John Cow dot Com » Content Creation

Ending the Year off With a Big Thankyou!

Jason Katzenback — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 17:14:40 +0000

Why I Love Doing This!

First of all I am not going to lie to anyone and say I am not in this for the money. Yes, this is my source of income, and yes I do this to make money… like duh… as if you did not know that.

But… and I am serious here…

I also take pride in always doing a good job. I have never been one to settle for second best and before my online career I always had a desire to achieve something bigger. In my own mind I was always good at it too… I say my own mind because I know that as I got promoted and moved around, I could not please everyone.

I remember when I was 29 and shipped across the border to the US to work as a manager and my welcoming by the employees there was.. well, less then spectacular.

The cool thing however was that the day I left to go full-time with this IM thing, the comments i got from a lot of them was… well 180 degrees from when I walked in the door the first time. In fact one individual that pretty much was one of those people that made everyone nervous gave me a hug when I was walking out the doors. This was a red neck mechanic that… well you would not have expected that from him. Another person said that they were going to really miss me from the morning meetings as I always was able to see the good and lighter side of things and make people smile.

Why am I telling you this?

I have always wanted to get the best out of people and I always want to help people be good at what they are doing and get the best results possible. Over the years I have seen many people succeed through some relationship to me… whether it be tools, training or just friendship. The problem is, even though you know this… well sometimes you just want to hear it… ’cause it is always nice to be appreciated.

Below is an email I received just a few days ago… and all I can say is Thank you Tom!

It is wonderful to hear success stories… not ones about a specific product… but just in general that I was tied in with this person’s six figure net income.

Before you read that though, I want to give quick recognition to a few that were part of helping me get to where I am today…

The late Corey Rudle – Was the first ever IM product I was introduced to… back in 1996. He was certainly a pioneer in this industry and was somehow tied in with a huge majority of the successful big names in this industry.

Mark Hendricks – Back in late 2004 we talked on the phone for over an hour thanks to an email I sent him… he totally changed my view on this whole IM game.

Jason Potash – I was an original “EzineAnnouncer” customer, became one of that product’s success stories and because of that I became good friends with Jason and today I am business partners with him on many projects.

Marc Quarles – I was a successful “DirectoryGenerator” customer and always provided feedback and ideas to Marc, as a result we became good friends and partners in many new projects.

John Reese – TrafficFormula v1 (what else is there to say… it was an amazing info product when it came out)

Jerry West – As good as I am at SEO and affiliate marketing… I am and will always be a student of Jerry.

Marc Lindsay – Was one of his first JV partners with PLRPro (while he was still in the army) and we became very good friends and he has been one person who gave me a lot of encouragement through a shitty time.

Buck Rizvi – Just a freaking good guy, that is good at what he does and has also giving me encouragement through a crappy time that kept me focused.

Dean Caporella – A success story of mine (sort of), a very good friend and someone who always reminds me as to why it’s worth it to take a few extra minutes out of your day to help people (especially customers).

Garry Conn – When I first took over ownership of this blog early 2008, Garry and I ended up having a little competition that.. well really helped me with this whole blogging thing. Garry is a good family man and has a great blog.

OK… that’s all the yukky, mushy crap I can give for 2009.

Here is the email I got from Tom Elliot… and Tom.. THANKS!

Hey Jason and Marc,

I’ve been meaning to write for a while to thank you for the excellent mentoring you gave me during the first Portal Feeder mentoring program. Thanks largely to the foundation you gave me, I’ve increased my gross internet sales from an embarrassingly low annual sales of like $12.36 to a solid $ six-figure annual number. In 2010, I will generate a comfortable $ six-figure net income from internet marketing and see no reason that can’t continue to grow at a solid rate over the next few years.

I’m now employing two full-time staff in the Philippines, a part-time bookkeeper in my office, and soon hope to add a full-time position for one of my daughters. My goal is to provide a solid business opportunity for my children to carry forward in these uncertain times and to be able to give back through charitable giving to causes that are important to my wife and me.

I can’t honestly say this is all the result of your training, but you guys gave me the basic framework and the confidence to pursue the dream. Thanks to your patient mentoring, I’ve added income streams from affiliate products, my own info products, some great physical products sold through affiliate links, and a growing list of 30,000 subscribers in various niches.

All I can say is thanks! Please let me know if I can ever reciprocate your confidence, willingness to share, and good will.

Best regards,
Tom
Elliott Scott Holdings, LLC
325 NW Vermont Place, Suite 105
Bend, OR 97701

I am considering doing another closed door mentoring program in 2010… this would be for only 20 people and would be a weekly meeting one on one for an hour a week plus a group call each week plus access to all my products. I will pretty much hold your hand from start to finish and provide support and stuff for you for a full year. I will be sharing more on this next week… so if your are interested stay tuned.

Website Design & Being a Trusted Expert – Part 2

Jason Katzenback — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 00:14:54 +0000

Do Your Visitors See Their Perfect Reflection In Your Website?

Continued from Website Design & Being a Trusted Expert Part 1

The first thing a buyer wants to see when entering your site is something they can relate to; the site has to resonate with them. If they can see something of themselves in the site, they will inherently trust it more.

You need to think about the site organization – you need to make sure that there are the appropriate links that relate directly to what buyers are looking for, and that follows their thought process so that it looks logical and organic to them.

Once you’ve identified the situations that your targets are finding themselves in that causes them to seek you out, and you have the starting point for how to organize you navigation. Make your buying process follow the path of solving those problems. You then have the opportunity to communicate your expertise in solving these problems, build an empathic report with them, and move them further along to completing the buying cycle.

Who your target audience is will also influence the formats in which you talk to them. You need to think about your buyer’s preferred media and learning styles. Some groups will love to read long copy, while others prefer things short and to the point. An older target audience might not enjoy videos or podcasts as much as a younger audience. Whatever the personality of your target audience, your site also has to have its own distinct and memorable personality. And you need to make sure that, once you’ve decided on what that should be, that you stay consistent with that tone throughout all of your communications.

