Moe Tamani's Internet Marketing and SEO Blog, Articles and Search Engine Optimization Tips » Internet Marketing Articles

8 Keys to Successful SEO

Seomul Evans — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 07:37:51 +0000

8 Keys to Successful SEO

internet marketing Articles from Moe Tamani, the SEO Services Consultant.

If you’re the owner of a company that does any business online, you should make search engine optimization (SEO) a top priority. After all, you can’t turn visitors into customers if you can’t get the visitors in the first place. SEO is simply a matter of optimizing your webpage so that interested parties can find you quickly and easily, and it is typically managed by ensuring that your website is at the top of the list when potential customers search for keywords relating to your business on a search engine.

While SEO professionals can help make the job quicker and easier for you, completing SEO on your own is not an altogether impossible task. In fact, simply using these 8 keys will help people find your website quickly and easily.

1. Keyword Research. This is probably the most important aspect of successful SEO. Think about what words your potential customers are typing into a search engine when they’re looking for a product or service like the one you offer. Then make sure your content and meta tags contain those words. Use can also use a tool that suggests appropriate keywords for your business.

2. Write Good Content. Update your content frequently, at least every few days, and make sure you’re sharing information that potential customers will find useful and relevant. Inbound links are pertinent for high search engine rankings, and the best way to get those inbound links is to write content that others will want to link to.

3. Avoid Flash. Search engines only read text, so using Flash is the equivalent of not having a webpage at all. Splash pages can also keep search engines from seeing your information. If you feel you simply must use images, make sure your alt descriptions are full of keywords.

4. Use a Clear Title. Your titles should relate to your content and contain your keywords. Search engines reward pages with titles that relate to content with higher search engine rankings. You should also include your title in your title tag and in your h1 tags.

5. Use Clean Code. Search engines have an easier time crawling code that is clean and clear. Connect your tags to the appropriate information, and transfer everything into a cascading style sheet (CSS) file. This will ensure that search engines have an easier time indexing your information.

6. Robots.txt. This is a file on your page that tells search engines what parts of your site to index. Read more about them online to find out how you can use them to your benefit when you’re optimizing your page.

7. No Fancy Stuff. There are plenty of ways to try to trick search engines into giving you higher rankings in the search engine results, but you should stay away from them. They may give you results at first, but it won’t take long for the search engines to figure out what you’re up to. When that happens, you risk being banned completely from the search engine results.

8. Don’t Forget Your Audience. It used to be that search engine optimization consisted primarily of loading up content with keywords and key phrases that would attract search engines. But search engines now read content just as humans do. They want to see clear, relevant, useful information, just like the human visitors that come across your website. So write for humans, not for robots. It might take some time before you see real results, but be patient.

If you find that you’re still having difficulty wrapping your head around SEO, don’t hesitate to call upon an SEO professional. These professionals have years of experience working with search engines and companies to make sure that online businesses get the rankings they need and deserve. You don’t have to go it alone, so get the help you need to make your business succeed!

Social Bookmarking: A Primer in 4 Easy Steps

Seomul Evans — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 08:15:00 +0000

Social Bookmarking: A Primer in 4 Easy Steps

internet marketing Articles from Moe Tamani, the SEO Services Consultant.

SEO experts and internet marketers have long recognized the importance of using social bookmarking as a valuable SEO tool. But if you’re not familiar with it, you probably aren’t going to take advantage of it and all it can do to help increase your search engine ranking and grow your business. Here are 5 things you should know about social bookmarking to help you get started.

1. What Is It? A social bookmark works just like one of those handy leather strips that you put in a book to mark your place when you go to bed at night. Instead of marking your place in a book, however, a social bookmark marks a webpage so that you can easily find it again. The advantage of a social bookmark is that it allows you to share the page that interests you with other people as well.

2. How Does Help My Business? Let’s say that someone finds a link to one of the timely, relevant, high-quality posts on your business blog. That person bookmarks your link, and then other people on the bookmarking site can see it too. They become interested in your site because you’ve written such compelling material and then they become both followers and customers. If they belong to more than one social bookmarking site, which is often the case, then they might bookmark you on each of the sites. Now you have multiple links to your post, and search engines reward you for that! Voila! Higher search engine rankings for you!

