5 Blogging Hacks to Make Your Content Marketing More Efficient

By Teesa Vaz  |   Submitted On May 10, 2016

  

Don't you just wish there was a way you could save yourself the countless hours that you pour into your business blog and instead use that time to do what you really enjoy? Like running your business, for example!

There are some great time savers out there to help you significantly reduce the amount of time that you are spending on your blog. Try out some of these blogging hacks and see if it makes your content marketing efforts more efficient:

1. Consider the amount of time you have to write a blog post when selecting a format.

Who said that every blog post you write needs to be 3,000 words? Often, the best blog posts that I read are filled with pictures or include a really helpful infographic. If you don't have a lot of time to commit to writing an in depth blog post, collaborate with someone in your industry to curate an infographic. You could also use the post to throw together a quick how-to video or share pictures of customers loving your new products (with their permission, of course). While a lengthy post filled with text could easily take you 2+ hours to write, taking advantage of images and graphics could cut your time down to 30 minutes max.

Mixing up the types of content that you share on your blog can keep it from becoming monotonous and can offer an unexpected element for your readers, which they will love.

2. Keep a running list of content ideas.

Often, deciding what to write about takes longer than actually writing the blog post. Save yourself the agony of trying to come up with great content ideas when you're sitting down to write and instead refer to your running list of killer content ideas. Naturally, the best ideas come to you when you're in the shower or are driving in your car. Take a minute to jot these ideas down on a Google document or Trello board. Basically, these ideas should be stored in a place that is easily accessible and offers the ability to organize your thoughts.

3. Hold yourself accountable by adding writing deadlines to your work calendar.

In the fast-paced corporate world that we live in, it's so easy to put off writing blog posts and instead deal with the 98 different office emergencies that are happening at the moment. Instead, to help hold yourself accountable to maintaining a solid blog for your business, build writing deadlines into your work calendar. This will give you a set time to work on a blog post. Plus, if colleagues have access to your calendar as well, they will know not to interrupt you during this time.

4. Develop a blog post production process that works for you.

If you spend 95 percent of your time writing a blog post, chances are that it won't give you the results that you want. The best bloggers boost their productivity by creating a blog post production process that breaks down each aspect of writing quality content (brainstorming, researching, writing, editing, publishing, and promoting). At any given time, you could have multiple blog posts in these various stages. Think of it as your content pipeline!

5. Come to the realization that not every post will be perfect to your standards.

You will drive yourself bonkers if you try to make your posts 100 percent perfect before hitting publish. Obviously, you want to thoroughly proofread and edit your posts before publishing them, but the big takeaway here is not to over think things. Being too meticulous can be a huge time drainer!

So, hopefully, these time-saving content marketing SEO tips will help you to write higher quality blog posts without consuming too much of your business day!

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/expert/Teesa_Vaz/1683331

Visit also my 10k in a 100 day's challenge.

http://myfirst10kbusiness.blogspot.nl/

Leverage Videos For Brand Messaging And Gain Benefits Of Online Digital Marketing

By Abhilash Tyagi  |   Submitted On May 02, 2016

  

Everyone loves videos, or at least it seems so. Most of us spend a considerable amount of time watching videos on social platforms. We also visit YouTube where 400 hours of videos are uploaded to the site every minute. We scrounge Facebook, Instagram and other social channels to lay our hands on engaging pieces of videos to quench the appetite for information. It's this very intense desires of ours of watching videos that has forced new-age marketers to look for ways to leverage them and benefit businesses. This is why the concept of video marketing has picked a lot in recent times.

In today's time of digital era, it's hard to ignore the value of visual information. Since users are evolved now, their expectations have risen a great deal when it comes to consuming messages and ideas shared by brands. Earlier, users loved different content types including texts, images and graphics, but not anymore. Videos are now the most preferred form of content for internet marketing purposes and marketers are leveraging them to fullest. They have dominated the online marketing landscape for their ability to deliver sound and picture to convey a variety of emotions to users.

In fact, studies confirm that buyers today make buying decision based on videos, and this sums up the increasingly growing importance of them. There are many reasons why videos have become the most important marketing tool today, and one reason is their being most persuasive. They influence buyers and also impact their buying patterns; they give in-depth and complete information of products or services to brands to remove any doubts from the mind of buyers. They are the only marketing tool that strikes to the heart and mind at the same time, which is why marketers want to benefit from them in a great way.