Price point is also important when it comes to how much sales copy to use. If you are selling a low priced offer (less then $97), you do not need 30 pages of sales copy… keep it to about 4 full page scrolls max. If you are offering a free trial (Pay $1 now and then get access for 30 days), then use even less copy. Focus on the benefits and let the free trial do the selling for you. In fact (obviously depending on the target audience), for free trials, short pages with a video and few bullet points work VERY well!

As you start to get repeat visitors, they will develop an emotional and personal relationship with you. They will expect to see and hear things in a certain way from your. To change that voice drastically without any warning will undermine the trust you’ve built with them. That’s not to say you shouldn’t be testing things (that’s a whole other series of posts) but you need to make sure you’re not making dramatic changes in the personality of your site without cause.

Don’t forget the importance of images and pictures in setting up the personality of your site. They are powerful tools that, when chosen correctly, can really resonate emotionally with your audience. When chosen incorrectly, they can be off-putting, and ruin the atmosphere that you’re trying to create. This is a good place for testing – most people focus on the hard things, like the offer, or buy-it-now buttons, but you’d be surprised at the difference an image can make in your conversion rate.

A few important things to understand about images.

“I Am Not That Old Am I?” – People want to think they are younger then they are… so if you are relating to a target audience that is 50, have pictures that have 40 year old looking people.Use common sense here… if you are targeting a teenagers, do NOT but pictures of children (I hope you realize that is obvious).
“Show Me How I Will Look After Your Product” – You want to show what the end result of what your offering will provide. This is why you don’t see weight loss supplements with only fat people on the page and dating sites with only lonely losers on the page. Show pictures of happy couples, six pack abs, laughter and other happy things. Obviously it depends on what your selling, if you are selling a product focused on potty training, a picture of a guy with six pack abs is not really a good choice… but a happy kid on the potty with happy parents, that there is a good one.
“Show Me Where to Go” – Use arrows to highlight where to take action… this has proven over and over again to increase conversions. We all hate to admit it but we all want to be told what to do… we just don’t want others to know that. Make it as brain dead simple as possible to see exactly where your customer is to go on the page, and arrows work very well.

Make sure that there’s a way for visitors to provide feedback to you. Make the ‘contact us’ information easy to find, use ‘rate this’ buttons for your products, and have either forums or comments enabled on your blog so that people can express their opinions easily. You can get valuable information about how well your site is resonating with its intended target (or not.)

Here’s what you need to do:

Make sure all of the technical aspects on your site work properly – no dead links, no images that fail to load, etc.
Come up with a site navigation/site map that is designed and organized with your potential buyers in mind – not how you organize your company. Also on the main page that you actually are selling, try to have the navigation moved out of the “above the fold” area. Keep them focused on the offer.
Make as many places for a two-way conversation that you can: easy to find ‘contact us’ information, a forum, comments on your blog, customer ratings on products.
Make sure that the ‘soft’ elements, like graphics and images, match your buyer personas and are going to resonate with them and make them perceive you as a Trusted Expert.

Website Design & Being a Trusted Expert – Part 1

Jason Katzenback — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 21:56:41 +0000

Before you implement your external communications strategy to bring customers in to your site, you need to make sure that your internal communications strategy is in order – that is, your website itself.

Cause the best PR and marketing campaign in the world won’t increase sales if your website sucks!

And how can it suck?

Oh, there are so many ways: obvious problems like…

broken links
bad checkout process
hard-to-find contact information

to the more subtle problems like…

focusing on your products and your wants instead of your buyers
writing in a voice that’s going to alienate your identified personas
not having any useful information on the site to establish yourself as a thought leader
having bad SEO so no one can find your site
and so on and so on!

You need to fix these first so that when you do start promoting the site and driving traffic to it, you’re putting your best foot forward and presenting a strong, cohesive website that addresses the needs and wants of your potential buyers.

While this is not a design series, and I can’t teach you how to build a beautiful site (which is an art form in itself) I can help you fix the most common mistakes people make when building a website. The tips I’ll give you are things that anyone, regardless of design and coding experience, can do to improve the effectiveness of their website.

To best leverage the power of the content that you are creating, you need to make sure that it is easy for visitors to find what they need on your site. And you do this through smart design.

Again, concentrate on solving their problems rather than trying to sell your product. Where most people go wrong is that they base their website on their own companies internal organization structure, which makes it really easy for them to find things, but how does that help the target audience? They don’t care about how you organize your company, they care about your problems.

Don’t forget the WIIFM? (what’s in it for me?) that drives their behavior.

To design your site properly (i.e. to get the most conversions) you need to learn as much as possible about the buying process for your product. You need to know how people find your site, and the length of time in a typical buying cycle (i.e. small purchases, short buying cycle, medium purchases, longer buying cycle, large purchases such as cars or homes – much longer buying cycle.) and you need to focus on walking the potential buyer through micro commitments…

Do NOT try to get them to be committed to buying from you to soon!

More to come about exactly how to do that in Part 2…

How to Create Trusted Expert Content

Jason Katzenback — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 18:21:13 +0000

You need to provide content to your potential customers in the same language that they use. If you use similar style and language that they do, then your message will resonate with them even more. Every single thing you write, from blog posts, to emails, to press releases, to your website’s content, it all needs to take this into consideration.

Well-written materials will help your buyers understand how you can help them, why you’re the Trusted Expert they should go to when they are finally ready to make a purchase. I can’t overstate the importance of this. The content that you write for your potential customers will have a much greater influence over their opinion of you and your company than any piece of advertising that you will ever do.

But how do you know how to talk to them? How do you make them believe that you’re a Trusted Expert? Refer back to your buyer personas. They will tell you exactly how to talk to your audience. Avoid jargon; it’s the language that people turn to when they don’t have anything of use to say. It doesn’t make you sound smarter, and it’s the same stupid buzzword phrases that everyone else (meaning your competitors) is using. You will stand out from the competition by using superior content.

