Article marketing is the use of articles to promote your web site. You’ll be writing articles, submitting them to directories online, and using them to push your site further up the search engine result lists.

Why You Should be Using Article Marketing

If you haven’t been doing article marketing before, you’ve made the right choice to start learning more about this valuable marketing approach. Before you start down this path, let’s look at the main benefits you’re going to achieve from article marketing.

1) Increased Exposure

By getting your name out into the Internet world, you can increase your exposure dramatically. You want people to start recognizing who you are, and you want to see your name appearing a lot near the top of search engines. This is a good way to increase your reputation.

2) Improved Credibility

One challenge all marketing has to overcome is the credibility challenge. If the consumers don’t trust you, they won’t buy from you. With these articles, you’re working on establishing yourself as trustworthy and reliable. That means consumers are going to be more likely to trust you. And that’s a very good thing for your bottom line.

3) Increased Backlinks

Of course, the biggest benefit for your web site is going the increased number of backlinks it will receive thanks to your articles. Remember that keywords are important but backlinks (also known as inbound links) are critical if you want to score high search engine rankings at Google and other top engines.

4) Reduced Marketing Costs

And one of the best reasons to recommend article marketing, particularly for someone just starting out in Internet marketing is the cost. If you write your own articles, most of your marketing won’t cost you anything at all. Most article submission sites don’t charge a dime for you to submit your content.

That makes article marketing not just one of the most effective Internet marketing approaches but also one of the smartest.

How to Write Effective Articles for Marketing

Now before you can start benefiting from article marketing you’re going to need one thing: articles. Whether are a confident writer or not, there are a few things you need to know in order to get started in the right direction. Here are some strategies for writing good articles for marketing.

Keyword Placement Strategies

The biggest mistake you could make when writing your articles is to load them full with keywords and forget the importance of quality content (we’ll discuss that in a moment). Keywords are important but you need to know how to use them strategically.

If you do a search for keyword density or related phrases, you’ll quickly discover a wide range of ideas on the issue. Here’s the bottom line: density doesn’t matter as much as placement and relevance.

First, the keywords you choose for a page need to be clearly related to the content. Otherwise, your site won’t get a good ranking. Second, you need to place your keyword in specific locations in the body: the first paragraph, the last paragraph, and one per body paragraph. If you’re also using secondary keywords, replace a couple of the primary keywords in the body with them.

Read through the article to make sure the keywords flow with the content. If not, make revisions. Remember you’re writing for the audience, not the search engines.

Importance of Content

As mentioned above, content is very important when it comes to your search engine rankings. Google and other engines want to give users the best results possible so they don’t want 500 words of fluff around 20 uses of a keyword.

The search engines are looking for the same things as your site visitors: quality information, well-researched facts, and useful content. They want to read things they didn’t already know and things that are going to help them in their day to day lives.

If you’re not confident in your ability to write strong content, hire a copywriter or rewrite excellent content you find on the Internet. Just remember, if you choose the latter, the article must be completely rewritten in your own words or you’ll be plagiarizing.

Effective Titles

Think about how you choose what to read on the Internet or in a newspaper or a magazine. You look at the headlines or the titles. If the title is boring, you’re not going to waste your time. On the other hand, if the title catches your eye you’ll be more likely to stick around and check out the rest of the content.

The same thing is true of the articles you use for marketing. You’ve got to come up with some catchy names to grab the eye of potential readers. Here are a few things that work very well:

•    Numbers – The 7 Best Foods to Eat if You Want to Look 18 Again
•    Shocking Statements – Her 69-Year Old Grandmother Was Mistaken for Her Sister: What’s Beauty Secret Made That Possible?
•    How To’s – How to Catch the Man of Your Dreams Without Going to Another Bar
•    Statistics – Each Minute Someone Dies from Lung Cancer, Don’t Let the Next One Be You

All of these headlines – if you saw them atop an article – would make you stop and take a look at the rest of the content. And those are the types of titles you need to be writing.

Tip: Write a few extra titles for each article so you can do testing to see which ones pull in the most readers.

Putting Together Resource Boxes

Although you want the title to hook the readers, you really want their eyes to scan down the page to the resource box. This is where you have your moment to do a marketing spiel of your own. Most submission sites don’t allow any sales or advertising in the article itself but you can promote whatever you want in the resource box.

Incidentally, the resource box is also going to travel along with the rest of the content. The submission sites require the resource box be posted along with the articles on publishers’ sites who them.

The content of the resource box should be succinct but should include your keyword, your link (usually up to two can be included), your name and/or your business name, and a brief sales pitch. Below is an example:

John Doe is the owner of Acme Pharmaceuticals, a leader online provider of weight loss treatments that work safely and quickly. If you want to learn more about how you can drop 25 pounds in two months visit (web site link).

The example is, of course, not real but it gives you a good idea of how all those elements can be effectively combined.

How and Where to Publish the Articles

Once you have your articles written, the next stage of your marketing efforts will involve publishing them online. To do this, you’ll want to locate submission sites that accept such content. Some of these sites are open to general types of content; others cater to certain niches, such as business or technology. Researches before you start submitting so you don’t end up wasting your time.

Here are some suggestions on where and how to get your freshly written articles out to the world.

Top 5 Directories Where you MUST Submit

Before you can begin submitting, you need to where to submit. Below is a list of some of the biggest and most popular submission sites. Although the competition for publishers is more intense at these sites, their credibility with Google can make your backlinks more effective and will help your article show up higher in search engine results.

•    EzineArticles.com
•    ArticleDashboard.com
•    Buzzle.com
•    GoArticles.com
•    ArticleBase.com

All five of these submission sites have not only a Pagerank of 5 or 6 which makes them good choices for submission, but also high authority in Google. If you are going to be writing about online business or technology, submit to WebProNews.com which also has a Google beloved and PR6 directory.

You can find plenty of other good submission sites online, as well as some good niche submission sites. Just do a few Google searches or I’ve summed up this best and most updated lists of article directories that approve your articles within 3-7 days.

Tips on Article Submission

Now that you know where to submit (or at least have a good starting point), you need to know how to make sure your articles are accepted for submission. Not all of them will be. Each site retains the right to refuse any submission.

