Consider your target market when designing your web site.

The design itself would include the general theme of the web site. You should also pay attention to smaller details such as color and font style and size.

Make sure that the web site is user-friendly and do not forget to insert helpful articles, tips, hints and related links that can be shared to other users.

It is a good thing to have an option to send a link or an article to a friend, which will add more users and increase your client base.

There should also be various ways to browse through your web site, to fit each user.

A person might find it to difficult use the scroll down option so you should also provide hyperlinks which are accessible to them.

5. Concentrate on the web site content.

Regularly update the content of your web site so that old and new users can find something new when browsing through your site.

Make the content brief and precise. Writing a content which has more than 600 words typically will make the users lose interest, since most of them do not actually read but just skim through the text.

Strive to be the best and most comprehensive web site and you will make your mark when it comes to information about the products and services that you offer.

It helps a lot to pay attention to detail, too.

Finally, keeping your web site’s content updated is a must.

Spread the word about your web site and use the basic search engine optimization techniques and you will surely gain positive results once users visit your web site.

We already know when blogs are optimized correctly they are great for bringing in traffic and generating sales. That is why you need to hook up with Twitter. While Twitter is not a full fledge blog, it is a micro-blogging tool that allows you to instantly let people know what it is that you are doing.

You can set up your blog with a simple feed that will help you optimize and create the results you want to get from both your blog and Twitter. Considering the many ways that you can feed your blog to Twitter, you can talk to people all over the world in a way that you never could before.

There is a simple little tool called Twitter Feed that you can set up on your blog. This tool will integrate Twitter and your blog allowing you to create an automation tool that will give your blog even more legs and bring in traffic. All without any extra steps needed by you once the initial installation is complete.

Setting up your Twitter Feed is not a long or hard process. You can literally do it in 5 minutes or less. Here are the simple steps to getting started.

• If you do not have a Twitter account, you need to set one up. This will allow you to broadcast your blog RSS feed.
• Once have set up your twitter account, go to the Twitter Feed site and login using an OpenID.
• Once your account is all set up you can then integrate your blog with your twitter profile by adding your blog’s RSS feed. You can do this for as many blogs as you like.
• Be sure to set up the time intervals in a way that doesn’t post too many at once and get you banned from Twitter for spamming.
• Once you are done whenever you post to the blogs you have in your Twitter Feed, the URL and post announcement will go out to all your Twitter buds.

Twitter Feed is a great tool, but try not to abuse it or your followers. Your readers and followers want to read your content and using Twitter Feed will help you get it out. Just be sure to feed it in the right way.

There are lots of ways to get them there, but the question is – how do you keep them returning?  If a reader isn’t impressed by your blog at all, then they’ll leave your blog, never to return again.

With them goes their blog’s traffic that you could’ve benefited from if they’d linked to you. Here are some tips to make your blog appealing enough to keep the traffic there to earn you some money.

The most common mistake some bloggers make is in their blog’s design. Blog readers not only look for interesting and informative content – they also want to come to an inviting space to read it.

The blog’s design needs to be inviting to them and comforting. It’s crucial not to have anything that would annoy them to the point of leaving because they can’t stand it. Make sure you’re not annoying them with colored font that’s hard to read or a bunch of graphics that are too distracting.

A few animated graphics are fine, but don’t have flashing ads and glittering graphics detracting from your blog’s message – or your strategically-placed advertisements.  It’s fine to use colored font for your posts, but make sure it’s easy to read.

A pale yellow font color against a pure white background may be too difficult for the visitors to read. They shouldn’t clash with the background color either. Clashing colors can give visitors headaches, so they’ll leave your site without bookmarking it for a later visit.

The other common mistake bloggers tend to make is with their content. Some bloggers don’t update very often. If you only post once a month, your readers will forget you’re there and won’t return to your site. Post to your blog at least three times a week to keep human visitors and search engine spiders coming back.

Some bloggers also make the mistake of only providing text content to their blogs. Text posts are great, but mix it up a little every once in awhile with multi-media formats.  Provide some interesting pictures, audio files and videos. Offer a little variety and your visitors will come back to check and see what else you’ve been up to.

It’s also important to stick to your blog’s niche topic. If you’re blogging about Homeschooling, then stick to that topic. Providing information about a celebrity’s latest excursion will turn off your readers unless it somehow relates to homeschooling.

To make your blog successful in bringing you money, make sure you make the blog appealing to your readers.  If your readers keep coming back, your chances of making money from your ads and offers will increase.