Understand your audience. You’ll need to consider what market problems your buyer personas are faced with and develop topics that appeal to them. Then, you need to write for that audience. If you use examples and stories, the content will resonate with them much more than just dry facts. Remember, you’re trying to build a relationship with these people. Make it interesting, and make them want to come back for more. Choose a great title that grabs attention and then use a subtitle to describe what the content will deliver. People are more likely to download, click, or sign up to get more if they have a clear understanding about what they’re getting.

Promote the effort like crazy. Offer the content on your site with easy-to-find links. Add a link to employees (if you have them) email signatures, and get partners to offer the links as well. To drive viral marketing efforts, alert the appropriate reporters, bloggers, and analysts in your category or niche that the content is available and send them a download link. Tweet it, post it on Faceook – get your information out there. Don’t rely only on your website to get info out there – use articles, comments on other blogs. This will help to drive traffic to your site as well as put you on the map with the authorities within your niche. Make yourself a Trusted Expert in their eyes, and they’ll tell the world.

People in the early stages of the buying cycle need basic information, people further along in the process want to compare products and services, both from what you offer and among your competitors, and they then need detailed information about the benefit of your products vs. someone else’s, or even one of your products vs. another one of your products. When the buyers are at the end of the buying process, it is crucial that you have an easy-to-use checkout system linked directly from your content so you can make the conversion as easy as possible for them.

Don’t forget about your communications after the sale, either. Make sure to continue the dialog with the customer, either through an opt-in email newsletter or by directing them to your forums – anywhere where you can continue the two-way conversation. You should also provide them with a tool in which to provide feedback on the sale itself.

Here’s what you need to do:

Decide that form of content best suits your buyer personas. White paper? Ebook? Webinar? YouTube Video? All depends on what your personas like best.
Decide how you’re going to talk to each persona. Based on their needs, wants, and preferred methods of communication, each message should have subtle differences in tone that will make your message resonate more with each persona.
Start writing your Trusted Expert content.

Marketing Content and Content Marketing

Jason Katzenback — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 23:09:40 +0000

For the most part, the instinctive thing that people do is the opposite of what will make them money. The Majority of internet marketers instinctively try to push their product on every one they meet. Sadly, it is the complete opposite of what they should be doing.

Instead of being a sales man, you need to become the Samaritan. Create value for others on a massive scale. People love value. They will adore you for it. And when they do, they will be ecstatic to buy your products.

Most people think of marketing and content as two separate things. Most people think: “I create my marketing to sell my content.” However, content is far better marketing than marketing.

Content provides the prospect with an opportunity to feel what is it like to learn from you, which is much more effective than any Pay Per Click ad. If you begin to look at your content as marketing it will help you make money much faster than if you were to think about it like the majority of internet marketers do.

There are 3 types of marketing content:

1. Free Line Content. This is the content you use in order to attract prospects, get subscribers and build your list. The content you give out for free in order to get the opt-in. Free reports, downloadable videos, audios, and software demos are the best example for this type of content.

2. Relationship Content. This is the content you use to build relationships and connect with your list. Email newsletters, e-courses, daily tips and anything you can send out daily during the first 7-10 days after the prospect has opted in.

3. Conversion Content. This is where you make the product offer to your prospects. Sales letters or any other types of offers you make to your prospects asking them to buy your product.

Amazing things happen when you start thinking of your content as marketing. Your mindset undergoes a shift. So now you don’t think about getting something – you think about giving something.

You stop thinking: “How do I take their money? How do I get them to spend money with me?” and start thinking: “How do I give my prospects the best value content and take advantage of my knowledge, so they can get some real world experience, so when I build a relationship with them and ask them if they are interested in buying some of my stuff they say “YES!” because they trust me?”

This is a Guest Post by Igor Kheifets. Igor is 21 year old Internet Marketing Expert and the author and creator of Mastermind Internet Marketing where he shares the latest strategies on Social Media Marketing, Traffic and Lead Generation, Copywriting and Productivity.

Best Outsourcing Course Ever Created

Jason Katzenback — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 17:59:18 +0000

The doors are finally open for what I believe to be the most valuable training available so far this year for helping you be more efficient with growing your business…

I have no doubt at all!

In fact I think this is the coolest “outsourcing” course of its kind… period!

I’m telling you, this is worth 25 times the price if you actually use it.

I am not a fan of just blatantly tell you to go buy something. I will usually try to be at least a little subtle about it or something…

But not this time!

I am also willing to throw in a very “practical” cool bonus as well… and not ebooks that everyone already has or anything like that…

but a bonus that will help your bottom line and costs me money to actually give you.

If you purchase through this link…

http://www.johncow.com/outsourcemethod

…and then email…

support [ at ] traffickahuna [dot] com

…with the receipt (so we can match it up with our stats), we will do two complimentary publications to our huge TrafficKahuna blog network of 10 000+ blogs. We will write the content (so it is unique on every post)
and have it keyword optimized and then submit it for you.

If you look at the cost of a month membership with TrafficKahuna PLUS the time to create 2 quality articles and post them PLUS the amount of backlinks it gives you… you will see that this is a cool bonus that actually will help your business and you will not have to do anything. No figuring out a new software, no reading an ebook or anything. Simply focus on learning the Outsource Method and let us take care of giving you a HUGE amount of link love to your favorite site.

This bonus expires Thursday July 23rd (no exceptions)!

So again here are the clear instructions…

Clear your cookies (if you want my bonus)
Claim your access to the Outsource Method with this link:
http://www.johncow.com/outsourcemethod
Email your receipt with the URL of the site you want promoted and the keyword anchor text you want used to promote the site…. We will do the rest.

There is a 100% money back guarantee, so do yourself a favor and at least look at what these guys put together…

I guarantee it will help your business!

P.S. I know Marc and Daniel very well and one thing that has always impressed me is the quality of their stuff… you will not be disappointed.

