Tag Archive for: Google

How to attract more visitors – The 10 most important visitor resources for blogs

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How can you find a lot of users for your business blog?

How can you find a lot of users for your business blog?

Is there a secret, why corporate blogs and business blogs have more success than traditional corporate websites? Is it the modern architecture of blogging systems? Is it the exiting and exhilarant spelling style of bloggers? Or is a conspiracy of the digital natives against the internet retirees?

Nothing of it! Blogs and bloggers are simply using some very effective methods to attract visitors.

The 10 most important visitor resources for blogs:

  1. Feeds – Blogs are read via feed reader predominantly, not via browsers any longer. Well-known blogs have more than 100.000 feed reader per day. On a normal day in Germany, there are some blogs with more than 10.000 feed reader.
    Highlight your RSS feed on your blog and take advantage of a feed service like Feedburner
  2. Google – Visitors through search engines are the second largest visitor group of blogs. Bloggers use always methods of search engine optimization (SEO) in order to achieve good rankings with important key words.
    Write in a search engine friendly way. Use Google’s Webmaster Tools and install a SEO plug-in like wpSEO!
  3. Pingbacks and Trackbacks – Links don’t just offer a value-add for your own users but also backlinks and numerous new users.
    Link all directions as often as possible and learn to use trackbacks in a proper way.
  4. Twitter – with the micro-blogging service you can approach users faster than with your blog. News with real add-on information are spread via Twitter the “viral” way very fast.
    Work on broadening your Twitter follower base. Promote your Twitter account on your blog and vice versa. Twitter your blog postings at the right time!
  5. Social Networks – Promote your important blog postings on XING, Facebook or LinkedIn.
  6. Forums – Are you an accredited expert, for example a wine blogger?
    If you see in a forum the question: What are the most expensive wines or the 10 most dry French ones? Write a posting on your blog and post only the link in the forum.
  7. Blog directors and RSS feed directories – Just some selected directories (Technorati, Blogoscoop, Bloggerei, Wikio) generate new visitors. Especially, if you are ranking well in these directories.
  8. Your comments on other blogs – Make yourself heard on other blogs as a constructive business partner – far and foremost in not well-known blogs. This will result in new visitors. Beware the free of sense comments! This will damage your own blog reputation in the long term.
  9. Comments of others on your blog – This is the secret of well-visited blogs:
    Be responsive to comments – You will win permanent visitors!
  10. Guest writers – Invite readers/users, other bloggers or “VIP’s” from the offline and online world to write guest posts. Every guest author will be talking to others about it or link directly to this post.
    Your creativity has no limits: travel agents blog about journeys of their customers, hotel managers animate guests to write about their vacation resort, … Your customers don’t want that? Ask them if they want to publish some of their holiday pictures on your homepage! You will be surprised seeing the reaction…

Did I forget something? Is your ranking of visitor resources different? Where do you see options to attract more visitors for your blog? Looking forward reading your comments and reading your ideas and thoughts!

Guest writer Karl-Heinz Wenzlaff is the German expert and consultant for business blogging. He knows the useful tips and tricks, and is specialized on professional company blogs, product blogs or employee blogs. Some month ago, he helped me migrating from Blogger to WordPress in order to set up a magazine theme.

Thank you for being one of my guest writers, Karl-Heinz.

Online Reputation Management bleibt (zeit)aufwendig…

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Als ich meine Vision des Personal Web Managers geschrieben habe, dachte ich, es wird sicherlich bald eine solche Dienstleistung des Reputation Coaches für aufstrebende Manager oder stark im Web aktive Persönlichkeiten geben. Derzeit ist interessant zu beobachten, wie sich dieser Plattform-Markt für persönliches Reputation Management in Position bringt.

