Business Blogging - How to Build A Better Blog

How to Drive More Qualified Traffic to Your Blog - TeleSeminar

** Business Building Mastery Expert Teleseminar Training Series **

TOPIC: How to Drive More Qualified Traffic to Your Blog With Denise Wakeman (interviewed by Travis Greenlee

WHEN: June 9th, 2009 - 10am Pacific | 1pm Eastern

In a hurry? Grab your FREE seat: http://budurl.com/BizMastery

Every blogger wants to know how to get more readers. And of course readers are the life blood of your business blog if you want to grow your business. Readers create your community and when they become
raving fans, they become your clients.

There are myriad ways to drive traffic to your blog. And, there are some simple tactics that can exponentially increase the right traffic to your blog. This program will give you 7 specific tactics to drive
more qualified readers to your blog.

You will learn:

1. How to create compelling headlines
2. The strategic way to use keywords in your blog posts
3. How to automate your social networking sites to get a flood of traffic
4. Two elements that absolutely must be on your blog
5. Two simple habits that will continually encourage traffic

As Travis Greenlee says, This is going to be one ROCKIN' call...

Grab your seat now --> http://budurl.com/BizMastery

Where do you find an audience for your blog?

A couple weeks ago over on Biz Tips Blog, I asked about your challenges around creating and managing your online visibility. In addition to the usual issues around staying motivated and finding time, a couple of readers wanted to know how to get in front of their ideal reader (aka prospect/client).

Here are a couple of ways you can do that. Take your pick or implement them all!

1. The first thing I usually suggest to clients is that they do research on blogs in their niche. You can be sure that if a blog already exists then there is probably an audience and they will be fairly targeted for you. I'm presupposing that you've done keyword research and are clear on your niche and who your ideal reader is. You can use a free keyword tool to create a list of your best keywords.

How To Mobilize Your Blog Audio Replay

Yesterday I interviewed Kim Dushinski, author of The Mobile Marketing Handbook. The info she shared was so good, I decided to give away the audio to everyone, even if you did not register for the call. I wanted to get this audio to you ASAP since the weekend is upon us.

How to Mobilize Your Blog (and why you need to!)

During the interview Kim shared several resources that will enable you to get your blog mobile-friendly in less than 10 minutes -- and they're free! She reviewed the pros and cons of each site.

After the call Kim contacted me and let know she forgot to tell you about the BONUS she has for anyone who invests in her Mobile Marketing Action Plan (a steal, if you ask me) by Monday, April 13.

Kim is including two detailed tutorials for WinkSite and MoFuse, sites that will help you optimize your blog for mobile devices. These tutorials are NOT usually included with the Mobile Marketing Action Plan.

Plus I included a link to the mobile business card platform we talked about.

This is good stuff and essential to pay attention to. Did you know that 4 billion people world-wide use mobile devices??? Think of the opportunity!

OK, listen to the audio and TAKE ACTION. At the very least, get your blog mobile-friendly. It's free and
easy.

http://www.biztipsblog.com/how-to-mobilize-your-blog.html

Contests and Causes Drive Blog Traffic

I'm on a winning streak. In the last couple of days I've won a newly published book about using LinkedIn and won a premier Wordpress theme. All because I commented on a blog and participated in a fundraising cause.

I'm sure we've addressed this before and want to revisit the idea.

First, contests. Using your blog to promote a contest is a great way to drive traffic, build buzz and generate interaction with your blog's community. Take a look at what Jim Kukral did.

Jim had an autographed copy of Lewis Howes' new book LinkedWorking. Jim had two objectives: build his LInkedIn network and give away a the book. On his blog, he wrote about the book and offered to give one away to someone who posted a comment. Plus you had to connect with Jim on LinkedIn and post a link to your LinkedIn profile in your comment. I was already connected with Jim, but I commented anyway and shared my profile link (helps with creating visibility!). And I won the book!  Whoo hoo!

And here I am writing about Jim, his contest and the book I won. I write this not to brag about winning but to share with you how you can do this too.  Pretty simple. I think I read about Jim Kukral's contest on Twitter, but I can't remember.

I also did this on my personal blog, Slim-People.com. I was contacted by Weight Watchers and asked if I wanted to give away a copy of thier new cookbook and a 3 month membership. To be eligible to win, readers had to submit a comment with their best tip for healthier eating. It was a win all the way around because my readers learned valuable new info and two people got to win.

Fundraising for a special cause can also drive traffic. And this is where the power of social media comes in.

Blog Outreach Gets Easy with MyAlltop.com: What's on YOUR page?

Staying informed about what's going on in the Blogosphere and in your niche just got a whole lot easier. Guy Kawasaki announced this week you can have your own page on Alltop.com, the leading blog catalog.

Anyone who's read our free white paper or our Better Business Blogging report knows that one of The Blog Squad's four essential keys to having a blog that works for business is Blog Outreach.