To improve your odds of passing muster, you should follow these helpful tips:

• Read the guidelines. Each site has their own rules about what they will and won’t accept. Make sure you read them carefully. Then follow them to the letter when you create your article.
• Keep your article around 500 words – any longer will bore readers; any shorter won’t provide enough content to be useful. Be aware of the minimum and maximum word lengths accepted at each site.
• Avoid advertising in the article. The best way to be rejected is to write an ad about your company or your product. Informative writing is what they want in the body. All of your publicity should stay in the resource box.
• Make sure your article is 100% unique. Article that fail to pass plagiarism detection software will not be published and repeat offenses can get you banned from the site permanently.
• Proofread. Most of the sites will reject articles that contain a large number of grammar and punctuation errors. Be sure to edit before you submit. If you don’t trust your eye, ask someone to read through the content for you and make corrections.

If you do get rejected, don’t worry too much. Make some changes and keep trying.

Do-Follow Links & Directories

Among the benefits of using article marketing are the backlinks. But to benefit from this benefit, you need to use a do-follow directory. Do-follow links are ones that are followed by Google spiders. Not all directories will allow you to use these links in your content.

Here are ten of the top do-follow directories:

•    EzineArticles
•    Idea Marketers
•    Article Dashboard Directory
•    Easy Articles
•    SelfGrowth
•    UnArchived Articles
•    ArticlesFactory
•    Article Alley
•    Bloglines
•    Zimbio

Yes to No-follow sites too?

As you can probably guess, no-follow links are ones that are not followed by the search engine spiders. There are some directories for your articles which only accept these types of links. You should still consider using these directories because they can provide a great source of traffic even if you can’t benefit from the backlinks.

Two of the best examples are Articlesbase.com and Google’s knol (currently in beta).

Other Important Content Promotion Portals to Consider

Besides the article submission sites mentioned above, there are a few others you should consider, too. These are quickly gaining in popularity so getting involved in them now is a good idea.

Squidoo – You write and submit content known as “lenses” to the site under your profile. You can choose your own topics and can provide content without going through an approval process. If your lens is “live,” you can have do-follow links in the content.

Hubpages – Like Squidoo, Hubpages allows you to great your own profile and add the content you want. If you have a score of over 75, you can include do-follow links in your content. Another benefit is the option to earn royalties on ads placed on your Hubpages.

Mahalo.com – Billed as a “human powered search engine,” Mahalo consists of a serious of pages created by users to provide information for people doing searches on the site. You can only submit pages that have not been added yet.

How to Promote Your Site Using the Articles

Once you have the articles published at the sites, your next job is to promote them. The more traffic you can direct to your articles the more traffic you’ll have arriving at your web site. Here are three methods.

Social Networking – Power of social bookmarking

Social networking is the idea of sharing what you like with others on the Internet. You can do this by recommending sites or sharing links via Facebook, MySpace, or similar sites.

Another way to do this is through social bookmarking. You submit sites and links that have caught your eye to sites, such as Mixx, Digg, StumbleUpon, and others. Dozens of these sites exist.

Not only do the links increase traffic to your articles but the backlinks can increase their ranking in search engines.

Blogging

Another good way to promote your articles is through blogs. Set up a blog off-site and write responses to some of the articles you’ve submitted. Or write about similar topics and add a link to the article with the rest of your content.

You may want to mention articles by other writers, too. You don’t want readers to think you are the same person as the writer – that would ruin your credibility.

You can also use your articles as blog posts. Wordpress.com is a great site to use if you’re just getting started with blogging. It doesn’t cost anything to use. Blogger.com, which is connected to Google, is another good choice.

Content Exchange

If you know another web site that would cater to a similar audience and that is also in need of high quality content, do a content exchange. Post one of your articles and resource boxes on their site or blog while you post one of their articles and resource boxes on yours. You can mention that you’ve done the exchange and provide links to your article on the other site. This increases your exposure to a new audience and gives both of you valuable backlinks.

Just be careful to choose a site that will attract a similar audience and that isn’t going to ruin your reputation with your own visitors.

Now Get Started

You now know everything you need to begin article marketing. Once you write that first article, you’ll be well on your way to success.

Just remember marketing isn’t something you can do occasionally. To be effective, article marketing needs to become part of your regular routine . . .  And if you don’t have enough time to sort out, let some professional article marketing service provider handle this job for you. But do start today if you haven’t thought yet.

We’ll be meet again with next chapter on Social  Bookmarking.

Till then,

Chill & Cheers.. Enjoy sulumits retsambew contest

sulumits retsambew dedication – After summing up advanced guides on on-site optimization and SEO copywriting, we’re ready for the third step – Directory Submissions. Let’s go…

What is directory submission?

Web directory submission is a debatable strategy among webmasters today. But I’d still call it as one of the first and integral link building steps in an SEO and marketing campaign. The success surely depends upon how you do and to what quality pool you’re submitting your listings.  To start with the discussions, we’ll define directory submissions as

Submitting your website’s URL with a unique title and description to a web directory or a link directory.

Does the directory submission value still exist?

Talk is rife that the importance of web directory submission may be waning purportedly because major search engines are developing algorithms that are shunning link farms. It is true that some directories are really not worth submitting to. There are, however, many directories – some free and others paid that will be vital to your link building campaign. I therefore submit that directory submissions if done appropriately are still relevant today and will remain so for quite some time.

It is important to do some background research on most of the directories before submitting so that you do not end up wasting your time or in some instances both time and money on valueless submissions. Some of the things to consider when selecting directories to submit to include but are not limited to the following:

1. Page Rank – One of the first criteria to verify the authority of a directory in Google.
2. Page Indexing  - Do not assume that all directory pages are indexed in the major search engines just because the main page and a few others are. Do a check to ascertain whether the category page that you want to list in is indexed. If not, then that submission is useless.
3. Human Reviewed – If a directory is reviewed and moderated by real editors, then stay assured. It’d filter the spam listings and will accept only relevant and high-quality websites. So that’s what you should look for- The human operated directories, NOT the ones that allow every listing.
4. The “no-follow” tag  - Some directories add a feature known as the “no-follow” to deny you credit for your link. Even though the links in such directories will give you organic traffic, they do nothing to help you improve your site’s link popularity.

Well, it is so unrealistic to check thousands of directories for above 3 quality concerns. Just to ease you guys, I’ve attached a perfect and most updated list of best 400 web directories.

Free 400 approve directory list (137)

Types of directory submissions

There are 3 different ways of submitting websites to web directories – manual, automated and semi-automated submission. When going for web directory submissions discussion, it is vital to examine the benefits offered by each of the ways of submission that exist.

1. Manual Directory Submission

Manual directory submission simply means visiting each directory and submitting your website manually. This will involve manually filling in the required information before submitting the site. There is a general consensus among webmasters that manual submission is more preferable over automated submission due to the following reasons:

• You have more control as to which directories to submit or not to submit to.
• Many websites use conformation captcha code to prevent spamming. The code needs to be entered manually to complete the submission process. Automated submissions may experience difficulties with such a requirement.
• The acceptance rate is higher with this submission method as you’re very close to the most accurate category and sub-category.
• Don’t forget adding at least 5 targeted keyphrases in the tags field.
• Several quality directories require you to register as a member before making the submission request. As such, they decline automated submissions.
• Some major search engines like Google and Yahoo will only allow manual submission.

The downside to manual submission is that it is a tedious and time intensive process which is also more expensive than automated submission. That may seem like a small price to pay considering the benefits that will result. I would recommend that you opt for manual submission for the first 500-1000 top quality directories and after that you could give automated submission a try with the next 1000 directories (The crap ones? With a hit and trail link method if you get).

2. Semi Automated and automated Submission

Semi Automated Submission can be done by either purchasing a software package or by identifying a website that offers this utility. It affords you an inexpensive and fast method of submitting to multiple directories. Semi Automated and automated Submission also allows you to select categories and sub categories and enter your site’s description and even keywords where necessary. The main drawbacks are:

• Many directories have requirements that lock out automated submission
• Acceptance rate is lower
• Submission is indiscriminate and several submissions have no value.

If you have already manually submitted to many high quality directories, you may want to use automated submission software to submit to hundreds of directories that are of lower value.  An example of automated submission software can be found by following this link. Some other directory submissions software with good reviews can be   Submit Eaze, Fast Directory Submitter And Submitting Monster

Free Directories – Are they a waste of your time?

While it is not debatable that many directories especially free ones are not worthy of your time and link, there are several that are worthy of every second that you invest submitting to them. They offer obvious cost benefits and if your budget does not allow you much flexibility, these directories can save the day for you.

Listed below are some carefully selected free directories that I know are worthy of your attention. The list is not comprehensive and should only serve to start you off.

1. www.dmoz.com
2. www.lii.org/
3. www.jayde.com/
4. www.mavicanet.com/
5. www.illumirate.com/
6. www.directoryvault.com/
7. www.domaining..in/
8. www.getlistedrightnow.com/
9. www.searchsight.com/
10. www.worldsiteindex.com/
11. www.onemilliondirectory.com/
12. www.freewebsitedirectory.com/
13. www.esgsite.com/
14. www.directory.askbee.net/
15. www.buzz-directory.com/
16. www.bys.net/
17. www.creativeagency.eu

If you are worried that getting approval on some of these directories can take forever, here are 6 tips that can help speed the approval process-

• Make sure your site does not give the impression that it is under construction by say having broken links.
• Read the submission guidelines for each directory so that you do not violate any of the rules
• Don’t write any promotion oriented descriptions. Rather write simple yet professional description that describes your website well with your unique selling point.  Remember, some directories will decline your listing by default if you add words like “specialize, popular, excellent, awesome, best, buy now etc.” Avoid promotion to get accepted.
• Ensure that you choose the most fitting. Try and imitate the style of other descriptions that have already been approved in the targeted category.
• Do a search on your keywords in each directory and examine the resultant categories and descriptions. Use the information to determine the most appropriate style to adopt.
• Post your home page first before deep inner pages

Paid directories – Do you get value for your money?

Free directories are usually associated with some drawbacks which include issues with quality of links as well as the length of time needed for your listing to be approved by directory editors. For these reasons, paid directories can offer obvious advantages. Buying your way in can dramatically increase your link popularity. However, this venture requires substantial investment as buying 30 PR5-PR7 links can cost you between $300 and $600 per month.

It is best to buy a few links – say 20 to 30 from high quality directories then combine that with submissions to many other free directories.

Below are some of the best paid directories:

• http://botw.org/
• http://dir.yahoo.com/
• http://www.avivadirectory.com/
• http://www.business.com/
• http://www.ezilon.com/
• http://www.joeant.com/
• http://www.skaffe.com/
• http://www.elib.org/
• http://www.directory.v7n.com/
• http://www.gimpsy.com/
• http://www.goguides.org/

How to write titles

Titles are important as they introduce the purpose of the site. Some directories allow descriptive titles with keywords while others will only allow the official name of the website to appear in the title section. Either way, you should make sure that you follow the guidelines to avoid rejection. In cases, where the directory accepts descriptive titles, you can take note of the following points to ensure that your title is acceptable:
• Your title should be relevant to the objectives of your site
• Your title should be objective and not read like an ad with overly promotional lingo
• The title should not be just a collection of keywords but should make sense
• Your title should be of a reasonable length (Usually 3-5 words is good enough).
Below are 4 things to avoid when writing titles:
• The use of all UPPERCASE in the title. This tends to be unfriendly to the eye
• The use of an exclamation mark (!).
• Avoid stuffing your title with keywords or using some keywords repetitively.
• Tooting your horn with such words as “the best, cheapest, greatest, leading” etc.

Writing descriptions

Writing a description for your site is a very important aspect of directory submission. First, an ill matching description can cause a directory editor to reject your submission. Secondly, search engine crawlers use descriptions to determine your site’s relevance. Therefore, if the description differs from the content, your site can easily be dismissed as immaterial.

In addition to the points mentioned in the title guidelines above, you should also take note of the following when writing descriptions:

• You may just describe what your site has to offer but not pricing details or other promotional details. If you are to include features or benefits in the description, just make sure you don’t sound overly promotional.
• Contact details don’t belong in the description so do not include them.
• Use the usual Sentence case unless under special circumstances such as writing a registered name.
• Avoid ending your description with such phrases as “among others”, “etc” or “so and so”… .

Where to submit – niche or general directories?

Selecting your first 200 directories to submit to requires you to do your homework thoroughly.  This is because these will form the backbone of your submission activities. You should target niche directories first because of the traffic that they are likely to bring in addition to increasing your link popularity. It is advisable to also target quality general directories as they also add value to your link building campaign.

You can find good and working list of niche directories at DirectoryCritic.com.

One way Links Vs Reciprocal Links

One way linking means that you do not have to link back to the website that links to your website. Reciprocal links on the other hand refers to an arrangement where two websites agree to link back to each other. Generally, one way links are accorded more significance by search engines. Prefer them unless you’re submitting a directory and comfortable with reciprocal one.

Speed of directory submissions

When it comes to speed of doing directory submissions, feel free. You can even submit to 1000 directories in one day. Why? Because all of them will not approve immediately. You’ll get approvals (or rejections) and they keep coming for months. So that would actually be a slow link building even if you submit 1000s in a single crazy day.

Conclusion

Link popularity is one of the most important ways used by search engines to determine how your site ranks and directory submission still remains an integral part of link building. While hundreds of free directories may prove worthless, there are many others free and paid directories that will be invaluable to your link building campaign. Remember also that as long as a directory is indexed and has not been banned, it is still worthy of your link regardless of its page rank or quality.

While I conclude the directory submission guide, I’d comment on value on directory submissions today. David Wallace article on value of directrory submission is complete in itself but I’ve personally got some link popularity if not traffic from some quality directory submissions. Niche directories always beat general directories when it comes to link value. I’d recommend human operated and well maintained web directories to list your websites. See you again at next DYN guide on Article Marketing.

Chill & cheers!

What Is SEO Copywriting?

SEO is an acronym of the Search Engine Optimization. Basically, this refers to a technique which ensures that a website ranks better on major search engines. SEO copywriting, therefore, refers to a specialized form to adhere to the rules of search engine optimization in terms of keywords, alignment and balanced pitch.

Traditionally, SEO copywriting was thought to be a keyword-rich copywriting. But it has become more of keyword-oriented copywriting with the recent advent of web 2.0 tools and audience’ increasing awareness to quality information. So, SEO copywriting means – to please both your audience as well as search engines.

Regular Copywriting and SEO Copywriting— Two Sides Of a Coin?

Before dealing with the specifics of the SEO Copywriting, it’s important to know the difference between SEO copywriting and the regular one.

Regular copy is written keeping your regular and subscribed audience in mind. You’re least bothered about the keywords but stay on-topic. This kind of copywriting is exceptionally great, compelling, conversational and written only for real people targeting certain topic. Most of the blogging is done using regular copy style but with an advanced touch of tags and long tail keywords. Google hot trends are helpful for bloggers in creating such in-demand posts.

An SEO Copy is written keeping the search engines and readers; both in mind. SEO copy needs an advanced keyword research. It needs to please the search engine with the right keyword density and positioning; and readers with the desired quantity and quality of information that made them land on the page after a particular keyphrase search. A professional SEO copywriter will frame the topic considering the possible keywords that can be used. The professional makes sure that content makes sense while keeping the required keyword density. Not every writer can create a meaningful copy while using maximum keywords in a balanced manner.

SEO Copywriting: Positives and Problems

SEO copywriting definitely charms webmasters for its search engine rankings benefits but it does have some pitfalls too. Let’s have a look at both positives and problems of SEO copywriting.

SEO copywriting Weaknesses

SEO copywriting requires a specialized writer - As we already discussed above, it is not everyone’s game to play with the right keywords and drafting the right copy that invites both readers and search engines at the same time. You need to pay for those appealing high rankings with SEO copywriting.

Not for every niche – Not all website can monetize SEO copywriting. For example, there can be academic or social niches that may not work so well with SEO copywriting. You need to target only audience and leave the entire job to link building. Likewise, graphic sites can’t make use of SEO copy.

Only for not-so-competitive search terms – Needless to say, if you spam your copy (so called SEO copy) with hotels hotels hotels and hotels haphazardly, your site will not outrank others. All I mean to say, it works well only for minimum to average competitive search terms. For other high competitive keywords, most intensive backlink strategies are required.

Don’t forget the competitors – Yes, your competitors can employ some other technique to rank on same keywords. And if their technique beats your SEO copywriting magic tool, you’ve lost your position. So SEO copywriting is not a solution. It is just a support to your SEO campaign.

SEO Copywriting Strengths

• It helps the website rankings for a stable position. Search engines find the website with an SEO copy more relevant to the search terms so they give priority to such sites.
• Likewise, SEO copywriting helps your visitors find the content and site relevant, thus it tends to convert your visitor into a customer or regular reader.
• Though this logic is debatable but SEO copywriting helps in maintaining stable search engine positions even if there are frequent algorithm changes.

Start With Advanced Keyword research

Advanced keyword research is the base of SEO copywriting. After all you need the keywords to target and that comes from what people are looking for; what’s in demand and what is achievable.

Keyword research tools

I personally love SEObook keyword suggestion tool however, most people tend to follow Google’s external keyword tool at first hand. SEObook’s tool gives a great and almost actual idea of number of searches in Google, Yahoo and MSN. Paid tools like wordtracker and keyword discovery can help you get a narrow idea. Recently, Spacky has come into online market with an easy and free access.

Be realistic

Targeting “real estate” is definitely a silly idea. Be specific. Target achievable keywords like Costa Rica real estate, panama real estate, Real estate Panama etc are achievable as well help you get niche visitors and targeted traffic.

Target what’s in your reach

Targeting those highly competitive keywords is not recommended. You can get better traffic as well as rankings if you combine some competitive keywords and create an achievable set of keywords.

Relevancy

Make sure that your keyword research lead to your ultimate goal. If you’re an SEO service provider, targeting keywords like advanced SEO services, cheap SEO services would be better than targeting “search engine optimization”. Target what leads to your sales. Using related service keywords makes an SEO copy more effective as well as converting.

Remember that if you’re armed with right and advanced keyword research, you tend to create the most relevant content that enhances your credibility among your competitors.

If your content is laced with hot keywords, more and more people tend to link you up; and you get backlinks… for free. So in short, an SEO copy gets you targeted readers, becomes the base for your sales and brings you free backlinks.

How to Write that Perfect SEO Copy: Tips and Techniques

We’re aware of the SEO copywriting strengths but how to churn out that killing copy where you need not to sacrifice the readability of your web content. Easy easy.. take it easy. After you’re done with an advanced research on your monetizing keywords, let’s move step by step and explore that SEO copywriting technique.

Title – The Copy King

Of course it is. Blog platforms already take care of this point and your title becomes h1 or h2 tag. It is the most important key element determined by search engine to count your website among relevant ones. Else, the main title of a copy works as h1 tag in static websites. If you keep the most targeted keyword as the title, it works the best but may look dull and dry to your readers; spoiling to look and feel of your web copy. You can rather wrap your keywords into a compelling title.

Mind The Opening

What if the copy starts with the keyword itself and pick up a pitchy line to grasp your visitor’s attention or something that he may already be thinking. This trick works great until and unless the keyword is too vague to put right at the beginning.

Otherwise, you may include the keyword in the first line (first 15 words) in a smart and appealing manner. Reason is; search engines take it as the page description and reader will have an idea of the relevancy from first two lines itself. Opening should be engaging and relevant enough to get your visitor read ahead.

Use of Synonyms

It makes your web copy look natural and not spammed with keywords. Not to forget, searchers search with synonyms too when they don’t get satisfactory results from general keywords, so you should not miss the opportunity to be found out.

Use of long-tail keyphrases

Some long-tail keyphrases can really help you monetize your niche. Without repeating these longtail keywords, once appearance is enough to be scanned by search engines.

Making use of subheadings

This is another key element of SEO copywriting and to get found by your audience. Firstly, use of secondary or primary keywords in subheadings makes h2 and h3 tags work nicely and in favor of your search engine rankings. Secondly, you’re not repeating the keywords but making your copy easy to read. Second,

Body of the copy

To what extent you need to repeat? Well, as long as it is digestible and doesn’t make your copy spammy. The right technique for an SEO copywriter to spread the keywords in copy is –

• Have a look at the keywords. Assemble 4-5 keywords vaguely in mind.
• Think of a draft and idea that can work with these keywords. Subheadings make good drafts often.
• Now, start writing the copy without including the keywords but in relevance. Just be natural.
• Once your draft is ready, pick up the keywords one by one and start inserting them here and there; wherever they fit nicely.
• Make sure that you use the keywords at least twice in entire content; naturally.
• Now, add the appealing pitch to the copy so it doesn’t look keyword-oriented but reader-oriented.
• For a perfect SEO copywriting, try making use of keyword seasoning rather than keyword density. Days of keyword density are gone. I’ve personally ranked higher for many keywords and niches, where the keywords were used hardly twice in 1000 words. However, other factors like on-page optimization, backlinks etc. do matter.

Stay on-topic

Here comes the right selection of keywords. To make use of maximum keywords, you should not divert from main theme of your copy. It’s better to choose a set of related keywords so you can use them naturally at the right place. If you’re writing on carpet cleaning, then you use keywords like carpet cleaning, carpet cleaning services, carpet cleaning “city”, carpet cleaners, professional carpet cleaning etc.

Get your visitor in action

You must be looking for some action from your visitor. Lets get them in action. Add that appeal, those questions using the right words and keywords so they either stay engaged through the content, or contact you, or subscribe or make a purchase. It is possible only if you

1. Stay on-topic
2. Look natural in convincing them throughout
3. Follow the right path to your motive
4. Make use of right keywords at right place at right time

SEO Copy: Language and Style Elements

Writing an effective copy that works equally well for the readers and search engines is a challenge. Well, the first category reads the lines while the second type launch a scan and then decides over the ranking. Now, the interesting part here is that the search engines are doing that for the readers. All search engines are making maximum efforts to make their results as relevant as possible. Google has recently changed its algo and removed the misspelled search results completely. An SEO copy makes the visitor feel that they’re on the right page and sustain their interest. Again, it is the human beings that will be your potential consumers. So, it is important that your content has the style that will not only attract them, but will hold them on as well.

Here are some tips that will help you achieve that end:

Address the visitor directly:

Until and unless it is not an academic copy, you can address your visitor with the question crawling in his mind. This technique works wonders. You need to grasp your readers’ attention right at the beginning. If lose the grip, you’ve lost the visitor… forever.

Bring reality

Be conversational. Talk to your readers so they stay engaged throughout the copy. A casual tone will help your readers feel comfortable and interested.

Also, this is the style that corresponds most readily with the internet. Essentially, internet is the causal social media. In fact, it has developed a language of its own and that is mostly casual. So, if you are maintaining that in your work, you are likely to get a better result. If you observe the style taken up by Google, you will find out that they are playful and yet they establish a direct communication with the reader by addressing each of them individually and yet at the same time. This is the best way to communicate through the internet.

Sense of humor

Win your readers with a good sense of humor. Few jokes, crisp talks, relevant and interesting examples put life in an SEO copy. Try and you’d believe the magic after some increased sales or more subscribers.

Leave the corporate stamp and be friendly

Even if you’re writing a professional copy for a brand, it can be more effective with a personal touch and conversational writing style. This is what the people like to see. Beyond the periphery of the online communication, this is true to every means and modes of communication. An effective communication must be built on a common platform. That means that the communicator and the recipient must associate with each other… naturally and comfortably.

Avoid technical jargon

The principle behind this is the same as the previous one. Too much use of technical words can distract or even disappoint the readers. Remember, most of them are layman and hardly have any technical knowledge about the subject you are dealing with. So, the target will be to make them understand the point using simple words. Thus, ‘insomnia’ can be replaced by ‘sleeplessness’ and so on. But, there is a common tendency to use the technical words as much as possible. Remember, people search most with general keywords.

Sometimes, however the Jargons are welcome
Well, this is when you are talking with the niche audience. In fact, in such circumstances, the use of the jargon is quite necessary. For, that will create a closer bond between you and the reader. So, you can talk about the technicalities of scripting when you are talking with a computer programmer. There you are showing of your erudition on the subject and in return, you will get appreciation. However, you can use jargons only when you are sure of the expertise of your audience. A thorough research on that topic is therefore, mandatory before launching on the use of technical jargons.

Create Visuals with Word

The ideal style of SEO copywriting should reveal a vivid visual of what you’re saying. The keyphrases,language and the syntax should put up a show. For that, you have to ignore the terms and rather go for the plain words that describe the message more vividly. This will lay open the idea that you want to share with the reader. An SEO copywriter would be to ignite the fire of imagination within the reader’s mind… with the right use of keywords. Once they start to feel the product, they find their needs meeting with the product and they start thinking about purchasing it.

‘We’ is not the best means always

There are big brands like Microsoft, Mercedes or IBM and their brand value is enough to impress the readers. However, if you are not writing copy for such a big brand, you should not brag about it. So, ‘we’ should not be there too much. It is far more effective to say how you can improve your conditions and help them out. At the same time, avoid boasting of your achievements unnecessarily even if it the ‘about us’ page.

Induce the readers to take part

Remember the readers are shy or confused. So, when they are visiting your site for the first time, they will be reluctant to be active. Naturally, the responsibility lies on you to encourage to action. Otherwise, you will never get the response you are looking for.

Top 6 Mistakes to Avoid in SEO copywriting

Though we already discussed randomly and indirectly about not-to-do in above content but here are quick recall of mistakes that one should avoid.

• Do Not Deviate: Stay Focused

• Do not get emotional with the keywords: Avoid spamming and write naturally

• Do Not Add Fluff: Provide Proper Fact, Solution and Answers

• Do Not Evade Answers to What, Where, When, Why and How all using the keywords.

• Do not miss the chance to use subheadings wherever possible

• Do not leave the customers to guess. Provide the follow up information

Formatting support to effective SEO copywriting

Formatting your page content can be a good SEO tactic that search engine recognize often.

Use Bold And Italics – search engine bots do put extra attention to bold and Itlaics text. However, too much use of them will spoil the effort. You should use them sparingly.
Do Effective Linking - Inserting internal hyperlinks in your site can be very effective for a successful SEO. These links can help your readers with a better navigation. First, they explore your site more. Second, they give you extra benefits in terms of on-page search engine optimization.
Use Bullets and Subheadings – Bulleted points are good both to your readers as well as search engines. These are another key spots to use your keywords in an easy way.
Short and crisp paragraphs – This goes mainly for your readers. Shorter paragraphs tend to make even longer pages interesting and readable.

So that’s all for now for SEO copywriting, however, we always keep a room for additions and improvement. We’ll be back soon with next DYN chapter – Directory submissions.

Chill & cheers!

See the Difference: On-Site and On-Page

That difference can be explained in terms of points of view. On-page optimization deals with the nitty-gritty and working with individual pages. On-site optimizations, meanwhile, take a ‘big picture’ approach with the whole website including on-page within this.

Tasks like meta-tagging, formatting text and image optimization would thus fall under the former, while items like site structuring, interlinking, mapping and navigation together with on-page optimization are categorized with the latter. So let’s start with on-page optimization.

Title tag optimization

Title tag is the first and most important element that attracts searcher’s attention. It needs to be short yet appealing, relevant and descriptive. Within 60 characters (9-10 words), you need to please searcher as well as search engines. This is what you can do to make your title tag outstanding.

1. Include your site name or business name. It helps branding your business too.
2. Use one or two of your most targeted keywords in a smart manner.
3. Don’t write a sentence. Use of words like is, am, are would be waste of your 60 characters wordlimit. Let the title look like a title only
4. Don’t write in all caps. Write only title caps. EXPERT SEO AND MARKETING COMPANY may prove hard to your searchers’ eyes. Expert SEO And Marketing Company looks soothing to eyes.

For example, for www.Health-Niche.com, a nice title may look like-

Health Niche – Authentic Health Information Resource Online

Meta Tag Optimization

Though many SEO experts don’t find it as important for on-site SEO as it was before, but an alert webmaster will not ignore any aspect of optimization. It may not be very relevant for search engines today but it is the second most important element that attracts your targeted audience. Meta tag can be an impressive description of your website/ webpage while covering some good keywords within 200 characters (35-40 words).

You can take note of following points to make a good meta tag structure-

1. Don’t be too dull and boring in your meta tag description. You can write a call-to-action description about your website with your unique selling points. Let your searchers know how you’re better and why they should click you.
2. Adding your contact id or phone number gives a good advantage in meta tag. It can a direct call-to-action idea.
3. Using keywords is a good idea but stuffing the description with keywords will disappoint the searchers. Write what looks good, relevant and digestible.

Remember, you never get a second chance to make first impression.

Image Optimization

Search engines can’t read images so use of alt text comes in scene. Moreover, because of slow loading, even human readers may not find the images. Alt text optimization help them know what’s the image is about. These points will help you in image optimization.

1. Write a short and relevant description in alt text (alternate text). This text will appear when you rover your mouse over an image. Use of targeted keywords can be a good idea in alt text. If the image doesn’t appear because of any reason, alt text appears.
2. Giving title to your image is another nice thought. It would appear as a tool tip when you move your mouse on the image.
3. Prefer giving a relevant name to your image rather than “DSC7689.JPEG”.
4. Always use images of moderate size. Too big images may increase the loading time as well as page size that may affect your search engine rankings too.

The example code for image optimization can be

[img src=”http://sitename/imagename.jpg” alt=”Image description” title=”Title of the Image”]

Keyword Optimization – Good Research and Balanced Density

Search engines can be a hard bunch to please. Tailoring your site to their demands will improve your ranking, but overdoing it could just as easily harm your position. A balance must be struck between implementing enough of each strategy to get noticed, but at the same time not enough to get penalized. Find yourself a keyword density analyzer (usually called a KDA), as it will be your best tool for sticking to the right amount of keywords.

By the time you get on-page SEO and keyword density part, you should already have a list of keywords to use. If you’re entering a hotly contested market, it’s a good idea to target less popular keywords or variations of ones already used by bigger players. Don’t waste your time, money and energy by working on random keywords. Keyword research tools like SEObook keyword research, Google adwords, Wordtracker are good. Recently, I got to know about Spacky.com that actually gives more of Google adwords result but still an easy and quick keyword research option.

1. Keywords should make up about 2% to 5% of all the content in each page. A 500-word content, for example, should have anywhere from 5 to 20 instances of your keyword. Too few doesn’t mean you’re under-optimizing; but too many may hurt your search engine ranking.
2. Compound your keywords. Instead of using ‘mountain bicycle’ and ‘bicycle parts’ separately, use ‘mountain bicycle parts’ so that you’ll cover both while typing less.
3. Feel free to use synonyms. It works really great. First, your content doesn’t look spammed with keywords. Second, your searchers may try different synonyms to get more and more relevant results and you got the chance there.
4. Use as many longtail keywords as you can. They’re not only easy to use but also easy to rank for. HitTail.com is one of the great sites for longtail keyword ideas. Moreover, you can use words like best, free, cheap etc. with your keywords.
5. Use singular and plural forms of your keywords

Fine-Tuning Your HTML Tags

Of all the on-page optimization strategies, formatting is easily one of the simplest and easiest to implement. All you’ll need is a basic knowledge of the various HTML tags.

Search engine spiders determine which words and strings are most important on a single page, and use a simple method to do so. A string of text that’s formatted differently from the text around it is presumed to be emphasized, and therefore more important than the rest. The more prominent a block of text is, the more important it’s assumed to be. The ultimate goal of on-page SEO is to show search engine spiders what each page is about.

Here are some things you should remember about SEO-friendly HTML Tagging:

• Use headings when possible. Search spiders give the most attention to heading tags (<h1> to <h6>). You can’t, however, use these tags at every turn. They’re a good idea only in titles and subheadings. The most important header tag is h1 that is actually your site name or title.
• h2 and h3 work as page titles or post titles. That is why we emphasize using keywords in titles or page names.
• h4 and h5 can be used best in form of bold subheadings within your post or pages.
•  Make optimum use of bold, italicized and underlined text wherever possible. The <b>, <i> and <u> tags are the easiest to use in paragraphs because they don’t affect the formatting of adjacent text. You can use <quote> tags if picking up some content snippet from some other source.

I personally liked the post on use of header tags nicely. Give it a read.

Using Internal Links and Outbound links in On-site optimization

Inbound links are most often discussed in SEO, but internal links are of equal help and importance when optimized correctly. This is an area that many webmasters overlook, and one that you can easily turn into your advantage with a better navigation for your visitors and search engines.

1. Do PageRank sculpting. This is one of the most discussed topics among SEO experts lately. I’d rather like to quote from Searcheginemarketing.co.uk -

PageRank sculpting refers to the act of using nofollow tags on internal site links to focus page strength or link strength to the pages and anchor text that a site owner wants in a search engine.

I may come up with a article on pagerank sculpting very soon but for now, there cannot be better read than  views of 10 SEO experts on pagerank sculpting and Matt Cutts recent article on Pagerank Sculpting.

2. Give descriptive anchor text. You can use “Click Here to know more” for all your links, but you’re missing out on an optimization opportunity. Seize the chance to get your keyword in and give a link vote, all in a single string. Instead of just “Click Here,” use specific words like “car rentals in New York” or “hotels in California.”

3. Link content to other content. Turn simple keyword phrases in Article A into links that point to related Article B. Not only will cross-linking your content give a link vote from one related page to another, but also keep visitors reading your content i.e a better stay time.

Keyword Positioning Can Improve Rankings

The position of text and keyword also has a big influence on how the spiders will prioritize a string of text. Keywords, when placed at the very start of an article on a page, will have more weight than the same keywords in, say, the middle or toward the end of the same article. Putting keywords in the title and subheadings, therefore, would give the most weight.

Although you should definitely scatter your keywords throughout your content, it’s still a good idea to put at least one or two instances of your keywords as high up and to the left as you can. Combined with appropriate formatting, this will clue the spiders on the priority of your keywords in your content.

Adding Site Maps

Adding a site map to your website is a simple but very effective on-site SEO strategy. Now, there are three ways to implement a site map – one for readers (HTML sitemap), one for spiders (XML sitemap) and a third that covers both. You’ll obviously want the third on your site.

Visitors to your site will need an HTML site map that’s literally a listing of all the important pages on your site. In case of wordpress blogs, HTML sitemap plugin is all you need to set up. For sites, it’s a good idea to simulate this listing first on paper or in an Excel file so that you can make sure it looks intelligible visually.

1. List all the categories of the content on your website. Instead of categories, you could also opt to use tags, as in blogs. For larger sites (i.e. upwards of 100 pages), make sub-categories and subtopics as well.
2. Place each page in one category. If a page belongs to more than one category, place it under the more relevant one; don’t double-list it.
3. Convert all the text into links. Use the text you made as anchor text for links that point to the corresponding pages. Make as much of your site map clickable as possible.

Spiders, on the other hand, require a more technical solution. You’ll have to do a bit of coding to do it, so start reading up on syntax.

1. Create an XML file that contains links to all the pages on your site; you can do this manually with a text editor or use one of the many XML site map generators now available on the web, especially for blogs.
2. Upload the XML file to your site’s root directory. Take note of the complete URL.
3. Update your site’s Robots.txt file to let the spiders know about the site map’s existence. Add a “sitemap:” line in your site’s Robots.txt file followed by the complete URL of your XML site map. 4. Update your sitemap in Google webmasters’Tools.

Do both and you should get something for both visitors and spiders alike.

Many pages use some sort of graphical site map that, while helpful for human visitors, is unintelligible for search engines. For any graphical elements on your site, always provide a text equivalent – alt text or descriptive anchor text, say – for the engines to read.

Site maps minimize the risk of orphan pages, lone pages with no link to any other part of your site. Secondly, internal links establish which pages are most important in the site. Lastly, the network of links keeps your site in the W3C standards on site structure.

On-Site Optimization for Blogs

Because of its unique function, on-site optimization for a blog can be tricky. Your home page is dynamic, always changing with each new post. A new post for one keyword, for example, might get displaced when a new post for another keyword is uploaded.

The best strategy for optimizing blogs is to blend static and dynamic elements. Though your home page changes with your posts, you can set it to show more than just those. Adding static areas in the home page can address the SEO difficulties of most blogs.

1. Place a short blurb or introduction with keywords at the top of the page. It’ll keep critical keywords visible on the home page.
2. Design a header with appropriate keyworded alt text. You could even use it as part of the blog template itself, as long as it’s on the home page.
3. Keep a static list of keywords on a different part of the home page. This is most often done with a list of tags or topics, usually paired with a navigation bar at the top or side of the page template.
4. Be religious with tagging. Each of those tags are keywords too.
5. Stick to just one or two topics per post. As tempting as it is to write an epic about anything and everything, keep your posts focused on just one or two items. The search engines will end up ranking the page higher than its coherence.

If you don’t want to keep a static homepage, then All-in-one-SEO plugin in wordpress does all the job for on-page optimization or in other words, optimizing your blogposts. All you need to put title, post description and keywords in the fields while you write your post.

The plugin lets you optimize your homepage with a good title, description and keywords from its general settings

Alias for page title Plugin does the similar job in Joomla.

Whichever strategy you decide to use, remember to keep your keywords visible. You’ll be good to go as long as your keywords on your home page are readable by the spiders.

Static Sites and On-Site Optimization

Doing on-site SEO for a static site is a little different from optimizing a dynamic site like a blog. It doesn’t, however, come without its own set of obstacles.

1. Implement all the on-site strategies above. It sounds simple, but there lies the difficulty: ensuring you didn’t leave anything out. It’s a long list of jobs to do, and is daunting for a large site with more than a few pages.
2. Maintain a clean site structure. That is, see to it that all the pages are properly linked to each other. This can get difficult, especially if you add pages piecemeal.
3. Check each one. Measure what you can – keyword density, keyword positioning and text readability, among others. A single page that violates the spam guidelines of any search engine can detract from the ranking of your entire domain.

Having a good system on a static site makes on-site SEO easier. Make site map that you can easily update so that your site is always inter-linked, regardless of new pages. Always be conscious of which pages are important so that you know where to use NoFollow tags.

Working on robots.txt

Robots.txt is used to restrict and allow the search engine bots/crawlers from accessing different pages/ parts of your sites. If you don’t have robots.txt file, then create one from your cpanel.

You might need to restrict search engine crawlers to access admin folder of your site as it contains no information. In that case, you need to do following –

User-agent: *
Disallow: /admin/

Similarly you can disallow crawlers for other folders too like

User-agent: *
Disallow: /administrator/
Disallow: /cache/
Disallow: /components/
Disallow: /editor/
Disallow: /help/
Disallow: /includes/

user-agent: *  – implies here that none of the crawler should be allowed to visit the following destinations.

Similarly you can allow  the crawlers to visit any location. Though it is redundant to do so as crawlers by default access all information

User-agent: *
Disallow: /administrator/
Allow: /searchhistory/

Also, If you have created an XML Sitemap for your site you can specify the path to the Sitemap in your robots.txt file.

User-agent: *
Disallow: /administrator/
Allow: /searchhistory/
Sitemap: http://www.yoursite.com/sitemaps/profiles-sitemap.xml

To make your blogposts or site pages in-links do-follow, you need to put the following

User-agent: *
Disallow:
User-agent: Googlebot
Disallow: /cgi-bin/

To have no-follow inlinks, you may want to do the following

User-agent: *
Disallow: /
User-agent: Googlebot
Disallow: /cgi-bin/

Or you may want to try advanced robots.txt generator at basisoft.com

A Quick SEO Checklist

You may have noticed by now that good on-site optimization for any website doesn’t require a special technique or software. It’s about knowing where you can optimize and optimizing consistently. It’s not as easy as it sounds, but it’s doable for sure. Make sure you don’t forget to…

• …fill up all possible Meta, Title and Alt tags in your HTML code
• …keep keywords between 2% to 5% of your total content
• …give special balancing and attention to your keywords
• …place keywords as early in your content as possible
• …maintain as clean and compliant a site structure as you can
• …fix your robots.txt file according to your needs

If you think you need a more explicit guide to optimizing your own site, check out your competition. Though it doesn’t fall clearly into on-site but getting your website W3C Complaint is the last yet important step to close the job. Get analytical SEO tools like KDAs and then use them on the top 5 or 10 pages for your keyword. That should be an excellent clue about what – and what not – to do for your own site.

Keeping an eye on other pages, however, won’t likely be enough to get you high rankings. The secret to making the check-and-coy stratagem work is to always put in something extra – more and better tags or another optimization, for example – so that you get an actual edge over the competition.

That’s all for now about on-site optimization, however, I may add or edit if I get to know something more relevant in future.

See you all on the next DYN series post – SEO Copywriting

Cheers!

Picture your website sitting on top 3 positions within 5-6 months backed by a powerful marketing plan executed successfully following Google’s webmaster guidelines and enjoying those appealing top positions without any worries of drop in rankings. Liked it? Enjoyed this ranking fantasy? You surely would.  It’s been more than two and half months and we’re sitting on a stable position among top 3 Google results for sulumits retsambew. Though I’m not new to SEO and marketing, but sulumits contest is definitely my first ever contest and it has given me a lot.. Actually a lot (that I’d share in a special post after the contest).

I realized that I was going lazy in last 2 weeks and I had to do something really productive; for me as well as for my readers and for all the webmasters who can share their expertise. And I came up with a plan – The master plan that would start from entering to web world with your blog/website to reaching to dominating your niche with a successful, strong and fair SEO and marketing plan.

It’d be a step-by-step guide with detailed information, lists, tips, and warnings. This kind of series or guide is nothing new but we’d just try to cover almost every detail that a webmaster may need and every question that one may have in mind.

Moreover, It’d be great if my old and new readers, subscribers as well as expert webmasters come and drop their comments, questions so that we could make this master plan even better.

I’d like to cite every possible site and post that has inspired me to create this master plan. I shouldn’t forget citing ShoeMoney’s Xtreme course that has sparked me with this plan idea.

Every marketing and website promotion plan has certain steps to go ahead. It is not just about link building but about brand building and targeted traffic generation as well; using some conventional and some advance methods. This plan would discuss each step in detail with dedicated posts. This is our initial outline of steps discussed though it can change anytime as we move ahead.

DYN1 – On-site Optimization
DYN2 – SEO Copywriting
DYN3 – Directory Submissions
DYN4 – Article Marketing
DYN5 – Social Bookmarking
DYN6 – Blogging Communities (Hubpages, Squidoo etc.)
DYN7 – Do-follow Blog Comments
DYN8 – Forum posting and advertising
DYN9 – One-way Link Building Through Text Links
DYN10 – Contextual Link Building
DYN11 – Guest Blogging
DYN12 – Link Baiting
DYN13 – Yahoo answers, Wikis
DYN14 – Email Marketing
DYN15 – Video Marketing
DYN16 – Landing Pages
DYN17 – Social Media Marketing
DYN18 – PPC (Pay per click)

I’d try to make these posts after every 3 days. Feel free to drop your comments or ideas or even steps that you may want to discuss. You can comment here or mail me at sunita@contentaxis.com. I’d add your suggestions in the posts.

See you all on Sunday with first post DYN1 – On-site Optimization.

You may not want to miss this DYN series. Subscribe here if you’re not subscribed yet. Glad to be in touch with you.

Cheers!