One of the most effective marketing and SEO strategies currently available is your blog. With the ability to quickly add content for both visitors and search engines, it has become the way to share your information in a way that subtly increases your visitor’s interest. It also allows for their input which creates involvement.

Our article today “Four Pillars of a Successful Business Blog” is on our StomperNet blog, our own business blog. The blog format is one that cannot be beaten for building your influence on the marketplace. With the appropriate design, it is also a format that can add SEO for your website, with meta tags, descriptions, and more.

A common resolution among entrepreneurs and small business CEOs is how to model or remodel their blog to bring more traffic and conversions. Regardless if you have a product or service, you may have been struggling to build your thought leadership, authority, and SEO with blogging. The key is adding the appropriate elements, like Search Engine Optimization to each post that will encourage both visitors and search engines to find and refer to your site.

Of course, the goal of any good business owner is to increase profits. But you may be frustrated by your blogging efforts lacking in conversions, results, and profits. Fortunately, Sherman Hu has easy to remember acronyms for B.L.O.G and P.R.O.F.I.T.S that help you create better posts.

Talk soon,

Lee Collins
Managing Director
StomperNet, LLC

“And it occurred to me that there is no such thing as blogging. There is no such thing as a blogger. Blogging is just writing — writing using a particularly efficient type of publishing technology.”

~ Simon Dumenco ~
“Media Guy” of Advertising Age

The Four Pillars of a Successful Business Blog

By Sherman Hu

The Four Pillars Of A Successful Business Blog is written as a checklist. The acrostic or acronym – B.L.O.G. (Build, Launch, Orchestrate and Generate) will guide you through this checklist.   There are three reasons why you can benefit from these four pillars.

1. CONTROL

The lessons within the checklist below will give you insights to control your blog’s success. For some, knowing what to do gives them the power to control their blog’s success. For others, seeing the lessons in a clearly laid-out “checklist” will offer a format to easily work through the list of actions.

2. OPPORTUNITY TO PAY IT FORWARD

Your life lessons or experience shared on your blog can be priceless to your readers – if they can find it or be engaged by it. It makes sense to discover how you can gain more exposure to your blog, and engage your readers when they get there. This way you can help others with your product, service or knowledge offerings. Otherwise, your blog will not ‘exist’ – either on Google’s top ranks or in the minds of your visitor.

3. TANGIBLE AND INTANGIBLE RESULTS

Not only will you feel proud of building a successful business blog, you’ll also receive many profitable results. When you achieve a position of authority or thought leadership via your business blog, you can expect a boost in speaking engagement invites, coaching clients, product sales, strong affiliate commissions, joint venture requests, a strong database of subscribers who value your opinions, or other results based on your business model and offerings.

Let’s begin, shall we?

1. BUILD: Get in the right M.O.D.E. for success

I’ve created another acrostic in this ‘Build’ phase titled “M.O.D.E.” (Markets, Objectives, Design and Engineer). You need to get in the right M.O.D.E. for success.

MARKETS

Have you researched and selected your market yet?

A market gives you an opportunity to offer multiple, related offers over a period of time to the same audience (eg. ‘People who are interested in time management’ vs. ‘Getting Things Done (GTD)’).  Choose a market accustomed to spending money, one that can be presented with related offers and a market you’re personally attracted or interested in.

Have you researched the trends of your market?

Gathering trends will give you “intel” on your competition, what Google indexes in its top 10, universal search patterns, related search keywords, keyword suggestions, search volumes, questions commonly asked by your market, influential bloggers in your space and hot news.

Resource: “20 Ways To Research Trends, Competition & Keywords”

Have you profiled your perfect customer?

Flesh out a ‘perfect customer’ from your target audience to make your audience “real” and believable. Give this person a name, a stock photo and write their short story, including their pains. Print and keep this profile sheet visible. Focus on this ‘John or Jane Doe’ whenever you write copy or create your marketing.

OBJECTIVES

There is power in knowing your destination before you begin. Without keeping your objectives in sight, you may fall victim to distractions that may take you astray. Set a S.M.A.R.T. objective that’s Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timely.

DESIGN

You want to look professional and be taken seriously, right? So get your own domain name.

Keep it short, memorable and ‘radio-friendly’. If you were on radio and had to share it on the air, would it be easy to say and spell (without you spelling it out)? If you have an existing site, setup your blog in a sub-folder titled “blog”, so your blog URL will be www.YourDomain.com/blog.

Select a Blog Theme.   Showcase your business individuality and personality. Google for “free WordPress themes” if you’re using the WordPress blog software. For professional blog themes, I’ve used StudioPress.com and WooThemes.com with satisfaction.

Do you have creative (logo, icons, masthead graphic) ready for your blog? Showcase your business brand and personality! Either design it yourself or contract/outsource. Consider 99Designs.com or DesignOutpost.com.

Have you set up communication channels (i.e. ezine autoresponder service, contact email, telephone number, RSS feed etc) for your blog?

How are interested visitors going to contact you? For ezine autoresponder services, I recommend Aweber, Mailchimp or iContact. For blog rss feed management, I recommend Feedburner.

ENGINEER

Have you chosen which blog software you’re going to use? Choose a platform or software that’s easy to publish, search engine friendly, includes commenting features, pre- scheduling content, updates blog directories automatically when you publish new content. For free, scalable and self- hosted blog software, I recommend WordPress.org hosted on your own hosting account.

Have you registered for your hosting account? A hosting account will host your blog and media (i.e. video, audio, PDFs, images etc). For stable and good customer service, I recommend NameCheap.com and Hostmonster. com. Others claim great satisfaction with Hostgator.com, Dreamhost.com and Bluehost.com.

After registering for your host account, point your domain’s DNS to this new host so visitors to your domain will see your blog/site at this host. Your hosting service will provide you with tutorials or support on how to accomplish this.

