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5 Blog Post Tips to Increase Web Traffic

March 27, 2012 by 4 Comments

Your company may have incorporated a blog on its website or have a blog linked to your company’s website. Your company probably uses social media, hoping it will increase your web traffic, sales, and revenues. Unfortunately, if a blog post (or other web content) isn’t compelling or you don’t have enough posts, your blog will remain stagnant.

Follow the five blog post tips below to increase web traffic.

5 Blog Post Tips to Increase Web Traffic 

 

Content-Content Interaction (Formal)

Content-Content Interaction (Formal) (Photo credit: jrhode)

Select the right primary and secondary keywords/phrases.

You’ve probably heard this a million times already, but it begs repeating. Selecting and optimizing the ‘right’ primary and secondary keywords/phrases for your blog posts can increase web traffic.

To find out which keywords/phrases work for your company, test them by using the “A/B Testing” method.

Select a couple of keywords/phrases and use them within pages and Google AdWords (if you advertise on the web) in addition to blog posts.

Look at the number of clicks and impressions for the keywords/phrases. Which keywords/phrases receive the most clicks and impressions? What are the conversion rates? Knowing this information is useful when your choose keywords/phrases.

Once you have your primary and secondary keywords/phrases, hire a freelance writer, content manager, or social media manager to write your company’s web content, ‘tweets’ and Facebook status updates.

Optimizing ‘tweets’ and Facebook status updates with your keywords/phrases can increase web traffic. Try it today!

Write a blog post in a conversational tone.

Writing for the web is different than writing for print. A blog post should be written using simple and short sentences. If you don’t already use the Flesch-Kincaid method to analyze your blog posts, you may want to consider it.

Flesch-Kincaid Score 

90-100 : Very Easy

80-89 : Easy

70-79 : Fairly Easy

60-69 : Standard

50-59 : Fairly Difficult

30-49 : Difficult

0-29 : Very Confusing

It’s important to write web content that has a score of at least 60 or higher. The higher the number means the web content is easy to read.

Most journalists write newspaper and magazine articles that score a 70 and above. They use simple language to get their point across.

Pay attention to the word count of a blog post.

Most freelance bloggers and freelance writers will tell you a blog post should be 300 words to 700 words. However, I’ve read many blog posts that are over 700 words. Heck! I write blog posts that exceed 700 words.

Tip: About Pages, Bios, and other pages are usually 500 words.

Base the word count on your audience.

Ask a question at the end of a blog post.

If you want to start a conversation, ask a question at the end of a blog post. This is a good way to entice visitors to post comments which begins a dialogue between you and your target market.

You could automate an email response such as, “Thank you for reading our blog. We appreciate it!” However, you may want to answer a few emails personally or have your social media or content manager respond.

Tip: Ask a question or take a poll on your social media networks.

Speaking of responding … Make sure your content manger or social media manager responds to comments. Readers who make thoughtful comments want to know if someone from the company is paying attention to them.

If you receive too many comments (100 or more) you could always close comments.

Bold headlines get attention.

Writing headlines takes patience and practice.  A bold headline will stop readers’ in their tracks — they’ll have to read your web content.

Most copywriters will spend at least 30 minutes or one hour writing the perfect headline. This may seem outrageous, but it really isn’t.

Think about it. How much do you think the writers at top selling magazines earn for writing headlines? I won’t keep you in suspense — they earn a boatload of money! It is worth it to pay writers a high salary if a magazine receives a high ROI.

It’s all about ROI (return on investment). If your company wants to increase their ROI, it’s worth it to pay a copywriter top dollar for writing headlines.

These are some blog post tips that can increase your company’s blog web traffic.

Make sure your freelance writer or staff writer keeps the company’s target audience in mind when writing a blog post.

Writing a blog post is different from writing an editorial article. Most of the time a blog post will be shorter than a 1,000 word print article. However, there are exceptions to the rule. This is why it’s important to know your target audience. Write for them!

What is your biggest challenge with blog posts? Share.

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Freelance Writer Reveals Secrets to Writing Headlines for the Web

March 22, 2012 by 5 Comments
secret to writing headlines

Photo credit: Israel Papillon-Stock Exchange

Effective communication is important for both print and web copy writing. The most important aspect of writing is creating an eye-catching headline. A freelance writer who’s skilled in writing for the web understands that it’s important to write headlines that get noticed. It’s also important to optimize a headline for SEO purposes. Below are a freelance writer’s ‘secrets’ to writing a headlines for the web that will grab the attention of readers.

How a Freelance Writer Writes Headlines for the Web 

Reads tabloid magazines

A freelance writer knows that tabloid magazines have the best headlines which is why they’ll read them. Are you shocked?

Tabloids grab a reader’s attention and don’t let go. This is why they sell! The headlines ‘hook’ a reader and beckons them to read the articles.

Effective communication such as headline that grab’s your target audience’s attention is important when you write for the web.

It’s important to ‘optimize’ a headline with one or two keywords/phrases. The key is to place the primary keyword in front and the secondary keyword at the end. Or, you could just use the primary keyword.

Here’s an example:

Web Content Writers Crash SEO Companies Server for the Second Time

The primary keyword/phrase is ‘Web Content Writers’ and the secondary keyword/phrase is ‘SEO Companies.’

A freelance writer reads Cosmopolitan 

The publishers of Cosmopolitan magazine understand the importance of effective communication. Their writers create headlines that make readers want to read the articles.

They may even shock them. Talk about effective communication!

Some freelance writers have been known to subscribe to Cosmopolitan and other magazines, only to rip-off the front covers and toss the magazines. This is how a freelance writer builds a ‘headline reference’ file. It’s good for those days when a writer needs help or inspiration to write a headline.

Reads blogs

A good freelance writer reads other blogs. They pay attention to a bloggers writing style to see what attracts readers to a blog.

Effective communication is highly important when a freelance writer writes for the web. Readers want quick information that’s helpful.

In order to grab their attention, a write must create a headline that makes readers stop what they’re doing. Of course, converting them to a customer is another goal as well.

Continues their freelance writing education

A good freelance writer continues their freelance writing education by doing the following:

  • Attending writer’s conferences and workshops
  • Enrolling in writing classes
  • Reading books about freelance writing
  • Networking with other freelance writers
  • Enrolling in communication classes such as public speaking

Specialize in Freelance writing

You may be surprised (or not) to discover a freelance writer began their writing career as a journalist. It’s not unusual for a newspaper or magazine writer to transition into a freelance writing career.

They’re used to meeting or turning in work ahead of time (deadlines increase, it happens) and understand the importance of writing for a targeted audience. A ‘good’ freelance writer can adjust their writing style to ‘fit’ your company’s audience. Of course, they can write headlines that get noticed!

Now you know the secrets a freelance writer uses to write headlines for web content.

What challenges does your company face when it comes to writing headlines? Share.

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SEO: The Benefits of Knowing and Understanding Web Optimization

March 20, 2012 by Leave a Comment

Most businesses owners hire SEO companies to optimize their websites. There’s nothing wrong with this if the SEO companies do their job. Think about the following questions for a moment:

 

  • What happens if the SEO company goes out of business? Who will take care of your web optimization?
  • What if Black Hat SEO techniques are being used? Do you even know what ‘Black Hat SEO’ means? If you don’t, your company’s website could be in danger of being taken out of search engines.
  • If you have an ‘in-house’ SEO manager, what happens if they quit? Are your employees crossed-trained? Could someone pick up the work?

 

It would behoove business owners, especially small business owners, to know something about search engine optimization. Otherwise, your page ranking and web stats could decrease faster than you could have ever imagined.

 

Benefits of Knowing and Understanding Best SEO Practices

What really is Search Engine Optimization?

What really is Search Engine Optimization? (Photo credit: Go Local Search)

 

Understanding SEO is a good way to make sure your SEO company is doing their job.

 

If you don’t understand SEO, how will you know if your website is being optimized? If you don’t receive reports on a regular basis, how do you know if any optimization work was completed for a specific amount of time? You don’t have to know everything about web optimization, but it’s a good idea to know how to view your websites source code so you can check to see if your keywords were entered.

 

If your in-house SEO person quits, who does the work?

 

Sadly, most employees aren’t crossed trained. If your SEO person quits, your website won’t be optimized for too long. Who will write the blog posts? Who will update the web pages? It’s a good idea to cross train employees, especially if you own a small business. If you don’t want to learn SEO then one of your other employees should know how to do it.

 

Competitors in Your Industry Know and Understand SEO.

 

Let’s face it; technology moves at a faster speed than it ever did. If you don’t keep your skills up-to-date, you can find yourself going out of business. Customers expect businesses to be on social media websites because it’s a fast and easy way for them to connect. They also expect that a business is optimizing their website with keywords/phrases that will help them find what they’re looking for in a quicker manner.

 

What happens if your SEO company is using Black Hat SEO techniques? How would you know?

 

If you aren’t familiar with SEO and how it works, you could be in a lot of trouble with Google and other search engines. This means your SEO company is using unethical techniques to help your company gain higher search rankings. Unfortunately, search engines look for these unsavory practices and will ban your company from displaying in their results. Black Hat SEO techniques include:

 

  • Keyword stuffing blog posts and web pages.
  • Buying the wrong types of links (you should avoid this anyway).
  • Invisible text — putting white text on a white background.
  • Doorway pages are basically ‘fake’ pages.

 

You can save time and money.

 

If you understand search engine optimization (SEO), you could do the work yourself and save thousands of dollars each year. The drawback is that keeping up with the optimization can become time consuming.

 

It doesn’t hurt to know something about best SEO practices, especially if you hire an outside firm to take care of all of your search engine optimization. Remember, it’s important to use White Hat SEO versus Black Hat SEO techniques. If you know and understand how optimization works, you’ll be able to tell straightaway if a firm is using unethical practices.

 

There’s nothing wrong with becoming familiar with how web optimization works. It will only help your company in the long run. Technologies change overnight. What worked yesterday, may not work today. Updating your skills is a good way to ensure your company doesn’t lag behind other companies within your industry.

 

What’s holding you back from learning SEO? Share.

 

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Why is Social Media an Important Marketing Tool?

March 15, 2012 by Leave a Comment

If your company hasn’t taken advantage of social media, you could be missing out on the opportunity to increase business results and profitability. Social networking sites such as Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Google+, and others are free to use. When they’re used properly, they can drive traffic to your website, convert visitors to customers, and increase your sales and revenue. Let’s find out why social media is important and how it can help grow your business.

 

Social Media is an Important Marketing Tool

 

Social Media Week 2012 SP

Social Media Week 2012 SP (Photo credit: Fora do Eixo)

Connect and effectively communicate with customers.

Your customers use social media. They’re on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Some of them can be found on StumleUpon and other social networking sites.

The bottom line is that your company wants to be where your customers are.

 

Here’s an Example:

Bank of America uses social media to communicate and assist their customers with any questions they may have.

Customers with a specific question can connect with Bank of America at @BofA_Help. This is a good way for Bank of America to track how many customers use this feature.

 

Your industry has a social media presence.

Google your industry and other businesses in your industry, chances are they have a social media presence. See what they’re doing and find out how you can set yourself a part from them. Don’t get left behind!

 

Social networking sites will continue to develop.

Let’s face it; other social networking sites will be created and the current ones will evolve over time. Choose the best ones that work for your company. The ‘big three’ are Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

 

Tip: Social networking sites will come and go. Pay attention to social networking trends and use social networking sites that have staying power.

 

FYI: The newest social networking site is Pinterest. However, make sure you READ ALL TERMS AND CONDITIONS because there’s been chatter about the legalities of using Pinterest.

 

Social Media: What Your Company Can Do Now

 

Get employees involved in social networking.

Employees may resist the idea of social networking and social media; however, it would be in there best interest to get behind your company’s online marketing strategy.

 

Mashable’s social media demographics INFOGRAPHIC clearly shows who’s using social networking sites and where they can be found. It’s no surprise that most people use Facebook.

 

Embrace social networking, it can be fun.

It’s amazing that your company can connect with customers on a national, international, or global scale. Have fun with social media — keep the tone light and conversational.

 

Display social media icons on your website.

Make sure icons are visible on your website. Don’t make visitors hunt for them. Place icons at the top and bottom of your website. If you have a blog, include a ‘share’ button on posts.

 

Be active.

Hire a social media manager and or ask a freelance writer to ‘tweet’ and post Facebook status updates (manage your social networking).

 

FYI: Most social media managers put 30+ hours into social media.

 

Automating social media sites could appear mechanical and cold. Break it up by having blog posts automatically post to Twitter and Facebook. But engage in ‘real’ conversations too.

 

How has social media increased your business results and profitability? Share.

 

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A Freelance Writer Gets Results, Increases Profitability

March 13, 2012 by 5 Comments

As a freelance writer, I work with clients in various industries. A month ago, I started working with a client in the travel industry. I’m thrilled because not only do I get to write quality content such as editorial articles and blog posts, I get to teach everyone about SEO and social media. I enjoy teaching and have taught classes such as Blogging & SEO at a recreation center in Downtown Chandler in Arizona. Below are ways a freelance writer can help grow your business, and perhaps, teach you and your employees’ new skills such as social media and social networking.

A Freelance Writer Increases Business Results and Profitability
Freelance Writer and Ghost Writer Amandah Blackwell

Amandah Blackwell, Freelance Writer and Ghost Writer

1. A freelance writer is objective. Since a freelance writer isn’t a part of your organization, they’ll have an objective viewpoint of your projects whereas employees could be too emotionally attached to certain company projects.

2. A freelance writer has a high accountability — writes quality content. A freelance writer does not get paid unless a project is completed Most freelancers charge 1/2 or 1/3 up front; however, they won’t receive the final payment until the work is completed.

On the other hand, employees get paid either way. In the end, organizations could pay a lot more, especially if an employee quits or is fired. Plus, there are costs such as PTO, health care, continuing education, etc.

3. Experience. A freelance writer has a wealth of experience writing quality content. They could also have experience with graphic and web design, social media, SEO, and other professional skills. Your freelance writer can help you increase business results and profitability in the short and long run.

Tip #1: A freelance writer is probably familiar with social media and SEO along with providing quality content such as blog posts, articles, eBooks, white papers, newsletter content, and more. You may be surprised how many skills they possess.

4. Adds value. A professional freelance writer understands the meaning of value. Not only will they write quality content and eye-catching headlines, they can provide suggestions for blog posts and articles. They could rewrite web content if necessary.

A freelance writer could assist with keyword/phrase research to make sure the ‘right’ keywords are being used.

Tip #2: Social media is great way to promote a company’s services and products. Ask a freelance writer to write ‘tweet’s and Facebook status updates to increase web traffic and sales. They could manage all of your social media accounts.

5. Can fill-in for staff writers. A freelance writer can fill-in when staff writers go on vacation or a leave of absence. This way the remaining staff writers won’t feel that much pressure to pick up extra work.

Have you hired a freelance writer? How are they adding value to your company? Share. 

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Filed Under: Freelance Writers, Freelance Writing, Overcoming Obstacles, Search Engine Optimization, Social Media, Tips and Tricks Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,
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