8 Things to Remember When Starting Any Blog

1  Start your blog on the right platform.  There are many companies out there where you can start a free blog but no matter who they are and what services they offer it would still best to choose the number one writing platform which is WordPress.com.

A blog can be started either by signing up for free or by getting your domain which will make your blog unique. This will insure that you can now start building your house.

2  Choose the template which will fit your personality and business.  You can choose many different templates and view these templates before you install them on your WordPress.com website. This can save you a lot of time later and you won't have to change your whole site around if you are happy with the correct template and sometimes the keyword here is simple is best.

3  Choose a template which is not complicated and will work for your business as well. I have to admit that this is indeed the easiest way for anybody to start a blog.

4  Get the main elements together on your blog.  A few pages must be created and then added to your menu in your back office. This includes about us page, home, contact us, privacy policy, income disclaimer if needed. The privacy policy can be created for free online.

These pages important and it will tell your audience more about your business and what type of services you are offering. Not only is it fun to create your blog, but it is all about your personality as well.

WordPress.com is not a difficult site to work with and in time you will do it with eyes close.

5  Add content that is relevant to your site.

Adding content is the best way to add more value for your subscribers. The most important thing is to give them more than what they are asking for. We are not all writers but if you don't have the time to add content it can always be outsourced.

6  Spend time on a regular basis to update your content.  There is nothing worse than going to a site and the author just seemed to have abandoned his site. It isn't always true that the biggest sites are the most popular. The one thing that they do that we can really learn from them is that they make sure that they are consistent.

7  Learn more about SEO methods.  Unfortunately, we were not born with all the knowledge in the world. Spending time on doing research that can help your site is a definite investment and one that you can always use to improve your site.

It is only the beginning that is the hardest, but learning how to optimize your site will not only bring your site more traffic, more sign ups but most definitely build your community or your list.

8  Focus on what you do know and not what you don't know.  There will be technical things that you don't understand at first, but this is not a problem. This will only be an indication of how many things you will still need to learn.

The internet is filled with free source offering information on any topic or subject that you might acquire or need. Spend your time wisely and focus on what you still need to learn before things will change around for you.

Finally, no matter what you do never give up!  Build a blog or website can be overwhelming at first and the wonderful thing about the mind is that we remember by practice on a regular basis. These are simple things to remember, but very important if your blog is going to be successful.

I had to redo my template in the beginning and this took me three months. Now I do understand that if I had this knowledge in the beginning, it would have changed my world around.

Learning one thing every single day will improve your life and your blog. In the beginning you might not see results and it is only temporary. The main thing to remember is to do what 90% of marketers will never do and that is sticking it out until you are happy with the end results.

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Attract Search Engines To Your WordPress Blog

WordPress and SEO go hand in hand because the search engines favor the WordPress blogging platform to a high extent. If you have a WordPress blog, then you probably will receive a higher ranking than other websites. Reasonably, your chances will be improved if you get some things right initially. You can choose any topic out there and there will be loads of WordPress blogs covering that topic. But, for many different causes, they do not all have excellent search engine rankings. You have to learn how to optimize your WordPress blog for the search engines. Ensure that you place specific things in motion so that you will be ranked highly for your keyword.

Paid themes are a safer way to go and do not use advertisements. If you can meet the expense, you should initially select a high class theme that is not shared and this will allow you less hassles.

Have Trackbacks in Your Comments:

One of the main things that helps your WordPress blog get excellent ranking is the trackbacks. This makes it simple to have links made in the comments section to anyone who is linking to your content. When you allow trackbacks on your WordPress blog, this gives other people an avenue for linking to your articles and making a backlink for you. If you do your homework, you will learn that most of well populated WordPress blogs have trackbacks turned on. This is a method for allowing others to link to your article if they found it fascinating.

Sprinkle Keywords in Your Content:

Even if you run your site on the WordPress platform that doesn't mean that you can waive off the basic principles of SEO. You should always maintain a decent keyword density in your articles so that you're not completely ignoring this aspect. Don't stuff too many keywords into your content but weave them in at targeted locations that seem vital; beef up your synonym use to keep from repeating your keywords too many times within your article.

WordPress blogs do seem to have a distinct advantage when it comes to optimizing for search engines. It's the small stuff that will make or break you no matter how huge or small your blog may be at the second. Why aren't you getting started yet? Now your blog can be a huge player in a really huge pond. These three things can help make that happen.