Es steht eben viel auf dem Spiel: die Bewerbung einer Karriere, die für Nachhaltigkeit einer authentischen und erfolgreichen Persönlichkeit steht. Die Online Reputation wird dabei immer wichtiger für den nächsten Karriereschritt, aber ihr Management bleibt leider trotz unterstützender Plattformen zeitaufwendig. Ein kleiner Überblick…

Bisher galt der amerikanische Dienstleister Reputation Defender als der weltweite ‘Platzhirsch’ im Entfernen oder ‘Geradebiegen’ von bildlich belegbaren Fehltritten oder voreilig getroffenen Statements und Kommentaren, die im Web verewigt sind. Denn, wie wir alle inzwischen wissen sollten: Das Web vergißt nichts – teilweise nur, wenn wir entsprechend nachhelfen. Und so bietet Reputation Defender mit myChild ein Produkt an, das den Ruf und die Privatsphäre des Kindes schon von Kindesbeinen an online schützt.

In Deutschland ist mit my ON-ID eine sehr interessante Plattform am Start, die Online Reputation auf technischer Basis zu handeln, monitoren und optimieren anbietet. Die Web 2.0 Plattform offeriert sehr viele Optionen, das eigene Personal Brand als Visitenkarte (bzw. fast schon im Format eines Online CV aufzubauen (mit zahlreichen Schnittstellen und Widgetfunktionen zu anderen Social Networks).

Am Wochenende erhielt ich nun die neuste Pressemitteilung von Dein Guter Ruf, die mir von meinem Ex-Kollegen Jannis Moutafis zugespielt wurde. Die Nachricht preist die ab sofort kostenlose Suche des (mir noch völlig unbekannten) Reputations-Dienstsleisters an, sowie die Option eine Web-Imageseite zu veröffentlichen. Als Gadget wird der Test „Welcher Online-Typ bin ich“ angeboten, der einem Tips zum persönlichen Reputation Management offeriert (mein Testergebnis siehe Bild).

Hintergrund des Tests: Der Profil Organiser wird hiermit promotet. Dort kann man seine Netzwerk-Profile eingeben und hat diese so im Schnellüberblick und -zugriff. Der vordergründige Vorteil der Übersichtlichkeit, läßt sich mit einem grundlegenden Tip entkräften…

Starte kein Profil in einem sozialen Netzwerk, wo Du nur einen kleinen Mehrwert siehst und evaluiere vorher, ob Du nur aus einer zeitweiligen Zugehörigkeit (Schule, Uni, etc.) oder aus zukünftiger Überlegung (Kontakte halten, Karrierebenefit, etc.) dieses nutzen wirst.

Die Dienstleistungen von Dein Guter Ruf erinnern mich dennoch stark an den Personal Web Manager, denn hier geht es offensichtlich wirklich um den strategischen Ansatz des Reputation Managements mit persönlicher PR-Betreuung. Man bietet vier verschiedene Versionen an: Basis-, Profi-, Premium- und VIP-Manager – von kostenlos bis 129,90 EUR pro Monat. Letztere verspricht sogar…

– Wir legen für Sie Profile in mit Ihnen abgestimmten Portalen an.
– Wir integrieren bereits vorhandene Inhalte in Foren, Blogs, Fachportalen.
– Wir prüfen monatlich Ihre Reputation und liefern für Sie geeignete Portal- und Themenvorschläge.
– Wir führen für Sie geeignete Online-PR Aktivitäten durch.

Insofern wirken die Preise vernünftig und erinnern an das Preismodell von Reputation Defender.

Kurztest: Dein Guter Ruf
Suche: Die Suche ist unbefriedigend. Bei 466.000 Googletreffern zu meinem Namen fand Dein Guter Ruf rund 70. Einige hatten überhaupt nichts mit mir zu tun. Zahlreiche positive, wie Interviews und Gastbeiträge von/mit mir, wurden gar nicht gefunden.
Image-Webseite: Ein Bild kann nicht gefunden, hochgeladen oder integriert werden (vielleicht in einer Bezahlversion?!). Der erste Eindruck eines Menschen zählt – und der Mensch verkauft sich in der Karrierebewerbung über ein persönliches Bild. Man verschickt ja auch keinen Lebenslauf ohne Foto.
Paid Services: Daß man für zahlreiche Funktionen (z.B. Kommentar eines Suchtreffers) im Web 2.0 Zeitlater bezahlen muß, ist irgendwie Web 1.0 Welt. Zumal my ON-ID hier schon diese Funktion ohne Aufpreis anbietet.
Fazit. Unspektakulär, nüchtern, sachlich, nicht personalisierbar – aber vielleicht ist die Form genau das, was zukünftig für das Personalwesen die nachhaltige Bewerbung ist. Wer weiß…

Spot On!
Neben my ON-ID macht sich mit Dein Guter Ruf ein weiterer Anbieter auf, unsere individuelle Online Reputation im Auge zu behalten und zu professionalisieren. Mein Urteil bleibt dennoch kritisch. Die Idee Reputation Management mit persönlicher PR-Strategie zu verknüpfen, gefällt mir gut (schon wegen seiner Nähe zu ‘meinem’ Personal Web Manager). Man müsste es fast einmal einem Test unterziehen, um zu sehen, wie erfolgreich sich die Arbeit für das Personal Branding zeigt (Erfahrungsberichte bitte an mich schicken). my ON-ID ist dennoch derzeit einen ganzen Schritt voraus und bietet die spannendere und zielgenauere Lösung das Online Reputation in der Spur zu halten. Reputation Management bleibt weiterhin aufwendig, vor allem zeitaufwendig, denn am besten wird sie derzeit noch von jedem Einzelnen kritisch beäugt, bewacht und bewertet.

News Update – Best of the Day

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Although a study shows that 36% of internet searches lead to negative results, Microsoft and Google are still fighting their virtual competition for the best search engine – Bing vs. Google. Now, an eye-tracking study by User Centric offer a first look in the success of both. In sponsored links Bing performed better…

“However, sponsored links… attracted more attention on Bing (~42% of participants per search) than they did on Google (~25% of participants per search).”

Social media enters school education in America. Xavier Lur gives some interesting insight in the learning options of YouTube, Twitter or Facebook. And he links to 25 cases to use Twitter in the Classroom…

What will Bloomberg’s digital future and expansion strategy be looking like? Andrew Lack, CEO of Bloomberg’s new Multimedia Group, says that it will rely on original video news content to mobile phone users around the world. Watch his words at the Advertising 2.0 conference…

News Update – Best of the Day

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Alarm on the American local SEM advertising front… 50% of Google’s self-serve advertisers get lost as clients the following year, reports Silicon Alley Insider based on a study by Clickable.

If you are from the advertising industry, then there is no way around this makeover of Don McLean’s American Pie about media and advertising…

The new iphone was presented yesterday at San Francisco’s Worldwide Developer Conference 2009…

How to write text ads that generate leads

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In school we have learned how to write a summary in 5 sentences max. Isn’t this exactly what we need to create (newsletter) text ads that are meant to generate leads? Let’s see…

The last nine years working with customers on silicon.de, we have seen hundreds of bookings for text ads in our newsletters. In most of the cases these were meant to generate leads as we say. Now sure, leads is a powerful and impactful term ensuring the future of business, sales opportunities and save the job of responsible decision makers in marketing or sales departments.

Lead generation can be seen as collecting addresses (contact generation), profiling customer needs for products and services (interest generation), or using the direct offer for real sales or bargains (lead generation). For this post we make no distinction on the three different categories and just want to focus on the 5 sentences formula.

Headline
The number one…
The one-sentence headline is the door-opener, the eye-catcher, the first impression on your customer and your access to lead opportunities – and revenue in the end. If you fail there, the rest of your text ad will be deleted immediately in front of your customers eyes. An effect we call the ‘Skip this ad’ view…

As customers -hopefully- spend some time reading your headline (remember that this is a gift customers hand over to your business…), you should give them some kind of benefit in return from the start. So my advice is, find successful openings to create a basis for your lead generation idea from the start.

The offer. This must be written in clear words and addressing the customers needs, desires … or purse.
Examples: Get your free paper… Use 25% offer… Profit from money back…
The rhetorical question. All things that appear to be clear to customers but raise attention and/or curiosity. In Twitter days, we realized that people with rhetorical text messages generate big interest. My most-read post ended ‘… future of the business, or business of the future’. Using oxymoron is just fabulous…
Example: Don’t you want to win the lottery? Don’t you think firewalls are necessary? Don’t you think washing hands saves your health?
The advice. The world is full of questions and everyone is eager to get more insight in tools, tactics and trends which leads to even more questions. The more valuable ‘coaching effect’ we offer, the better our reputation becomes – and with that our convergence. ‘How to’ is the answer to those questions… and the reason for the headline of this post.
The ‘buzz verb’. Indicate with the first words what the (potential) customer is intended to do and what your business expectation is. This is a direct approach which is most often used for real lead generation.
Examples: Read now…, Buy now…, Follow up…, Enter data…
The ROI view. Especially in times of recession everybody is looking for better profitability. If there are ‘easy-to-receive’ options, people are open to use those and leave their data with your business.
Examples: Become more productive…, Save money by…, Increase sales with…

Body text
Sentence two to four (max.)…
The body text outlines the benefit and explains the customer how and why using the offer is desirable and makes sense. In my theory this should be done with the following 3 sentences, or optional as main ideas for your body text. Addressing the customer that is already leering to the point-of-sale (POS) …

Problem. Customers who see their responsibility have more urge to get in touch with your offer and business benefit than those who are just tangent to the issue as a tiny part of a (business) system. Target the people you are interested in by describing problems, duties or responsibilities your target group wants to get rid off or find an ease in – and which are on an open plate in public (business) talks.
Examples: How your live can change…, How your sales can benefit…, How your wife is happier…
Opportunity. Use stats or testimonials that your customers can identify with. These should illustrate your problem statement. In case you haven’t invented a complete new product, offer a comparison which puts the benefit in pictures like a metaphor.
Example: People that have used this have lived 3-times longer than…, People that bought this product, saved 25% off their time…
Scenario. The conclusion of the previous explanation, leading to just one intention. Wanting to ‘own’ the product, service, etc…
Example: Seeing these facts, you have the proof why…, Reading this you have not many options… (not ‘no’ option – no teacher mode!)

PS: The body text framework is also a successful structure that works for Google text ads.

Call-To-Action
Last sentence, number five…
Don’t leave the user in the scenario mode. Tell the (potential) customer what he/she needs to do now. Take him/her by the hand and push their eyes with ONE sentence to ONE action point (=URL). No confusion, just conversion!
Example: Click here…, Download now here…, Save now with one click….

Spot On!
Generally speaking: One break per ‘block’ (headline – body text – call-to-action). The shorter the message, the more open customers are to have a glance at it.

PLUS: A text ad is not a branding tool! Mentioning products more than once is useless. Trademark as well as copyright signs have no right to exist in text ads. Please use banners if you are after branding and awareness.

Brevity is the soul of wit. And if you need help, just let me know…

Internet keine Konkurrenz für klassischen Journalismus

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Eine aktuelle Studie des Instituts für Kommunikationswissenschaft der Universität Münster besagt, daß das Internet für den Journalismus mehr als Ergänzung denn als Mitbewerb oder Konkurrenz gesehen werden muss. Im Rahmen der Studie wurden 183 Internetredaktionen aus Deutschland interviewt, womit sich 44% aller ermittelten Redaktionen an der Erhebung beteiligt haben (nach vorheriger inhaltsanalytischer Auswertung von rund 1.200 Internetangebote).

Schon lange stellen sich die klassischen Medienhäuser die Frage, inwieweit Weblogs, Twitter und soziale Netzwerke die traditionelle Medienwelt beeinflußt. Früher konnten Redaktionen von Presse, Rundfunk und Fernsehen exklusiv die ‘Medienmache’ ihre Expertise nennen. Inzwischen wird der Medienmarkt durch Firmen oder Privatpersonen zusätzlich mit verschiedensten Plattformen bedient. Inwieweit das Internet den Journalismus verändert, wurde in einem zweijährigen Forschungsprojekt am Institut für Kommunikationswissenschaft der Universität Münster untersucht.

Laut Studie lässt sich das Ergebnis auf die folgende Formel bringen: „Ergänzung statt Konkurrenz”. Noch dominieren die Online-Angebote der traditionellen Massenmedien. Weblogs und Nutzerplattformen stellen insgesamt 5% der als journalistisch identifizierten Internetangebote – eine noch niedrige Zahl. Dennoch ist die erweiterte “Partizipation” und die “Technisierung” (Automatisierung der Nachrichtenauswahl durch Google News und andere Suchmaschinen) inzwischen deutlich sichtbar und beeinflußt den modernen Journalismus. Der beruflich ausgeübte Journalismus werde deshalb aber nicht verdrängt, ziehen die Studienverantwortlichen den Schluss.

„Weblogs und Redaktionen beobachten sich gegenseitig, sie übernehmen Themen und kommentieren einander”, beschreibt Prof. Dr. Christoph Neuberger, der Leiter des Forschungsprojekts, die Beziehung.

Zur Recherche nutzen rund drei Viertel der Internetredaktionen Weblogs und 99% die Enzyklopädie Wikipedia vorwiegend als Nachschlagewerk (83%). Ihre Zuverlässigkeit schätzen sie als hoch ein.

Spot On!
Der traditionelle Journalismus ist dennoch in einer schwierigen Transitionsphase. Auf der einen Seite müssen Medienhäuser sich im Internet engagieren, andererseits fehlen zukunftsträchtige monetarisierende Geschäftsmodelle. Die heutige Aussage von Fried von Bismarck überrascht nicht, kostenpflichtige Inhalte als Businessmodell zu evaluieren – trotz hoher Reichweiten und der Vorbildfunktion von Spiegel Online.
Allerdings muß man auch die Kehrseite der Medialle sehen: Der Nutzer ist aufgrund seines Einflusses wichtig für den Input und somit die Qualität des zukünftigen investigativen journalistischen Outputs. Muß der User Zahlen, ist fraglich, ob der User generierte Input weiterhin so zahlreich bleibt, oder schwindet. Denn: Wenn die von der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft finanzierte Studie zeigt, daß viele Redaktionen mit den Möglichkeiten der Web 2.0 Nutzerbeteiligung experimentieren, ist das ein klares Zeichen der Wichtigkeit, des Einflusses und Zukunftsträchtigkeit der modernen und sozialen Medien für den Journalismus. Hierbei profitieren Redaktionen laut eigener Aussagen von Kommentaren (20% lassen diese bereits zu) sowie von eigenen Weblogs, Videologs oder Podcasts (55% setzen diese ein).

UK: Internet users love browsing social media – less shopping

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A recent study by Hitwise reveales that UK Internet users are spending more time browsing online media than ‘going’ online shopping. In March 2009 9.8% of all UK Internet visits were directed to social networking websites and 8.6% to online retail websites. Compared to 2008, the figures turned around (online retailers 9.7% – social networks 8.2%).

In the passed year, online retailers sawe a downsize in traffic from paid search like sponsored or paid for links on search engines (i.e. like Google, Yahoo!, Live and Ask) – 2009: 8.9% and 2008: 10,1% of visits to online retailers came from a paid search listing.

“The growth of social networking, online video and the continuing popularity of news websites has meant that an increasing proportion of consumer’s online time in the UK has been devoted to online media,” commented Robin Goad, Hitwise’s Director of Research.

The traffic that Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, YouTube and the likes generates for online retailers increased in one year from 5.2% to 7.1%. And social networks now generate 58.3% more traffic than webmail providers (Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail and GoogleMail). The best performing categories in 2009 were Auctions, Fashion and Department Stores.

“Social networks are a relatively small but fast growing source of traffic for online retailers,” commented Goad. “At present, only a minority of retailers pick up a significant amount of traffic from social networks, but many of those that do have seen a positive impact on traffic. For example, fashion retailer ASOS has a strong presence on Facebook and in March received 13.3% of its traffic from the social network. Another example – in a very different market – is online bookseller Abebooks, which currently receives a quarter of all its UK Internet traffic from social networks, more than it gets from search engines.”

Spot On!
Is this showing a trend that people are willing to buy products in social networks? In the UK, it sounds possible. It could be the next step. We all know that the easy purchase process is a winner – for companies and customers. Thinking of the future of social networks, companies should consider engaging with customers much more on social networks while also integrating ‘light’ e-commerce opportunities in their Facebook Fan pages or in their company profiles at XING. Or at least indicate and lead the way for customers to some good offers or marketing activities. And re-thinking efforts on big spendings for paid search is definitely something that needs to be thought about…

News Update – Best of the Day

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According to a Microsoft research the time peole are online in Europe will be more than the length of time they spend watching TV – and this will already be the case in June 2010. The outlook of the software giant predicts that people will spend on average 14.2 hours a week online and 11.5 hours a week watching TV.

Although YouTube is ot the easiest site for Google to bring to advertisers minds, it still does some good results – and has increased ad selling from 6 to 9% – in terms of its video views. Nevertheless, revenues are still low – as for all competiors like Hulu or MySpace, said AdAge. Again it shows, content is king from revenue perspectives…

“The gain in YouTube’s U.S. business is the result of a number of factors, including more content agreements with partners such as CBS, MGM and, more recently, Disney, expanding YouTube’s partner program to thousands of indie and small producers and successfully guiding YouTube visitors to content it can sell to advertisers.”

Some fashion spots are just cool… and find a great ending.

Will Facebook tackle Google? Doubt it…

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The investment bank RBC Capital Markets sees Facebook in three years leading the online market – and leaving Google behind. Their argument: traffic. When watching the Google traffic, it becomes obvious that almost 20% of the Google traffic comes from social networks, RBC thinks.

Facebook is growing and growing, in January Facebook had already 175 million users. In the last months the average increase was somewhere at 20 million users a month. Now, the investment bank’s outlook says that if the increase stays stable, Facebook could be facing more unique users than the online giant Google in 2012. At least Ross Sandler from RBC Capital Markets states that…

Isn’t this statement a bit overestimated?
So, is traffic the right argument? Which platforms really does drive traffic here? How does Facebook drive traffic to Google? Where are the Facebook links that push users to Google? The ‘back button’ cannot be so powerful, right?! Search? Ads? Back-links? What else? Sorry, I cannot find the point…

There is no Google search box on Facebook. Maybe it is the social graph that has it’s effect on targeting, personalization or the digital identity of users might influence the power of Facebook on Google in the future. But traffic sounds like an superficial invalid argument, don’t you think…

Twitter Ads: Thoughts on the test

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Now, there has been a lot, a lot, a lot of thoughts and talk lately on how Twitter will be making money. Finally, Twitter is experimenting with a new revenue model as Techcrunch tells us…

First, it seemed like a nice idea to promote their own service (i.e. widgets and search), which I thought is the case. This well-placed add-on feature makes it easier to work with Twitter, especially heading towards their search site, when you are not using any of the helpful Twitter apps. And there were also some good thoughts on Twitter becoming a search engine and as how this will be a driver monetizing their business. But Overture (now controlled by Yahoo), has patented placement of text ads on a search results page. So, this was probably a difficult pitch.

Now, back to what is happening, see the black box on the right hand side on ‘Widget’…

It is obviously really a ‘simple’ test for some solid revenue stream generating business, we all are familiar with via Google text ads. But can this be an appropriate test to recall on revenue models?

The two test objects, Twitter search and the above mentioned Twitter widget link, belong directly to the Twitter concept. It offers some immediate navigation benefit to the user. This is what users are after for a long time. Thus, ‘Twitterati’ will click on the links and appreciate the easy way accessing their search service. So, the results Twitter sees with the test don’t reflect in any way potential click rates on text ads as these are dependent on results.

Isn’t there a difference if you promote some internal service or feature, or if you run a promotion from some external party or company? In my experience, in terms of text ads, and those generating results, we can definitely say, there is a huge difference on the click rates. Hence, on the conversion rate clients will find the difference as well. Editorial focus is not comparable to advertising, reaching out for awareness, right? And as clicks is the interactive currency ‘No. 1’ for marketers and convergence their need, according to yesterdays CMO report, the test sounds like comparing apples and oranges.

Spot On!
Nevertheless, the test is worth some thought. And just imagine Amazon and Twitter are getting engaged, the business model becomes clear based on some semantic web thoughts: connecting Amazon’s product catalog by connecting tweets and related products. Someone talks about a film and gets an offer from Amazon in the text ad. Or maybe Yahoo could be the new ‘Who is buying Twitter at last’ as they could compete in the long-tail market. In general, Google could finally face a competitor here…