Internet

Launching a new website – Days 21-30

September 29, 2009 By Sherry Tingley

checksmall-web-traffic Launching a new website is not as easy as some would have you think. This is the last article in a series of articles that covered the promotional strategies of the first 30 days in the launching of a new website. Time will help any new website get more traffic and this site is so new that it will have to go through some growing pains for the next four months. Patience is needed to develop and get these new sites to a profitable stage.

The last week of the month showed some solid traffic increases. The total visitors for the month was 1018. As a whole, that wasn’t too bad. Next year at this time, it will be interesting to compare the differences.

Using SEO elite, I checked for the number of backlinks and there were 22 backlinks. These backlinks were acquired by writing articles and making comments on other people’s websites.

I checked the main search engines to see how many pages were indexed with each engine. Google has indexed 104 pages. Yahoo has 38 pages. MSN has only one page indexed and I’m not sure how to get more pages indexed by them. I just found a link to submit sites to MSN: http://www.bing.com/docs/submit.aspx so now I’ve submitted to that website. Alta Vista reported indexing 38 pages and All The Web has indexed 38 pages.

One strategy that I have added to this site is to add a blog. I think that WordPress blogs are very search engine friendly and I believe that adding content to it on a regular basis will be helpful.

I was able to get some help in making my website comply with the W3C, the web standards organization for all web pages. I have tried in the past to get compliant with that website, but my web skills were not good enough to understand how to change things to get into compliance. A friend of mine from the Philippines told me about a fellow named Taylor S. Ripley. He runs a web development and hosting site at http://www.turkreno.com/. I gave him a call and he was nice enough to walk me through correcting all the mistakes that were on my front page. He also helped me create a more useful sitemap and I have submitted that to the search engines. He was so knowledgeable and helpful. I highly recommend him as a person to help you with your SEO efforts. It was so nice to meet someone that was so helpful.

So to wrap things up for this 30 Day Plan, I’d like to review the most valuable lessons that I learned during this time period.

1. When developing a new site, submit a basic sitemap for at least part of your site to Google webmaster tools so you can start getting some traffic.

2. When your site is completed, submit another sitemap to Google so that they will index all of your pages.

3. Submit your new site to Yahoo, MSN, All The Web and Alta Vista.

4. Begin the process of creating a sense of community by visiting other sites that relate to your topic and participate in their conversations on their blogs.

5. Write articles that relate to your product or website and make sure that they get distributed to a large number of directories.

6. Make sure your site is W3 Compliant.

7. Be patient and keep contributing to your site by making it better and offering people more resources and help.

8. Start trying something, anything. Some of what you do will work, and some things won’t. Doing something is better than just dreaming about it.

9. Realize that it takes time for your new project to become profitable and know that it is possible to get your sites profitable enough to support yourself.

10. Network with other people through http://www.meetup.com to find others in your community that are pursuing the same types of business.

I hope that part of this experience has helped you learn what you can do to get your sites started an on to profitability. Good luck with your projects!

How to Promote Your Website

September 24, 2009 By Sherry Tingley

You know that you should be helping with your own SEO by promoting your website and providing opportunities for back links, but HOW? Here are a few ideas I shared with one of my Real Estate clients:

CRAIGSLIST and OTHER FREE CLASSIFIEDS

Craigslist is an amazing place to post advertisements for your services with a link pointing to your website. You should try it! Also, writing little articles in your Blog about what you do not only will be good for Search Engines, but they can be used on Craigslist, Backpage, and on Article Submission sites.

DON'T FORGET TO PUT LINKS TO YOUR WEBSITE!

Never waste a Blog Posting by not having links pointed back to your website. Without links you shouldn?t be wasting your time! Think of every link you place online as a vote for yourself. If your search term is ?Colorado Springs Real Estate? and you have that term set up as a link pointed to your site, as top agent Brandon Smith does at ColoradoSpringsHomeSite.com, the more links like this that appear on the web, the higher your Google ranking will be. One by one, post by post, week in and week out, think about how you can insert the keywords and keyphrases you want people to find you when searching in Google and other Search Engines.

VIDEO IS REALLY REALLY EFFECTIVE!

Think about the Video idea as well. Create your own little commercial. Using a Webcam or a little Flip Videocam is so easy now.