P.P.S.Because there are costs associated with the bonus, it will happen after the refund period has expired, I trust you can understand that.

http://www.johncow.com/outsourcemethod

Communication in Your Web Design

Jason Katzenback — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 16:45:59 +0000

Continued from previous post Website Design & Being a Trusted Expert

While ‘content’ usually refers to the written part of your communications, it really includes all the visual elements, as pictures also communicate to your users. So really…

‘content’ is anything and everything that the user sees that will affect how they perceive you!

And web design is more important than you think; users make judgments about the authority and credibility of websites based on their design.

You could have the most informative, authoritative written content in the world, but if your site looks like it was designed by a 12 year old with ADD (or even worse, a 60 year old with no web experience) the user will reject your site.

Web design also goes beyond the look and feel of the site to its usability. This is something that a lot of advertising agencies were forgetting about for a while: they were designing these beautiful, meaningful, and significant websites that won a lot of creative awards, but were absolutely horrible to try and navigate or get any kind of useful information out there. This was the most self-indulgent import from the world of traditional advertising – the habit of creating advertising for people in the advertising world, not to accomplish the goals of the business.

In traditional advertising, it was hard to say that a campaign hadn’t worked when it had gotten so much good press (which, first clue, was about the ads and not the products) but in this online world, where everything is measurable, it became obvious quite quickly that advertising for advertising’s sake wouldn’t cut it. (That’s not to say that it doesn’t still happen, but you’re too smart and now well-informed to let that happen to you, right?) Truly remarkable sites are beautiful and easy to use.

Unfortunately, those beautiful and easy-to-use sites are few and far between. But there are a lot of small changes that you can make to improve both the look and the functionality of your site. Above all, you can’t underestimate the importance of your usability; your decision process about the design choices you make should be subject to the same amount of scrutiny of your other business decisions.

Remember, whether or not a user completes a transaction on your website depends heavily on the experience and usability of your web design. If you haven’t prioritized your resources to include some time spent on your web design and how it communicates to your targets, it can have an adverse affect on your sales.

Twitter Mania Contest Ends Tomorrow

Jason Katzenback — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 12:13:49 +0000

There is Still Time to…

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Five Ideas for Generating Purposeful Content

Jason Katzenback — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 11:32:43 +0000

Blog writers face the same kinds of struggles and challenges that other writers do. It’s not easy, day after day, to come up with new ideas for your blog. Yet, if you only go through the motions and throw something up just so you’ve got a post for that day, it weakens your site and your credibility. So, what do you do when you have blog writer’s block?

I don’t have all the answers, but there are a few tips that have worked for me:

Read other blogs: One thing that makes the blogosphere different from the rest of the Web is the dialogue that takes place, not just in the comments section, but across blogs in a given niche. Problogger may write something one day, and the next day you’ll see something by Copyblogger that expands on the idea. Don’t steal someone else’s idea, but find your own way to apply what’s out there.
Take a break: Get out from in front of the computer. Go for a walk, breathe some fresh air or get some sunlight. If you want a real change in perspective, take your laptop to the mall or a Starbucks. You’ll be surprised what odd places your muse might be hiding.
Rework an old idea: Peer back through your archives, maybe even back to your earliest posts. There’s a good chance most of your readers haven’t read those early posts. Take one of them and update it. Add some new information or insight you’ve gained since you first wrote the post.
Outsource: Hiring someone to write your blog doesn’t have to be a long-term thing. Jump on one of the bidding sites and hire someone to give you a few weeks off while you regroup. Use that time to queue up some new posts, too.
Stop whining and write: Sometimes, you’ve just got to look past your current situation and force yourself to type something – anything – to get started. Write a post or article. If it’s crap, don’t publish it. Instead, rework it two or even three times, whatever it takes to turn that post into gold.

None of these ideas guarantees you’ll come up with the next big thing in your niche, but they can’t hurt, either.

How To Construct A Press Release That Gets Attention

Jason Katzenback — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 11:52:52 +0000

Press releases have always been a great way to get not only visitors to your web properties but also backlinks. The problem is, most people have no idea how to write one. It’s not that difficult at all and I will give you an outline and some of the things you should do and shouldn’t do.

Firstly, ask yourself whether your news is actually newsworthy? If you think it’s not don’t worry, it doesn’t take much to make it look newsworthy. Here is the biggest no-no of a press release. Don’t use it simply to make a sale or sell something.

A press release needs to be toned down. It needs to answer the who, what, where, when and why of whatever it is you’re promoting.

Here are a list of DO NOTs:

Don’t make your press release sound like an advertisement. If it does then go back and tone it down and remember the four “Ws.”
Never write a press release just to mention an opening or a launch. They are a dime a dozen and these type of press releases will usually get turfed.
Always avoid hype and don’t fill it with fluff. It needs to be direct and straight to the point.
Avoid exaggerations and over the top claims. The Journalism profession is one of skepticism. I know because I’ve spent my career working in news rooms around the world.
Avoid too many exclamation marks. This is definitely a no-no…!!!!! I would not include them at all.

Here are a list of the DOs:

Get straight to the point. People should know what your press release is about simply by reading the headline and the first paragraph.
Lead with your main point. It’s the hook to attract enough attention to get the media to want to use your press release.
Your press release should only focus on the features but in a toned down manner. Never try to sell. Ask yourself “why anyone else would want to read my press release?” Put yourself in the Journalists or reader’s shoes and decide if your release is interesting enough to share with the world.
Always try and use real life points that will illustrate how you or your service solved a problem. You could identify a problem and then explain why your product or site can solve it. Never exaggerate.
Try and relate your story to something going on in the world right now. For example, it could relate to the current state of the economy. If you have a home business opportunity relate, it to the frail economy. Mention the problem and then why you have the solution. Mention benefits.
Your language should be plain. Avoid using unnatural language. There is certain language which may be appropriate in a particular niche but remember, you want your press release to touch the general population. That’s what a Journalist will be looking for. They want to appeal to a wider audience and not just a specific niche.
The press release should end with a short spiel about your company, site, product, history etc. This is like a resource box but keep it short.

