budurl.com — More Twitter training by Mike Klingler founder of Renegade Professional. budurl.com Twitter.com DidiAlcheva.com http Build network marketing prospects list on the internet network marketing world with Twitter-Build an audience.

By: DiyanaAlcheva

About the Author:

You can find just about anything and everything under the sun in the many blog pages and blog after blog. Online advertising tapped into the tremendous potential, as blogging became more and more popular, as did the every growing audience. The outline below describes 5 reasons why doing business online by blogging, is the best Internet marketing tool today.

Blogging arrived on the Internet marketing scene in the late 90s. It originated as a way to Blogging and Internet Marketing comment on an existing webpage, an opportunity for visitors and readers to react or voice their opinions. It opened the door for real-time, 2-way conversations, even highly charged debates, among bloggers and blog visitors. Blogging has evolved into pages and pages, blog after blog of personal opinions on just about anything and everything under the sun. As it became more and more popular, online advertising tapped into the tremendous potential and ever growing audience. Doing business online today by blogging, is a smart choice for the following 5 reasons.

1. Blogging is easy.

The simplest way to get your information, your products, and your services on the Internet is through blogging. No special skills are required… an average adult can read and type, or at least click a mouse. Think of a blog as a virtual tablet of paper and you simply write your ideas, experiences, new products, and service descriptions down and if well written, the truth behind your articles will entice your readers, or blog visitors, to want to know more about you and what you have to offer. So basically, if you have a computer and an Internet connection (who doesn’t?) then you can blog and advertise.

2. Blogging is authentic.

In this day and age where advertising saturates our lives, we question the credibility of most advertising claims. However, in the , your blog content will represent a Blogging and Internet Marketingmore personal aspect of who you are and what you have to offer, establishing your credibility up-front. Reading blogs about first-hand product use is like talking to people about their first-hand experience. Consumers definitely want to buy a tried and tested product. Your potential customers will “get to know you” first, then naturally want to buy from you once you earn their trust.

3. Blogging is free.

There are many reliable and respectable companies offering services which include hosting and blog (CMS). With a free blogging service you can create a professional and profitable blog at no cost. Any opportunity for free Internet marketing tools is definitely a bonus especially for a start-up business. Needless to say, there are also and they too have their advantages. These services may warrant your considerations either once you get your free blog generating revenue, or if you know up-front your blog will require advanced functionality.

4. Blogging builds credibility.

Your blog readers want credible information, answers to their questions and solutions to their problems. Blogging about your experiences and skills in a particular industry, regularly, will ensure your readers they can depend on you to give them what they want. As such, you become an expert that they routinely turn to; the benefit is that more readers visit your site and more bloggers link to your blog. As companies and professional organizations notice the growth of your readership base, they may soon get in touch with you for advertising on your blog page, or make you an affiliate, which pays for every referral generated from your blog site.

5. Blogging builds your market share.

Unless you are already famous, chances are, only your Mom and close friends are reading your blog. Mom has a lot of friends, and your friends have friends, and they let them know how interesting your blog site is, but you can’t depend on this circle of blog visitors to sustain your profit base for long. You should be using the following to build your market:

-E-mail – Today, is rapidly surpassing the popularity and effectiveness of email to quickly and effectively reach your target market. In this age of speed and quick access, logging in and downloading email is simply taking longer than clicking into a blog. Long gone are the days where we email pages and pages of information. You can now, simply shoot a very short email with a link to your blog where they can find the information in its’ entirety. Also be sure to include a signature in every email you send, to anyone, with a link to your blog.

Blogging and Internet Marketing-Subscriptions – An easy way to build your blogging audience, which in turn increases your market share, is to offer readers a . As a subscriber, they can receive email notifications when you update your blog, or when you have “special” offerings for subscribers only. It is very important though, to be responsible with your subscribers email addresses. The last thing you want is a comment on your blog that you are a spammer.

-Understand your readers – It’s important to be knowledgeable and constantly monitor your readers needs and wants. A simple survey, every few months will aid you in keeping your finger on the pulse of what your readers will benefit from the most. Additionally, you’ll be able to gather profile information and advertising preferences. By asking your readers to give you feedback on a post, an ad link, or a trial that you shared, it’s like interviewing your readers without the commitment and intrusion of a face-to-face interview. Your readers will also appreciate the fact that you care, and you are willing to listen to them, especially when you implement things on your blog specific to their feedback.

-Join a blog network  Be active and productively participate in a that share the same industry, interest, readership base, payment mode, etc. Consumers find credibility and convenience in clicking one link to several real bloggers about a single subject. The links back from these relative blogs will improve your search engine optimization and at the same time, help build even stronger credibility for you with your blogging audience.

-Use RSS Feeds – RSS feeds are the fastest growing technology on the Internet today. As such, having to your blog is definitely another means of generating awareness for your readership base. Having a variety of feeds can add interest to your blog site and offer your readers the ability to zero in on the exact information that is of most interest to them.

Give your business a boost by effectively using blogging as an Internet marketing tool.

Put your blog readers needs first, build a strong, credible base and become the authority in your niche and the profits will naturally follow.

By: Denise Palmer

About the Author:

You have got your blog up and running on the internet. The next obvious thing to take care of will be to devise promotional strategies that will make your blog visible to others. This requires a certain extent of planning on what kind of tools that you want to apply to the formation of promotional strategies for your blog. These strategies should be given a fair amount of consideration before applying them.

Strategies for blog promotion are many. Nonetheless, what’s listed below are proven strategies that should work effectively for your blog.

(1) Search engines and blog directories

Web directories such as Yahoo and search engines such as Google surfaced to catalog all new sites that are being created. Directories prominently used are Technorati , Blogwise , Blo.gs just to name a few. Send your newly created blog to such directories and search engines for indexing. Your blog will be made visible promptly.

(2) Apt description of your blog to your targeted audience

Write a short and apt description of your blog ; the description must fit the type of audience that you have targeted. Whatever benefits that readers can get from reading your blog must be clearly pointed out. One of the strategies for blog promotion requires you to let your readers know the real reason why they should read your blog in the first instance. What’s in your blog for them? You can support this strategy by using “tagging” which essentially is a subject or category description that you are attaching to your blog and to each individual blog post. This will make your blog more easily searchable by others. Tagging can be done with your posts on directories such as Technorati, for instance you can add tags like “London” and “shopping” to a particular post so that your blog will show up when others search for these topics in blog search engines.

(3) Make use of the “ping”

The “pinging” action will enable you to automatically alert readers that you have written a new post on your blog. This action is executed through the various blog directories and other services that do publish blog updates. Upon publishing your latest post, you will “ping” directories and search engines. The latter will search for the new content on your blog. The “pinging” action will show your blog up in a list of recently updated blogs. To save you the time of “pinging” major search engines and directories separately, you can perform this action in one huge ping , by making use of BlogExplosion , Pingoat or Ping-O-Matic . It is important to remember that you need to “ping” only once. Take note that this “ping” act is one of the more important strategies for blog promotion that should not be neglected.

(4) Two-way comments

If you want to get more traffic, one way is to post your comments on the blogs of others. You should also allow others to post their comments on your blog too. Your perceptions on your blog can be read by others. Posting your comments is in effect equivalent to your contribution to a discussion with other bloggers. Anything topic that is insightful and interesting will surely draw more readers to your blog. It is a door to the building up of your reputation as an expert in your industry. The provision and availability of good helpful resources and relevant links to the topic in question will please the readers and should help to add value to the discussion.

(5) Performing exchanging of links with others

Linking up with other blogs and getting linked back to your own blog is a proven strategy that is intrinsically perfect integration with the blogging model. Readers will be able to access more sources of information on your blog. Your blog will be able to capture more traffic as other blogs link up with your blog. Importantly, the incoming links to your blog should be absolutely relevant to the content of your blog. This is another vital strategy for blog promotion, simply because if the incoming links originate from relevant high-traffic sites, your blog’s search engine ranking will be positively affected. Links can be placed within individual posts.

(6) Put “trackback” to full use

In blogging, you can use “trackback” to the list of other blogs that have linked to particular posts on your blog. You can locate these in the comments section under each post. With this feature enabled through your blog software, each time someone makes a link to a post on blog, you will be informed via an automated message from the other blog, and in return, your blog software will automatically add a link to the other blog below the post that is being referred to. You can use Haloscan where you can find free trackback tools to manage.

(7) Good quality content

What’s needed most on your blog is content. Content must be of quality in order to attract readers. If you want to write real good content, you must ensure two things:

(a) Information that you give on your blog must be unique. Give expert content from various perspectives.

(b) Keep yourself informed and abreast of latest developments in your industry. Be the one to make the first spin of news.

(8) Create repeat traffic

Readers come and go. The solution to this scenario will be for you to write new post on new topic every day. It appears to be hard work, but there isn’t much choice if traffic is to be repeated. Remember that the content must be great. This is a vital strategy for blog promotion, especially for the purpose of generating repeat traffic. Writing up a series of posts will help in getting repeat traffic as readers will come back for more revelation from the future post. You can even try to request from your readers their email addresses, so that you can notify them of your new updates. This is essentially building up an opt-in list that opens the door to numerous email marketing opportunities.

(9) Social bookmarking, blog awards, web ring

Join social bookmarking sites such as Del.icio.us that permits users to share their favorite web sites with one another. Just “tag” to your blog posts and readers will be able to bookmark your site in their Del.icio.us account. Another great social bookmarking is Digg. Blog awards are given out online. You can participate for the fun and traffic that it will potentially drive to your blog. You can also join a web ring where you can find many groups of like-minded people who may fall into your category of target audience. This will enable you to build your relationship with them on same platform.

To make your blog effective, you will have to work hard on your content. Using the above listed strategies for blog promotion, you will be able to drive traffic to your blog, as well as succeed in your creation of repeat traffic. So, put these strategies to good use and blow away your competition.

By: Jeremy Long Chia Teik

About the Author:

You have just entered into “The Twilight Zone.”  No! What I meant to say is, “The Online Marketing Zone!”  This zone is for those who have the entrepreneurial spirit, that craving desire to be successful, and that one belief that the business you now own is designed just for you.  In this zone all questions will be answered perfectly and lifetime goals will be achieved.  This zone is exactly what you have been looking for.  Or is it?  Be careful!  You may be entering into a zone that some marketers inevitably find themselves in where consequences have not been considered.  Avoid these three common mistakes that online marketers make.  

1) Chasing Opportunity instead of Passion in the zone

Bottom line.  You need passion with a dose of excitement to get you through the tough times.  The opportunity is nice, but to get through these tough times, the times when you have written a number of articles, placed solo ads, ordered CPA traffic, tried postcards, etc., with little results, you must STAY EXCITED.  Staying excited about your business will push you through these times.  Identify and articulate your interests first, then see if you can build your business around them.  For example, if you’re passionate about saving the environment, write an e-book on green cleaning products or ways to recycle trash.  No matter what product you choose, keep that excitement throughout the whole process.  Online marketers in the zone make the mistake of chasing the so called “Opportunity,” instead of keeping the passion burning to build a successful business.

2) Developing a Product before Finding an Audience in the zone

Although you now have a product in mind, you may not have an audience.  You may have even found a product that greatly interests you.  The problem may be that you are the only one that shares that interest.  That’s the mistake you’ve made and you may not even realize it.  If you build an online business around a product or service that no one wants, needs, or is actively seeking, you’re in a big world of trouble.  So while you begin with your passion, make sure others do likewise.  You can use the “keyword selector tool” located at http://www.slowseo.com/tools/.  First, enter the security code provided.  You will then be asked to type in words or phrases related to your product or service.  Type in keywords you think your target audience would use to find it (e.g. “Sony digital camera,” “Luxury resorts,” “Louisiana hot sauce”).  You’ll receive a list of an estimated number of times your word or phrase was searched for during that month.  You can even double-click on any word or phrase to get a more in depth look at the results.  Try it out!  Keep in mind, your goal is to get highly focused and targeted prospects to your website, not just warm bodies.  While in the zone, do not forget your audience.

3) Expecting and Asking for a Sale on the First Visit in the zone

Remember that marketing is a relationship-building process, not a transaction.  It can take a month, even years, to develop the right relationship between you and the audience.  It takes time, effort, and commitment to build trust, rapport, and a lasting friendship.  That is essentially what you are trying to get, a friend who will buy from you time and time again.  A friend who will tell others what a great experience they had or what a great product they bought so that they will want to check it out for themselves as well.  You need to make them believe that your product or service is the only one out there.  It’s just like dating, you must take your prospects on a first, second, third and maybe even a sixth “date” before you invite them to purchase from you.  Never, ever ask for a sale on the first visit while in the zone.     

You may be an online marketer who has taken these factors in consideration.  If so, great!  But, if not, you may find yourself making these mistakes and falling into the “Online Marketing Zone.”  Get out of this zone as quickly as possible so that you won’t make these mistakes!  These mistakes could make or break your business.  Avoid chasing the “Opportunity,” instead, chase with passion.  Determine your target audience before developing your product.  And lastly, build a lasting friendship with your audience before asking for a sale.

Hi, my name is Dancy Pace, the author. I hope you enjoyed my article. If you are interested in learning more about a proven system that helps you make the sale, then please visit my website at http://www.BetterLifeToCome.com.  It could make a better life to come for you as it has for me.

By: Pace, Dancy L.

About the Author:

One of the main differences between a blog and a static website is the way people are able to interact with your content. With a static site it’s just people reading words on a page. When you have a blog they can explore and even comment back! You want to get that sort of interactive spirit going so you can create a loyal readership with your blog.

That doesn’t mean it’s easy! There are literally millions of blogs out there all vying for the attention of your audience. It can be even harder to grab people’s attention when you’re just getting started. The bad news is that it’s going to take some work and dedication to build up a loyal readership. The good news is that it’s very possible, and even fun, to put these things into place. Follow these rules and you’ll have the kind of repeat visitors and fans that really make blogging worth your while.

Rule #1: Write Great Content

Let’s face it; if your content stinks there is no way people are going to come back and read again! They’ll just click away, never to return. If you write great content, however, you’re sure to get some fans. Not everyone considers themselves to be a good writer. That’s OK! No one expects you to have perfect grammar and spelling. It’s far more important that you write interesting content that stands out from the crowd. Give your real thoughts and opinions on things that matter to the audience.

When you write great content, not only will you have people who want to visit your blog all the time. They will also link to you! You know that more linking means higher rankings in Google. That’s definitely a great thing that will expand your readership base to levels you couldn’t even imagine when you got started.

Rule #2: Leave the Comments Open

It’s amazing — but there are bloggers out there who close their comments! While it can be a lot of work to try and get rid of those spam comments, you’re also missing out on a big part of what being a blogger is all about. You need to let the audience write back and speak their mind too. People don’t just want a website they can read anymore, they want one they can add their “2 cents” to. So, leave your comments open and listen to them. It doesn’t matter if people always agree with you or not (they won’t!), you’ll get a much larger and interested following.

Rule #3: Guest Blog

The chances are good that there are some blogs out there that are very well-liked by the people in your niche. These blogs probably get a lot of traffic and a lot of respect. It’s time to get your name and website out there in front of this audience! All you need to do is write to the owner and say that you’d like to write some guest posts. They will probably be more than happy to take a break from their own posting and to give you a link back to your blog. This will not only give you link juice for the search engines, you’ll also win some of their loyal readers who are interested in what you have to say.

Learning how to create a loyal readership with your blog is incredibly important if you want your blog to thrive. It’s all about the people, and making sure they are aware of your blog and love your content.

By: Turn Blogs To Cash

About the Author:

Blog is short for Web Log or Weblog and the Blogosphere is the online blog world, some parts of which are hyperlinked extensively to each other.

This is the Wikipedia definition: Blog is short for weblog. A weblog is a journal (or newsletter) that is frequently updated and intended for general public consumption. Blogs generally represent the personality of the author or the Web site.

I recommend that you read lots of people’s blogs to learn what blogs are. Go to your favorite search engine and type in the word ‘blog’ and the subject you’re interested in. For example, ‘web design blog’, or ‘blog music’ , or ‘sports blog’. You’ll find lots of blogs that way.

Blogs have become a way in which regular, non-technical people can post information to the Web as easily as they can access it.

Why are blogs so important?

Well, they’re not that important, yet. But they could be soon, and most likely will be. In fact, some would argue that they are already vital in today’s Web business world. I am not ready to agree to that yet, but it is becoming more obvious to me over time that blogs can no longer be ignored in business.

Online businesses can benefit from blogging by taking advantage of a vehicle for easily posting new, original, and business-related content on a regular basis.

Here are some more business benefits of blogging:

• Blogs help to position you and/or your company as experts and leaders in your industry.

• They’re interactive in nature. At the end of each blog entry is usually a link that allows anyone to add their own comments to your blog entries. This allows your customers and potential customers to make comments about your products or services or ask you questions to help them in their buying process.

• Blogs are marketed easily and quickly by their RSS feeds

• Blogs allow you to stress your choice of products, services, relevant news stories, quotes, pictures and more with your audience, customers and potential customers.

• People are generous with adding links to your blog if the content is good, especially within their own blogs. More links means more traffic and better search engine rankings.

Here are some ways in which you can make revenue from your blog:

1. Selling advertisements. Whether you use banners or text links, if your site draws a regular audience interested in your blog topics or theme, try to offer ad space to organizations that are looking to market to your audience. In fact, if your blogs becomes really popular then advertisers will call you. 2. Offering Google’s AdSense. Google’s website explains, “Google AdSense is a fast and easy way for website publishers of all sizes to display relevant Google ads on their website’s content pages and earn money.” learn more about AdSense. 3. Affiliate Programs. Affiliate programs allow Web sites who provide links to your site to receive payments or reciprocal advertising in exchange for promoting your Web site. In the case of blogging, this is reversed, where you post links within your blog, and collect money from the owners of those links when they result in a click-through and sale.

Here are some websites where you can get your blog listed in:

• BlogWise – http://www.blogwise.com • Blog Search Engine – http://www.blogsearchengine.com • Blog Hub – http://www.bloghub.com • Blog Daisey – http://www.blogdaisey.com • Get Blogs – http://www.getblogs.com • Is Blogs – http://www.lsblogs.com

How to blog for business:

First you need to get blogging software. You can choose to create a blog that is housed on another site such as http://www.blogger.com (which is a blog service) or you can host it on your own Web server. I recommend the latter since the links that are developed by others pointing to your blog won’t be counted in the search engines. This is because the links are attributed to domains, so a link to http://MyNewBlog.blogger.com gives a link credit to blogger.com and not your domain.

If your blog is a business blog, you really ought to host your own blog as opposed to using a blog service. You’ll need the extra functionality and control.

If you plan on hosting your own blog and if you plan to use a UNIX Web server platform then you need to go with blogging software such as Movable Type, for example. If you have a Microsoft Web server platform for your site then you’ll need software such as BetaParticle blog. Here is a great list of various blog software: http://www.lights.com/weblogs/tools.html

Next you’ll need a database to hook your blog up to. The database is what stores the blog entries, among other things. If you don’t know if you have a database on or connected to your website server, or if you don’t know how to hook up your blog to your database, contact your host company or Web server administrator for help.

Once you have the blog set up on your domain (for example http://www.MyWebsite.com/blog) and you’ve hooked it up to a live database, you can start blogging. Generally, each entry is also a day. So you can write a new entry every day, or whenever you want, and that entry will show up on the blog at the top, moving older entries below.

You ought to think of a theme for your blog. In other words, your blog could be about your personal experiences in the industry you’re in. It could be about your company’s product reviews, or new services. It could be about your thoughts and opinions about issues related to your industry. It could be a place where you regularly find and list new resources to help others in your industry. The list is endless. But be sure to stick to a theme and be original. You want to offer something of value to your website visitors.

Sticking to theme helps you position yourself for future advertisers and also makes for better reading for your visitors. Furthermore, you want to give a good impression with your blog and with each and every entry if you want it to augment your online business. Finally, sticking to a theme helps with the search engines since it’s believed that engines determine website themes and use this information for ranking.

Of course your blog could be about personal things too. Many blogs are just that, an online journal. But since we’re interested in Web business here, I am discussing business blogs only.

What’s great is that blogs get indexed easily and quickly by search engines. Each entry is another “page” that can be potentially listed in Google for example, which will drive more traffic to your site.

Another neat thing about running a blog once it’s set up is that you do not need to be technical at all to make regular entries. This is helpful if you want to delegate the writing to someone else, since technical skills won’t be a prerequisite. This allows you to have the most qualified person regarding the blog’s theme and hopefully the best writer actually making the entries.

Be creative. Add images to your blog entries to spice things up a bit. Although blogging can be lonely, keep at it. Sometimes it seems like you’re just writing new entries each day for yourself only. It may be a while before someone chooses to add a comment to one of your entries. You may not hear from anyone for a long time. But that doesn’t mean people aren’t reading it. In fact, check your website statistics to see just how many people are visiting your new blog. As you add more entries, get your blog listed on other sites and market your blog. It will build, and eventually you’ll have a nice following of engaged readers.

Most importantly, be sure to pepper your entries with calls to action. For example, if your business blog is attached to your travel website and the blog’s theme is traveling and finding great travel deals all over the world, make sure you add a link to an entry that points people to a travel special you’re running on your website. What would be even better is a blog entry about the fantastic vacation you took to Hawaii and included at the end was a link to cheap Hawaii vacation deals on your website.

Copyright Jason OConnor 2006

By: Jason Oconnor

About the Author:

With the uncertainty of the economy, legal marketing agency Beyond All Reasonable Doubt Marketing is advising law firms to take a serious look at their budgets. While marketing, advertising and public relations dollars frequently are cut to reduce expenses, marketing experts agree that a down economy is actually the time when marketing efforts should remain in place, and if anything, be enhanced.

“When other law firms reduce their spending and cut their marketing, they have less presence in the marketplace,” explains BARD Marketing founder and president, John Sailer. “This means the time is ripe for a savvy law firm to grab market share – to reach the audience that is still there but who is hearing from fewer of your competitors.”

When planning your law firm’s budget, you should start by identifying how much you want to spend. While there are no hard and fast rules across the different types and sizes of law firms, it makes sense to budget your marketing as a percentage of expected revenue. Several studies have pegged overall law firm marketing budgets to be between 2 percent and 3 percent, with leading firms spending 5 percent or more.

Second, prioritize your initiatives by looking at both costs and expected benefits. This is easy if you tracked your efforts in past years. Remember that some of the lower cost initiatives may bring strong value while some of the higher cost initiatives may bring very little value. With this said, it is imperative to track outcome of every initiative.

BARD Marketing is experienced in budgeting and planning for short- and long-term marketing and advertising plans, and enables law firms to achieve and track ROI for their marketing activities. For more information or to request a report on Yellow Page Advertising Costs and Effectiveness, please visit www.bardmarketing.

By: Bard Marketing

About the Author: