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May 14, 2013 By Denise Wakeman 6 Comments

Make the Most of Your Blog Posts

Guest post by D’vorah Lansky, M.Ed.

I’d like to thank Denise for graciously hosting me, as a guest blogger, in celebration of the launch of my newest book, 21 Ways to Launch a Successful Virtual Book Tour.

In this blog post, I’d like to share with you one of “21 Ways” to launch a successful virtual book tour. This tip comes from “Way #16: Make the Most of Your Blog Posts!”

In essence, your audio, video, and written blog posts are “virtual real estate.” In addition to providing informational, educational, or entertaining content, you can include subtle marketing material. For example, at the end of each of your blog posts, you can include information about yourself along with a compelling reason why people should come to your blog.

productivity tips Respond to readers’ comments

During your virtual book tour, people will share comments and ask questions. Use this interaction as an opportunity to both illustrate your expertise and build a relationship with your readers. One way to encourage comments is to ask a question at the end of your blog posts. For example, you can ask the readers’ opinion of what you wrote or a specific question. Then respond to their comments. Authors who respond to comments generally get many more comments than those who don’t. This in turn helps with search engine optimization (SEO).

During your virtual book tour, you’ll want to visit each blog multiple times: at least once on the day you’re scheduled to appear there, as well as throughout the tour. These visits will allow you to respond to additional comments.

Add images to your blog posts

iStock_000005733150XSmall Adding images to your blog posts makes them more attractive and engages your readers. Such images will increase the likelihood of people reading through your post and possibly asking a question or sharing a comment. Adding images also makes it easier for people to share your post on Pinterest, thus broadening your reach. Be sure to include a photograph of you smiling with each blog post, as well as an image of your book. These additional steps will grow your branding and allow your readers to identify with you.

Create a Call to Action in your post signature

As part of your book tour, you’ll have the opportunity to build relationships with new readers. Include a call to action in the signature block at the end of each blog post. An example of an effective call to action is an invitation to readers to visit your blog where they can enter their names and email addresses in order to receive a free chapter of your book.

Create a signature template file

Quill_Pen Create a template file you can use for each of your posts. To do this, open up a Word document and compose your blog post signature. Typically, this signature block includes 100–150 words, where you can include things like your name, credentials, book title, blog URL, how you help people, and a compelling reason why people should visit your blog. Offering people a free chapter of your book is an excellent strategy. Once you’ve created your signature file, save this as a template so you can easily copy and paste the content to the bottom of each of your blog posts.

Do you have a blog post tip you can share with our readers? Did one of these tips capture your attention? Scroll down and share your thoughts in the comments section below.

This post is being written in honor of a virtual book tour celebrating the publication of my third print book. You can enjoy the festivities by joining us on the tour to 21 blogs, in honor of 21 Ways to Launch a Successful Virtual Book Tour. Scroll down to access the virtual book tour schedule as well as a link to the book on Amazon. Thank you and enjoy!

D’vorah Lansky, M.Ed., is the author of 21 Ways to Launch a Successful Virtual Book Tour. Visit her book blog and check out the full schedule for the virtual book tour, celebrating the launch of this exciting new book: www.VirtualBookTour21Ways.com

D’vorah offers virtual book tour workshops and courses for authors, entrepreneurs, and virtual professionals. She has taught hundreds of people, across the globe, how to conduct successful virtual book tours. You can purchase her newest book on Amazon.

May 12, 2013 By Denise Wakeman 3 Comments

Are You a Lazy Marketer in the Summer?

marshmallow feast During a conversation with my business coach, we were discussing what happens to entrepreneurs and business owners in the Summer months. We both were getting a sense that business owners, particularly solo entrepreneurs, tended to back off on their marketing during the late Spring and Summer months.

There’s been a feeling of slowing down when I talk to other entrepreneurs. A desire to back off a bit and focus on fun Summer activities.

But we have no proof or statistics that this is actually true, so I decided to run a poll.

Will you help us out and select which response fits you best about how you market your business in the Summer? Are you a lazy marketer? Or on top of it year-round?

Believe me, I get it. The Summer is time to go to the beach, go on an Adventure away from the grind of daily life, or go camping with your pals and roast marshmallows over a campfire.

But what happens when Fall rolls around and you expect to run a successful launch for your new product or book, and you’ve been virtually absent for the last couple of months?

Please vote and share your views about Summer-time marketing, in the comments below.

Filed Under: Marketing Trends Tagged With: online marketing

May 4, 2013 By Denise Wakeman 7 Comments

Want More Visibility for Your Blog on Twitter? Nestivity May be the Answer

Does this sound familiar? You love Twitter but you wish you could have better conversations with your community of followers about what you publish on your blog? Even with a great tool like Hootsuite and creating niche lists of people, subjects and hashtags, sometimes the stream flows so fast it’s difficult to keep track of conversations and get beyond “Thanks for the retweet.”

That’s where Nestivity comes in and may be a good solution for you. I’ve been experimenting with it for a couple of days and it looks promising when you want to explore a blog-related topic or question in depth with your Twitter community.

Nestivity is in public beta and bills itself as “community with Twitter.”

Nestivity turns your Twitter handle into a “Nest”, a place for you to connect with your followers in a more organized and structured way.

You can get a free account or upgrade for more features and you sign in to your account with Twitter.

In a nutshell, you create “projects” which consist of discussions related to a project topic. Discussions can be inspired by a tweet or blog post or a question. You have the option to add images. A unique URL is created for the discussion and included with your tweets and those of the community who respond.

I’m experimenting with a discussion around a blog post about creativity published on The Future of Ink:

By using the embed feature, you can put the discussion on your blog, encouraging your readers to participate by clicking on the “tweet a comment” button. This is a big deal for bloggers since you have an opportunity to get more visibility for your blog posts. They can spread further and attract new readers to your site. You’ll also meet new people on Twitter who are interested in your content. Nestivity makes is easy to follow people who participate in your discussions.

To get set up and started on Nestivity, I refer you to a thorough how-to post by Kristi Hines at Kikolani. Why recreate the wheel, right?

I’d love to know what you think about Nestivity. Does it look like a tool you’ll use? Check out the discussion I’ve posted about creativity and then post a comment so you can experience how it works for yourself.

Filed Under: Marketing Trends Tagged With: twitter, visibility on the web

March 31, 2013 By Kathleen Gage 3 Comments

A Simple Two-Step Process for Profitable Product Creation

Guest post by Kathleen Gage.

Marketing-Product If you’ve been online for any length of time, you’ve likely heard how profitable information products can be.

There is no shortage of experts who claim they make hundreds, even thousands of dollar a day selling information products.

It may seem too good to be true, but further investigation will show you that experts in virtually any industry make great money with product creation – when they know what they are doing.

Beyond the money, there are ample benefits to packaging your knowledge into various products.

Increased perceived expert status
Ability to service clients who can’t (or won’t) invest in your higher end services
Sustainable revenue
Increased market reach
A product allows you to be selective about who you work one-on-one with
Scalability of your business
Increased client base

However, before you jump into the game of product creation you must have a clear understanding of exactly what your market needs, wants and is willing to pay for.

The fact is, not all clients are created equal. Some are a great fit for your higher end products and services while others will be great candidates for various levels of lower priced product offerings.

To optimize your product creation efforts you have to identify two areas:

Problem
Solution

The more you know about the problem, the easier it will be to create a solution.

A few ways to identify the problem are:

Surveys
Forums
Social networks
Media trends
Books
Competition

Surveys

A simple survey can produce incredible results. With a few strategice questions you can find out exactly what challenges your market has.

For example, imagine if you were a relationship expert whose market is primarily professional women. Here’s one question you could ask:

“What is the greatest challenge you and your spouse have with intimacy?”

If 80% respond with, “I’m too tired to feel the desire for intimacy,” you are in a great position to create a product addressing this very issue.

Forums

Check out the online forums your potential clients and customers frequent. Pay attention to discussions and postings.

Spend time reviewing the conversations taking place. This is one of the best ways to see what the greatest challenges your market has.

Social Networks

As with forums, social networks can produce a great deal of information. Notice the threads that are started, which ones get the greatest involvement and exactly what is being posted.

A very underutilized process is actually posting a question that triggers discussion. If you are a nutritionist you could start a discussion like:

“What is your greatest challenge when it comes to eating healthy?”

Strategically posting this type of question will provide you with ample information for a product.

Media trends

There is more than enough information available in the media. Subscribe to top publications, blogs and online magazines that target your market.

Spend a few minutes every day researching the latest trends.

Books

Keeping a finger on the pulse of Amazon.com and BN.com can give you a great deal of information on what the market is currently interested in.

Read the reviews on books to give you even more insight as to what your market is interested in.

Competition

Knowing what your competition is up to is a great way to see what the market wants. The fact is, as market demand for something grows, so do offerings by your competitors.

Pay attention to articles and blog posts from your competitors as well as their social media activity.

Notice when they introduce a new product to market. If your competition is well positioned, you can save a lot of time and effort by watching their activity. You may even be able to partner with them on future offerings.

Conclusion

Having a deep understanding of your market’s problem puts you in a great position to create a viable solution that they need, want and are willing to pay for.

Join Kathleen Gage and me on Thursday, April 4th for a free webinar, Profitable Product Creation.

Filed Under: Marketing Trends Tagged With: product creation

March 7, 2013 By Denise Wakeman Leave a Comment

Digital Publishing Trends for Online Entrepreneurs [audio]

Digital publishing in all its varied forms, is the currency of the Web and the means by which you boost your visibility, enhance your credibility and attract the right prospects to your business.

“If we’re putting content online, we’re publishers whether we like it or not.” @denisewakeman @futureofink

— Elizabeth H Cottrell (@RiverwoodWriter) March 6, 2013

Recently, I was interviewed by MaAnna Stephenson of BlogAid.net about the trends in digital publishing I’m seeing and implementing. You can listen online or download the MP3 to your preferred listening device.

( 50 minutes)

Transcript coming soon.

MaAnna and I talked about various tools you can use to easily create and repurpose content that will help you expand your reach and drive more traffic to your primary home on the Web (guess what that is!).

Guy-Kawasaki-quote For most clients I recommend starting with an ebook created from your existing blog content. The purpose is to demonstrate that it’s easy and you don’t need to recreate the wheel, start from scratch, and can get published on Amazon’s Kindle site quickly. Here’s a list of some of the tools I use and recommend for getting started.

To fast track your digital publishing education, check out the inaugural Digital Publishing Online Intensive. It’s not too late to join and get replays from the Digital Trends Panel discussion, keynote by Guy Kawasaki on How to Publish a Book, and training webinar on The ABC’s of Creating Digital Content by Sue Painter. 12 more training webinars are being presented throughout the month of March.

Filed Under: Marketing Trends Tagged With: digital publishing, Guy Kawasaki

February 27, 2013 By Denise Wakeman 3 Comments

The Top 10 Reasons to Self-Publish [Infographic]

It’s no secret that when you choose to self-publish your content, you’re no longer considered vain or a loser because no main stream publisher would publish your book. Self-publishing is a smart decision for many online entrepreneurs and business owners who want to move fast and retain control and profits from their work.

The trend towards new ways to publish and build credibility and visibility with your work, is one reason Ellen Britt and I launched The Future of Ink last year. It’s also why we’re presenting the inaugural Digital Publishing Online Intensive (DPOI).

The Keynote Speaker for DPOI is Guy Kawasaki, author of the new bestselling book, APE: Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur – How to Publish a Book. Guy is the perfect choice to kick off the event. If you’re the least bit interested in how you can capitalize on the self-publishing trend to get your message out to the world, then I recommend you pick up a copy of APE (or get it as a bonus when you register for DPOI!).