Corey Preiss has been involved in SEO for 6 years. Go to Mandatory Blog SEO for more articles.

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True or False: Video Killed Text Content

We all know what happened when video came along and killed the radio star, but did it do the same for written content across the Web? This is concerning news for any SEO company that offers content marketing services. This is a debate that can go on for many years, but the truth of the matter is this - video has caused a big splash on the Web. You'll find marketers, brands and even the end users using video content on YouTube, Vine, Facebook and Twitch.

It has even made it as part of the SEO services packages that SEO companies offer to their customers. The uptick in video publishing is likely due to the major impact it has on prospective audiences. Video has shown to be an excellent way to interact with various types of audiences.

According to numbers, video content is highly shared and engaged with by users. Consumers are said to be 39 percent more likely to share video content. 36 percent more likely to comment on a video and 56 percent more likely to like a video.

But does this mean that it's a done deal for text? One thing we know for sure is that text is still alive and well - it's just a different type of format that is best used for different reasons. The best case scenario would be to implement both into your Internet marketing strategy.

What Data Shows

The numbers are staggering for video content - the average Internet user watches about 206 hours of video content each month and according to Nielson, 64 percent of marketers are planning to use more video in the near future. Sure, video content beats text when it comes to engagement, but there are situations where users would prefer to read text. An SEO company can help you determine the services that will work for your company and when to use video content and when it's best to use text.

Videos Are Lazier

The one reason why video content is doing so well is because it doesn't require much cognitive work. The brain is shown to process videos 60,000 times quicker than text. People today are more inclined to choose to do tasks that are less work. Reading articles and watching video involves two different brain processes. When you read an article, your mind is actively involved and requires a longer attention span. Again, video content can be used in certain scenarios that suit the topic and the user.

Video sounds truly amazing - it's no wonder SEO company experts swear by them. But it's also important to note that not all Website visitors will prefer to watch a video. Your Web design can implement video, but make sure that it does so in a strategic way.

http://www.ithinkanidea.com/ is a leading, full service internet marketing agency. I Think an Idea works with serious business owners small to large alike. Based out of Los Angeles, CA providing great results for services such as SEO, social media marketing, Online reputation management and PPC management. I Think an Idea can maximize your search engine presence and amplify your brand across social media channels, and help safeguard your reputation.

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10 Tips For Creating Great Content For Your Website

Trying to create great content on your website on a regular basis can sometimes seem like a chore that never gets done. Once you publish some content, you already need to publish some more. Having a solid content marketing plan is going to produce serious value for your business. Here are 10 ways to create engaging content that will keep your audience interested in what you have to say.

1. Understand Your Audience

Everything you do needs to focus on your audience. Writing interesting content means knowing who they are, what they want, what they need, and why they need it. Each time you generate content you need to know exactly who it is focused on so that you can word everything in a way that speaks out loud to them.

2. Create Engaging Headings

Once you know the topics you need to produce content for each week, you can create titles to work with. Having the titles gives you the keywords and subject material that the content should be about.

3. Plan Ahead

Create a plan of interesting content ideas. You can base it on the time of year, holiday seasons, celebrations, and your products and services. Knowing in advance what types of content you need to produce will actually help your creativity.

4. Mix Things up

Content can be any number of styles. It can be read, watched and listened. By creating many different types of content you will keep the creativity flowing. Some types of content are best suited for a blog post. Others are best suited as a podcast or video.

5. Ask Questions

When you're not sure about what to do, ask a question and then answer it. Typically you can use questions that your audience is asking on social media and in online forums to structure your content to be something they want to know.

6. Make Lists

When you generate content, from blog posts to videos, lists work well. Each point in the list gives your audience a chance to absorb the information, and then the next point moves them forward to take in more.

7. Stick To Your Topic

If your content doesn't connect to the title or starts going off course, pull it back to make sure that every word of the content relates to the title. People expect the information they're reading or watching to relate to the title.

8. Include Relevant Images

When you use an image that relates to the content it will mean a lot more than any words you can write about a topic. Images can evoke feelings as well as help explain more than words can.

9. Keep It Simple

Explain jargon to your audience and define terms to them, so that there is no confusion about what something means and no mistake about what you want them to do to follow through.

10. Edit Carefully

Nothing can ruin an engaging piece of content more than lack of editing. One misspelling or misused word can ruin your credibility and reduce the trust the reader has in you as an expert.

Writing for an online audience is very different from writing for an offline audience. Throw out your traditional old-school writing rules and discover the easier and faster way to connect with your audience. Download this free report on how to write content for an online audience: http://jonallo.com/content

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10 Ways You Can Create Good Website Content

The content on your website should inform, educate and engage your prospects while developing your authority with your audience. Also, when you post new online content it attracts the search engine crawlers. The more pages of a website those crawlers index the more traffic they can bring to your website.

Here are 10 ways you can create good website content.

1. Identify Your 'Why'  -   Each piece of content you post on your website must have a reason for being there. If you don't know what the point is, it'll be hard to get anyone to take action.

2. Understand Your Audience  -  When you produce any content it's crucial that you know who you're creating it for. Try developing an audience avatar and write the content for that one person rather than creating it for a unidentified person that you don't know. This can help you develop very personalized content that gets results.

3. Stay Updated  -  You may think that you know your niche but things change over time as technology improves and styles change. Keep up to date in your industry so that you're ready for changes that may occur.

4. Keep An Eye On Your Competition  -
Join your competitor's mailing lists, and look at the content they're sending out. Can you identify if it's working well for them or not? How can you do it better?

5. Know the Buying Process  -  There's a set buying process that your audience will go through, even if they don't realize it. It's important to recognize where people are in the buying process. Generally it's a five stage process:

i   Awareness
ii   Information Search
iii   Evaluation
iv   Decision
v    Purchase Plus, after purchase your customer will decide if they will buy from you again.

6. Improve Your Strategy  -  Take the time to work on improving your strategy to make it work better. Base this on the information and facts you have about your customers, your niche, your products and your customer's buying process.

7. Be Consistent  -  To ensure that the content on your website will get results, it's important to post content on a consistent basis.

8. Promote Your Content  -  If you don't let people know that your content is out there, you'll get a lot less positive results from it. Post it to your social media sites and email it out to your subscriber list. You can even promote it via pay-per-click ads.

9. Create Engaging Content  -  No one wants to consume boring content. Ensure that the content matches the needs of your audience, speaks to them on their terms and provides value in and of itself to your audience.

10. Mix It Up  -  The more variety that you provide to your audience, the more engagement you will get. Don't limit your website content to just text. Content can be read, watched and listened to. It can be an article, a blog post, a report, an eBook, an online course, an audio file or a video.

Writing for an online audience is very different from writing for an offline audience. Throw out your traditional old-school writing rules and discover the easier and faster way to connect with your audience. Download this free report on how to write content for an online audience: http://jonallo.com/content

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SEO Tips to Get Your Website to the Top of Search Engines

When it comes to the success of digital marketing and finding new customers via the web, keyword optimization is one of the most important tools you can bet on. Keyword optimization or keyword research is the act of researching, analysing and selecting the best word or concept of great significance to your product, services or campaign in order to target and drive traffic from search engines such as Google to your website and other digital platforms.

Getting your website or blog on the first page of search engines can be a daunting task if you do not understand the fundamentals of optimization. Although this tutorial is not guaranteeing you the first place in major search engines, it does point out what one needs to do to be in the Search Engine Optimization game.

It is much easier than you think and this article is to guide, help and provide you with the basic and key for successful search engine optimization:

Step 1. Choose the right keywords

It is tough to be the best at everything and that includes Keyword Optimization. The first step of reaching the top of search results is identifying the right keywords. It can either be a single or multiple words or entire phrases. As you might already be aware of, most searches on the internet are made in the form of a question. Therefore, before you start writing down the keywords, you need to decide which keywords you want to focus on. These are the words people would type into the search engines in order to find your page, blog, website or product.

It is very essential that the word you choose as the keyword is broad enough for lot of people to search for on the internet, but narrow enough that you have a decent chance of getting a high search rank for it on the search engines and results.

For example, the word "shoe" is way too general. However, "Where can I find cheap shoes online" is a pretty good one. Similarly, the word "Europe" is way too general and Wiki sites will normally dominate these top spots. So, "the best holiday destination in Europe" is a much better phrase to focus on.

Here are my top tips for choosing the right Keywords:

1. Start with customers

Think about who your target audience or customers are. What are they likely to type into the search bar when they are looking for answers where your services can help them? Why not ask existing customers what they would search for?

2. Weigh up the competition

Although it is important for you to choose words that many of your target audience might be typing into search engines, they should not be words that bigger companies with the most muscles and bigger budget will compete for.

3. Use Google tools

Guess not only. Google has several good tools which can aid you find what is popular to search.

On Google Trends, a public web facility based on Google Search engine, shows how often a particular search-term is entered relative to the total search-volume across various regions of the world, and in various languages including a list of popular searches. You can also enter keywords and see how popular they are, compared with other phrases and ideas on similar terms - in order to choose the one that most are looking for.

You can also find keywords using Google's ad tool AdWords. You do not necessary have to advertise, you can just create an account and select using the "Keyword Planner" under the "Tools" menu.

Step 2. Customise Your Content

Once you have successfully chosen your keywords, there are a few other things you need to do in order get your site ranked high on search engines. One of such things is content creation. You have to create and distribute relevant and valuable content (such as speech, writing, photograph or any of the various arts) that attracts and engages your well-defined target audience. Content marketing helps us to attract new customers and build loyalty with existing customers.

For existing customers, this could also mean they take part of the relevant content that creates additional sales by learning more about your offer, and is more expensive products/ services than they have done previously. The following are few tips to consider during content creation:

1. Working actively with texts

Use keywords in the title and preamble of all the pages. Also, include the keywords in the body, the much higher up it is in the text, the better it is for your ranking.

However, be careful not to use your keywords too much. Google may interpret your site as a nonsense page which is only trying to attract traffic and you go down in search results. A rule of thumb is that your content should feel natural and interesting. Which of course is also important for your visitors.

2. Do not forget your photos!

Rename even your photos with your relevant keywords. This will make it possible for search engines index them and you can get hit even in image search. If you have the opportunity to enter an alternative text for each image, do not let go of such an opportunity.

Step 3. Get visits and links from others

The most important thing for search engines is to deliver good and relevant results, remember that's their primary business. Therefore, priority is given to websites that Search engines deems others rate high or think is good. An example is sites with links and many visitors who stay long to engage with the site. Therefore, this is really important to:

1. Make sure to get a lot of visits to the page

Ask family and friends to visit your website. Get the link or URL out there as often as possible, for example, you make a video, put it up on YouTube and the links there - but incorporate all the content on your site and link to it there.

2. Ask others to link to your site

Ask friends, business partners or customers to link to you, perhaps in exchange for a link back or share interesting tips in your field and let others get put up pieces of contents with a link to you.

3. Share your site on social media

Sharing your website and contents on social media (not forgetting Google+ Google for obvious reasons) is extremely important. It can provide visits to the website, more traffic, attention and higher rankings

4. Get visitors to share

Get others to share your site and contents on social media, using "share" buttons. AddThis is a one of the free tools allows you to instantly share or bookmark pages with one easy-to-use tool. AddThis can also get statistics on how much your content is shared.

Step 4. Revise the technical

Even how your site is built technically is important for your rankings. Here are some things you can do:

1. Use Google Webmaster Tools (Now Google Search Console)

The Google Search Console (aka Google webmaster) is an amazing tool which offers many tools that will aid you to thoroughly analyse your site. From this analysis, you can work on problem areas to make your site rank better on Search engines especially Google

2. Make Your Site Mobile Friendly,

With a good percentage of the world's population owning mobile devices these days, it makes sense to make sure that your site is mobile friendly. Mobile users also expects good mobile experience when they visit site.

If your site is not mobile friendly, it may rank lower in searches from mobile phones. Google recently Google released a significant new mobile-friendly ranking algorithm that's designed to give a boost to mobile-friendly pages in Google's mobile search results, therefore you can't go wrong with this offer.

3. Make sure the page is fast

A site that takes a long time to load will rank lower on search engines. Google has indicated in the past that site and page speeds is one of the signals used by its algorithm to rank pages.

Page speed is also important to user experience, the slower your site/page speed the more likely you will have high bounce rate and lower average time on your site. Some of the great tools which can help you with your site speed is Google Pagespeed Insights and GTmetrix. This are tools that empowers you to make decisions that increase the performance of your website.

Step 5. Use Web Analytics Tools

Use analytics to measure the outcome of your efforts or to determine which areas of your site are doing well. Google Analytics offers free and enterprise analytics tools to measure website, app, digital and offline data to gain customer insights.

Example: Google Analytics enables you to track the visitors to your store, and generates reports that will help you with your marketing.

Under the "acquisition" in Google Analytics select "all traffic" -> "Channels" -> "organic search" so you can under the "keyword" to see which keywords drive the most traffic and the "source" which search engine. Using Google webmaster tools, you have access to them in Google Analytics under "acquisitions" -> "search engine optimization".

Step 6. Use Google AdWords

Business regardless of size, wants to be found on the first page of Google. Getting seen by customers at the exact time they are looking for your information, products, services, deals or location is intent marketing (marketing based on someone intending to find your products), and it's profitable.

Many businesses use Google AdWords to archive these by creating highly effective advertising campaigns to market their products and services, drive traffic to their website, and ultimately, increase sales.

I hope this article has given you an in-depth view of keyword optimization and you find one or more of the above tips useful.

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5 Incredibly Effective Digital Marketing Strategies That Most Marketers Are Too Afraid To Try

What are you doing to embrace and tackle marketing industry changes? Are you afraid to try new things? Or are you fearless?

One of the reasons I am so passionate about the marketing industry is the anticipation of changes, and ability to experiment with new marketing tactics and efforts.

Taking chances is often what separates top marketing professionals from novices. But how can you separate fads from educated risks? Take a look at the top strategies I’ve identified that most marketers might deem risky, may not be aware of, or not fully understand.

These are risks, yes, but they are risks that are worth taking.

1. Switch from outbound to content marketing -  In the past, it was enough to highlight your product or service and the hundreds of fantastic features and capabilities. These days, you have to add value to your brand and product/service with content that teaches and establishes you as a thought leader and an expert. Why should your customers believe in what you’re selling?

It might scare you to switch to an inbound format that teaches and nurtures your prospects. How will they know what you offer, you ask? How will we sell and generate leads without pushing our product? Content marketing can be scary to adopt because it relies on your expertise and puts the ball in your prospects court.

In contrast, content marketing is shown to drive more traffic and leads than outbound marketing. According to Demandmetric content marketing generates as many as three times more leads than outbound marketing.

2. Interactive content -  As content marketing rises in popularity, pushing through the clutter is becoming more and more difficult for all of us. But even though we know we must differentiate ourselves from the pack, we can be hesitant to make our basic content more interactive and exciting.

Interactive content can draw more attention to your messaging while increasing your engagement on powerful social media sites. Quizzes, ROI calculators and interactive infographics can help you convey your brand’s story in a more dynamic fashion.

As a bonus, eye-catching, interactive, fun content can draw the attention or industry publications in addition to attracting prospects. As a result, you can extend your reach and continue driving traffic and high quality links to your site and blog.

3. Embrace up-and-coming social media channels -  While there remains a place for LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter, new social media channels will allow you to reach consumers in new and exciting ways. Additionally, new channels allow you to explore more creative methods of telling your stories and conveying who you are.

Snapchat, Instant Articles on Facebook, and Instagram Stories provide companies and even professionals a channel to experiment and target specific groups and audiences. As a bonus, new and exciting social media channels are often a great place to promote the interactive content discussed above.

4. Developing content for real people, not algorithms  -  As a marketer, you may have gotten in the habit of developing and creating content that will highlight your company, blog, business or ideas at the top of the search engines.

These days you’ve got to step out of your box and think about your content in the context of your reader’s desires, fears, worries and needs.

Creating content that is displayed in front of thousands of sets of eyes is no longer enough to set you apart. Instead, readers expect real ideas that are well written and display complex and interesting ideas and thoughts.

While SEO is still very important, don’t be afraid to put your audience and their needs and wants first and consider your page rank secondarily.

Instead of using keywords to draw more traffic from search engines and their algorithms, use keywords to highlight your points and draw readers in by providing information that is valuable to your audience.

5. Reuse and repurpose your top content  -  Even your loyal readers may not see your content initially. It could take several touches and multiple channels to get through to them. Try reposting your top blog posts with refreshed titles or new visuals.

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