The best part is that it doesn?t need to be long. In fact it?s better if it isn?t. When I scan through videos and audio podcasts, I?m looking for bite-size nuggets that won?t take too much of a bite out of my day, because I just don?t have that much spare time. Think 30 seconds to 2 minutes. Talk directly into the camera about what you do for a minute. You can do that. Keep doing takes until you have ?the one.?

YOUTUBE IS FREE AND GOOGLE LOVES IT (THEY OWN IT)!

Once your completed video is on your computer and you?ve done any editing you wish to do, upload it to YouTube for Free. If you don?t have a YouTube account, set one up now. It will take just a few minutes. Once you have uploaded successfully to your YouTube account, I will point you the way of putting it on your website.

Just think how amazing it would be if you would record 30 second spots for each page on your website. Google likes to feature YouTube videos on Page 1 of their search results. If you took just a minute to add the main search words that you would want people to find your video with in YouTube, you may be rewarded for your efforts with Page 1 placement. (It happens all the time!)

FOCUS ON YOUR LOCAL MICRO AREA INSTEAD OF THE BIG METROPOLIS

Perhaps trying to throw a whole swath over a big marketing area (let?s say ?Dallas?) are not going to be as effective as focusing like a laser on the actual smaller community that they really want to market to, like ?Plano, TX.? There are thousands of people all trying to get that big market key search term placement on Google. To get that will certainly cost you a lot in paid premium search engine placement. By focusing smaller, your competition for that high Google placement is reduced significantly.

KEEP BLOGGING!

If you have been blogging, Congratulations! DON'T STOP! It's not a “get rich quick” type of operation. Think of it as a mountain building exercise and each post is a shovel of dirt. One by one you will create your mountain until it towers above all others in your field who are not putting in the time, or who only put money into the Pay-Per-Click programs.

This again is an example of the Assets vs. Liabilities theory talked about by Robert Kiyosaki in Rich Dad Poor Dad. Premium Pay-Per-Click campaigns are Liabilities; once they?ve been clicked on, they?re gone! Building your own empire online of Blog Postings containing links pointing to your website can stay up forever, and their exponential nature can build and build and bring you the benefits for years to come!

Internet Entrepreneurs Strategic Success Plan

August 26, 2009 By Sherry Tingley

jay-leno Preparing for success is a process that may take longer than you think. It seems that with any worthwhile endeavor, there are things to accomplish that take you much longer than you had planned for. Some people would have you believe that being an Internet entrepreneur is a simple thing to do and that being successful at it is a cinch.

Let’s use Jay Leno as an example. Although he is not an Internet entrepreneur, he is a successful business man. After watching his nightly current events monologue you probably felt better about life because you had a few good, perhaps great laughs. That ten-minute television dialogue is something people used to love to hear and would stay up late at night to tune in to.

It was recently revealed in a Wall Street Journal article about Jay Leno’s upcoming television show that the short segment of comedy actually takes quite a bit more preparation time than you or I might think. Apparently there are six hours of preparation time and discussion with twenty experienced writers to produce this short comedic dialogue. Even with all that effort put into the short segment, Jay Leno often runs his monologue by his high school and home town friends to see what they think.

So what does that teach Internet entrepreneurs about becoming successful?

A lot can be learned from this revelation about the preparation time it takes to be successful. Preparing for success can take more than the 30 minutes you might have planned. In fact even after you have had years of Internet training, successful projects may take a tremendous amount of time to arrive in the winner’s circle.

When you think you are prepared, ask yourself what kind of effort you put into your current entrepreneurial project. Did you converse with anyone else about the feasibility of your Internet entrepreneurial project? What kind of expert advice did you receive and did you take that advice? Will people benefit from what you have prepared and how will they benefit?

To be successful as an Internet entrepreneur, you are going to need a good plan and a realistic prediction of the time it will take to accomplish your plan, You are going to need to discuss it with other successful Internet entrepreneurs and perhaps your old friends from long ago. You will need to plan for your project to benefit others and the degree to which that will occur will be the degree to which you are successful.

The Social Media Golden Triangle

August 23, 2009 By Sherry Tingley

If you have been baffled and confused and just don’t know where to start with social media, you must not have heard of the Golden Triangle. The Golden Triangle was lost thousands of years ago… Wait! That’s a different story, this one was discovered within the past two years!

This is a story of how the Social Media Golden Triangle can completely transform the way you communicate with your clients and customers and your business. We all know that economic times have changed. You have been hearing about Social Media, Social Networking, Viral Video and many other social media outlets that you wish you could leverage and turn into business.