Have you installed your WordPress blog on your hosting account? The first step to getting your blog-site up and running. The hosting services recommended above should offer simple, 1-click installation features to quickly install WordPress to your hosting account.

Have you customized your WordPress blog settings? Customize your blog to suit your business purpose. If you need instruction, consider WordPress.org support, WordPress. tv or WordPressTutorials.com for tutorials.

Now that you’ve built your “M.O.D.E.” for success, let’s “Launch”. Time to set up your launching P.A.D. to establish authority and visitor engagement.

2. LAUNCH: Your launch  P.A.D. to authority & engagement

The general public seeks the opinions of thought leaders and influencers for their perspective on trends, strategies, best practices and habits. In the same way, you can build your blog over time to gain credibility, authority and influence.

Here’s the acrostic P.A.D. and a checklist to help you build your authority and engagement with your visitors:

PUBLISH

Are you catering your writing to your target market (or perfect customer)?  What are your perfect customer’s biggest pains/ problems and are you blogging about it?

What are your perfect customer’s visions/goals/dreams and are you blogging ways they can accomplish it? Are you case-study-ing your customers’ success? Are you telling stories?

ASK

Are you seeking feedback and comments from your readers?  Are you asking specific questions in your posts? Are you leaving your posts open-ended to encourage your readers to comment? Are you making it easy for your readers to comment instead of adding registration “hoops” they have to jump?

DEPLOY

Are you deploying content that’s actionable, insightful and meaty?  Are you embedding images, audio, video and other cool media to engage your viewers?  Are you responding to industry information and topical news?

Are you drawing in your readers with sexy, irresistible headlines? (For instance, think of those magazines in supermarket lines) Check out Brian Clark’s “10 Sure-Fire Headline Formulas That Work”

Have you added elements to your blog to show credibility? - bio photo, bio, contact info, social media profile links, media room, magazine tear sheets, radio interview recordings, TV segment clips, certification logos, association badges etc.

Now that you’ve set up your Launching “P.A.D.” for success, let’s “Orchestrate” your S.Y.M.P.H.O.N.Y. of traffic.

3. ORCHESTRATE: Coordinate your  S.Y.M.P.H.O.N.Y. of traffic

Sharing all the strategies to get traffic to your business blog could occupy a full report. However, we’ll squeeze as much into the acrostic S.Y.M.P.H.O.N.Y. to coordinate your traffic efforts:

SYSTEMIZE

Have you systemized your blogging with pre-scheduled content?  You can modify the timestamp of each WordPress blog post to publish in the future. So take advantage of this feature.

Have you added additional search engine directories to be updated automatically when you publish your posts?  In your Dashboard, go to Settings > Writing. Scroll down to “Update Services” box. Click the link above the box to grab more search engine directories to add to your box. Now you’ve extended your reach whenever you publish blog posts.

Have you systemized your search engine optimization?  You can do this with plugins for basic SEO, or use StomperNet SEO Services if you want a team handling all your search engine optimization.

YANK

Are you ‘yanking’ as much exposure to your blog through the use of videos? Video styles include screencasts (see Camtasia Studio or Screenflow), newscaster (“talking head”) style, live video broadcasts (see Ustream.tv) or dynamic video slideshows (see Animoto.com)

Are you leveraging video syndication services?

MOBILIZE

Do you mobilize your readers to easily Word Of Mouth or share your posts with their tribes on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc? There are many plugins to help you with this task. On ShermanLive.com, I use “ShareThis”, “Damn Sexy Bookmarks” and the “TweetMeme” plug-in.

PROMOTE

Are you promoting your blog posts via Social Networking sites like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Squidoo etc? Are you promoting your blog posts via article directory sites like EzineArticles.com?

HEIGHTEN

Have you heightened your chances that your blog posts will receive more inbound links via Social Bookmarking sites like SocialMarker, OnlyWire, StumbleUpon etc?

OBTAIN

Have you obtained additional inbound links and exposure from Press Releases? See Marc Harty’s http://OnlinePRMadeEasy.com for an instructional course on this topic.

NAVIGATE

Have you navigated your opt-in list system for a web-form to add to your blog?  Have you navigated the system to add a series of drip marketing pieces?

YIELD

Are you yielding the power of viral reports, viral blog posts and viral videos?

4. GENERATE: Produce P.R.O.F.I.T.S. today

Now that you’ve Orchestrated your “S.Y.M.P.H.O.N.Y.” for success, let’s move on to “Generate” “P.R.O.F.I.T.S.” today.

And finally, the “G” in “B.L.O.G.” stands for “Generate”. How can you “Generate P.R.O.F.I.T.S. with this acrostic? Let’s unpack it now…

PUBLICIZE: Have you publicized your product or service offerings in a prominent location on your blog?

RECOMMEND: Have you offered recommendations to 3rd party merchants with an affiliate link (in full disclosure, obviously) within your posts or in the sidebar?

OBTAIN: Have you obtained likability and trust from your audience through value-add email broadcasts?

Have you obtained trust with (and knowledge of) your customers to make solid recommendations to them to solve their problems?

FACILITATE: Are you facilitating irresistible offers packed with so much value your customers can’t say no?

INTRODUCE: Are you introducing upsells, cross-sells, down-sells, one- time offers, and the like, when your customer shops in your store?

Are you introducing your offerings in different formats so interested customers will buy from you again?

TEST & TRACK: Are you testing and tracking your offers to increase your ROI?

SERVING: Are you serving your customers with seasonal offers and packages?

Remember, there’s practically a holiday each and every month of the year.

Now we’ve completed the how to Generate “P.R.O.F.I.T.S.” checklist in the acrostic “B.L.O.G.” If you work on this checklist, you will experience dramatic results.

STOMPER Speed Boost

Last month we hinted this was coming.

And you’ve been asking for it since we opened our doors 5 years ago.

What is it?

Click here to find out!

Secret Sauce Checklist

B.L.O.G.  for Success

• BUILD: Get in the right M.O.D.E. for success
• MARKET: Research
• OBJECTIVES: Set a S.M.A.R.T. objective that’s Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timely
• DESIGN:  Look professional
• ENGINEER: WordPress.org self-hosted

• LAUNCH: Your launch  P.A.D. to authority & engagement
• PUBLISH your writing to your target market (or perfect customer)
• ASK your readers
• DEPLOY  Content that’s actionable

• ORCHESTRATE: Coordinate your  S.Y.M.P.H.O.N.Y. of traffic
• SYSTEMIZE with pre-scheduled content
• YANK as much exposure as possible to your blog
• MOBILIZE your readers with social media plugins
• PROMOTE your blog with social sites
• HEIGHTEN your chances with Social Bookmarking
• OBTAIN inbound links and exposure from Press Releases
• NAVIGATE  your opt-in list system
• YIELD the power of viral

• GENERATE: Produce P.R.O.F.I.T.S. today
• PUBLICIZE: your product or service
• RECOMMEND: 3rd party merchants with an affiliate link
• OBTAIN:  likability and trust
• FACILITATE:  irresistible offers
• INTRODUCE: different offers
• TEST & TRACK: to increase your ROI
• SERVING: seasonal offers and packages

Stomper Buzz

Next Week’s Focus: Focus on SEO

Stompernet Blog

If you have been watching it over the past year, you have seen many changes. Some have been major changes, some minor. These changes are intended to get you our guests to notice the website, take action and to come back again.

Traffic is great, but traffic that comes, looks at your page for 5 seconds and leaves is not going to increase your income. You want your traffic to take notice of what you have to offer and to take action.

Additionally, you want your customers to actually want what you are offering and to be able to find it. Have you ever gone to a site and can’t find what you are looking for? Frustrating isn’t it! Well, with some minor changes to your website, you can help your visitors find exactly what they want without having to look all over the site.

You can also provide them with the type of look that keeps them there and focused on your site. But don’t worry… you don’t necessarily have to do a complete overhaul of your website to get that traffic. Read Vin Montello’s article below and learn exactly what you need.

Lee Collins
Managing Director
StomperNet, LLC

“Design should never say, “Look at me.” It should always say, “Look at this.”

~ David Craib ~
401 Design Meditations: Wisdom, Insights, and Intriguing Thoughts from 150 Leading Designers

Increase Traffic with A Change in Website Appearance

aah… January will begin clean… empty… with so much promise. Like everything at school upon returning from summer break.

I used to love that feeling of a new school year.

On that day we all have hope; Hope that this year will be different.

The sprucing up of the school sets us up for a “shot at success.”

I’d like to give you a similar shot at a successful business year by helping you spruce up your websites for 2012.  A little bit of change can be enough to increase your traffic because it spruces up your website and people are drawn to that change.

So what kind of changes can you do that are major enough to cause your potential customers to notice but minor enough to not redo the whole site?

Add some pictures

If you don’t have any graphics or photos to help your page “sell,” then look to the royalty-free websites. There are a ton of these sites that will sell you professional photos and graphics for what amounts to a dollar or two per piece.

The little known secret is that some of these sites have thousands of graphics you can not only use royalty free, but ones you can download and use “free” free!

That means your site can take a giant leap towards looking more attractive and professional for less than 10 bucks… or in some cases nothing!

Try some strategic highlighting

A yellow highlighter can be your friend when trying to optimize your page for selling. The highlighter is great for “pulling” must see parts of your sales message out so even copy skimmers can’t miss them.

But… when highlighting, remember this phrase: “When you draw attention to everything, you end up drawing attention to nothing.” Put simply… use your highlighter sparingly!

Add (or change) Color

There are styles and trends in advertising colors that change from time to time. Not as often as fashion changes, but still something you should put some time into. That’s why I keep The Big Book of Color in Design on my desk at all times.

It explores how color can be a feeling or feelings.  While you may not think of black, yellow and cream as feminine they can be.  In fact you probably have seen that combination in the store if not at your home on a bottle labeled Olay.

But if you are trying to portray, like soothing, technological, rich, etc, you can flip to a section with that “feeling.”  Then you will get numerous examples with exact colors in the exact combinations… with the hex numbers you can punch right into Photoshop!

Freshen up your fonts

As with color, fonts sometimes fall in and out of fashion. We all know by now that the vast majority of time you want to use a sans serif font.  Serif – if you don’t know are those curly bits on the ends of fonts like Times New Roman or Courier.  Sans serif simply means “without serif.”

So… your website should probably use a sans serif font, but which one?

That’s when Google can be your best friend. Just search for “new fonts,” “font trends,” or things like that and you’ll find page after page of people who know better than either of us. One place I find myself going to find the newest trends in fontage (is that a word?) is www.fontshop.com/blog.

Consider switching over to WordPress

It’s getting to the point now where almost no one puts up static html websites anymore. Whether your site is a catalog site, services site or a standard sales letter, it can all be done inside the confines of a WordPress blog.

These days there is a theme or template for anything you want to do with your blog. Just search around for ten minutes and before you know it, your page is not only better looking, but more easily updated.

by Vin Montello

Vin Montello is a former Hollywood television writer that brings his 20 years’ experience as a story-teller, to every direct response sales letter he writes. Vin invites you to his wildly successful marketing blog at MarketingClambake.com. You can also learn more about him at MontelloMarketing.com.

STOMPER Speed Boost

To celebrate our 5th Anniversary,
we’re doing something extra special for you…

Secret Sauce Checklist

Website Changes that Create Sticky Traffic:

• Add pictures
• Highlight special text
• Add or change colors
• Change your fonts
• Switch to WordPress

Stomper Buzz

Next Week’s Focus: Income Continuity

Stompernet Blog

While I enjoy working on web design, learning how others implement web design is an essential part of my continuing education. No matter how much you know about any niche, there are always new things to learn. Plus, it’s always good to keep your mind refreshed on the essential basics.

The article below is a great refresher of what is current. But even though the basics are somewhat dynamic, they modify as technology and people change. Yet the core elements of sales pages remain constant.

You always want to follow the best placement rules and good copy. Images have been a part of it for years, but now in the visual era, videos have become commonplace.

You want to reach potential buyers where they are and all of these features need to be added to your web design. If you want to turn visitors into buyers, the design needs to tell what actions to take, quickly and easily. All pages should be designed around the customer, not you.

Adam Stonehocker has more information to help your product page look great!

Lee Collins
Managing Director
StomperNet, LLC

“It is easy to fail when designing an interactive experience. Designers fail when they do not know the audience, integrate the threads of content and context, welcome the public properly, or make clear what the experience is and what the audience’s role in it will be.”

~ Edwin Schlossberg ~
Founder of ESI Design

4 Steps to the Perfect Product Page

By Adam Stonehocker, for Claim the Web

Your customer has navigated into a product page and is thinking about buying. What can you do to make sure that the customer purchases from you? Good content and information will make a big difference in conversion rates, but it’s important to focus on the right information. What information is found on a good product page?  Let’s walk through a few steps on how to create great selling product pages!

Step 1 – Keep it “Above the Fold”

Try to keep your content all in one easy-to-view page. The less scrolling that your customers have to do to investigate features and characteristics about your product, the better. Keep that “Buy Now” button in their view and always above the fold.

Many ecommerce sites now use a tab feature so that customers don’t get lost when scrolling down a page to find reviews, videos, color options and so on. This a great way to allow customers to keep their eyes on the product and the “Buy Now” button.

Step 2 – K.I.S.S. (Keep it Super Simple)

With product pages, less is more. Don’t clutter your page with paragraph after paragraph of descriptions, features and benefits of the product. Otherwise, you’re boring your customer! Keep the product description short and concise, organize your main selling points with bullet points, and make sure to label and organize common information like weight, dimensions, material (if applicable) and other common data related to your item needs to be organized and easy to see, not hidden in the text of a long paragraph.

Step 3 – Share with Social Media

Let your customers share your products on social networks! A simple tool like “add this” will greatly enhance your customer’s ability to show off their latest purchase. (Not to mention drive more traffic to your site.) If your current ecommerce software allows you to integrate social media into your product pages, make sure you turn the feature on, and that you link everything up to all your social media accounts.

Step 4 – Good Images and Video

Images and video are crucial to selling your products. Remember that customers cannot pick up your product, feel it in their hands, and hold it in front of them. Give them the next best thing: images and video. It’s great to have a static image of your item, but you also need additional images to show different angles of the product or to show the item in action with a lifestyle photo. Any video that can show the product in action or illustrate all the features and details of the product is essential.

If you have the right amount of content, you’ll keep your customer thinking, “Buy now!” And when you show the customer amazing pictures and video, you will see your conversion rates and sales increase.

Now that you’ve got great product pages, your customers are more inclined to purchase from you, rather than go check out the competition. Start to implement these 4 simple steps, and you’ll see your conversion rates increase and receive far less phone calls with people confused about the product that you’re offering.

STOMPER Speed Boost

To celebrate our 5th Anniversary,

we’re doing something extra special for you…

Secret Sauce Checklist

4 Web Design Tips to Convert Visitors to Buyers

• Remember to keep it “above the fold”
• KISS Keep it Super Simple
• Let them share it with Social Media
• Always use good images and video

Stomper Buzz

Next Week’s Focus: Setting Up Systems & Automating Them

Faculty Office Hours Next Week:

WEDNESDAY November 16, 2011 ~ 2 pm Eastern

“Strategic Thinking – Clarifying Your Thoughts” with Judy Whalen

Strategic Thinking helps you to explore options, get clarity and make good decisions.

Having trouble figuring out the next steps?  Not sure which way to go or what decision to make?  Join Judy as she shows you how strategic thinking can give you clarity, direction and confidence to pursue that direction. StomperNet Members Register Now

Upcoming StomperNet Public Webinars:

THURSDAY November 17, 2011 ~ 7 pm Eastern

“Setting Up Systems & Automating Them” with Dr. Lisa Lang

In this webinar, Dr Lisa will share the automated process they use to automatically generate leads.  She will share all the details of what they do, what technology they use and all the specifics.  Bring your questions about how you might get started with an automated system!

Register Now

Have a Question? We Have ANSWERS for YOU

“StomperNet Open Forum” Fridays at 11ET

We know everyone has questions about their business or different stumbling blocks. Well we invite you to bring them to the table during our Open Forum. With the combined training and experience of our Coaches you will get the direction you need to get you back on your road to success!

The next StomperNet Open Forum Call with our Professional Coaches happens next Friday at 11am EDT and we hope to see you there! These calls are intended to be live Q&A sessions and playback will not be available.

Let us know your thoughts on today’s issue.

Post Your Comments Here

Stompernet Blog

By Rand Fishkin, CEO & Co-Founder of SEOmoz

As the worlds of web design and SEO merge ever closer, we’ve been seeing design-specific elements produce a positive impact on SEO for the sites that employ them. It’s terrific news for SEOs who love design and are capable of, and passionate about, making it part of their repertoire.

It’s also great for designers who find that, as they evolved from Flash designs to machine-readable CSS and separated markup from content, they’ve earned more links and more organic search love.

In this article, I’ll walk through examples of those design practices in use, and describe how they can help improve your opportunity for organic search rankings and traffic.

#1 – Designing That Elicits & Conveys Emotion

A phenomenal article from Aarron Walter of Mailchimp on ThinkVitamin.com – Emotional Interface Design: The Gateway to Passionate Users – deeply explores the trend of designers using their talents to imprint emotion on users. Personally, I love this practice, and professionally, I see it as incredibly valuable for SEO, too.

Rather than simply providing a user with information, these sites attempt to convey a sense of the companies, products and services they represent, in a tangible way.

For McMiller’s Sweets; on the left, the website expresses the brand’s humor, whimsy and obsession with their product. I only wish I could buy online – there’d be a few boxes headed for the SEOmoz offices right now.

On the right Box.net, an enterprise-focused software company, aims to achieve an air of simplicity and a feeling of the ease that comes from using a basic consumer application, but targeted at a business audience. Their redesign has me convinced – it’s light and airy, it’s up in the clouds (perhaps a double-meaning since they host in “the cloud”) and it even calls out the “sexiness” of the application.
When users are emotionally invested in the websites they visit, they’re more likely to:

• Link
• Share
• Contribute Content
• Participate
• Remain Loyal
• Invest in the Experience
• Browse more Pages

All of these have either first or second-order impacts on SEO in a positive way.

#2 – The Scroll-Triggered Call-to-Action

Sometimes you don’t want to overwhelm content with calls-to-action… at least not until you’re fairly certain your visitor has finished reading. That’s where the brilliance of the scroll-triggered call-to-action comes in.

Browse any article on the New York Times website and you’ll see this behavior in action, driving you to read the next article in the series only after you’ve reached the bottom of the current piece.

It’s great for boosting page views, but also drives more awareness of those pieces, improving links and driving up visibility for previously less-well-publicized works. My guess is that clicks are quite high.

In the next example, the blog.OKCupid.com leverages precisely the same tactic. This case might be even more brilliant. After wrapping up a remarkable article about what statistics tell us not to do in online dating, my first instinct is to share the piece with some single friends. OKCupid’s flawlessly timed dropdown overlay synchs with this internal compulsion and makes it easy to tweet, like, stumble or buzz away.

Scrolling + triggers = more browsing, more awareness and more sharing (and I think the potential applications for SEO are far greater in quantity than just what’s been shared above).

#3 – User Badges

If your users are passionate about your site and their experience or participation, why not make it easy to share?

For years, sites have been offering users the virtual incentives of points, badges and status to encourage greater participation. Andrew Follet from Concept Feedback authored a brilliant piece analyzing this precise behavior and exposing some terrific examples.

We’ve noticed an interesting behavior as it relates to user badges as well, and it’s spurred me to whiteboard the following chart numerous times for those who have online communities considering SEO.

The lesson? Make great communities, encourage participation and reward your users with badges that will make their sites look good. It’s the online equivalent of giving out high quality, well designed t-shirts – fans won’t just wear them to bed; they’ll actually show off your brand.

#4 – The Animated HTML Multiheader

I wrote about the multiheader a long time ago, and the evolution of design has made them tremendously more compelling and useful since then. Case-in-point, Unbounce, who has 5 different messages/features on their homepage all accessible to engines and all part of a single multiheader.

The advantage is two-fold – more content on the homepage that’s accessible to search engines (thanks to clever CSS/HTML usage) and everyone who links to any one version is concentrating the link juice singularly on the home page. In some cases, that could cause problems, but in others, it’s a great opportunity to leverage design to focus the links you acquire where you need them most.

BTW – Speaking of Unbounce, If you have yet to read Oli Gardner’s 12-Step Landing Page Rehab Program, you’re seriously missing out.

#5 – Sexy, Embeddable Infographics

Infographic linkbait is certainly all the rage these days, and I think it’s a well-justified trend. The brilliant part is that you benefit by producing the infographic and other bloggers benefit by sharing it and attracting views, attention and links of their own. So long as the embed works seemlessly and the infographic is compelling, you’re off to the link acquisition races.

Some examples I enjoyed came from Smashing Magazine, who put together this piece on programming (and the how-to behind it’s creation).

As with badges, the “beauty rule” applies – the sexier your infographic (and the most interesting/useful/compelling the content), the higher adoption will be.

#6 – Designing Around Illustration (with CSS)

It used to be that I’d see a website built around illustrations and artistry and shake my head in sadness, knowing that the beauty of the UI was unlikely to be experienced by anyone except those coming via type-in. Today, with the amazing progress of CSS, sites like CarbonMade.com can have their design cake and eat their SEO, too.

Google’s “text only” cache shows every word you can see in the screenshot – we’ve come a long way indeed. And, darn it if that design doesn’t make me want to just climb a mountain and jump off a cliff into an octopus-filled lake below… errr.. make an online portfolio (yeah, that’s the one!)

#7 – Creative Content Formats Unleashed

Sometimes, you visit a site that stands out from everything else you’ve seen on the web in the past. Historically, many of those sites have also been tragically obscured from search engines. Nowadays, a new breed is emerging, showing off massive creativity, brilliance in design innovation and a compelling combination of link-worthiness and search-accessibility.

A few of my favorite recent stumbles into this realm include: shopsanctuaryt.com and heartdirected.com – a great place to find more remarkable creative formats, though lacking the machine readable content to be an SEO example itself.

It’s a great time to be on the web, thinking about SEO, design and the brilliant things that can happen when they overlap strategically. Here’s to hoping that more of us who invest in organic search traffic will bolster that task with the power amazing design can bring. It’s not just more links – it’s greater engagement and a higher liklihood that sharing of all kinds will occur. However the search engines evolve, you can be sure this is the type of behavior they’ll seek to reward.

PS. If design inspires you, I’d recommend checking out Drawar and Six Revisions list of 10 Fresh Galleries for Inspiration

Rand Fishkin is the CEO & Co-Founder of SEOmoz, a software startup focused on simplifying SEO and sharing it with the world. He co-authored the Art of SEO from O’Reilly and was named among the 30 Best Young Tech Entrepreneurs Under 30 by BusinessWeek. Rand has been written about it in The Seattle Times, Newsweek and the NY Times among others and keynoted conferences on search around the world. He’s particularly passionate about the SEOmoz blog, read by tens of thousands of search professionals each day. In his minuscule spare time, Rand enjoys the company of his amazing wife, Geraldine. Contact him at rand@seomoz.org.

Build Your First Website in 20 Minutes
by Bryan Azorsky

FLV

Stompernet Blog

This week our topic is web design. Years ago, business owners simply had to have a simple website with just the basic information. In those days websites were few, web speed was very slow and anything larger than a tiny image took forever … that is if you got your Internet to connect at all.

Then came along programs like DreamWeaver, CoffeeCup, and suddenly HTML became a lot easier for the masses. Internet speeds quickly improved, and therefore images became more commonplace. Next came along several improved blogging programs which coders also gobbled up. Suddenly the world of websites was much easier and the number of websites exploded.

Nowadays, if your website is several years old and still has basic design, people notice. It is natural to think if your site is this far behind the times, then your business probably is as well.

But that’s not all. If your website is too loud… sound wise, color wise or graphic wise… your consumers go elsewhere. And if they can’t find their way around your site, they will find their way around to another website. Furthermore, choosing the appropriate content to use is critical.

Obviously you want your business to succeed. With all the resources available today, there is no reason you shouldn’t have a modern website. With little changes and some great web design details, you will find more success. That’s why this week we’ve brought together some great people who are ready to provide you with ideas and information to help your web design.

Ryan Taylor
Director of Operations
StomperNet, LLC

IMPORTANT:  Some of the resources shown are only available to members. With our all-new tiered benefit levels you can join us today for as little as $49.00and get instant access to the world’s largest SEO and Online Business community plus all the tools and resources you need (including upcoming free webinar replays) to enhance your existing business or start, build and grow a thriving Internet-based business!

Curriculum Resources

• SEO 301 – Site Design Best Practices

Forum Posts

• Web Designer’s Success Guide

• One Page Web Design Resource

New Media

• The Perfect Customer Lifecycle with Geoff Zimpfer of Infusionsoft

• Get To The Top Of Your Game: Ways To Achieve More With Less Effort with Melanie Benson Strick

Faculty Office Hours
THURSDAY November 10th, 2011 at 1:00pm Eastern

“Top 10 Things to Include (or Not!) on Your Website”  with Andrea Warner

Just because your website LOOKS great…certain aspects need to be implemented or you may be missing out on much-desired sales. Join Andrea and learn the Top 10 Things to Include (or Not Include!) on Your Website to make sure you are getting the conversions you want.

StomperNet Members:  Register Here!

* Free Live Webinars This Week

WEDNESDAY November 9, 2011 ~ 4 pm Eastern

“How To Outsource Your Business To The Philippines For $2.50 Per Hour” with John Jonas & Janak Mehta

Join Janak Mehta and John Jonas and Learn Outsourcing Like You’ve Never Heard It Before…

How to hire the best! Paying less does not mean you have to sacrifice quality. John and Janak will show you exactly what to do to find top performing employees for pennies on the dollar.  Spending a little to outsource will actually generate more money because you won’t be tied up with menial work that someone else could do, while you could be pursuing new ventures.

John and Janak will reveal all the powerful tools to get your workers up to speed and working independently right away. That way you really can ‘replace yourself’. Discover how to hire and train individuals to do almost anything you could imagine. A little known process for hiring and rewarding employees that will get you top-quality work, quick turnaround, regular communication, and tons of profit!

Register Now

“StomperNet Open Forum” Fridays at 11EDT

We know everyone has questions about their business or different stumbling blocks. Well we invite you to bring them to the table during our Open Forum. With the combined training and experience of our Coaches you will get the direction you need to get you back on your road to success!

The next StomperNet Open Forum Call with our Professional Coaches happens next Friday at 11am EDT and we hope to see you there! These calls are intended to be live Q&A sessions and playback will not be available.

Stompernet Blog

By Jorgen Sundberg

Would you like to effortlessly attract more customers, business opportunities or even a new employer? How about being able to increase your fee or salary? Pick and choose what projects and what people to work with?

The solution is to have a strong and magnetic personal brand. I am sure you have heard about it, but today we’ll look at what it is exactly. Before we do this, however, we have to start with the origin, which is the brand.

What is a brand?

A brand is the unique experience that people remember about a product or service. We are all surrounded by products and services every day, and some of them are very similar – you try distinguishing Coke from Pepsi in a blind test. The reason marketers make use of brands for their product is so they can differentiate their brand from the competition. The goal is to position it as a premium brand so that consumers believe they are enjoying an exclusive product. We all know that adjectives like “premium” and “exclusive” are associated with higher cost. After all, that’s what pays for the entire branding exercise.

What is a personal brand?

A personal brand is the unique promise of value of a person. Simply put: it’s who you are and what you do – nobody else can be or do the exact same thing. “Be yourself; everyone else is already taken”, as Oscar Wilde famously said over a century ago. That message still resonates with profoundly accurate truth today; however, nowadays it’s important to tell the world around you exactly what that self is and what it can do for your target audience.

Just like a product, an individual can brand himself or herself to stand apart from the competition. In this day and age, consumers have no problem finding a dentist, plumber or realtor – they find lots of them online and they take their time to shop around. Skills and knowledge have become ubiquitous and commoditized, and the value of personal branding becomes more important now than ever. The person that has taken their time to build an excellent brand for themselves will not only be more visible but should also be able to charge premium rates for their work – a very enviable position to be in.

Look at business moguls like Richard Branson or Steve Jobs. Their strong brands have given them the Midas touch – effectively turning everything they are involved with into pure gold. But hang on; these guys represent company brands, you say. Yes, they certainly do. Imagine Richard Branson selling off Virgin tomorrow and Steve Jobs leaving Apple (again) – do you think they would struggle to find new projects? Your personal brand works very well alongside a corporate brand and can be the best insurance policy you have ever invested in.

What is personal branding?

This is the process of uncovering/creating, building and promoting your brand to your target audience and the greater world. Aristotle said, ”Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.” This certainly applies to personal branding. By going through this process you will have to engage in some serious introspection, the result of which is typically very useful for all aspects of life.

By branding yourself effectively, you ensure that you are no longer the “jack of all trades, master of none”. The aim will be to achieve an expert status in your chosen field. Once you become an expert, you will attract more business and employers. The choice will be yours! The law of supply and demand stipulates that you will be able to choose with whom you work with and what price or salary you expect.

5 Things you can do for your personal brand today

1. Create a personal brand statement

By taking a step back and examining exactly what value you provide to others, you’ll be able to construct an effective brand statement. It should be no longer than two sentences containing who you are, what value you provide (whether it’s a product or service), and how you do it uniquely (knowing your USPs – Unique Selling Points – will facilitate).

The statement represents your personal brands unique promise of value and is distinctive to you only. Once you do have the statement, you can use it to be more focused and targeted in your approach to customers and employers.

Here’s an example, which just so happens to be mine: “Jorgen helps people and companies attract more business online through effective use of personal branding, social media and blogging.”

2. Write a bio

The longer version of your personal brand statement is called a bio. It’s typically a three paragraph text that outlines who you are, what you do, your skills and experience as well as listing and quantifying your past achievements. Be sure to include any awards received, mentions in reputable media, and other personal endorsements at the end as it is proven to attract eyeballs.

Unless you are an executive, author or public speaker you probably haven’t written on of these. Here’s an example of a good (and slightly abbreviated) bio by Chris Brogan himself:

“Chris Brogan is an eleven year veteran of using social media and both web and mobile technologies to build digital relationships for businesses, organizations, and individuals. Chris speaks, blogs, writes articles, and makes media of all kinds at [chrisbrogan.com], a blog in the top 5 of the Advertising Age Power150, and in the top 100 on Technorati. He is co-author of the New York Times bestselling book Trust Agents, and the recently released Social Media 101.

He is president of New Marketing Labs, a social media agency. Chris frequently speaks at and attends marketing and social media events, sharing his passion for developing human business practices.

Chris won the Mass High Tech All Stars award for thought leaders for 2008. He has been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, US News & World Report, The Montreal Gazette, Newsweek, and some other places.”

3. Achieve consistency

This is useful to do before you start hitting the market with your new personal brand toolkit. The cardinal sin in personal branding is having an inconsistent image. Avoid having the rock’n’roll profile on Facebook and the separate employee-friendly LinkedIn profile. Expect to be cross-referenced online as Google is at everyone’s fingertips, so stay consistent.

A good test is to ask yourself whether or not you would show the profile to your grandmother. Remain congruent in all that you do, whether it’s online or offline communications. Your target audience needs to know what to they can expect from you. Nobody wants to deal with people that shift characters or are outright unstable, so stay consistent at all times.

Gain social proof by connecting to industry authorities and, better yet, get recommendations from your customers, counterparts and peers. LinkedIn is the place to get endorsements, and the best way to get them is to volunteer and write them for others first. The old law of reciprocity dominates the social media space.

4. Create a marketing strategy

You will now create a marketing mix based on whom you want to reach out to. Look at your target audience. Where do they hang out? Do they read a certain magazine, go to a particular events or comment on a handful of blogs? You have to make sure you are seen there. If you have the time and resources, do it the proper way and conduct a marketing survey. If you are not that fortunate, just start doing your thing and see what works – the trial and error approach has helped launch the personal brands of many beginners.

5. Promote yourself

The sprint is over; now begins the marathon. Once you have your personal brand together and you have created your plan, it’s all about keeping it up. Whether you have decided to blog, to be a public speaker, write books or to attend networking events – make sure you do it regularly and become a reliable and trustworthy part of people’s lives. This will in turn build up your loyal fan base, the bunch of great people that act as your brand ambassadors and sales force.

There is no time like the present to start your personal branding journey. Most people only think about their brand when they really need it (e.g. looking for a new job), but this will probably be 12 months too late. Building and promoting a strong brand takes time and effort but it’s the best personal investment you will ever make. You may change industries, move out of the country, take a long sabbatical – but your name and brand will always be with you.

Don’t put this off, set some time aside in your calendar now to begin your branding journey and start reaping the rewards.

by Jorgen Sundberg

Jorgen Sundberg is a personal branding consultant based in London. He blogs at JorgenSundberg.net and his company is Personal Branding UK (personalbrandinguk.com). Jorgen is passionate about helping people with their online brands and would love to connect with you on Twitter @JorgenSundberg.

Scratch Your Niche

by John Jaworski

FLV / MOV

Everyone needs to start somewhere!

With our community, our training, our support,

and our NEW StomperNet levels,

you will find exactly what will help you take the next successful step in your business!

Become a StomperNet Member TODAY!

Stompernet Blog

The point is, emails are NOT a case of “Send it and they will come”. (Or really, what most people are looking for…“Send it and they will buy”.) You have to be very strategic in your email marketing to get your desired outcome.

It takes a well-written subject line, a compelling offer and much more. Certainly not just any ‘ole words in an email will do! If you want to make sure your emails are getting read and making an impression, read our StomperNet Intelligence Report on How to Design Your Email to Make Your Customer Open, Click and Buy.

Lee Collins
Managing Director
StomperNet, LLC

“It’s hard to target a message to a generic 35-year-old middle-class working mother of two.
It’s much easier to target a message to Jennifer, who has two children under four,
works as a paralegal, and is always looking for quick but healthy dinners and ways to spend more time with her kids and less time on housework.”
~ Elizabeth Gardner, Internet Retailer

Email Blastoff! Design Your Email to Make Your Customers Open, Click and Buy…

By Audrey Kerwood

HAVE A REASON TO MAIL YOUR CUSTOMERS

Here are some ideas that work well:

• A big fat discount coupon. This can be just for specific products or a blanket store-wide discount. You can set a threshold price for store-wide sales so you don’t end up losing money on your lower profit items, i.e. 10% off orders over $50.
• Buy one get one free. If you’re promoting a product with enough of a profit margin, buy-one-get-one sales are fantastic sellers. Even if you sell a product people wouldn’t necessarily need more than one of, you can offer buy one get one of equal or lesser value. If you can pull this off it’s a great sales tactic.
• Buy one get one ½ off. Same basic principle as the buy one-get-one, you just keep more of the profit while still offering the customer a deal.
• Buy one get a free widget. It works very well for anything that can be accessorized; it’s really one of my favorite promotions

Write a Killer Subject Line

It’s all well and good to have a great offer for your subscribers, but they won’t know about it unless they open and read your email, right? Subject lines aren’t just as important as content and design..they actually can be more important. Your customers probably subscribe to more than just your newsletter and they’re probably not waiting in anticipation for your next mailing.

If your subject is bland, it doesn’t matter how well-written the content is or how amazing the images of your products look, because most of your customers will delete your email without opening it. People are being sold to everywhere they go and it seems everyone is always having a sale so: “Big Sale at My Store” isn’t going to get you the open rate you want.

So what do you write? What will keep them from deleting your email and in fact, coerce them to open and act upon it? How can people decide if they are interested based on what amounts to nothing? Over-communicating is just as bad. For instance “Three Day Buy One Get One Free Sale On Modern Art Tapestries Handmade and Imported from Belgium For Stunning Home Decor.” Too long and it looks like spam.

You want a bite-size hook, not some long boring exposition that will be truncated by your customers email client anyway. So make your message clear and concise: adding a call to action doesn’t hurt either. Try “Three Day Buy One Get One Tapestry Sale”, or “Get a Rod with Your Tapestry Purchase”, or “All Tapestries 20% Off This Friday”. These all work.

Don’t use all caps, avoid extra punctuation, and don’t use more than one exclamation point if you must use any at all.

What Makes for Good Design?

Now that you’ve gotten your customer to take a look at your content, you need to capture their eye with your design. There are a lot of different elements and considerations that go into design so I’m going to start with the most basic and technically the only necessary one – product pictures.

Your products need to be the focus. Whether you’re featuring just one or a whole menagerie, your images have to be crystal clear and sharp. In other words, your products need to pop.

You can use in-context images or just simple product pictures. One layout I’m fond of using is an in-context image at the top either to the right or left of my offer text, then three to six regular product images in columns underneath. I’ve also had success with nine regular images in three rows arranged by category. But the design that works best for me may not work as well for your products and/or customer base, so always be testing new layouts.

Timing Is Everything

Scheduling is another very important factor in email marketing success. Just as sales ebb and flow with the days of the week, so does email response. There are a lot of different ideas and theories marketers have about the best day to mail but I firmly believe it varies by industry and customer type .This is just something you will have to test.

You need to get a feel for your customer base and how they like to do things. Look at your stats and figure out the day of the week and rough time you get the most orders. By rough time I mean morning, afternoon, or night and schedule your mailing to hit inboxes just before. That’s how you should begin and test from there. You should also test frequency of mailings. Your customer base, again, will dictate this..

If you put as much thought and care into designing your newsletters and emails as you do your website you will increase the value of your list and reap the benefits of repeat sales. Keep testing and digging deeper into the wants and needs of your customer base and you will create another income stream from within your existing business, it’s a wonderful thing.

STOMPER Speed Boost

To help you begin your Internet marketing success, we’ve created Stomper Startup, a 13-session course covering everything from just getting started to making advanced marketing strategies. No vague information here. Nothing has been left out. Only specifics that will make a difference for you! This truly is the only course you need to get the right business off the ground making a sustainable income!

Get the full story on Stomper Startup by clicking here.

SEO Secret Sauce

1. . Have a reason to email your customers.
2. Create and test different types of sales – Buy one, get one, Single product, Free accessory, etc.
3. Write an eye-catching subject line to describe your sale and subscribers want to click.
4. Test different email design layouts.
5. Figure out your sales cycle and schedule your emails to go out right before your highest sales period.

Stomper Buzz

Next Week’s Topic: Personal Productivity

FACULTY OFFICE HOURS NEXT WEEK:

WEDNESDAY, July 20th, 2011 at 1:00pm Eastern

Faculty Office Hour with Melanie Benson Strick.

Bring your questions for Melanie about increasing YOUR Personal Productivity! StomperNet Members, Register Now!

THURSDAY July 21st, 2011 at 7:00pm Eastern

Personal Productivity with Faculty Member Dr. Lisa Lang.

Decisions ARE Productive. Learn how to make crisp, clear decisions with Dr. Lisa and the Theory of Constraints. StomperNet Members, Register Now!

Let us know your thoughts on today’s issue.

Post Your Comments Here

Stompernet Blog

It’s Christmas in my home, but whatever you’re celebrating this time of year… I hope it’s a peaceful time for you.

Now with the formalities out of the way… I hope you enjoyed our “Scrooge” video…

And I really REALLY hope we surprised you with our Stomper Scrutinizer software. I will admit, we tried to throw you off a bit and make you think this was going to be some big high-priced Product Launch…

After all, it’s more fun playing Santa Claus when no one’s expecting it!

In any case, let us know what you think and what kind of results you’re getting from Scrutinizer…

Happy Holidays from Andy Jenkins and the whole StomperNet crew!

Post a Comment

Stompernet Blog

This is some critical stuff – it doesn’t matter how much traffic you get if you can’t get that traffic to convert. And if your design is all messed up, you aren’t going to convert.

So let me know what you think… join the conversation here by leaving a comment or question on the video. If you haven’t already, you can see the video here.

As you can tell, we are reading (and responding) to your comments…

Best,
Andy

Post a Comment

Stompernet Blog