Everybody Wants to Know About SEO

Small Business Solopreneurs: What's the up-side of being laid off from someone else's company? How can you start up a business you're passionate about on a shoe-string budget? How can search engine optimization (SEO), dynamic content, blogging and social marketing help bring attention to your enterprise?

So, What's Up? Blogging every other day is hard to keep up! Nothing new there. Keep your eye on the prize: The more you write, the more people you will reach. What is new here in the Hudson Valley is that, after a week of rain -- tons of rain! -- the sun has come out. Oh joy!

So, What's SEO? This ubiquitous acronym stands for search engine optimization. Not that that explains much. Here's the story: There are now a gazillion websites on the Internet, so the big deal is not so much HAVING a website as GETTING lots of "traffic" or "eyeballs" to your site.

How do people land on websites? They search for something they want to know more about on Google, Yahoo or MS-whatsis (plus, now there's Bing). Searchers get back trillions of results, so how do they choose where to land? Maybe from the top five, maybe only the top three, to be honest, everyone's in a hurry and hopes they can just click on the one at the top of the page and get exactly what they want.

How does a website get to the top? There are too many ways to count, but here are a few:

1. Start by picking a URL that specifically describes your business, like "writer4biz.com." But space it with hyphens like this: "writer-4-biz.com." Why? Because the little search engine mechanisms cannot read "iwrite4biz," so they don't connect your site with a search for business writers. But they can decipher URL words separated by hyphens and bring up your site in a search for writers.
2. Make a list of key search words people might use to find a service or product like yours. Then research it (Google has a page that does this) to find out what words people have actually been searching for.
3. Starting right at the top of your Web page, use these key words. For example, don't title your first page HOME, call it something along the lines of Need-an-Experienced-Copywriter.html?
4. Make sure all headings, subheadings and bullet points on your landing page incorporate your key words. Search engines crawl over text, but they mostly love headers, bolded phrases and bullet points, as they look for words that match someone's search request. Each of your Web pages should be 10% to 15% comprised of key words.
5. Finally, search engines love "dynamic" Web sites, sites that are changed and added to frequently. I'm not talking about design but interactive features like podcasts, videos, contests, and freebies that make your website stand out as interesting and, well, dynamic.

The Soap Box: I saw a headline in our local Rockland County paper today. It said, in effect, that small business would create, and is creating, an entrepreneurial upturn in our economy. Will you be part of the upturn?

What Are Small Businesses Waiting For?

Small Business Solopreneurs: What's the up-side of being laid off from someone else's company? How can you start up a business you're passionate about on a shoe-string budget? How can search engine optimization (SEO), dynamic content, blogging and social marketing help bring attention to your enterprise?

Current Status: As a solopreneur writer-editor and Internet marketing coach, every business day I add to my knowledge of Internet marketing -- and HR options, better risk management for financial services, osteopathy, yoga breath, acupuncture and other complementary modalities. I'm happy when I'm learning, and even happier when I'm writing about what I'm learning. This is the essence of working for yourself: enjoying the challenge and the doing of it. Love what you do sounds trite, but mostly because we tend to avoid this simple rule for a balanced, satisfying life -- in favor of a dumb belief in struggle.

This Is Interesting: According to the Center for Media Research, 56% of small businesses still do not have Web sites. That is an amazing figure! Web sites can be set up for $0 - under $500. Web hosting can be had at Blue Host or GoDaddy for about $7 per month. Google ads can start at $10 - $25. What are these businesses waiting for?

Because 70% of Internet traffic is directed by queries to search engines, blog posts from your Web site target the exact type of customers you want -- simply by talking about your product or service every other day. Two major sources of Web traffic are blogs and social networks. Signing up on Twitter is free and takes about 5 minutes per business day. Your target customers are there, so you should be there to meet them, offering value and demonstrating your expertise and love of what you are doing/offering.

The Soap Box: Breathing. It's automatic, right? Nope. Shallow breathing is more or less what we do unconsciously. Just enough to get by, not deep enough for optimum health. Try this:

Quick Stress Relief How-To:

1. Sit up straight and begin breathing deeply. As you breathe, take your mind to the muscles in your feet, ankles, calves, knees and so on till you reach the top of your head. Think "soft."
2. As you relax the areas related to breathing, make your breaths even slower and deeper.
3. Unfocus your eyes, taking in a panorama, not just one object.
4. Consciously leave the stress response behind and enter the rest response.
5. When you reach the rest response, continue your slow, deep breathing for about 5 minutes, focusing on your breath so that your mind does not wander back to work mode.

Back to Blogging

Small Business Solopreneurs: What's the up-side of being laid off from someone else's company? How can you start up a business you're passionate about on a shoe-string budget? How can search engine optimization (SEO), dynamic content, blogging and social marketing help bring attention to your enterprise?

Current Status: I am not a techie. I am a writer/editor. I am setting up a couple of business blogs for a holistic medical practice, and it turns out you need to be a bit of a techie -- someone who knows coding -- to work with WordPress. Unlike Blogger, which anyone can lay out and add widgets to, WordPress presents the newbie with an endless bog of indecipherable blog documentation useless to a non-techie, non-Web designer. So I have been struggling for over a week to get to the part I know how to do: the blog posting itself. 