Just remember not to write a salesletter. It’s a news oriented item and needs to grab a reader’s attention very early on. Avoid too much fluff and keep it a reasonable length…250-400 words. Here’s a resource I posted in The forum recently on constructing a press release. It’s basically a template and will be a good guideline to writing your press release:

http://www.ducttapemarketing.com/IPR.htm

Lessons from the Foodies on Purposeful Content

Jason Katzenback — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 11:41:06 +0000

Next to Make Money Online blogs, food and recipe blogs are probably the most prolific type of blog you’ll find. It seems like every bachelor, chef, mom and teen wants to share with the world their ideas on food and cooking.

Yet, if you’ve spent any time reading food blogs, you’ll quickly realize something: the vast majority of them consist of little more than a single recipe and one or two lines like “I made this for dinner and it was good” or “This was too spicy. I won’t make it again.”

(On a side note, why give a recipe for a recipe you didn’t like? Isn’t that a lot like putting up a review of a product, saying “buy this, I hated it?”)

At any rate, after closely looking at those food blogs you’ll realize something else, too. Most of those food blogs have less than a dozen subscribers, and most of the subscribers are probably friends and family.

There are a handful of food blogs that make it, that really stand out. These big-time food bloggers get featured in Bon Appetit and Good Housekeeping or on the Today Show.

So, what does it take to make it as a food blogger?

Well, in a lot of ways, it takes the same thing it takes in any other niche: it takes purposeful content.

Take a look at some of the most successful food blogs. They don’t just give a recipe and a couple of poorly-shot pictures. They give a story, detailed cooking instructions for the novice and often studio-quality pictures. They give content that’s useful. They provide something their readers can utilize right then and there, and they do it in a way that’s pleasing to both the eye and the ear.

That’s how your blog writing has to be, too. When you write, can your reader taste what you’re talking about? Can she hear it, and picture it in her mind’s eye? Are you telling a compelling story, using only the best in media? Do you spell things out for the novice, but do it in a way that’s not condescending?

The sooner you master these techniques, the sooner you’ll be successful as a blogger.

Create Writing Rituals to Power Your Writing

Jason Katzenback — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 22:46:21 +0000

No, you’re not a professional writer, but that doesn’t mean you can’t use the same tricks and techniques professional writers use. One of the dirty little secrets effective writers don’t tell you is that they aren’t good writers because of innate talent; they’re good writers because they practice writing rituals.

Writing rituals are nothing more than personal habits. They might have to do with how long you write, where you write or when you write. In some cases, there are behavior-based writing rituals that use a repeated action – such as sipping a drink or sharpening a pencil – that you do before, during or after writing.

Many rituals don’t have any practical impact on your writing, per se. Instead, they have a practical impact on you, which then impacts your writing on more levels than you can imagine.

Here is what writing rituals do for you:

They decrease your stress: The stress of writing quality content day in and day out can lead to procrastination. By using writing rituals, you put yourself in a familiar situation that reduces procrastination and peels away some of your stress.
They boost your confidence: It’s easy to feel like a slave to your blog, having to publish updates on a daily basis. Using writing rituals gives you the ability to regain a sense of your own self control.
They make the writing process easier: Nothing will cut through a little writer’s block like using your writing rituals. They make it easier to start writing and power you through the writing process.

Now, just because most writing rituals don’t have a practical impact on your writing doesn’t mean that they can’t. For example, here are some rituals that writers use in order to get their juices flowing every time they sit down to write:

Outline before you write: If you jot down just three or four main points that you want to get across in your blog post, you’ll be surprised how fast the writing goes from there.
Close your other applications: When you’re 500 words into a blog post and an email comes in, you’ll be tempted to read it. If and when you get back to the blog post, you are essentially starting over. Close everything out during the writing process.
Set parameters: Know how long you’re going to write for or, better yet, know how many words or blog posts you want to write. Don’t stop or even get up until you’re done.

So, what about you? Do you have any blog post writing rituals you’d like to share?

Codrut Turcanu Interviews Me

Jason Katzenback — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 14:46:42 +0000

Did a quick interview with Codrut Turcanu of Remarkableblogging.com and he put it together nice and neatly in a PDF format for me to be able to give all of you

Since he put this into a nice PDF… be great if you visted Remarkableblogging.com and left a nice comment there

Just Write Good Content …

Jason Katzenback — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 20:16:57 +0000

This is Jerry West again from the SEO Revolution. You know, this “Just Write Good Content” thing is one of the biggest lies in Online Business and Marketing world.

Yeah, that’s right, LIES.

You see, just writing content isn’t enough…you have to actually MARKET the content. What a concept, huh? Unfortunately what has happened in the IM space is “rockstars” like Matt Cutts from Google, who has great intentions in the market, but his suggestions are taken literally.

The result?

Content is written, really good content, and it is posted on the site or blog…and the owner then sits on their hands and just waits for links to just “appear” to the page and they start rolling around on a big pile of money.

That isn’t reality.

You see, old fashioned “grass roots marketing” is needed in order to get your message out when you sell a product, and there is no difference with content.

Content is your product. Market it effectively and be as aggressive as you need to be to get the results you want.

Next week I’ll cover some of my favorite techniques to market my content.

3 Steps of Authority Content – How Confident Writing Converts

Jason Katzenback — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 19:06:42 +0000

It’s no secret in the blogging world: hitting high in the search engines alone isn’t enough to make it big online anymore. You need something else. You need a way to convert readers and visitors into buyers.

With the increasing popularity of blogs, competition is fierce. There are a handful of things that will make your site stand out among the vast sea that is the blogosphere. One of them is authority content.

You see, you need more than visitors to have a successful and profitable website; you have to establish yourself as an authority. Your website content and blog posts have to pack a punch. They have to engender trust. They have to demonstrate that you truly know what you’re talking about. When you say “get this product,” they won’t do it unless they believe in you.

