background preloader

Blogging

Facebook Twitter

Use Images (Not Just Words) to Turn Your Distracted Visitors into Engaged Readers. Search "editorial calendar" in All. How To Make Your Blog Appealing To Your Key Audience. Will your potential visitor stop and read your blog content or won’t he? That’s the key question. Regardless of your goals, if your blog isn’t appealing to your target audience, it’s not going to attract an audience or achieve your goals. Your blog has to be like chocolate cake to entice readers. Neal Shaffer, Founder and Editor-In-Chief of Maximize Social Business, gets this. Schaffer grew and expanded his blog, originally named Windmill Networking, into a top rated community blog with over 20 global contributors.

In his opinion top blogs contain 5 attributes that create blog appeal. This is a point many bloggers overlook. Here are Schaffer’s 5 points that all top blogs contain combined with my blogging tips. 1. As humans, we take in visual information 60,000 times faster than text. Add a photo or image to each blog post to get your reader’s attention.Integrate a number of images and/or screenshots to entice your content and illustrate your points. 2. 3. Don’t skip the list posts. 4. 5. Your 31 Day Action Plan to Getting More Blog Readers. "Stan, I know what I need to do but I'm not sure where to start! " We were talking about blog marketing, the topic that gets bloggers all tied up knots.

His next questions were tinged with frustration. "Do you start with SEO? " "How about creating an ebook? " "When do you need to build a Google+ page? " Have you wrestled with these questions too? Today, you'll get some answers. I've created a 31-Day Blog Marketing Action Plan for you. A Few Things To Remember Before You Get Started I've briefly explained each day's marketing task. Ok, here we go. The 31-Day Blog Marketing Action Plan Let Me Show You "How" to Maximize Your Blog Marketing Success Each Day My new blog marketing course "How to Get Your Next 10,000 Blog Readers" will show you, in detail, how to implement each step in this calendar. The price of the course goes up by $10 every Monday, because new strategies are added every week.

A Rabble-Rouser’s Rules for Writing Kick-Ass Closing Paragraphs. Copyblogger. How a content-sharing plan can help your post go viral. Most social media managers know the power of content marketing. By creating and sharing our best content, we generate great resources for our social feeds and huge value for our audience. But are we really getting all of the value we can out of our content? We may not be, and the fix may be as simple as adjusting how we approach our social media sharing. Too many of us spend hours crafting new content only to spend a few minutes promoting it on our social channels. This is a shotgun approach, and it represents a lost opportunity. Creating a content-sharing plan As a new blog post is published, our normal mode of operation usually includes sharing that post on each of our social media feeds immediately after it is published. Some of this work is automated, while other portions are manual. By creating a content sharing plan through the use of a message queue alongside our post, we can add new life to our content, and increase the chances of our post going viral.

Simple right? How I Wrote A Viral Blog Post, And How You Can Too. Part 1 in the “Anatomy Of A Viral Blog Post” series, regarding a viral blog post I wrote about Diet Coke and the food police. “Hey Julie,” I was asked, “how do you write a viral blog post?” “Simple,” I said. “First, you write on your blog for ten years in obscurity and then…” All joking aside, most bloggers are interested in writing something that thousands of eyeballs read.

With that in mind, I’m going to tell you a few secrets on what it will take for you to make your blog post go viral, saving the really big important super secret for the very end. Don’t Let Your Old Posts Die The blog post went viral because of a tweet I sent out a month after I published the post. I didn’t do much with this viral blog post beyond sharing on Twitter when I published, and a month later. The original publishing date of the post didn’t cause much interest, beyond regular readers, nor did any of my posts on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr or LinkedIn. Make It Easy To Share Look, we’re all lazy. Or, Settle down, now. Content Curation: 6 Strategies to Add Value With Your Own Commentary. The Best Content Marketing Advice Ever. Have you ever wondered what the best piece of content marketing advice is?

Where do you need to focus your marketing efforts versus what’s just nice to have? Now that content marketing is the hot marketing buzzword, what are the critical elements your content needs to rise above the noise to drive measurable business results? To help you, we surveyed 19 top content marketing experts to get their advice and here’s what they say. “Stop being amazing, and start being useful.” From Youtility cited by Jay Baer of Convince and Convert, author of Youtility and Peg Fitzpatrick one of the ringleaders at 12Most. “Content marketing is like producing a movie. It requires a cast of skills to design, execute, distribute and measure a content initiative.” These references are chuck full of useful information for every content marketer. What other useful content marketing advice would you add to this list and why would you include it? Related Articles Top 23 Content Marketing Blogs. 25 Editing Tips for Tightening Your Copy. 10 Drop-Dead Easy Ways You Can Use Storify to Create Compelling Content.

Storify has been around since 2010 and has gained some traction with users but it’s not really been a bloggers dream tool until it released its iPad app earlier this year. Sure, there are similar curation tools out there, but nothing quite like Storify that allows you to take text, documents, videos and images, alongside social media content in a clean vertical like this story by Mike Cassidy called What Facebook’s $38 IPO price means to the rest of us: The reason this is so cool is that the drag-and-drop curation keeps all of the original links and functionality…and then embeds them into your post.

Then add your commentary: You can then search in Storify using keywords that it will uncover content for you. You then find the tweet that is relevant to your discussion and drag it to your document and it shows up like this: So what kind of content could you create using Storify? Let’s look at ten ideas. 1. You can use Storify to build a post based on people’s reactions to certain events. 2. 3. 7 Keys To Maximize Content Distribution. You can create the best content in the world but, until you distribute it, it’s not effective. To ensure that your content reaches the maximum potential audience, integrate it with your other marketing and communications.

This is a key aspect of your content marketing plan! Here are 7 owned and social media publishing platforms to consider for content distribution. Where appropriate, modify your content to be contextually relevant for the venue (Hint: Think like a content curator!) Also, take into consideration where your audience is when they seek and/or consume your content. Post content on your website where it’s appropriate based on the topic covered.

Don’t assume that visitors will seek out this information if it’s not in front of them. Leverage the power of your content marketing by distributing it across owned and social media assets. Where else would you distribute your content on internal and social media platforms? Happy Marketing, Heidi Cohen Related Articles. 7 "How-To's" to Create a Rock Star Social Media Strategy. 5 Tips Every Content Curator Needs to Write Better Calls-to-Action. 10 ways to write content that ranks high on Google. Since its arrival on the online scene, search engine optimization (SEO) has put writers in a difficult position. Do you write for people or the search engine algorithms? Thankfully, we no longer have to choose. According to an infographic from ContentVerve.com, Google actually prefers natural-sounding content—as do, obviously, your readers.

Besides, what’s the point of landing a high Google rank if your content won’t turn people into customers? [RELATED: Hear how top companies adapted to the digital PR industry changes at this August event.] The graphic goes on to explain 10 ways you can ensure your content will land a top spot in Google’s search results. 1. 2. 3. 4. See the full list of tips below: (View a larger image.) Popularity: This record has been viewed 15409 times. Today. The 3 Core Elements of Good Storytelling (And Why Your Business Needs Them)

5 Major Content Marketing Problems (with 5 Helpful Solutions) 8 Ways to Win at Marketing by Being Useful. Marketers are competing in a vast sea of messages from other companies, friends and family of their clients and prospective clients. Today’s marketers need to be smart and be HELPFUL with their social media marketing and not bombard a sales message over and over again. In my new book “Youtility: Why Smart Marketing is about Help not Hype” the premise is that if you create marketing that people genuinely want, you can dispense with the “shock,” “awe,” and “viral” and focus on solving problems, answering questions, and creating long-lasting customer relationships by doing so.

Your company is being forced to compete for your customers’ attention against those customers’ family members and best friends. If you’re useful enough, and if you commit to inform rather than promote, customers will reward you with trust and loyalty. 1. 2. You have to understand what your prospective customers need to make better decisions, and how you can improve their lives by providing it. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. How to Become a Thought Leader. This post originally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum, where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business.

What do Robert Scoble, Umair Haque and Nate Silver have in common? They’re all considered to be at the peak of respect and innovation in their respective industries — part of a pantheon of so-called “Thought Leaders.” The term thought leader is the highest of compliments, and arguably the hardest moniker to achieve. It’s not enough to be good at what you do; a thought leader is meant to be the greatest form of praise, geared towards someone who is on the absolute cutting edge of their industry or making big enough moves to warrant the distinction. But what separates a thought leader from any other leader, and how do you become one? Let’s take a look at this buzzword and discover how it can help you build your business. What It Means The term thought leader has a relatively traceable history.

Becoming a Thought Leader. Why Things Catch On, The Science of Why People Share. Do you want to understand the science behind why people share? During this fascinating interview I explore these very concepts. To learn the reasons why people widely share content, I interview Jonah Berger for this episode of the Social Media Marketing podcast. More About This Show The Social Media Marketing podcast is a show from Social Media Examiner. It’s designed to help busy marketers and business owners discover what works with social media marketing. The show format is on-demand talk radio (also known as podcasting). In this episode, I interview Jonah Berger, author of The New York Times bestseller, Contagious: Why Things Catch On. Jonah shares the reasons behind why people engage with word of mouth and why marketers should pay attention to this.

You’ll learn about the 6 principles that drive people to share. Share your feedback, read the show notes and get the links mentioned in this episode below! Listen Now Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed Why People Share Social Currency. Why Things Catch On, The Science of Why People Share. 31 Flavors of Content Marketing. July is ice cream month. Ice cream was an important food group in my family. In fact, my mother slightly modified our last name so she could write our first names inside of a picture of a scoop of ice cream on our lunch bags.

