What Makes Quality Content?

Posted by Denise Griffitts on Sep 20, 2010 in Entrepreneurism, Internet Mastery | 0 comments

What Makes Quality Content?

“Language is the apparel in which your thoughts parade before the public.
Never clothe them in vulgar or shoddy attire.” ~  George Crane

Whether you write about the virtual assistance industry or scrap booking, there are key ingredients that go into the creation of a good article. Providing quality content involves providing website visitors and readers with information they find useful and informative. While the details will vary, depending on your topic and article structure, there are some common ingredients of quality content:

Answer a question.
People visit your website and your blog for one simple reason. What is in it for them?

• How can you help them find answers to their questions?
• What answers are people in your niche market searching for?
• What are the frequently asked questions in your niche?
• Are there subject areas in your niche for which few articles have been written?

Find out what readers in your niche are looking for and write articles that will answer those questions. Brainstorm a list of questions and topics. Providing the answers that readers (and potential buyers) are searching for will help to establish you as an expert who meets their needs.

Do the research to find out what your readers want answers to.

• Place a poll or survey on your website or blog. Survey Monkey offers a free Basic plan. Google “free online polls” to find other services.
• Send an appeal to your list and ask them what they want to know. People are genuinely disposed to be helpful and you will be surprised how many great answers you receive. Email marketing services like Constant Contact offer online polls as part of their service.
• Go to Facebook, Twitter and Linkedinand do some research on your niche. There is a wealth of information there. Join groups on LinkedIn, Facebook Fan Pages and target people in your industry on Twitter and follow them.

Write clearly and accurately.
Minimizing – or eliminating – grammatical and spelling mistakes is essential to good, high-quality content. Before submitting any article for publication, run spell check and proofread it to catch any spelling and grammar issues. If possible, have another set of eyes look at the article to catch anything that you missed. I always hand off my articles to my assistant to see where I might have missed something. Another tip is to read your work out loud to catch awkward phrasing or repetitions.

Include a compelling title.
If your title isn’t interesting, no one is ever going to get to your beautifully crafted article. Scan a few newsletters and blogs and see what articles and posts grab your attention. When in doubt, consider possible titles that include “5 Ways to…” or “10 Tips for… or “How to…” Such titles always attract readers who expect short tidbits and quick reads for their time. Good titles require some effort, but since the title is the first thing potential readers see, it’s worth your time to craft a strong one!

Be concise.
Online readers prefer short articles, ideally those between 300 – 500 words. There’s a fine line between providing enough content to answer your reader’s quest for information while not providing such a long article that they don’t make it to the end to click on your resource box. If your article is too long, consider breaking it up into a series as I have done with these article marketing tips.

What makes quality content? It’s content that a reader is looking for, that answers questions, offers information a reader wants and promises more of the same if they click on your link. Quality content is what will attract visitors to your website and make your article marketing efforts work.

Resources

Free Report: 5 Steps to a Big-Profit, S.M.A.L.L. Report Business by Jimmy D. Brown

Easy PLRis a wonderful resource that will help you find an ongoing supply of fresh content for your blog or article marketing efforts. However, I highly recommend that you edit and re-write these articles in your own voice. Use them as a jumping off point and then take it from there.

Need an Article. When you need well-crafted and well-written content for business, for website, or for personal reasons Need an Article has the solution to your writing needs. Again, the same suggestions about editing and re-writing these articles in your own voice applys.

Be sure to signup for our newsletter so these articles arrive in your email box when they are published.

5 Steps to Marketing Your First Article

Posted by Denise Griffitts on Sep 19, 2010 in Internet Mastery | 0 comments

5 Steps to Marketing Your First Article

Words are timeless. You should utter them or write them with a knowledge of their timelessness. ~ Khalil Gibran

For many people, the idea of actually sitting down and writing an article stops them cold. You may wonder if you have anything worth saying, or if your writing is “good” enough for publication. If it makes you feel any better, virtually every writer – even the professionals – start out with the same fears. In fact, author Jeffery Deaver is quoted as saying, “I’ve often said that there’s no such thing as writer’s block; the problem is idea block.”

But once you have one article under your belt, the next ones become much easier.

Here’s a five-step plan to have you on your way to your first article:

1. Brainstorm topics.
What questions do you get about your topic area? What are the sticking points for newbies to your field? What equipment or specialized knowledge do people need to get started? Make a list of the most common questions you are asked about your business.

For instance, I recently suggested to my Veterinarian that we add a blog to the website that we built for him last year. He immediately reared back with terrified look in his eyes and did his level best to convince me that he just didn’t have a darn thing to write about.

My response? Nonsense! Apart from treating the animals in his care, his day is spent soothing anxious pet parents and answering a myriad of questions ranging from the best nutrition products to care of a pet in declining health and everything in-between. Once he understood that he did indeed have a wealth of information to share with the community, he then offered up the excuse that he just doesn’t have time to sit down and write. I kindly agreed with him on this one, but noticed that the office manager who has been with the practice for many years was very engaged and interested in the conversation. Long story short, she is now writing a very popular blog and article series for the veterinary hospital. Just by sharing information that comes up during the course of a day, they have found that they actually have more article ideas than they ever thought possible.