But how do you do that? How do you write in such a way that your readers believe in you, and trust that you’re telling them the truth?

Here are three basic principles that will help your content drip with authority:

Write well. Grammatical and spelling errors cost you more sales than you think. Be diligent with your editing, and work hard to hone your writing skills. Know the rules of the language, and develop your own style and feel.
Keep it personal. You don’t have to reveal a single detail about your personal life to make people feel like they know you. Personal anecdotes that are light on identifying information and heavy on message are extremely powerful.
Believe in the products and services you recommend. The best salespeople in the world know that you have to believe in what you’re selling. A transaction benefits both the seller and the buyer. If the products or services you’re recommending are crap, your readers won’t come back.

So what comments do you have… any other tips???

PS –> For those of you waiting for the continuation of the “An Audlife dot Com” case study, I apologize for the delay in this. I have had a tool in the works (free and no opt in required) to help with this and I had hoped it would have been ready by now. We should be all set for getting back into it this coming Monday.

How to Deal with People who are Stealing your Content

Jason Katzenback — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 16:49:23 +0000

This guest post is written by Will Paoletto. Will is an SEO Strategist at Big Oak Inc., the SEO agency, responsible for the comic gem Ranked Hard

How to Deal with People who are Stealing your Content

Have you ever been the victim of stolen or scraped content? Sometimes sites that steal your content end up ranking above you for various keywords, and in the worst case scenario, the stolen content actually confuses Google and causes it to penalize your site. First, let’s cover one of the common tactics that people use to sabotage other sites by stealing their content, and then let’s go over how to hunt down and deal with the people who do this.

One of the relatively simple tactics that people use to sabotage other sites is to scrape their content and then turn the content into articles for submission to article directories. They submit the articles to hundreds of article directories, make the byline of the article their name (or presumably a pseudonym), and link off to their website in the author’s box. When websites come along and syndicate these articles, they are all attributed to the thief’s website. As a result, Google may look at the original content owner’s site and now assume that it is nothing but a collection of stolen articles from around the net. You would think Google would be wise enough to identify the person who had the pages cached first as the original owner, but there are documented cases of Google filters being tripped as result of this tactic. As is always the case, established websites are much less likely to fall prey to this banning technique, and sites with high trust rank would likely be invincible to it.

Of course this is just one of the many ways that stolen content can be hazardous to the health of your site. So how do you deal with the people who do this? Well, in the example above, the thief is attempting to increase his Google ranking and simultaneously sabotage the competition, so he is giving away his URL. You can deal with this person by taking the following steps:

1. If the webmaster has no contact information on his site, then skip to step 4. If he/she actually has contact information or a contact form, then be cordial in your initial email to the site owner. Do not be rude. Being unprofessional or nasty will only make the person less likely to cooperate. After sending an email to the owner, wait about 24 hours. If you do not receive a response, then email the owner again, and this time be a bit more forward. In the best case scenario, the thief will bow to your wishes and remove your content.

2. If 48 hours go by and you still haven’t received a response from the person, go to a public forum (preferably one in your niche) and announce that they are stealing your content. Say that you have emailed them twice and have yet to receive a reply. Ask the forum if anyone has a way to get in touch with them. Do not attempt to publicly defame this person because doing so will only sacrifice your professionalism. Other members of the forum will likely do your bidding for you anyway.

3. If more than 48 hours pass without a response from the person, then send a third email detailing the steps you will take if they do not remove your content. Say that you will contact their sponsors, their web host, and any party helping them. If the individual has stolen images from you and is hosting them on a photo sharing website, say that you will file a DMCA request with the image host.

4. If they have no contact information on their site and their domain registration info is private, then you’ll want to contact their web host. You can find out who their web host is by looking up their site’s IP address and then doing a reverse DNS lookup. You can accomplish both of these tasks by using a site like dnstools.com. Tell the web host what this person is doing, and the host should cooperate with you. They have to look into the matter by law, but as we know, not all web hosts are created equal, so you may have to send dozens of support tickets. You can also file a DMCA request with Google and other search engines. Reporting the site through Google webmaster tools is an additional option as well.

The key to success is remaining civil with the person stealing your content. They’ll be much more likely to comply with your demands if you never break away from a friendly, professional tone. Smile through the screen as you file DMCA requests and report them though webmaster tools. By the way, if you don’t have a clear copyright notice on your website, you should add one, otherwise your stance will be severely weakened if you ever find yourself embroiled in a controversy over content.

So did this post help and what are your comments about it?

Online Social Marketing and the Call to Action – Just Do It

Jason Katzenback — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 03:43:44 +0000

We firmly believe that the absolute most important part of using social media (Web 2) sites is the content you submit. Without good content you will not get your articles ranking in the search engines and even if you do get the rankings you will not get any conversions.

There are different types of online social marketing sites available to use. There are some that allow you to bookmark, some leave little comments or posts and others that allow you to create your own little page such as Squidoo.com, Hubpages.com, Ning.com, Google Notebook & Ezinearticles.com. It is these sites that the content we talk about in this post is focused on being used on.

The majority of people out there trying to earn money with these types of sites are often too focused on quantity rather then quality. They will outsource the content or spin it without taking the time to ensure it reads well and is informative. Your first priority needs to be focusing on the human visitor. You can then go back and tweak the content slightly to better optimize it for the search engines, which we will
explain more about later on.

The simplest and most effective method that we use for creating good “human focused” content is to follow the simple formula A.I.D.A. which stands for…

A – Attention: Get the persons attention right away. This is where your title (headline) comes into play. You will want to right away grab the attention of the reader and for an example, say we were promoting a page on our site that was a weight loss pre sales affiliate page for “Supplement X” and our keyword was “supplement x reviews”; our headline (content title) might be…

“Most Supplement X Reviews Are Full Of Crap, I Stopped Using It and I Will Tell You Why!”

Now, this might seem aggressive to some, but if you were looking for a supplement x review, would this not get your attention?

