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Nearly everyone who has ever done any kind of marketing on the internet knows and understands this statement and yet so many marketers continue to ignore it.  Why is that?  It could be that they don’t believe. It could be that they are scared of change and are happy to do business as business sees fit; constantly at the mercy of Google and the traffic it decides to grace the marketers website with. It could even be that they don’t feel that they have the technical proficiency to set up and operate an email autoresponder for themselves.

For those that fall into the first category all I have to say is open your eyes…look around.  If you have been marketing online for ANY amount of time you have been out on someone’s list.  You stumbled upon some free eBook requiring you to trade your email address for the free information, or some video series or some free software that was going to change your life as an interent marketer.  We gladly trade our email address hoping beyond hop that we were finally going to be delivered that one missing link…the key to our internet marketing salvation and once we do the emails start rolling in.  "Get in on this super duper secret opportunity right now - only 12 hours left…$197.00 please!"  "Learn how I made $193,867.15 with one product in one month - 15 spots left….$267.00 please!" These people are using the power of their list to ensure that they do not have to solely rely on traffic from the search engines to ensure future profits.

As far as the second group goes…those that are afraid of change…there is really nothing that I can do for you and internet marketing, a field that is constantly growing and changing and morphing is probably not the best field for you to try to conquor.

The main target for todays post is the third group of people…those who feel they don’t have the technical proficiency to set up an email autoresponder. I am not going to go into step by step detail with regards to HOW a specific email autoresponder works…that will be for another post on another day.  That being said, what I AM going to do is explain the basics you need to think about as you plan your workflow.

The first thing you need to think about is why would people want to give you their email address…they know that by doing so they will start getting emails from you.  Therefore you generally need to give them something that they want in exchange for that email.  Say you are running a weight loss website, you might want to offer them a free eBook called something like "Learn How You Can Eat More AND Lose 10 Lbs in 2 Weeks!". Now as people are searching for weight loss principles, programs, tips or whatever and they find your site you will be in a perfect position to capitalize on their desire by providing them the FREE eBook for the low low cost of their email address. The reason that this is so powerful is that not many people will make a purchase their first time to your site.  Not only that, how many times have you yourself stumbled upon a site, not found exactly what you were looking for at that time and never gone back.  By building a list you can send out a constant trickle of reminders inviting prospects back to your site.

One mistake a lot of people make when starting out is that they immediately send their prospect from the submission form to the product or service they promised.  The problem with this is that many savy surfers will give a fake email address to get access.  Generally what you want to do is two-fold.

1. Redirect the customer to a "Thank You" page explaining to them that the link to the information they are seeking is being emailed to them and that they should check their email to confirm their request.  You may also want to provide a link back to the page with the original submission form along with a reminder explaining to the prospect that if they don’t have access to the email they provided they may want to go back and use an email address they do have access to.
2. Send an email to the prospect confiming thier request for information and linking to a "Congratulations" page that has the information they requested.

Doing these steps insures that the email addresses that are being added to your list are valid.

Upcoming articles will cover some of the specific email autoresponder options available as well as how to set them up.

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This report is going to be short and to the point. In a few moments you will learn exactly how to increase your article click-through rate dramatically by crafting the perfect article resource box. The resource box is the most important part of your article. The whole article should be set up around getting the maximum number of clicks from it.

Many people see an average CTR (Click-Through Rate) of about 6%-7% for articles that they write and submit to the various article directories. Right now I am averaging closer to 25%-30% across all my pen names for articles written over the last eight to nine months.

So what’s the secret to wringing every possible click from your readers?

Believe it or not it’s actually quite easy to get your Resource Box CTR up that high or even higher. If you set your article’s resource box up correctly, your articles will provide you with tons of natural search engine traffic twenty four hours per day, seven days per week. 

The goal in setting up a proper Resource Box is to ensure that it seems like a natural part of the body of your article.  Many article writing professionals will tell you that the Resource box is where you build your brand. Start off by telling the reader who you are.  Then explain to the reader how accomplished and knowledgeable you are in your field in order to gain trust. Finally provide your call to action trying to convince them to do whatever it is that you would have them do (go to your site, download an .mp3 file or ebook, sign up for a newsletter, etc.)  The problem with this methodology is that we, by nature, are inherently selfish and impatient people with a limited attention span; as soon as most readers get to the point in the article where it says "John Smith is an accomplished…" they feel they have gotten all the pertinent information they are going to get out of your article and off they go to do more research or apply what they have learned.

