Online Assistant

Recently, the following happened to me: I wrote my regular weekly newsletter and posted it on my site. Since this was a longer URL, like millions of other webmasters, I used a URL shortening service to make this link more usable and manageable.

I posted this shortened URL to Twitter and placed it in my weekly email posting... immediately I started getting emails from my subscribers and followers... the link doesn't work, you must have made a mistake.

Which can be easily done, but when I checked the link, I found that the shortening service was not working properly and giving the dreaded "Page Not Found" response. To compound the problem, I was using the Google URL shortener Goo.gl and since it was Google everyone assumed the mistake was on my part. I mean Google is Google.

In the past, I had been using bit.ly but had switched to Goo.gl, well - because it's Google. And everything works better with Google; this was the first time something I used with Google had not worked as planned. And it just wasn't my links, none of the links with Goo.gl were working. No big loss, unless you were linking your Black Friday and Cyber Monday traffic through these shorteners. Ouch.

A URL link shortener works by redirecting your shorter link to the longer one you have entered into their database. If this is a permanent 301 redirect, then your SEO benefits should pass through to your longer link. No harm done. But if the shortening service uses a 302 temporary link then SEO is not passed through to your longer link since the search engines only read this link as temporary.

All the top URL shorteners such as tinyurl, bit.ly and goo.gl use 301 redirects so they are SEO friendly, if they're working!

From this SEO perspective, there is no reason not to use these shortening services, besides they are great for sharing links and getting your links out there.

I only started using those link shorteners because of Twitter which only gives you 140 characters to make your point. These shorteners are also good for sharing and spreading your links around the web. However, in one way using a URL shortener is not a smart marketing move because you are giving up control of your link, putting it in someone else's hands, in this case Google's.

If it goes down, or they decide not to link to your content for some reason, you're in trouble. Same goes for bit.ly, they are in control of your links. Maybe it doesn't count so much if it is a general link, but if you a have an affiliate link in there, you can't change or alter it. Or just imagine, you have 10's, even 100's of thousands of these shortened links spread all around the web, bringing valuable SEO PR back to your site. Suddenly the service or company goes under and all your links disappear from the web overnight.

Web services and sites go bankrupt or change directions all the time, so the above scenario is not out of the question. If you're using and depending on these shortening services to deliver both traffic and SEO to your site, then you should ask yourself.

One of the unwritten rules of Internet Marketing, always control your links and route them through your own domain which you control. Especially if you place these links into viral ebooks, articles, videos... make sure you are linking through a URL on your site. This way you can easily alter the link if anything changes.

By using these URL shorteners, even one run by Google, you really are giving up control of your links. Granted, Google and Goo.gl will probably be around for the foreseeable future and until last week I didn't hesitate to use their shortening service. Now I am not so sure about using their service and question my usage of any of these shortening services in general, despite all the great benefits they give your online marketing.

If you do use one of these URL shorteners, make sure you completely check out the service and its history before you start using it. Actually, if you're going to use these shorteners, it would probably be a good idea to use three or four of them so that all your eggs/links won't all be in the one basket. Better safe than sorry.

Have you had any similar experiences with URL shorteners? Please share your experiences and your thoughts on using URL shorteners as comments

Creating keyword stemming (the ability to have a page returned for multiple results) is accomplished easily through using synonyms and alternative keywords for inbound and internal links.

To promote this SEO tactic simply:

1. Map out the keyword cluster that best corresponds to the root phrase.

2. Make sure the initial keyword is utilized once in the first 25 words of the document.

3. Contextually integrate the secondary keyword 1-2 times into the page.

4. Make sure the page has 500-750 word min. so that search engines have enough context to identify the pages primary and secondary topic.

5. Use both the singular keyword variation and the alternative variation in the title if possible (or in the title+meta tag) - such as keyword1 in title, and keyword 2 (singular or plural in meta data).

6. Build internal links using the alternative keyword variations to supply the foundation of link flow.

7. Build inbound anchor text to the page (from other relevant pages) with the alternate variations of phrases you want the target page to rank for ( i.e. rates, pricing, fees, prices, cost) as an example of semantic stemming.

8. Wait for all the changes to get indexed.

9. Continue building internal and external inbound links until the page reaches the top 10 for one keyword, then reduce the inbound links for that keyword and focus on alternative variables so all the keywords are sufficiently nurtured.

10. Enjoy stemmed keyword rankings over time.

This works particularly well in the event that you are optimizing an array of keywords based on a semantic cluster (group of related words) and wish to use the synergy they create to provide buoyancy across multiple keywords simultaneously.

This simple, yet effective SEO technique can represent the difference between ranking for 10 keywords, 100 keywords or 1,000 over time, depending on how you scale this process across multiple pages in your domain.

A bounce is when a visitor visits your website and then hits the "back" button in their browser or types a new URL to leave the website within a specific length of time. This means that the visitor only visited one page on the site. The length of time in a session varies depending on the analytic software that is measuring your site. There is no industry standard so every search engine has their own way of determining a bounce.

To improve your bounce rate, you need to increase the number of page views that the majority of the people finding your site visits. The search engines use averages to determine your bounce rate. The formula considers the number of bounces in comparison to the number of visitors to the your web page and the number of page views.

1. Improve your website load time. One of the biggest reasons that visitors do not stay on a page is a slow loading page. People are impatient and they will not stick around to wait for graphics, videos and scripts to load. If you must run some of these, you need to understand how to order the placement of these elements to keep the slower loading items further down your page. This will allow the text to load before your video or images. Thus giving you a way to grab the visitor's attention while they wait for other elements of the web page to load.

2. Make your site easy to navigate. If the information your visitor is looking for is not easily found they will move on. Give them very clear ways of finding their way around your site. Make it known that there is more to your site that may interest them than the first page.

3. Divide longer articles into smaller chunks. Use a "more" link to naturally lead them to the next page or label the pages with very easy to find "Page 1, Page 2, Page 3, etc" Guiding your visitors to more related material will make it easy for them to visit more than one page on your site. Any time it is possible to break their actions down into "steps" should be an opportunity for you to divide information into more than one page.

4. Give clear instructions on where you want them to go next. One of the biggest failings of most websites is not telling your visitors what you expect them to do next. By ending an article, blog post or page with a "Visit this page to learn about..."

5. Internal contextual links. There are many advantages to using inline anchor text links. Using text links within an article or page content leading to another page within your website on the topic will give your readers an easy way to find more information on that particular subject. It is also an effective way to gain keyword relevance for search engines.

6. Make your keywords and meta descriptions relevant to the page content. You should avoid using site-wide keywords and descriptions. Create your keywords and descriptions based only on the content of that specific page. One of the quickest ways to lose a visitor is to bring them to a page that does not contain the information they are searching for. You will receive much more targeted traffic by accurately describing what you have to offer. If you have a gardening website and your visitor is looking for information on container gardening, they will quickly leave if you bring them to a page about how to do landscaping.

Creating a positive experience for your visitors will improve your site bounce rate. Organize your site with your viewers in mind and you will reap the benefits of improved SERP and increased page views. These are just a few tips on improving your website.

With Microsoft and Yahoo combining their muscle in the search space, it is imperative that you do not ignore it in your search engine optimization efforts, especially since it will be the Bing search engine that works behind Yahoo search as well. There have been countless articles written online and in technology magazines comparing Bing to Google, but you need to know the differences between how these two search engines rank their pages so that you can optimize your web pages for both of these as well as Yahoo.

Why Would You Rank Higher in One, but Not in Another?

Most small business owners get frustrated that their site either ranks highly in Bing, but poorly in Google or vice versa. Here are some of the reasons why this may be happening and more importantly some workarounds to tackle this problem.

1. Amount of text: Bing places a lot of importance to content, so if your pages have more than 350 words, then you have better chances of ranking higher in Bing. Not so in Google, for which it doesn't seem to be of importance. So, you need to optimize each and every page individually to meet Bing's page score requirements.

2. Natural Language: Bing places a lot of importance on relevancy, so if your website is optimized with LSI keywords, then you are likely to be ranked higher in Bing. Google is soon catching up, so maybe it's a better idea to optimize based on LSI rather than mindlessly repeating exact keywords. You can also get a firm offering professional link building services to help you out here.

3. Title tags: Bing places more importance on title tags than Google, so make sure that your keywords appear in your title tags as often as possible.

4. Back links and outbound links: Bing places more importance on links in general than Google, and the higher the number of relevant back links you have, the better your chances of a good ranking in Bing. Google used to penalize sites with a large number of outbound links, but Bing likes them, and so you may want to have a judicious amount of these as well in your site. Here again, if you get a professional to work on this area, their link building services team would identify the right places to place links for you, so that it actually translates to a better page rank.

5. Domain age: Both Bing and Google seem to favor older domains, so if you are trying to start off on a new business, it is better to purchase a domain name, that's been around for some time.

As a business owner, you would want all the traffic that you can get whether from Bing, Yahoo or Google and the best way to do this is to optimize it for all the major search sites out there. The best way out is to hire professional link building services to help you in your optimization efforts. If you do not do this, you may miss out on a sizeable chunk of traffic as more and more users start using Bing for their searches.

Most niches are so competitive, that on page search engine optimization and good content is no longer enough to rank well in the search engines. To achieve high positions in search engine results, you need back links. Not only do you need back links, but you need them to come from a diverse range of sources to achieve the best results.

Focusing all of your link building efforts on just one source, and on just once anchor text, will appear unnatural to search engines, and you will lose out because of this. You should spread you links between a wide range of sources to encompass directories, blog comments, article writing, social bookmarking, web 2.0 profiles and blogs, and forum posting. Even more valuable than this is obtaining links from high page rank relevant sites. This can be tricky for most small new websites though, if not impossible. Therefore webmasters of these sites should concentrate on obtaining links that are attainable.

Directories are website that list links to other websites based upon categories. For example, a directory may have a category on food, which will in turn have sub categories on Asian food, European food, and so on. You should submit you website URL to the category that best describes your websites content. There are large amounts of directories in existence, a link from a directory is not worth much, but when you have several links from several directories, the link power soon adds up.

Blog comments are a great way to direct targeted traffic to your website, as well as build links to your website for search engine rankings. You can search for blogs that are related to the theme of your website, and post a constructive comment on one of their articles. Within that comment you should post a link back to your website. Other readers of the blog may choose to follow this link and visit your website. These links can be very powerful for improving your search engine ranking, particularly if they are on high page rank blogs.

Article writing is my favourite method. You submit original content articles to article directories such as ezine, on a wide range of subjects. Within the article, you place a link back to your website. Not only is this method great for driving traffic, since the article directories have a huge reader base, but you also get a high value link for search engine rankings. Just a few of these links pointing to one website is enough to improve that websites ranking, provided the niche is not too competitive.

Social bookmarking your URL in sites like digg and reddit will again not only drive traffic from readers of those sites, but also give you another valuable link for search engine rankings. You should post your URL in a relevant section with constructive comments. If your link is considered spam it will be deleted.

Forum posting is also an extremely successful way of driving traffic and gaining links. Join a forum on a subject related to your websites niche, and start becoming a valued member of the community by posting helpful information and advice. You may be allowed to leave a link to your site in your signature. As your online presence grows, you will soon see traffic coming from the forum, and the links will also help improve your search engine rankings.

Finally, another of my favourite methods is creating a blog on web 2.0 sites like hubpages. Links from these sites are very powerful, and the online blogging community is huge. If you create a valuable interesting blog, many people from those communities may also choose to visit your website.

These are some of the cornerstone methods that new webmasters can use to build links. The key is to ensure that your postings are relevant and not spam. If you provide useful content to accompany your links, you will surely be on the road to search engine ranking success.

Free quality back links simply don't exist. If you don't have a budget to spend you must invest a considerable amount of time getting them.

The reason is obvious - besides building quality content that interest other marketers, you also need to run a strong promotion campaign for the community to notice your work.

The best approach is to quit chasing links and focus on creating timely content that a) interests, b) draws attention and c) builds interaction/controversy around it.

