For the first time since Level343 opened its doors in 1998, we’re closing for the holidays! There won’t be a blog Thursday, but don’t worry. We’ll be back with fresh content, updates and general mayhem, Monday, January 2, 2012. In the meantime, we’ve started a quarterly enewsletter (first installment went out early this morning). We invite you to view the email in your browser and click on the subscribe link.
One of our favorite past clients, and one of our most loyal supporters, recently asked about pinging blogs: “Do you find it beneficial to ping your blog? I have done it. I usually use pingoat, pingfarm and pingomatic. I didn’t see anything in your blog about it. Any thoughts?” Thanks for the question, Carla. We do have some thoughts, as a matter of fact – lots!
Blog writing – it’s one of the hardest, easiest, most frustrating, most relaxing, creative, unoriginal thing you can do… ish. On the good days, you get an idea and golden words just flow from thought to fingers to keyboard to publish. On the bad days, every word you put down is an exercise in pulling teeth.
So, you broke down and paid for a course. You learned that content marketing is the wave of the future and that with great content your profits will explode; all your worries will be over. You spend some time each day researching and writing. You’re doing it all right. Except, your list isn’t growing. No one forwards your emails. You don’t have more comments on your blog posts. Worst of all, your sales are flat. Is it time to throw in the towel and rent a billboard? Before you do, take a second to look at these common content marketing mistakes. You might be on the brink of exploding profits without even realizing it!
Content curation? Not content creation? Even the word processor we use thinks the word is spelled wrong. However, content curation has been around for quite awhile. As content developers and a business with a blog, we know it’s hard to keep up with the constant need for fresh articles. After posting umpteenth hundred posts, everybody has at least one experience with the whole “What do I write about NOW” question. Usually, this happens only a day or two before the next one post is due to come out.
Many of you may not know, but we put up a website usability survey on our site some time back in October. At the end of the survey, we left a place for open-ended comments where visitors can add their thoughts, tips, pointers, etc.
Your web presence is up and running smoothly, the visitors are swarming, and even buying your products or services. The next step is to start a related blog. Your blog might be a place for your customers to ask questions, to talk to other customers, or to find more detailed information about your company, services and products. Whatever the purpose and intended goal for your blog, there are a few generally accepted rules, which apply to all company or business blogs, that will keep visitors coming back.
The line between reaching the search engines and reaching visitors is incredibly thin. Trying to reach search engines with SEO can alienate both, while trying to reach just the visitors can leave your site unseen in the SERPs. What’s a webmaster to do? How does it all come together for a strong return on investment?
Is Your Blog’s Comment System Inviting or Pushing Away?
October 13, 2011