3. How Do I Make It Work For Me? Social bookmarking websites all have cute little icons that you can put at the bottom of your posts. This makes it easier for your readers to simply click on the icon and automatically bookmark your post at whatever site or sites they choose. The only problem with this method is that it’s time-consuming and takes too much effort to remain current. So now it’s possible to use a social bookmarking script. When you put the script on your blog or website, be sure you use it yourself. Then ask friends and family to use it, too.

4. The Caveats? Like any legitimate SEO tool, social bookmarking isn’t the equivalent of a magic wand that’s going to put your website at the top of the search engine results by tomorrow. It takes time and patience. The most important thing to keep in mind is that the content you produce and publish has to be high in quality and value; otherwise, no one is going to bookmark your content, no matter how easy you’ve made it for them. And social bookmarking is one of many tools that you need to use in concert with one another to increase your rankings. It’s not a magic bullet.

With each passing day, social bookmarking becomes an increasingly crucial aspect of search engine optimization and you simply can’t afford to forgo the traffic that will come your way as a result of increased search engine rankings and direct links to your site. Social bookmarking can bring you both of these things with time, patience, and plenty of good content.

If you’re still not sure how social bookmarking can help your particular business, don’t hesitate to consult with an internet marketing professional or SEO expert. These professionals have been following the social boomarking trend since it started and will be able to create a detailed plan for effectively harnessing the power of social bookmarking for your business. Just be sure not to waste another day trying to run a successful business without taking full advantage of social boomkarking. You won’t regret the time and effort you put into making it work for you when you see the fantastic results.

3 Reasons to Get Over Your Fear of Competing with Big Businesses

admin — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 00:05:23 +0000

3 Reasons to Get Over Your Fear of Competing with Big Businesses

internet marketing Articles from Moe Tamani, the SEO Services Consultant.

Big corporations have huge budgets. They spend more on marketing in one month than you do on your whole business for an entire year. They have experts and specialists doing all of their branding. So how can you possibly compete? Start by remembering that your small business has some significant advantages over major corporations.

Finances. Let’s face it, the internet has really leveled the internet marketing playing field. There’s not much a huge corporation can do on the internet that you can’t do. You can both optimize your websites, you can both host your website on a web-based content management system, you can both post relevant and high-quality articles to your blog, you can both use social networking sites to connect to potential customers, and you can both optimize your landing pages to ensure more leads. All of those activities are critical to internet marketing, and you can do them with the same ease and cost as a multinational corporation.
Social Networking. Let the big companies do your work for you! Let them spend all the money they want on new marketing, because all they’re doing is attracting targeted traffic to social media sites. And if you’re in the right place at the right time, that targeted traffic will be exposed to your business as well.

Additionally, many big companies aren’t savvy enough to use social networking appropriately. Instead of becoming part of the conversation on social media sites, they’re interrupting it with their loud messages and demanding attitudes. They don’t realize that social media users are interested in creating connections rather than having marketing messages shoved down their throats.

If you use social networking appropriately by connecting with other people rather than trying to sell them something, you’ll have an enormous advantage over big businesses. Don’t be intimated by their presence on social networking sites. Keep making your connections and you’ll see a huge payoff in the end.
Customers. Sure, large companies are less affected by losing customers, but your advantage is that you can actually create relationships with potential customers. Social networking is a major piece in creating such relationships, and if you as a small business owner remain committed to the relationship-building task, you will see it pay off. If you’re patient with potential customers and share information with them rather than going for the hard sell, you’ll see that sales come much more quickly. Convincing and persuading, the primary tactics of big businesses, isn’t going to get you very far. Building relationships is.
Your job as a small business owner is to gauge the challenges faced by your potential customers and to help them find solutions to those challenges. Big businesses too quickly lose focus on individual problem-solving in favor of getting their message out to as many people as possible as quickly as possible. When you keep in mind that internet users can frequently find the solutions to their challenges by searching the internet, and when you offer yourself in a consultative fashion, you are more likely to be attractive to potential customers who are looking for a partner rather than a savior.
Think Differently About Marketing. Experts tell us that companies will spend $1.9 billion advertising on social networking sites in 2009. But maybe we need to think about “successful marketing” in a different way. What if someone came to your website, downloaded a free ebook, passed it on to ten friends, and those ten friends starting talking about what you had to say? Would that count as success even though you made no money? Absolutely! So instead of looking at the dollar signs, listen to what your gut tells you about whether or not your marketing efforts are successful. Couple your instincts with efforts to calculate your internet marketing return on investment and you’ll see that you have significant advantages over big business. Make them work for you!

6 Reasons to Avoid the Social Media News Release, Part II

admin — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 04:52:37 +0000

6 Reasons to Avoid the Social Media News Release, Part II

internet marketing Articles from Moe Tamani, the SEO Services Consultant.

In the last article on the Social Media News Release, we discussed reasons to avoid using the SMNR for all of your press releases and that caused quite a buzz . That’s not to say that the SMNR is a bad investment altogether. In fact, it’s a pretty good way to start out if you’re new to combining press releases and social media in your business. But as you get increasingly comfortable using the SMNR and want to customize it for your own particular needs, here are some ways to go about it. Remember that if you are using the press release for SEO once you send out that press release, the sites that may be interested by what you have to announce will most likely be the same as the ones that will pick it up again so your added link building juice/benefit will be minimal.

1. Customize the Template. The value of the template is that it allows you to use as many or as few elements as you need. So include whatever you like that you feel will benefit your business and get your message out.

2. Use It on Your Own Website. Once you’ve customized the template, put it up on your own company’s website and nowhere else. After all, the idea is to keep people coming to your website, not to someone else’s. Create your post using blog software as it will automatically produce an RSS feed.

3. Create a Text Version. Once you’ve customized the template and posted it to your blog, create a text-only version to send over the wire. Your text version should be roughly 250 words and should include about 3-4 optimized links. One of those links should be a backlink to the full release that you just posted to your own website. The point here is to get folks to your site. This gets people talking on your own site and helps you build links.

4. Grade Your Press Release. The web is full of tools that will analyze your press releases for you. So take the text-only version and have it analyzed by one of these tools.

5. Send it Out. Send that text-only press release over the wire. This will save you lots of money over the full SMNR template, and people will still get to see the full release when they go to your site.

6. Send SMNR only if you feel that your keywords and industries targeted are very different from your own. For instance if you are a marketing firm and most of the press releases are about marketing but this last one is about an alliance with an airline then this may be a good opportunity to spend those extra bucks in MSNR as that press release will also be distributed on sites that typically will not link back to you because they are in another industry.

So there you have it. The SMNR is a great tool if you customize it and use it in a way that saves you time and energy, and gets potential customers back to your site.

5 Ways to Make Social Media Work for Your Business

admin — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 13:45:28 +0000

5 Ways to Make Social Media Work for Your Business

internet marketing Articles from Moe Tamani, the SEO Services Consultant.

Owning your own business is difficult enough without having to worry about finding the perfect balance of marketing strategies. Stick solely to traditional marketing strategies and you’ll find yourself potentially missing an enormous demographic. Try to milk the internet for all it’s worth and you’ll find yourself completely overwhelmed by the number of tools and application available for internet marketing. But what if you used social networking sites as a happy medium between traditional and hard-core internet marketing strategies? Using this one tool could make a huge difference in your business without overwhelming you altogether. Here are 5 ways to get started using social media in your marketing strategy.

1. Create a Strategy. Your competitors have already created a strategy for using social media, so chances are you’re already behind. This means thinking intentionally about how to use social media instead of randomly opening an account here and joining a group there. Spend some time determining the kinds of sites available and evaluating what role they might have in your marketing strategy. Then make a plan to use them consistently and effectively. If you just “go with the flow” you’ll be wasting your time and effort.

2. Brand Building. Social media marketing is like having one enormous billboard advertising your company. Everything you post, every tweet you write, and every comment you make should be treated as a chance to show your audience what your business is all about, what you value, and what you stand for.

