Many bloggers and webmasters deal with traffic as their major challenge. Although a lot of people manage generating traffic to their website, they find it hard to sustain it consistently. You can find a few tips below on writing attention-grabbing articles and also how to keep your readers wanting more.

1. Headline

A lot of people make mistakes when it comes to headlines. It is wise to keep in mind that your headline would determine how many people would be wanting to read your articles. A lot of people make excuses saying that they are not copywriters and they are not great at making headlines, etc.

You got to play with a lot of different headlines as many as you can come up with on certain topics and subject. Even if the contents are the same, try writing as plenty of headlines as you can to match the content. Ten headlines as a minimum is recommended and then can choose what the best one is. You might want to try doing this for all the articles you write and it won’t be long that you will be able to come up with perfect headlines.

2. Think about your audience

This is another very significant factor making or marring your readership. Why talk about honey if the headline is maize? It’s senseless. Your content has to meet with your audience. For instance, if your readers are farmers, you must not talk to them as if they are students. You must be keeping the audience in mind and that way they will perceive you as professional.

3. Consistency in writing

In a lot of things, quite a number of people ignore this characteristic of consistency. Human as we are, all of us love consistency. So you can try setting a time for article writing, even if it is just one in every 5 days or so. Although you could write articles frequently, it won’t be good to have inconsistency in your articles.

4. What they want is what they get

If people decide to visit your website or product page after reading your article, there is a reason behind it. The reason is because they got what they wanted. If they came for articles regarding food (which you have suggested on your title), then that’s what they should get and what you should be giving them. So if it about making money online, that is what you’ll have to give them.

When you give them exactly what they want, you build trust which will help you later in the future. As much as you can, you should try making them happy so they will want to read the things you write.

5. Using bold words when needed

In order to emphasize on particular words, you need to make use of bold words. Using italics or bold words to emphasize a point or a certain word will be able to guide your readers and make them focus to that certain point you are making. Making your articles short and concise will allow you to convey the great message you are imparting.

All in all, by being able to write good headlines, you can get the readers’ attention while consistency in writing which also suit their needs will make the readers come back for more. Also, I would like you to have the goal of writing in such as way that your readers will want to turn in to you because of the impact that you have made.

admin Article Marketing, Web Content

Optimizing your blog so Google will index it immediately is no feat.  However, with a lot of confusing information on search engine optimization (SEO) about how to beat the natural ranking system and ranking high in Google search, many are disappointed and often times fail.

The probability of Google indexing your site in 24 hours or less is possible.  However, the secret to your success in doing so is strategy.  If you already have your blog ready, read on and follow the simple steps and you’ll be surprised to see your site in Google’s search result within a day.

Easy to Follow Steps for a 24-Hour Google Indexing

1. Blog submission to Google

The first and most logical step to do is of course, submit your blog to Google.  Otherwise, Google won’t be able to index it.  Although there are free blogging platforms that submit your blog site automatically, self-hosted blogging platforms require you to do it yourself.  It’s an easy job to do and won’t take five minutes of your time.  Use the Google webmasters’ (www.google.com/webmasters) tools to verify your site.  Below are the steps on how to use the tool for your blog:

I.1  Go to the Google Webmasters’ Tool site and sign in using your Google account.  If you don’t have one yet, create one for free.

I.2  Click the “add site” button and type your domain.  After doing so, click “Continue”.

I.3  You now need to verify that you are the owner of this site.  It can be done in two ways: (1) Meta tag or (2) upload an HTML file.  I suggest you use the Meta Tag way, it’s easier.

I.4  Next, you have to verify your Meta tag.  This will require you to add the Meta tag code Google asked you to copy to your site.  It’s a code to your “.php” file.

I.5  After, step 4 is done, proceed to your WordPress dashboard.  Using the menu tabs on the left hand side, go to  “Appearance”, then “Edit”.  Click on “Header” (header.ph) on the right hand side to open up your header template.  Look for the <head> tag highlighted and paste below the verification, the Meta tag Google has provided.

I.6  After you have done all of step 5, click on the “Update File”.

I.7  Now that you’re done with WordPress, go back to www.google.com/webmasters and click “Verify”.

I.8  Once clicked, Google will display a confirmation page that you are the owner of the site.  Now you’re done with your blog submission.

2. Sitemap submission to Google (based on WordPress platform)

Before you submit your sitemap to Google, you have to install the Google XML sitemap plug-in that will create your sitemap for search engines to read.  After doing this, you may now add your blog’s sitemap.

II.1  Go to Google Webmasters’ Tool site and click on your domain so it will open the Dashboard for your site.  Click on the “Site Configuration” on the left hand side then click on the “Sitemap”.

II.2  Click the “Submit a Sitemap” button and enter your sitemap’s name.  It should be “sitemap.xml”.  Sitemap analysis may take a few hours before it is added.  Ensure that there are no errors. Check on how many URLs are being indexed and the time Google last visited your site.  While Google is checking on your sitemap, you will begin to get a list of top search queries your site is being found for including incoming links, and keywords that Google thinks that your site is optimized for.

The site verification you did including the addition of your sitemap is Google’s way of determining that your site is ready to be indexed.

3. Create Some Buzz About Your Blog

The more buzz you create, the more often google bot will revisit and re-index your site. Here are several ways that help you in creating buzz to your site, aside from posting new content:

1. Social bookmarking – This is a great way of generating natural linkbacks right away.  Submit your site to social bookmarking services like StumbleUpon, Digg, and Twitter.  Open an account for free, if you have not done yet, log on to each site and click “Favorite” to your site.  Your friends and colleagues may help you do the same.
2. Forum posting – This is another way of generating SEO juice and links to your blog.  Remember to put your blog link in your forum signatures.  However, do remember to post relevant ideas so that forum moderators will not misconstrue it as spamming.  Post to as many forums as you can.  Google gives priority to websites that are generating links.
3. SEO Plug-in installation – Blogs usually come with an SEO Pack.  WordPress gives out one for free.  You can download the All-in-One-SEO pack plug-in from their site and install it.  SEO is definitely a must to generate your traffic.  Having one from the beginning is a good long-term strategy.  You may want to check out my How to Install video for set-up and to optimize it’s use.

There you go. Simple, easy, and fast steps to ensure that Google will index your blog within 24 hours for maximum visibility.

admin Google, SEO

For a few weeks or months now, you have your blog.  Layout is fantastic and have a few guest articles published on other blogs.  Because of that, you’ve gained some backlinks.  Despite all these, traffic is still slow.  You are beginning to lose interest because of this.  Things are not moving the way you want them to be despite your efforts, despite your hardwork.  You’ve read a lot of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) stuff and it seems you’ve followed but still nothing.  Pretty soon, you’ll give up and eventually lose your blog into the world of anonymity.  Does this sound familiar to you? What else can you do in this situation?

If your blog is meant for business and it seems like you are in the verge of bankruptcy and have few options left, let me tell you one thing that I strongly suggest.  Read on to discover.

Collaboration

Did it ever occur to you to team up with other blogs from the same niche as you have?  Yeah, I know you wanted domination all by yourself, who wouldn’t?  But at this point, teaming up with someone is sometimes a viable alternative.  There is nothing wrong with collaboration.  There are numerous businesses out there that would be happy to team up with you.

Collaboration is often valuable and has its advantages.  However, before you plunge into it, ensure that the collaborative relationship is win-win situation.  Formulate a plan and agree with your partner in writing and you have to stick with what you agreed upon.  Everything has to be clear upfront.  Additionally, with this collaboration, you get a lot of benefits such as: (1) you have a partner that will push you to do more rather than doing it half- heartedly.  It’s similar to going to a gym alone rather than with a buddy, which could be more enjoyable than just plain working out; (2) two minds are definitely better than one; and lastly (3) you have someone to strategize with.

It’s a proven fact that when you work with someone else, there is an added bonus of sharing knowledge, networking, skills or personal qualities.  Adages like:

1. “Two heads are better than one.”
2. “The sum is greater than parts.”
3. “In union there is strength.”
4. “Achieve synergy.”
5. “One-stop shopping.” (sharing content to widen your market reach)

These are all highly applicable and would bring great benefits for both you and your prospective partner.

