R.I.P MyBlogLog – Yahoo Announces Shutdown of Service

After many rumors over the past twelve months, Yahoo has officially announced the shutdown of MyBlogLog in an email to users:

Dear MyBlogLog Customer,

You have been identified as a customer of Yahoo! MyBlogLog. We will officially discontinue Yahoo! MyBlogLog effective May 24, 2011. Your agreement with Yahoo!, to the extent that it applies to the Yahoo! MyBlogLog, will terminate on May 24, 2011.

After May 24, 2011 your credit card will no longer be charged for premium services on MyBlogLog. We will refund you the unused portion of your subscription, if any. The refund will appear as a credit via the billing method we have on file for you. To make sure that your billing information is correct and up to date, visit https://billing.yahoo.com.

Questions?
If you have questions about these changes, please visit the Yahoo! MyBlogLog help pages.

We thank you for being a customer on Yahoo! MyBlogLog.

Sincerely,

The Yahoo! My BlogLog Team

As I’ve said before, never has a great service gone so rapidly downhill after being acquired.

R.I.P MyBlogLog

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Into The Minds of Link Builders

This isn’t a hidden fact; link building is the missing piece of most online marketing plans. Onsite SEO and content are just part of the game, but there is no part of code you can change that will have an impact on ranking like good, strong, focused links to your site’s pages. Naturally, link building is the one thing we all hate doing. Most SEOs, when you mention link building, will either groan and put their headphones back on, or just cry. But it is a necessary part of SEO.

So instead of drowning out the part of your to-do list, or bawling, how about we get directions from three of the top minds in link building. I sent questions to some of my favorite link builders and mashed up their answers to give you some insight from those that truly love link building. If you want more after this post, check out some more top minds discussing link building at the Distilled Link Building Seminar in New Orleans or London.

Without further adieu, our link building ninjas are:

Julie Joyce owns Link Fish Media, Inc, a link development company headquartered in Greensboro, NC that focuses on helping clients in ultra-competitive niches all over the world. She also really likes pub snacks.

Ben Wills is the CEO and Co-Founder of Ontolo. While working at the largest SEO company in the early 2000s, he designed and directed implementation for thousands of SEO campaigns. And thus began his focus on scale and automation. While not figuring out hard SEO and link building problems, he road trips thousands of miles a year and rock climbs whenever his body and schedule lets him. Following him on Twitter: @benwills

Brian McDowell focuses on product development and customer success for Conductor. McDowell has designed and built multiple in-house proprietary technologies for natural search and built large in house teams consisting of developers and junior level SEO practitioners for companies such as LendingTree, RealEstate.com, Market America and Red Ventures.

Please note that these answers have been edited. If you want to see their full answers, download this Link Building Full Interviews. On to the questions:

You do something most SEOs hate to do, why? (Dear God Why?)

Julie: Haha! Honestly, I really love it. It’s tedious, it’s hell at times … I think it’s quite difficult to do well and that forces those of us doing it to constantly try to think of creative ways to keep going and stop the wall from coming down. There’s something very satisfying about seeing an amazing link … I’ve never felt like that looking at a meta tag.

Brian: It is exciting to measure and analyze specific tactics and techniques in order to get a better understanding of how external factors enhance (or dilute) your SERP positioning. Link building is a science and it takes a lot of effort to do properly.

Ben: Honestly? After 7 years of it, I got bored with SEO. … I realized that the problem of link building hadn’t been solved well and that I hadn’t built an idea I’d always wanted to. Boredom? Cured.

Is there one tool that is completely indispensible to you?

Ben: Ours I say that cheekily, but it’s also true. I really don’t like doing the same task twice and so we’ve built numerous tools around each of those tasks.

Julie: Rex Swain’s HTTP Header Check – It’s just so old school it’s crazy, and it’s amazing how many people do not use 301s properly. If I’m building links to a site, I’d at least like that redirect to be in there!

Brian: Tools to help with Automation – hands down. Good SEOs use tools to automate their efforts and become more efficient.

What is the one thing you wish you knew when you first started in link building?

Julie: I wish I’d known how worthless Google’s Toolbar PageRank is as a link building metric. (Amen Sista!)

Ben: It might be a rough road, that I’m not going to get it right from the beginning, and that that’s really ok and might be the best way to go.

Brian: I wish I knew the importance of auditing my investments (both pre and post publish). Audits are used to monitor your link investments in order to make sure your links are live, constructed properly and live in good neighborhoods. Fixing broken links (including internal 404s) should be considered another tactic in link building and not just general maintenance.

If you took on a client looking for link building help, what is the first thing they should know?

Brian: What are the expectations of these sites and what are they using to measure the level of success. I’d want them to know to focus on distributed relevance without a hyper focus on a specific term. Link building takes time and should have consistent and sustained growth. Patience is needed and the amount of time is purely dependent on the competitive landscape for their niche and which terms they are targeting. I’d ask things like:

• Does the customer care about lead generation, online sales, incoming calls or just visibility?
• How quickly can changes be made to the site (important in link building for managing relevance)?
• What analytics package and use of Google and/or Bing Webmaster Tools?
• Is the customer currently using an SEO platform to track and monitor their efforts?

Ben: Link building is the least measurable form of marketing in terms of impact on rankings. No one knows how to value a link right now in terms of search rankings and ROI…the math is simply too complex and constantly changing. Even if you figured it out, it would be irrelevant pretty quickly.

Julie: The first thing we tell people requesting a quote is that we do buy links and that paid links are risky business. We don’t just buy links, but link buying is definitely our specialty. If they are comfortable with the risk and I am comfortable with it, things progress, but if one of us isn’t, we part ways immediately.

What link building technique or source of links do you think is under used / undervalued by SEOs right now?

Julie: That’s a tough one. I definitely have a soft spot for good paid links so I’d probably say that those are the most undervalued types of links. I think there’s an assumption that all paid links are horrible spammy ones on irrelevant one-page sites, but it’s absolutely not true. Really nice paid links that are relevant, don’t leave a footprint, and drive traffic are definitely undervalued.

Brian: The ones I use. On a serious note, I think infographics are something that not enough people focus on. They require a creative mind, a great designer and a data analyst to work together and produce something amazing enough to be shared. Good infographics have a long lifespan, generate links and references as well as good social citations.

Ben: The most undervalued technique is more of a well-designed strategy that’s consistently executed, day in and day out. We hear a lot about one-off efforts, but rarely about recurring strategies that build on themselves over time.

When it comes to international or localized search, any tips on how to get links from your area?

Brian: Street teams work great. Shake some hands and kiss some babies to get the job done. Network. Is your lunch hour worth a link? Absolutely. Offer to exchange some SEO knowledge and straight up ask for the link. If you do not have easy access to the geographical area, become a part of its community: sponsor events and work with the local news media.

Julie: It depends on where the target market is. If you’re a UK site but you do business all over, I’d not be as keen to suggest as high a percentage of .co.uk links as I would be if you only sold in the UK itself. I don’t pay as much attention to hosting location … Relevant language links are nice if you’re working in a foreign language. In terms of how to get them, I always go back to the emailed link request. People say it doesn’t work but it works for us (perhaps because we’re offering cash!) For something non-paid, I think there is a massive amount of ideas too numerous to name here, but content and social media would be driving forces there.

Ben: For international, I would say to offer something unique to that area/country and distribute it through well-connected experts in that country. For local? Get involved! There are so many local opportunities from local bloggers to volunteering to holding free local events. I can’t stress enough how much simply “showing up” can help with local link building. If you’re in it for the long haul, “show up” to something new once a week for 3 months. After that, you’ll know better than anyone consultant could tell you what opportunities are out there.

What is the biggest misconception in link building today?

Julie: I’m going to harp on paid links here but I do think it’s that all paid links are crap. Secondly, I’d say that it’s the idea that you can compete in an ultra-competitive niche without buying links. People say it’s possible but no one is willing to step up and point you to an actual example. I can’t really imagine telling a client like that to just write great content.

Brian: That spending time and resources on link building is not necessary or a priority. On the flip side, a great link profile will only get you so far if you have poor site structure. SEO is a hybrid of technical aptitude with a deep understanding of industry best practices and a creative mind for marketing and brand management.

What sites/blogs would you recommend for people looking to learn about link building?

• Linkspiel.com
• paulmadden.co.uk
• wiep.net
• Ontolo.com/blog (Garrett French)
• blog.conductor.com
• seomoz.org/blog
• Distilled.co.uk/blog/
• seoroundtable.com

What is the most creative link building tactic you’ve ever seen?

Ben: People might not like it when I say this, but I’d say that negative reviews for that glasses company that imploded late last year was pretty creative. In poor taste and unethical? Yep. Creative? Absolutely.

Julie: I’d have to say that Lyndon Antcliff’s fake news bait was amazing. Not only did he fool people, he divided people, and he got our attention. I like a nice prank anyway so I thought the whole thing was hysterical. The story is still up and look at the backlinks!

Brian: A competitor built a site that had free hit counters before this tactic became mainstream. The hit counter site was clean and actually looked fairly decent. In order to use their “free hit counters” you had to use their code and accept the marketing agreement.

What I particularly liked about this hit counter site was the fact that they ranked #1 in PPC for many niche keywords and often times they were the only result. They were effectively buying clicks for people to put the hit counters on their site. The real cash cow here was that the hit counters came with a link to their many properties in multiple ways. Some links had keyword rich anchor text, some links were exact URLs and others were brand names. There was also the existence of image links with great alt text and titles. These links were distributed across a wide population of unrelated pages and the tactic was fairly effective for a long period of time.

I loved this approach since they were effectively attracting amateur webmasters looking for a free basic analytics tool (tracking visits). While something like this wouldn’t work well today (not that people aren’t trying) the reason I loved this was that it embodied the creative nature of link building in a new and unique way.

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Britney Spears, Plenty of Fish & $500,000!

Have you seen Britney Spear’s latest music video, “Hold It Against Me“? If not, you should… and it’s not because of the music or video, but instead because of the marketing genius and branding put into the video. It’s reported that Britney Spears has earned $500,000 just for the product placements in her latest video, which includes sponsors such as Sony, Plenty of Fish and more.

You can watch the video below, and here’s how the paid placement and sponsors appear throughout the video.

0:39 – Britney is handed a bottle of perfume, which she sprays on herself, followed by a close-up shot of Radiance logo
0:47 – Make Up Forever eyeshadow appears in shot, followed by a shot in which Britney applies the eyeshadow
1:27 – First shot of Plenty of Fish screen
1:30 – Britney clicks on Plenty of Fish logo
1:32 – Britney clicks on Plenty of Fish logo again
1:34 – Shot of Sony logo
1:35 – Plenty of Fish logo appears prominently in shot
1:36 – Shot of Plenty of Fish profile page
2:40 – Close shot of Sony logo
2:41 – Shot of Britney performing on Sony TV

Celebrity gossip and new web site, PopEater, says “Plenty of Fish has already reported a 20 percent increase in traffic to their site since Spears debuted her video last week.“. Considering the massive amount of traffic flowing through Plenty of Fish, to a see an overall 20% increase is quite amazing. Plenty of Fish looks like they are actively getting into the music video advertising business, as this is now the second music video they have had paid placement in. The first was with Lady Gaga in here “Telephone” music video.

While other music artists like Katy Perry thinks it’s caddy and actually tweeted “do it w/style & grace…Not so in ur face like some. U hv to get creative w/it. Some artists don’t care tho, & u can tell.“, I can tell you that there will always be a market for monetization, and if one celebrity isn’t making use of it, another will. Just think about all of the paid placement in TV shows and movies on a regular basis… it happens because it works!

The Jersey Shore Guide to Irresistible Personal Branding

The Jersey Shore is back and up to its old antics again.

My guess — you being a respectable content marketer who finds that sort of display crude, irresponsible and embarrassing — is that you’re not tuning in.

Hey, I hear you. But do you know who isn’t offended by it?

The 8.4 million people who tuned in to the season premiere last month, making it the network’s most-watched series episode ever.

Whether you’re a true fan of Snooki, or you credit her with single-handedly hammering that last nail completing the Decline of Western Civilization, it doesn’t matter.

The fact is that each member of The Jersey Shore cast has gone on to create a recognizable and profitable personal brand in the 14 months the show has been on the air.

Not too shabby. And tucked inside the show’s success are personal branding lessons that any marketer can benefit from. Even if you’re not spray-tanned to a disturbing shade of orange.

Get a pen and paper because personal branding school is in session, Jersey Shore style.

Lesson 1: Own your oddities

If there’s one marketing principle reinforced by The Jersey Shore it’s that your oddities are what make you watchable.

Five minutes into checking out what’s going on in Seaside Heights this season and you’ll notice that most of the Jersey Shore cast barely looks human. They’re walking Halloween costumes, tanned, oiled and gym’d to the max.

And it’s their oddness that makes them interesting and what drives millions of people to tune in each week.

In an earlier Copyblogger post on branding and belly dancing, I spoke about the importance of creating a character — one that allows you to show off a heightened version of yourself to attract the right people to what you’re selling.

You’re probably not 4’9″ and God knows the world doesn’t need another Snooki, but what’s kooky and stand-out about you?

Figure out what it is and how you can make it work to your advantage.

Identify it. Use it. Become it.

Lesson 2: Polarization is a good thing

It doesn’t matter if you’re big, little or fall somewhere in between. Most of us are afraid to be a polarizing figure by taking a hard stance.

Just look at what happened to Groupon after the Super Bowl.

We hold back from going too far left, too far right or too far in our own direction in fear that we’ll be isolating our audience. And I get that – because you very often will be. But that’s not a bad thing.

The Jersey Shore kids are good examples of that. You’re either appalled by their train wreck or you’re mesmerized by it. And that’s why it works.

A post on the OK Cupid blog last month touched on the same concept, bringing up the mathematics of beauty. Specifically, it showed how playing up what some people don’t like about you allows you to attract the people who will.

It’s why edgy Meaghan Fox is more attractive than wholesome Kristen Bell, or why guys with tattoos are rated better looking than the average prepster.

If you want to be memorable, create a contrast. Going the safe route and trying to be everything to everyone won’t win you fans, it’ll only bring in people who don’t have an opinion about you either way.

Those people aren’t going to buy your stuff, and they won’t remember your name in the morning.

Lesson 3: People want a little drama

Season 3 of The Jersey Shore came with one promise -– that it would be the most drama-filled season to date.

So far, it’s lived up to the hype, with cast members getting into scary physical altercations, getting arrested, and with sudden character exits. The drama keeps people hooked because everyone wants to see what’s going to happen next and who is going to do what to whom.

If you’re working to build your personal brand, I wouldn’t recommend going out and getting arrested tomorrow, but do look for ways to create a little spice.

Maybe it’s Groupon releasing controversial commercials or you deciding to take an unpopular stance on your blog.

Associating your brand with a splash of excitement will help keep it top of mind and always relevant.

Lesson 4: You’ve got to build your platform

It’s easy to hate on The Jersey Shore kids for what they represent, but at the end of the day, they’ve created a platform that extends far past the show.

Snooki is a New York Times Bestselling author (wrap your head around that).

“The Situation” is said to have made $5 million from appearances and products (including his own vodka line and garment bags).

Jenny aka “JWOWW” has a book and bronzer, Ronnie endorses a popular weight loss drug, Angelina has a music single, Sammi has a perfume, and Vinny and Pauly D both have clothing lines.

Not bad for 14 months in the spotlight.

Sure, it’s ridiculous, but they created it.

The personal brand you create means nothing if you don’t have a business model. If you’re spending an hour a day on Twitter talking to people without finding a way to bring them back to your site or direct them somewhere else to do something, you’re leaving money on the table and you’re wasting your time.

Decide what you want these channels to give you and then create a plan for how you’ll be accomplishing that.

While The Jersey Shore certainly isn’t doing our younger generations any cultural favors, they are giving smart marketers some branding lessons worth tuning in for.

And now you have an excuse for the next time you’re caught watching …

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Are You Too Busy to Write? Seven Ways to Blog More Productively

Is finding time to blog something you struggle with? A number of people have asked me how they can find time to blog on top of everything else that I have going on.

Writing content is vitally important for your blog. It is your source of direct visitors, plus the meat of what you share in social media, the combination of which is essentially all the marketing many of us do. Your content attracts and maintains a relationship with your subscribers, and it is also what prompts readers to take action, even if that action is simply a blog comment.

Without regularly added, fresh, original, useful content … well, your blog becomes the web equivalent of the Pacific Junk Patch.

One thing you might have noticed though is that I don’t stick to a rigid writing schedule. This helps me find time to work on my blog around other commitments, but is only possible for me because of a few factors:

1. I already have a reasonably sized, engaged audience. You might say I have some “credit in the bank”.
2. “Traffic” is not something I rely on for my income. Providing I help enough people work towards their own goals then I will attract “few but enough” customers to pay my bills.
3. My philosophy is that you are only as good as your last post. Given the choice between “phoning it in” to keep up an arbitrary schedule and waiting to post something I am happy with … well, you guessed right, I wait.

You might not have these luxuries so need to balance your schedule a little more in favour of keeping in touch with subscribers more often but without making it too taxing a job for you.

My approach is to offer my loyal audience content you will want to bookmark, give you actionable tips via the benefit of my experience. If I succeed then I get more subscribers and clients, and really, unlike many bloggers my subscribers and customers are the only people I need to worry about where my blog is concerned.

I have no advertisers to keep sweet, and I don’t intend ever selling my blog, so I have no need to inflate my page views. Providing I do well with keeping my readers happy then my peer group and potential partners will also be happy.

If however you make money from impressions or ad clicks then you will need to get your traffic up and maintain that high level. That makes having a more rigorous publishing schedule a priority.

At the same time you can’t let your quality suffer because you are pushing quantity, making your productivity even more important.

Most of my readers are individuals, professionals or small businesses, so it might be well within your reach to shift your online business model to be more about authority than page views and clicks. If that is the case for you then focus on one solid article a week rather that try to achieve an unrealistic schedule – that might be all the solution you need. If you do want to eek out a few more hours in your week though, read on for some more tips!

How can you find time to not just write but create great content?

1. Set time aside – preferably quiet, focused time with zero distractions. I recommend actually putting this time in your diary and sticking to it. If you try to “catch 10 minutes” then you are going to either keep pushing the task back or you are going to find that time just vanishes altogether. Also setting a specific time allows your subconscious to prepare.
2. Write in Batches, and if possible schedule your posts in advance – Most blogging software such as WordPress allows you to write articles in advance and set the date and time when they should go “live”, visible on your blog. Publishing in advance allows you to write in quieter times and have the articles visible at busy times. While I no longer do this on chrisg.com I have always done this when writing for clients (when you have a contract for a certain number of posts per month it is not a good idea to write them just before they are meant to be sent out to subscribers!). Writing in batches allows you to get into a flow and you will find the writing process far more fluid than trying to task switch between your main job and being a writer. Darren often has cafe days where he will sit and batch write a whole raft of posts, and he ran away to a hotel to complete his work on the Problogger book!
3. Jot down ideas as they come to you – When you relax your brain or think about something else is when some of your best ideas will come to you, so make sure you store those ideas on a notepad, in your phone, or on some scrap of paper! A really cool aspect of the WordPress is you can use multiple tools, even email, to send a draft of a post to your blog for later use. I have a whole bunch of draft posts that are just headlines and some bullets waiting for me to complete them.
4. Repurpose content – “Repurposing” is taking your content and using it in a different location, in a different way, or re-packaging it. So I might take a series of posts and create an ebook, or I might expand an article into a presentation. Someone might request they republish my article in their newsletter. It can work the other way though, and it can be a great way to fill your blog. Take points from your presentations and write them up as blog posts. Maybe you have a transcript that you can copy and paste as a starting point? Have you got a section of a report or ebook tat you can use? Emails to customers? Existing content is an asset to be reused if you are creative!
5. Answer questions – Taking the last point further, my customer, coaching client and audience questions are my best source of content. This post came from a question I get asked a lot and was asked in interviews twice last week. When you answer a question in email, on a forum, in a chat, blog comment, or in an interview with a transcript, then you can copy, paste and edit to create a post. The best part? You KNOW it is on-topic and relevant.
6. Have a system – My coaching clients know that I have a writing system that allowed me to write for at one point twelve different blogs at once. This has meant I have written thousands of articles, and to be honest was probably too many because people were telling me I was getting over exposed! In brief, use headline formulas, write an outline, create without stopping, turn off the internal editor until you have a first draft. People try to write the whole thing at once and get stuck switching from creating to editing and back again. Don’t do that – split the creative part from the editing part and you will work with your brain rather than against it!
7. Failing all that – outsource! If you still struggle then get guest writers, pay writers, or what I think is a really smart move, get an editor to take your thoughts and ideas and polish them into finished articles.

These might not be silver bullets but they do work. While my family is watching TV I can sit with them with my laptop tapping out outlines, drafts, or editing. Some times it will take three or even four days for a post to get to the point where I am happy to hit publish but I have also had articles written in under half an hour that have been big hits in social media and in terms of traffic.

The big difference though is when you make time.

How do you find time to blog? Do any of my tips work (or not) for you? Please share your thoughts, experiences and tips in the comments …

Talking of being more productive … I want to tell you about my latest course …

Make More Progress: Quickly implement effective tactics to get more done and achieve more in your business.

Increase your productivity without any rigid organisation systems that cause even more work, rapidly create and launch information products in record time, and get more done with less effort.

Go ahead and click here right now to find out more!

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Make Money with CPATrend Affiliate Network

As a blogger and affiliate marketer, I’m continually pitched by ad networks on a daily basis about running offers on their network. The difference between me running an offer on their network or not, usually comes down to the offers they have available, but also how persistent they are with me, while not getting to the point of annoyance. Another huge incentive and plus to keeping bigger affiliates happy with a new network, is to immediately setting the affiliate up with the highest payout rates without having to see any volume is also a huge plus. These are just a few of the key points which led me to start working with CPATrend.com.

In most cases, an affiliate network will ask me to join their network and do a review, then hand me off to one of their affiliate managers (which sometimes is brand new and knows nothing), while other times the actual owners of the network will talk with me on a daily basis and let me know when hot new offers hit the network. Once again, this was my experience with Philip Shapiro, the owner over at CPATrend.

A Deeper Look into CPATrend

I also wanted to tell you a bit about their network and the offers they have available. Like the majority of affiliate networks, CPATrend has it’s hands full with a lot of different affiliate offers, but also a decent amount of offers that other networks don’t have. It’s also nice to see that some of these offers are at higher rates, which give other networks a run for their negotiating dollars.

There are currently over 150 different offers available on the network, but I’d really like to point out that there are some great offers for anyone actively running Facebook Ads campaigns. CPATrend has a decent amount of offers on that network that are performing very well through Facebook advertising. This include dating apps and lots of games.

Well known affiliate offers found on the network consist of Ab Circle Pro, Robert Allen, Cupid, Flirt, CreditReport.com, Make My Baby, VistaPrint and many more. The CPATrend network is run off the HasOffers platform. Payments are sent out on a Net 15/biweekly or weekly basis and available through Check / PayPal / Direct Deposit / Bank Wire, with a low minimum payment of $50.

$100 Signup Bonus – Exclusive to ZacJohnson.com Readers

Since I’m personally working with Philip and CPATrend, I wanted to setup an exclusive deal for my blog readers. Join CPATrend today, and when you earn $1000 within your first 30 days, you will receive a $100 bonus! This is a 10% earnings bonus on your first $1,000 earned. It was tough to get Philip to give such an offer, as margins are already tight, so this promotion is for a limited time only, and you must signup by April 22, 2011. (Make sure you have a quality site or traffic source, as they don’t allow everyone into the network)

Just pushing a few dating leads (average payout: $2-$7) per day for a month will earn you over $1,000 in commissions, so it’s a very attainable target to hit. When applying for CPATrend, simply put “ZACJOHNSON.COM” in the “How did you hear about CPATrend.com?” section of the signup form. This will allow for you to enter the $100 bonus promotion.

Join CPA Trend Today!

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7 Mistakes that Lead to Guest Post Failure

Guest posting! The highway to unbridled blogging success! Nab yourself a spot on an A-List blog and suddenly it’s your name in lights. Traffic, engagement, the undying adulation of the unwashed masses!

Sounds great, right?

Well, it is, actually.

But what about those of us who really crave a bit of failure? The ones who like to start every anecdote with “One time I almost” or “I was this close …”?

What does guest posting offer for us?

Well, fellow failure-chaser, you’re in luck. Because writing and submitting a guest post offers some real opportunities for spectacular failure.

So start taking notes, because you’re going to be able to tell your friends about the time you nearly wrote an amazing post for an A-Lister that almost took your own blog to a whole new level.

1. Be as timid as humanly possible

The first opportunity for failure is the pitch. Confidence carries the day when it comes to guest posting.

So if it’s failure you’re looking for, don’t show any confidence. Try not to sell your idea, and make sure you don’t actually write the post you’re proposing. Be hesitant, and make it apparent that you’re wasting your host’s time. With a bit of luck, they won’t you send so much as a read receipt.

2. Don’t startle the readers

Maybe the A-Lister you’ve just pathetically pitched has taken pity on you, and asked you to draft up your post.

What he’s looking for here is some competence. So make sure you don’t show any. Starting with a bang and grabbing attention leads to success, so don’t do it. Write cautiously and quietly, so as not to startle your audience into action.

3. Imitation is the most sincere form of flattery — so shamelessly copy content

Your lukewarm opening should have dissuaded all but the most persistent of writers. So it’s going to take some real incompetence to screw this up now.

The quickest way is to do something that’s been done before. Retread old ground — but not in a new and interesting way. No, simply regurgitate your host’s best piece with some added spelling mistakes and grammatical errors.

Be very cautious with this, as covering old topics in a fresh way is actually a terrific way to write a popular guest post. Make sure not to add your own twist or fresh angle and you should be fine.

4. Shamelessly plug Unmemorable Title your own blog

It’s now time to look over the content you’ve just haphazardly thrown together.

To hit the dizzying lows of total failure, you need to employ an ancient SEO technique known as “spamming.” In other words, drop your link into the post so often that the page becomes nearly unreadable.

This is going to fail for two main reasons. One; it’s going to make your host even less likely to publish your piece. Two; it doesn’t work.

5. Make your ending as flat as possible

If you’ve done everything wrong up until now, you should be faced with a pathetic piece of trash, where every second word is a link to your blog.

Congratulations. You’re nearly done with the writing. All that’s left for you to do is cobble together an ending that peters out. And whatever you do, don’t forget to leave out effective closing techniques like a strong call to action.

6. Treat your host like you’re one of The Sex Pistols

The chances are that you’re going to have to interact with your host, as they attempt to polish the steaming post you’ve just deposited in their inbox. So now’s the time to channel some old-school punk.

Just like The Sex Pistols in their first TV interview, start swearing at your host, avoiding giving direct answers, and give the impression that the conversation is beneath you. With luck, this should be enough to make sure you don’t get published …

(If you want to really nail it, you could try throwing up on their desk. The blogging equivalent of this is publicly trash-talking bigger blogs. This works spectacularly well at ensuring you won’t get your guest posts published.)

7. Run like mad and don’t ever look back

If after all of this, by some horrible stroke of luck you do get published, there’s still one more opportunity for failure.

Demonstrate a complete lack of commitment to your guest post. Don’t reply to comments, don’t promote it on Twitter or Facebook, and certainly don’t write a post on your own blog to take advantage of the new traffic that your guest post provides.

And with that, you’ll have blown your big guest posting chance.

Complete and utter guaranteed failure as a guest poster in just seven short steps. Not for you, the benefits of seeing your name alongside the luminaries in your niche. No, because to do that, you’d need to be confident, competent, and committed.

Far easier to just take my advice and slip quietly into obscurity and mediocrity.

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An Outsourcing Resource You Probably Never Heard About

Suppose I told you I had one guy willing to work full time for you, so 40 hours per week, and that he had a good knowledge about SEO, Internet marketing and web design. What kind of salary do you think you would need to pay him?

$1,000? $1,500?

What if told you the salary he was asking for was $300?

Sounds crazy, but it’s true. I am talking about hiring people from the Philippines. There are plenty of recent graduates there who want to work from home over the Internet, and $300 (converted to the local currency) is considered a decent monthly salary.

Another advantage is that most Filipinos speak English almost fluently, and they are quite savvy when it comes to the Internet and new technologies.

At this point you might be thinking: “OK, sounds intriguing, but where can I find those workers?”

That is the resource I mentioned in the title of this post. It’s a website called OnlineJobs.ph, where you can find hundreds of Filipinos looking for online work. You’ll even find the skills they have, the monthly salary they are asking and how many hours per week they are willing to work.

You can browse the marketplace without paying anything, but if you want to see the contact details (e.g., email address) of the workers you’ll need to pay $40 for one month of access.

Before you go ahead on a hiring spree, though, here is a remark: you’ll need to spend some time researching and testing the candidates.

I have had both good and bad experiences hiring people from that site in the past. Sometimes the person worked as promised and delivered good results, but there were other times when I swear the other person was working 5 instead of 40 hours per week, and I couldn’t do anything about it except terminate the deal after the first month was up.

Still, I think it’s a valid resource if you are looking to outsource some parts of your online business.

What about you guys, what resources or websites do you use to outsource or find remote workers/collaborators?

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Introducing Marketing Pilgrim Channels: Sponsors Welcome!

We are excited to provide our Marketing Pilgrim readers and sponsors new opportunities.

For our readers we are going to create content channels that make stories about important subject areas easier to find. These channels will include: SEO (search engine optimization), paid search (PPC), social media, Google, Web Site Analytics, Social Media Analytics, Local Internet Marketing (SMB), Mobile and Internet Law. Of course, with a rapidly changing landscape like the Internet marketing world these could just be the start of the channels we start to track.

For our sponsors and advertisers this a great new opportunity to reach our audience of Internet marketing influencers and decision makers.

We are really excited about this new phase in Marketing Pilgrim’s evolution. If you would like to learn more about sponsor opportunities with Marketing Pilgrim Channels contact Frank Reed ( editor AT MarketingPilgrim dot com).

Channels will be coming online in the next few weeks. If you have any suggestions of what you would like to see let us know!

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Week In Review: Increasing Conversions with Pretty Math

WEEK IN REVIEW IS BACK!

This week in review covers increasing your conversion rate, which dating ads work and which don’t, lies told by SEM companies, and more!

• “Growing A Business vs. Living Your Dream“ – This was actually posted on Finch Sells last week, but it was too good not to include. It’s a great look at balancing the growth of your business with your personal life goals.
• “17 Tested Ways to Increase Your Conversion Rate (from ASW11)“ – This post highlights some of the best tips from Dr. Drew Eric Whitman’s keynote presentation at ASW11. There are 17 easy style and design tricks that will increase your conversion rate.
• “An Internet Marketer Should Be Every Businesses Best Friend“ – This is basically an overview of how awesome you are for being an affiliate marketer. Seriously though, this post points out how Internet marketers can benefit any business.
• “Showing You 3 Of My Dating Ads – Why Tracking Is So Important“ – This post gives you two dating ads that didn’t work, one dating ad that did work and one full dose of confusion. Why did the dating ad work? One commenter (GDUBS12345) pointed to this awesome OkCupid study from last month.
• “Lies That Search Engine Marketing Companies Tell“ – Hilarious look at some of the lies SEM companies are telling their potential clients.
• “Case Study: Does Live Help Increase Conversions?“ – This is an interesting case study. Does offering live help on an e-commerce website or landing page help? How? Find out.
• “Get Access to a Trademark Database and Avoid C&Ds“ – Whatcha gonna do when they come for you? Ian Fernando shows you an easy way to avoid getting cease and desist orders.
• “Behind the Screens: Top Affiliate Workstations“ – It’s like MTV Cribs, but for affiliates. Find out where top affiliates make the magic happen!

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Do We Trust The Government With The Internet?

As you all know each day I summarize links I find worth reading, toss in a few lines of offhand commentary, and send it out as "Signal." So far a few thousand folks have subscribed to it, and while it's not exactly Pulitzer material, it's fun to do and it is a nice way of forcing myself to not just read the news, but think about it as well.

Last night, quite late it turns out (I had a dinner), I once again sat down to do Signal. The first piece I came across (from the WSJ) sparked something of a rant in me. I'm going to re-post it here, for this audience, to see if it sparks any kind of response.

The backstory is simple: The Journal article, which covered a Congressional hearing on the FCC's approach to regulating the Internet, opened with this: "In a contentious hearing, House Republicans attacked new regulations for broadband Internet lines and criticized the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission for adopting them."

I read on - I've been interested in this issue for years, as many readers know. This particular hearing centered on the concept of net neutrality, which I support, though your mileage on the definition of that term may vary. (More on that here).

In any case, the third paragraph of the article opens with a quote from Rep. Fred Upton (R., Mich.), who chairs the House Energy and Commerce Committee. It was this quote that sparked my Signal mini-rant. Here is is, in full, with a bit more formatting added:

”Why would you put the government in charge of the Internet?” asks the Republican leader.

Well that certainly begs a pretty big-picture question, don’t it?! Perhaps because we trust in both the Internet and our government? Because that government is supposedly under the “rule of the people” in a “democratic system”? I mean, why the hell have a government if we don’t actually believe in what it embodies?

Do we not believe that the Internet is a resource fundamental to freedom, innovation, and our shared humanity (Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, Iran…)? I think we can all agree to that. So in what system should we entrust the Internet? I’d argue it should be within our best expression of shared and collective will – so far, that’s what we call democracy, no? Sure, it’s messy, but I guess the question then becomes, can we trust our government, messy as it is? Or is it the enemy?

Is unfettered capitalism a better approach? I’d certainly prefer the Internet be governed by a system in which we can vote the bastards out should they mess it up. If they regulate to the point where innovation and freedom suffer, then vote them out. If they leave it unregulated to the point where choice is stifled and we pay more each year for less, vote them out. If instead we opt for a total free-market approach, OK cool, I hope it works out. But if companies have the ability to lock in access, content, services, and innovation, well, history teaches us that a few of them will certainly work hard to do just that.

And if they win? Well, by that time, it might be hard to vote ‘em out. A good debate to have, no doubt.

What do you guys think?

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Interview: Slaven Radic

Slaven Radic dabbles in software, online marketing and startups. He is an expert conference attendee who lives and works in beautiful yet sometimes rainy Vancouver, Canada.

How long have you been making money online?
I had my start online in the early 90s, firstly being fixated with dial-up BBSes then the initial Internet boom. It was an exciting time for entrepreneurs, as possibilities seemed endless. During those days I realized that I really couldn’t see myself working for anyone else. I dropped out of university and launched several ventures, most of which fizzled quickly, but I kept learning and pushing until I built a successful software company in 1999, still operating today.

How did you become successful?
My first real success was the email software I developed and marketed in 1999. Internet was becoming more and more popular and email usage was exploding around the world. A year or two later I was awarded some great industry honours which helped increase our visibility.

A large majority of my time at this stage was spent on product development. Looking back, despite the enormous effort that went into the product itself, I am most proud of the community we built around the product which survives to this day.

Do you have any experience with affiliate marketing? If so, to what extent?
I started with affiliate marketing in the early 2000s. I didn’t understand it well back then but saw it as a great way to extend your marketing efforts without spending money on advertising. The affiliate landscape was still very undeveloped, and while some savvy affiliates were doing very well, most vendors like myself didn’t catch on early enough. It took a few years until I figured out the best ways to drive traffic through the affiliate channel.

Over the past few years, working with Geordie Carswell and our talented staff, we’ve built a marketing company with focus on marketing our software, as well as variety of products and services in related verticals. Our expertise is in PPC and SEO marketing strategies, although that hasn’t stopped us from experimenting in other areas.

This year brings many changes to our space, as affiliate marketing becomes one of the primary ways many products are marketed online, digital or otherwise. It’s been interesting to watch this evolution and how different verticals are adapting this model. Today, traditional affiliate marketing is as varied as the products being marketed. Dropbox is a great example of a company trying something different: they reward referrals by gifting increased storage, which would normally cost users money. The cost of this promotion to Dropbox is nominal, yet they’ve seen great benefits of increased referrals. My goals for 2011 are to find and invest into interesting new products or services that take advantage of this new landscape.

What accomplishments so far are you the most proud of?
I have done all sorts of projects over the years but honestly, companies come and go but relationships you build last a lifetime. I have been advised and mentored by a few great people who selflessly helped me fine-tune my approach to business and life in general. If I had one piece of advice to give to new entrepreneurs it would be to take their networking and relationship building very seriously.

And while you can do a lot these days with Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook and Quora, there is no substitute to actually leaving your computer and meeting people face to face. You don’t have to go far, start with local events and actually try and talk to people – find out what they do, how they do it and why! Help them if you can, and if you can’t, connect them to people who can.

Additionally, consider forming a peer support group, with regular meetings or phone calls to keep you all connected and on-target. These are somewhat pretentiously referred to as the mastermind groups but it’s really something that anyone can start or be a part of. Recruit potential peers at conferences, user groups, forums, anywhere you find like-minded individuals.

What do you think it takes to be successful?
Having the right network will help you succeed but be prepared to work your butt off. I’ve spent most of my 20s glued to my monitor. In the beginning the money was tight so that monitor gave out a sickly monochrome amber glow, and this was in the mid-nineties when those monitors were seriously out of fashion. At the time I couldn’t care less – I was just happy to have a conduit through which I could create something cool. I’ve spent many a night working till dawn to finish whatever project I had on the go at the time. It took a good ten years before I was able to work healthier hours – although even today I generally work six or seven days per week unless I’m traveling somewhere.

Today, I find that many people expect success should be a lot easier than that. They expect that it shouldn’t take as much effort. Tim Ferriss has perpetuated this perception with his “The 4-Hour Workweek” book, but when I look at what Tim accomplishes in any given week, including his social media efforts, book writing, book tours and promotional circuit, you realize he hustles a “tad” more than the four hours in any given week.

Is there anything that you don’t like to do, that you just hate working on?
Of course, the administrative overhead grows over time, and while a lot of it can be outsourced and delegated some tasks are just too important for that, chores like the never-ending contract revisions, financial planning, accounting and taxes, etc.

What is the future of marketing?
The future is pretty exciting – we are still at the early stages of Internet marketing and possibilities are growing by leaps and bounds as more and more people use the Internet daily, and in ways no one could have predicted just three years ago.

For example, I know marketers who have done very well in the mobile space. However, that whole segment will keep expanding at an amazing pace, opening up opportunities for marketing of services not normally seen as a good fit for mobile. Imagine what happens when most of your potential customers access the Internet through their cellphone. And even then, they spend most of that time on Facebook. If you only advertise on Google AdWords then you need to familiarize yourself with alternatives as your ads will be seen by fewer and fewer people. Rethink the best ways to reach your target audience in this new landscape.

What about the sudden explosion of app stores? Apple has pushed ten billion apps to their customers – that is an amazing number. Even Amazon is readying to jump into the fray with an app store for Android phones. Additionally there are at least three new app stores brewing on the sidelines, from Microsoft, RIM and HP. A lot of those apps are distributed for free and can carry advertising, which you can reach through several ad networks.

And if you are selling ebooks, consider an alternative: instead of pushing your $30 ebooks through old-school affiliate networks why not hire a programmer to repackage it for iOS and Android, or even as Kindle and iBooks downloads? You might also find that lowering your price could increase your overall revenue, sometimes dramatically. This is all vertical-specific of course, but the key is to think outside the box. Consider what new platforms would work for your product and then test, test and test some more.

Do you have a Twitter account or Facebook “Like” page?
You can follow me on Twitter at Slaven – I use Twitter to learn and communicate so feel free to engage me in a conversation any time. My blog is at Slaven Radic – come by and say hello!

How to Kick Groupon to the Curb and Become a Local Hero

Everyone’s talking about Groupon these days.

From daily deals to tasteless Super Bowl commercials, this company is getting a lot of attention. And the attention they want most is from the local small businesses that power their revenue model.

Does your local business need Groupon? No, not at all. In fact, there are much better alternatives if you’re up for it.

If you faithfully serve your local community with valuable content, unbeatable offers, and amazing service, you won’t need Groupon.

Here are a few fine ideas on how to do it …

In this episode Brian and I discuss:

• What Groupon really is, and how that knowledge can revolutionize your business
• The simple concept that drives buyers (always has/always will)
• Why you shouldn’t rely on Groupon, Facebook, or Twitter to dominate your market
• How to create an unstoppable, hyper-local marketing campaign — that you own
• Why the old ways need to be at the heart of everything you do

Hit the flash player below to listen now:

Other listening options:

• Click here to download the mp3 | 29.9 MB | 24:52
• Click here to subscribe via iTunes

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SMB’s Optimistic But Still Struggle With Economy and Marketing

SMB’s are an interesting group. Many of these people are just regular folks. Most are not true business people in the sense that they went to business school and have applied rigid business principles to their business. Many don’t have marketing teams, on staff PR people or any of the niceties that make talking about Internet marketing and social media marketing much easier if the audience is a Fortune 500 that has employees that aren’t spending their own money on services.

As a result they rely a lot on relationships, street smarts, networking savvy and a sometimes oversized portion of optimism. I say oversized only because they have to keep hoping that things will get better or else they can lose the will and, quite plainly, not have the resources to keep the doors open.

One of the companies that is tied to these folks, MerchantCircle, has produced its fifth Merchant Confidence Index for Q1 2011 and the results paint a picture that is typical SMB: cold harsh reality living right next store to hope and optimism. Here are some of the results from the survey.

How would you rate today’s economy compared to the past twelve months?

About 62% of those surveyed said the economy is the same or weaker today then it has been over the past 12 months. Enter the SMB Optimist’s Club!

How do you expect sales revenue to change over the next 3 months?

57% feel that their sales will improve somewhat or significantly in the coming months. This is where you have to love the SMB because in one breath they say that conditions in the overall economy are not so hot but they feel that it will break in the coming months.

When it comes to marketing it looks like it won’t be the thing that helps that sales increase happen!

75% of the respondents said that their current level of marketing spend will either remain the same or decline. If you work with SMB’s on a regular basis the ‘news’ that their marketing spend will remain the same is not a good thing. SMB’s tend to spend money on marketing when they have it rather than actually having a budget for it. In this economy, many don’t have it so remaining the same in their spend could be a euphemism for “we aren’t spending much this year either”.

The hope for this group comes in the form of social media which is still perceived as a near no cost option for them to get the word out. That perception holds until the realization that the cost of time, people resources and knowledge are indeed ‘expenses’ can be a bit of a buzz kill but it sure beats spending cold hard cash on Yellow Page ads.

What are the ways that these folks are promoting their businesses? The following list is the percentage of SMB’s who said they will be using these particular outlets to promote their business

Facebook – 70.3%
Google – 66.2%
LinkedIn – 58.2%
Google Places – 51.4%
Yahoo – 49.2%
Yahoo Local – 45%
Twitter – 39.8%
Citysearch – 39.7%
Yellowbook – 39.3%
Superpages.com – 33.3%
Bing – 33.2%
Yelp – 32.2%
Facebook Places – 32.2%
YouTube – 26.8%
YP.com – 25.6%
Ask.com – 19.9%
MySpace – 19.2%
Foursquare – 8.7%
Groupon – 6.6%
LivingSocial – 5%
Gowalla – 3.4%
Bizzy – 2.5%

Aside from the largest players it’s pretty interesting to see that the cooler the service is perceived to be by the Silicon Valley technorati the less it is used by the common man. Is there an Internet reality divide developing where the hip and cool come up with toys for the hip and cool while the masses just look for things that might actually work to help them?

So how do you react to these findings? Do you see it differently? Where are we on the mass adoption scale for location-based services and the like? Is that kind of talk just for the VC crowd to get all hyped up about? Are findings like this something to be concerned about regarding a bubble in the Internet space?

Let’s hear your thoughts and opinions. It’s good because it gives us something to do during a slow news day!

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Free Top Ranking Keywords Report from SEO Link Wheelers

Over the past few months I’ve been getting back into the game I love, and that’s focusing on building web sites and killer content. As much as I love building web sites, it’s never fun to work on the backlinks and social bookmarks it takes to truly get a web site indexed and getting the search engines to love you. With that said, I’ve been looking at a lot of different solutions for link building and bookmarking management.

I remember when I first paid a few hundred dollars for a company to help with building links and getting my site ranked in the search engines. It was complete crap… I rarely ever hear from them and I don’t recall seeing any results. This was around seven years ago, but it’s just a reminder of how horrible the link building industry can be if you don’t know where to go. With so many to choose from, how are you supposed to know where to go? One of the most trusted solutions around is SEO Link Wheelers, and they are actually heavily promoted and used by ShoeMoney as well.

How SEO Link Wheelers does Link Building

There are many different methods for link building, such as article marketing, social bookmarks, backlinks, using anchor text and forum posting. Trading links with other web sites may seem like a good idea, but one way backlinks is where the link juice really flows. Everyone has a different concept on what works best, but SEO Link Wheelers takes a bit of everything and builds actual “link wheels” to increase backlinks to their customers web sites. In addition to backlinks being spread across article directories, blogs, and web 2.0 directories, SEO Link Builders also creates original content and YouTube videos to build quality backlinks.

SEO Link Wheelers gives you a 100% guarantee that any links they build for your web sites will be Dofollow, all content will be relevant, unique, and created 100% by hand. The video below was created by SEO Link Wheelers to give a better understanding on how their service works, and why it’s important to cover all link methods when building the right link wheel for your web site.

What are Your Target Keywords?

Before even jumping into the SEO and backlinking game, you need to take a look at what your web site is ranking for and how you can improve your results. Head over to SEO Link Wheelers and submit your url into the box on their main page. You will quickly see a report with three of your top ranking searching terms. If you want the full list, just click the “Full Report” link and confirm your email, then you will have free access to a report like the one below.

This report is an excellent summary of how your web site is listed and ranking in the search engines. You will see up to 100 keywords and rankings, along with the average CPC, traffic volume and the url of your site that is ranked for that search term. This report is completely free to access. You then have the option to choose a link wheel package to improve your rankings.

Building Your Backlinks and Putting It All Together

Taking everything we’ve covered, SEO Link Wheelers will build a link wheel and campaign just for your web site and the keywords you are looking to rank for. With three different packages available, you can choose from 37 links ($379), 74 links ($479) or 119 links ($664). When you first look at these prices, they may seem high to you, but that is because SEO Link Wheelers is actually building a link wheel with original content just for your web site and backlinks… these aren’t just links thrown around on Twitter, Facebook and dead forums. The value in these links is that they are spread across high content sites with pagerank and original YouTube video is also created. You can see a breakdown of what links are included in each package below.

At the very least, I highly recommend you head over to SEO Link Wheelers and grab your free report on what search terms are sending you traffic. If you decide to signup for a backlinks package, be sure to use coupon code “ZACJOHNSON” for 12% off your first order with SEO Link Wheelers.

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Top Marketing and Sales Execs Jump Ship to Facebook and Twitter

There is always plenty of talk about Twitter and Facebook and their money making potential. Well, actually Twitter’s is more about potential where Facebook is already a considerable success.

Now both are looking to ratchet up their efforts and they have each turned to interesting competitors to get new talent.

As reported by Kara Swisher at BoomTown, Facebook has taken the top Microsoft global advertising executive, Carolyn Everson, and made her VP of Global Sales. Awkward! She was just hired by MS last June after a long search and now has quickly jumped ship exposing some frustration with how Microsoft does business (are you surprised?). Facebook and Microsoft have a pretty serious relationship with Bing powered search results and Microsoft being an investor in Facebook from back in 2007. ‘The Book’ tried to make nice with this statement:

Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg addressed that issue in a statement:

“Microsoft was one of our earliest partners and is still one of our most valued. We have a long and strong relationship that includes search ads on our site, a social layer on Bing search results and a deep and popular integration with Xbox. They are a leader when it comes to unlocking the power of social for their already popular products and services. We look forward to continuing to expand our relationship with them.”

Isn’t that special? This is just another in a long line of Facebook moves that is followed by a coy flutter of the eyelashes and a completely insincere “Oh, did we do that? We’re sorry!”. Looks like they treat their partners much like their account holders. If they need to screw you, they will and they won’t blink or lose a minute of sleep over it. Heck, it’s just business, right?!

Twitter on the other hand has saved the top marketing executive of Yahoo, Shane Steel, from languishing in a dead end marketing position. I say dead end because Yahoo is still mired in mediocrity and is still calling major cuts a success. All of this while losing market share and respect. If you are Ms. Steel you have to be relieved to be getting off a slow boat and onto a bullet train in Twitter.

All Things Digital reports:

Shane Steele, previously VP of global marketing for Yahoo, started at Twitter today as director of sales marketing. She’ll be reporting to Adam Bain, the company’s president of global revenue, who joined last year from Fox Interactive Media.

Steele is a longtime marketing exec with previous stints at the video ad start-up Tremor Media and Coca-Cola. She comes to Twitter at a time when the company is finally focusing on turning its service into a business.

This is much more challenging role than going to a Facebook because people have been incredibly patient with Twitter and its revenue generating efforts but that patience could go away in a heartbeat. The pressure to perform and to move Twitter from a “Are they making any money at all?” industry mindset to a “See, we knew they were going to be a revenue machine!” mindset is going to be great.

So while the rest of the world tries to figure out how best to use Facebook and Twitter for their business, both social media giants are staffed up to sell something to someone even if it isn’t all figured out just quite yet.

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