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Successfully Marketing Your Blog with Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Techniques

November 10, 2008
This is part 4 of a 4 part series on Marketing your Blog.

The final method you can use for marketing your blog is through the use of search engine optimization, or SEO, techniques. Search engine optimization involves taking steps to make your blog more attractive to the search engines so the search engines will provide your blog with a higher ranking on the organic search engines results page. Obviously, the higher your blog is ranked on the results page, the more likely it is that people will visit your site. And, since these search engine results are completely free, you don’t have to worry about paying every time someone clicks on your link.


Getting your blog to rank naturally high on the search engine results is possibly the best way to market your blog. Not only does it cost nothing, but many people don’t bother to look at the sponsored links that are brought up from a PPC campaign. In addition, simply having your site ranked high on the list automatically makes your blog appear to be more relevant and reputable in the eyes of those who are searching for a particular keyword phrase.


There are numerous ways you can get your blog to rank higher in the search engine results pages. One method is to incorporate certain keyword phrases into your blog posts. In order to give yourself the best chance for success, visit a site such as Google Adwords and look at the popularity of various phrases that are related to your site. Ideally, you should target those phrases that are searched often but that do not yet have a great deal of competition on the Internet.


Creating links within your blog also helps increase your search engine standing. By linking various relevant posts to one another, the search engines are better able to crawl throughout your blog and analyze what it has to offer. It is also beneficial to build up your incoming links, which are links coming to your blog from other blogs and websites.


There are several methods you can use to increase your incoming links. If you engage in social networking, you can build your incoming links by leaving a link to your website at forums, blogs and other social networking websites. You can also increase your incoming links by guest blogging on other blogs and by submitting articles to article directories. If your article is good enough, it may go viral. This will help increase your incoming links while also improving your overall reputation within your target market.


The way your blog is set up can also have an impact on your search engine ranking. If your blog is full of broken links, for example, the search engine spiders will not be able to comb through your blog properly. As a result, the spiders may think your blog has less to offer than it really does. Therefore, if you are not comfortable with the technical aspect of maintaining a blog, it may be worthwhile for you to hire an expert to help you with the initial set-up. That way, your blog will be attractive and easy to navigate for search engines and for your readers.

Posted in Advertising, SEO, Traffic | 11 Comments »

Successfully Marketing Your Blog with Social Networking

November 7, 2008
This is part 3 of a 4 part series on Marketing your Blog.

If you don’t have a great deal of money to dedicate toward marketing your blog but you do have plenty of time, social networking is a great way to boost your traffic while also building a community with your blog. In fact, one of the great things about social networking is that it can really help you build a solid reputation within the community of your target audience while also helping you build-up the popularity of your website.


There are many ways you can go about conducting social networking, but the basic premise behind this marketing method is to get out there and interact with others so they will want to come check out your blog. One common method of social networking is visiting blogs that seem to be targeting the same audience as you. Take some time to get to know the blog and its community, then start making your own comments and participating in the discussions. Each time you leave a comment, you can also leave a link to your blog. If the members of that blog community like what you have to say, they will likely click on your name in order to learn more about you.


You can use the same type of technique with forums. With forums, you may be able to set up your account so your forum log-in name is linked to your blog. If not, you can include a link to your blog in your signature. That way, your link appears every time you leave a message on the forum and, once again, those whose interest you pique will click on the link and visit your blog.

Video websites such as YouTube also provide you with great opportunities for networking. If you create humorous videos, instructional videos or informational videos that become popular on the website, you can potentially bring a great deal of traffic to your blog. In fact, any time you create a video to post on your blog, you should also post it on sites such as YouTube in order to get even more use from your video and to increase your chances of reaching more readers.


Sites such as MySpace and Facebook also provide opportunities for social networking. By interacting with those communities on a regular basis, you can build relationships with other people that might be interested in reading your blog.


The key to successful social networking is to leave comments that are meaningful to the blog or forum you are visiting. Simply saying something such as “Great post!” is not going to be enough to draw in traffic. Rather, take the time to build relationships with the communities you find at these sites and you will soon find them coming to your blog to interact with you there as well.

Posted in Social Media, networking | 14 Comments »

Successfully Marketing Your Blog: An Overview

November 2, 2008
This is part 1 of a 4 part series on marketing your Blog.

So, you have decided to get serious about drawing traffic to your blog and hopefully making some money in the process. If so, you probably already know that marketing is the first major step toward building a successful income with your blog. At the same time, understanding how to successfully market your blog is a completely different animal. In fact, it can be downright frightening and even costly if you don’t know how to go about it the right way.


There are three major ways you can go about marketing your blog. These include:


  • Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Advertising

  • Social Networking

  • Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Techniques


Within each of these categories, there are numerous techniques and methods you can use to successfully draw more traffic to your blog. At the same time, it is important for you to complete some market research before you begin using any of these methods. Otherwise, you can waste a great deal of your time and money on marketing techniques that do not yield any real results.



Conducting market research involves getting to know your target audience in order to provide your audience with what it needs. In other words, you need to “get inside the heads” of those people you are hoping to reach with your blog. You can accomplish this by conducting surveys and polls on your blog as well as by visiting other blogs and forums that are frequented by your target group.


During the market research stage of marketing, you should not focus on participating in blog and forum discussions. Rather, spend some time as a “lurker” who simply reads the posts of the community members. This way, you can get a better idea of the personalities of your target group as well as the problems they are facing.


Getting to understand the needs of your target audience is the key to building a successful marketing campaign. After all, if your blog will only be successful it is able to fulfill a need. This need may be social in nature or it may provide information to the reader that helps the reader in his or her relationships, career, hobbies or other area. For example, if you are writing a blog about being a single father, it is important for you to understand the concerns and problems that single fathers face. That way, you can gear your blog posts toward addressing those needs.


Once you have successfully created a profile of your target audience, you will be able to better determine how to market your blog in a way that will bring targeted traffic to your site. In that way, you will be better capable of monetizing your blog or simply creating a meaningful community for your target audience if that is your goal.

Posted in Blogging, SEO, Social Media, Traffic, marketing | 16 Comments »

Using Forums for Business or Fun

May 30, 2008
Forums are  online meeting places. In fact this is one of the simplest and least expensive Internet marketing options available. Forums are focused on a particular niche subject and encourage those who share an interest in this particular subject to get together to discuss relevant issues, ask questions, provide advice and even just socialize. Forums can focus on just about any subject.
When you visit one, just look for the topic you are interested in.Using forums can also be worthwhile for your own site because you can take the opportunity to post a link to your website when it is relevant and offers something of value to the conversation. This is worthwhile because the Forums features a high concentration of your target audience members.

When using forums to promote your business, it is important to ensure you are following the rules associated with the message boards. Forums may have restrictions regarding the posting of links and failure to abide by these restrictions may result in you being banned from the forums. For this reason it is important for anyone who is interested in using forums for promotion of their business to carefully read the user agreement to ensure they are not violating any of the rules.

It is also important to simply use common sense when promoting your business on a forums. Just because the rules do not restrict posting links, does not mean you should spam the board with your link. Take care to only include your link when it is relevant. This will prevent forums users from assuming your link is just worthless spam.


Finally, when using forums to promote your business it is important to be courteous to other forums users and to keep all posts professional. This is important because you and your business are much more likely to be taken seriously if you act professionally and responsibly. You should maintain this degree of professionalism even in posts which do not include your business link. This is important because other forums participants will remember you by your user name and will not be likely to take you seriously if you have previously made posts which were offensive, mean spirited or inaccurate. If follow the rules and participate,you will start to build credibility and that will be beneficial to you and/or your business

Digital Point Forums: General forum for business related issues. Includes topics like e-commerce and customer related issues.

MySpace Forum: General, Racing, Imports, Domestics, European, General, Business, Money, Stocks, General

SitePoint Forums: Resources, Design, HTML, CSS, PHP, ASP, MySQL …

WordPress: If you need help getting started with WordPress or have a wordpress blog

Posted in Social Media | 2 Comments »