Tips for Business Bloggers: Here's the thing -- blogging can work for you, or it can be a big, blogging disappointment. It's easy to fail: just set up a blog and never use it. For it to be effective at making your Web site dynamic, you need to get a fresh blog posted every other day. How are you going to make that happen? 

• First, if you have a Web designer, feel free to use WordPress, which has some distinct advantages over Blogger -- it looks more professional, for one. But if you are going to do it yourself and do not have Web design/HTML experience, I recommend Blogger, which is backed by Google and is easy to set up in a short time. 

• Second, take the time to organize your thoughts about what you want your readers/customers to understand. List some topics that will provide accessible information, and add to it as you go so that you'll always be a couple of topic ideas ahead. 

• Third, know yourself. If you really aren't going to maintain your blog every other day, then hire an experienced content writer. A good choice is someone who already knows something about your product or service area, who has published writing samples to show you, and who listens carefully to what you want to accomplish with your blog. 

• Finally, be patient. It takes time to develop a following. Blogging isn't the only form of Internet marketing, it's just one piece of a marketing strategy. If you provide value for your target customers -- and post often -- your blog will provide a good return on a modest investment. 

Soap Box: Web 2.0 marketing is neither agressive nor expensive. Its best value is that it continues to grow -- unlike a traditional marketing campaign that has a launch date, a large expense and an end point. To make it work for you, you must be patient...and diligent.

What Is Dynamic Content?

Solopreneurs: So, what's the up-side of being laid off from someone else's company? How can you start up a business you're passionate about on a shoe-string budget? How can search engine optimization (SEO), dynamic content, blogging and social marketing help bring attention to your new enterprise?

Boomers in business: Listen up.If you put up a gorgeous Web site and then ignore it because it's "done," your pretty pages will sit there: static, untouched and unvisited. If someone visits once, why would they ever visit again? Because the same old page is just sitting there. 

A dynamic Web site: In contrast, dynamic pages have elements that change. You might run a survey of your visitors and then announce the results next week. You might run a contest and offer a prize, or create free downloads of How-To Lists and reports that can educate your visitors -- with no sales pressure. Your site will become dynamic if you constantly add to, change and improve it.

Benefits of dynamic content: When your site is dynamic, it draws the attention of the big search engines. The more attention your Web site has from search engines, the more likely it is that a consumer searching for a product or service like yours will find your site rather than any of thousands of others that compete with you. 

It's not rocket science: It is a fact that nearly 75% of Web sites don't express the benefits of their product. How could that be? I think it's because nearly everyone gets super-involved with their own business and forgets that the best way to market yourself is to put yourself in your customer's shoes. 

What does your customer want? What does she want to know? What will your product do for him? What will make her trust your site and your service? If you don't answer these questions on your first page, there's very little incentive for a visitor or page viewer to become your loyal customer. 

Express your benefits honestly: So, think about the ways your business benefits your target market, and then express them briefly, directly, clearly -- but especially honestly -- on each page of your site. Put some thought into how your site visitor's experience can be made simple and easy. And find ways to be helpful, generous and authentic as you interact with your visitors. 

  

Recession as Opportunity--for Small Business

Small Busines Owners and Solopreneurs: I was laid off on 4/7/9. Since then, I've gone through a lot of emotions, especially anxiety, but at this point, I've a) applied for writing/editing jobs; b) set up my own writing/editing business on the Internet; and c) collaborated on a book with a doctor and friend. And, as spring nears its end, the weather has finally begun to behave in a warm and sunny fashion, and so I'm enjoying my freedom from cubicledom! To make my own hours, to work on a comfy sofa, lawn chair or bed with my laptop on a pillow, to go out when I want, stay in when I want and have the hours back that I used to waste commuting -- ah, it's indeed sweeeeet!

10 reasons small businesses are on the rise: The playing field is leveling for small businesses -- they're competing with the "big guys" more easily than ever before. Why?

• The risks are lower, small businesses are generally more in touch with their target markets, more creative and quicker to change with the markets than big corps.

• Niche ("long tail") marketing is now smart, for big and small companies alike.

• Listening to consumers/customers/clients is more important than ever, and small businesses can do it just as well or better than their larger competitors.

• Small businesses often respond to customers with lightning speed and their Web sites fully service their customers (rather than confuse them and waste their time).

• Learning to connect with communities and groups on the Internet, whether through social networks or customized Google Ad campaigns, and to actually prescreen your own prospects through landing pages and enewsletters, can lead to a higher percentage of conversions per marketing dollar spent.

• Personalized service and customized products (vs. cookie-cutter solutions) sell -- mostly on small business sites.

• When small businesses pay attention to building longer-lasting relationships with existing customers, they do it better and faster than large corps.

• Small businesses put creative and innovative products out on the 'Net faster than big business.

• Marketing analytics, behavioral targeting, video ads and tiny widgets that save clients time and help them get things done are within everyone's reach.

• Small businesses are getting into Email marketing, business blogs and social marketing in a big way because these methods are cheap, with long-lasting results.
  

Soap Box: Sounds exciting, doesn't it? The Great Recession is an opportunity, not only to start a business on the cheap, but to regain your freedom and autonomy if you've been working for someone else.

Readings: Guerrilla Creativity, by Jay Conrad Levinson; Guerilla Financing by Bruce Blechman and Jay Conrad Levinson; Guerilla Marketing, by Jay Conrad Levinson; Blink by Malcolm Gladwell.