I – Interest: Now that you got their attention it is time to get their interest in what you are talking about. Following the above example, if our main purpose is to promote this product, this is where we have to pull the reader in and get them interested in learning more.

We have taken the stance that we will be slamming the product but in reality we will not be, the title was just to get their attention. You may want to start by explaining why other reviews are so fake and how it is so hard to know what is real out there. Peak their interest in what you have to say so they keep reading. It is very important that you relate to them right away as well. Remember, this is just an example of a strategy to try… you can write this however you want.

D – Desire: You got their attention, peaked their interest in learning more and so now it is time to spark a desire. In this example we would now need to make sure to come clean and explain what was meant about quitting supplement x. Maybe take the stance that we quit early on because of forgetting to take the supplement and then a month later started up again and we soon realized that quitting was the worse mistake we made because the product worked.

Make sure to explain the benefits of the product and how it will help. Do not just say something like “lose weight” instead you will want to highlight exactly what the benefits of this feature is. So you might say something like…

“Helped me to fit into my size 32 pants from a size 38 in only 30 days”

A – Action: This is now were you tell them how they can quench that desire. This is also where many people fail because they make a weak call to action and just leave the reader hanging. It is so important that you tell the reader exactly what to do. Do not just put something like a keyword linked to your page or use “Click Here” because this does not tell the reader why they need to take that action. Instead tell them why to “Click Here”.

A couple examples may be…

“Click Here Now to Learn How Easy it is to Get Started”

“Get complete access to this incredible system by Clicking Here Now”

You will want to reemphasize the benefits and encourage the reader that this is one of the smartest things they will ever do.

IMPORTANT: You will want to ensure you have linked to your page with the keyword but we also recommend you use a call to action word such as “Click Here”, these get much better clickthroughs then just the keyword. You can add a nofollow to the click here link if you like

It is also important to understand that this type of content is not for every social site, these are meant more for the sites that allow you to create a page that you own. Some sites however frown upon this type of content and do not like call to actions in the content and get up tight if there are more then 2 links in the content. Do not be discouraged if your content gets taken down from some sites, learn and tweak and try again. Remember though, the whole purpose is to get the reader to take an action and visit your blog.. so use the content to convince them that they need to do that.

TIPS: Grab a notepad and a pencil and rough out the outline of the content. It is easier to start it out this way then on a computer. Also, create your headline first and then the article… this helps guide you as to what to write about.

Once you have your content ready, you are going to want to optimize the content (we will talk about this tomorrow) and we will also show you how to make a few variations of one article for a few different sites

So, did you get anything worthwhile from this post?

Duplicate Content Duplicate Content – Is There An Echo in Here?

Jason Katzenback — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 21:47:04 +0000

Yesterday we posted about content with purpose and it brought up a question about “Duplicate Content” and we figured that we better address this before we get into talking about actually posting content on different social media sites. A word of warning however, the following is 100% our opinion only and is based on what we have seen from our result.

1. Duplicate Content is More then Just the Body of the Content

Duplicate content is not just focused on the content body itself but it can be due to other page factors such as the page title and meta description. Basically Google has a goal and that is to offer the best search results they possible can and to achieve that they want to ensure that the results are not simply multiple copies of the same content. This is especially important for on your own blog when you have two articles that are on the same topic but are completely different.

If you put the same title and or description on both pages there is a huge chance that Google will actually consider one a duplication of the other. They figure that if the two pages are talking about the same thing then why should they display both pages.

So the first thing is always ensure your blog has a unique title and description for every page.

2. Do Not Post Content on Another Site and Then Link to the Same Content on Your Site

This may sound obvious but we see it often and what happens is people will create an article, then submit it to an article directory or even another blog and then link to the exact same article on their own blog.

This is pretty much a waste of time since Google is going to only use one version of the content. Instead make sure to always modify your content as much as possible before you link it back to the original content. Remember, you want to own multiple spots in the top 10 for your keyword and by modifying the content you can do that.

3. Using a Snippet of the Content and Linking to the Source Content?

In yesterday’s post i mentioned having content with purpose and part of that was to…

Give part of the answer but leave them wanting more
Give them the exact steps to get the rest of the story

What we meant by this was not just giving them part of the article (such as the first paragraph) and then telling them to read the rest of the article by clicking here. Yes you can use this strategy but what we actually mean by this is that you give them some of the answers to their problem but do not give them everything.

You want them to feel like they got value and learned something but if you tell them everything then they have no need to visit your site. On the other hand if you only give them a tiny little taste (like the first paragraph) then you more then likely have not been able to tell them enough to get them interested.

Give them enough to show you know what you are talking about, that you can relate to their situation and that you can help them with their problem… then give them a link to follow.

OK, we know this is not exactly a duplicate content issue but we felt it was something to address none the less

4. Duplicate Content will NOT banish your site:

We blame Internet marketers for this rumor and the reason is they are putting the fear of God into people about duplicate content in order to sell what ever it is they have.

Duplicate content is not a great thing but it is not the evil enemy of Google either. You kind of got to use a little common sense here (yes we know it is not so common).

Think about news sites and popular blogs… they post other peoples content all the time and the reason is the content is worth while and something worth sharing. The issue is when 100% of your content is duplicate content and you are offering nothing new to your readers, then it can cause issues.

If you do post other peoples content on your blog then we recommend you make sure you have one unique post for every duplicate post. It is also wise to make sure your page title and description are different then what others have published.

Also, if you submit an article with an article distribution service, you are NOT in danger of punishing your site. What these services do is blast the same article out to 1000′s of article directories and the idea is to get loads of back links. The issue is this content is all duplicate content and Google pretty much has lost all respect for article directory links from 95% of the directories. Now that does not mean the links are worthless… but they just are not all that fantastic. Also since the content is duplicate, they will only show one or maybe two at the most of your articles in their results… which means very limited traffic.