What I’m about to discuss is nothing new, but it is a strong force that if used properly, will change the course of your business.

You have undoubtedly heard a lot of hype and hoopla around Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. These three sites make up “The Social Media Golden Triangle”. Now is the time to put them to work for your business. Using the Golden Triangle can help you identify, attract, and interact with your target audience. This powerful combination of websites can take you from just barely surviving to thriving in the current economy.

Let’s look at each piece of the Golden Triangle separately so we have a basic understanding as to what each piece does:

Twitter

Twitter is a new tool designed to keep things short and sweet. There’s no time for industry jargon, just tell me how it is and I’ll decide if it’s worth my time to view your full message. Part branding strategy, part relationship development, Twitter is one of the most popular and fastest growing websites on the Internet today. Twitter is a pitch free zone, don’t bother pitching your products or service, think and write frequently and consistently. Be sure to offer value, how can you help your followers.

Facebook

Social media marketing, actually, marketing in general shouldn’t be about you!

Yes I said it, in fact your company isn’t about you, it’s everything to do with your customer or client. Your website isn’t about you it should be about your clients or customers problems and how you can solve them.

A strategy to leverage Facebook is to create groups around the problem you solve, not the product or service you offer. People aren’t looking for the solution by name, they are searching for the solution to their problem, so start by talking about their problems .

YouTube

Know it, Like it and Trust it…If “you can’t believe everything that you hear,” “seeing is believing” and a picture is worth a thousand words, then video must be the “it”.

Done right, you can connect with, and get your audience to know, like and trust you.

Again, we are in a NO Pitching Zone, where people are more concerned with content and value than hearing what you have to offer. In videos, be yourself, talk about the problem your target audience may be having and ways you can help solve them. Educational videos position you as the expert and help you attract the right people, they also help people solve their problems, making you look like problem solver.

Bringing it All Together

Think about it, what we are addressing here is the need for communication with the people you want to get in front of, how to leverage you website better how to leverage all of these people flocking to these social media sites. How to get your message in front of them without pissing them off and just posting advertisements Social media isn’t just a new way to communicate, it’s a completely different culture and needs to be approached carefully when used as a marketing tool for your business.

Before jumping in and starting a campaign, learn each piece of the triangle’s culture first, social media users want value, not fluff and advertisements.

By Dan Beldowicz
Article Source
Dan Beldowicz is the Senior Marketing Consultant at Single Throw Internet Marketing. Online for over 11 years, Dan is helping companies develop websites that generate business and social media campaigns that connect with customers. Follow Dan on Twitter at http://twitter.com/danbeldowicz or on the Single Throw Blog.

Launching a new website – days 14-21

August 21, 2009 By Sherry Tingley

This article is a continuation of a 30 day plan to launch a new website offering bank checks. The goal of the plan was to do something every day to promote the site and see what kind of traffic we’d get. Unfortunately on August 8, the site went into the Google sandbox and none of the pages that were being listed with top positions in Google were being listed anymore. The site is still in the sandbox unfortunately. It’s not hard to tell when your site is in the sandbox because your pages won’t pull up for the search terms they were originally pulling up for.

As you can see from the graph the site is going through ups and downs in traffic. Most visible is the drastic decrease in traffic on August 8. There is a steady increase, but this is not due to getting out of the sandbox, it is due to some promotion efforts through a company I hired to help.

Originally, I planned not to spend any money during this first thirty day period, but I caved in after the drop in traffic. I hired a company that helped me with this website and asked them to do the same thing for my new site. If you are interested in knowing who they are and what they do, be sure to email me.

The goal is to get between 500 and 700 visitors per day. At that point, the site will be pulling in some decent income.

Sites can be in the sandbox for three to six months so the plan now is to build high authority back links which means getting the site listed in different directories.

The plan now is to:
1. Add quality content to the site through a blog.

2. Work on increasing the number of inbound links (quality links not just any old link).

3. Tweak and improve the SEO quality of your site.

4. Write articles.
So you should be seeing some changes coming soon to the site which will include a WordPress Blog.

Again, the biggest mistake made with this site was to wait until the entire site was done before submitting the site to Google. So if you are working on a new site, be sure and get at least a few pages presentable with a sitemap and submit it. Hopefully that will shorten your stay in the sandbox.