Here is an example of what I would call a less than optimal use of an author’s Resource Box: 

John Smith is a professional writer.  He graduated with a Masters of Arts Degree in Journalism from the Missouri School of Journalism.  He has written pieces for such publications as the New York Times, the LA Times and USA today.  To learn more about how to write effective articles or to hire a professional article writer visit JohnSmith.com.

Now this sounds like a very professional, well thought out, brand building author’s bio or Resource Box and IF the prospect takes the time to read about how great and accomplished John Doe is they might even follow the link to his site. However, rather than do it that way, I recommend placing your call to action first.  In fact, in most cases I would recommend that you NOT put anything EXCEPT your call to action in the Resource Box. Unless you think that your site will not be enough to build your brand for you, your name doesn’t matter, your accomplishments don’t matter; all that matters is the click-through. 

If you ONLY care about increasing your CTR you could use something like:  

Click Here to learn how to write effective articles that will knock your competition off the pages of Google

In the above example you would apply your href tags to "Click Here".  

Now I am sure that many of you are wondering "Well why are we only mentioning the "how to" page and NOT the sales page as well" right?  The answer is simple. The type of person who will typically be drawn to an article about writing articles is more than likely looking to write their own articles not hire an article writer.  A pitch about hiring an article writer might not register well for that prospect.  In this case it would be better left for the prospect to follow the link to the "how to" page and let your site sell your services once they get there.

Also, in the resource example above, we reworded the call to action.  The reason for doing this is that you want to make it seem as if what you are offering is the one magic bullet they are looking for…in this case information on how to write an effective article. No more researching how to write good copy, no more guessing if the strategies they are using are effective…just straight to the point tips, tricks and strategies for writing good content that will dominate the search engines!

If however you are interested in increasing your CTR but would also like to gain some inherent SEO benefit out of your article marketing efforts you could use: 

Learn how to write effective articles that will blow your competition off the pages of Google by visiting JohnSmith.com.

In this case your href tag would be applied to "write effective articles" (linking to the "how to" page of your site or an ebook download or a newsletter subscription page).  If you chose to you could also link "JohnSmith.com" to your homepage. My recommendation would be that you NOT do so because the more choices you present to the reader the less likely they will be to choose the option you want them to.  For instance, if your "how to" page is where you get them to take action (download an ebook, subscribe to your list) or attempts to convert them to a paying customer and your homepage attempts to send them to your "how to" page then you are putting up an additional barrier to your sale by directing them to your homepage as opposed to your "how to" page. 

Finally, if you absolutely feel you must ALSO build your brand you can create a Resource Box that looks something like: 

Click Here to learn how to write effective articles that will blow your competition off the pages of Google by visiting JohnSmith.com. John Doe is a professional writer.  He graduated with a Masters or Arts Degree in Journalism from the Missouri School of Journalism.  He has written pieces for such publications as the New York Times, the LA Times and USA today. 

The Resource Box above places your call to action seamlessly at the end of the body of your article but before the author’s actual bio information.  This allows the author to increase their CTR while at the same time building their brand amongst readers who actually make it to the true end of the article.  Obviously you can swap out the first line above for the more SEO friendly line depending on what your goals are. 

By following these guidelines when setting up your resource box you will take your article marketing to a whole new level. Not only does this make for a much stronger call to action, but also, by placing the anchor text right at the start of the box allows the blue coloring of it to stand out better and attract the reader’s eye before they ever realize they are coming to the end of the article which is exactly what we are trying to accomplish. 

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I’m going to share some internet marketing techniques  with you that will drive traffic to any website you own, but first it’s important to understand how traffic works. This article will not go into minute details (that’s for upcoming articles and posts). Instead, you are about to be shown a quick overview of how traffic works and how you can get your share.

So You Have a Website…What Now?

Just because you put up a website doesn’t mean that Google (or any other search engine for that matter) is going to start sending you traffic. In fact, search engines doesn’t SEND traffic anywhere. The search engines simply display a listing of sites ranked by what the user enters into that particular search engine’s search box. The user then has to actively click on your site’s link to visit your site. That being the case, the key here is to show up in the search engine’s rankings on page one or page two (where people will actually see it) while also ensuring that the user wants to click on the search result for your site.

Why Is Ranking Important?

If you have a website that is promoting a product or service, then there is a good chance that you are competing with thousands (if not millions) of other pages on the internet promoting the same thing. Over 90% of all search engine users never go to page 2 of search engine results. That’s why it vital to get onto page 1 of search engine rankings. That is why you need to force your site’s pages to rank higher than the pages of your competitors.

How Does Google Determine How It Will Rank Your Site

While the actual algorithms that Google uses for site rankings is secret, there are many things that have been discovered. What Google looks for when ranking your site is of course relativity. If your page is offering instructions on how to assemble wedding gift baskets, then Google will index your page as a page on how to assemble wedding gift baskets. That part is simple. It won’t show up (or shouldn’t show up) for pages on how to repair a computer. The problem comes in the fact that you will be competing with thousands of other pages that offer similar information.

So you need to do things to your site to leap frog over those other pages and come out on top. The biggest thing that Google looks for when deciding how to rank similar pages is popularity. In other words, how many other sites are linking to your site? Google does this because they feel that,  just as our country is run as a Democracy where a single candidate gets elected into office by having the most votes, the people should also decide which sites are most relevant within a given niche. In Google’s eyes, if another site is willing to post a link to your site, then you must have a quality site and deserved to be ranked higher. Getting enough links (or votes) will play very heavily when Google decides where to rank you. Links to your site from other sites are called “Backlinks”.

Now here’s the catch… you can have 20 links to your site and still get beat out by a site that only has 10. The reason is this… Google gives “extra credit” to links that come from quality sites or sites similar to yours.

So Where Do You Get Quality Backlinks That Drive Traffic?

So now that we know some basics of what Google wants, we will start to develop a traffic plan that will help us to start ranking higher on Google’s search engine. Below is a chart showing where we are going to go to get those valuable backlinks. Don’t worry if it looks overwhelming. I’m going to give you a blueprint that automates most of it, and here’s the good news, in addition to getting valuable backlinks from the sources below, you will also be getting additional targeted traffic!

Sources of Backlinks and Traffic

Step-by-Step Traffic Blueprint

The following is the blueprint that I use to create a massive amount of free traffic for my websites. Here’s why it works: If you actually follow through with all of these  steps, you will not only create hundreds of links back to your website, but you will also get tons of traffic to your site as well.  You see this plan will give you more backlinks then 99% of all similar websites. In other words, you will be a top 1% websites within your niche when it comes to getting traffic to your site.

What Google looks for when it looks for websites to rank high is content lots and lots of relevant content. This is because when people visit search engines, that is what they are looking for. Content comes in many forms…it can be articles, blog posts, videos, podcasts, etc. What you will need to  focus on is building an accumulation of content and flooding the internet with our content. One thing to keep in mind when generating your content is that what will make your site rank higher is having an abundance of original content. So if you simply cut and paste content from other websites you will most likely be beat out by the site that already has that content. So you will want to make sure to focus on creating and developing original content.

Steps to flooding the internet with your original content:

1. Brainstorm ideas for an article. To come up with ideas for an article you can start by  visit websites and blogs that are similar to yours. As you come across blogs, you should write a comment to their blog posts with a link back to your site whenever possible. For a detailed breakdown of how you can generate the necessary content you can see our article Creating Unique Blog Content.

2. Write an article. Use Microsoft Word or your favorite word processor and save it to your hard drive. This step is important as many people have a tendency to write straight to their blogs editor.  the reason for saving this to your hard drive is that you will be using it again and again.

3. Turn your article into a blog post. Pretty self-explanatory…simply post your article to the WordPress blog on your website.

4. Distribute your blog post via social media marketing. Submit your blog post to all the major social bookmarking sites such as FaceBook, Digg, Reddit & Mixx.

5. Submit to Twitter. Generate a short Twitter blurb letting all of your follower know about your new blog article.

6. Create a Squidoo Lens. You can take your article and very quickly create a Squidoo Lens. Google loves Squidoo!

7. Post your article onto Hosted Blogs. Copy and paste the same (or slightly rewritten article onto several hosted blogs that you have created such Blogger, BlogSpot, WordPress.org.

8. Submit to article directory sites. You can publish the same article to article directory sites that get indexed by Google. A couple of good examples of these types of sites would be EzineArticles.com and GoArtilces.com

9. Send out press releases. There are many free online press release submission sites. You can rewrite your article slightly and blast it out as a press release.

