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Review 31 days to built a better blog by Darren Rowse

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 28. June 2011 0

Looking for ways to improve your blog’s performance? Try 31 Days to Build a Better Blog, EBook by Darren Rowse

Improving your blog’s page views and getting more relevant traffic requires vigorous planning, research & implementation of ideas and techniques on a daily basis.

Wouldn’t it be easier if you could get a step by step guide to what should be done for improving your blog’s performance?

31 Days to Build a Better Blog (31DBBB) is a downloadable e-book consisting of 188 pages that offers advice on what you can do to improve your blog’s traffic (task) and how to do it (teaching). A total of 31 tasks have been defined to build a better blog in 31 days. You can get it for just $19.95!

The workbook has been written by Darren Rowse who has been blogging since 2002 on over 30 blogs.

31DBBB has been designed for relatively new bloggers who need help on what to do next, frequent bloggers who are facing stagnation and those bloggers who feel that the growth of their blog has stalled. Some of the techniques that one can learn include – coming up with new post ideas regularly, writing different styles of posts, promoting the blog and interacting with readers, developing an editorial plan for the blog, and writing about your niche, etc.

Most people who have purchased the e-book are of the opinion that
• The workbook acts as a good reference point for planning regular blog related tasks throughout the month.
• More than one task can be completed and implemented in a day.
• The e-book has succeeded in teaching simple yet valuable techniques for bringing more traffic to their blog.

Order your copy of the 31DBBB for a firsthand experience. The writer offers a money back guarantee in case you are not satisfied with the results!

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Facebook Studio – Facebook-studio.com

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 16. May 2011 0

It is a well known fact that almost anyone and everyone today is using Facebook for either personal / social networking or professional / business expansion thanks to its viral nature. The various Facebook Marketing Products such as Facebook Pages, Sponsored Stories, Facebook Ads, Facebook Places, Facebook Deals and other Facebook Apps are opening up tremendous opportunities for publicity and promotion of local businesses and places, artists, bands, companies, brands and organisations.

Using these tools, marketing heads are finding newer ways of connecting with their target audiences and driving more traffic to their business.
To successfully run marketing campaigns and promote brands on Facebook, it is important to develop a strong marketing strategy. Those business owners who are innovating with Facebook are seeing the results and Facebook Studio celebrates these victories!

What is Facebook Studio? http://www.facebook-studio.com
www.facebook-studio.com is the official website of Facebook Studio, a space specifically tailor-made for the marketing community to showcase their innovative, successful and ground breaking marketing campaigns using Facebook. The idea is to highlight those marketers, business owners, people and creative agencies that are designing promotional and results-oriented marketing campaigns based around Facebook Marketing Products and have thus been successful in solving business problems or creating a positive buzz around their brands.



Elements that Make up Facebook Studio include –

Gallery: Scroll down towards the center of the home page to view the “Gallery”. As is evident from its name, this is the section on Facebook Studio where you can find a collection of the newest creative campaigns submitted to the Studio. When someone submits their creative work on the Studio, once accepted, it is visible here. Options to sort by most recent, most liked and most shared as well as narrow by region and language are available.

Spotlight: Those submissions on Facebook Studio that attract a lot of attention and earn high number of “Likes” are moved to the Spotlight section and permanently live here. The campaigns under Spotlight are listed along with details on the client, agency, and features used such as Facebook Apps, Facebook Pages and Facebook Premium Ads etc. Other sub heads on the page are short description of the Campaign, Campaign Performance, Campaign Info & Credits. A case study video is required to be submitted too.

Awards: The most innovative and best submissions which are a part of the Spotlight become eligible for Facebook Awards. These awards are granted by the judging panel.
Learning Lab: This section hosts a number of videos and informative materials to help people learn and understand the tools better.

Agency Directory: This is an alphabetical listing of agencies who have submitted their creative campaigns on Facebook.

What’s New: (Most Popular, What Friends Are Saying, News)
Facebook Studio is considered to be a good place to learn from your peers, other marketers and those who have used Facebook in the most innovative manner and seen excellent results. Such understanding can be beneficial to improve and grow business practices.

What do you think about Facebook Studio? Please leave your questions and comments below.

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BranchOut Vs LinkedIn

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 15. May 2011 0

The corporate world is becoming fiercely competitive with every passing day, making it essential for present day employees and employers to expand their business network and keep their eyes and ears open for viable job, career and recruiting opportunities.

With the growing popularity of social media networking, websites like LinkedIn.com and BranchOut.com have become important tools for career networking.
Since its launch in July 2010, BranchOut.com has been an important topic of discussion as a career networking website, especially due to its similarity to the older player LinkedIn.com. There have been several conflicting views about which one is more useful. Speculations about whether or not BranchOut will score higher than LinkedIn are doing the rounds.

Let’s take a look of both of them one by one –

LinkedIn.com: Launched on May 2003, LinkedIn is probably one of the oldest and most popular websites for building one’s professional network online. It provides individuals from all over the world a free platform to put together their professional identity and showcase their skills set, work experience and business connections – colleagues, co-workers, classmates, employers, clients and partners etc. It is believed that more than 100 million professionals from all over the world use LinkedIn including independent professionals, business owners and recruiters.



• Once you create your profile on LinkedIn, you can grow your network by searching for your past and present colleagues, college mates and friends and send them requests to join your professional network on LinkedIn.

• Additionally, you can discover inside connections to companies when you are looking for a job or setting up a new business. As a recruiter, you can do a “People” search and add promising candidates to your network.

• Another interesting feature that LinkedIn offers is the ability to become a part of a group. Industry Groups are great for connecting with experts in your industry and moving a step closer to achieving your goals. You can ask questions and in turn, get valuable answers and advice – a true example of genuine knowledge sharing.

• By requesting your colleagues, clients, and bosses for recommendations you can make your profile even more powerful.

• What’s more, LinkedIn offers businesses the ability to have their own Company Page, another useful tool for connecting with your customers & clients and building meaningful relationships with them on a regular basis.