You should be reading other people's blogs, leaving comments, and participating in the Blogosphere. It's part of our CODA Blogging System: Content, Outreach, Design and Action.

Even if you never register for one of our blog training or makeover programs, you should at least by now recognize that other people's blogs are key to your success.

That's why Alltop.com has become so important. Alltop gathers together in one place key business blogs and categorizes them by niche. And now, there's MyAlltop.com. Here's why this is important...

Two Ways to Use Your Blog in Tough Times

"It's amazing that people have so much time to fret about today's emergency but almost no time at all to avoid tomorrow's." Seth Godin on Seth's Blog

 What can you do now that would be really smart marketing in the face of business uncertainty? What's immediately at your fingertips, doesn't cost much to maintain, and only requires 30-40 minutes a day? It doesn't matter if you're employed by someone else right now or you're freelance. (Hint: starts with a B, ends in a G...)

Use your Business Blog.

Write and write some more. Double the frequency of your publishing. Better yet, improve the quality of your posts by writing useful, relevant stuff that will save your readers time, money and energy.

No matter what your situation, your business blog can do two important things for you in a recession:

1. Establish your expertise
2. Connect you with people

Top Blog LIsts: Why You Should Pay Attention in Your Niche

Somebody likes us, really likes us. We didn't win an Oscar or make Time Magazine's Top 25 blogs, but Mitch Mitchell put us on his list: 9 Best Blogs for 2009.

Build A Better Blog: these ladies, Patsi Krakoff and Denise Wakeman, have put together a supreme blog about business blogging, and if the rest of us want to find a model to follow as far as gaining blogging prominence, these are the two ladies to follow.

This week also announced the new quarterly Top42 Content Marketing Blogs. Even though my other blog, WritingontheWeb.com slipped from #3 to #12, it's still an honor to be on the list. Be sure to check out this list for the other sites who are writing about content and how to leverage content for marketing purposes (like writing for your blog...).

Why are top blog lists important? First, it's a great way to short cut your research. If you want to publish a great business blog, you need to know what others in your field are already writing and publishing. You can't blog in a vacuum.

How often are you participating in the Blogosphere in your niche? How many blogs are you reading regularly and commenting on? If you need to find other blogs in your field, visit Alltop.com or Blogs.com. This is one of the four keys to successful business blogging, as we teach it in our Build a Better Blog Learning System.

Secondly, it's just plain smart to build relationships with these other bloggers by leaving meaningful comments on their blogs and joining in the conversation. It's also one of the top ways to build traffic back to your own blog.

Starting a Blog and Making it Effective

A couple of weeks ago I was interviewed for an article on small business blogging by a reporter from Newsday. The article was published today and also includes quotes from corporate blogging expert Debbie Weil:

Small Business: Starting a blog and making it effective

The "blogger's to do list" referenced in the article is posted here.

3 Ways to Motivate Blog Readers to Take Action

I was recently asked: what are three ways you motivate readers to take actions?

This is something we regularly teach professionals and business owners who are just starting out with a blog. It's part of The Blog Squad's CODA System: Content, Outreach, Design and Action.

Encouraging readers to interact creates loyal followers who are more likely to take further action and get more deeply involved with you (like purchase your products and services).

It all comes down to one word: ASK

1. Ask readers what they want by publishing polls and surveys (use SurveyMonkey, Vizu or SocialToo).
2. Ask readers to comment and tell them how to do it ("click on comment link below...")
3. Ask readers to submit tips, guest posts or finish your post for you, i.e., you write a top 10 list and include only 7 tips, asking your readers to contribute their best tip.

Provide opportunities for people to get more involved by taking them beyond your blog: download a free report, attend a teleseminar, meet in person at conferences and workshops.

Connecting on your blog is the first step. Interacting on your blog is the second step. Moving readers off your blog to a deeper experience is the third step.

The Blog Squad's free report on Better Business Blogging goes into more detail about the CODA System and how to motivate action with your readers.

SEO for Bloggers: How to Get Started

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is a mystery to most bloggers. I don't claim to be an SEO expert -- far from it -- but knowing a bit about how search engines work and how to find and use appropriate keywords for your content is useful (some would say critical) for creating an effective business blog.

For the last couple of days I've been reviewing a new training program called Wordpress SEO Secrets created by my colleague Michael Martine (@Remarkablogger on twitter). Like the title says, the program is directed primarily at bloggers who use Wordpress, but in my opinion, much of the content is important for all bloggers to know, regardless of the platform you use. 

The tutorials however, are all created for Wordpress. And since we know there are millions of Wordpress bloggers and some of them actually read this blog (even though it's on TypePad! :-) ) I thought it important to share this program with you.

When we work with clients, one of the first things we talk about is the fact that if you want to be found on the web by your ideal client, there are a few things that will greatly help: