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Beanstalk's SEO News Blog

At Beanstalk Search Engine Optimization we know that knowledge is power. That's the reason we started this SEO blog. We know that the better informed our visitors are, the better the decisions they will make for their websites and their online businesses. We hope you enjoy your stay and find the SEO news contained within this blog useful.

July 20, 2012

Gearing Up for Social Media Marketing

Image: freedigitalphotos.net

Different demographics are using different social media channels. Reaching the right audience with social media is about using the right channels and voice to connect with and engage your followers. Different sites as well as online marketing and analysis techniques can help you connect with the audience you’ve been trying to reach. Below is information about common social media networks and their audiences so you can gear each channel towards the demographic and sectors of your potential audience that uses it most.

Facebook

There are a number of infographics and articles online with information about who is using Facebook. Knowing that the average person visits the site 40 times per month may not be the information. Here is breakdown of who is using Facebook and how to connect with them:

People from the ages of 18-44 are using Facebook the most. This means you’re information needs to be broad enough to reach and connect with most of your audience, but not so broad that no one takes interest. Posting information about news topics related to your field and asking open-ended questions are two of the best ways to do this.
Though the 20- and 30-somethings are some of the most active on Facebook, people over the age of 45 are becoming more frequent users. If your products relate to the older demographic, share information they can relate to. If your services are for those in their early 20’s, share that.
Because the Facebook audience is so broad, use Facebook Insights to see who is on your page and talking about your company. Gaining knowledge of your key demographics can help you provide content that will encourage more interaction and engagement.

Twitter

Like Facebook, Twitter had a wide range of users. Men and women use the site pretty equally, though a large majority of Twitter users include African Americans and Hispanics. People are more likely to buy from a company the follow on Twitter than from one they don’t so reaching your audience on Twitter is an important factor for both online engagement and overall sales.

Most Twitter users live in urban areas. If your business is based in a well-populated city, turn your Tweets to reaching those in the same city and other urban areas.
Because Twitter now has targeted promoted tweets, you can reach a specific audience. You aren’t tweeting to all your followers, unless you choose to do so. You are instead, placing the tweet in front of the audience you want to reach.
Programs like SocialBro provide insight into who your audience is and when they are online. Knowing the material that will relate most to your audience as well as the right times will help you refine your Twitter strategies to reach new people.
Many tweets are now coming from smartphones and 1 in 5 smartphone owners use Twitter on their phones. Sharing and tweeting comments that can be viewed quickly via a smartphone could increase your Twitter traction.

Pinterest

Pinterest, at the moment, has a more focused audience. Composed mostly of women, top interests of this image-driven site include crafts, gifts, hobbies, interior design and fashion. Brands based in these areas should be devoting a decent amount of time to their Pinterest efforts. Even if your business doesn’t seem to be a fit, your company’s Pinterest can succeed.

A top geographical location of Pinterest users is the East South Central United States, which includes Mississippi, Alabama, Kentucky and Tennessee. Posting images that people of this region can relate to and take interest can lead to more engagement on your Pinterest boards.
Women compose nearly 80% of Pinterest account holders. Regardless of your brand, gearing images toward women is a great tactic.
See what’s trending and consider how your business can relate. Because Pinterest is open to a wide variety of images and information, focusing on what the users are pinning at the moment can gear your boards and pins in the right direction.

Tumblr

Tumblr combines blogging and image-sharing to create a unique site that’s perfect for social bloggers. Men and women use the site pretty equally. One of the most surprising demographics is the age. According to an infographic from Mashable, over half the site’s users are under the age of 34, with 18% of the total users being under the age of 18. Fitting your company into Tumblr means targeting content to a younger audience.

Because the age group is so young, gearing content to trending topics and information a person around the age of 20 can relate to is a great way to gain a following. Use common tags and popular images to increase traffic.
Some of the most tagged terms on Tumblr include gif, “LOL” and fashion, though art and vintage are other common tags. Use these as they relate to your business and content to gain new followers.
See which of your posts, reblogs and other content receive the most traction. What tags lead to followers? What content generates the most buzz? Measure your progress so you can easily make adjustments.

All social media sites are about connecting. On Facebook, you can connect with people of all ages and from all backgrounds. Twitter is used by people in urban areas who want a quick and constant stream of information. Pinterest appeals to women and Tumblr to a younger demographic. With each social media site, research who likes and follows your company to see which audience is the most engaged with your company on that channel. As you figure out what your audience is on each channel, you can gear the content towards them for more successful social media campaigns.

Author:
Erica Bell is a small business writer who focuses on topics such as telemarketing and social media trends. She is a web content writer for Business.com.

SEO news blog post by guestpost @ 11:08 am

Categories: Facebook,LinkedIn,social media,Twitter
Tags: Erica Bell, facebook, pinterest, social media, tumblr, twitter —

June 9, 2012

Social Media Camp – Fred Sarkari

The keynote start with an interesting fact. The average infant laughs 483 times per day. An adult … 11.

Alright … let’s begin.

Keynote: What Is Social Media?

Fred Sarkari is the keynote speaker. Her reminds us of some issues with social media:
Social media is a crutch. Don’t forget the human element. Too many business ignore the human element in exchange for social media.

There are three possible outcomes from a social media presence:

Opportunity
Opportunity passes you by
Opportunity ruins your business

Warning: the human mind views success as being busy. Too many people measure social media as a success when they are spending too much time on it.

It’s important to understand that we are no different than children. We make decisions based on emotion and justify with logic. When engaging in social media you need to understand that people are viewing with emotion. Not everything needs to be perfect – we are human.

Similarly – we need to ask ourselves the same question children do … “Why?” When engaging in social media it’s better then to do one or two things well than many poorly so ask “Why?” when looking at a new platform.

Rules For Social Media:

Build relationships. You can be replaced … your relationships can’t. You need to be willing to put yourself on the line, express who you are and communicate with your audience honestly.
Don’t be an ego collector. Numbers don’t mean success. You can buy fans but they’ll never buy from you.
Invite eyeballs to home base. Real interested visitors can pull their social traffic to their website/blog/etc.
The BBQ effect. Friends of friends are qualified/liked and trusted. But if you turn on your fiends and try to sell them … they’ll feel betrayed. Use social media to build trust and respect. Invite them to your BBQ to meet you … the rest will follow.
Be found. Content, don’t post useless information (personal note – please please please listen to this one if I’m on your Follower list. I don’t care that you’re having a coffee at Starbucks). Gear your updates to what your audience is looking for.
Partnerships. They’re dangerous if you don’t develop the right partnerships but one or two of the right ones will change your business.
Social media is like a cocktail. If you order a cocktail you don’t want it diluted with ice. Similarly, your followers don’t want your updates diluted with useless filler.
Ask yourself: if you could be found by one specific person … how would you describe them?
Return. We spend so much time and resources getting people to us, don’t lose them. Give them what they want.
Do: Inspire people. Educate people based on what they do, not what you do. Help them execute their needs.
Resources. What resources do I have? Make sure you allocate them effectively.

Overall a very good presentation. Covered the basics but sometimes a reminder there is spot on.

SEO news blog post by Dave Davies, CEO @ 9:39 am

Categories: social media,social media camp
Tags: social media, social media camp —

February 1, 2012

Which Social Site Do I Use? Part 4: Social Media Terminology

This is the last in our series of "Which Social Sites Do I Use?" In Part 3, we discussed how to link your social sites together to maximize their effectiveness. In this last installment we will cover some commonly used terminology to help get started in the world of social media.

Twitter Tweets/RT & Mentions:

A tweet is simply a message posted on Twitter. While all agree on usage of tweet as a noun, people disagree on whether you "tweet" or "twitter" as a verb.
RT stands for retweet: Users add RT in a tweet if they are reposting something from another person’s tweet.
A mention is any Twitter update that contains @username anywhere in the body of the Tweet; this means that replies are also considered mentions.

Google +1 Button, Circles & Sparks:

The +1 Button: Each time you click +1, you’re adding to the batch of sites that you are attaching to your online profile. You’ll find your full list of +1′s in a special tab on your public Google profile. You can show your +1′s tab to the world or choose to hide it.
Circles: You share different things with different people. But sharing the right stuff with the right people shouldn’t be a hassle. Circles make it easy to put your friends from Saturday night in one circle, your parents in another, and your boss in a circle by himself, just like real life.
Hangouts: Bumping into friends while you’re out is one of the best parts of going out and about. With Hangouts, spontaneity hits the web. Whether you’re home in your pajamas or hitting the streets with your mobile phone, video hangouts let you bring up to 9 people into your world. It’s the next best thing to everyone being there.
Sparks: Google Spark would start on a single idea. Then, this idea would grow from collaborators’ comments, likes, and other ideas branching from this "spark". There would be connections, more connections and collaborating, and soon, a whole tree of ideas and support. A web of ideas revolving around a single motion, a single vision, linked by tags, keywords, and web links.

Facebook Likes & Recommends:

The Like Button lets a user share your content with friends on Facebook. When the user clicks the Like button on your site, a story appears in the user’s friends’ News Feed with a link back to your website. People are more accustomed and more familiar with this term. It is considered a more subtle action, and some people might feel less hesitant about liking something (rather than recommending it).
Recommend Button is a considered a stronger action than a "Like" and usually works well for negative (but interesting) content such as news stories. Followers may be more compelled to click a recommended link in their feed though some people may feel less compelled to make such strong action as a "recommendation" There is a perception that you would only recommend something that you firmly agree with or feel confident about recommending. Recommend also places a larger snippet in the Facebook news feed.

Take-Aways:

Don’t rely only on Social Networking. Use it in conjunction with a well developed, multi-tiered approach with might include traditional advertising.
Be willing to commit a significant amount of time, stay engaged and offer quality content.
Social media is about building up relationships online and instilling trust in your brand.
Engage with a deep understanding of your long-term business goals and mission statement and integrate them as part of an overall marketing strategy.
Put Social Buttons only to the most important networks on your site. Don’t overwhelm your visitors with too many.

Social media and networking is responsible for the biggest revolution in marketing and is undoubtedly responsible for the changing face of modern business networking. Staying engaged with your followers through social media allows businesses to stay closely connected with contacts, followers and customers in ways that traditional advertising and marketing could not.

Any business that is not fully engaged in social media is missing out on a increased customer base, increased sales and the potential for unparalleled growth.

SEO news blog post by guestpost @ 10:26 am

Categories: Facebook,Google+,LinkedIn,seo articles,social media,Twitter,YouTube
Tags: social media, terminology —

November 9, 2011

Why Great Content Is Seldom Seen

The post-panda Internet has left many website owners desperate to regain former rankings. The main directive of the new algorithm was to force websites to produce higher quality, relevant content on their websites if they hoped to remain competitive and to keep or increase their SERP rankings.

With the advent of social media en masse, Google (and the web in general) began using the public sharing of a website’s content across social networks as a predominant search engine ranking factor.

While this was a wonderful idea from a user perspective as it forced sites to produce better quality content for their visitors, many content developers found that their rankings were still suffering due to an apparent inability to generate interest in the wonderful content they were developing.

"Content marketing is an umbrella term encompassing all marketing formats that involve the creation or sharing of content for the purpose of engaging current and potential consumer bases."

Often we produce what we feel is great content only to find our efforts falling upon deaf ears. In most cases it is not the content that fails but is more often the result of what we do (or do not do) once the content has been created. Great ideas do not simply propagate themselves into the collective consciousness of the public. Viral web content is the reward of a well devised promotion and a carefully planned implementation strategy. The deployment of your content marketing strategy is crucial to its success.

Most of us rate how "great" content is by the number of page visits, tweets, or likes that the post receives; but what makes good content and more importantly, what can you do to ensure that it is distributed by as many visitors as possible?

Credibility

The best content comes from writing about topics that you know about. Those subjects that you have intimate knowledge about or are derived from your own experiences will always make for more credible content and will be considered higher quality content from a reader’s perspective.

Good content takes time and effort to develop. Great works (in any media) rarely come on a whim or spontaneous inspiration. If you have taken the time to prepare your piece by researching the subject and can offer something that is new, fresh or can communicate it in an especially novel or exciting fashion, it is much more likely to be shared by your readers. If you are particularly passionate or verbose in your delivery, your content becomes an effective vehicle for instilling confidence in the readers mind and generates credibility thereby allowing you to be considered a "specialist" in your area of expertise.

Actionably

Effective content should illicit an emotional response, or create a call to action for the reader. Try to make your content actionable. Leave your readers with the sense they have gained wisdom from your piece and give them something they can take away from it. Content will be shared more readily if it speaks to your readers directly in a more actionable way. A particularity well written piece of content will almost share itself. If you can be proud of the content you have developed and are excited to share it with others, chances are that your readers will want to share it as well.

Marketing

Once you have taken the time to do your research and have composed a wonderful piece of content, how do you get others to read it and share it? While great content is more likely to be shared virally, it is utterly useless without the uses of proper exploitation and a comprehensive marketing strategy.

The first distribution base for your content can be to the friends, coworkers and acquaintances in your email contacts. Remember that it is probably okay to ask your close contacts if they would mind redistributing your content as well. Customer newsletters are still a viable option to use if you have one in place.

"Content marketing subscribes to the notion that delivering high-quality, relevant and valuable information to prospects and customers drives profitable consumer action. Content marketing has benefits in terms of retaining reader attention and improving brand loyalty."

Effective syndication relies on your company having a strong social media presence. Reach out to your online community, through your social media profiles that you have setup. While there are a myriad of social networks you can share your content with, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are the most popular and are the best places to start syndicating your content. Don’t neglect other niche market social networks that may be closely geared towards your industry as well.

Delivery

Timing is everything. You will need to ensure that your content is not being syndicated at ineffective times. Plan to release your content on a Monday morning rather than on a Friday afternoon or on the weekend. Statistics show that most people check their social accounts at the beginning of the work day and after lunch. A 9-5 Monday through Thursday deployment strategy will typically be more effective, with Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays being the most effective days. Remember that it is okay to tweet your content in the morning and again in the afternoon. However, over-using this tactic can quickly annoy your followers.

Plan your content publishing as you would plan a product launch. If it is a particularly large story or news item, you can pre-announce its coming as well. This is an effective way to build consumer anticipation. Consider using a press release with a noteworthy online content syndication service such as PRWeb for your press releases.

Promotion

Perhaps one of the biggest reasons marketing content fails to attract views is due to the lack of follow-through and ongoing promotion of the piece. You need to continue with the promotion of your content long after it has been initially syndicated. Develop a promotion plan that includes reminding people of your content via your social networks and actively work to build links to your content on relevant sites through press releases, your website, guest blogging, online advertising or online radio shows. Any medium where you can gain exposure to your content will be beneficial in securing views.

Any online content takes time to develop traction and get noticed. The Internet has caused most of us to believe success happens overnight. Careful planning and implementation over the course of a well planned promotion, will always yield better returns.

SEO news blog post by guestpost @ 11:48 am

Categories: Google,link building,Rankings,seo articles
Tags: content optimization, social media —

June 30, 2011

Google+ is a real negative for Facebook

Google has done social media very well in Brazil, completely dominating the market with their Orkut service. So when people started saying that Google was nuts for taking on Social Media, it made me ask why?

I like Facebook.
I love GMail.
I share some photos and quotes on FB.
Google sees everything I do.
I use Google’s chrome browser to view FB.
I get most of my FB updates in GMail.
I am also a privacy nut.

To me, that’s not a fair fight when Google would need a blind fold, and one arm tied behind their backs for it to be a close race. So then it must be that the folks who are suggesting it will fail are actually trying it out and making some quick ‘first impressions’?

Here’s the link to get started with Google+. I think you’ll find that it’s rather unlikely anyone is speaking from a hands on perspective given how limited the service is right now. Heck it doesn’t even confirm you’ve been added to the contact list, likely because everyone is still trying to get an invite.

Even if you get an invite and go to the page you’re likely to hit this:

Already invited? We’ve temporarily exceeded our capacity. Please try again soon.

Plus if you are in the trial group, apparently the invites are limited to 100 just like GMail was. EDIT: If you add contacts to a social circle, and then send an message to the social circle, Google + will invite all those contacts to join, without counting them as invites. No doubt that this will only last a few hours before it’s patched however.

So for those without an account here’s some videos showing you what’s coming.

A quick run through all the features in one video for all you TL;DW types.

Social Circles are a brilliant grouping function. On FB we see people either suffering because they have no groups, or suffering to create and manage groups.
Google’s approach with Social Circle’s visual drag n’ drop couldn’t be more simple or clever. Now when you have something gross to share you can drop it on a circle of people that you know will be mortified by your image.
Want to crack an inside joke 90% of your friends wouldn’t get? Make a social circle for the folks who would get it and drop the joke on them.

If social circles was all you had, you’d find yourself making a ton and management would become a chore.
Enter Google + Sparks, an ‘interest’ manager that lets you tune into whatever sparks your interest. If you share something with Spark you can also invite groups of people to push your spark out to. Thanks to Google +1 if you are doing this properly you’ll see it come back in the +1 score.

Google Hangouts is essentially a group video chat. Anyone can start one and friends can jump into any open hangout with other friends. The selling point is ‘unscheduled’ social time, where anyone with any spare time can ‘hang’ together.

As tech gets better, sharing becomes easier. Instant upload is on the forefront of media sharing where all the heavy lifting is done for you, and you’re left with minimal effort to share what matters.

Have you ever planned something with more than 2 friends, quickly? Getting assigned as the ‘planner’ for anything can sometimes ruin all the fun of what you’re planning.
Huddle allows you to quickly pull everyone together and sort out the game plan without any single person taking on the task of planning.

After that really well composed tour I’m only left with a few issues.

Overlapping services:
- Do I use huddle to plan lunch?
- Should I go see who’s hungry in a hangout?
- Perhaps I need to start a ‘Bacon Cheeseburger Spark’ and see who’s interested?

We have to wait for an invite:
- Waiting really is the hardest part.
- Even if you get an invite you may not get in yet.
- Socializing with 2 out of 200 friends won’t work well.

We need friends to do things with:
- You read this far?
- Lets be friends!

If you’ve found some flaws or see some shortcomings of the Google+ service, drop us a line, we’d love to hear some solid insight into what isn’t great about the new service. I heard Dave on the radio show while I was working on this article, and they were discussing Google+ for a few minutes. Dave was trying to play devils advocate and it sounded like he was really having a hard time shooting it down which is impressive.

Once we’ve had some hands on time with the service we will have more of an SEO insight into what Google+ offers, but for now enjoy the videos and discussion.

SEO news blog post by Ryan Morben @ 8:11 pm

Categories: Google,Internet Law,Privacy,Search Engine News,social media
Tags: facebook, google, social media —

March 31, 2011

The New +1 Button from Google

No…this is not a nerdy Dungeons & Dragons reference. Google announced on Wednesday that they are introducing a new feature called "+1 Button." This new feature from Google is still in the experimental phase, but it is most definitely going to have an impact on SEO and rankings. So far this new feature has only been release in English searches in the USA and Canada.

Use +1 to give something your public stamp of approval, so friends, contacts, and others can find the best stuff when they search. Get recommendations for the things that interest you, right when you want them, in your search results.

Your +1′s are public. They can appear in Google search results, on ads, and sites across the web. You’ll always be able to see your own +1′s in a new tab on your Google Profile, and if you want, you can share this tab with the world.

Google states clearly that:

The +1 button is shorthand for "this is pretty cool" or "you should check this out."

Click +1 to publicly give something your stamp of approval. Your +1′s can help friends, contacts, and others on the web find the best stuff when they search.

Google is being very clear that this will have a significant impact on sites and will be part of the new Google Social Ranking signals. It seems that this is another step in reducing the emphasis on links as a ranking signal as well.

It is well documented that social signals are already a determining factor in determining rank. Facebook "shares", for instance have long been established as having a significant impact on rank.

This is another move towards the "Social Web" by Google. Inbound marketing is definitely the future for all SEO efforts and will soon be one of the few ways to garner truly organic traffic to your site. It is increasingly necessary to engage users across as many social mediums as possible.

From an SEO standpoint, some people feel that the new social metrics will be easy to game. However, I would have to disagree. Google collects a lot of information on users in order to determine that profiles are in fact tied to real people and are authentic. Taking a look at your Google Dashboard will give you a good indication of some of the main factors that Google uses to determine if you are “rea” [erson with authority. Some of the factors Google will look at are: Gmail account, Analytics, Blogger, Buzz, Calendar, Contacts, Google Docs, Picassa, Reader, and perhaps most importantly: Social Circle and Content.

Both Bing and Google have been very clear that links shared through Twitter and Facebook have a direct impact on rankings and as SEOs we need to make this major part of our SEO strategies.

Google is already working on implementing a +1 feedback button for you to embed on your website. This will be similar to the Facebook "Like" button, or the Twitter "Tweet" button, or an upvote. Once you enable +1 you’re also opted in to show this information on 3rd party sites in exactly the same was as Facebook buttons.

I think the biggest concern that arises from the implementation of this new feature, is what about sites that are not necessarily “cool” or “popular,” but are more useful in nature. We can only hope and assume that the more traditional ranking signals will still hold water for these sites.

SEO news blog post by guestpost @ 6:35 pm

Categories: Facebook,Google,Google,link building,Rankings,social media,Twitter
Tags: +1 button, social media —

March 8, 2011

Skype…Y U NO Social?

In an interesting article from ZDNet, it looks as though Facebook and Skype have resumed talks over a merger between the two online companies. If the rumor-mill is correct, you may be soon able to make a video call to your friends on Facebook. This appears to be another step between the migrations of the two technologies. They have been discussing a potential joining or partnership since September of 2010, but were unable to reach any agreements at that time.

Skype has had the ability to voice call your Facebook contacts since the release of version Skype 5.0 released in 2010, but it did not include video chat ability. While Skype has included some Facebook features into their software, Facebook has not reciprocated as adding any VoIP services on their website and mobile apps would instantly put them in direct competition with many other services that offer video calling such as Google’s Gmail and Apple’s Facetime.

Skype currently allows for video conferencing with up to 10 other people but it is only available on their premium package. Allowing this option would be a huge boost to the popularity of both Facebook and Skype. Google has been trying to develop a social network with its release of Orkut, but has been so far unsuccessful.

And this is where the conspiracy theory comes in:

More and more subscribers use Facebook to conduct internet searches as they would in Google. As it stands now, Facebook places paid ads for localized searches on your Facebook page. If Skype owns eBay than any potential merger between Facebook and Skype opens the floodgates for direct and specific product placement from eBay. Adding a partner with an affiliate such as eBay seems essentially problematic if not completely unethical.

And now for the "SEO Spin":

As SEO’s we need to watch for these shifting usage patterns in an effort to make the exploit peoples search patterns. While Facebook does not offer much for the SEO to promote a client’s business, it may be that the best SEO efforts will be realized through a back door approach. What if an SEO’s client were to place their products on eBay in order to have them appear on your Facebook page when searching for relevant terms?
Further bulletins as events warrant.

SEO news blog post by guestpost @ 7:31 pm

Categories: Facebook,Skype
Tags: conspiracy, facebook, skype, social media —

February 17, 2011

July 2, 2009

Who can afford to give free advice? (Why Write Articles)

Companies who give free advice often get benefits of recognition and media attention. These days that is more often via social media the likes of blogs, stumble upon, and digg, all of which are modern forms of “word of mouth advertising”. But they surpass word of mouth in that references from online social media may stick around years longer than a customers memory can recall things clearly. Information also moves so much faster in our modern world. A reference to your site online whether good or bad can generally spread a lot further a lot faster than good old fashioned “word of mouth advertising”. Not to mention that the references stick around a long time and continue to be viewed by more and more web surfers as time goes on.

So why not take advantage of that and publish all manner of resources to garner some attention? At first glance for a businessman it might seem a bit strange to publish resources on say fishing if you’re a fisherman. Or if you’re the best jewel smith you would think you should keep your tips and tricks to yourself. However the reality is most of the people who see this information and think “it’s cool” are never going to be at a level of expertise to become your competition. They still would need thousands of dollars in training and tools to match the quality your business already offers. Not to mention that most of your tips and tricks are probably known among industry professionals so you’re not really divulging any secrets that could affect your customer base are you? If anything a few amatuers might try your advice and find they’re unable to achieve the quality you are. They’ll be able to appreciate your companies workmanship even more.

If authors were worried about competition text books would only be written by retired professionals. Instead active industry professionals are often the one’s writing new resources because it gains them respect and a reputation in the industry. Online that respect and reputation can translate to your businesses website being a hot topic and resources you publish have a chance to spread among social media attracting all kind of buzz in your direction. The question is will you be ready to keep up?

Free tools, tutorials, howto’s and various other resources and gadgets really are the way of the web. Domaintools? MXtoolbox? Tizag? Howstuffworks? Speedtest.net? Ipchicken.com? All of these services monitize themselves in some way. Some of these monitize themselves with advertisements but others are built by a particular business strictly to promote themselves or their partners.

Customers love when you give them things for free. You might be a bit aprehensive the first time your business is asked to publish free advice. But consider advanced fields like the software industry or web design and think about how long it took you and your employees to get where you are? Did it happen overnight? Unlikely. It probably took years of your spare time learning your trade either at home in your coding cave or at College or University.

Don’t be a protectionist in a time where free tips are the the norm. Your contributions may help people with their coding hobby. (some of which will go on to be professionals after years of dedication) Most people are likely to realize they can’t compete with the level of quality your company can produce in such a short time. Then there are those who fiddle around and find out at some point that they don’t have the time to do it themselves. Meanwhile your real competitors already know the score themselves so your free resources probably won’t help them any.

Out of the few prodigies that can turn a professional product from your tutorials and other resources have you really lost any business? This person obviously had the time, the talent, the ambition and the desire to do things themselves. Were they ever a potential client?

There are already many do it yourself programming and web design communities and resources out there. Why not add to the pool and get your name spread around blogs, twitter, instant messages, discussion boards, and more?

SEO news blog post by Dave Davies, CEO @ 3:19 pm

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: link bait, link building, social media —

April 27, 2009

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