How to Get People to Share Your Content Without Tricking Them

Every SEO copywriter knows that shared and viral content is the most valuable kind of content, but without artificially creating that buzz (which is difficult) there’s really only two ways to get people to pay attention to content that’s available out there.  Trick them into sharing, or offer them a reason to.

Tricking Them Doesn’t Work

The problem with tricking people to share content, in my experience as an SEO copywriter at least, is that they don’t like it.  No one likes to be tricked – and many people will not only avoid sites and content that does and tell their friends.  Which means you’ll be generating all the wrong kinds of feedback, which, in turn will make you unhappy.

It’s important too, to remember that anything like that will seem odd if you’re not careful – there’s nothing worse than setting up a viral campaign that everyone ignores, or people can see have been set up to create artificial buzz.  The campaigns that get ‘caught’ doing this, even with the best content, are often hijacked and derided, and often small brands don’t recover from that.

Creating Means of Sharing Content Using SEO Copywriting

SEO copywriting and content created using those services should be enticing enough that people choose to share it when they’re working with you anyway – if it’s not, you’ll need to look at why and work on fixing that first.  Your copywriter should be able to edit your content so that it’s better if there’s anything wrong with it, and then, there’s two ways you can handle getting interaction and feedback.
  • Share it with your readers via newsletter, or social networking site and specifically invite comment on the article – often people will respond to ‘what do you think?’ or ‘share if you agree’ or similar.  Even generating conversation on your social networking sites should be good enough in most cases to get the ball rolling.  And remember too, some people will share anything their friends see, so it’s a question of getting the right people interacting and involved, which is why viral marketing has an unpredictable element.
  •  Add comment bonuses and other items that encourage people to tweet etc. – or hold a competition.  Some companies hold competitions using Rafflecopter, which tracks social media sharing (should you so choose) – it’s a valid marketing method for many industries and can cost little to nothing at all in many cases – all you need is a viable product to give away.
And Afterwards?

Many companies wonder what to do with the momentum they build with social networking – while it’s true it opens up more points of contact to those around the articles, and sometimes this can lead to an extra work, but the increased value from SEO articles and copywriting that this brings makes it all worth it.  SEO copywriting content cannot fail to bring new leads in via social media and while things settle down with Google’s updates, it’s important to leverage content in any way you can.

While it’s true that it’s often difficult to build a truly viral campaign in this way, working with social media allowances and blending it with your copywriting needs and leads can bring powerful traffic and support to your business – creating new customers, new connections and new relationships, for a tiny fraction of additional work.  And once you’ve built momentum, and created a trusted brand for yourself in social media it will become easier still – so ensuring your copywriting is up to par is the best way to move forward.  That way, your readers and clients will hit retweet and share almost automatically.

Your SEO Copywriter is one of the most valuable social networking tools you can use, so working with them is of utmost importance.

original - SociableBlog

Guest Posting Etiquette – Some Must Follow Tips

Guest blogging is picking up buzz. Mainly because guest posting is best way of link building and provides instant result. However, as in every process some etiquette should be followed. This post deals with etiquettes that are required in guest blogging.

Many believe that guest posting etiquettes should be followed by guest bloggers leaving out publishers. Guest bloggers are equally important as publishers (provided the content is of high quality). Content are not tapped from thin air. It requires effort and the effort is put by the guest blogger. Therefore, publishers should follow some etiquette too.

Etiquette for Guest Bloggers:


Read the Publishers’ requirement:

The crucial step in guest blogging is to know the requirements of publishers. Every publisher will have different needs. A certain publisher might demand for specific topic while other might be open to ideas. It is guest blogger’s duty to meet all the requirements of the publishers. If publisher demands for 700+ word article provide the same.

Contacting publishers:

Not all accept guest post right away. Some prefer to be contacted and pitched regarding the post. Even if you are sending post to a community member like My Blog Guest it is crucial to know the publisher. Of course, if the publisher had invited to send guest posts then its okay.

Provide Unique Content:

The most common complaint from publishers is that guest bloggers provide either spin content or copied content. It is understood that for guest posting purposes unique content is mandatory. I would like to emphasize that not only the content should be unique but also the whole idea.

Responding to comments:

After a publisher has published a post, it is the duty of guest blogger to respond to comments. A guest blogger might not be available all time. However, a guest blogger should ensure that he visits the post regularly and stays abreast with the discussion. The best way to do this is by signing up for comments notification/updates.

Etiquette for Publisher:

Here are some etiquette for publishers

Respond to email:

Many publishers will fret and fume at this topic. Their argument is that ‘it is hard to reply to every email’. Yes, it is hard to reply to every email but reply should be made. Have you ever sent a guest post to Problogger? Staffs of Problogger, without fail, reply to every email. As a publisher, you should respect the time put in by Guest Bloggers.

Intimate of changes:

Publishers should inform regular contributors of the changes. For instance, if you had promised to provide 2 links and later decided to cut into 1 link, do not forget to notify your contributors.

Changing the links:

Some publishers consider themselves as smart. They promise dofollow links and after a month change dofollow into nofollow. Such practices are unethical and indicate disrespect towards guest bloggers. Moreover, it is the duty of the guest bloggers to check regularly and ensure that the links are unhampered.

These were some of the simple rules for guest bloggers and publishers. If you have something to add either as a guest blogger or publisher then you are welcome.

original:SociablWeb

Common SEO Mistakes That Can Make Your Website ‘DEAD’

Effective Search Engine Optimization definitely helps in finding your website. While there are certain guidelines, if followed can help your website rank high among the top websites in the search engine and also gives an outstanding rank ahead of all your competitors. On the other hand, there are certain mistakes which can kill your website, hence leading to the path of failure. Since SEO is a long term process, so any mistake if made may take months to reverse and get back your SEO back on the right track. So, SE Optimizers should be alert enough before committing these mistakes.

Here are some of the silly seo mistakes you must circumvent in order to prevent your SEO campaign from being executed.

SEO Mistake #1 Aiming Keywords based on Search Volume

This is the most common mistake a SE Optimizer can easily make. When choosing keywords which suits best for your website’s content, it is important to remember that search volume is alone not the most important thing you should always think of. Other factors also need to be taken care of before targeting your keywords such as keywords must be relative to the content. Secondly, the intention of the visitors must be taken care of.

SEO Mistake #2 Fails in understanding the SEO guidelines properly

This mistake is often committed by amateurs who want to think something creative and in order to think something out of the box, they mostly turns up with ideas which violates the guidelines offered by most of the search engines. Therefore, it is essential to know that violating the guidelines might results your website being banned from a search engine.

SEO Mistake #3 Focusing mainly on quantity over quality in link building

Links are just like the bread and butter of SEO, but having more and more links would not help you much if they aren’t good quality. While the Google Penguin update which was unleashed on April mainly encourages websites with clean and natural links and therefore it has become more important than ever. So, it is highly recommendable for the se optimizers to stay away from unrelated sites, link exchanges and other low-quality sources and should focus on building quality links from related sources. It is better to be alert while exchanging links as link exchanges with banned websites is definitely frowned upon. It is more valuable to get twenty great links in the long run rather than making hundred spammy links which would definitely get your site in snagging condition.

SEO Mistake #4 Creating Web Page without a Title

Title reflects the content of a webpage. A webpage lacking a title is just like a body without a face. It makes your content unclear and hazy. Therefore, it is always advisable to add proper titles to your content as it is definitely beneficial for your search engine optimization.

SEO Mistake #5 Using Duplicate Content or Poorly Written Content

Many SEO companies offer a large number of articles on various topics which have been copied from other sources. This can have a serious effect on your website. Readers as well as search engines do encourage fresh and unique content. Search engines also doesn’t like content with keyword stuffed in it. So, it must be kept in mind while writing. Many of the search engines take serious actions against such sites, which provides poorly written content and also not well-optimized at the same time.

SEO Mistake #6 Using too many Images and Flash Animations

This is true that images and animation do make your website look catchy to the eyes of visitors. However, using splash pages with flash animations and big size images would increase the load time of your site, resulting in the evasion of all your visitors and increasing the page load time. So, it is always better to use relevant images and flash animation that describe the content without much overdoing it.

SEO Mistake #7 Unsuccessful in updating your Social Media sites with Innovative Posts

With the evolution of social networking sites, it has gained a lot of importance among people and also in the eyes of search engines. Creating unique content is the foremost step you need to promote in your social media sites. As social media marketing is a great way to interact with your visitors, so make sure that every time you are updating your profile, you start it with fresh and exclusive post.

SEO Mistake #8 Making Use of Page Cloaking

This is a frequent tactic which is often being used by optimizers. It is meant to separate the pages which people will see and which will be crawled by spiders. However, we must avoid in making use of Page Cloaking as it can be one of the reason which can kill your website. A common practice of many is to cloak pages which are rich in keywords to attract search engines spiders while it is being hidden from visitors. However, it must be keep in mind that search engine spiders would want to index and reference the same pages which web users can see. But if cloaking is detected, then your website may have a chance of being banned altogether.

