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The Content Creation Challenge: 22 Tips from Copyblogger [infographic]

"I don't know what to write about!"

"I'm stuck and have writer's block!"

"I have nothing new to say."

Ever say any of those things to yourself when faced with the need to write a new blog post? It's the content creation challenge and I hear some version of those statements above all the time from clients and others in my networks. That's why I love the brand new infographic (below) from Copyblogger on 22 Ways to Create Compelling Content When You Don't have a Clue.

I've written about the content challenge many times in the past so if  after studying the infographic, you need even more motivation and more ideas, check out these articles on Build a Better Blog as well:

Want great content for your blog? Ask for it!

Cool Tool – Use Evernote to Track Content Ideas, Links and Resources

6 Ways to Constantly Produce Quality Blog Content

22 Ways to Create Compelling Content - Infographic
Like this infographic? Get more content marketing tips from Copyblogger.


Got a hot tip for consistently creating compelling content? Share it with us in the comments!

Filed Under: Business Blogging
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Get a Little Love for Your Blog – Your Valentine Gift

Your Blog As Centerpiece of Business on Kindle Fire

It's Valentine's Day and I want to share some blogging love with you!

If you missed the gift in December, you have another opportunity…

For two days (February 14 and 15) you can get my Kindle ebook "How to Make Your Blog the Centerpiece of Your Business" for free on your Kindle!

Click here >>> http://denisewakeman.com/hub

I have one invitation and two favors to ask if you get the ebook:

1. If you'd like a virtual autograph (Kindlegraph) for your ebook, click here (it's cool!)
2. Click the orange "Like" button at the top of the page
3. Write a quick review of the ebook, or post a video review
4. Scroll down the page until you see the Tags. Check off the "blogging" tag and click to Accept. (I'm doing an experiment. Supposedly, the more people who aggree with a tag, the higher visibilty the ebook gets)

If you got the ebook in December, please share this post with others in your network who could benefit from the business blogging tips…

Thank you, enjoy and blog on!

P.S. You don't need a Kindle to get the ebook. You can download the free Kindle reading app for your computer, iPad or smart phone here.

P.P.S. Don't have a blog yet? Check out Christina Hills' Website Creation Workshop…by far the best training on how to set up your sites on WordPress. 

 

Filed Under: Business Blogging Tagged With: ,
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How To Use Guest Blogging To Get Targeted Traffic To Your Niche Website

I've long advocated incorporating guest blogging in your online marketing as a great way to build visibility in your niche. When you carefully target the blogs you where you want to guest blog, you can generate ongoing traffic to your site and establish credibility in your subject area.

This is a guest post by Susanne Myers of DailyAffiliateTasks.com.

Why Guest Blogging?

Whenever I need to generate more traffic to one of my niche websites, the first strategy I turn to is guest blogging. I love the fact that I can get in front of an established audience (the loyal readers of the blog I’m posting on), share my content and then invite them to check out my own site. It’s a great way to get a big surge of traffic directly from the blog and to also build some strong incoming links that will help will search engine traffic for years to come. 

Where To Guest Blog?

Your first goal will be to come up with a list of bloggers that you can approach about guest blogging. You want to find about 10 blogs that cater to the same niche you are in. Don’t go after the really big names at first. Instead focus on some established blogs that are getting traffic. Look at the number of comments. I like to go after blogs that average 5 or more comments per post. This usually indicates that the blog is getting some traffic and has some loyal readers.

How To Guest Blog And Get Published?

Your next job will be to spend some time reading the blogs you’ve selected. Browse through the archives and add the RSS feed of the blog to your favorite RSS reader. You want to accomplish two things here:

  1. Get a feel for the blog and the types of posts that are published.
  2. Start commenting regularly to start building a relationship with the blogger.

After a couple of days two things should happen. You will start to get ideas for blog posts you can write for each blog and the blog owner should start to recognize your name from all the awesome comments you have left.

Write one of those guest blog posts and send it to the blogger. Rinse and repeat with the other blogs on your list. Don’t bother emailing the blogger first asking if they’d like a post… go ahead and send them the finished blog post. It’ll make it easier for them to just plug it in and publish.

To increase your chances of getting the post published, link back to one or two posts on the blog or include an affiliate link for the blogger (you can find those within other posts on the blog). The idea here is to make it even more beneficial for the blogger to post what you’ve written. The more there’s in it for them, the harder it will be for the blog owner to say “No” to your guest post proposal. 

What’s Next?

Keep writing and sending off more guest blog posts. Once a post gets published, spend a little time promoting it. Tweet about it, post a link on Facebook etc. You’ll end up getting more traffic from each guest blog post that way and you may just be invited to guest blog on those sites again.

Ready for more tips on what works and what doesn’t? Join Daily Affiliate Tasks.com for $10 per month and work on things that actually work to bring you more traffic, more subscribers and make more affiliate commissions working as little as 30 minutes per day. Learn more and join today at DailyAffiliateTasks.com.

Learn more about how to get targeted traffic to your sites in a series that includes four additional articles.

Susanne Myers, DailyAffiliateTasks.com

About the Author: Sweet and smart, Susanne Myers is a little power house with a huge affiliate marketing presence but, don’t let her quiet demeanor fool you.  Susanne’s brain works at the speed of light formulating plans and plotting to take over whatever niche she happens to be working on at the time.

The journey to a 6-figure income was filled with twists, turns and yes, failure but Susanne, never let the mistakes get her down.  She educated herself and quickly learned how to choose profitable niche markets and the rest, as they say, is history.

Today, Susanne has taken her love of all things internet & affiliate marketing and has started to teach others how to claim the same success she’s found by using a step-by-step, this-is-exactly-how-I-did-it strategy and she’s willing to teach it to you.

Filed Under: Business Blogging Tagged With: ,
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10 Common Business Blogging Saboteurs…And How To Overcome Them

This is a guest post by Tom Treanor of Right Mix Marketing and the Business Blogging Telesummit.

10 Common Business Blogging Saboteurs…And How To Overcome Them

 

procrastination-blog-saboteurs

The business blog has become a critical component of many a company's online marketing strategy (and for good reason). It's the place where companies can place content that attracts (and educates) their target audience and it's one of the best ways to improve a company's search engine optimization.  The business blog provides fuel for a company's social media activities by providing valuable content for them to share with their connections (and for their connections to share out as well).  Good blog content can help a company be perceived as an authority in their industry or locality and the business blog can become a major lead generator when given the attention it deserves.
 
With that in mind, writing those blog posts should be a no-brainer, right?
 
Well, the sad truth is that we may have the best intentions, but our actions don't always fall in line. We may have an idealized picture of where we want to be in a few months with our blog, but day-to-day things just seem to get in the way of progress.
 
Let's face the fact that there are invisible saboteurs that impede our blog writing. Let's address some of the most important ones and look at ways to overcome them. What others do you have to add? What other solutions do you have? Leave them in the comments below.
 

10 Common Business Blogging Saboteurs – do you say these to yourself?

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Business Blogging Tagged With: ,
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LinkedIn Tips – 8 Ways to Drive Traffic to Your Blog [video]

As I spend more time on LinkedIn, I realize how many ways there are to 1) create visibility and 2) drive traffic to your blog.

In this 4:57 minute video I show you eight ways you can use LinkedIn to showcase your blog and send your connections back to your site so you can share more of your expertise and (hopefully) entice them to take some action that will provide a deeper connection with you. (Don't forget, once you get people to your blog, you need to have a call to action so they don't disappear forever!)

Hi, this is Denise Wakeman, your online visibility mentor. I want to share with you eight ways to drive traffic to your blog from LinkedIn. If the audience for your blog is primarily business people, then there's a good bet that they spend a lot of time on LinkedIn, the business-to-business networking site. I've been spending a lot more time there myself and as I've been optimizing my profile and participating in groups more, I've discovered there are quite a few ways to get your business blog content in front of your contacts and then compelling them to click through to your site.

So, here are eight ways I have discovered to drive LinkedIn contacts to your blog. First, make sure that you have a link in your profile. The very minimum, make sure to customize the label of the link rather than using the default label "my blog" and when you're on your, on the edit profile, you see that there is a little link there that says "edit" next to websites, so you can just change the name of the site.

Number 2: Autopost your blog updates to your status. You can use a a social media management tool like HootSuite. If you use FeedBlitz to deliver your blog updates, you can enable the option to automatically post to LinkedIn as well. You can also do a search for Word Press plug-ins to auto post, and there are quite a few, so you'll want to pick the one that works the best for you.

There are two apps applications you can add to your profile: the Word Press and the Blog Link applications. And these will, once you set them up, they'll automatically publish your then post to your public profile. So, click on the 'More' link up at the top navigation, and then click on 'Applications' and follow the steps to add them.

Set up a company profile. This is different from your personal profile. And, again, if you look for "company profile," There's an area there where you can syndicate your blog feed. Join groups. If you're a member of any LinkedIn groups in your niche, post links to relevant blog posts in the discussion forum. Now, a thing to know, you want to check the guidelines for the groups. Some groups consider this overt promotion and they don't allow it. Now, I just set up a group for business owners to help boost their visibility on the web, so I encourage group members to share their content, but that's just a difference between me and other groups. So, check first before you do that.

Number six: Start your own group, focused on your expertise. As I'm learning, this is by the far the most powerful way to use LinkedIn. I've actually been going through Louis Howes' Linked Influence Program, and I've picked up a lot of great tips from him. With your own group, you can syndicate your blog feed to post automatically on the discussion board. Members do not have this option.

Now the one caveat on this, is that when your news feed picks up your blog post, it does not push them out in the daily digest of new discussions. So, you may want to you know, this will be a personal decision whether you want to add this or not, I actually manually post my new blogs, my new blog posts to my LinkedIn in group, rather than having it done automatically.

Number 7: This is super important. Make sure you have a LinkedIn share button on your blog post. Not only can use it to quickly share your new articles, but your readers can as well. The powerful part of this button is that in one step you can share your status, share your post to your status box and to any groups you're a member of, if it's okay, remember. So this is really a fast, simple way to get your content up on LinkedIn.

Then, the final way to get your blog posts out to the members of LinkedIn, your contacts, is that, use the answers feature. So answer questions in the Answers section, and if appropriate, include a link to a blog post that specifically addresses the question you're answering. So you can see here, where the little red arrow is, that I answered the question and then I put a link to more traffic tips which was the subject of this question.

So, that's it. I'd love to know what you think, it's your turn. How do you use LinkedIn to attract people to your blog? If you'd like more tips like these, about boosting your visibility on the web, you can get a free eCourse with seven simple implement tips at BoostYourVisibility.com. Until next time, this is Denise Wakeman. Blog on.

How do you use LinkedIn for visibility and traffic generation? Please post your tips below!

I invite you to join my LinkedIn Group: Online Visibility Boost for Entrepreneurs. It's an active groups with the purpose of providing you with opportunities to share your content so you can reach more people and … build more visibility for you, your business and the services you provide.

Filed Under: Business Blogging Tagged With: ,
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