Are you an ardent home cook? Do you continually receive praise for your cooking and regular requests for recipes? Perhaps your cooking niche is cooking small meals to be frozen for later use. People would want to know:

• How will cooking and freezing small meals benefit me?
• Is this a cost effective method of cooking and shopping?
• What equipment will I need? Do I need ziplock bags? Air tight containers?
• What type of spices and seasonings freeze well?
• Do I have to season the food less because the seasonings will get stronger with time?
• What are the problems I might encounter?
• Should I label my containers and date them? What are the best tools for this?
• What are some basic recipes?
• What foods last the longest and what foods will be prone to freezer burn?
• How do I avoid freezer burn?

By brainstorming with your family, friends, and even just yourself, in just a few minutes, you can have topics for your first dozen articles.

2. Choose one to begin with.
Pick one of your topics to start with. Forget about choosing the “perfect” topic – there is no such thing. Grab a pen and a piece of paper, a note pad, or sit down in front of your computer, set the timer for 10 minutes and jot down everything you can think of related to that topic. Don’t worry about complete sentences, formatting, or spelling, just get the ideas down. This is your “stream of consciousness” exercise which will then lead to more tangible ideas.

For instance, if my topic is “How cooking and freezing small meals can benefit you,” I might write;

• Save money
• Healthier diet
• Control portions
• Lose weight
• Fun
• Time saving
• Social – can do with family or friends
• Organization – helps me plan my time better if I don’t have to cook every night
• Less stress

Some people like to use mind maps to create these lists. If you’d like more information on that process, I suggest googling “mindmap software.”

3. Organize it and flesh it out.
The next step is to take the outline you created in Step 2 and organize it into common themes. You’re aiming for an article about 400-700 words, so three to five main points is ideal. If you have more than that, never fear! You can turn that information into another article or an article series. This article is actually #2 in a 11 part series.

Then take your outline and build on it. If this is where you start feeling butterflies in your stomach, relax. Imagine you’re writing an email to a friend to explain to him or her the topic of your article. Again, don’t get stuck on grammar, spelling, etc. Just get the info on the page – you can always go back and edit it. Professional writers often create several drafts of their work. Very few people get it right the first time! I do recommend you write in your own voice and your own style. You will be more comfortable and so will the people reading it.

4. Proofread.
Now’s the time when you can go back through the article and edit and polish, making each sentence say what you want it to. Be sure it’s cohesive, that the statements flow together, and that it makes sense. Also be on the lookout for places where you can tighten your writing – where you use three words when just one will do, or where there are redundancies. Ensure that each word, each sentence, each paragraph have purpose.

When you think your article is finished, walk away from it for an hour or even a day. Then go back and read through again. By giving yourself some time away from your article, you will pick up previously missed errors or ones that spell check didn’t catch.

5. Submit!
After you’ve written your article and polished it until it shines, it’s time to submit it. Most article marketers submit to online directories – clearinghouses where experts post articles and editors find content to publish. While there are hundreds of online article directories, there’s no need to submit to more than a few. Each has its own pluses and minuses, so take some time to pick the best for your niche. A quick search on Google for “article directory” will bring up dozens of options. In part 9 of this series, I will give you the top 10 article directories and tips on how to use them.

If you know of large circulation newsletters or ezines in your niche, submit directly to those publishers as well. Make sure you follow the article directories guidelines exactly, as some have minimum and maximum word lengths, as well as other requirements. And if you have your own blog, absolutely publish it there. Break it into smaller pieces if you must, but publish away!

Article marketing is a valuable free marketing strategy, but it must be used consistently— and often — for the best results. So once you’ve finished one article, go back to the beginning and start writing your next. Keep the content flowing, and soon you’ll see the results of your hard work. You can’t buy better promotion than that!

Resources

Free Report: 5 Steps to a Big-Profit, S.M.A.L.L. Report Business by Jimmy D. Brown

Easy PLRis a wonderful resource that will help you find an ongoing supply of fresh content for your blog or article marketing efforts. However, I highly recommend that you edit and re-write these articles in your own voice. Use them as a jumping off point and then take it from there.

Need an Article. When you need well-crafted and well-written content for business, for website, or for personal reasons Need an Article has the solution to your writing needs. Again, the same suggestions about editing and re-writing these articles in your own voice applys.

Be sure to signup for our newsletter so these articles arrive in your email box when they are published.

Can Your Business Benefit From Article Marketing?

Posted by Denise Griffitts on Sep 16, 2010 in Internet Mastery | 2 comments

Can Your Business Benefit From Article Marketing?

Words are the only things that last forever; they are more durable than the eternal hills. ~  William Hazlitt

Article marketing is one of the most useful methods of promoting a business online. Not only is it easy and low-cost, it works and anyone can do it!

By writing articles on your areas of expertise and offering this content free of charge to online and offline publishers, you can:

1. Spread the word about your services, products and reviews to your target market.
2. Demonstrate your professional knowledge about your industry or niche.
3. Create a body of work that continues to “sell” you and your website long after the initial article creation.
4. Create a following of interested and engaged readers who will refer you or your services to others.

On another note, other website owners, bloggers, and newsletter publishers are constantly looking for quality content to provide to their readers. You help them out by providing your well-written, targeted articles. In return they include a plug about you and your business, called the “author resource box,” at the bottom of the piece. The resource box includes a link to your site. So, they get free content, and you get free publicity. It’s a win-win situation.

You may be wondering if article marketing will work for your niche or industry. The short answer is yes! There are blogs and newsletters and ezines and websites on just about every topic under the sun, from accounting to Zoroastrianism.

Here’s a short list of businesses that can benefit from article marketing:

• Service providers (virtual or traditional)
• Virtual Assistants
• Bloggers
• Affiliate marketers
• Ebook Authors
• Info product sellers
• Online Store owners
• Coaches and consultants
• Realtors
• Podcasters
• Membership site owners
• Authors
• Speakers
• Network marketers
• Owners of niche websites

In short, if you’re selling something, offering professional services, or trying to drive traffic to your website or blog, article marketing can be extremely beneficial for you. It’s one of the most efficient ways to attract targeted visitors, to build trust among your readers, and to gain new customers or clients.

Here are some broad examples:

• Bloggers can use article marketing to attract readers to their blogs and increase their subscriber base.
• Bloggers can use article marketing to write reviews about affiliate products  and increase their revenue streams.
• Webmasters can use article marketing to create valuable backlinks, and increase website traffic.
• Writers can use article marketing to exhibit their writing skills, educate readers, and attract clients.
• Hairstylists can use article marketing to share hair care tips, showcase their expertise, and attract business to their salons.
• Dog trainers can use article marketing to share dog training lessons, and inform the public about the needs at a local shelter.
• Fitness professionals can use article marketing to share fitness and health tips, exercise tips and healthy recipes, thereby creating a body of work that tells potential clients that they know their craft and can be trusted to help clients with their fitness goals.
• Dentists can use article marketing to share information about gum disease, whitening systems, new developments in periodontal care and just about anything else that is of benefit to their patients and potential patients.

Whatever your passion or field of expertise, article marketing can benefit you and your business. When used correctly, it can successfully attract targeted traffic to your website or blog, grow your mailing list, help you become an expert in your field, build trust with your readers, make your website more popular, spread your name and website across the Web, add backlinks to your site, allow you to “advertise” free, brand yourself and your business, and generate sales.

As you can see, the benefits of article marketing are numerous. So who can benefit from article marketing? You can! And, it starts with just one article.

Next in this series:

5 Steps to Marketing Your First Article

What Makes Quality Content?

What Kind of Articles Work Best?

Offline Article Marketing Secrets

How to  Find Article Writers and PLR (Private Label Rights) Articles

Advanced Article Marketing Skills

How to Write a Killer Resource Box

Top 10 Article Directories

Five Tips to Marketing Your Articles to Get Them More Exposure

Tracking Your Article Marketing Results

Be sure to signup for our newsletter or RSS feed so these articles arrive in your email box when they are published.

Lou Bortone Discussess How to Generate Visibility & Traffic With Online Video

Posted by Denise Griffitts on Jun 25, 2009 in Internet Mastery | 1 comment

Your Partner In Success Radio Show

Increasing online visibility is the goal of most online business owners. There are many strategies for building visibility online including article marketing, blogging, email newsletters/ezine, expert question sites, press releases, social networking and videos.

Tomorrow I will interview viral video expert Lou Bortone and fellow Master Business Building Club expert on my BlogTalkRadio show who will discuss how he has increased both his web traffic and client base since he began using video as an online marketing tool.

Lou Bortone is a long-time marketing and branding consultant who helps entrepreneurs build breakthrough brands on the Internet, with services such as online video production, video branding, coaching and creative support. Lou is a former television executive who worked for E! Entertainment Television and later served as the Senior Vice President of Marketing & Advertising for Fox Family Worldwide, a division of Fox in Los Angeles. Lou is an author and ghostwriter of six business books, a Certified Guerrilla Marketing Coach and a Book Yourself Solid Certified Coach.

We will discuss why now is the best time to jump on the online video bandwagon and what the benefits of having a strong web video presence are. Did you know that since the dawn of YouTube, marketing with video has become the best way to connect with customers and drive sales? In fact, studies show that video is 600% more effective than text alone in delivering your message. 600%! Do you need to know some quick, easy and free ways to distribute your video? Lou will cover thoroughly cover that topic. He will also offer tips for optimizing your videos and how to make your videos more interactive and viral.

This will be a very interesting and informative interview, so be sure to mark your calendar!

When: Friday June 26, 2009

Where: Blog Talk Radio – Denise Griffitts. “Your Partner in Success”

Time: 9 am PST / 10 am MST / 11 am CST / 12 pm EST

Call In Telephone Number: 347-843-4988

Time permitting; we will open up the call for questions and answers. Please be sure to login to the chat room to ask questions during the call.

We look forward to “seeing” you!

By the way, you can visit Lou’s websites at Online Video Branding and Video Traffic Blast.