Both of my siblings had summer jobs selling ice cream. My sister worked at a Carvel and my brother drove a Good Humor truck. My father helped my brother by counting the (quite literally) cold cash. In honor of July being Ice Cream Month, here are thirty-one flavors of content marketing. Annual reports. As a content marketer, it’s important to use a variety of different content formats as well as weights. What other forms of content marketing would you add to this list? Please note that this title is from this list in case you’re looking for content inspiration. Happy Marketing, Heidi Cohen Related Articles Photo Credit: Blogging. Syndicator: A Great Alternative to Google Reader. Gone are the days of traditional RSS. Before media was social, RSS was used to consume content from around the web — but now social media managers and marketers are using RSS to discover, curate and share media and content to social networks. With Google Reader set to shut down on July 1st, we’ve enhanced HootSuite’s RSS capabilities to not only provide a powerful solution for bringing content into the dash from around the web, but also for managing and curating content through social syndication.

Meet the HootSuite Syndicator. HootSuite Syndicator Simplifies RSS to Social In addition to filling a void left by Google Reader, allowing you to manage and organize all of your RSS content from streams in the HootSuite dash, the HootSuite Syndicator conveniently fits into your social content curation and distribution work flow.

But even better, it’s easy to quickly share items to your social networks in HootSuite; the app will even remember which items you’ve shared! 1. 2. 3. 11 Chrome Extensions to Improve Your Social Media Experience. If there's one thing that ties all your digital experiences together, it's your browser — let's presume it's Chrome. Maybe you use it on mobile in addition to desktop. It gets to know you, and you, it. But everyone has a few tricks up his or her sleeve. We did a little recon and found quite a few Chrome extensions that impact and enhance the way we use social media.

See, most social sites try to keep things simple — if they add too many features, it would start to confuse people, especially new users. Have you tried any of these Chrome extensions? 1. While it doesn't support Instagram videos quite yet, the Instagram extension easily checks in on your stream without opening a new window. 2. Reddit is not a pretty site — the focus is the content and minimalist functions, so the platform does without any bells and whistles. 3. Some common recommendations for strong passwords: Use bad grammar and never apply the same password to multiple sites. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 14 Google Tools You Didn't Know Existed.

Now that you've written your eulogies for Google Reader, it's a good time to remember that Google has an abundance of other resources that may not be as popular but still deserve a spotlight. We rounded up some lesser-known Google tools and applications that could help you cope with the loss of Reader and rekindle your love for Google. From fun tools like Google Ngram Viewer to useful resources like Full Value of Mobile Calculator, you'll find an array of tools for developers to small business owners to the average consumer.

Take a look at the gallery and let us know what your favorite Google tool is in the comments. Image courtesy of Flickr, Scobleizer. Succeed With Video Content Marketing: 5 Tips and a Case Study. 7 Ways to Make Guest Blogging More Powerful. 6 Ways to Inspired Content Marketing. 8 Remarkable (and Stolen) Content Marketing Ideas. Social Media. Create Content Perfection With These 5 Essential Ingredients. Measure Your Content Curation Success: A 10 Question Scorecard. Today. 10 fatal mistakes of social media marketing. 4 time-saving content curation tools. 9 terrific apps for content marketers. 6 Ways To Get Your Content To Spread Like Wildfire on Social Media. 11 Social Media Tools That Will Save You Time And Provide Key Marketing Data. 3 Tools to Help You Discover and Share Great Content. Content Marketing: 7 Steps to a Successful Repurposing Strategy.

79 Most Popular Social Media Blogs to Comment on or Guest Post For. Cool Image Search Tricks. Create Content Perfection With These 5 Essential Ingredients. Social Media. 39 Awesome Tools and Resources for Blogging and Social Media Marketing. Attract Blog Readers with Better Blog Writing. Seven research tips for informed writing | Bad LanguageBad Language. Content Summit - joking47 - Gmail. 5 Smartest Content Marketing Tips for Bloggers. 28 Attributes of Good Content Marketing to Rock Your Social Business. Is Your Content Worthy of a Like, Share, Pin, Retweet, Google +1? 16 Content Marketing Golden Rules For Real Results. The essentials for finding and using images online. Content Marketing Must Have Checklist. 20 Ways to Get Your Content Marketing Discovered. 20 Experts Select Key Content Marketing Metrics. Heidi Cohen. 7 Actionable Twitter Tips To Build Your Following. 33 Blogging Tips to Maximize Social Media Reach.

Power Your Business Storytelling By Creating a Content Brand. Find Content Creation Ideas: 7 Sources for a Virtually Endless Supply. Power Your Business Storytelling By Creating a Content Brand. Content Marketing Institute. Content Marketing Institute. Content Marketing Institute. Content Marketing Institute. Social Media. Twitter Traffic, How to Double Your Traffic to Your Content With Twitter. 10 Points to Create Compelling Content. Blogging SEO – 7 Tips With Resources from Blogworld Expo New York.

11 Tactics to Optimize Your Blog. Social Media. 6 Ways to Make Your Story Go Viral. 17 Essential Content Templates and Checklists. How to Craft a Blog Post – 10 Crucial Points to Pause. Why Interlinking Your Blogs Posts is a Must (and Not Just For SEO) Your First Week of Blogging – Plan Your Future Blog Posts. How Much Content Should I Have Ready to Go When I Launch a Blog? Crawl before you walk: 6 Step-by-step Instructions for Starting your First Blog. 9 Tips to Start Blogging Successfully.