• Besides your own status updates, you can view updates from all your connections.

• For those interested in advertising, you can advertise on LinkedIn using its Direct Ads feature and target people based on their location, industry or job titles.
LinkedIn is a great tool for those of you who want to manage your career growth as well as find and share opportunities. You can consider your LinkedIn profile to be your formal, professional space on the web and can track who viewed your profile and other related statistics.

BranchOut.com: Launched in July 2010, BranchOut is Facebook’s new career network application. In order to use BranchOut service, you must have a Facebook account. Once you sign up for the application, you can either enter your own career summary or simply import all your professional data from your LinkedIn profile.



• The good point about BranchOut is that it keeps your professional information separate from your personal interactions on Facebook.

• Hence, you can connect with other Facebook users for professional networking & career growth. To do this, you can share BranchOut app with your friends and gain access to their professional data (as well as friends-of-friends). Your professional network can grow across hundreds and thousands of companies once you connect with friends and hundreds and thousands of their friends!

• In addition, you can also search for a company name and see a list of all those people who work there currently and have worked there in the past.

• Using the job search feature, you can browse through over 3 million job listings based on criteria such as location, position, company name or any other keyword. As an employer, you can post your own job.

Advantages of one over the other – LinkedIn and BranchOut –

• LinkedIn has for long, been known as a no-nonsense, professional networking website where people come for one purpose and one purpose only – to network with other professionals & generate more business. On the other hand, Facebook is still synonymous with personal and social networking. Majority of individuals continue to use Facebook simply to connect with their family and friends. It is a distinct possibility that many people will prefer to maintain their personal and corporate profiles separately, thus opting to continue using LinkedIn for all professional networking as opposed to Facebook’s BranchOut application.

• BranchOut has an attractive layout and is very easy to use. In fact, all it takes is a couple of simple steps to directly import one’s professional data directly from LinkedIn to BranchOut and setup your BranchOut profile!

• Facebook has a huge network of people and its popularity is growing by the day. Since BranchOut harnesses the power of Facebook networks to grow professional connections, it is possible that BranchOut becomes really big, very soon.

• Some feel that BranchOut’s job search feature is more superior to that of LinkedIn.

• BranchOut provides business-related details by getting together professional data from friends’ profiles. This means that a user will only be able to see such data if friends of friends have added these details to their profiles and made it accessible.

• Moreover, simply by adding more and more people from your friends’ network to your own (who you don’t really know) may not be all that useful. There is a debate between quality and quantity.

While both LinkedIn and BranchOut have strong and weak points, which one is better for you will largely depend on which one gets you more business and turns out to be more profitable for your business!

What do you think, will BranchOut become bigger than LinkedIn? Please leave your questions and comments below.

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What is Branchout.com? How to Use It for Professional Networking?

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 15. May 2011 0

Whether you are a job seeker (wish to take on that perfect job or join your dream company) or an employer (looking for the most qualified and experienced candidates to join your company), you must get out there and expand your professional network any which way you can. Branchout.com is known to help!

What is Branchout.com?
Branchout.com is the official website of BranchOut, a fascinating new application on Facebook which allows users to connect with other Facebook users for professional networking & career growth. The name itself speaks volumes about how individuals can use this tool to branch out from their present networks and open new avenues for career opportunities by simply connecting with the most number of effective people within their friends’ networks.
Founded in July 2010 by CEO Rick Marini, BranchOut has gained tremendous popularity in a very short span of time. BranchOut has over 500,000 active users and this number is growing constantly.



Facebook – Connecting beyond the people in your life
If you thought Facebook was restricted only to social & personal networking, think again! By using the BranchOut application, Facebook users can now use the power of Facebook networks to invite friends and friends of friends to connect with them in the professional sphere.

As a Facebook BranchOut user, you can tap into your friends’ networks, career network with some of the most successful professionals, search for better jobs and develop strong inside connections, thus, getting closer to your dream job / company. If you are an employer, you can post a job / vacancy at your firm and hear from hundreds and thousands of interested candidates, making it easier to recruit smartly.

Features & Benefits of Using BranchOut

1. Your Professional Profile on Facebook (FB)
If you haven’t yet signed up for BranchOut.com, you are probably still using your personal Facebook profile which is meant to connect and share with the people in your life – your family, friends and acquaintances. Once you sign up for BranchOut and start using it on Facebook, you have the unique opportunity to expand your presence on Facebook, professionally too.

Unlike your personal Facebook profile, your BranchOut profile on FB strictly presents data and information relevant to your job and career. It is a safe and secure tool for sharing professional information such as your career summary, education, work history, mutual connections and endorsements, etc with other professionals who are active on Facebook.

2. Your Opportunity to Build Strong Professional Networks
Having a strong professional network is always a plus when it comes to progressing in your career and with BranchOut, building a healthy career network is easy. Think about how your work network across hundreds and thousands of companies will grow once you connect with friends and hundreds and thousands of their friends! However, keep in mind that BranchOut provides business-related details by pulling together such information from your friends’ profiles. What this means is that you will only be able to see such data if friends of friends have added these details to their profiles and made it available.

3. Your Chance to Develop Inside Connections
How many times have you wished you knew someone in some of the top companies who could help you make inroads for yourself and discover lucrative job opportunities? Wouldn’t it be great if you knew someone who already worked in your company of interest? With the help of BranchOut, your wish could very well turn into reality! By searching for a company on BranchOut, you will be able to see all those people who have worked and are currently working there. Chances are these people are already a part of your network or your friends’ network! Yes, you can see which of your friends’ connections have worked with the company you are interested in working with, if they too are using the BranchOut app.

4. Your One-Click Job Search Engine
Searching for that perfect job just got easier with BranchOut. Using the job search feature, you can browse through over 3 million job listings based on criteria such as location, position, company name or any other keyword. What’s more, you will also be able to view your inside connections at each company – it can’t get better than this!

