We always get quesitons from our clients about how they can improve their skills on tactics that they are doing. Yesterday for example, I had a quesiton from my client at Peternity.com
a place where people honor their pets for eternity by offering pet memorial products like pet urns, garden statue pet memorials, and other pet memorials.
Colleen asked, "Do you think it's okay for me to do my blog posting thanking another blog for featuring me on their blog. It would give me an opportunity to put in links to product pages on my site through my blog."
We get this and other questions often. Basically the answer is yes, however it's common courtesy to actually link to the other person's blog. Here are the rules about blogging ethics… Another thing you may want to do is blogroll folks that have other blogs that you want to promote. In your blog that means you list other blogs that you recommend.
And of course, MarCom Broadband is all about search engine optimization and it's critical that if you want folks to even FIND your blog, your keywords need to be in it. Make wure that you list them in headlines, close to the beginning of the sentence in para one and close to the beginning middle and end of the blog in general.
Monday, January 21, 2008
Tuesday, January 8, 2008
Social Media Marketing Versus Public Relations
I was reading Paul Gillin's newsletter this morning (which if you don't get, you absolutely MUST) and something he said in a prelude to a podcast he did with David Strom (in St. Lewis) triggered this thought. What skills can PR pros still use in the new world of social media marketing? This is actually something that I initially was concerned about some three or four years ago as I became familiar with search engine optimization (SEO). I called it search engine marketing (SEM) back then, and now it's known as social media marketing.
Check out Tech PR War Stories. Their podcast was prompted by Tamar Weinberg's list of the best Internet marketing blog posts of 2007 .
Paul encourages PR folks NOT to focus too much on all the new SEO tech tricks and services, stating, "With so much focus on search engine performance and user recommendations these days, PR pros may be tempted to spend all their time learning how to game the various traffic drivers that are sprouting up all over the Internet. Sure, it’s always nice to get a traffic boost from Digg or StumbleUpon, but the value of that traffic may not be worth the effort."
They talk about what IS important which includes the fundamental skills of PR, mainly creating compelling content, building relationships and delivering a message which are all still really important on the Internet. In the podcast David and Paul try to put the recommendation engine craze in perspective.
This is why MarCom Broadband has continued to focus on an integrated approach, and why we named the firm MarCom in the first place -- as in marketing communications -- which encompasses almost every aspect including advertising copy and design, marketing, journalism or content building, public relations, and now, Internet tactics. The Broadband part of our name just addresses the quantum speed at which the Internet allows us to do it all now. The short of it is that your 2008 Internet marketing strategy should include all of these points.
Strom commented about how new technology changes things all the time, to the point where it can be overwhelming ... because it's not enough to continue to just do the same thing year after year. Download their podcast here. (http://www.gillin.com/Podcasts/tprws-41.mp3)
Gillin also believes headlines that are search engine friendly are very important. We agree, that's one tip that I have used that really works, as evidenced just yesterday when my associate Mike Keesling did a quick review of one of our clients.
One year ago, we started working with T.S. Wiley, who developed a new protocol for bio identical hormone therapy (BHRT) protocol, known as The Wiley Protocol. When we searched for bioidentical hormones a year ago, she and her website came up as number 35. Today it shows up in Google as number five. I have been writing many articles for Wiley, posting them on the article submission sites throughout the Web -- therefore we have many Google Alerts that show up with headlines including her key words which Mike did in his keyword analysis last year - such as hormones, bio-identical hormone replacement therapy, and bioidentical, etc. We have been doing PR Web releases, and some newsletters. This year we are ramping up with a blog.
So it IS important to take a look at using the keywords in headlines, in a company's website, including all the tags such as meta and alt tags on each page (stuff Mike does for our clients). And also keywords can go in photo caption tags and videos for You Tube
It all comes down to content which will serve you best. As David and Paul said, "Content is the king."
Check out Tech PR War Stories. Their podcast was prompted by Tamar Weinberg's list of the best Internet marketing blog posts of 2007 .
Paul encourages PR folks NOT to focus too much on all the new SEO tech tricks and services, stating, "With so much focus on search engine performance and user recommendations these days, PR pros may be tempted to spend all their time learning how to game the various traffic drivers that are sprouting up all over the Internet. Sure, it’s always nice to get a traffic boost from Digg or StumbleUpon, but the value of that traffic may not be worth the effort."
They talk about what IS important which includes the fundamental skills of PR, mainly creating compelling content, building relationships and delivering a message which are all still really important on the Internet. In the podcast David and Paul try to put the recommendation engine craze in perspective.
This is why MarCom Broadband has continued to focus on an integrated approach, and why we named the firm MarCom in the first place -- as in marketing communications -- which encompasses almost every aspect including advertising copy and design, marketing, journalism or content building, public relations, and now, Internet tactics. The Broadband part of our name just addresses the quantum speed at which the Internet allows us to do it all now. The short of it is that your 2008 Internet marketing strategy should include all of these points.
Strom commented about how new technology changes things all the time, to the point where it can be overwhelming ... because it's not enough to continue to just do the same thing year after year. Download their podcast here. (http://www.gillin.com/Podcasts/tprws-41.mp3)
Gillin also believes headlines that are search engine friendly are very important. We agree, that's one tip that I have used that really works, as evidenced just yesterday when my associate Mike Keesling did a quick review of one of our clients.
One year ago, we started working with T.S. Wiley, who developed a new protocol for bio identical hormone therapy (BHRT) protocol, known as The Wiley Protocol. When we searched for bioidentical hormones a year ago, she and her website came up as number 35. Today it shows up in Google as number five. I have been writing many articles for Wiley, posting them on the article submission sites throughout the Web -- therefore we have many Google Alerts that show up with headlines including her key words which Mike did in his keyword analysis last year - such as hormones, bio-identical hormone replacement therapy, and bioidentical, etc. We have been doing PR Web releases, and some newsletters. This year we are ramping up with a blog.
So it IS important to take a look at using the keywords in headlines, in a company's website, including all the tags such as meta and alt tags on each page (stuff Mike does for our clients). And also keywords can go in photo caption tags and videos for You Tube
It all comes down to content which will serve you best. As David and Paul said, "Content is the king."
Thursday, January 3, 2008
Blogging is a Top New Year SEO Trend
The world of the blogosphere has grown, matured and diversified as a business communication medium and a tool used by search engine optimization and social media marketing experts like those of us at MarCom Broadband.
Just like websites, blogs are just another way to provide information -- but the difference is that a blog is more dynamic, contentwise. Many websites, even our own at MarCom, are more like portfolios. Although the trends are to have a more dynamic website, many folks still have static information or web copy on websites.
There are several different types of blogs for companys. An executive blog can profile comments and/or blog content from it's management team, or the executives of the company. But it is important that these executives take the time to write -- at least two to three times a week, otherwise you should ghostwrite for them.
Currently I am helping one client with his blog at http://www.roccobasile.blogspot.com/ so you can check out how we talk about his charity work.
You may need to coach your clients and help them with editing their blogs. And they need to learn how to make sure their key words are inserted into the blogs properly, or it won't do any good for their SEO.
There's also another type of blog, which has been tagged by the experts as an "advice" blog. That's what this blog of mine is. I give advice on social media marketing. Sometimes I go off topic, which is fine, and actually encouraged. These kind of blogs do really well in the search engines.
Whatever you blog about, the key thing is that you are consistant, with two to three posts a week. Keep it of interest, keep it real, and add your keywords.
As for how to set up your blog, I like the templates in Blogger.com, but there's also Wordpress, and other blog formats that are free and very easy to set up and use.
Happy blogging in the New Year!
Just like websites, blogs are just another way to provide information -- but the difference is that a blog is more dynamic, contentwise. Many websites, even our own at MarCom, are more like portfolios. Although the trends are to have a more dynamic website, many folks still have static information or web copy on websites.
There are several different types of blogs for companys. An executive blog can profile comments and/or blog content from it's management team, or the executives of the company. But it is important that these executives take the time to write -- at least two to three times a week, otherwise you should ghostwrite for them.
Currently I am helping one client with his blog at http://www.roccobasile.blogspot.com/ so you can check out how we talk about his charity work.
You may need to coach your clients and help them with editing their blogs. And they need to learn how to make sure their key words are inserted into the blogs properly, or it won't do any good for their SEO.
There's also another type of blog, which has been tagged by the experts as an "advice" blog. That's what this blog of mine is. I give advice on social media marketing. Sometimes I go off topic, which is fine, and actually encouraged. These kind of blogs do really well in the search engines.
Whatever you blog about, the key thing is that you are consistant, with two to three posts a week. Keep it of interest, keep it real, and add your keywords.
As for how to set up your blog, I like the templates in Blogger.com, but there's also Wordpress, and other blog formats that are free and very easy to set up and use.
Happy blogging in the New Year!
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