SEO Mistake #9 Lacks in Updating Data

Creating a Website is not the final thing, when it comes to search engine optimization. If the content used in your website is not updated, then it won’t help you much in getting a higher rank on search engine. Staying up to date on the content is certainly imperative to give your site an advantage over others.

SEO Mistake #10 Abortive of Using CSS

CSS is a tool which helps you to reduce the size of your pages, thus reducing the time it normally takes to load. However, it helps you to concentrate on the text which search engine spiders normally feeds on. Therefore, CSS definitely plays a vital role for your website and should not be unnoticed in the optimization process, as it enhances the visibility of your web pages.

Thus, if you have been commending any of the above mistakes and were just naive about the impact that you had on your website. Going through this post would surely help you a lot in implementing the required changes and correcting your website as needed through the search engine optimization process and it would also definitely help to make your website visitor-friendly and search-engine friendly at the same time.

original:SociablWeb

7 Old-School Ways To Build Your Brand Rep In Your Community


Branding is essentially, aligning your company’s internal activities with what it produces for the outside world. It’s not a communications strategy, but rather a business strategy; a long term, sustainable product or service that is consistent, clear, and delivers time and again.

Whether it’s with clients embarking on a new campaign or on your own trying to define your personal brand, the term “branding” seems to be the popular buzzword these days. “Branding” is often misunderstood and is frequently misused. Yet, a business’s brand represents the company’s reputation externally and reflects how employees feel about the company internally.

Currently, we are in a climate where small and medium-sized enterprises are being squeezed and forced to create a clear point of difference. Small businesses especially, need to find a way to compete.

The following are 7 old-school ways to build your brand rep in your community.

1. In a Nutshell

Ask yourself what you want the customer to feel when interacting with your business. Then, find one word or phrase that most accurately sums up what you stand for.

Continue on to your website, your offices, and other extensions of your business and ensure that they convey a similar theme. Think of ways to conjure up that feeling in customers without saying it explicitly.

Once you determine your strategy, run it through all of your activity including the logo, tone of voice, and dress code. Remember that dissatisfaction is what drives customers. Develop and communicate a relevant brand promise and deliver.

2. Get it right the First Time

Deliver on your promises. Competitive markets have and will always punish companies that are unreliable.

A relationship of trust is an integral part of growing a strong brand. Reaching the point where customers trust you allows clients to feel at ease, even if you do get it wrong on occasion.

Any advertising expense spent in a small business is better focused towards “performance marketing.” Focus on delivering an augmented product that is continuously improving.

3. Build from Within

All big business brand icons have distinctive company cultures or “value systems” that give the brands definition. A company brand should permeate the organization and drive decisions.

Involve your employees in building the brand from Day 1. Allowing them to help shape the values makes it easier to convey them to customers. Spend time on developing a message that resonates throughout your staff.

Remain flexible enough to occasionally evaluate and tweak your brand message’s effectiveness and make sure to communicate it internally. Beware of becoming too formal or risk losing engagement. The best way to get customers to trust you is to start trusting your employees.

4. Consistency is Key

Be absolutely transparent to your audience about your brand values from the outset. Your products and services are likely to evolve as you grow, but your brand values should remain consistent.

Keep in mind that for many, your marketing message is the first impression they will have of your company. Resist the urge to tweak established values.

5. Customers Contact

To some extent, your brand takes care of itself if your product is good. On the other hand, involving customers in product development has become somewhat of a trend that provides customers with a sense of co-creating products.

Customers love to feel close to the creative process, and you can build reciprocal respect, by featuring them as case studies.

6. Social Media

Stay on top of what’s out there to build a brand. Social media is just as important as a communications tactic and something that could be applied internally.

It’s a great strategy for small businesses to provide customer service and support, while getting their name in front of people.

7. Create a Community

Social media has hastened an importance of community in brand building by sharing knowledge and extending the network online. It’s important that information about the business doesn’t just come from the marketing division.

Whatever your means of communicating, show your personality. Focus on where your customers are, be that on YouTube, eBay, Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn, but use each medium appropriately.

Differentiate yourself by what you stand for and let the personality and values formulate organically. Innovate beyond the familiar and keep these 7 old-school tips in mind when developing a brand rep in your community.

original:SociableBlog
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