Showcase Your Endorsements & Request for Introductions
You can add more power to your BranchOut professional profile by requesting clients, customers, employers and employees to endorse you. These recommendations are showcased on your profile and enhance your professional standing. You can even request your connections and those of your friends’ (friends-of-friends) to introduce you into a company you are interested in joining – just what you need to move one step closer to materialising your career dreams.

Now that you know why you should use BranchOut, let’s take a look at How to Use BranchOut.com –

In order to use BranchOut professional networking service, you must have a Facebook account. If you don’t have one and are on the Branchout.com Home Page, sign up for Facebook. If you do have a Facebook account, log in to your account. You will be immediately taken to the BranchOut application.

1. To setup your BranchOut application via Facebook, login to your Facebook account, search for BranchOut application. On this page, click on login and sign up for the application if you haven’t already. BranchOut will request you to “Allow Permission” to access your basic information, send you an email, post to your wall, access your profile information and access your friends’ information.

2. Next, you can fill out your professional profile information beginning with a Career Summary and save it. If you prefer it, you can even opt to import your profile information via LinkedIn, if you already have a professional profile there. All your profile data will be imported and presented on your BranchOut profile. Click on Continue.

3. Now you will be presented with your most connected friends. Click on “Share” to invite them to use the BranchOut application. Click on “Continue”.
Complete your profile & you’re all set to use BranchOut to avail its benefits!

What do you think of BranchOut? Please enter your questions and comments below.

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Top 10 Reasons for Promoting Your Business through Facebook

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 12. February 2011 0

Facebook has quickly become an immensely effective word-of-mouth marketing tool, one of the most preferred social media networking sites for interacting with customers and reaching out to new ones.

To begin with, all you need to do is spend some quality time to create and update your Facebook Business Page for free. Once done, this page will officially represent your Company on Facebook and open huge possibilities for business promotion.

Here are some REASONS why your BUSINESS should be on FACEBOOK –

1. Facebook is Trendy – Brand Presence

In this day and age when being on Facebook is like second nature to most people, your visibility on Facebook will present you as a young, technologically savvy company that understands its users well.

2. Facebook Has a Global Reach – Brand Recognition

Over the past couple of years, the number of people using Facebook has grown exponentially. With millions of active members across the globe, having a presence on Facebook ensures brand recognition in the minds of users and potential customers.

3. Facebook Has Millions of Users – Word of Mouth

By having your official Company Page on Facebook, you can create a rightful presence for your business and become visible to customers & prospective customers. Watch how your fan base grows as your customers start to follow your Facebook Page and recommend you to hundreds of others in their network.

4. Facebook is Expressive – Timely Customer Feedback

Your Facebook Company Page allows you to communicate your core business values and philosophies to your customers through status updates, comments, event calendars and discussions, thus facilitating direct interaction with them. Access to relevant feedback on what they think about your products & services is just what you need to enhance your offerings, thus winning customers for life.

5. Facebook works round the clock – Distribution of Information

Every time you update your Fan Page with latest news on your products & services, this information is instantly passed on to your fans through Facebook news feeds. Moreover, friends of your fans get to hear about you too – a perfect way to promote your business.

6. Facebook is Inventive – Heightened Visibility

Facebook Social Plug-ins such as the Like Button & Like Box, Activity Feed, Comments and Recommendations are excellent for further promoting your business activities by integrating them with your website.

7. Facebook Facilitates Promotion – Demographic Advertising

While most Facebook promotion tools are free to use, you can choose to further your marketing campaign using Facebook’s advertising tool which enables you to advertise more selectively to your target users.

8. Facebook Improves Search Engine Rankings

Search engines love fresh, relevant and keyword rich content. Optimise your Business Page using targetted keywords to see your page rank high up on search engines – a perfect way to attract greater traffic.

9. Facebook Helps to Fight Competition

Chances are your competitors are already marketing on Facebook. Don’t miss this opportunity to get your name out there, just like your competitors are doing.

10. Facebook Increases Site Traffic

Every time you update your Facebook Page with posts linking back to your website, you generate and source additional traffic to your website and blogs.

Get started today and create a Facebook Fanpage for your business.

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RSS: Makes it easy for people to read your blog

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 5. February 2011 0

It’s great that you are consistently working towards growing your blog by updating it regularly with fresh, relevant and useful content. All that is left to do now is to slowly build your web traffic and improve your blog’s readership by attracting more and more targetted web surfers. After all, what is the use of having a content-rich, regularly updated blog if there is no one to read it?

As you work on these goals, don’t forget to also spend some time in researching and implementing such tools on your blog which can improve its readability, make it technologically up-to-date and further enhance the readers’ experience on your blog.

RSS is one such tool that is a must for every blog! Let’s take a look at why RSS can be very useful for your blog –

What is RSS? Also referred to as Really Simple Syndication, RSS is an outstanding technology that enables content syndication by generating RSS Feeds.

RSS Feeds Help in Content Sharing: Web surfers today, have a whole lot of choice when it comes to finding information on topics of interest. However, all this choice also makes it difficult to keep a track of the websites / blogs that they would like to read through and visit regularly. RSS Feeds provide a common platform for reading updated content from a host of sources with complete ease.

Once you provide RSS functionality on your blog, you make it easy for your blog readers to follow your blog and read its content on a regular basis.

RSS Streamlines the Process of Accessing Information: There is no need for your readers to access your blog or for that matter, any other blog on their browser once they subscribe to RSS feeds. Feeds present the latest updated content from different blogs, accessible at one common location through a feed reader. The content is presented with the blog post title / headline and usually includes a summary of the content. All readers have to do next is to scan through the list of updated posts and decide whether or not they want to read a particular post. A simple click makes it possible to read the full article.   

RSS Helps in Content Sharing: RSS is a revolutionary technology that helps readers to read your blog content easily. It gives them the flexibility to choose how they will access your content. Most web surfers prefer to subscribe to blog feeds through email delivery. This is one of the most convenient options as it delivers useful content directly into their inbox.

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Free Search Engine Traffic

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 5. February 2011 0

There is no denying the fact that search engines are one of the biggest sources of free traffic on the internet today, and why not? More and more web searchers are relying upon popular search engines such as Google to ‘FIND’ information. What’s more, the search functionality is further refined to accommodate image searches, video search and even local search.

No matter what you want to know – from information on the latest fashion trends to tips on how to grow cauliflowers in your kitchen garden, the internet is bound to give you relevant answers by presenting you with pages upon pages of web resources.

What then makes one website more popular or successful than another?

  • Search engine optimisation is definitely one important factor that cannot be ignored. If your website contains plenty of well written, relevant content and is optimised comprehensively for your most important keywords, chances are that sooner or later, it will start appearing in and moving up across organic search engine results, thus automatically driving plenty of free traffic to your website. This is why it is said that it pays to have a strong web presence.
  • Increasing your web property is another way through which you can improve your popularity on search engines and get plenty of free traffic. Think of it this way – the more active you are on the web, the more chances you have of attracting target customers to your website since almost everyone is online today!
  • Blogs are very effective as they enable you to interact with your prospective customers easily and regularly. By posting useful information on your Company blog, participating in forums and leaving constructive comments on other industry blogs, you can reach out to your target audience and provide answers to their queries by directing them to important product pages on your website.
  • The mantra of the day is not to wait for your cusotmers to find you. Instead, it is your responsibility to go out of your way to look for them in destinations where they are most likely to be found – on social media networks such as Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn, Digg etc. Your job is to create a number of landing pages for your customers so that they can see you wherever they go. As your blog and other pages get indexed on search engines, not only will your brand become popular, it will also win you plently of free search engine traffic.
  • Announce your presence by writing newsworthy Press Releases and submitting them to Press Release distriution sites. You will be surprised to check your statistics and know just how much traffic well written Press Releases can generate.

Google News is another avenue that is worth exploring. Facts show that a majority of people go online to access the latest news. Start appearing in Google News and enjoy loads of free search engine traffic.

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Linking Strategies

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 5. February 2011 0

Interested in increasing the popularity of your website? Want to attract free, relevant to your website? Have you tried Link building?

Most Companies today are spending their time, manpower and foresight into planning and developing strong linking strategies. To put it simply, Linking Strategies refer to those plans and methodologies which are put into practice with an aim of improving a website’s link popularity.

Incoming links to a website can go a long way in popularizing the website, attracting free web traffic and improving the rankings of the website on search engines such as Google. This realisation is what guides most webmasters to undertake link building campaigns aggressively.

While it is true that links to your website / blog can be very useful in supporting your overall efforts to market your website well, what cannot be overlooked is the quality of these incoming links. Simply linking to your website from unrelated sites of poor quality can do more harm than good. When an incoming link to your website comes from a related, high quality and high Page Rank website, this link will get more value to your site.

Blindly linking to other websites in the hope that they will reciprocate your links is not recommended.

There are some very useful sources through which you build incoming links to your website. These include –

  1. Website Directories: There are a large number of good quality website directories on the web today. All you need to do is to locate these genuine, quality conscious directories and add your website link to them in your relevant category. Once accepted, your website will be listed along with a brief description about your website – a great way to get incoming links to your website while directing genuine traffic to your website.
  1. Blog Directories: If you run a blog, you can follow a similar exercise. Locate good blog directories and add your links in the relevant category.
  1. Provide Useful, Relevant and Original Content: This is one of the simplest, most useful methods for attracting valuable incoming links to your web resource. If you regularly update your website with good quality content that is of value to your target audience, chances are that other websites will recognise you as a helpful resource and link to you on their own!
  1. Article Directories: In addition to adding new content to your website / blog, you should also consider writing original articles and submitting them to article directories. You can link back to your website in the space provided for Author Profile, generally in HTML format, ideal for links!
  1. Social Media: If you haven’t started, you must create your website’s presence on social media marketing networks and tools such as Digg, YouTube and Facebook etc. These provide a perfect opportunity to create unique incoming links to your website / blog.

Last but not the least; you can also consider studying your competition to understand their Linking Strategies.

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Directory Marketing

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 5. February 2011 0

Building a strong online presence is imperative if you want to tap into the large customer base of prospective target audiences who are extremely active on the internet. No matter which industry you may belong to, you are bound to benefit from the large number of targetted, revenue generating customers just waiting to be discovered. And to achieve this, no stone must be left unturned.

Once you have invested sufficient time, money and efforts into building valuable web properties in the form of websites and blogs, next, it is your responsibility to promote these resources as much as possible and in the most cost efficient ways. The aim is to attract more and more web traffic to your website in the shortest period of time.

Directory Marketing Helps!

A simple search on any Search Engine will bring up never ending listings of Web Directories that list a plethora of websites across different categories such as Health, Advertising, Writing, Finance, Beauty, Architecture, Gardening, SEO etc. These directories serve as a reference point for anyone who wants links to useful, good quality websites on any given topic / industry. Not only do these directories list these websites, they also generally provide a brief description of what the website is about and links to them directly.

Listing Your Websites & Blogs on Quality Web Directories: Website / Blog Directories

Your website marketing and link building efforts can gain a whole new meaning with Directory Marketing. Your job is to first search for some good quality, reputed directories that you can add your websites to. Commonly, most directories fall under any one of the following categories – Paid Directories, Niche Directories, and Generic Directories, Free Directories.

Whether you are willing to pay to get listed into a directory or prefer to tap the free ones is entirely up to you. However, keep in mind that some very reputable directories have strong policies with regard to adding a website to its listing. It is generally seen that if your website has been around for some time now, is free from errors and offers useful resources to its visitors, it stands a good chance of being accepted.

Article Directories

Writing and submitting well written, original articles to articles directories is another great way to direct useful, relevant and valuable free traffic to your website is no time. Make good use of the resource box that is offered to contributing writers by linking back to your website / blog. This way, you can make sure that article readers will not only recognise you as an expert in your field, they will also visit your website / blog to follow what you have to say regularly, Is there any better way to get your targetted visitors to come back to your site again and again?

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Ezine Marketing

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 5. February 2011 0

Improving the popularity of your website, promoting your business and driving more relevant traffic to your web properties is something each website owner hopes for. However, in the midst of cut throat competition across all industries on the internet, simply hoping is not enough. Timely and thorough action is required if you want to attract free traffic and win over a loyal customer base. Ezine Marketing is considered to be one of the most cost effective and useful tools for achieving just this!

First things first – What is an Ezine? In its simplest terms, an Ezine refers to an Email Newsletter or a website that publishes content regularly and distributes this content to a list of opt-in subscribers. Marketing via ezines is a great way to promote your website, products, services and business on a regular basis.

Ezine Marketing: Tools & Techniques

Once you create an Ezine, you must promote it properly on your website so that interested readers can sign-up and receive your content regularly. Moreover, it is often seen that simply promoting your Ezine is not sufficient. It is important to offer something of value to your prospective subscribers for free such as an E-book or a PDF file with some new article. This will give them an incentive to opt for your Ezine and also give them an idea of what to expect.

Writing Useful Informational Articles:

Writing articles is a great way to communicate with your subscribers and offer them something of value from time to time. This can range from insightful, factual articles on relevant subjects related to your industry or opinions, experiences and reviews, specific to your business.

Offering Advertising Space:

Ezine publishers earn revenue by offering prime spaces on their Ezine for advertising. A targetted email to subscribers talking about advertising options can be a good way to attract advertising revenue. What’s more, to make your offer even more attractive, you can offer special discounts to your subscriber base. In addition, Ezine owners too can consider advertising on other related Ezines as this offers great potential to reach out to other targeted customers.

Besides publishing your own Ezine, you can also consider tying up with other Ezine publishers and posting your video tutorials, ads and other useful content on their Ezine.

Interaction with Subscribers:

Another great way to market yourself and your Ezine is by organising regular contests for your subscribers. You can even invite them to make contributions in the form of ideas, articles etc. The aim is to keep your subscribers involved and interested.

If you are not using Ezine Marketing yet, it’s time to start doing so.

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How to Write Press Releases

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 5. February 2011 0

Whether you want to keep your customers, clients and partners informed about the latest developments in your Company/ business, or want to stay in the news, Press Releases are just right for you.

Writing Press Releases is one of the best ways through which you can attract free web traffic to your website on a regular basis. Today, there is no dearth of Press Release Submission websites on the internet. All you need to do is to write newsworthy Press Releases and submit them to such websites. With time, your Press Releases will be picked up by Search engines and before you know it, you will witness a surge in your website traffic!

Writing Press Releases is somewhat different from writing articles in terms of formatting, tone of voice and presentation of facts. Getting your Press Release accepted by professional Press Release Distribution websites can be challenging. The moment your Press Release moves away from facts, and starts to sound like an advertisement, it runs the risk of getting rejected for publication.

You need to focus on : How to write a Press Release that is factual rather than promotional.

Let’s take a look at what you should keep in mind while writing a Press Release:

  • Is your Press Release Factual & Newsworthy? The purpose of a Press Release is to share facts and provide accurate, newsworthy information about your Company to readers and journalists. Hence, before you get down to writing a Press release, make sure that you are clear about what you want to say.

  • Make The Headline of Your PR Attention Grabbing: Your PR headline is the first thing that is noticed about your PR. Infact, most readers (journalists) decide whether or not to read a PR based on its Headline. Hence, choose a headline that is concise, attention grabbing and capable of arousing the curiosity of its target readers.

  • Provide Answers to the Essential Questions: As you reach the body of the Press Release, you must first provide a brief on what the PR is all about – like an introduction, talking about the purpose of the PR. The next paragraph should be used to answer questions such as Who, What, When, Where and Why.

  • Quotes Are Important: Whether you are announcing the launch of a new range of products or breaking the news about your Company’s latest event, it is good practice to add a human touch to the PR by adding a few quotes by the Co’s CEO or any other person of importance.
  • Follow the Correct Layout: Keep in mind the standard format and rules of PR presentation and layout. Start the body with a line that mentions the city in which the PR has been generated and date on which it has been released by the co. In the last paragraph, include a line that says “For additional Information” and provide details on how someone can find more information on your Company. 

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Importance of Unique and Quality Content

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 5. February 2011 0

You must have often heard the popular phrase on the internet that ‘Content is King’. While this concept has gained popularity over the last few years, there was a time when webmasters were totally unaware of the importance of good quality unique content. All they cared about was visual excellence and this is why they spent large amounts of revenue in building a visually attractive website, complete with pictures, graphics, flash and the likes. Web design companies were gaining prominence like never before and competitors across all industries only cared about making their website more appealing to their target audiences.

However, slowly there was a major shift in this approach which has taken place as a result of the realisiation that the most essential element on a website is content. Good quality, unique and well written relevant content takes precendence over all other factors. Everything else, eventually falls into place once the content is built. Such is the power of the written word.

Commerical & Informational Knowledge Bank: People of all age groups and from all walks of life have made the WWW an important part of their daily lives. Either commercially or for purely informational purposes, each one of us depends on the internet for something or the other. For all this, the written word is required. How else will a Company in one part of the world reach out to and communicate with its customers in another part of the world?

Online visitors are in need for quality information and quickly. Hence, it pays to offer fresh, updated and useful resources on your website in the form of articles, reviews and more.

Here are just some of the benefits of unique quality content on your website :

  • Your target audience will recognize you as a dependable and credible source of information and visit you regularly.
  • Search engines will love you. By regularly updating your website with quality, well written keyword rich content, you will be able to appear higher up in search engine results for your desired keywords.
  • Once search engines rank you well and visit your websites regularly for freshly added original content, they will repay you by sending lots and lots of targetted web traffic to your website. Can there be any other simpler way to attract free traffic to your web properties (blogs, websites)?
  • Another benefit of having quality unique content on your website is that it makes your website popular as far as links are concerned. More and more webmasters are following this trend of link exchange with related websites or linking to websites that offer good quality resources which will be useful for their visitors.

If you haven’t already, make sure to start focussing on your website content.

Whether you plan to write fresh, unique industry specific content for your website or outsource content writing to an outside firm, it is definitely worth the effort.

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Blog: Keep ADDING fresh, relevant, useful content

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 5. February 2011 0

So you’ve finally taken everyone’s advice and started your own blog. That’s a great start. However, there is no time to waste. The most important task on your To-Do list now must be to build up your blog. The sooner you start growing your blog; it will give you positive results in the form of relevant traffic, popularity and conversions.

Remember: the first couple of months are always crucial.

Regular Updation of your Blog is an Absolute Must Unlike a website; a blog cannot do without regular updation. In fact, what differentiates a blog from a website is this very need. While you can survive with a niche website of just a few pages and build it up over time, in the case of a blog, you cannot afford to take it easy. Depending on the theme of your blog, you can make it more comprehensive by posting content and relevant videos, etc.

Develop a Plan of Action You must know that Search engines such as Google love relevant content. If you want Google to like you and send its spiders to crawl your pages regularly, you must work out a plan of action that allows you to publish relevant content regularly on your blog. A post per day is most ideal. However, if you are unable to do this, you can try to create new posts atleast twice a week. You can also consider hiring a writing service that will take over the job of supplying your blog with fresh content on a regular basis.

Add Fresh, Relevant and Useful Content All blogs need to be updated as often as possible by posting relevant content. Doing so not only keeps the blog current and fresh, it also makes it a rich source of information that offers value to its readers, who in turn keep coming back for more.

Best Content Sources Articles are considered to be the most ideal form of blog content. Depending on your industry of interest, start posting informative articles that have just the right blend of some of your most important keywords. Make sure to link back to relevant pages on your main website. Product reviews & opinions are also useful. Another popular content source is guest posts by other industry experts. Invite others to write posts for your blog and offer to add their signature / link along with the posts.

RSS Feeds Also known as Really Simple Syndication, RSS feeds allow readers to subscribe to your blog posts and receive updates of new content added to your blogs, regularly.

As you start adding well written, relevant and useful content on your blog regularly, you will start appearing in organic search results and are bound to notice a steady rise in your readership.

Can there be a simpler, easier and more economic way to receive free traffic?

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Importance of serious keyword research

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 5. February 2011 0

Ask any informed internet marketer about what is the single most important factor to keep in mind while attempting to enhance your web presence and they are bound to say serious keyword research.

What are Keywords? Keywords refer to those thousands of words or phrases that are used by web searchers to find information on the internet. These words are typed into search engines like Google, Bling etc which in return present pages upon pages of search results or links to website resources based on how competitive those keywords are.

This relation between keywords and search results seems pretty straight forward when seen from a searcher’s point of view. However, things are a little more complex for those thousands of website owners who want their website to be found each time a surfer searches for products or services similar to what they offer! Thorough keyword research and their proper implementation simplify this process and help to meet cut throat competition which exists across all industries.

What do you mean by Keyword Research? Even though we well understand that there is a direct relationship between key phrases typed into search engines and the results that are presented thereafter, not all keywords can be relevant for one particular marketer.

How then, do you make sure that your prospective customers will find your website? The answer is simple – keyword research.

Keyword Research refers to the process of conducting an in-depth analysis or research of the most relevant keywords and key phrases that are being used by online visitors to find websites similar to yours. Once you know the most relevant keywords for your business / website, you can take the necessary steps to optimise your website for those specific words or phrases.

The keyword research activity requires thorough planning and is usually done right in the beginning of any web marketing efforts. Once completed, it sets the right tone for the activities that follow next. In the event that a website is not optimised for the right keywords, it will not be able to attract free web traffic from search engines, thus missing out on higher conversions.

There are a number of very useful and easy to use Keyword research tools available. Some of the most important ones include Overture Keyword Selector tool, WordTracker Keyword Research tool and Google Adwords Keyword Tool.

If you haven’t already, spend some time in conducting a serious keyword research for your website. I assure you, this time spent will go a long way in bringing you valuable results.

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How to Market with MySpace?

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 23. February 2010 0

MySpace is a social networking tool that has gained popularity over the years. As is clear from the name itself, MySpace basically refers to a free personal web page that can contain information about you, your life and your business.

While some people may use MySpace only to make friends and interact with them, many others recognise its potential as a free web marketing tool that can do wonders to their web presence and help them to popularise their website and business. However, the best approach on MySpace is still considered to be one in which a person networks and interacts with friends as well as uses the platform to market his / her business.

Customising Your MySpace Page:

As with most other social networking tools, using MySpace is easy. You begin with creating a page for yourself and customising it by including information about you and your business / website such as Interests and Personality, Display Name, Background and Lifestyle, Companies, Networking, etc. Once you create your profile, you are all set to look for people you know and connect with them. You can even search for people you would like to know. This is especially useful for those who want to connect with their target audiences. You can send a friend request and wait for them to accept you. Friends can start communicating with one another and begin reading each other’s MySpace page.

Marketing with MySpace: If you have been wondering how to Market with MySpace, read on –

Once you have created a presence for yourself, you can start taking steps towards marketing with your MySpace page. This can be done using the following methods:

  • Create a strong MySpace page: You are perhaps, the only person who knows your business inside out. Use the Myspace platform to talk about your core competencies. Make your page interesting, something that offers value to its readers such as a regularly updated blog. You can even upload images, songs and pictures. Be as honest and clear as possible and try to make your personal page warm and friendly.
  • Search for your Target Audience: Send friend requests to people who may be interested in your niche business. Make your message friendly as opposed to filling it with marketing and promotional talk.
  • Start Interacting: Once you have built up a decent friends list, you can begin interacting with them. Leave comments on their pages and include a link to your website. Doing so will drive traffic to your website.
  • Send out Bulletins: The Bulletins tool on MySpace helps you to send out such updates which will be directly posted on the MySpace pages of all your friends. It is recommended not to overdo using this as people might start getting annoyed with excessive self promotion.

Some of the other tools that you can use include MySpace Groups, MySpace Events, Link Exchange, MySpace Music, etc. If you haven’t started yet, login to MySpace and explore its marketing opportunities.

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Internet Marketers Top 10 Social Media sites

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 22. February 2010 0

Gone are the days when advertisers and marketers could simply rely on traditional media to create a buzz around their brand and products. With growing competition and a fight to succeed across all industries, the need of the day is to reach out to your target audiences across all media and platforms. The internet is one of the most popular mediums to target customers and Social Media Marketing is definitely the need of the day.

Also known as a form of internet marketing, social media marketing refers to the collective efforts of marketing and promoting a website or business through the use of a plethora of social media channels such as social networks, blogs, forums, social book marking, online communities as well as social media sharing tools.
Let’s look at Internet Marketers Top 10 Social Media Sites

1. Facebook: Facebook is a well known and extremely popular social networking website that allows you to connect with people all across the globe, no matter where they may be. Irrespective of whether you want to market and promote yourself or your business, Facebook offers you tremendous opportunities to gain exposure absolutely free of cost. http://www.facebook.com/


2. Twitter – Twitter is a free social media, networking and micro blogging service that enables individuals and companies to market themselves by reaching out to & connecting with thousands of people online. And all that needs to be done to accomplish this task is to answer a simple question – ‘what’s happening?’ http://twitter.com/


3. YouTube: Launched in 2005, YouTube is a video hosting and sharing website that enables users to upload their videos and share it with the rest of the world. http://www.youtube.com/

4. MySpace: MySpace is a social networking tool that has gained popularity over the years. As is clear from the name itself, MySpace basically refers to a free personal web page that can contain information about you, your life and your business. http://www.myspace.com/

5. Squidoo: Squidoo is an upbeat and popular publishing platform where users can publish content on topics of their interest on pages known as Lenses. http://www.squidoo.com/

6. LinkedIn: LinkedIn is a platform that offers professionals the opportunity to maintain their professional profile and interact with other professionals in their own and other fields. Currently, over 50 million professionals are using LinkedIn to interact with one another and exchange information & opportunities on the professional front. http://www.linkedin.com/
7. Delicious: Delicious is a social bookmarking website that enables publishers to bookmark websites on the internet and see what’s new on the web. http://delicious.com/
8. Digg: Digg is a popular social bookmarking site that enables users to bookmark the latest News headlines, Videos and Images. http://digg.com/


9. Flickr: Flickr is a well known photo sharing site from Yahoo. It allows users to share pictures, with friends, family and other business associates. http://www.flickr.com


10. StumbleUpon: StumbleUpon provides a platform for sharing personal recommendations on stories, pictures, and videos etc. Helps to discover the best on the web. http://www.stumbleupon.com/

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Facebook Ads Bigger Than Google Adwords

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 22. February 2010 0

In a very short span of time, Facebook (FB) has gained tremendous popularity, the world over. Almost everyone, web savvy or not is on Facebook and why not?

Facebook has revolutionised the way people interact and keep in touch with one another. Right from families and friends to colleagues and casual acquaintances, FB makes it possible to connect with people in real time, on a day to day, minute by minute basis.

However, Facebook is not just limited to Friends’ Lists. It is packed with a number of different tools that enable members to market themselves and their businesses well. Facebook Advertising is a good case in point!

Though there are conflicting views about this, many people feel that Facebook ads do a better job at targeting online audiences and are more effective than Google Adwords!

Given the tremendous pace at which the Facebook user base is constantly growing, it won’t be a surprise if Facebook ads will soon begin to challenge the online advertising dominance that has up till now been enjoyed by Google!

Let’s take a look at some of the factors that may contribute to this change:

  • More and more people are joining Facebook every day, all across the globe, thus adding to its list of several hundred million users.
  • The large user base spends several hours on Facebook.
  • Facebook’s Ad design interface is clutter-free and easy to use.
  • Facebook ads can be targeted closely to its members based on such factors as age, education, gender, location, marital status, hobbies, etc. This is the information that is provided voluntarily by registered users.
  • Facebook estimates the number of users you can target with your ads based on different factors.
  • Facebook knows who its members are and is aware of its user’s preferences. Such specific information enables Facebook to offer advertisers the flexibility and benefit of serving their audiences highly customised and well targeted advertisements.
  • Facebook makes it possible to serve the most relevant ads to people based on their interests, thus improving the chances of arousing their curiosity in these ads.
  • Facebook provides detailed Advertising Reports which help advertisers to understand how well their ads are performing. They can then make the required changes and check the improvements.
  • Competition on Facebook may still be lower than on Google Adwords.

Google has spent many years perfecting its Adsense and Adwords tools. Despite that, it has been seen that Facebook ads and advertising on Facebook is definitely catching up and may even become much bigger than Google Adwords.

Whether or not Facebook ads will actually outshine Google Adwords is something we must all be willing to wait and watch. As they say, only time will tell!

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Google Profile – A Must have Marketing Tool

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 18. February 2010 0

Web marketers, all across the globe look for ways and means to enhance their web presence, popularise their business and gain positive online exposure. Some do it through their websites, while others prefer to achieve the same through regular and dedicated blogging. Whatever be the case, the motivating factor is always to reach out to a larger audience. Now, Google Profile makes this even easier!

Irrespective of whether you have a website or a blog, you can build yourself a highly customised web presence thanks to Google’s Profile feature.

What is Google Profile?

The Google Profile service launched by Google enables you to design your own Personal Profile page on Google that helps you to choose exactly what information should be provided when someone searches for your name on Google.

Simply put, your Google profile administers how you are presented on the various Google products. This is the information that can be seen by all other Google users.

By creating a Google Profile, you get to tell web searchers who you are. The great thing about this feature is that it lets you have complete control over the nature of information presented. If you do not want to make your Address and other contact details public, you don’t have to! Just mention your email id and you are reachable without being over accessible! Moreover, you can also control who can and cannot see your personal details.

How Does It Work?

Google Profile enables you to hand pick every piece of information that you would like to share about yourself, each time someone searches for you on Google, using your name or other keywords associated with you. This way, you provide the right information to people.

  • Go to http://www.google.com/profiles
  • Click on “Create my profile”
  • Customise the page with the information that you would like to share about yourself with anyone who might search for you on Google
  • Enjoy your very OWN and highly customised Google Profile!

Once you have logged in to your Google Profile account, you can start entering your details.

Some of the features under Google profile include:

  1. Once you enable the ‘Send a Message’ feature, you can keep your email hidden and still, receive emails from other Google mail users.
  2. You can make your profile more impressive by adding photos from Google Image applications such as Picasa or Flickr.
  3. You can customise your personal profile page by adding a short bio about yourself.
  4. You can add your most current contact details and control who can see it.
  5. Using this feature, you can link to your other Google web properties on the net. This includes links to your Blogger blog, Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter pages. Now all your friends need to do is to visit your Google Profile page and connect with you via different online tools.
  6. The ‘My Places’ feature helps to share information about your present as well as past locations.

You no longer need to fret about not finding yourself on Google searches whenever you search for your name!

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How to Write a Good Blog Post and Where to Market it?

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 17. February 2010 0

Most internet savvy individuals have their own blog today and this is the reason why, the internet is flooded with Blogs on every imaginable topic. Thanks to their ability to be updated regularly and the ease with which they can be maintained, Blogs have started occupying the same space & importance that was once reserved for websites.

However, simply having a blog is not enough. If you are interested in truly using your blog to market yourself, your brand or your product well, you must work on maintaining its quality and usefulness. After all, how else will you be able to break from the clutter and create a special space for YOUR blog?

Writing Good Blog Posts One of the prerequisites of owing a good, widely read and followed blog is to pay attention to the quality of content you post on it. You cannot have a mediocre quality blog and expect great results from it. The online visitor of today is smart and recognises quality. Hence, if you are interested in tapping into the most genuine and valuable reader base on the internet, it is imperative to write good blog posts that offer value.

Selecting a Relevant Theme: Before you create a blog for yourself, think about its purpose and relevance. It is recommended to build up your blog based on your niche industry. Since you know your industry well, you will be able to share value with your blog readers in the form of articles, reviews, feedback and opinion on topics related to your core competencies.

Planning in Advance: If you are starting a new blog, it is good practice to write atleast 5-8 posts in advance. These can be added over a period of time. However, if you already have a blog, you can plan each blog post before you actually make them live. Spending some time in planning what you want to say in your next blog post as opposed to immediate action can help to improve the quality of your posts.

  • Use a strong, interesting and attention grabbing Headline and sub heads.
  • Write short posts and space out the text by including lines in between each paragraph.
  • Divide the content using bulleted points.
  • Proof read your text before posting it to make sure there are no typos or spelling errors.
  • Stick to the topic / theme of the blog when writing blog posts.
  • Write a good introduction that tells the readers what the post is about. If you can hold their attention in the beginning, there is a good chance that they will read till the end.
  • If you are new to blog writing, practice will help. Hence, try to read other blogs relevant to your industry and see how they are tackling different subjects. Write as often as possible and set goals for yourself.

Once you have developed a good quality blog, the next step is to start marketing it across different blog directories. Leave your valuable comments on other blog posts and add a link back to your own blog. Include your blog url in your email signature, website and other resources. Most importantly, have fun with it!

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Why You Should Be Your Own Boss?

Publisert av Sigve Kommedalden 16. February 2010 0

• Are you bored of your routine 9 to 5 job?
• Do you feel stagnated in your present career?
• Do you wish you had some more time in hand to spend with family?
• Are you dissatisfied with your current salary and see no chance of improvement?

More and more individuals today are faced with a similar dilemma. Unhappiness in your present job can sap you of all your positive energy, productivity at work and motivation to perform.

Today, a growing number of people are realizing just this and turning their attention towards more lucrative career options, something that can give them creative satisfaction, monetary fulfillment and flexibility at work.
Read on to find out the benefits of becoming your own boss -

• You are in-charge of your revenue:
Self employment offers you the opportunity to have complete control over your income generating abilities and the revenue you earn over a period of time. After the initial warm-up period, once you get a hang of what you need to do and how you need to do it, you have the chance to maximize your earnings with no one and nothing to stop you.

• You are Answerable to Yourself:
Being self employed in your own business, whether from home or an office provides you the freedom to work on your own terms. You become your own boss. From setting goals to meeting them and checking your progress, you become the BOSS.

• You Enjoy Flexibility:
Remember those days of employment when you and your colleagues constantly cribbed about the lack of flexibility at work. Well those days are over once you enter the world of self employment. Right from the work hours to the projects you take up, you are in complete control. Depending on what suits you best, you can choose your work location, work hours, and work policies.

• You Enhance Your Personal Life:
All work and no play can make even the best of workers lack motivation to perform. Now that you make the decisions, you have the opportunity to give your family quality time that they deserve. Right from planning family vacations to dinners and picnics, you can plan your days in such a way that you have ample time to rest, relax and rejuvenate, thus enhancing your productivity at work.

• You Set Your Own Goals:
Working under someone has its limitations. However, once you start working for yourself and become your own boss, you have the right to set your own short term and long term goals for achieving success in all your endeavours. Right from the initial planning stages to the actual stage of achieving what you set out to achieve, there is no one you have to answer to and get your plans approved from. This ensures saving precious time which would otherwise be wasted in getting approvals.

The road to success in self employment is by no means easy. However, with a little bit of focus, dedication and motivation, you can become a successful entrepreneur – someone who is happy with that he / she is doing.

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