What will not happen is Google will NOT punish your site or blog for this. If this was the case then all you would have to do is submit the same article to loads of sites and link to your competitors and you could eliminate them all.

5. How Unique Does the Content Need to Be?

This question always seems to come up and the simple answer is as much as possible. The bare minimum however, in our opinion, is to ensure that the title and description are 100% unique and then make sure the body of the content is at least 30% unique.

We have done tests and have seen that making the title and description unique has made the biggest impact. So if your really lazy then at least make your titles and descriptions unique.

Summary:

It basically comes down to the question of are you focused on just getting back links or are you focused on getting traffic!

When you are using article directories or social media sites like Squidoo and Hubpages, you want to ensure that all your submitted content ranks well in the search engines. By putting the same content on all the sites, sure you get back links but only one of the sites will appear in the rankings for that focused term. If you make sure there is unique content on each of those sites then you can potentially rank in the top 10 with each one!

So which one would you rather have… one search result and multiple back links or multiple search results and multiple rankings?

Any comments or questions?

Random Blog News… Contest, Content and… uhmm… OK we got nothing else

Jason Katzenback — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 03:17:36 +0000

Item 1 –> As mentioned last week, tomorrow we will be announcing a new COWtest here at the Johncow pasture and this one is a little less intense (heck it is way less intense) then the COWpetition. The prize is a brand spanking new iPhone… plus we will probably through in a couple extra things too. We will give all the details for that tomorrow but we thought that we would also take this opportunity to share with you a great post from Contest Blogger called…

“How to Avoid Getting Cheated in a Blog Contest”

This is a pretty relevant post with all that is going on with contests as of late and it never ceases to amaze us how many scum bags there are out there and that we even have to consider this issue… but the world is full of selfish idiots (could have used much more colorful words but decided againt it ). If you know of a blog that is holding a contest that looks suspicious, please tell us about it.

Item #2 –> There is a contest over at http://www.kushmoney.com/2008/06/01/june-competition/ that is coming to a close very soon. This is not a big item contest but it is a legit one and if you use entrecard, they are giving way 10000 ec credits plus some advertising.

Item 3 –> The auction of GamerzReviewz over at sitepoint is going ok… we approved a bid of $700 and have a few pm’s asking for a buy now price. The contest is to have the site up for 30 days but to be honest we would love to just be done with it. We love the site and would rather keep it but on the other hand it is frustrating to keep it and manage it when you know you are selling it… which leads us to a thought that just came to us.

Right now our blog is at $700 and Garry’s is at $255…. would it be wrong if we pulled it out to keep it for ourselves and just donated $1000 (which is $300 more then the current bid) to World Vision?

As readers of this blog please let us know your thoughts on that… we do not want to put one more thought into it until we hear your thoughts.

PS –> We promise we will finish the keyword research series this week and we should have the cowpetition and keyword research material all put into a PDF for everyone who subscribed to our rss feed via email. If you are not subscribed then do it!

Keyword Research – Start Up the Diamond Digger

Jason Katzenback — Fri, 30 May 2008 01:59:08 +0000

In the previous post called “Content Creation Madness” we took our focus off of the keyword research for a little while to focus on getting the initial content for the blog started. Now that the content is in the process of getting created, it is time to go back and start up the “Diamond Digger” to find us the keywords that we are going to want to focus on for making lots of MOOney!

The tool of choice for us is Brad Callen’s Affiliate Elite, it is a very cool little tool that has lots of great features but our hoofs down favorite is the AdWords Campaign spy tool. The reason this is so powerful is it will track for you which keywords are being advertised on consistently by the same people and the power in that is if the same advertiser is spending money on the same term for 2 weeks straight, there are only two things going on. Either they are making a profit or they are an idiot… and in our experience 90% of the time, when the advertisers has an ad showing for 14 days, the ad is profitable.

Disclaimer –> This strategy does not work for 100% of the markets out there. Occassionally you may come across a market that does not have a lot of words being advertised on with PPC. This does not mean the market can not be profitable, but you will want to make sure and snoop around at the competition and see how they are monetizing their sites. When there are a lot of PPC ads, that is usually a good sign that there are an abundance of affiliate opportunities available.

Lets Get Started…

Reminder that Affiliate Elite is not a free software but we are not going to lie to you and say that we do this with free tools just to please a few readers. This is the tool we use for this job, this is the tool we used for this cowpetition and this is the tool we recommend you use if you can afford it.

Step 1 –> Open Affiliate Elite and select the project type “Analyze Adwords Competition”

Step 2 –> Click on “Add Campaign”

Step 3 –> Enter a campaign title, leave Google selected and leave the “number of times to run each keyword” at 1 and then click OK

Step 4 –> Click on “Add Keywords” and paste in your list of keywords and click OK.

Step 5 –> Now click on the “Scheduler”

Select “Daily” and then “Next”

Select to “Run the Check” Daily and click next and then select when you want to run it and then click “Finish”

Step 6 –> Now click on “Options” and then change the “Use SE Courtesy” to “15 to 20″. This is important so that you do not get your IP blocked from Google. This process will run in the background and you want to have it have it run slow and steady to ensure you get all the results.

Click Here to Enlarge This Image

Step 7 –> Now click on “Run Now” and run the initial process.

Step 8 –> Now click on the close X in the top right corner

and since you have the scheduler running, Affiliate Elite will stay active in your task bar.

To reopen Affiliate Elite, just double click on the icon in the bottom corner of your screen.

Step 9 –> Now you are going to let Affiliate Elite run for 14 days straight and at the end of the 14 days you will know exactly what words are “Diamonds”

Remember the reason we use this strategy is because we want to try and eliminate as much of the guess work out of the market research as possible. By finding out what the competition is using and making money with in PPC, we can then take those results and transfer them to SEO. Next week we will walk you through what to do with the words from Affiliate Elite.

In the next post we are going to talk about setting up the blog and how we need to focus on both the human visitors and the search engines.

As always, we look forward to your questions and feedback about this post

Keyword Lesson Series: