Video: Hootsuite Scheduling Clarification

Hootsuite is my favorite online Twitter application because it allows me to group friends & searches into columns, has a built-in URL shortener, and allows tracking of stats for the links you shorten with their service.

They also allow for scheduled tweets, but the interface is a bit awkward at first. Once you know what’s going on, scheduled tweets are a Hoot! (ok, bad joke)

Take a peek at this video, it’s less than 2 minutes long, and easy to follow. (if not tell me, and I’ll redo it after I cry!)

Video: Social Media Addicts Association Meeting (SMAA)

This is a riot!  This video really shows my true nature… being an iPhone addict that Tweets and Facebooks all day long, I may have to consider attending one of these… or at least tweet about it!

Calling All Industry Experts!

Are you an expert (or nearly so) in your industry?

I’m looking to leverage my marketing expertise with the expertise of those in a variety of industries to put together highly profitable membership sites that are valuable to the community at large.

What kinds of industries do I need?

Just about any, so long as you have information that is valuable enough that people will want to pay for it.  Examples include Programmers, Stock Traders, Insurance Agents, Realtors, Fortune Tellers, Fitness Trainers, Dietitians – and these are just a few of thousands of examples.  Any industry that can be leveraged to sell things to the public on a continual basis.  Don’t let this part throw you off, contact me, and let’s brainstorm.  90% of industries can be leveraged to make money on a continual basis.

Are there industries that you already have ideas for?

I do.  I’m actively looking for WordPress experts, Programming Experts (especially AJAX), and Financial Indicator Programmers (TradeStation, NinjaTrader, etc).  I have programs that I could have up and running in a weeks time for these programs.

What kind of money will we make?

Great question, and it all depends on how successfully we can work together.  The idea is that all profits will be equitably split 50/50 between the 2 of us, minus expenses like marketing, PPC and other advertising.  The idea is the have a subscriber base of over 300 members in a years time.  To put that into perspective, if we were to charge out $30/month that’s $9,000 or $4,500 each – per month! Some industries and concepts will allow for a higher priced monthly charge, say $100/month.  With 300 members, that’s $30,000 total, or $15,000 each – per month!

What kind of commitment is there?

Every site and concept will be a little bit different, but I would figure at least 20 hours per month, and maybe up to 40 hours per month.  So there is a commitment, but with the possibility of a large payout in the end.  Your commitment will consist of writing.  If writing scares you, then this won’t be the right opportunity for you, unless you can convince a friend to do your writing with your oversight.  Some programs might require daily intervention, others will only require weekly or monthly attention.  We can discuss specifics and put a quick plan together to see if it’s still something you want to pursue.

So what is my role in this whole thing?

My role is to handle all technical and marketing aspects of this joint venture.  This includes setting up the membership site, getting the site laid out professionally, hosting, graphics work, get video&audio feeds put together, and to market the site to assure that we gain the necessary exposure, including banner ads, print ads, PPC, social media, SEO, and other Internet marketing techniques.

Do you have an example membership site?

Our latest membership site is the Moxie Mafia Social Media Training System.  As you can see, it is very professional, informative, and inviting.  This is a great example of the kinds of sites that we’re aiming to have put together.

I’m interested, what do I need to do?

I’m glad you’re interested.  All you need to do is call me (Matt Kettlewell) on my cell phone at 970-261-2684 , or call the office at 970-985-4192 or use our contact form and I’ll call you back to discuss our opportunity.

Good Content Has Natural Keyword Saturation

For the last 10 years or so, I’ve really not payed close attention to keyword saturation numbers because of it’s abuse so early on in the history of the Internet

You remember those days don’t you? You were searching for the Whitehouse homepage, and would land on a major porn site? Ahh the good ol days of when Internet technology was new.

I’ve recently been writing articles for Ezine Articles’ “Hundred Articles in 100 Days” contest, and am really getting into it. I get to stretch my mind, hone my cognitive abilities, and retrain some of my creative processes.

There’s also huge value to a website’s traffic through article marketing as well, and is considered by some to be the single most effective form of online marketing.

After I recently submitted an article,  a pop-up dialogue box told me that I used the same phrase too many times, and that I needed to write a better article. In this particular article, I wasn’t targeting a keyword.  Nope.  Just a good article about search engines, so the term “search engine” was used where needed.

Keyword stuffing is another term used for this, if it’s used in a bad way.  I thoroughly preach to all businesses to never, ever keyword stuff.  There’s no reason to, and search engines are known for degrading your rankings if they think you’re keyword stuffing.

I’ve been teaching myself over the years to use nouns instead of pronouns. To use more descriptive language that is easier for readers to comprehend, and make use of. I don’t always do it, but I try to write this way a majority of the time, partly because it does add some SEO value, but it also increases the readability of most of my articles.

So is it a problem that my articles had the term “search engine” in it too many times?  From Ezine Articles’ perception, yes.

Do I agree with Ezine Articles’ decision to block my article?  yes.  Why?

Because they have too many people that abuse their system with articles only for SEO purposes.  They are looking for quality content to add to their site.  This means that they have to set certain guidelines to filter out potential trash.  I respect this decision to filter.  It’s a protection mechanism that covers 90% of the bad articles from getting listed.

I want my articles to be side by side with good articles, so if my article gets flagged as being keyword stuffed, then it gives me a chance to reflect, improve my own writing, and make corrections.

But is it really a problem to have the term “search engine” in my article, if say I posted it on my own blog? Not at all, so long as it’s sole purpose is to convey your message to your readers.

What I’ve found is that by writing an article that is easy to read and understand, especially technical articles, that I need to use nouns a lot more often, and be slightly more descriptive, which will naturally lend certain terms to be used more often.   This leads to what I refer to as “Natural Keyword Saturation”, and I think is a good thing.

But if you’re after some contrived “keyword saturation” number, then you’re writing your articles and content for the wrong reason.  The primary reason that you need to be writing articles and pages is for your readers and visitors.  They are the ones that will get the satisfaction of the words that you write, and will return day after day to listen to your wisdom.

So take the time to write some good articles, put them on your blog, and don’t worry about keyword saturation.  Just let the keywords saturate themselves “naturally”.

Popular Social Media Sites Under Attack

As many of you might (or might not) be aware, but Twitters down… and without the great big “Fail Whale” that you normally get when Twitter is having problems.

This time, the issue is a little bit more serious… according to Twitters original status updates, all they could say was : “Site is Down”.  They later went on to update us that they were in the midst of a DOS attack.

FaceBook experienced delays, a short outage, and links not working.  There are reports that FaceBook is looking into this problem, which in itself probably means that they know something’s going on, but they aren’t addressing it publicly yet.  Time will tell.

LiveJournal reportedly also had some (more…)

Is Yahoo Microsoft Search Engine Deal Really a ‘Good Deal’?

Well it’s official.  Microsoft and Yahoo have finally agreed to merge their search engine technologies.  But is this a good thing, or a bad thing to combine search engine companies together?

I’ve been reading about the merger, and it seems that there are both good and bad things about the Microsoft and Yahoo merger.

Randfish of SEOmoz gave a nice summary of the top 10 things that might change with the Microsoft and Yahoo Search Engine merger, and gave some nice insight into things that could change.

I hadn’t even considered that Yahoo Site Explorer could go away, which right now is the best source of back link information, through the linkdomain search query operator.

There are some, as noted in this SearchEngineWatch article on the merger reaction, that seem to think this will be a good thing for advertisers and marketers.

I personally think that is a wee bit too early to decide for sure what this means, but I do think that with only 2 major players at the table, there will be more and more reason to SEO a site for both of them, instead of just relying on optimizing for Google.

What does this mean for SEO cost?  it might cost more to get organic results if you push to have both search engines return your site in top search engine rankings, but I think that overall PPC costs will go down on a “per click” basis, but having to manage two separate accounts, instead of just an AdWords PPC campaign will cost more to manage.

Less is more… or so I read in a Unix book at one time.

I do think that with only two big search engines, instead of one big one, and two little ones, that we might see some neck-to-neck competition.

Just like the good ole beginning days of AMD and Intel, duking it out to to see who would be the first to 1Ghz… or who could pipeline more data simultaneously.

Personally, I think that it will be a humbling experience for Google, and they will be forced to do a little bit more, and raise the benchmarks for superiority a little bit higher.  But I’m sure that Yahoo and Microsoft are well aware of this, and will be ready to charge forward with their own ideas of what it will take to dominate the search engine marketing space.

I don’t know about you, but I’m really excited to see what the future of search engines has in store for us in the near future.

Power Posting and Actionable Blogging

The idea behind most businesses is to grow big and build a reputation so that you can put food on the table and take the kids to Disney Land.

The problem that most businesses have is the growing big part… and the building a reputation part.

There are two primary parts to reputation: Quality and Quantity.

Quality addresses what you say and how you say it.  Do you finesse your words, or do you prefer to say it like it is?  No matter how you say it, you’re setting up the quality of your message.

Quantity addresses where you say it, and who says it for you.  Do you write only on your blog, or do you write articles in magazines, and trade journals?  Do you write once a month, or once a day?

So if you can find a way to have a positive reputation with high quality and sufficient quantity, you’ll be building on your company’s reputation in no time.

Does a good reputation guarantee growth?  No.  But you have a better chance of growing if you do.

So if building a reputation is a matter of quality and quantity, is there a way to combine them? (more…)

What Is Your Business Missing?

Normally I write up really great articles about lilttle tips and tricks on how you can improve the marketing for your business, or little things that you can do to your website to make it stand out from the crowd.

But today my dear friends, I’m not going to tell you much.  Nope.

I want to ask you some questions.

I really want to know ‘what is holding you back in your online marketing successes?’

What are your top Internet marketing issues that your business is facing?

Why am I interested?

Partly to make sure that I’m writing the types of content that you want to hear about.

But also I’m curious if there is a common ground of mis-conception about how Internet marketing or SEO works.

So let’s help each other out - leave a comment below on your top Internet marketing issues that your business is facing.

It can be questions like:

• that you don’t understand social media
• how twitter works for a business
• why you would change a page title
• how to find the resources to make it happen
• where to start – there’s so much
• Should you use PPC?
• Not getting returns on paid advertising
• Not enough resources to pave the way
• too expensive

These are just some suggestions of things I’ve heard in the past.  I’d really like to know what your personal issues with online marketing are, so go ahead and leave a comment below -

Flying Blind with SEO

What is the one thing that sets a Professional SEO Expert apart from someone that is blindly following whatever the newest article tells them to do for their search engine optimization?

The SEO Plan

Set & Almost Forget SEO Basics

1. What makes a word a keyword?
   Your website will be made up of many words, but a keyword is special, it is what your website is about. Take this one step further an define a keyword phrase as a group of words that define what your website is about.
   • Focus on 1 – 5 keyword phrases for your entire website.
   • Focus on 1 – 3 keywords phrases for your each individual page.
   • Keyword phrases need to be in heading, titles, hidden tags, etc.
   • Focus on keywords sounding natural in the text…don’t overuse.

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The Pacific Path to Being Specific

So let’s get pacific!

Writing the sales copy for your web page can be a daunting thing, but when you are a pacific away from your specific intentions, it is your readers that will not be able to make the leap.

When you are specific about what you have and what you want your readers to do, big things can happen.

• The search engines will find you when someone searching is as specific as you.
• Your readers will not have any questions about what you have and what they need to do to get it.
• Painting a very specific picture in a readers mind, usually makes them think of a friend that needs to see your message.
• There is no need to stuff keywords into your copy, keywords will naturally be there.

There seems to be an embarrassment to sell anything. I’m not sure when or where that happened, but selling is nothing more than a barter. In order to barter, you first need to explain all the benefits that your item can offer. Next, you need to inform the audience exactly what you are willing to receive, in return for all those benefits. In today’s society the barter is usually put in terms of currency.

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The Magic of Being on Page One

Question:What does lingerie have to do with an iPod?

Answer:The big guys in the industry are using pay per click (PPC) to show up on page one of Google.

When you do a search for lingerie, you would expect to see Victoria Secret on page one, however the only place on page one Victoria Secret exists is the paid advertising.

When you search for an iPod you expect to see Apple at that top, and you do, but Best Buy and Circuit City don’t show up on the first page naturally. Both companies choose to show up as advertisers, as does Bose for their iPod doc.

Is this a bad thing?

Absolutely not! In the search of being on page one there are certain keywords and terms that you should optimize your web site for. There are other keywords and phrases that are part of your business, but you might not want to optimize your site for them. These keywords and phrases might not be your core business, only a part of it.

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Experimenting Through the Fear of Being Wrong

One of the biggest challenges for a business professional both online and off, is the fear of being wrong. What if you have the wrong market? What if you are advertising on the wrong web site? Could you be wrong about buying a big billboard and only putting a web address on it?

Wrong…wrong…wrong….

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A Niche of a Different Long Tail

You may not be familiar with the term “long tail keyword”, but it is a simple concept really. If you are one to watch the statistics on your web site (if you’re not, you should), then you would know that sometimes people will find your web site using the most unusual phraseology.

Unusual phrases, the ones that are very targeted and specific, are referred to as the long tail. In short, it is the sweet spot of searchers that know exactly what they want. However, the downside is there are a lot fewer searchers that ride out there on the long tail.

Many Internet marketers make a great income focusing their marketing efforts using long tail strategies. The magic that makes it work is a searcher that knows exactly what they want and a web site that provides it.

Using a long tail keyword strategy is really no different than thinking in terms of niches, and as you may know, “there are riches in niches!”

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Target Your Online Customer to Target Your Dollar

Marketing 101 – You can have the best product or service, but if you can’t get the right message to the right people your most likely outcome is failure.

There are many great products that are no longer available or sitting in a warehouse somewhere.  Why? The simple answer is the company that sold those products did not make the right marketing push to the right people, at the right time.  Sometimes it is simply a matter of giving up too soon and even though all the rest was right, the repetition wasn’t there.

Internet marketing is no different. First it takes time to find out where the target customer hangs out.

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Surviving the Market

Did anyone watch Survivor this last season?  The newest Survivor millionaire is 57 year old high school physics teacher, Bob Crowley.  During the special announcing, the winner, Bob was asked how he had acquired a piece of string that he used to make a fake immunity idol, and where he had acquired the beads to make it look so realistic.  Bob chuckled and said that the string was the tie on one of the challenges that were issued, he just popped it in his pocket, and the beads came from the tribe flag.

I saw this two minute segment of Survivor this past Sunday when I was walking back to my office, this is the only two minutes of this season that I have seen.  What struck me was the relevance of what he did to win that one million dollars and what it takes to win one million loyal customers.

Wow what a leap!  No, not really.  He won because every time he saw something he took note of it, or if possible he put it in his pocket.  For those marketing any type of product or service, squirreling away information is by far the most important task of any marketing effort.

I am reminded of how Joe Girard would collect information about each and every prospect that he spoke with and he would add to that information after each additional contact.  He referred to this as his intelligence system.  Every business needs an intelligence system.

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