You're probably well acquainted with the classic link sources but in this article I'll try to broaden your perspective with a few more pieces to the puzzle:

1. Alternatives to classical content syndication

2. More elusive methods of building links from private websites

3. Social media as a link provider

Although linking opportunities may be sprinkled in every corner of your niche market, in most cases your eagerness isn't met with the same feelings by your potential partners.

Instead of barging in with your one sided proposal, a better approach is to show your available for creating a unique piece of content to be added on their site, with the afferent link pointing back to your own site.

To prove your expertise, consider rendering a fragment of the future article. This shouldn't be a discarded advice due to the fact that today's web content is ninety percent repackaged information.

If you lack the qualities for producing a block buster article, but still have a solid understanding of your market, consider hiring a ghost writer to put your thoughts in print.

Lack inspiration or just want to exploit your existing work? Give it a thorough rewrite. This way you promote your writings to new readers and further enhance the site's relevancy due to keyword variation.

Article and press release directories should remain on your list of content destinations. The reason why I suggest supplementing them with topic related sites is because with some ADs, approving and indexing your content by SEs takes up to 2 weeks.

Plus, working with private blogs you can enjoy a certain doze of exclusivity, a rare commodity for directories with hundreds of registered writers.

I highly recommend making sure you target well positioned sites. Check their Alexa rankings and authority (PageRank) before contacting them.

Tip. One of the easiest way to find the best sites and directories to publish your content is by tracking established authors and get your content on the same sites; that's called piggy backing on their resources.

When providing a testimonial, the recipient, invariably, must embed a link back to your site. If they don't, you might as well retract your feedback.

Also testimonials can be translated in reciprocal promotion within an established marketing partnership.

At all times, be sincere in your appraise because promoting junk products could hurt your credibility.

Just promote products and services from recognized marketers which deliver results.

Social bookmarking sites are an easy-picking source for free back links, granted that you don't "succeed" in getting you accounts canceled for promoting exclusively your own content.

The top social bookmarking platforms have strict rules regarding abusive behavior, but this benefits you in terms of fast indexing by search engines and link juice or authority as they're well regarded by Google, Yahoo and MSN.

Apart from social bookmarking you can use social media platforms like HubPages and Squidoo where you create useful tutorials and "how to"s of interest for your niche.

HubPages and Squidoo ranking power is often neglected but the truth is that young business websites don't stand a chance against even newly launched pages (or lenses) on these two domains.

So, in order to expose your content rapidly, publish it on these sites, then improve the authority of these pages with a basic link building campaign. Finally, point some back links from these platforms back to your own site.

Avoid bookmarking on sites powered by open source software like Pligg and Ning because they don't get indexed on a regular basis by search engine.

It's never been harder to keep up with the latest web trends - with the expansion onto mobile platforms, the growth of social media and the need for start ups to be aware of new SEO techniques. Constructing a mobile website, creating social media campaigns and selling online are just some of the challenges businesses will face during 2010.

Here are top online trends for the next 12 months.

Every web-savvy business knows smartphone use is on the rise. But few are actively developing for mobiles by creating websites specifically used for handheld devices.

As more and more mobile users flock to gadgets with larger touchscreens and internet browsers, such as the iPhone or Google Nexus One, the mobile space will become bigger and SMEs need to get on board. If your website isn't accessible through a smartphone or app, users will give up and go somewhere else - losing you traffic and potential sales.

Using search engine algorithms in order to get your site on "page one" has been a tactic used by online businesses for years. But SEO experts say the process of getting a website known will become even harder in 2010 with the rise of personalised and real-time search.

Social network Twitter sparked a trend when it designed the first popular real-time search engine. When users search for a term, the site would update that search with new "tweets" as they were being made.

Google has recently introduced a real-time search function of its own, complete with indexed tweets, while Microsoft Bing has made a deal to show tweets in search results. B

Facebook and Twitter were the standout social networks from 2009, and their popularity will surge in 2010 with both introducing new features, including paid accounts for business.

But businesses need to pay attention to the trends on these sites. Creating a social media strategy is no longer optional, it is vital to the health of a company and its ability to tap into an online user-base.

Some experts say if you aren't engaging online, you're missing out on a huge opportunity to gain new customers and fans who will effectively market for you if given enough reason. 2010 will be the year in which businesses must jump on social media or risk being left behind by the competition.

More and more Australian businesses are selling online, but compared to the US they have a lot of catching up to do. Online spending has grown from 1% to 3% of overall spending over the last 10 years, compared to the American equivalent of 7%.

The internet advertising industry continued to grow in 2009 and will do the same in 2010, but the next 12 months is expected to see the ongoing development of mobile advertising.

Last year the Interactive Advertising Bureau forecast the online ad market to pass $2 billion by next month, representing a 27% increase from 2008. While the downturn forced spending down in 2009, it's safe to assume that figure will rise in 2010.

The mobile advertising scene is fairly new, so naturally few SMEs are actually investing in the sector. But Apple's recent acquisitions of Quattro, along with Google's purchase of AdMob, shows the big players are serious about the mobile space.

Most businesses are at least operating a website, but even those rejecting the online space need to be aware of how fast rumours and allegations can fly in the digital age. Several companies have had their reputations tarnished within hours from the activities of either rogue employees, or a botched advertising campaign.

Last year, Domino's Pizza landed itself into trouble when two employees posted a video of themselves handling food unhygienically on the internet. Cotton On experienced backlash on Facebook when it continued to sell baby clothes with slogans such as "They Shake Me".

While mobile advertising may be taking awhile to heat up, many businesses are developing new and interesting mobile marketing campaigns to draw people into their stores.

Google has developed a system whereby users take a picture of a barcode with their mobile phone and use the search engine to find information. But it isn't just big companies which are using mobiles for marketing. Peter Shipman, who owns a casual Mexican restaurant in the US, bought ads in university newspapers to advertise a barcode sent through text messages used to claim discounts.

US company Jagtag is now developing a technology used to identify barcodes through camera phones, when it is then sent via text message in order for the user to receive a discount code.

The growth of the internet has allowed businesses to publish content of their own, including blogs, pictures and even videos.

Once upon a time, businesses wouldn't trust open-source programs in favour of branded, more trustworthy software solutions. But now open-source has given SMEs a way of operating high-end programs without substantial costs.

With popular programs such as Mozilla Thunderbird, Open Office, WordPress and Joomla now gaining notoriety, organisations are beginning to realise open-source programs aren't just technically inferior rip-offs, but legitimate alternatives.

A number of organisations, including the British Government and the French police force, have openly supported open-source, while Gartner research from late-2008 indicates the majority of businesses in the Asia/Pacific region took up open-source in 2009.

And with the development and popularity of open-source Android operating system continuing to grow, open-source is likely to play a major part in a business's IT strategy in 2010.

Two years ago "cloud computing" was viewed by many businesses as a buzzword with no particular meaning, used by tech-heads who didn't quite know what they were talking about.

Now, using cloud services has become an essential for businesses. Whether they are backing up their data or using a piece of software hosted on external servers, cloud computing is now a part of everyday operations for many SMEs.

Cloud services have branched out into three main categories: applications, also known as software-as-a-service, infrastructure, used for data backups, and internal service providers for businesses with customised apps and programs.

Analyst firm Gartner recently named cloud computing as one of the top strategic technologies for 2010, saying it could be exploited in a number of different ways to customise programs and apps to a particular company's needs.

"Using cloud resources does not eliminate the costs of IT solutions, but does rearrange some and reduce others. In addition, consuming cloud services enterprises will increasingly act as cloud providers and deliver application, information or business process services to customers and business partners."

In order to succeed and combat the competitive online world, you need to maintain a good reputation online. A good reputation does not only require a good website design but a lot more to build confidence, to grow sales and ultimately leads to better revenues and higher profitability.

In today's Internet buzz nasty rumors, wrong opinions and incorrect news spread rapidly and if not taken timely action to handle the news properly, you may face a serious threat to your online business and credibility.

Here are some simple measures you can take to maintain your website's reputation:

1. Responding to customers

Being open and responsive to customers is an important part of creating a positive impression and managing your website's reputation. If someone asks you a question, answer it there or through e-mail. Be quick in addressing your customer issues before the word spreads.

2. Giving humble responses to negative comments

Be real, not everyone is satisfied with your work and services. If these people are among the ones spreading negative comments about you for whatever reason like delayed service or unfriendly attitude, answer them instantly to terminate the issue right there!

Be very polite when putting your point of view in front of such people and you'll sure succeed in saving your reputation. Answering negative remarks modestly can be a great way of turning a bad situation into positive one.

3. Creating official online profiles

Create your own platform for users to share their experiences they've had with you. Create your own profiles and websites complete with the kind of information you actually want to be available about you. Let users communicate with each other and comment about your products or services, whether positive or negative.

4. Reporting stolen material from you

It's very well possible that online competitors may steal material from your website to increase their ranking and traffic. This may lose your credibility among your users, making you "not-so-unique" in their eyes. To control such theft, you can report their site through strict action.

5. Blogging

Writing blog posts are extremely effective in promoting your business. Through blog reviews and blog comments, you even increase your chance of getting high traffic volumes to your website.

If you or any of the experts in your business have important knowledge like instructions, guidelines, tips and tricks that can be useful for the users, share them through writing blog posts, let say you write blog for "basic tips for web design". This will greatly enhance your online reputation.

6. Using Search Engine Optimization

Majority of the internet users accept results from Google searches or any other search engine as highly credible. Therefore, to maintain a good website reputation, don't forget to optimize your website. You can consult professional search engine optimization services for this purpose.

7. Using the social media

Setting up social media networks in order to maintain your website's online reputation is a great thought. To begin with, set up your profiles on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and MySpace. Once you have your accounts setup, you will need to do the following things:

- Create a complete profile by putting all the information

- Engage and Interact with the members

- Monitor comments for both positive and negative remarks

You might have spend good time and money for your website design and building up your website's good reputation, so it's important not to let anyone drag it through the mud. Follow the above given tips to maintain your positive reputation among the online community. Keep active in social networks even in emergency situations so that everyone who have been associated with you know you are still around. If your clients find you handling difficult situations rather than running away, they will be more confident of working with you more and more.

A standard social media campaign helps spread the word about you and encourages other people to as well.

An explosive social media campaign has inherent viral exposure, inspires community driven communication, helps make the web a better place, and even brings joy to people, however fleeting.

When you share in social media, if your goal is just to get more people to see your links, you're on the right track, but at the same time, you're limiting your potential. You may think that getting explosive results from social media will take more time, energy and money, but this doesn't have to be the case.

If you're a business owner, you know that working harder doesn't necessarily mean better results - what if you're working hard on the wrong thing?

Sometimes the remedy is working smarter. Here are a few small changes you can make to your social media approach that can propel your social media results from lukewarm to smoking hot.

Explosive Social Media Tactic #1 - Hot Content

The cornerstone to any social media campaign is the content. If you get this component wrong, it doesn't matter if all other elements are perfect. Study what's going hot in your targeted topic and find a unique angle to tailor your content into what people already like, without stealing their ideas.

Explosive Social Media Tactic #2 - Niched Network Nuances

The more tightly focused your submissions to social media sites are, the more likely they are to go viral, whether they are links you share by other people or yours. Here's the logic.

People follow other people with similar interests. They're on sites like Google, Yahoo, Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon, Delicious and Digg actively looking for new content. Put those two things together and you have a whirlwind of clicks happening. The only question is, will it be your link that gets clicked or passed over?

Having 5000 connections on Twitter or Facebook is useless if you are connected to people who don't want your broadcasts, and you're just as useless to them if you don't want theirs. If my interest is in improving my existing business and you're trying to get me to sell your network marketing products, it doesn't matter how many times you ask me. If I'm not interested, your continued broadcasts will be ignored, or worse yet, blocked completely.

It's about the perfect balance of quality AND quantity.

And if I'm not paying attention to you, I can't and won't spread your message. If you are in network marketing, why not go after people who love the network marketing concept but can't seem to find the right company? That's a perfect match, and can dramatically cut down your search for the right partners and prospects.

Explosive Social Media Tactic #3 - Simplify Sharing

It amazes me how many people miss this one.
You've got great content. You've got a massive, niched network.

