Posts Tagged ‘blogging 101’

• If you have a Word Press blog, which is the platform for this particular blog, you may be excluding your blog from the Google Index without even realizing it.  Two of my clients were being excluded and I was left puzzled and questioning what I KNEW to be true.  Goes to show that you learn something new every day…and today I learned something new about Word Press.

• One of my clients has a Word Press blog, which he built himself using the free guide “blogging for buyers“.  He hired me to help him find a domain name and I felt really good about the domain we chose.  Based on all the research I did, it seemed as though the domain name alone would help him to yield good search results once he added some good content to the site.   Not So Much!  (learn more about how to chose a good domain name here.)

• No matter what we did and how I coached him, we couldn’t get Google to index his blog.  We have all of the SEO tools installed, had hand submitted the site to the Google Index and NOTHING! I hope this will all change with what I discovered today.  I wanted to bring it to your attention as well to make sure you have your Word Press blog set up properly to be indexed and crawled by Google, Technorati, etc.

• Follow these steps to make sure you are in good shape:

• On the left side of your Word Press screen, you will see “settings”, click on it.  A list of options will drop down, and one of those options is “privacy”, click on it. This is what you will see:
  

• Make sure that your site is set TO BE CRAWLED, and not set to block the search engines.  I am 100% sure that both of my clients who had their settings set to “block the search engines” did not choose that setting, which leads me to believe that it is the default setting.   I can’t think of any other way that it would have ended up “blocking” the search engines and I am very hopeful that now that it is fixed, Google will begin to crawl the site and we will see some activity.

• There is much more information regarding getting found on Google in the Getting Found On Google Section.  Good luck to you on finding your place in the Google Index.

P.S. Thank you for taking your time to visit and hope you find the information useful. I hope to help you learn everything you want and need to know about blogging. I welcome your questions (site specific is good) and definitely your suggestions. I hope to answer your questions before they come up or when you find that you have one. By clicking on the Orange RSS Feed button on the left side of the screen, you will be automatically updated of new information available without having to "check in" to see what's new. It's the easiest way to keep up to date. Thanks again for stopping in, I value your time!

• I recently came across a situation where one of my clients was told by his business consultant that his  blog was for one purpose only.  To educate people  and share good information.  My client was told that his blog should not be used for “marketing purposes” and I tend to disagree.

• If your blog isn’t to be used for “marketing”, then what is the purpose in having it?  Now don’t get me wrong, educating people and offering your visitors valuable information is crucial to the success of your blog, but factoring self promotion and marketing is also important.  You have to find good balance in your blog to make sure you are educating your readers, after all that is what most people are looking for when they read blogs, they want information and providing valuable information will keep them coming back for more.

• My recommendation to you when creating a blog post is to educate FIRST and market second.  If you approach your posts by marketing first, you will most likely loose the interest of your readers within a few moments.

• The best way to use your blog as a marketing tool is to provide valuable information with hyperlinks directly to your product pages where people can take action with the product or service you are offering.  It serves three purposes:

1. Blogs create fresh content which is what “Googlers” want and what Google wants to provide.
2. Leads potential clients to the place to take action
3. Create links throughout your site or from your blog to your site, which helps with your quest to work with Google.

• To learn everything you need to know about how to blog along with what to blog about read “profitable blogging”

• For those who wish to get started on blogging, whether it be to make money or to keep in touch with family and friends, trying to figure out what to name your blog can be one of your biggest challenges.   I have an easy solution to what many find to be a big “road block” to moving forward.

• If you want people to be able to find your blog via the Internet Search Engines like Google, the fastest and easiest road there is to find a domain name for your blog that matches what people are searching for related to your subject matter.  If you have read earlier posts on how to get found on Google, you understand that the Google algorithms are programmed to help people searching on Google to find the most relevant results. Typically, the most relevant results to any search would be a domain name that matches the search term…right?  If you “Google” nadine blogs, the number one result is currently www.nadineblogs.com, because the domain name matches the search term.

• You may be asking yourself how exactly you figure what people are searching for…and again…pretty easy to figure out…IF you know where to look.

• Google has a “keyword tool” I like to use to help me figure out what to name my websites and blogs, which I STRONGLY encourage you to utilize before you name your blog or register your domain name.  The best way to use this tool is to type in different search terms that match the desired subject of your blog.  You will see a list of results with numbers that indicate the search volume for each term.

• Your best bet is to find a term that has the highest number of search volume and try to buy a domain name to match it.  To give you a good example, I will use one of my most recent clients, “Moore’s Martial Arts” in Livermore, CA.  Moore’s doesn’t currently have a website or domain name for the school located in Livermore, so we are starting from scratch.

• The steps I went through to find the “perfect” domain name are as follows:

• I search using the keyword tool for terms that included Livermore martial arts.  Martial arts being the most generic term I could think of to describe what they do.  Upon doing my research, I found that there are close to 600 searches each month for the term “Livermore Martial Arts“.  When you consider the amount of search volume for that particular keyword, it would make great sense to see if I can obtain the domain name “Livermore Martial Arts”, which is exactly what we did.

• IMPORTANT NOTE: It is important for me to note that just because I have identified a great domain name that matches the search term, it in no way guarantees this website will make it to the front page of the search engines.  What helps get you to the front page of the search engines is good content that is relative to the term you wish to be found for.  It is also VERY important to submit your site to the search engines by submitting your site map.  No site map…no search results.

• Learn more about submitting your site to the search engines on this recent post. Your site will not be indexed until you submit your site map.  Make sure to read this post.

• Today, the FTC released updated guidelines for bloggers who endorse products and services.

• The updated guidelines from the FTC say the following:

• The revised Guides also add new examples to illustrate the long standing principle that “material connections” (sometimes payments or free products) between advertisers and endorsers – connections that consumers would not expect – must be disclosed. These examples address what constitutes an endorsement when the message is conveyed by bloggers or other “word-of-mouth” marketers. The revised Guides specify that while decisions will be reached on a case-by-case basis, the post of a blogger who receives cash or in-kind payment to review a product is considered an endorsement. Thus, bloggers who make an endorsement must disclose the material connections they share with the seller of the product or service. Likewise, if a company refers in an advertisement to the findings of a research organization that conducted research sponsored by the company, the advertisement must disclose the connection between the advertiser and the research organization. And a paid endorsement – like any other advertisement – is deceptive if it makes false or misleading claims.”

• Read the complete press release from the FTC here. To see the   complete guide published by the FTC, click here.  It is 81 pages and makes for great reading in the evenings you find it difficult to fall asleep. LOL

• It will be important to make sure people who read your blog know you are being compensated when you endorse a product.

• As I learn more about these new guidelines, I will post more.

• I could still most likely find more leads and prospects than most simply because I know how to blog! It usually isn’t in my nature to come off as so “arrogant” or “blunt” for lack of a better term, but I often feel like I am beating my head against a wall when it comes to helping out my “friends in the real estate business”.

 

• Though I do have a real estate license, I am not a Realtor, nor am I a mortgage originator or anything else I may need my license for. I am however the owner of PrinterBees, which I founded because I really…really…really wanted to help real estate professionals who were serious find new business as well as keep their businesses consistent with ongoing marketing programs that work. All you need is a little consistency – Did I mention the part about beating my head against the wall? This post isn’t about PrinterBees I (which I really do hope you will consider if you need printing done BTW…)

 

• This post is about something WAY MORE IMPORTANT and it sure costs a lot less too!  This is about how to use the Internet to build your business.

 

• I read a great post called “Why I’m Kicking Your Butt in Selling Real Estate“, By Bob Haywood and would encourage you to read it too! He is right on the money and I abosolutely love how blunt he is.

 

• As an Internet Junkie and one who really understand why the Internet is so crucial to your business, I am going to give this yet another try and HOPE…HOPE…HOPE…you may just take my word for it this time and actually follow through. Yes, follow through. As so many mentioned on the above mentioned post…put down the real estate magazine and do something different! If you don’t have a marketing plan that includes the Internet, your magazine won’t help you…trust me.

 

• I randomy picked the City of San Diego to try and help you understand the importance of having a presence on the Internet. I don’t have any clients there, so I won’t make anyone mad for sharing my secrets!

Currently (according to Google) EACH MONTH, there are approximately:

1. 165,000 searches for the term “San Deigo Real Estate”.
2. 8,100 searches for the term “Realtors San Diego”
3. 14,000 searches for the term “properties San Deigo”
4. 110,000 searches for the term “san diego houses”
5. 301,000 searches for the term “homes for sale san diego”

• This is just a VERY small example of the over half a million searches each month done by people looking to buy and sell real estate just in San Diego! Do I have your attention? THERE ARE OVER 500,000 people looking to buy and sell real estate in San Diego and I only listed off five search terms! There were thousands and thousands more that I didn’t take the time to add in.

 

•  Call me crazy, but I am thinking that if you have a website that is ranking anything close to page one on Google for any of the terms I mentioned above, I don’t think you have time to read a realtor magazine, because you are too busy running the bank to deposit your commission checks!

 

• It may seem like having and maintaining a website is like climbing Mount Everest without the proper training and preparation, but it really isn’t that hard with a little direction. Seriously, it isn’t that hard and I really want to help you.

 

• My first e-book, was profitable blogging and written to help people understand how to make money and residual income by blogging. I then authored “Blogging For Buyers”, After reading Bob’s post about why he is kicking your butt in real estate to help you get started with your website. He inspired me along with all the great responses I read following his post. Thanks Bob…I hope it helps!

 

• There is no catch, you don’t even have to register to download it, I only ask in return of my providing you with the steps by step instructions of how to get started, that you actually do it! At least try…what have you to loose? Oh…and if you need printing, please remember PrinterBees, it is how I eat.

 

• The book can be downloaded here and I also encourage you to visit my blog and subscribe to it. I am passionate about helping people learn how to utilize the Internet and I know it is what I was born to do….teach! The Internet is here, it’s really cheap when it comes to marketing and most importantly, it is what people are using to find what they are looking for. I hope they find you!

• I am often asked how to go about choosing the right keywords to optimize for with regards to Google and I have to tell you that it really is no easy task, it does take research and more importantly it takes time.  For companies that provide SEO services, one of the most time consuming aspects of doing SEO for any website, is determining the right keywords to optimize for.   There are several factors to consider when choosing your keywords and I am hoping this article will help explain what to look for and how to do it yourself.

• What needs to be considered when choosing your keywords is the following:

1. Who am I trying to attract?
2. What might they be looking for (“Googling”) when they enter a search term
3. How will I identify the most qualified prospects, the ones looking to make a purchase?
4. What is the competition for the keyword?  When you “Google” the keyword, how many results come up?  Is it 35,000,000 or is it 500,000?  Obviously it will be much more difficult to compete with 35 Million other websites vs. 1/2 million.
5. How many people are actually searching the keyword you wish to optimize for?
6. What words are “related” to the keywords you are optimizing for?  This is called your “semantic keywords”.  Semantic keywords are explained in the youtube video below.

   Here is the link to the Google Adwords/Keyword Tool so you can try it yourself
   The keyword we are after is “door hanger printing”, so you can Google it to see how we are doing.

• I encourage you to watch the video, which will explain how to accomplish what I have listed above.  It is also VERY important that you you use the tools Google makes available to you to increase your chances of being indexed.  If this all seems like a bit more work than you have time for.  I do have a team of people who do much of my SEO.  It is very time consuming, but if you have more time than money, I do encourage you to try it on your own first.  What have you to loose?  If you feel like you need help with your SEO and managing it, I provide SEO services for a monthly service fee starting at $499/mo.  The clients I work with do rank, do get traffic and do see an increase in business when we start optimizing their sites.  The investment pays for itself several times over.  Again, following all of the tutorials included here will help you to rank yourself.

Follow the series of videos to see how the rankings are coming along for “door hanger printing” and if what we are doing is working or not.

• The word “Blog” comes from the term “Web Blog”.  Web Blogs became a popular and easier way to communicate once the Internet came along than past methods like having a Pen Pal, mailing cards or even writing emails.  With a “blog”, friends and families can communicate with everyone at one time by simply adding a blog post and allowing everyone to have access to it

• When “blogging” first became popular, people used blogs as on-line diaries and journals.  One of the things that made it fun and exciting was giving family and friends the ability to comment on blog posts and interact with one another via their web logs.

• Websites like MySpace, used mostly by teenagers and young adults  really helped blogging  explode in popularity giving users the ability to post something on MySpace page and other users/friends could respond and interact about whatever had been posted.  Posting photos, change themes and customizing MySpace pages to fit personal tastes, the latest trends, or simply rebel against parents made it even more exciting and fun for this generation.

• Blogging became a new way of communicating with friends.  When other social websites like FaceBook and Twitter began to catch on, it closed the generation gap and kids found not only their friends had Facebook and Twitter accounts, they even found their grandparents “twittering” as a way to stay in touch.

• “Twittering” is considered “micro blogging” because you are limited to 140 in each “tweet”.  Read more about Twitter and how to participate in the post “Six Easy Twitter Lingo “Twips”.

• Because blogs offer dynamic content vs. static content with a standard HTML web page.  Search engines like Google have become more fond of blog sites because the content us much more fresh and up to date and therefore end up closer to the top of a search result in many cases.  With all of the talk about Search Engine Marketing and businesses trying to figure out the secret recipe to being indexed on page one of Google, more and more businesses are turning to blogs to create current content, make announcements and keep their clients up to date about their businesses.

• For businesses, a blog could and really should include announcements, market updates along with any and all commentary having to do with the industry the business is serving.  The more relevant and important the information, the more people will frequent the blog.  Businesses who have blogs and depend on their blogs as a communication tool, need to commit to keeping their blogs updated and current.  Businesses who don’t make that commitment and are fortunate enough to make their way up to the front page of Google because of their blogs, will soon find their websites lost in the shuffle without such a commitment.

• With regards to maintaining a company blog, it should fall under the specific job description of someone in the company who should be held accountable to keep it up to date.  In an ideal world, a blog is updated daily, but updating it two to three times per week is totally acceptable as well.

• The big thing to remember is to provide your readers quality and relevant information.  Filling your blog with a bunch of fluff meant to keep search engines happy will not help your business in the long run.

• Learn more about blogging for money by reading the free e-book, Profitable Blogging.  Profitable blogging includes everything you need to know to help you get started.

• Feel free to ask any questions you have regarding blogging or how to blog either below or on the “ask a question page”.

Happy Blogging! ~ Nadine

RoboForm – I use Roboform all day, every day and it saves me so0 much time and frustration!   With RoboForm, I am able to keep track of all my passwords, website links, affiliate sites I belong to and so much more.  Click here to check it out!

 

I keep all of my information on a flash drive that is with me at all times. I also keep a back up of it in my Drop Box in the event I loose my drive and then I always have access to my website addresses, log ins and passwords from anywhere in the world.

 

Drop Box - Can I tell you how many times I have been saved by my faithful dropbox, which costs me all of about $9/mo?  Dropbox keeps a copy of files on your hard drive out on the Internet and available from anywhere in the world!  At a seminar yesterday, we needed a Power Point Presentation that wasn’t with us badly.  No Problem!  Pulled up Drop Box, opened the file and was editing it within about 1 minute.  If my hard drive were to crash, while it would SUCK big time…I wouldn’t have the stress of having lost all of my data, because there is an exact copy of it out on the Internet in my Drop Box account.  I also love that it is fully automated!  Click here to check it out and save your data from being lost!

 

A spreadsheet – if you don’t have Roboform - If you get tired of logging in to my affiliate sites to get the same link codes over and over, keep them in a spreadsheet, and make sure to save it in your Drop Box.

 

I personally use the “safe notes” feature in Roboform, because my Roboform is always up and then I don’t have to keep opening files.  When I get a new link code that I know I will want to use again, I copy and paste it in to my Roboform.  All the links are all in one place and I just copy and paste from there.  My recommendation would be to use Microsoft Works, because every windows machine comes with it and you can open it anywhere, even when using a computer that doesn’t have MS Office.  Make sure to note the expiration dates of any of your link codes so you can update them when necessary.

 

Artisteer -  Generate Your Own Word Press themes in Artisteer.  I have mentioned this blogging tool several times because I use it so frequently.  I can create a custom theme in less than 5 minutes if I am in a hurry. I can also get really creative and spend as much time as needed to get it just perfect.  You need absolutely NO PREVIOUS DESIGN EXPERIENCE to use this tool and it is super user friendly and easy to learn.  I have created videos to help you learn even faster – click here to see how fast and easy it is.

Quick Press -  Have you read a great article or had a great thought, but didn’t have the time to write a complete blog?  I use the Quickpress feature in Word Press to make notes to myself about blogs I want to write.  I write some notes, save it as a draft and come back it to later so I don’t loose my thought or idea.  If it is going to be a good blog post, it will still be a good blog post two days later!  I wrote this particular blog post as a draft that I came back to later when I had the time to complete my thoughts on it.

 

Ring Central Phone and Fax- Ring Central is a time saver for bloggers or any small business owner.   This is the service that we use for PrinterBees that makes it “appear” we are in an office location vs. working from a home office.    You have the ability to create extensions for different departments that can all ring to one number, you can accept all of your faxes through Ring Central, to the same number.  All faxes come in through your email and they come through on a PDF so you don’t even have to worry about misplacing pieces of paper and they are very easy to forward to the person who needs to deal with it.  We are very happy customers of Ring Central.