In addition, videos build more credibility and trust among buyers than any other form of content. They are easy to decode, simple to understand and above all, easily searchable. They are where customers spend their maximum time which is why they are considered an invaluable source or tool for internet marketing. They help catch the attention on the internet and turn viewers into prospects. More so, they are easily shareable and they are easy to embed; they can deliver SEO results and they can reach to as many users as possible across the world in quick time.

What's more, videos are now being used by marketers to engage, inform and enrich users and gain their attention. They are also used extensively to educate and inform users about product, services and different aspects of the business. Without them, brands would find it extremely difficult to convey their messages in the most appropriate manner possible. Given so many benefits attached with videos, it's hard to imagine a brand not utilizing them for their online digital marketing purposes. It'd be a mistake not to tap into the vast potential of a content type that is going to grow bigger in the days to come.

Hi, I am Abhilash Tyagi an SEO analyst, employed with Mind Digital Group a digital agency in Delhi. I enjoy reading and writing and I write posts on topics of my interest and passion. Mind Digital offer you consults and guides brands on planning, execution and implementation of digital marketing services to help them with rankings and visibility.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/expert/Abhilash_Tyagi/2170569

Banner Ads Tips And Tricks

By Juan A Rademacher  |   Submitted On January 27, 2016

  

Banner ads are also known as image ads and display ads.These are nothing more than image advertisements that you can't help but run into all over the internet. Banners are cost-effective and a great way to get your business image out there for the masses to see.

Banners have been used since the start of the World Wide Web. It used to be easy to create an attention grabbing banner ad and get easy clicks. However, the internet is much more competitive now, and people want to interact with banners that do more than just grab their attention.

A good banner ad should:

* Be relevant to your web site. Let your customers know just what it is you are marketing, especially if you are looking to gain customers from your marketing niche.

* Be professional. Pictures can say a thousand words: make your graphics and colors pop. Remember, you are running a business, so keep it neat and professional.

Before you start creating your banner ads you need to consider a few options available to you:

Size

Most websites have their own requirements about the size of banner ads. These ads are usually just the regular standard sizes that have been around forever. Just be sure you know what each website requires. You can use a graphic software program like Adobe Flash or Adobe Photoshop to find the correct ad size.

Plan to use two-thirds of your banner for your image (which is your value proposition), and the other third for your call to action.

Create A Strong Title

Your title, or heading, should be an immediate attention grabber. Create a captivating and short heading that reaches out to your niche market. Vary the colors and font sizes of your headings, and make it a valuable part of your ad.

Using Banner Ads Effectively

It makes sense to place banner ads on websites that already generate a lot of traffic. It makes even more sense to place these ads on websites that actually cater to your targeted market.

One nice thing about using banners is that you can easily measure the CTR (click-through rate). If your banner ad has a click-through rate of 7%, then out of a hundred impressions (times the ad was shown), 7 people actually clicked on your link. The higher your percentage, the more clicks you are getting, the more effective your banner ad is. It really is this easy.

Buying Ad Space

Now that you have created the perfect ad banner, it is time to put it to use advertising your website or blog. You could contact individual website and blog owners to discuss prices and terms, but this whole process is really a time-consuming and stressful part of advertising. Most website owners decide to hire an advertising network that helps them with the distribution of these banners.

Find an advertising network that you like. AOL Advertising, BuyAds.com, Google AdWords, and Right Media are just a few of the available networks. Discuss ad sizes with each network to see if your ads are in compliance.

If not, you may want to change them if you choose a company you like that wants something different from what you already have. Making necessary changes before advertising makes the whole process flow smoothly.

Banner ads can be affordable and cost-effective. However, large advertisers can easily spend in the range of $2,000 to $6,000 and higher. The cost of these ads is the main reason you need to create a banner ad that will appeal to a lot of people.

The more clicks you get, the more money you will make. A good banner ad campaign will see you recoup your investment money in no time at all, and hopefully leave you a handsome profit.

My name is Juan Rademacher. I have a keen interest in traffic generation because I find it's one of the greatest stumbling blocks newbies run into. Without traffic you DON'T HAVE an online business. Banner advertising is just one of the traffic options available to you.

To read more about how to generate traffic to your website visit: http://jarwinsmarketing.com/how-to-drive-traffic-to-your-website-fast/

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/expert/Juan_A_Rademacher/1128355

How To Write A Good Online Newsletter

By Donna L Walsh  |   Submitted On February 09, 2016

  

All internet marketers agree that in order to become successful, you must have a list of potential customers that you can promote to over and over again. One of the easiest ways to grow and sustain a list is by publishing an online newsletter on a frequent basis.

Graphics and a good layout are important to the attractiveness of a newsletter. However, to appeal to and keep your subscribers, a newsletter must provide quality information in the niche that your readers are interested in.

In order to write a good newsletter, you must first define the niche your newsletter will be about. Since you can't be everything for ever body, you may want to narrow the niche. For example, instead of your niche being internet marketing which is extremely broad, narrow it down to something like website development. This is still a very large subject that gives you a lot of leeway so you will have plenty to write about. But by concentrating only on website development, it will be easier for you to become known as an expert in this niche instead of a jack of all trades.

Do not narrow your niche so much that you have trouble writing anything on the subject. Also remember that the real purpose of a newsletter is to grow a list of potential customers that you can promote products and/or services to. So you do not want to narrow the niche so much that there are very few products available that you can offer to your subscribers. While you will want to create products yourself, if the niche is too narrow, you will quickly run out of ideas for new products.

Once you have decided on your niche, you need to define your audience. Are you writing for newbies, those with some internet marketing experience, or advanced internet marketers? Of course, your audience will also depend on how well you know your subject. You can't write articles for advanced internet marketers unless you know your subject very well and can give them new insights. However, you can easily research and write articles meant for newbies and mid-level marketers.

Decide how often you want to publish your newsletter taking into account the amount of time it takes to research, write, layout and edit an issue. While publishing a newsletter every day sounds like a great idea, you will soon find out that you spend all of your time getting your newsletter ready for publication with no time left over for important things such as product creation and setting up sales campaigns.

Instead, publish your newsletter weekly, twice per week at the very most. However, you do not want to go longer than a week in between issues. Do not publish erratically or too infrequently. Doing so will alienate your readers who may forget that they even subscribed to your newsletter As a result, they may unsubscribe and possibly report your email as spam.

Decide on how you will layout your newsletter. You will want to include a greeting, your name, the name of your newsletter, and the issue number. For example:

Hi [FIRST NAME], 

This is [YOUR NAME]. Welcome to the [ISSUE NUMBER] issue of [YOUR NEWSLETTER NAME]. 

You may then want to include a disclaimer such as this which reminds your subscriber that they did join your list:

You are receiving this message because you ordered one or more products and/or subscribed to one or more of our Newsletters and/or eCourses and agreed to receive emails from me through a double op*t-in procedure.

The email address {!email} was subscribed to receive this information on {!signdate long} at the following URL:

{!add_url}.

If you no longer wish to receive any communication from me, just click on the unsubscribe link at the end of this email.

PLEASE NOTE: The periods are included in known spam words. The tags are for the autoresponder used.

The next section might be an announcement/editorial section where you tell your subscribers about upcoming events, wish them a happy upcoming holiday, or tell them about anything interesting.

If you want to include a tips or product review article, place it here. This should be short, no more than 350 words.

Next would be your featured article.

If you want to include a secondary article, include that after your featured article.

Now say good bye. Include a notice that you will be sending them promotional emails. For example:

That wraps up another week's newsletter. I hope you enjoyed this issue. Don't forget to send me any comments or questions you may have. I would be only too happy to help you in any way that I can.

From time to time I'll send you important updates that will provide information that has the potential to greatly improve your online business... and of course your profits!

However, you can rest assured that I will only ever recommend products that are considered to be of HIGH value and will provide indisputably benefits to help you grow your business.

If there is a particular subject you would like me to write about, please send me an email and let me know!

I want to write articles that interest YOU. But I have no way of knowing what that is unless you tell me. So please take a couple of minutes and let me know what you want to learn about. 

Have a great week

[YOUR NAME]

[YOUR WEBSITE(S)] 

Then include something about recommending your newsletter to your reader's friends.

If you like [YOUR NEWSLETTER NAME] recommend us to your friends.

[URL TO YOUR SUBSCRIPTION FORM] 

Lastly, include all your legal information.

If you use a first rate autoresponder, it will include required information at the end such as your physical address or PO Box and an unsubscribe link.

This layout will work for just about all newsletters. It is recommended that you use HTML for your newsletter so you can include graphics with your articles, a picture of you by your signature, etc. You will also be able to bold, highlight, and colorize important areas of your newsletter thereby making it more visually appealing.

PLEASE NOTE: Including a picture of yourself will help to build a rapport with your subscribers as they will see you as a real person, not just a name.

Before publishing your newsletter, be sure to proofread, edit and change anything that does not flow correctly.

For more information about starting an online newsletter, check out Donna Walsh's eBook at http://HowToStartAnOnlineNewsletter.com. With 300+ issues delivered by her DWWD Newsletter you can rest assured that you'll be learning everything you need from a DOer that knows her subject.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/expert/Donna_L_Walsh/702869