10. Post parts of the article onto relevant forums. You can take portions of the article and put it out there on forums. When using forums don’t spam, just add content that is relevant to an ongoing discussion or create a new discussion of your own utilizing a portion of your article and have a link to your site in your profile’s signature.

11. Create a PodCast. Use the article and record it as an .mp3 audio file so that you can publish it as a podcast. You can do this with an inexpensive microphone that you can pick up from just about any retail or online store and the free open source audio recording and editing software Audacity. Best of all it only takes minutes to do.

12. Create a Video from the Podcast. Create a slide show utilizing free images you find on the web and combine it with the .mp3 audio file you created to produce a video utilizing the free screen recording software solution CamStudio. Upload the video to video sharing sites such as YouTube.

If you follow these steps you WILL see a dramatic increase in traffic to your site over time.  The problem that plagues so many internet marketers is that they spend a little time generating and promoting content and when they don’t see immediate results they give up. If you are persistent in your efforts and consistent in your methodologies your hard work will pay off in an unending supply of natural search engine traffic.

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Creating Blog Content

When it comes to sucking internet traffic out of search engines and other websites, nothing beats original content

You are going to have to produce content for your blog, then take that same content and spread it out over the internet so it grows virally. I’m going to show you how to do this.

Now I know some of you are thinking… “But I can’t write”. Well I disagree. If you can talk, then you can write.

Your goal is not to write the next best seller, it’s just to get content onto your website that’s loaded with keywords that people on Google or other search engines are searching for.

Once you crank out a few blog postings, it gets easier and easier.

Where to Get Ideas…

If you need help getting started, just go to Google Blog Search which is Google’s search engines for blogs and type in the keyword you are looking to target to pull up any blogs related to your niche. Visit some of these other blogs and get some ideas about what you can write about.

I did a test and entered “internet marketing” and this was the result…

Also, try going to article directory sites and see what others have written. For instance you could go to eZinearticles and type in one of the keywords you are trying to target and you will find hundreds if not thousands of articles previously written by other authors. Just keep in mind that there are no results for adult topics since they don’t allow adult content so if you run an adult based site you need to be creative in how you do your searches to come up with ideas.

A good strategy would be to take an article you find on your niche and re-write it with a focus on your target market, product or service.

The one thing you don’t want to do is copy articles or blog posts word for word; that’s plagiarism.  Plus the content is already out there, so more than likely the site where it originated from will beat you every time for search engine traffic and authority.

The one exception to the “copy-and-paste” rule is that you can copy the articles from EzineArticles.com as long as you leave the author’s credit in-tact. While this is not as good as original content, some content will beat out no content on your blog every time.

Writing Headlines…

Headlines for your blog posts are important. It’s what will get web surfers to click and visit your blog.

Coming up with ideas for headlines for your blog posts can be easy once you’ve done it a few times. One trick you might want to try is to look at the covers of magazines like business opportunity magazines and swipe from their headlines.

For instance, from the cover of a recent Entrepreneur Magazine I could write a blog post then simply add a word or two to the magazine’s headlines to create my own headlines like:

 “Five Secrets to Making Money Online Now!”
 “Start Your Home Based Business the Smart Way”.

You can even use the words “Homebased” or “Home-based” instead of “Home Based” to catch the people that break the name up when typing it into Google’s search box.

Also, you can use the words “mlm” or “network marketing” to get traffic from people searching for MLM opportunities. By doing this you could take the same headlines shown and turn them into something like:

“Five Secrets to Making Money Online with an MLM Now!”
 “Start Your Network Marketing Business the Smart Way”.

Part of what you are trying to do is put key search terms that people are searching for into your headlines.

The writer’s of headlines for Cosmopolitan Magazine are some of the highest paid writers in the world. This is because the headlines on the cover, not the content inside, is what makes their magazines fly off the shelves. So doesn’t it makes sense to swipe good copy from the world’s best headline writers?

If you look at a cover, it follows a formula. The upper left hand of the magazine (the first headline) is always about sex. Why? Because sex sells; which is why three of the headlines above are about sex. So from the above magazine you could come up with headlines like these:

“Taboo Money! The Dirty Sexy Little Secret that Could Make You Rich”
“Advice from network marketing entrepreneurs you’d be crazy not to take”
“Don’t Get Caught Naked Trying to Start Your Online Business with out Having These Tips”.

All three of those headlines are modified versions from just one Cosmopolitan Magazine cover.

Outsourcing your writing:

If you really don’t want to write and have a few extra dollars, you can always outsource your writing. The easiest way is to find 5 to 10 articles that you want re-written then place a post on Rentacoder, Elance or Project4Hire asking people to bid on the job.

Say that you just want 10 articles, an average of 300 words per article, re-written to be unique content. Be sure to ask anyone bidding to submit samples of their writing. You can even request that the writer post them onto your blog for you if you want to avoid that task. (You will have to set them up with a non-admin password that only allows them to post).

You will get lots of replies, and lots of bid offers. You should be able to find someone that can crank these out for under $5 per article.

When you accept a bid, you will then place the payment into the site’s escrow account. When the writer has finished writing the articles and has submitted them to you, then you release the funds from escrow.

So you hate to type…

There are several options for people that hate to type.

We’ve already discussed outsourcing your writing, but there are also other options if you wish to create your own content and get your ideas, in your own words, onto your blog without having to type.

You can always get a USB microphone for your computer and use a software package like Dragon Naturally Speaking. Available at:
http://www.nuance.com/naturallyspeaking. Dragon Naturally Speaking will turn your talking into text. That way you can simply say what you want, then cut and paste the text into a blog post.

Another option is to record what you want, then have it transcribed and emailed back to you as text. There are many services that will do this for you like eTranscriptionist.com.

Also (as mentioned above) you can always outsource the transcribing using sites such as Rentacoder, Elance or Project4Hire.  You can even ask for someone that can edit your writing for grammatical errors or even ask for someone that can do some “heavy” editing and re-write portions if you feel you need it.

Getting Help With Grammar…

If you use Microsoft Word, then you will get minor help with grammatical and spelling errors. But if you really want to polish up the grammar with your articles and blog posts, then consider the grammar correcting software made by White Smoke. You can even use their online version for free at: http://www.whitesmoke.com/free-online-checker/.

However, don’t get too caught up with grammar. If you get too clinical and perfect, then you will lose the one thing that makes your writing look like it came from a real person. People want to do business with real people. So don’t worry too much about a few misspelled words or grammatical errors.

For Those On a Budget…

If you don’t own Microsoft Word to write with, there is a no-cost option called “Open Office”. It’s an open source Microsoft Office clone software package and can be downloaded for free at: Openoffice

In Conclusion…

When you write a blog post you will be creating content that can be used over and over, not just in your blog.

Infact in an upcoming article I will cover how to use content you create again and again to bring in traffic.

Remember, it’s text on web pages that bring in search traffic. Search engines can’t see graphics, pictures, or see into videos. So fill your articles with words and phrases that you think people will be searching for. The more blog posts you make, the more chances you will have to catch traffic from search engines. Here’s why more is better – You never know what combination of words Google will fall in love with.  Plus, Google loves blogs that update frequently.

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So you finally made the leap and decided you want to give internet marketing a try…now what?

• Be Keyword or Brandable
• Be Hyphenated or Not
• Be Long or Short
• Use .Com, .Org, .Net, .Biz, etc.
• Use Plurals, "The", "My" & "Blog"
• Use Stop Words

• Multiple Similar Domains

• Pro - The search engines are more readily able to identify the keywords you are trying to promote as they are broken up by hyphens.
• Pro - Being that the non-hyphenated version is taken at least you still get a version of the domain you initially settled on.
• Con - People WILL forget the hyphens (not ALL people obviously but some will). Imagine this…you know the website is HomeBasedBusinessOpportunity.com but can’t remember if it is Homebased-Business-Opportunity.com or Home-Based-Business-Opportunity.com. Anytime you use a hyphen in your URL there is a significant risk that you are handing prospects over to your competition for this reason alone.
• Con - In some circles this could be considered spammy.

Long or Short
 
Another topic that is hotly debated is how long a domain name should be; currently domain names can be as long as 67 characters in length. In general most people agree (or would argue) that the shorter the domain name is, the better. One of the main reasons for this is that the longer the domain the more room for error when a prospective surfer is trying to type it in.
 
Shorter domains tend to appear more appealing to the eye in advertising (both online and offline). That being said, a short domain name is typically better than a long domain name as long as the domains name makes sense to the surfer and is memorable. Put yourself in a surfer’s shoes when making this determination. Would you more readily remember hbbo.com or homebasedbusinessopportunity.com?

• MyWidgetManufacturer.com
• TheWidgetManufacturer.com
• WidgetManufacturerGuru.com

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