Even the most successful bloggers start to run out of their own original content to post about. Some resort to scraping the bottom of the barrel to find things to discuss, but that ultimately loses them readers, which means less money streaming in.

Where do you find great ideas to post about?  There are actually many different things to use to get you out of your stuck-in-a-rut mode. These may be simple techniques to use, but they can be effective if used right. Here are some things to try the next time you get stuck for something to write about:

–>  Scour the news sites – Search the news sites like CNN, MSNBC, and FOXNEWS and see if you can find a top story that you can blog about. Instead of just linking to the story, add your own accounting of it. You can post about your personal feelings toward the story or ask your readers what their thoughts are on it. Just make sure the story somehow relates to your blog’s topic.

–>  Check out your fellow blogger’s sites and see what they’re blogging about – It may seem unethical, but as long as you’re not stealing content, it’s perfectly acceptable to see what the community is interested in.  Is there a post that catches your eye?  Is there something you can add to that post?  A new spin you can put on it?  Media outlets always have an eye on the competition to see what others are doing – and you should, too!

–>  Internet research – Do a search on the Internet for your blog’s topic. See what information you can come up with concerning your niche. You may become inspired by something you’ve read there or you may think of some comments to post about it. Join Google’s experimental search option that lets you search in different ways – including timeline, information lists, and mapping details.  This can give you more ideas than the traditional search route: http://www.google.com/experimental/index.html.

–>  Check the video sites - YouTube has a zillion different videos out there that you can add to your blog.  See if you can find one that relates to your blog’s topic. Post the video to your blog and have your readers share their thoughts on it.

–>  Consider doing reviews – Reviews can be a good filler to use while you try to get inspired again. Choose some articles, websites, books or whatever you can think of that’s related to your blog’s topic and post a review of it. If it’s a good review, add your affiliate link and make some money from your opinions!

–>  Daily activities – Think about what happened within your day that you might be able to work into your blog.  If your blog is about flowers and you happened to go for a walk and saw some flowers on the way, use that as your post. Let your readers know what kinds of flowers are seen in your neighborhood and if possible, take come pictures to add since visual stimulation enhances the reader’s experience.

You can easily get back your inspiration for your blog posting if you look to other sources. They can help you come up with ideas of what you can share with your readers or they can give you a nice filler until your personal inspiration comes back. Don’t lose readers just because you’ve lost your blogging muse!

An interesting thing about keeping and maintaining a blog (also known as blogging) is that anyone can blog. What will make a blog more successful than most is simply a keen sense of its target readership. Of course, it will not harm the blogger (a person maintaining a blog) to possess a few basic skills navigating the Internet and creating links to other websites and blogs.

Bloggers today are finding that they can not only write and publish their thoughts for free, but also can find themselves getting compensated for writing. This is because one of the techniques in SEO is to create content that is rich in keywords, which is basically what search engines look for in ranking web pages in its SERPs. 

That said, here are some tips to make your next blog an effective SEO tool.

1. Choose a Theme (and Stick to It)

Most blogs never gain a real readership because it simply is a mishmash of a writer’s thoughts, with very little coherent theme to bind the entire blog together. If the blogger does it for the sheer purpose of a journal, there’s really nothing wrong with that.

However, as an SEO, a blog has to have a theme that will tie all the posts (individual articles) together. This is because instead of just looking for keywords, a search engine will also assess whether the page just happens to have a lot of keywords mentioned in the post or whether the entire blog is about the topic it is searching for. The former will rank less than the former in the SERPs. Given this point, it will do you well to pick a theme that you are interest and won’t tire of writing about. 

2. A Place You Can Call Home

Working alongside the idea of a theme, When creating your blog (whether with your own domain name or an a free blog site), give it a URL that has words related to the theme. For example, if you are going to blog about bonsai making, try to use words that are related to that in your blog’s URL (such as www.bonsaienthusiast.com). Name your blog using words that are relevant to your theme as well. Search engines look at these things as well to determine how high your blog could possibly rank. 

If you are blogging on a hosting site, it is possible to have your blog delegated into a proper category. This will help make a search engine easier to find your blog given that the category is strongly related to themes and search keywords.

On a related note, your individual posts should also be titled with words that are closely related to your theme. Again, working on a blog with a bonsai theme, one post could be titled “Miniature Trees: How to Get Started” while another one could be “Selecting the Right Pot for a Bonsai”. This will give your posts a URL that is rich in keywords, which helps in a page’s ranking on SERPS (but you already know that, right?).

3. Link And it Shall Be Linked Unto You

Another thing about blogs that SEO experts are finding to become a great advantage is the fact that blogs make it easy to link to other blogs, which in turn makes it easy for other blogs to link to you. 

This is yet another criterion a search engine uses to rank a particular page in the results pages. The more incoming links it possess about the keyword in search will increase ranking status because the page shows that a lot of people think what you’ve written is a good source of information.

So when writing on your blog, be sure to take the time to read other people’s blogs and other online articles related to your theme. Create links to them so that you point your readers to more information. This will increase the chances of other people creating links that will point to your blog.

4. Keep it Coming

Since blog content is so easy to create, search engines scour blog sites very regularly. That means if you keep on creating new content on a regular basis, search engines will have to keep up with what’s new on your blog.

By regularly creating fresh content on your blog, search engines will tend to look to your blog first before others that are not maintained and renewed as regularly as you do. It helps in the rankings as well, which is the whole point of this article, right?

These tips are just to get started on using a blog for SEO. As you go along, you’ll find more tricks of the trade that will help you push you up the ranks on SERPs. Of course realistically, don’t expect to rank on the top 3 pages on your first try. But give it a few weeks. And for as long as you keep to the tried and true principles, it may not be that far until you’ve captured a good ranking for your blog.

Here are just a few no-no’s that business owners all too commonly make when using Twitter. Are you committing any of them? Take the time to make sure by reading on.

One big mistake that people make when using Twitter for business reasons (or who think they are using it for business purposes) is getting caught up in the “commotion” there. It’s important to do some talking at Twitter because that is a form of networking in and of itself which is vital to business professionals. However, the talking you do should be succinct, to the point, friendly but professional.

As a marketer, your objective at Twitter is not to make new best friends or get dates; it should be to establish relationships that will lead to others desiring to do business with you. Now don’t misunderstand this. You don’t want to be manipulative. The objective is to keep the talk laid back and not beat people over the head with pleas or demands that they visit your websites.

Another big mistake that marketers make when using Twitter is posting tweets that are irrelevant or drive people away from them.  You can be funny, playful, personal, or serious, but what you type in for your message has got to have meaning and substance and be one that will attract others instead of turning them away.  It’s also ok to state your opinions on things, but be grown up about it and never type mean, obnoxious tweets or messages are prone to start too much controversy. For the most part, Twitter is a very friendly and open-minded community, but do realize that not everyone will agree with you on certain issues so if you find you are very opinionated on certain hot button subjects (Hummm….like politics? ), it might be best to avoid those particular matters.  As they say, you catch many more flies with honey than with vinegar.

Yet another error people make when using Twitter in business is that they include their website links in too many of their messages. Yes, in order to use social networking sites effectively for business you have to include links to your business, but don’t do it so much that it becomes annoying or seems manipulative. One or two link backs per day is plenty; any more than that will more than likely be considered overkill.

A related big mistake that people make with Twitter is posting way too many tweets per day. Not only does this take too much time away from their business, but once again they seem heavy handed or self-centered to the community. Five to ten new Twitters per day is plenty. Once again, make sure that you really have something to Twitter about, not just some words to throw up because you want to hear or in this case, see, yourself talk.

Finally, some marketers give up on Twitter too soon because they aren’t seeing the results they’d hoped for quick enough.  Remember, persistence is what pays off with networking, and networking on the Internet is no different. Twitter away for a while before you start expecting steady or big results.

1.    Expertise. Follow your strengths. Sites you set up must be on subject you consider yourself an expert on. Be specific. Be focused. Keep it simple and on that topic.

2.    Plan the site. A good layout for the site can improve usability. But, it does more. It helps your search engine rankings too. Why not take a couple afternoons this week to “spring clean” (yes, I know it is fall) your site. Simplify. Categorize. Prune. DELETE. This will help you more than you can imagine. At the same time, you will have a search engine friendly site.

3.    Research. Don’t see your site where you would like for it to be? Check out the sites that are there. What does the competition have set up? Note what seems to be working for them and and what does not. Why not check on blogs, forums or discussion list to see what your potential customers are buzzing about? If possible try to communicate with users in forums and get feedback on what should or can be improved further.

4.    Decide on important keywords. What DO you want to be known for? Where do you want to be found online? Decide on the most important keywords to use for your sight. Include these keywords in the metatags, copy page, page title, and file names.

5.    Remember that the Search Engines are your friend. Make friends with your search engines and don’t give it a hard time. Being nice and friendly to it will make its job easier to serve your site up to your target audience.

6.    Focus. Focus on the topic at hand and nothing else. The rule is one topic per page.

7.    Join the directories. Want an easy way to sky-rocket to the top of the search engines? Get busy writing. Write and submit your articles online. Article directories are repositories of knowledge done by human hands while search engine are huge databases collected by mostly machine methods. The relevancy of your page when joining the right directory may shoot through the roof. Of course, make sure you know what you are talking about.

8.    Start a linking campaign. A most effective SEO method. This is a must to do. Ask your allies, strategic partners, friends and acquaintances to place your site’s URL link on their sites. With a short description this can draw traffic from other sites and increase exposure. Google especially ranks the importance of its sites by the number of sites linked to it.  One of the best ways to get natural links and grab new readers is by writing articles and giving them to friends for their blog entries (we take them here! HINT!) Write those articles and include a nice, strong byline that links back to your website. Watch for two things–new friends from those websites and higher rankings on the search engines.

9.    Repetition is the key to victory. This is the big secret to success. You can’t get there all in one day. You have to decide now to keep on, keeping on. Get busy impleminting the ideas above. Keep repeating these tips, supporting and increasing what works and killing what does not as fast as possible until the desired result is achieved.

In the world of search engine optimization, content matters a lot. If a site has amateur or worse falsified information, fewer and fewer browsers will want to visit it. They will even spread bad news faster than good news so expect a garbage site to be ignored even in a week’s time.

The number one reason why Twitter can never replace a blog is because you can only post up to 140 characters at any one time. There is just no way to squeeze 1,000 words into such a small space. Not to mention, trying to send 7.14 tweets back to back, will not go over well with your followers. There is nothing like a person who tweets excessively. Doing so will cause you to lose followers and your goal with Twitter is to gain a friends not turn people away. You want Twitter to be tool that leads to your platform – your blog – the place where you share your story, product, or business.

Another reason why you can never replace your blog with simple tweets is because you just don’t have the same control to customize. Sure you can create a profile that says something about you but not the way you can with your blog. With a blog you can customize the whole kit and caboodle. You can add tools, plug-ins, and even more networking opportunities through your blog. You can’t do all that with Twitter.

Then we have the website name issue. You can’t attach a domain to twitter. On twitter you will always be www.twitter.com/whateveryournameis and that is it. Your username or extension is how people will recognize you on Twitter, but it’s not the same as a domain name for an entire website. In essence, Twitter owns your profile, not you. But your domain name – now that is all yours.

If you are an affiliate marketer, you want to talk about what you are promoting and, as was stated earlier, you only have 140 characters to say what you really want to say. That is not as effective as a blog post or blog series that can send the message more effectively. That’s juust one more reason Twitter can never replace a blog.

Don’t try to replace your own blog or website with twittering. Instead, learn to use Twitter as an effective tool that makes people want to learn more about you. Your blog is where you get down to the nitty-gritty and allow people to become more knowledgeable about your life, your product, service or whatever it is you are promoting.

We already know when blogs are optimized correctly they are great for bringing in traffic and generating sales. That is why you need to hook up with Twitter. While Twitter is not a full fledge blog, it is a micro-blogging tool that allows you to instantly let people know what it is that you are doing.

You can set up your blog with a simple feed that will help you optimize and create the results you want to get from both your blog and Twitter. Considering the many ways that you can feed your blog to Twitter, you can talk to people all over the world in a way that you never could before.

There is a simple little tool called Twitter Feed that you can set up on your blog. This tool will integrate Twitter and your blog allowing you to create an automation tool that will give your blog even more legs and bring in traffic. All without any extra steps needed by you once the initial installation is complete.

Setting up your Twitter Feed is not a long or hard process. You can literally do it in 5 minutes or less. Here are the simple steps to getting started.

•    If you do not have a Twitter account, you need to set one up. This will allow you to broadcast your blog RSS feed.

•    Once have set up your twitter account, go to the Twitter Feed site and login using an OpenID.

•    Once your account is all set up you can then integrate your blog with your twitter profile by adding your blog’s RSS feed. You can do this for as many blogs as you like.

•    Be sure to set up the time intervals in a way that doesn’t post too many at once and get you banned from Twitter for spamming.

•    Once you are done whenever you post to the blogs you have in your Twitter Feed, the URL and post announcement will go out to all your Twitter buds.

Twitter Feed is a great tool, but try not to abuse it or your followers. Your readers and followers want to read your content and using Twitter Feed will help you get it out. Just be sure to feed it in the right way.