Why feed them content that's hard to share? Does that report have to be in PDF format? If so, does it have to be behind an opt-ín wall if you're spreading it among people who have Already opted in? Anyone connected to your business through its Facebook page, or your Twitter stream is also part of your opt-ín list. Yes, it would be best if they were on your email newsletter list, but what faster way to get them there than to show them you don't need to hold them prisoner there?

If your whitepaper is of such high value that you don't want it to spread, well, that's something different. But if you're sharing it so other people will spread it, make it easy for others to share.

Put a few sharing links on your page.
Make it easy for them to Retweet.
The easier it is for them to share, the more likely they are to do it.

Explosive Social Media Tactic #4 - Consistency

And now we come to the area I fail at the most. It's one of the things I know I need to do, but I haven't quite gotten the hang of how to brainstorm, create and distribute quality content consistently, and still give the best possible service and support to my customers and clients. I always err on serving people who have bought from me, figuring that next blog post can wait until tomorrow.

Then at some point, I noticed a decline in return traffic - people weren't coming back because they'd already heard everything I had to say. The solution? I got help for my content creation process. The ideas are still mine, but I was able to barter help for research, transcribing, and editing. I am also able to get audio and video polished much less expensively than I thought, though I don't always use this option due to time constraints.

The other thing that helped a lot was getting over my perfectionism complex. Release your content as soon as you can. I can't tell you how much money I've left on the table from my old fear of the typo and grammar police. Not to mention the fact that I felt like I was leaving my audience hanging.

You subscribe to something because you want to get regular updates. If your favorite daily news show started coming on once a week, you'd probably switch channels. If you're inconsistent without explanation, your audience numbers will drop and your network will fade.

Explosive Social Media Tactic #5 - Think Engagement

Measuring your results by page view alone is a thing of the past. When the web was mostly text and images, it made some sense that how many pages a visitor viewed at your site was a true measure of engagement.

Nowadays this isn't the case. You want to look instead at how long people are at your site. The exception, of course, is when customers are coming to your site to buy, and the order processing system takes them off your page. But if people aren't leaving your site because they're ready to buy or subscribe, you truly must look at why they aren't paying more attention to your content, and what changes you can make to get them to stay.

This is critically important in understanding which content will go viral naturally. What posts are people staying on your site to comment on? When do they take a few extra seconds to retweet? Are they watching your videos all the way through?

Your website can have a million hits daily, but if the visitors don’t become customers, then those hits are worth very little.

The fact is you must pay attention to conversions for your businesses to survive. In general, the basic e-commerce formula works like this:

1. Driving traffic to the website.

2. Converting the traffic to leads.

3. Converting leads to customers.

4. Generating repeat purchases from your customers.

Bonus products can be an essential variable in converting your visitors to customers. However, offering bonuses are more than just putting the words “But wait – there’s more,” in your offer. The key is to know what types of bonuses will have the strongest effect on your prospects.

1. The Web Traffic to Conversions Process.

As a business owner, you have several tasks to make your business successful. First, you must drive traffic to your website. In addition, once you have website visitors, you must convert those visitors into clients or customers. While a lead does not necessarily equal a sale, it does equal a future potential sale. Once you have a prospect’s name and email address, you’re able to move into step two – converting them to customers and making sales.

Bonus products work very well as a tool to build your opt-in list and offering a free giveaway in exchange for an email address is a common lead generating mechanism. What you offer and how you offer it largely depends on your target audience.

In cases where you’re selling an expensive product, a substantial bonus product or a series of bonus products can help convince your prospects them they’re making the right decision.

You can use bonuses to build your sales in a number of alternative methods. Here are just a few ideas to get your creative juices flowing:

• One way to do this is to tier rewards so that the more the customer buys, the more bonuses the customer receives – for example, increasing membership status from silver to gold and gold to platinum.

• Consider giving away bonuses to customers who help you build your opt-in list. For example, you could reward every email a friend gives leads toward a bonus.

• Consider giving away bonuses to prospects and customers who are active and participate in your online community.

2. Why Do Bonuses Work?

In general, bonuses are defined as products or services you give away to incite a purchase, a subscription, a referral, or even an opt-in. You’re probably very familiar with bonus items, so let’s take a look at why they’re so effective.

Bonuses tap into several psychological triggers, including:

• Reciprocity. Reciprocity is the tendency we have as people to respond to something in kind. Bonuses are the epitome of positive reciprocity. Customers receive a free guide, a free video, a free e-book as an opt-in bonus – now they’re feeling grateful.

• Commitment and Consistency. Psychologists tell us that we’re more likely to say yes to something big if we’ve already said yes to something smaller. In short, it gets your prospects in the habit of saying ‘yes’.

• Liking. Who doesn’t like someone who gives them something for free? People buy from companies they like, and from personalities they relate to.

• Scarcity and Urgency. Use a limited bonus or give an extra bonus to customers who act quickly. It motivates people to purchase now rather than wait and possibly change their mind.

3. How to Create Bonuses for Your Target Market.

Even though your business may involve a niche topic, your customers are probably diverse and have diverse personalities, interests, and technological capabilities. We all have our own motivations and behaviors influenced by our personality. Learning to meet the needs and wants of the characteristics can help you create bonuses that cover a range of personalities.

Keep in mind that your customers will likely include many or all of the following ‘types’:

• Emotional Personalities - Many of these people make decisions based upon their feelings.

• Thinking Personalities - These are the people who like to plan, schedule and solve situations.

• Extroverted Personalities - These are the folks who tend to be open and comfortable in new environments.

• Introverted Personalities - These want to take it slower and make personal connections.

• Intuitive personalities - They have a natural ability to think outside the box.

Remember that each prospect has their own personality. Give them options and consider creating one great bonus to be packaged in a number of different formats to appeal to more people.

4. Creating Your Bonuses.

This is where many people drop the ball - they throw together sloppy bonuses or simply by resell rights to something that’s been distributed by a million other websites – in short, they stop taking their prospects into consideration.

Let’s take a look at three primary ways you can create eye catching and valuable bonuses.

• Resell Rights/PLR. The internet is full of companies and websites that mass-produce bonuses for you to give away on your own website.

• Creating Your Own Product. While creating your own eBook, video tutorial or software program can be a bit of work, it can also be tremendously rewarding and you’ll be sure you’re creating the quality products your prospects and customers deserve. If you already have a stockpile of great content, you can repurpose it to create new and valuable bonus products. Creating multiple bonuses from one packet of information is a great way to accomplish that task.

• Outsource The Job - Hire A Company Or Individual To Develop Your Bonuses. When outsourcing there are a few success tips: Determine in advance exactly what you want the freelancer to accomplish. Outline your project in advance - it will ensure communication is clear and the project is done the way you want.

Armed with this information, you can start planning and preparing the bonuses that will give you more paying customers.

Recently I was asked by one of my friends whether web browser compatibility is something that one should take care of when designing a website. It was an easy reply  - "Yes".  As usual the next question was  "Why?". I gave him my answer and I would like to share it with my readers too.

Nowadays, there are several web browsers available and as a result, it has become crucial for website owners and developers to ensure that their websites are compatible with all the browsers on all the platforms. Let's face it; in this day and age one would think that you could open a website with any browser but unfortunately different browsers interpret HTML and CSS in different ways, which of course has an impact on how things are viewed on your monitor. Because of this, it's crucial that the CSS and HTML of a website are optimised and programmed to be compatible with all the available web browsers.

While this certainly does require considerably more work, it can essentially result in your website getting a number of new users. Furthermore, one should also bear in mind that certain browsers are more popular than others. Firefox for example now has approximately 30% of the browser market while Internet Explorer still continues to be the leader with approximately 60% (although statistics suggest this varies in different countries). Safari accounts for approx 5% of the market while Google Chrome and Opera currently have more or less two to three percent of the market but this is only to be expected considering they're still relatively new in the game. One of the main reasons why Internet Explorer has managed to dominate the market for so long, is because it comes preinstalled with the Windows operating system. However, its ease of use has also helped to ensure it retains the top spot.

Of course, computers which run on the Windows operating system will in most cases already have all the necessary plug-ins installed so that the browser is ready to use immediately. Computer owners who decide to switch over to Firefox can sometimes wonder if the browser is working properly. For example, if you have just switched over to Firefox and you visit certain sites, you may be prompted to download an ActiveX application. However, even though some people may find this to be an inconvenience, Firefox has just recently celebrated their 1 billionth download and there are no signs to suggest this trend is changing.

In fact, the number of people using Firefox continues to increase by the day with many believing it to be better than Internet Explorer, largely because of its noticeable stability. Even though this may be true to a certain extent, it's also worth noting that Firefox has gone to great lengths in order to retain the old Netscape Communicator appearance and this of course is something which appeals to those looking for a little nostalgia.

The Opera web browser is also enjoying increasing popularity although it has been experiencing certain issues lately regarding various web pages. As a result, website owners and developers need to make an effort in order to make their code compatible, so that this browser can function as it should. In order to determine whether or not this browser is compatible with your website, you can simply use the browser to access your site so that you can see for yourself how things appear on your monitor.

Not only should you do this in order to ensure your site is compatible with all browsers, but you'll also be doing the wider community a favour, in that nobody enjoys wasting their time by visiting a web site which, because of their browser, fails to open properly.

The bottom line is, if you're able to ensure your website is compatible with all browsers then you really need to do so.Make it a point that your website is compatible with all web browsers especially those on the top which can bring you more people than the others.

Keeping a close watch on how Google is ranking pages on the web, one very serious concern is the issue of plagarisation or duplicate content. More importantly, how does having duplicate content on your site and on other people's sites, affect your keyword rankings in Google and the other search engines?

Nowadays, Google is much more open about just how it ranks content. Google's whole "do as I say" attitude leaves a bitter taste in most webmasters' mouths. Mainly because, regardless of whether you love or hate Google, there's no denying they are King of online search and you must play by their rules or leave a lot of serious online revenue on the table. Now, for my major keyword content/pages even a loss of just a few places in the rankings can mean I lose hundreds of dollars in daily commissions, so anything affecting my rankings obviously gets my immediate attention.

So the whole tricky issue of duplicate content has caused me some concern and I have made an ongoing mental note to myself to find out everything I can about it. I am mainly worried about my content being ranked lower because the search engines think it is duplicate content and penalizes it.

My situation is compounded by the fact that I am heavily into article marketing - the same articles are featured on hundreds, some times thousands of sites across the web. Naturally, I am worried these articles will dilute or lower my rankings rather than accomplish their intended purpose of getting higher rankings.

I try to vary the anchor text/keyword link in the resource boxes of these articles. I don't use the same keyword phrase over and over again, as I am nearly 99% positive Google has a "keyword use" quota - repeat the same keyword phrase too often and your highly linked content will be lowered around 50 or 60 places, basically taking it out of the search results. Been there, done that!

I even like submitting unique articles to certain popular sites so only that site has the article, thus eliminating the whole duplicate content issue. This also makes for a great SEO strategy, especially for beginning online marketers, your site will take some time to get to a PR6 or PR7, but you can place your content and links on high PR7 or PR8 authority sites immediately. This will bring in quality traffic and help your own site get established.

Another way I combat this issue is by using a 301 re-direct so that traffic and pagerank flows to the URL I want ranked. You can also use your Google Webmaster Tool account to show which version of your site you want ranked or featured: with or without the www.

The whole reason for doing any of this has to do with PageRank. You want to pass along this ranking to the appropriate page or content. This can raise your rankings, especially in Google.

Anyway, this whole duplicate issue has many faces and sides, so I like going directly to Google for my information. Experience has shown me that Google doesn't always give you the full monty, but for the most part, you can follow what they say. Lately, over the last year or so, Google seems to have made a major policy change and are telling webmasters a lot more information on how they (Google) rank their index.

So if you're concerned or interested in finding out more about duplicate content and what Google says about it try these helpful links. First one is a very informative video on the subject entitled "Duplicate Content & Multiple Site Issues" which is presented by Greg Grothaus who works for Google.

Another great link is this page from Google Webmasters Support Answers by Matt Cutts. It has a lot of helpful information, including a video on the Canonical Link Element.

In yet another post, Matt Cutts discusses the related issue of content scraping and advises webmasters not to worry about it. This is a slightly different matter, other webmasters and unmentionables may use software to scrape your site and place your content on their site. This has happened to me, countless times, including when my content has been reduced to scrambled nonsense. Cutts says not to worry about this matter as Google can usually tell the original source of the material. In fact, having links in this duplicate content may just help your rankings in Google.

"There are some people who really hate scrapers and try to crack down on them and try to get every single one deleted or kicked off their web host," says Cutts. "I tend to be the sort of person who doesn't really worry about it, because the vast, vast, vast majority of the time, it's going to be you that comes up, not the scraper. If the guy is scraping and scrapes the content that has a link to you, he's linking to you, so worst case, it won't hurt, but in some weird cases, it might actually help a little bit."

As a full time online marketer I am not so easily convinced, I mainly have pressing concerns about my unscrupulous competition using these scrapings and duplicate content to undermine one's rankings in Google by triggering some keyword spam filter. Whether in fact this actually happens, only Google knows for sure, but it is just another indication, despite the very detailed and helpful information given above, duplicate content and the issues surrounding it, will still present serious concerns for online marketers and webmasters in the future.

Microsoft released a new 24 page document titled "Bing: New Features Relevant to Webmasters white paper" on July 22,2009. The PDF file provided for download not only talks about the updates on Bing, Microsoft's own decision search engine, but also provides SEO tips for webmasters and web publishers. In addition, the white paper document contains instructive guidelines on how to create friendly, easy to index websites, as well as ways to make sites look attractive to search engine spiders.

Bing's primary function is to bridge users with websites and content across the Internet, a target all search engines aim for. So, what is different from other search engines you may ask? Unlike ordinary search engines, Bing offers categorized choices. Users can select options from the side tool bar, picking more to-the-point selections which, in the end, will reduce the amount of irrelevant sites popping up and saving the Bing users a lot of valuable time.

Did you know that more than 300 factors are used in determining categorization and that the categories that appear are entity-dependent? Bing categorizes every search to a number of smaller groups which the user can choose to avoid irrelevant results. For example: if you search for [baby monitor], the search results may offer you options, such as "shopping", "reviews", "ratings", and "videos", splitting up the search in convenient sections. Microsoft believes that this innovative way of organizing results provides new long tail opportunities for website owners.

A key objective of Bing is to deliver premium search results and one of the ways the search engine approaches this goal is through a new feature called "Best match". Watch what happens when you conduct a search for a particular brand, such as Adidas, Toys R Us, Campbell's, or Chrysler. The result is amazing. Bing will actually separate the official sites of these brands from the rest of the results, featuring a "Best Match".

One of the cool features Bing has to offer is "Bing Hover links". Just hover your mouse over your search results and a window will pop up on the right of it. It will show a summary of that specific query result, as well as and important links related to that result. Webmasters feel this feature increases qualified traffic and helps searcher to find the information they want without having to leave the Search Engine Result Page (SERP). This time-saving feature is truly appreciated by Bing users. They have made sure that the hover page helps the user to get what the user really looks for.

Through intelligent data extraction, Bing is able to compile useful information in the hover link section. This includes addresses, phone numbers, and email links the search engine has gathered not only from the content of a specific page, but from anywhere else on the Internet. This saves lots of time for users looking for details about some site, company or someone for that instance.

Websites saturated with Flash and Silverlight-based content often lack readable Meta data text. Titles and descriptions in the HTML source code are so poor, web crawlers hardly notice them. In an effort to bring these empty-tagged websites out of obscurity, Bing implemented a new technology capable of extracting limited data. This brings the flash based websites to obtain higher rankings in spite of having no meta data for other search engines to crawl for.

Recently upgraded, Bing's "Instant answers" feature now offers even more comprehensive and richer results to informal queries than ever. Type in a short question in the query box and wait to be impressed by the result!

Businesses should take advantage of the opportunity to list their company with Bing's newest addition, the Local Listings Center.

Searchers who do not know how to start a new or specific search often refine their keywords and phrases halfway through their query. Furthermore, the more information is available, the more people adapt the way they search and surf the Internet. Microsoft has done a number of intense studies to analyze specific search patterns and behaviors. As a result, updates and additions were initiated. Microsoft's goal is to improve searcher satisfaction by delivering faster, more accurate and complete results. It is a tough objective that, perhaps, is closer in reach than you think.

For those of you using advanced SEO techniques such as PageRank sculpting, you might want to listen up.

Head of Google’s crime spam fighting team, Matt Cutts, put the cat amongst the pigeons last month when he answered an audience question at the SMX Advanced conference about the value of using rel=”no follow” for PageRank sculpting purposes. When asked if it was a good idea to use nofollow when linking around within your site, Matt said no. NoFollow is a method to annotate a link to say to search engines “I don’t want to vouch for this link.” In Google, nofollow links don’t pass PageRank.

According to Matt, more than a year ago, Google changed how the PageRank flows so that links WITHOUT nofollow would flow lesser points of PageRank than before and that links WITH the nofollow attribute would count toward how PageRank is divided up amongst all links on a page. Seems SEOs and webmasters were getting a little bit trigger happy with their use of rel=”no follow” for Google crawl prioritization and were accidently blocking Googlebot from indexing important parts of their site.

Matt later clarified the issue with his blog post PageRank Sculpting : “We noticed some sites that attempted to change how PageRank flowed within their sites, but those sites ended up excluding sections of their site that had high-quality information (e.g. user forums)… I wouldn’t recommend PageRank sculpting because it isn’t the most effective way to utilize your PageRank. In general, I would let PageRank flow freely within your site. The notion of “PageRank sculpting” has always been a second- or third-order recommendation for us. I would recommend the first-order things to pay attention to are 1) making great content that will attract links in the first place, and 2) choosing a site architecture that makes your site usable/crawlable for humans and search engines alike. For example, it makes a much bigger difference to make sure that people (and bots) can reach the pages on your site by clicking links than it ever did to sculpt PageRank. “

So the short story is this: PageRank sculpting is no longer effective as a SEO technique (if it ever was). For the most part, the more links on a page, the less PageRank each link gets. Keep that in mind whenever you’re optimizing your site and when you build new pages.

One of the biggest measurements of a website’s success is the stickiness of its visitor base. Generally web masters would rather have 1,000 visitors who return regularly as opposed to 3,000 visitors who only visit once or twice. These days the web is massive, carving out a niche for your site and gaining a following within that niche is the key to success.

There are many reasons why you should try to make your website as sticky as possible. Visitors who return regularly are more likely to purchase some of your products or content. If you have a membership site, then retaining your member base is critical for growing your income and long term success. Also, a faithful following will encourage viral promotion of your site. There are “five C’s” of stickiness to remember, and they are:

Regardless of the site’s design, without good content, the visitor will not come back or stay at the site for more than a few minutes. High quality content is far and away the most important factor in attracting people back to a Web site consistently, and keeping them there for more than a few minutes when they do visit. It is said, in fact, that content is what drives 75 percent of consumers to return to their favorite sites.

In addition to your site being content rich, try to also keep it fresh. At least part of your site will be regularly updated, preferably at least once a month. This is why web sites which resemble online brochures fail. Delivering the same content in a blog, posted in installments, can be much more effective. This will encourage users to come back regularly, as they check in to see what new content you’ve added lately. This is stickiness in a nutshell.

When a site attracts enough visitors with similar interests it has the potential to develop into a “community.” That can be very powerful for the site owner. Providing message forums, chat rooms, podcasts, user profiles, blogs, etc. are all tools to allow your visitors to interact with both you and each other. This also makes your site VERY sticky if you are able to develop a thriving community.

Rather than visiting your site once a month people may begin to visit it multiple times a week. Having a thriving community can be viewed as developing a site which is constantly developing its own content. Rather than requiring you to spend hours developing content, you can instead monitor the postings on your site to ensure they retain the kind of atmosphere you want for your site. As time goes by you may also be able to appoint some of your more responsible members to monitoring positions to do this job for you as well.

Communication is equally important as content and community. Communication includes building and maintaining your list, reaching out to people on your list, and interacting with visitors to your site. Try to respond to any question, comments, or feedback you receive promptly. This builds relationships with your visitors and will keep them coming back.

One of the best ways to reach out to customers is to offer quality, free information. This is basically a sample of what your site has to offer, and should always help address the questions your visitors came to your site for answers for. The very nature of the web stresses that you consider offering more free content to your customers than most other mediums do. You have too much competition to be stingy. One of the most effective means of providing content to customers and developing a list of potential customers at the same time is to offer a free guide to visitors who provide you with a name and email address.

For example, if you run a site teaching real estate tips and tricks, after your visitors have seen your “foot in the door” content located on your “splash page,” offer them the first lesson of your course on real estate for free in exchange for their name and email address. You benefit from this by having names to attach to the IP addresses of your visitors. This provides you with more information about who is being drawn into your site. It is also important you use a quality auto-responder for this step, as communication is a critical part of your site and must be handled professionally.

One last note on communication: Be sure to provide your name and contact information clearly throughout your site. It will frustrate and turn away visitors if they have a question or comment and cannot figure out how to reach you. By providing a name and place to reach you it also helps contribute to the last two “C’s…”

These are perhaps the two most important things that get overlooked in websites. First, effectively promote your site by using professional marketing and search engine optimization for the niche your site seeks to fill. Provide reliable, safe, and secure means for your customers to purchase your for-pay content. If your ordering method does not look safe, all your efforts working to sell your content to your visitors will be lost if they get to the order page and you look like an unprofessional, fly-by-night operator. Always use a secure ordering form. Offering a money back guarantee can be extremely helpful to reassure customers.

Lastly, respect your customer’s privacy. Make it clear you will not sell their names, personal information, or email addresses. People hate spam and will be hesitant to identify themselves to you out of fear of having their information sold if you do not provide some kind of assurance against this. A clear and easy to locate privacy policy is necessary.

It is well known that not everybody in the world speaks English as their primary language. It is also well known that while the first fact is true, the vast majority of all websites... and especially websites about Internet Marketing are written in English.Not everybody can be an expert in English but you really should consider the importance of spelling and grammar in your online content.

Would you allow an auto repairman to work on your car after he described such technical issues as "fixing the thingy there" or talking to you about "doo-hickers" and "thingamabobs"? The fact is that if you are going to allow someone to work on your car, you want them to know a carburetor from distributor and you want to know what they are working on and without a bunch of generic talk or worse yet... gobbledy-gook involved in the discussion.

In all likelihood, you would probably leave running and never go back. It may be that they are the greatest mechanic in the world but you would never know that because they could not establish your trust. How many sales pages have you seen where you were almost compelled to buy something that sounded really good but had second thoughts?

I personally know of one very admirable product that is nearly complete in every sense of the word and it really is an awesome product. The sales page is long, involved, detailed and laid out in all the right ways according to the copywriting gurus but conversion rates still hover somewhere around one to two percent. Why is that? Well it could be because it is an expensive product but somehow I doubt that is the case.

It happens to be a very in-depth and informative informational product for Internet Marketing that leads you by the hand from start to finish where you can get enough going to at least get started creating your virtual online empire. While it is actually an incredible product and you would definitely be interested if you saw it, most people will never actually see it.

The fact remains that when somebody is going to "plunk down" their hard-earned cash for an informational product, they want information. "Well Duh!" you say. Still, how are you ever going to trust someone to provide you with valuable and timely information that will actually help you if they can not even get a sales page up without a massive number of errors?

Are you going to trust them or are you going to run... whether consciously or not, because you are just not convinced that they know what they are talking about?

Nearly everybody is judgmental to a degree. If a fat, smelly, homeless looking person cut in front of you in the line you would be much more likely to get upset than you would if an extremely attractive person graciously intervened and thanked you for your kindness, beguiling you with their charm and good looks.

Facts are facts and no amount of discussion can change reality. The same principles hold true in website copy. If your website is full of errors that could have easily been avoided, it is costing you more than just a little lost ad revenue.

How important is spelling and grammar in online content? Do you want your readers coming back from more or running away without even giving you a chance?