Strategic Alliances

On the other hand, you could also decide on collaborating on certain areas of your business.  You can collaborate technologically, such that you share advancement of your layout or PHP programming or anything related with technology.  On the other hand, you could also collaborate in terms of sharing contents or just enriching each other.  Similarly, there are other areas where you can collaborate strategically.  This can include:

• Market response and trends – together you can respond faster
• Market development – together you could try to enter new markets or develop one through combined efforts.
• Product-Market (PMC) – jointly you could develop one and put it out in the market
• Scaling or profit improvement
• Research and investments – together you could share the costs
• Expansion – together you can perhaps expand your hardware and share

There are endless areas you would want to consider and experience the benefits it will give you and your strategic partner.

Additional Considerations

As in any team effort or team building, there are several additional considerations that you have to consider.  Both of you should be on the same wavelength, so to speak; have the same priorities and both of you make strong agreements.  Be wary of people who are dishonest.  Of course that’s one risk you have to take, but nevertheless, you should always be on the look out for these people.

Additionally, before thinking of collaborating with someone, you should ask yourself the following important questions:

1. Do I know what I want to achieve with my blog (vision)?
2. Do I share with my partner the same visions?
3. Can we achieve our common goal within our limits?

Teaming up with another blog brings a lot of new beginnings and perspectives.  With the dawn of minimalism in terms of technology, perhaps collaboration with other blogs is the next best thing.  In the future, shared blogs in the form of social networks is highly possible for those Smartphone owners who would want blogs to appear short but informative.  With people clamoring for faster information on their hands, collaboration can perhaps be an answer.  Maintaining the identity of your blog is a must but giving what your readers want is of your prime consideration.

But before I go way off from what this topic is about and doze off with my dreams, let me pose you guys a question.  Is teaming up with other blogs possible?  If so, what are its advantages and disadvantages?  Share me your thoughts.  I look forward to reading it.

admin Blog Marketing, Web Traffic

Yes, readers, I got nearly 2,000 visitors in my first month of blogging.  If it’s possible for me, it would also be for you.  Newbies who would like to gain more traffic to your blog?  Read on.  I will share with you details on how to approach blogging the right way for traffic right from the start.

A Background

Passion is the secret so you can write practically anything about your topic.  I am extremely passionate with the subject I am writing about in my blog.  This passion motivates me to work, and thus it was not a struggle but more of an enjoyable thing for me.  What you write in your blog should be something that you can’t wait for others to know and similarly, you can’t wait until you tell it them.  Blogging is a dialogue between you and your target audience.  And blogging is one way of sharing what you know so you could help others as well.

My Blog

I am passionate about SEO, link building and article marketing.  Thus, I decided that this is something I wanted to share with my readers.  In addition, I don’t only talk about SEO and link building theoretically but give practical tips on how to achieve real traffic to websites and blogs.  I discuss and get to talk to people about their struggles regarding website marketing, what they did, how they cope and eventually how they succeeded.  These are the things that motivate me.  The best way to start a blog is to talk about something that really motivates you and drives you.

The Visitors

If you are definitely passionate about the niche you are into, here are the things I did to get those 2,000 visitors in my first month of blogging:

1. Know your competition – As in any competition, knowing who your competitiors are is vital.  There will always be someone talking about the same topic as you have but the competitive edge you have against them is your own personal experiences and the voice you have in your blog.  If your readers feel your honesty and straightforwardness, the readership you want to achieve can be attained.  The readers will trust you in providing them better, useful information than competition.  They would know that you are your true self and not just another anonymous blogger.

2. Discover common patterns that your competition has that are contributory to their blogs’ success.  I found out that majority of the successful internet marketing and seo blogs are interactively associating themselves with their readers.  Meaning, they answer comments, they answer emails and other guest posting requests.  Additionally, most bloggers in the same niche post one article per day.  These discoveries helped me create a pattern of my own that contributes to the success of my blog and the happiness of my readers.  What are the top bloggers doing in your niche?

3. Prior to launching your blog, be sure to have at least 20 articles already written.  Start writing about the things you enjoy.  Write, edit, write, edit, that’s the way to do it and never forget to ask feedback on your articles.  These 20 articles are your base articles before you go out and introduce yourself to web world and to other bloggers.

4. After launching your 20 articles, market your blog through emailing other bloggers, posting comments on forums or guest posting with other bloggers.  I spent my weekends commenting on their blogs, introducing and emailing them and asking them whether I can be of any help to them.  Always bear in mind to help them and not just helping yourself.

5. Make friends.  Blogging is all about networking.  Treat competition as friends.  As in any environment, there will always be a group that convenes and share common knowledge.  The same is true with your niche.  There will be groups that are formed and share things common to each other.  Email and comment bloggers from your niche so they get to know you.  If you earn powerful niche bloggers, chances are linking them back to you or vice versa won’t be a sweat.  Remember that it takes about 8 impressions before a person finally knows you.  Take advantage of marketing yourself.

6. Make posting an everyday habit.  Make it a point that you post one quality article everyday.  Talk about what your readers would like to know.  Ask them questions.  Provide them with quality links within your site or from another site so other bloggers would know that the links came from you and that’s an additional service to their blog traffic.  Similarly, the odds of them reciprocating is high.

7. Guest posting is the breakthrough of my blogging career.  I have had guest postings in 7 blogs with Alexa rating of 500,000 and gained a ton of traffic because of it.  In fact one guest posting made my traffic soar to an additional 200 visitors, 11 new subscribers and dozens of comments on my site.  Guest posting is the best secure way of getting high-ranking backlinks and tons of exposure for your blog.

8. Do it all over.

Creating quality content that is in accordance with what your target readers like, commenting on other blogs and forums, interactively participating with your readers, emailing, guest posting and being passionate about what you do in your niche is a surefire way of attaining the success you would want for your blog.

Forget about money first.  Refrain from putting great number of ads at your site.  Once you already have the foundation you need, traffic will come by without you asking for it.  Traffic means the probability of conversions and conversions would mean income.  What comes around goes around.  Achieving the 2000 visitors in your first month of blogging is sure hard work.  But hard work paved its way.  Treat your readers well and your blog would soon have more than the 2000 visitors I experienced in my first month.

admin Blog Marketing, Web Traffic

As a search marketer, I have long been looking for an ideal link building model, that makes everyone happy, where quality wins over quantity and there’s no room for manipulation (note: as a marketer I am well aware of the fact that there’s nothing perfect under the sun. But I wanted something at least better than what we have now).

Currently, the most popular (and the easiest) link building method is still paying for links (paid reviews, paid editorials, sponsorships, etc) however I tried to focus on following points:

1. A link building strategy should be free for everyone.
2. Everyone should get something. Only in this win-win situation, a free model is possible.

The Linknami community has been created to connect bloggers, content creators, link builders and entrepreneurs to help each other achieve their goals. Linknami consists of free tools for web publishers to exchange guest posts and build (targeted!) connections.

A guest post is a piece of quality content the author and the blogger arrange to publish on the blogger’s site for free. The guest post belongs to the author and is attributed to him. It is up to the author which sites to link to within the post and it is up to the blog owner to accept/reject the contribution.

Ideally, here are some points that hopefully will make the place perfect for everyone:

1. Free: No one is required or expected to pay for anything (Google likes this)

2. Win-win: Both the author and the blog owner are interested that the post gets maximum exposure: the blogger gets traffic (as well subscribers, links, etc), the guest blogger gains recognition (and also traffic, link authority, etc);

3. Relevancy: Flexible solutions for Guest bloggers: they can provide content in their niche (to get relevant links and traffic) or in neighboring niches (to expand their reach and experiment).

4. Quality wins as both the guest blogger and the blog owner want to make the most of it: the blog owner wants only quality content, the guest bloggers wants to build a reputation by providing quality content.

admin Link Building, Web Content