The first step to consider is creating a business blog. Chances are you have employees who are already involved in social media in one way or another, so ask them to post some articles to the blog. Be sure your blog includes your logo, a picture of yourself, and any other tools that will help you promote your brand. Use your company’s colors as background on your blog and as wallpaper on your Twitter profile.

3. Choose Wisely. Don’t feel like you need to use every single social media site available. Stick with a few and spend time using them to your advantage. Choose sites that help you connect with your target demographic, that help you show off the components of your business that interest potential customers, and that will be most helpful in connecting potential customers to your business.

4. Find the Right Balance. Social media is so popular that it might initially be difficult to find the right balance between it and traditional marketing strategies. In the end, they should all work together to serve your business effectively. Start with LinkedIn and create a business profile where you can post testimonials and make connections with your customers. Then create a Facebook group tied to your industry or product.

Finally, use Twitter to create a village of those with interest in your industry. Connect traditional strategies with online strategies by printing your Twitter ID on business card and make a place on your website that shows visitors where they can connect with you using social media.

5. Mobility. Many platforms allow you to communicate in real time by downloading applications to your phone. Imagine what you could do as a business owner attending a conference. Sharing with your readers what you’re learning, as you learn it, is a great way to build rapport with and interest in your customers.

Overwhelming or not, young people are exchanging information and making decisions based on social media sites. If you’re interested in connecting with them as they age, procure more discretionary income, and spend money on things that interest them, then you need to find a way to connect with them now. And you need to make sure you’re defining your business online rather than waiting for others to define you in your stead. Get connected online and let the world know who you are.

6 Reasons to Avoid the Social Media News Release

admin — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 14:55:25 +0000

6 Reasons to Avoid the Social Media News Release

internet marketing Articles from Moe Tamani, the SEO Services Consultant.

The Social Media News Release is a template available for the sole purpose of incorporating social media and multimedia into press releases. And while it may sound like an absolutely ingenious idea, it probably isn’t the best use of time and money for your business. Here are 6 reasons why using a SMNR may be one of the biggest mistakes you’re making.

1. People Don’t Read Them. Let’s face it, this is not the best way to get your information out to the general public. The number of people who actually view releases on news release websites is quite small. There are better ways to reach your potential customers that aren’t nearly as expensive or time-consuming.

2. They’re Expensive. The optimal use of an SMNR is to send a Social Media News Release with Multimedia, and it’s expensive. Even a limited distribution will cost you hundreds of dollars at minimum. Compare this to the cost of writing a blog, which will also allow you to include images and video. The blog is far cheaper and gives you a much higher return on your investment.

3. There’s No Critical Mass. One of the most important aspects of marketing with social media is that you can gather a huge number of like-minded or like-interested people in the same place. If you use an SMNR to send your information out to 500 websites, you may only get one or two comments on each website. If that’s the case then your interested parties aren’t talking to each other, which defeats the purpose of social media marketing. Not to mention the time and tedium involved in responding to comments on each of the 500 websites to which your release was sent. Consider instead how you might get those 500 commenters to have a conversation with each other.

4. They Don’t Help Your SEO. The whole point of news releases in general is to get inbound links to your site. And while SMNRs contain links, those links are not optimized and generally link to resources other than your website. Use the online Press Release Grader to see how your SMNR release stands up. You’ll most likely find that you have too many links, and that diminishes the effectiveness of your release greatly.

5. They Don’t Help You Reach Your Goals. The whole point of marketing your business is to get people to come to your website and get them to buy your products. So why would you spend money to put your information on another website? We’ve already noted that SMNRs generally don’t result in optimal links to your site, so there’s really no sense in using them for that purpose.

6. They Don’t Allow You to Use Your Own Mutlimedia Accounts. Did you know that if you want to include a video in your SMNR then you have to upload that video to the news release service’s YouTube account? That’s right! Never mind that you’ve already uploaded the video to your own account; now you have to upload it to theirs as well. This means that your video is sitting in an account with thousands of other videos that aren’t at all related to your product or service. So if a potential customer actually finds your videos and wants to see more from your business, he has to search a lot harder than if all of your videos were lumped together in your account. Another problem is similar to the one we mentioned in #3. The comments left on the new release service’s account are separate from the ones left on your account, so your commenters don’t have the opportunity to interact with one another. And you have to visit your video in both places to respond to all of the comments.

You’re much better off simply creating your own release, without images or video, and sending it over the wire, specially if you don’t have the know-how to optimize them. Save the really cool release for your own website where you have control over what happens to it. You’ll save time and money, and the results will be greatly beneficial.

The Response was as expected … rightly so to a certain extended that is why there is a second part on how to do it right! Checkout the second part of this post Social Media News Release Part II

6 Ways to Get Money Fast for the Broke Entrepreneur

admin — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 19:38:10 +0000

6 Ways to Get Money Fast for the Broke Entrepreneur

internet marketing Articles from Moe Tamani, the SEO Services Consultant.

This is not the sexiest article I have ever wrote but I have seen some really cash strapped entrepreneurs. It is an unfortunate fact that young entrepreneurs and others in the process of starting home-based business may find themselves needing to make money in a hurry. The first reaction to finding oneself in this situation is to panic, rendering it nearly impossible to think clearly and creatively about alternative money-making options. Keep these 6 tips in mind and you’ll be on your way to making some extra cash before the panic even sets in.

1. Sell Stuff. Chances are that you’re surrounded by stuff you simply don’t need anymore. Dig through your clutter, your attic, and the piles off stuff you haven’t looked through in awhile and determine what you can part with. Then hold a garage sale, either alone or with some neighbors. Put up signs around your neighborhood and put an ad in the newspaper.

Likewise, consider selling some of your unwanted stuff on eBay. Buyers on eBay respond more quickly and positively to postings that include images, so post pictures of the things you’re selling. A little research before you post will tell you what similar items have sold for and in which categories they were placed. If you need further help, eBay has an interactive Help application that will be very beneficial.

Craigslist is also a great place to sell stuff. Since listings are displayed by city, you know that anyone who contacts you is most likely local. This cuts down on hassles related to payment and shipping that you might experience on eBay.

All three of these options give you the opportunity to get rid of stuff you don’t need anymore while making some money in the process.

2. Deliver Food. This is definitely not the sexiest way to make money, but if you’re in a hurry for some cash, delivering pizza may be the way to go. You’ll get tips every day that you deliver, which will help out your cash flow.

3. Temp Jobs. Temporary staffing agencies are great places to look for quick work. You’ll have to visit the agency and fill out an application, but chances are that they’ll have work for you in the following few days. You can request jobs in clerical fields, in heavy labor, or anywhere in between. You’ll be paid on a weekly basis, and many temporary jobs turn into more long-term opportunities. Temp agencies are also great because they take care of tax paperwork on your behalf so that you don’t have to.

4. Take Surveys. Many online survey companies will pay you in cash for your trouble. Don’t bother with survey companies that enter you in a sweepstakes. But consider take surveys that offer prizes. Whatever you receive may be worth something if you can resell it.

5. Take Care of Kids. If you’re already staying at home with your own kids, consider offering to take care of a few more. Let people know about your services through word of mouth and by posting your offer on community bulletin boards and at schools. Check your local laws to find out the limit on the number of children you can care for as an unlicensed person, though.

6. Odd Jobs. Look around your neighborhood to see what kinds of services your neighbors might benefit from. Many folks are looking for someone to mow the lawn, shovel the snow, or clean out the attic. Distribute flyers around town to let people know what you’re offering.

It can be a little unsettling to find yourself short on cash, especially if you’re working really hard to start your own business. But don’t panic. There are plenty of ways to make money that will still allow you to work on your business as well. They may not be glamorous, but they’ll help you get by until you find yourself profiting from the business that you’ve always dreamed of.

7 Steps to a Great Hire for Small Businesses

admin — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 22:26:36 +0000

7 Steps to a Great Hire for Small Businesses

internet marketing Articles from Moe Tamani, the SEO Services Consultant.

If you’re a small business owner, then you know the importance of hiring great employees with the least amount of expense. Not only do you want to hire qualified employees who will work for a wage that you can afford, but you don’t want to break the bank in the process of recruiting. Here are 7 steps to hiring the right person for the job.

1. Clear Job Description. The first thing you need to do is to create a clear and concise job description with as much detail as necessary. This is only way to make your expectations clear and to measure an employee’s job performance. Don’t do anything else until you have a job description in hand.

2. Clear Qualifications. Be as detailed as you need to be in order to be clear about the qualifications that you require. This is the place to go into detail about the work environment, as well as the skills required to do the job well. This puts everyone on the same page as far as expectations.

3. Transparency. If you hide information from potential employees, it’s only going to result in heartache. Be clear about everything you expect and put it down on paper. Inform everyone, current employees as well as those in your candidate pool, about how the process is going. You’ll build the trust with current employees and future employees, resulting in higher loyalty and job satisfaction.

4. Look Internally. Now that you’re clear about your expectations, the next step is to begin recruiting. The logical place to begin is with current employees. If you’re not in the position to hire current employees for an open position, go to them for hiring suggestions. What kind of team member are they looking for? What’s missing within the structure that will help them do their jobs better? Do they know people who can get the job done?

5. Ask Questions. Once you have possible candidates, vet them within your existing community of employees. The information you glean in this step is invaluable and can help you avoid awkward situations.

6. Put One Person in Charge. Appoint one person within your company to be the contact person with potential candidates. This streamlines the process, helps avoid communication issues, and protects a candidate’s confidentiality. This person should manage all interactions between potential candidates and your company.

7. Expand your search. If you’ve heeded the above steps and still haven’t found the perfect candidate, then it’s time to expand your search. One option is to take out an ad. If you choose to do this, be prepared to be bombarded with emails, phone calls, and resumes from an overwhelming amount of unqualified people. If you still want to go this route, just make sure you don’t print the name of your company. Competitors don’t need to know what you’re up to.

Another option is to utilize the services of a recruiter. Recruiters can bring amazing candidates to you, candidates that they’ve already screened, thereby saving on the amount of time you waste talking to halfway-interested, unqualified people. But the truth is that it’s hard to find a top-notch recruiter. There are too many opportunities for conflicts of interest and shirking of standards and loyalty.

If you choose to use a recruiter, find out how big their pool of candidates is. They’re not allowed to recruit from companies with whom they already have a relationship, so you run the risk of using a recruiter with a small candidate pool. Get testimonials, at least five, from satisfied customers. Never pay a recruiter’s expenses unless you’re recruiting for a top-level executive position. Finally, put down deadlines and timelines in writing and be clear about what penalties they will incur if they miss those deadlines.

In all you do, remember that, as a small business owner, you should always try to get the most for the least.

The 4 Levels of Link Building

admin — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 00:14:06 +0000

The 4 Levels of Link Building

internet marketing Articles from Moe Tamani, the SEO Services Consultant.

SEO experts and internet marketing professionals know that the key to high search engine rankings is link building. They will also tell you that link building isn’t all that easy until you’ve done it for awhile, and that there are so many techniques for link building that it’s hard to sort them all out. Here are the 4 levels of link building to take you from novice to expert.

1. Do It Yourself, Quick and Easy. The easiest links to build are those for which you don’t have to rely on anyone but yourself. The easiest way to do this is to submit your site to directories. Simply submit your URL, the name of your company, and a short description of your company. Know before you begin that directories are managed by humans, so you may not see results right away. Also know that some directories require a small fee for your listing.

You should also use social media as a way to get links to your page. SEO experts don’t find these crucial to success, but they’re still a pretty simple and cheap way to target an audience that’s going to be using the sites anyway.

2. Do It Yourself, Not So Quick and Easy. Before you start on Level 2, make sure you’ve started a business blog. This is crucial if you want to have good content to which others can link. And the way you’re going to get these links is through press release optimization and article marketing.

When you’re writing your articles and your press releases, always keep your keyword strategy at the front of your mind. Links should coincide with your strategy. Before you send your press releases and articles into the ether, use a press release grader to see if they pass muster.

3. Networking Plus Significant Time. Networking is by far the most effective way to get links to your site. It’s time consuming and it can be frustrating, but it can also get you results that you never dreamed of. There are many ways to go about this type of networking, but the key is putting yourself amongst those who are potentially interested in what you have to say.

The best way to do this is to establish yourself as an expert in your niche. But never make people feel like they would be lost without your presence. Engage them. Show compassion. Share your own opinions and ideas and vulnerabilities. Start by reading industry-related blogs and commenting on them. Eventually you’ll want to establish a one-on-one relationship with bloggers, probably by casually mentioning third-party content that they might find interesting.

Ideally you’ll soon be asked to be a guest blogger on blogs that are related to your niche. In the process, you can link to yourself and let others in your niche know that you know what you’re talking about. If all goes well, they’ll start following you as well, which leads to the final level…

4. Links Resulting From Good Content. Once you’ve reached this level, you have established yourself as a knowledgeable resource within your field. Although you can probably never afford to abandon the strategies mentioned above, you are now generating most of your links from people who respect you and enjoy reading your excellent content. This kind of success doesn’t happen immediately. It takes a lot of time and effort, including effort in providing your followers with an array of high-quality, interesting, and relevant content. You may do his through your blog, through hosting webinars, or through publishing white papers.

The key to keep in mind as you’re starting out is that, while content is crucial, you’re going to have to start out doing more than creating great content. You’re going to have to go out and find followers, and then give them a reason to stick around. It’s not easy, but it’ll pay off in the end.

The Entrepreneur’s 8 Tips to Making it Big

admin — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 18:20:17 +0000

The Entrepreneur’s 8 Tips to Making it Big

internet marketing Articles from Moe Tamani, the SEO Services Consultant.

Every entrepreneur dreams of making it big! Here are 8 keys to making it happen.

1. Don’t Do It if You Don’t Love it. You’re only going to succeed if you love what you’re doing. Your love for your business is what keeps you going even when things look bleak or, worse yet, boring. Your passion it what gets you out of bed everyday to face what it sometimes thankless work. If you don’t really love what you’re doing then you’re not going to see it through to the finish. Never make money your primary goal. Your primary goal should be to have fun doing what you love.

2. Be Relentless. Persistence is often the only difference between wild success and abysmal failure. If you’re challenged, stand up to the challenge, whether it’s another person or a business setback. If you back down, you’re going to lose respect for yourself and doubt your ability to make your business succeed. If you truly believe in what you’re doing, then stand up to whatever tries to get in your way.

3. Negotiate. Aim high and settle if necessary. Taking less than you wanted isn’t always a bad thing.

4. Dream Big Dreams. What is it that you want most? Imagine what your business would look like if you had everything you could possibly ask for and then do everything in your power to make that vision a reality. We are almost always limited most profoundly by our own fear of success. Don’t be afraid to make decisions that lead to success, and don’t be afraid to win. The challenges will still be there when you get to the top, so don’t be afraid to succeed for fear that you will no longer be challenged.

5. Dare to Be Different. You’ll probably find that, whatever your business idea is, someone else though of it first. So set yourself apart from the competition. Do things people don’t expect you to do. Be unconventional. Try something new just for the sake of trying something new, whether it’s redesigning your product or papering your walls with inspirational quotes. If you surround yourself with the unconventional, you are more likely to think unconventionally. And in the business world, that’s a good thing.

6. Shameless Self-Promotion. Take some time to examine your strengths and the strengths of your business. Now, what can you do to let other people know about your strengths? How can you go about calling attention to the great things about your business that will compel people to seek out your products or services? Don’t be afraid to talk about yourself. If you don’t, chances are nobody will!

7. Trust Your Instincts. Be an extrovert. Ask everyone you know what they think about your business idea. When you feel like you have enough input, spend some time listening to your inner voice, the one that tells you if this is going to be a great idea or a bust. And then heed that voice, no matter how others might question your judgment or criticize your decision. Your gut is almost always right.

8. Be Great at What You Do. You’re never going to be successful unless you endeavor every day to be great at what you do. Being great is a choice you make, not something that just happens to you because you were in the right place at the right time. So choose greatness, intentionally and consciously, every day. And you will be great.

Success is a result of being proactive, of pursuing your dreams, of taking little steps every day that bring your goals to fruition. If you take the advice outlined above, you will see your business grow, and you will see yourself evolve into a great businessperson. Never be afraid of success. Make success the only thing you’ll settle for.