13 Pillars

An Introduction to Internet Marketing for Marketing Managers, Business Owners and Entrepreneurs
1st Edition
David Bain
-2-
THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING
Contents
Introduction..........................................................................................................................4 Pillar #1 Keyword Research............................................................................................. 8 Pillar #2 Website Design................................................................................................ 21 Pillar #3 Blog Technology.............................................................................................. 38 Pillar #4 Autoresponders................................................................................................ 56 Pillar #5 Paid Advertising............................................................................................... 73 Pillar #6 Press Releases.................................................................................................. 87 Pillar #7 Link Building................................................................................................... 96 Pillar #8 Article Submission......................................................................................... 121 Pillar #9 Group Interaction........................................................................................... 132 Pillar #10 Viral Marketing............................................................................................ 149 Pillar #11 Visitor Analysis............................................................................................174 Pillar #12 Continuous Content......................................................................................190 Pillar #13 The Evolving Web....................................................................................... 194 The 13 Pillars of Internet Marketing In a Nutshell....................................................... 205 The Next Step A Strategic Internet Marketing Plan..................................................... 219 About the author.............................................................................................................. 222
Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
Introduction
-3-
Introduction
-4-
Introduction
________________________________________________________________________
he 1 Pillar! o# Internet Marketing offers a broad introduction to internet
marketing methods for people like ou ! for marketing managers, business owners and entrepreneurs" It has been written to help ou build our o#erall online marketing knowledge, e$plaining a wide #ariet of internet marketing acti#ities or %pillars&" 'ew businesses understand the technical aspects of internet marketing" I strongl belie#e that companies need to ha#e some understanding of internet marketing methods in(house, so that the can understand wh things need to be done" Businesses can then make the decision to either do e#er thing in(house, or manage the process and outsource the technical side to a good search engine optimi)ation firm" *earch engine optimi)ation firms are good technicians, but the don&t necessaril understand how to portra our business online" The will do what the are told to do, or the will tend to do a #er good +ob of +ust certain aspects of search engine optimi)ation" ,owe#er, you know our businesses best and that&s wh it&s important for ou to understand what ou can and can not do, or should or should not do, from an internet marketing perspecti#e" The content of this book will introduce ou to the fundamentals of internet marketing and gi#e ou a broad understanding of how to implement them" I will be using real life and fictional e$amples to demonstrate the concepts discussed"
Introduction
-5-
The 1 Pillar! o# Internet Marketing is not +ust about search engine optimi)ation, and o#erall, internet marketing is a lot more than +ust search engine optimi)ation" ,owe#er, the two aspects of search engine optimi)ation -namel onsite and offsite search engine optimi)ation., are ke features of a successful internet marketing campaign" Onsite search engine optimi)ation includes getting all aspects within our site right, such as -but not limited to. ha#ing the correct title tags and heading tags on our web pages" Offsite search engine optimi)ation consists of controlling, as much as possible, the rele#ance of the sites on which our links appear, the rele#ance of the pages within those sites and the wording used within the links on those pages" Therefore, when a site wants to link to ou, ou need to be aware of what linking te$t to re/uest from the webmaster in order to ma$imi)e the #alue of the link" Inbound links from other websites pla a large part in our final search engine rankings so it is important to tr and generate as man rele#ant inbound links as possible" Increasing our inbound links can be done using a range of different techni/ues, which I will discuss throughout the 1 Pillar! o# Internet Marketing" Internet marketing as a whole includes paid ad#ertising as well as other forms of internet marketing, such as podcasting, #ideo marketing, email marketing or an other method of bringing traffic to our website or dri#ing prospects to our opt( in pages" -0e&ll come to what an opt(in page is later on. Ideall , when undertaking an internet marketing campaign, ou want to mimic what happens naturall when people find a website to be a useful resource" B emplo ing a successful internet marketing campaign, ou tr to replicate the natural building of links when increasing the popularit of our website" 1ou do this b generating a wide #ariet of links and building di#erse forms of traffic towards our website" Internet marketing can be summed up as an acti#it that helps to promote and measure the success of our business online" B reading the 1 Pillar! o# Internet Marketing book ou will better understand what needs to be included in an internet marketing plan for our own business" I&#e tried to pro#ide a broad(based o#er#iew of internet marketing methods in as a logical manner as possible" I&#e tried to do this in a wa that makes internet marketing methods easil comprehendible, while still pro#iding some of the
-6-
%meat details& within each of the internet marketing areas discussed" B sectioning off these internet marketing methods I began to reali)e that there were 12 ke important areas to understand ! and therefore 1 Pillar! o# Internet Marketing" There are two things to bear in mind when reading this book3 'irstl , the purpose of the book and who the book is aimed at" The purpose of this book is to pro#ide a comprehensi#e general introduction to internet marketing for marketing managers, business owners and entrepreneurs" If ou&re a seasoned Internet marketing e$pert I would hope that ou know most of the information ! although a little recap ne#er did an one an harm4 *econdl , this book is free" This means that it&s less likel to get updated as often as a paid book which is surel understandable" That&s not to sa this book will e#er become completel outdated" The principles behind each of the 1 Pillar! o# Internet Marketing will be ali#e and well for man ears to come" ,owe#er, to tr and keep things as updated as much as possible, instead of including an links to recommended websites within the book, what I&#e decided to do is to keep all the resource links online" That wa it&ll be much easier to alwa s recommend the most rele#ant of resources" 5inks to e#er website mentioned in this book -as well as man other rele#ant, useful resources. can be found at http677www"12pillars"com7resources" 'inall , when ou get to the end of this book, ou&ll see that I also pro#ide a follow(up 89(week internet marketing plan %action plan& newsletter" This newsletter is free(of(charge and it&s a great wa to help ou implement the 1 Pillar!" :ust #isit www"89weekplan"com to sign(up" But now it&s time to get going with the 1 Pillar! o# Internet Marketing"
Pillar #1 Keyword Research
-7-
Pillar #1
Keyword Research
-8-

________________________________________________________________________
e words are the phrases that people t pe into search engines to find a
product or ser#ice" At the #er beginning ou need to make sure all the different pages on our website are targeting the right ke words ( the phrases that people are likel to t pe into search engines in order to find the product or ser#ice that ou offer" The keyword phrase myth There is a m th that the best scenario is to appear at the top of <oogle&s search results for a reall popular word that relates to our industr " ,owe#er, this is a mistake because if ou&re doing this then the chances are that ou are focusing on our competitors instead of our own prospecti#e customers" The ke words that ou need to focus on are the ones that pro#ide great con#ersion rates for our website in addition to a reasonable amount of website #isitors -traffic." =on#ersion rates are measured b calculating the number of #isitors to our website di#ided b those that go on to undertake the action re/uired in order to reach our ultimate goal" If ou&re a college or uni#ersit ou ma think, %Oh, it would be fantastic +ust to appear at the top of <oogle for the ke word search %college&" >ot necessaril " 'or instance ou might offer #er specific courses" 1ou ob#iousl co#er +ust a specific localit ! and a specific price bracket" Therefore, ou are not likel to get #er good con#ersion rates from +ust that one word" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
-9-
Another e$ample is ou ma think, %If I offer a business articles website, wouldn?t it be fantastic +ust to get thousands of #isitors for the ke word %business&@ ,owe#er, in this instance as well our con#ersion rates will suffer as the ke word %business& can ha#e a #er generic meaning and as a result it is more likel that these #isitors will ha#e reached our website and not found what the were looking for" Aather than think about single term ke words ou should be focusing on succeeding with longer ke words, which are easier to rank highl in search engines and lead to better con#ersion rates" on!"tail keyword phrases It is important to use what are called long(tail ke word phrases" B using long( tail ke word phrases ou face less competition from similar businesses, making it easier to get ranked in search engines" 5ong(tail ke word phrases also gi#e ou higher con#ersion rates as the pull in more rele#ant traffic to our website, with #isitors more likel to follow(through and become our customers" B focusing on long(tail ke word phrases, rele#ant people who ha#e specificall searched for what ou ha#e on offer will be #isiting our website, rather than people stumbling upon our website b chance" >ot onl are #isitors from long( tail, more rele#ant ke word phrases more likel to stick around and purchase from ou" The &ll be more likel to bookmark our website and come back later" Internet search patterns Think of the patterns that people make when search for something online" Think about how ou use a search engine" Bo ou +ust search once and then pick out a website from our first set of results@ 1ou are more likel to perform an initial search using +ust one or two words and then tr and narrow down the results further after that" This impro#ed search is generall made b adding e$tra words -often determined b the initial search results. or the use of in#erted commas Caround a phraseD to indicate that it?s a specific phrase that ou&re searching for" Most internet users are aware that the more precise our search terms are, the more likel ou are to find the precise resource ou?re looking for" Eeople are looking for something specific when the t pe in a longer ke word Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 10 -
phrase into a search engine" That&s another reason wh ou shouldn&t necessaril worr about not coming up in the first set of search results" The keyword phrase solution # usin! keyword phrases The more ke word phrases that ou are tr ing to aim for on a single page, the harder it is to achie#e high search engine rankings for our chosen page" Bo not be tempted to go for lots of different ke word phrases for our home page ( ou should aim for one main ke word phrase on each indi#idual webpage plus some longer(tail ke word phrases -preferabl encompassing our main ke word phrase. ! up to a ma$imum of 2 phrases per page" An more than 2 ke word phrases per page will dilute the impact of each of the phrases on our indi#idual pages" A good e$ample would be if ou had determined that our main ke word phrase for our home page should be %F; tra#el guide& then a couple of longer tail ke word phrases that ou could include on the same page without diluting their impact might be %free F; tra#el guide& and %F; tra#el guide for tourists&" 1ou should also focus on different ke word phrases for different pages of our site, again up to a ma$imum of 2 per page" The main content on our web pages will naturall allow search engines to find alternati#e longer ke word phrases" That&s another reason wh ou should ha#e +ust the one main ke word phrase as a main target as well as +ust a few specific longer(tail ke word phrases" >ote6 Eillar G8 will re#iew different areas on our web pages where ou should be including our chosen ke word phrases" $earch en!ine rankin! In the 1HHI&s search engines like AltaJista were the most popular means of finding information on the web" At that time the meta(ke words tag was the primar factor in determining the rele#ance of indi#idual pages, and where those pages should be ranked in search engines" 'rom roughl the ear 8III onwards, search engines started to reali)e that their results could be easil skewed if the focused on the meta(ke words tag too hea#il " Instead of rel ing on this piece of meta data for ranking decisions, <oogle counted the /uantit of links to a webpage from other websites and the te$t used within those links -amongst other things. when deciding on the search Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
Pillar #1 Keyword Research ranking of a web page" The meta(ke words tag has continued to drop in #alue as the large search engines such as <oogle and 1ahoo4 ha#e become wise to spotting %ke word stuffing&" This has happened to such an e$tent that ma search engine professionals don&t bother with it an more" $electin! the appropriate keyword phrase
- 11 -
As <oogle has e#ol#ed the wa it ranks pages, ou should re#iew our ke word phrase strateg accordingl " In order to implement the optimum ke word phrase strateg , ou should use different le#els of ke word phrases according to the rele#ance of the ke word phrase, the degree of difficult in getting that ke word phrase ranked highl b a search engine and the structure of our website" To help ou determine the appropriate ke word phrase for each page on our website I would recommend that ou think of our ke word phrases as belonging to one of three categories6 1) %our home pa!e keyword phrase 2) %our cate!ory pa!e keyword phrases 3) %our keyword phrases on individual pa!es within your cate!ories Cate!ory keyword phrases e&plained B categor ke word phrases I&m assuming that our website is structured in a hierarchical order and therefore has a certain amount of links on the home page, and these pages that the home page links to ha#e further links that point to additional pages" I&m referring to the pages which are linked to directl from our pages as our categor pages" 'elpin! search en!ines to determine the relevance o( your site B structuring our ke word phrases into different le#els ou are helping e$plain to search engines the precise rele#ance of our site" The means search engines are more likel to understand the meaning of our site and the will be
- 12 -
more confident that our website is an authorit on a particular topic" 1ou should ha#e a separate ke word phrase for our home page, our categor pages, and our indi#idual pages within" 'or our home page ou can afford to choose a ke word phrase that is searched more often, and which will generate more traffic to our siteK categor pages less so and indi#idual pages e#en less so" As a rule of thumb I tend to focus on tow(word ke word phrases for m home page, three(word ke word phrases for m categor phrases and four(word ke word phrases for m indi#idual pages" )i!ure 1*1 +oo!le ,&ternal Keyword Tool
https-##adwords*!oo!le*com#select#KeywordTool,&ternal
Pillar #1 Keyword Research Determinin! su./ect areas to cover on your we.site
- 13 -
One of the first areas ou should address with our website is to determine our main categor sub+ect areas" A categor represents subsections within our website which aid search engines and #isitors to determine the contents of that particular subsection of our website" I suggest ha#ing appro$imatel 1I to 2I main categories within our site with different ke word phrases associated with each of them" 'or e$ample, if our ke word phrase on our home page is %golf lessons&, ou ma wish our categor ke word phrases to include %london golf lessons&, %cheap golf lessons& and %golf dri#ing schools&" 1our categor ke word phrases needn&t contain e$actl the same words as our home page ke word phrase, but the should be topic related ! and more specific" Researchin! keyword phrase cate!ories There are different wa s of researching categories for our site and there are a number of resources ou can use to help determine the most appropriate categories" 'irst of all, ou should go to competitors& websites and ha#e a look to see how the are structuring their websites, taking note of an categories the ha#e on their sites" *econdl , ou can use what is called the <oogle E$ternal ;e word Tool -'igure 1"1." This tool offers ou suggestions and ideas for other ke word phrases associated to a smaller word or phrase that ou t pe into it" This tool can be used for both website categor ideas and ke word research" Another a#ailable tool is ;wMap ( this gi#es ou ideas based on what people t pe into search engines" It maps words closel related to, but not the same as, the search term" It pro#ides a similar function to a thesaurus which is another option for researching different categories" The best wa of understanding how ;wMap can help ou brainstorm new website categories and ke word phrases is to ha#e a pla with the ser#ice" A link to ;wMap along with the rest of the resources mentioned in this pillar can be found at http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar1"
- 14 -
Takin! the !uesswork out o( determinin! keyword phrases ,a#ing determined our categories ou should then research the ke word phrases that people use to find the kind of product or ser#ice ou offer" There are tools a#ailable for researching our ke word phrases" These will gi#e ou an understanding of the le#els of phrases that people t pe into search engines" The main ke word research tool I recommend is called 0ordtracker"
C0$, $T1D% 1 Product".ased 2nline Retail 'reddie 'aldo is a golf shop owner with an online retail presence" Below is an e$ample of how he can use 0ordtracker to conduct his ke word research" In the first instance 'redd would t pe the word %golf& into 0ordtracker )i!ure 1*3 Keyword Tracker Tool
4ordtracker
- 15 -
Knowin! which keywords to tar!et It is going to be difficult for him to run at the top of search engines for the word %golf& unless he puts a lot of effort in, as there is a great deal of competition for the ke word %golf&" Jiew a screenshot of the 0ordtracker search on the word %golf& in figure 1"2" E#en if he does get to the top of search engine rankings for the ke word %golf&, are people looking for what he offers@ Eerhaps the are looking for golf courses or golf lessons rather than bu ing golf e/uipment from a local shop" Ideall , the ke word phrase that he should be targeting for his home page is something like %golf e/uipment& as that is specificall what he offers" Drillin! down deeper into 4ordtracker results In order to determine the ke word phrases that 'reddie should be using for his categor pages, he can click on the links within the 0ordtracker results for golf e/uipment to show results such as6 %used golf clubs&, %discount golf clubs&, %ping golf clubs&" As these are actual search phrases that people use on a regular basis the are more beneficial" The are also longer phrases and therefore more specific to 'reddie 'aldo&s website" ,e will also be able to see within these results how man times a da these phrases are searched for e"g" the phrases %used golf clubs&K %discount golf clubs& and %ping golf clubs& are t ped into search engines roughl LII times a da " ,e now has an idea of how to structure his website b using the ke word phrases used %golf clubs&, %discount golf clubs&, %ping golf clubs& within the categor of %golf e/uipment&, back with the knowledge that there are a great deal of people that regularl search for those phrases online"
- 16 -
)i!ure 1*5 ! Keyword Tracker Tool
$earchin! (or the keyword 6!ol(7 in 4ordtracker
- 17 -
C0$, $T1D% 3 $ervice".ased 2nline Retail :ane :obs runs a *ales E$ecuti#e Aecruitment =ompan " :ane is alread aware that her business is about sales +obs" But what categories should she choose for her website@ Fsing 0ordtracker :ane can see that people t pe in %sales +obs& 1MI times a da -'igure 1"N." That is a nice le#el in terms of number of #isitors for a ke word phrase to aim for our home page" Aoughl ou should aim for between 1II and 1,III times searched for a home page ke word phrase" =ategor phrases should be searched a bit less ( probabl something in the region of 8I to 8II times depending on the si)e of business or on how hard ou are prepared to work at getting those pages ranked highl in search engines" 'rom the 0ordtracker results -'igure 1"N., the different categories that she could ha#e within her website are6 Cmedical sales +obsD -M1 searches., Cpharmaceutical sales +obsD -21 searches. and Cdirect sales +obsD -1O searches." :ane can be confident that these are the phrases which people are actuall searching for" 1sin! 4ordtracker to amend your we.site strate!y ,a#ing initiall considered structuring the site ke words on a regional basis, :ane can now see that people don?t as commonl conduct regional searches e"g" %sales +obs Belfast& or %sales +obs >ewcastle&" This research therefore gi#es her a much better idea of how to structure her website and how to cater her offering towards the ma+orit of potential website #isitors" Brilling down e#en further, she can structure different ke word phrases for her indi#idual pages as well" B clicking on the phrase %medical sales +obs&, she can include these longer ke word phrases on indi#idual pages within that categor " E$amples of longer(tail ke word phrases that :ane can use on her pages within the medical sales +obs categor include %medical e/uipment sales +obs&, %medical de#ice sales +obs&, and %sales +obs medical e/uipment&"
- 18 -
)i!ure 1*8 Keyword Tracker Tool
Results (rom 4ordtracker a(ter typin! in the term 6sales /o.s7
- 19 -
Pillar #1 Keyword Research $ummary *tructure our site correctl to begin with" 1ou know what our business is about and what our home page is about" Make sure our ke words reflect our business purpose" 1ou should aim to structure our website in a logical manner for both users and for search engines" After ou choose our home page ke word phrase, choose our site categories" 0hat categories represent our business@ Brainstorm ideas and use resources such as an online thesaurus, ;0map, 0ordtracker and the <oogle E$ternal ;e word Tool to come up with 1I(2I rele#ant categories for our site" 'ocus on our indi#idual pages after our categories" In an ideal world ou should de#ise a structure of 1I to 2I indi#idual pages within each categor " If ou want, and if our website is large enough, then ou can go for sub(categories within categories before drilling down to pages within that section" =onduct ke word research to come up with one ke word phrase per page" Be as specific as possible" B selecting long(tail ke word phrases, e#en if ou ha#e fewer #isitors to our site, ou will ha#e a higher con#ersion rate from the traffic ou do recei#e" In the long term bringing in a couple of #isitors per da to an indi#idual page, e/uals MII(9II #er rele#ant #isitors o#er a ear" Jisit all the resources mentioned in Pillar $1 %eyword &e!ear"h and other recommended ke word research tools here6 http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar1 Eosition our ke word phrase in our site architecture ! and this is where we start Pillar $2 ' (e)!ite *e!ign"
- 20 -
Pillar #3
4e.site Desi!n
Pillar #2 Website Design
- 21 -
Pillar #3 4e.site Desi!n

________________________________________________________________________
ebsite design, pillar G8, aims to make the best use of the ke words ou
ha#e chosen for our site" In addition this pillar helps ou position our ke words in the most appropriate places on our site" The main aspects of pillar G8 consist of behind the scenes coding, na#igation structure, onsite optimi)ation, the precise rele#ance of each page and impro#ing con#ersion rates" Behind"the"scenes codin! The %behind the scenes& coding on an website needs to be as efficient as possible to assist with search engine optimi)ation" 0hen designing sites using software such as Breamwea#er, although it&s constantl getting better, surplus and repeated code can sometimes still be generated" 'or e$ample, in Breamwea#er, if ou highlight some te$t and make it bold, then remo#e the bold at a later point, some duplicate code has been known to be produced" >ote that this isn&t an slight on Breamwea#er ! Breamwea#er is probabl one of the best pieces of software a#ailable for designing a beautiful website without an knowledge of ,TM5 code ! but ou can ne#er 1IIP replicate the abilit of a human website coder" *o while some software is e$cellent for designing websites, the best solution for optimi)ing the code is somebod manuall checking to ensure all unnecessar code is taken out" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 22 The use o( cascadin! style sheets
One method of keeping our web page code as tid as possible is the use of something called cascading st le sheets" Among other things, cascading st le sheets -or =** for short. help ou reduce the repetition of code that might otherwise be re/uired when ou ha#e a particularl repetitious design st le on our pages" E$amples of such st les might include common fonts for headings, subheadings and links throughout the site" Another ad#antage -in addition to the reduction of our website source code. of using cascading st le sheets and storing all of our st les in the one file is that it gi#es ou the facilit to /uickl and easil alter +ust the one file on our website in order to amend the properties of an one element across our entire website" -'or e$ample the st le of an main heading that appears on our website. 2rderin! your we.site code in an e((icient manner One thing ou need to be aware of is that search engines crawl through our website source code in order to tr to understand what each of our web pages is about" The don&t see our design ! +ust the code behind our design" And the higher up within our code the rele#ant content, the easier that search engines will find it to determine that our web page is about a particular topic" If ou ha#e a flash , in#ol#ed top section at the top of each of our website pages, then the chances are that there is a great deal of code that is re/uired to make that top section displa correctl " In an ideal website design, our code will get to our main page heading as soon as possible, shortl followed b the bod content on our web page" This is the main reason wh lots of blogs displa their site na#igation toward the right hand side of each page" It means that search engines crawl through the post content before the get to the standard site na#igation, so there is a greater chance that this page will be ranked higher in search engine results for the bod content" 4e.site navi!ation (or visitors and search en!ines It is of great benefit to ou when ou tailor our website na#igation towards both users and search engines"
Pillar #2 Website Design 0ithin our website na#igation structure ou often ha#e categories, sub( categories and indi#idual rele#ant pages within these sub(categories"
- 23 -
If a web page features %backwards compatible na#igation&, this will allow a person who has reached an indi#idual page in a website, either #ia a search engine or an e$ternal link, to understand where that page fits into the website as a whole" The na#igation should pro#ide them with the option of browsing our site and if the can easil understand our structure the will be more likel to #isit another indi#idual page within the site" )i!ure 3*1 Trek the 1K travel !uide
http-##www*trektheuk*com#cornwall*php
- 24 -
'or e$ample, in figure 8"1, when somebod stumbles upon this page which is about a place called =ornwall in England, the immediatel understand where this it fits into the website as a whole" The &re therefore much more likel to continue to browse through the website" This associated na#igation also helps search engines b showing them the topics that are associated with the page, therefore +ustif ing wh the search engine should rank the page as more rele#ant for a particular topic" The na#igation on the page in /uestion reads as follows6 ,ome Q Elaces to go Q England Q *outhwest England Q =ornwall +ome , -Category. , -/u)-"ategory. , -/u)-!u)-"ategory. , -Indi0idual page. A #isitor can /uickl familiari)e themsel#es with the website and na#igate through the different categories" Another helpful pointer for search engines is to include the ke word phrases within a te$t link that points to a page" This ke word phrase needs to reflect the content on the page that the link points towards ! and not the page on which the te$t link resides" 'or e$ample, if ou wanted to link to a page which was about %'rench language courses& and ou linked to that page with a te$t link that contained the words %'rench language courses&, this would be assisting with the search engine optimi)ation of the landing page" This is another reason wh in the e$ample abo#e, the te$t %England& and %*outhwest England& is used within the na#igation links" It greatl assists with the search engine optimi)ation of the landing pages" 2nsite optimi9ation There are L essential aspects of onsite optimi)ation" These are things that ou should be aware of and should instruct our website designer to design our site in a manner that appeals most to search engines" 1" Eage Title 1our page title can be found in the -commonl blue. bar at the #er top of our website browsing software" -i"e" Internet E$plorer 7 'irefo$ 7 *afari etc. Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
Pillar #2 Website Design In figure 8"8, the page title te$t in the blue bar sa s CThe internet marketing strateg specialists ! Eurple Internet MarketingD" )i!ure 3*3 Purple Internet :arketin!
- 25 -
The 6Pa!e Title7 te&t can .e (ound in the .lue .ar at the top o( this screenshot The Eage Title ser#es the dual purpose of helping our users understand what the page is about, as well as pro#iding search engines with a ke word phrase inside the Eage Title" It is important that our site should use different Eage Titles on indi#idual pages in order to optimi)e each page on our website" This will enable indi#idual pages to be found b a search engine" 'ailing to do this will ha#e a detrimental effect on our web page rankings in search engines" 0hen search engine results are displa ed the Eage Title is the link that is underlined" B making the page title as rele#ant to the search as possible, the searcher is more likel to find what the are looking for and click through to Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 26 our website"
Of course the Eage Title must e$plain to people e$actl what is on each page too ! otherwise ou&re our new website #isitors aren&t going to hang around too long" 8" Meta Bescription Although the meta(description isn?t generall thought b search engine optimi)ation professional to be part of the search engine ranking algorithm, this meta tag can still significantl positi#el impact our search engine result #iew to click con#ersion rates" To #iew the meta(description ou can enter an indi#idual web page and right click to select %#iew source& or %#iew page source&" This enables ou to see the code behind the indi#idual web pages and near the top ou are most likel to find the meta(description" )i!ure 3*5 Pa!e $ource o( Build%our2wnBusiness*.i9
;iew o( the pa!e source
Pillar #2 Website Design The meta(description #iewed as highlighted in figure 8"2 begins %Business Articles ! 5atest business news R management ad#ice&"
- 27 -
At the time of writing if ou search <oogle for %business articles&, the number one result is the website www"Build1ourOwnBusiness"bi)" -'igure 8"N. 0hen ou #iew the descripti#e te$t underneath the clickable title ou will see that the te$t used in the description has been taken from the meta(description" )i!ure 3*8 +oo!le $earch
$earchin! +oo!le (or 6.usiness articles7 This shows wh con#ersion rates from a user #iewing a search engine result to the user deciding to click through to the website can be significantl impro#ed" If ou manage to include a meta(description in the search results which is e$tremel rele#ant to the users& search then it is much more likel that the user will decide to click through to the website" >ote6 If ou decide not to use a meta(description in our website coding, or if a search engine deems our meta description to be irrele#ant compared with the content on our page then the search engine ma instead decide to use some alternati#e content from within our page as the description with the search result" This is generall e$tremel unfa#orable when it comes to tr ing to impro#e our con#ersion rates"
- 28 -
Aemember ! ou do not need to incorporate the ke word phrase within our meta(description ! this probabl won&t influence search engines" The most important thing is that ou tailor our meta(descriptions towards users and tr ing to persuade users to #isit our page without being misleading" It is fairl simple to ensure that our meta(description is different for each page on our site" If ou are using a content management s stem, ou can commonl generate the meta(description automaticall , potentiall from the first few lines of our main page content" ,owe#er, ideall it is good to ha#e the facilit to include manual meta(descriptions with each page" In addition to indi#idual page titles, this will significantl impro#e our con#ersion rates from search engine result -*EAE. pages" 2" ,eading Tags ,eading tags should appear either side of a heading within a page" 'or e$ample the heading in figure 8"M, the home page of www"Build1ourOwnBusiness"bi) is %5atest business articles&" *ome hidden tags behind the source code of that heading e$plain to search engines that this is an important heading, and therefore that pro#ides a #er good indication to search engines about the content on the page" If ou #iew the source code behind the page -1iew Q /our"e in Internet E$plorer. ou will be able to see the heading tags in the source code" ,eading tags consist of te$t enclosed b S,2, where 2 is a numerical #alue from 1 to 9, with 1 being the most important of headings" 'or main headings like %5atest Business Articles& -the heading shown in figure 8"M. the code generated will look like6 S,1Q5atest Business ArticlesS7,1Q Aemember, the purpose of heading tags is to help e$plain to search engines what our page is about" If ou ha#e our ke word phrase within the heading tag, it is more likel that search engines will consider that our page is likel to be about our ke word phrase topic"
Pillar #2 Website Design )i!ure 3*< Build%our2wnBusiness
- 29 -
www*Build%our2wnBusiness*.i9 N" %A5T& Tags %A5T& tags are alternati#e te$t that appears if an image does not displa properl " *ometimes if ou ho#er o#er an image with our mouse the %A5T& te$t will be displa ed" %A5T& tags originated in the 1HHIs when Internet pages were slow to load because of dial(up connections" The te$t appeared instead of the image, describing what the image was" Fsers could then click on this te$t to download the image if re/uired" ,owe#er, %A5T& tags now ha#e se#eral additional uses" The can be used to help to e$plain to search engines what our pages and images are about, again helping our site ranking" Additionall the pro#ide a route into our website Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 30 -
when people are searching for images using <oogle Image *earch or M*> Image *earch" If ou ha#e %A5T& te$t associated with each image it is more likel those images will appear in search results, increasing the traffic to our site" %A5T& tags are also beneficial for #isuall impaired people who use software to read pages out loud" If ou ha#e te$t that e$plains what images are, it assists the software and makes our site more accessible, also gi#ing our site greater compliance with certain web standards" M" ;e word Aich >a#igation 0ithin our website, ou should be linking to different pages using ke word phrases" The ke word phrase should reflect the content of the page that ou are linking towards" 'or e$ample, if I am linking to a page about "hange management arti"le!, ideall , I want to be using the te$t, %change management articles& within the te$t link to that page" -'igure 8"9. )i!ure 3*= Build%our2wnBusiness*.i9
0n e&ample o( keyword rich navi!ation The orange %=hange Management Articles& te$t link links to the page which can be seen in figure 8"O" In figure 8"O, there are aspects that optimi)e this page for the %=hange Management Articles& ke word phrase" 1ou can find the phrase %=hange Management Articles& within the page title, heading tags, page content and links towards that page"
Pillar #2 Website Design )i!ure 3*> www*Build%our2wnBusiness*.i9
- 31 -
The 6Chan!e :ana!ement 0rticles7 pa!e 9" <ood FA5 'ormat The FA5 does not reall impact search engine optimi)ation a great deal, but it is important to ha#e a consistent FA5 structure within our website that search engines can follow" *ome websites ha#e their pages generated from databases with long FA5s that aren&t consistent because the change depending on which users are #isiting our website and what the are looking at" This isn&t good, as search engines will find it hard to determine which FA5 is the correct one and which one should be ranked" :ust remember that if ou make things easier for search engines then the are less
- 32 -
likel to come up with an e$cuse not to rank our web pages as highl as the might otherwise be ranked" There is often no need to ha#e lots of /uestion marks and different /uer strings within a FA5" Tr and make them as simple as possible" 'or e$ample, the following formats of FA5s are ideal6 www"build ourownbusiness"bi)7change(management(articles 3"ategory 4&L5 www"build ourownbusiness"bi)7change(management(articles7what(is( change(management 3page 4&L5 O" Bon?t 5ink to the *ame Eage in Two Bifferent 0a s Man websites link to their homepage within their own site b using 7inde$"html at the end of their FA5" The reason that website designers do this is that this the wa to tell our internet browser to load a particular page as the first page when somebod #isits our website" ,owe#er, all ou need to do is link to our home page using our main domain name for e$ample www"build ourownbusiness"bi), instead of www"build ourownbusiness"bi)7inde$"html" 1ou should also ensure that ou are consistent with our choice of whether or not ou use %www"& Fsing more than one format of link for the same page could dilute the impact of our linking structure" If ou ha#e links within our site using one format, but ha#e links from other websites in a different format, then it can reduce the popularit of our homepage with search engines" -i"e" if ou link to our homepage using www" ourdomain"com7inde$"htm from within our site et other sites +ust use www" ourdomain"com. The reason that ou should +ust stick to the one format of link is because search engines are less likel to rank our site highl if the are not able to recogni)e how popular our site actuall is" In addition, as a worst case scenario from these duplicate st les of linking, search engines ma think that these two different pages offering duplicate content" This means that the ma choose to de(rank one of these pages completel because the think ou are offering duplicate content on our website" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
Pillar #2 Website Design L" Fse %>o 'ollow& tags where appropriate
- 33 -
The final aspect of on(site search engine optimi)ation that I&d like to include here is the use of %>o 'ollow& tags within our linking structure" %>o 'ollow& tags enable ou to tell search engines %Bon?t rank this page& or %Bon?t rank these pages& because the are not important" Eages that ou do not want to be ranked in search engines should make use of the %>o 'ollow& tag, for e$ample the %about us&, %disclaimer& or %terms R conditions& pages within our website" There ma well be lots of pages within our site that ou do not want search engines to include in their results pages" B deliberatel di#erting search engines awa from certain pages, search engines are more likel to focus their efforts on determining what the rest of our site is about and rank the rest of the pages in our site more highl " The format of a %>o 'ollow& tag looks like6 Sa hrefThttp677www"build ourownbusiness"bi)Q rel?@no(ollowAQAbout FsS7aQ If ou are constructing a simple ,TM5 link, and ou don&t want search engines pass an credence to the page that ou&re linking towards, ou should include the %nofollow& attribute" :ore site architecture tips Make sure that ou stick to one precise topic per page" It is not +ust one ke word phrase per page, but it is one rele#ant, precise topic per page that is rele#ant for users" This will make life as eas as possible for search engines ! so ou&ll ha#e a good chance of getting a high search engine result ! and getting a high con#ersion of users clicking through to our pages ! and those #isitors sta ing on their site because the &re immediatel aware of the precise nature of the page"
,a#e a logical progression within as well as within our indi#idual pages" -Aemember the na#igation in figure 8"1. This will encourage users to progress through our site after stumbling upon our page through a search engine result page"
- 34 -
5ess is often more when it comes to con#ersion rates" 1ou ma want to minimi)e na#igation on some pages and gi#e people less options" This in turn dri#es our website #isitors towards the one option that ou reall want them to choose"
Precise relevance o( each pa!e Each page within our website needs to be e$tremel rele#ant" 0h not sur#e our #isitors and ask them how ou can impro#e our website@ This ma help ou reduce the amount of #isitors who lea#e within a few seconds of arri#ing ! thinking that our site is not rele#ant for their needs" 1ou&#e done the hard work when ou get #isitors to #isit our website after finding our pages listed in search engine result pages" Bon&t uncoil our efforts b making our site seem irrele#ant for ou #isitors& needs" 1our web pages should be designed for our #isitors ! with search engines in mind" Bon&t o#erload our pages with ke word phrases or make our #isitors ha#e to scroll to read the content that the are looking for" The best optimi)ed web pages don&t look %optimi)ed&" Improvin! conversion rates Impro#ing con#ersion rates should be another imperati#e area of focus within website design" 1ou need think about what our goals are for an indi#idual #isitor in addition to how ou will measure our goals" Bo ou simpl want people to lea#e a name, an email address, and get them to fill in a form@ These t pes of goals are the easiest to measure" Other goals ou might ha#e include ! selling somethingK tracking free downloadsK tracking link clicks or tracking pages #iewed to name +ust a few" Man businesses will want to capture contact details of #isitors e"g" name, email address etc" An important though is that ou shouldn&t rel on search engines fore#er for free traffic in ou business model, as our website might not be ranked highl b <oogle or 1ahoo or M*> fore#er" 1ou should aim to build an email list in order to reduce our reliance on search engines in the future"
Pillar #2 Website Design
- 35 -
A final important aspect of impro#ing con#ersion rates is to test different sales techni/ues" *oftware programs such as A0eber and <oogle Ad0ords will let ou displa different #ersions of the same page and test alternati#e #ersions against each other" 1ou can test our headings on our pages, our descriptions, or e#en the te$t within a button" This will help ou to produce the optimum #ersions of our cop " Eerhaps ou don&t need all the information that ou&re re/uesting our #isitors for@ Ma be ou&ll treble our opt(in rates if ou +ust ask for name and email address instead of asking for name, email address and ph sical address" Ideall , ou need to be testing all the time" Once ou find a winning page, ou should keep it but continue to test and tweak it to see if ou can further impro#e con#ersion rates"
- 36 -
Pillar #3 4e.site Desi!n $ummary Take some time to think about our behind the scenes coding ! make our whole website as efficient as possible, which will help search engines when the crawl through our site" <et our na#igation structure right and make sure it?s logical for search engines and indi#idual users" Aemember that our website #isitors ma land on an indi#idual page #ia a search engine and good na#igation will allow them to /uickl understand where that page is in relation to the rest of our site" This will make our new #isitors more likel to stick around for longer" Ensure that ou&re aware of the L essential aspects of onsite optimi)ation which will help to impro#e our search engine rankings" ,a#e ou considered the precise rele#ance of each page@ ,a#ing +ust the one topic per page will make life easier for both #isitors and search engines" B undertaking continuous testing and anal )ing what does and doesn&t work, ou can alter the structure of the site to ma$imi)e con#ersion rates" Jisit all the resources mentioned in Pillar $2 (e)!ite *e!ign here6 http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar8 -This resources section also contains links to m 8 recommended web hosts.
Pillar #3 Blog Technology
- 37 -
Pillar #5
Blo! Technolo!y
- 38 -
Pillar #5 Blo! Technolo!y

________________________________________________________________________
log technolog is how I prefer to describe the marketing benefits of
blogging" I #iew a blog as a great piece of technolog rather than an online +ournal or diar " Man businesses dismiss blogs as informal online diaries in which people #oice opinions" ,owe#er, the technolog behind a blog can be harnessed as a powerful Internet marketing medium for business ! and the communication st le can be an st le ou like" Pillar $ 6log 7e"hnology co#ers6 0hat a blog is A re#iew of some of the different t pes of blogging software a#ailable ,ow to /uickl and easil personali)e a blog with the use of themes and plugins 0hat Einging and A** feeds are and how the impact internet marketing 0h Eodcasting is so closel related to blogging and how to use a blog to start our own podcast
4hat is a .lo!B 0ikipedia describes a blog as being a website with entries made in a +ournal st le, howe#er, this is not necessaril the case ! I don&t like that description" 0hile the #ast ma+orit of blogs ma be presented in re#erse chronological order, Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 39 -
the content topic and st le is entirel our choice" 1our blog can include news stories, or ha#e formal content" It could be targeted internall within our organi)ation" 'ow use(ul is a .lo!B A good piece of blogging software is also a great content management tool" Blogs are an e$cellent wa for non(,TM5 literate workers within an organi)ation to upload new information onto a website" *earch engines tend to rank websites higher if ou continuall add new content to our site" 1ou should not think of our website as being a static entit ! it should be continuousl updated with content regularl added to our site" 0hen sites are updated regularl , then search engines are more likel to consider it current and therefore more rele#ant than a website that has not been updated for a period of time" A blog makes it #er eas to add new pages to our website" It makes it much easier to keep our website current" Popular .lo!!in! so(tware Blogger Blogger is software that ou can use that isn?t hosted on our own ser#er" I would not recommend it for business use" If ou are new to blogging it can be useful to register and create our own account to see how blogging works" It is owned b <oogle and free to use" 0ordEress The software that I recommend for business use is 0ordEress" -'igure 2"1. It is open source blogging software and it is also free to use" 0ordEress"org can be downloaded onto our ser#er and installed on our website" As ou can use it on our own domain a t pical address for our blog ma be 1ourBomain"com7blog"
- 40 -
THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING )i!ure 5*1 " 4ordPress
wordpress*or! 4ordPress themes 0hen using 0ordEress ou can also use 0ordEress themes, which allow ou to personali)e the look and feel of our blog" An thing relating to the la out, design, look and feel of the blog itself is deri#ed from a 0ordEress theme, and there are thousands of free themes that ou can use" 'igure 2"8 is an e$ample of a website that is gi#ing awa a theme free(of(charge is =op blogger" At the time of writing =op blogger has o#er MI,III A** subscribers, so it goes to show that gi#ing awa a good 0ordEress theme for free can be a #er effecti#e form of internet marketing" E#en if ou decide to download and use the =op blogger theme, ou do not necessaril ha#e to stick to the same color scheme" 1ou can use a theme as a base for our blog and then amend it according to our brand or website colour scheme, if re/uired" 1ou can e#en get a personali)ed 0ordEress theme" If ou want to install our blog on our domain, then the blog can be tailored to look e$actl like our site" 1our #isitors will probabl not be aware of the fact that the &re #iewing pages which ha#e been deli#ered #ia another content management s stem"
Pillar #3 Blog Technology )i!ure 5*3 " Copy.lo!!er
- 41 -
=opy.lo!!er has over <CDCCC R$$ su.scri.ers 1ou can search for a free theme to suit our indi#idual needs at 0ordEress"net" *earch b st le, colour, general look and feel, or browse to #iew different themes that are appropriate for our business"
Content mana!ement Blogs are a great content management tool as the don&t re/uire ou to be technicall literate to post pages or manage the publishing of new content" All ou ha#e to do is enter our title and content within the blog post, choose our categor and press %submit&" If ou install a 0ordEress blog on our ser#er ou can gi#e different le#els of authorit to different users" 1ou can limit access to particular categories, or Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 42 -
allow certain users to onl create posts, as opposed to authori)ing them to amend the look and feel of the blog" 'igure 2"2 shows the back office of www"EurpleInternetMarketing"com, which is a site completel designed and managed #ia a 0ordEress blog installation" If ou want to write a post, all ou do is click on %write& to add and entr to our 0ordEress blog" -*ee figure 2"2. )i!ure 5*5 Backend o( 4ordPress
0ddin! an entry to the 4ordPress .lo! =lick %write post& and enter the title and post te$t" Then select the #arious categories ou want the post to be associated with -if ou want more than one categor press %add&. and then press %publish&" It&s as eas as that to add new posts and therefore add new content to our website"
Pillar #3 Blog Technology 4ordPress plu!ins
- 43 -
0ordEress has been speciall designed to be %lean and mean& in the wa it operates" This is because the understand that different 0ordEress users certain features and not other features" In order to cater for e#er one&s needs, the made the sensible choice of designing 0ordEress to be a world(class core product without an e$tra %bells and whistles&" ,owe#er, because 0ordEress is open(source it means that independent coders can add additional functionalit to the software in the form of %plugins&" This means that users aren&t lumbered with downloading a bloated core product which has features that the don&t intend to use" To pro#ide these different features and functionalit there is a wide range of plugins a#ailable of which the ma+orit are free(of(charge" All plugins are are small software programs which work together with our standard 0ordEress installation" 1ou can search for plugins in the plugins director on the 0ordEress website" -wordpress"org7e$tend7plugins. *earch b what ou want our plugins to do" 0hate#er additional feature ou are looking to add to our blog somebod else has probabl had the same thought ! and perhaps built a plugin to accomplish the re/uired task" Eerhaps ou want to amend our graphics or the look and feel of our blog, or e#en amend our linking structure" 1ou ma want a plugin which will allow ou to help ou build a re#enue stream into our blog"
Recommended plu!ins At the time of writing there are man plugins which I use on one of m blogs ! the Eurple Internet Marketing website" The following are M plugins which I currentl use and that I am comfortable recommending" -Elease note that these kind of recommendations change all the time" Jisit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar2 for an up(to(date list of plugin resources U links to 8 highl recommended professional 0ordEress themes". 1. Akismet is a great spam filter if ou ha#e %comment posting& functionalit at the bottom of our blog posts" *ome businesses ma choose to disable the comment functionalit but it can be useful to encourage interaction within our Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 44 -
website" =omments can pro#ide up to date content for our site, while it also makes our blog more of a communit that people are more likel to come back to and listen and read other comments" The Akismet plugin should disable around HIP of our spam comments and sa#e ou a great deal of time in comment moderation"
8. a5inks is a tool to control links within a blog" One of the potential issues with blogs is that people can %steal& our content #ia our A** feed -we&ll get to what that is in a bit. and automaticall publish it on their own site" 1ou ma not necessaril want them to be able to do that" a5inks allows ou to build in automatic links within our blog posts" 'or e$ample, if I mention the phrase %business articles& within a blog post I might set it up so that the plugin automaticall generates a link to the home page of www"Build1ourOwnBusiness"bi)" If people republish that post which contains that link, then the link will probabl now be on the other person?s website pointing back to our site" At least is somebod steals our content ou gain b getting a link on their site"
2. Eopularit =ontest is a tool to make popular posts easil a#ailable for our #isitors to #iew" As pre#iousl discussed, blogs commonl displa posts in re#erse chronological order which can make it difficult for users to find old posts that still ha#e good content or are of interest" 0hat Eopularit =ontest does is to pro#ide a listing of our most popular posts of all(time in a sidebar within our blog na#igation" Because the chances are that this is our best e#er content, it will gi#e ou a greater opportunit to retain new #isitors on our site"
N. <et Aecent =omments is a plugin that shows the most recent comments that people ha#e made on all of our blog posts in a widget in our sidebar" If ou are encouraging people to comment on our blog to build up communit interaction, one wa of doing that is to publish the latest comments made on e#er post within our menu s stem" 1ou can displa the fi#e or the ten most recent comments made b people on our blog" This is beneficial in a couple of
- 45 -
different wa s" 1ou are encouraging our blog to be more of a communit and if people can see their latest comment in the main sidebar it will encourage them to post a comment again" The <et recent =omments plugin has additional benefits too" B being able to see a comment on an archi#ed post, this ma well encourage a user to #isit the original post" One other wa that this plugin adds #alue to our site is that ou?re impro#ing the search engine optimi)ation as these links point directl to the comments at the bottom of different posts and not to the posts themsel#es" This dri#es alternati#e search engine crawls throughout our site"
M. M A#atars is a plugin that&s associated with a website called M Blog5og, a #er popular blogging communit " 0hen users register at M Blog5og, the upload a small picture, or a#atar of themsel#es -perhaps e#en a compan logo." After somebod has uploaded this image to M Blog5og, in addition to the a#atar image displa ing on M Blog5og, whene#er a blog has the M A#atars plugin installed, the a#atar image will also be displa ed ne$t to comments b that registered M Blog5og user on the blog" This again encourages our blog to become more of a communit and more interacti#e as people can see their own a#atar images beside an comments made" If ou register with M Blog5og, ou can of course ha#e our own image at the bottom of an comments ou make on other blogs" An additional ser#ice that ou should register with is called <ra#atar"
Blo! pin!in! Einging is a process built into 0ordEress that automaticall tells other blog directories and news portals that ou ha#e added a new post to our blog" 0ithin our 0ordEress back office if ou click on Options and then select %write&, if ou scroll down ou will see that b default 0ordEress has a pinging ser#ice called ping(o(matic built into it" There are other pinging ser#ices, but ping(o(matic works well and is alread
- 46 -
incorporated into 0ordEress" 1ou don?t need to #isit the ping(o(matic website for it to submit our posts because automaticall whene#er ou add new content to our site it will automaticall be %pinged& to man ma+or blog directories and news portals" 0hen ou publish a post, this pinging mechanism will be aware of our post title, our post description and the link back to the original post" One of the ma+or ser#ices that will be pinged is called M 1ahoo" An one who searches M 1ahoo for a particular topicK -if ou ha#e made a recent blog post within that topic ourself., then our blog post will come up there in the search results" This is one of the man automated internet marketing tools that make blogging such a powerful part of our online strateg "
R$$ A**, which stands for Aeall *imple * ndication is another great automated marketing tool built into blogging software" It is a tool which lets people subscribe to the latest content published on our blog" A** feeds are also features of man other t pes of website but it is probabl most commonl found on blogs" The main ad#antage of A** on blogs for our readers is that it allows them to see when ou ha#e updated our blog without ha#ing to directl #isit our blog" It is an eas wa for them to be made aware as soon as ou publish a new post" 'ow do R$$ (eeds workB 1our A** feeds are the website FA5s that people can use in order to subscribe to our latest content" 0ordEress automaticall generates as man A** feed FA5s as ou re/uire" B default there is a main feed and a feed for each of our blog categories" 0hen someone subscribes to our A** feed in an A** reader -like <oogle Aeader., the software will displa our latest blog post title, and possibl some of the content depending on the A** reader settings" Eeople will then ha#e an option of #isiting our blog post if the think the full content will be of interest to them"
Pillar #3 Blog Technology R$$ (eed (ormat Instead of retaining the default A** feed FA5s from 0ordEress, ou should register with a free ser#ice called 'eedburner -figure 2"N. and submit our original feed FA5 to 'eedburner"com"
- 47 -
'eedburner will then gi#e ou an alternati#e feed FA5 to use" The call this ser#ice %burning& our feed" The ad#antage with gi#ing our subscribers our 'eedburner feed FA5 instead of our default feed FA5 is that 'eedburner will be able to gi#e ou lots of statistics such as how man subscribers ou ha#e and which software our readers are using to subscribe to our feed" )i!ure 5*8 " )eedBurner
$u.mit your 1R at )eedBurner 'ow to (ind and .urn your (eed 5et&s take m 0ordEress blog www"EurpleInternetMarketing"com7blog as an e$ample" As the folder 7blog7 is where 0ordEress has been installed, ou&ll be able to find the original feed at http677www"EurpleInterentMarketing"com7blog7feed"
- 48 -
I took this FA5 and submitted it to 'eedburner -I %burned& the feed." The feed FA5 I chose at 'eedburner was http677feeds"feedburner"com7purpleinternetmarketing" This feed FA5 deli#ers e$actl the same content to a user when the subscribe to updates, but using this #ersion lets me gain access to reall useful statistics about m subscribers when I log into m 'eedburner account" 0 !limpse at )eed.urner stats 'eedburner will pro#ide ou with a breakdown of the stats for each feed that ou decide to burn" The feed below -'igure 2"M. is from a podcast feed that hasn&t been promoted a great deal" As ou can see there are 2I subscribers to that feed, i"e" 2I people going to be told as soon as another episode is published" )i!ure 5*< )eedBurner
;iewin! statistics on )eedBurner
- 49 -
It doesn&t take too much promotional work to /uickl build up a few hundred subscribers to our feed" After that ou&ll start to naturall gain more subscribers as people tell their friends ! as long as if ou consistentl deli#er /ualit new content on a regular basis" It is important to use the 'eedburner ser#ice to %burn our feed& prior to publishing our feed FA5 and making it a#ailable for subscribers" The ser#ice lets ou gain access to lots of important statistics about our subscribers including how man subscribers ou ha#e and what kind of software people are using to subscribe to our feed" In addition to <oogle Aeader, another e$ample of an A** feed reader is in fact iTunes" iTunes is an A** reader that speciali)es in reading podcast A** feeds" $u.scri.in! to an R$$ (eed ,ow do ou subscribe to A** feeds@ Bo ou subscribe to A** feeds at the moment@ -If so ou need to subscribe to some feeds so that ou&re fairl comfortable with how the protocol works". If ou&re subscribing to a standard A** feed, not a podcast, the chances are that it will be te$t based updates" One of the most popular A** feed readers at the time of writing is i<oogle or the personali)ed <oogle home page -'igure 2"9." Take time to #isit www"google"com7ig" This is the personali)ed <oogle home page" 1ou can personali)e this page b adding our own A** feeds to displa content that interests ou" The %Add *tuff& link on the i<oogle page is where ou can search for different small widgets and feeds to add to our personali)ed page" At the bottom left(hand side of the %Add *tuff& is where there is an option to add an A** feed" Once ou add our chosen feed, ou should be able to #iew the latest content from that feed on our i<oogle page"
:ore R$$ readin! so(tware Aemember that there is a great deal of free A** feed reader software a#ailable if i<oogle or <oogle Aeader doesn&t suit our needs" *impl search online to find something more suitable for ou" -www"google"com7search@/TfreeUrssUsoftware. Fsing an A** reader will let ou /uickl scan the latest headlines within a blog Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 50 -
without ha#ing to #isit the blog directl " 1ou might find onl 1 in M posts on a blog of interest, so b subscribing to the feed using an A** reader, ou can easil +udge if it is worthwhile for ou to #isit a blog page, sa#ing ou a great deal of time" A** readers are a popular medium for people to use to subscribe to updates, a method of website update subscription which is growing in popularit and one which is going to become more important in the future" It is therefore important that ou build an A** subscription option into our website, also utili)ing the 'eedburner ser#ice as e$plained abo#e" )i!ure 5*= i+oo!le homepa!e
The personali9ed i+oo!le home pa!e Podcastin! Man people 7 businesses wish to publish a series of ME2 -audio. or MEN -#ideo. recordings online" It is wise to associate these media recordings with an A** feed so that people can subscribe to updates and be made aware as soon as ou ha#e released a new media file for consumption" This use of A** feeds is called podcasting" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 51 -
Another benefit with broadcasting a podcasts is that subscribers tend to be #er %stick & ! that is once people subscribe the will generall sta subscribed" If ou stop producing podcasts for a while, and decide to start again a few months later, then ou will probabl find that ou still ha#e around the same number of subscribers ! the people that had pre#iousl subscribed will simpl be notified #ia their subscription software -possibl iTunes. as soon as our new episode has been released" Creatin! your podcast It is relati#el simple to use a portable ME2 recorder to create our podcast" 1ou could also record our audio with a microphone at a computer with tools such as *k pe or <oogle Talk with ,otAecorder" A great free piece of software called Audacit can be used to edit our recording" Recordin! and editin! audio Aecording and editing our own audio ! or e#en #ideo ! is not as difficult as ou might think" ,otAecorder is software that works in con+unction with *k pe -an online JOIE 7 telephone ser#ice." ,otAecorder can be used to record an call ou are making online using our computer" It onl costs about V1M, -around W1I. for the software but it can be used to record hours of con#ersation if re/uired to do so" I ha#e used ,otAecorder to record *k pe based inter#iews with people from all around the world and ha#e got great /ualit recordings from using the ser#ice" One tip I&d share with ou is to use the setting that records both #oices on separate tracks -stereo." This will let ou edit each #oice separatel at the end of the recording which is especiall hand if ou find that one person&s #oice has been recorded at a louder #olume that the other person" To edit the audio recording I use some software called Audacit " Audacit is open(source and free(of(charge although I&d alwa s recommend making a small donation to such pro+ects" In figure 2"O ou can #iew a screenshot of Audacit in action -editing a recording." The software allows ou to manipulate the audio recording ( ou can highlight a section -perhaps if there has been too big a pause or a stutter. and remo#e it b selecting edit, highlighting the section in /uestion and then "ut"
- 52 -
THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING )i!ure 5*> " 0udacity
$ample screenshot o( 0udacity Pu.lishin! your podcast ,a#ing recorded and edited our audio, the ne$t step is for ou to publish our podcast" One of the easiest and most effecti#e methods of publishing a podcast is to release the episodes in a categor on our blog, and use the categor A** feed as our podcast feed" There&s an e$cellent free 0ordEress plugin called EodEress that&s dedicated to helping ou publish our podcast #ia our 0ordEress blog" Once ou install the plugin, all ou need to do is upload the ME2 or MEN file to our blog #ia EodEress in our 0ordEress back office" The EodEress plugin pro#ides a flash(based ME2 pla er where our blog #isitors are able to pla the track directl from our blog" It also pro#ides a direct download to the ME2 or MEN file for users to download and pla the track directl through a media pla er de#ice such as an iEod" Remem.er to use the )eed.urner service If ou&re going to gi#e this a go, remember to %burn& our blog categor feed that ou&re using for the podcast through the 'eedburner ser#ice ! and remember to select the %podcast& option on 'eedburner" -'or e$ample, I used http677www"purpleinternetmarketing"com7blog7tags7podcast7 as the categor on the Eurple Internet Marketing website for a podcast, but instead of using the feed Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 53 -
address http677www"purpleinternetmarketing"com7blog7tags7podcast7feed as m podcast feed, I burned this address with 'eedburner to create http677feeds"feedburner"com7InternetMarketing*trateg Eodcast as the new podcast feed FA5". =reating a new podcast feed with 'eedburner gi#es ou two distinct ad#antages" 'irst of all, as with our blog feed, ou get access to a lot of useful statistics such as the number of listeners ou ha#e and what software the are using to subscribe to our feed" *econdl , 'eedburner will also submit our podcast to #arious podcast directories" Don7t commit to a schedule .e(ore you try podcastin! Eodcasting is a marketing medium which is worthwhile tr ing" The great thing about it is that ou don&t ha#e to commit to a regular schedule" It could simpl be deli#ered on an ad(hoc basis as part of our blog posting strateg " If ou find out that podcasting suits our communication st le then perhaps ou can publish episodes on a regular basis in the future, but the important thing is +ust to gi#e it a go" 0n added .ene(it to podcastin! transcripts If ou do decide to publish a podcast, then ou ma also want to create audio transcripts" This wa , ou can pro#ide written content in our blog from the podcast and search engines will pick this up as fresh new content, helping ou significantl with better search engine results" Another positi#e with offering transcripts to our podcasts is that ou&re also catering for people who struggle with hearing our audio, or simpl prefer the written word as a communications medium" Of course ou can outsource the transcription of our podcasts" One such place is =asting0ords"com, who will transcribe audio from onl OM cents a minute" This can ensure that ou use our own resources in a much more cost efficient manner" ->ote6 Additional transcription ser#ices are listed at http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar2.
- 54 -
Pillar #5 Blo! Technolo!y $ummary A blog doesn&t necessaril ha#e to be published in a +ournal st le and displa ed in chronological order" The content of a blog can be an thing from articles to opinions and the most important aspect about a blog from a business standpoint is the technolog ! the inbuilt automated internet marketing capabilit 0ordpress"org is probabl the most appropriate blogging software for most businesses" It&s free to use, state(of(the(art and offers bespoke design and functionalit Elugins are small software programs designed b independent coders that add additional functionalit to our blog" There are thousands of plugins to choose from and most of them are free(of(charge" Einging and A** feeds can be used to help to automate our blog marketing" Einging is the process that makes a blog and news directories aware of the fact that ou&#e +ust published a new post" A** 'eeds let people subscribe to our content and allow them to #iew the content without actuall #isiting our site" Eodcasting can be used as a wa to augment our blog posts" Eodcasts are generall audio -or #ideo. files, and the are published using A** so subscribers are alerted as soon as a new episode is published" Tools such as Audacit and *k pe can be used to create and edit podcasts" iTunes is the most popular software to use to subscribe to a podcast feed" Jisit all the resources mentioned in Pillar $ 6log 7e"hnology here6 http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar2
Pillar #4 Autoresponders
- 55 -
Pillar #8
0utoresponders
- 56 -
Pillar #8 0utoresponders
________________________________________________________________________
utoresponders aren&t +ust an automatic email response deli#ered b
our
email software when ou are out of the office" The can be an e$tremel effecti#e part of our internet marketing arsenal" Among other things, autoresponders can deli#er personali)ed broadcast e(mails and newsletters to our entire email list ! at a predetermined time" Pillar $8 9utore!ponder! looks at the best autoresponder software a#ailableK how to build a responsi#e and worthwhile list of recipientsK as well as building relationships with our contact list so that ou impro#e our email con#ersion rates o#er time" 4hat are autoresponders@ Autoresponders are an thing deli#ered b email automaticall at a predetermined time that can be partl personali)ed for the recipient" Because these emails often include people?s names, the recipients commonl think that the are recei#ing personal emails from ou, rather than an automated e(mail machine4 An autoresponder se/uence can be set up so that e(mails are deli#ered on a set da of the month or o#er inter#als of time after somebod subscribes" Autoresponder se/uences can be as long or as short as ou want ! when people subscribe to our updates, ou can decide if the should recei#e an email after 8 da s, 1I da s, 81 da s, or e#en as much as M ears"
Pillar #4 Autoresponders 2ther uses o( an autoresponder service
- 57 -
But autoresponders don&t +ust ha#e to be emails or email newsletters" The can also be used to deli#er a step(b (step email course" 1ou could perhaps encourage our website #isitors to subscribe to a short email course deli#ered o#er a few da s with a #iew to upselling a better, more informati#e email course after building a trusting relationship with the prospect o#er the free course" 1ou can also use an autoresponder to deli#er a free product, and use this to build an opt(in list" 'or instance, if ou ha#e a free EB' report that ou want to offer ou can deli#er it #ia our autoresponder, and get people to automaticall subscribe to our newsletter or email updates when the re/uest the free report" Once the ha#e subscribed or opted(in to our list, ou can then market to them at an point in the future, either b using an autoresponder se/uence o#er a period of time or b using broadcast emails" -Fnless the decide to opt(out". Broadcast emails Broadcast emails are an important part of using an autoresponder ser#ice" >ot e#er thing can be built into se/uence in ad#ance ( some items are timel in that the are focused on products or e#ents that ma be sold out b a certain date" B sending broadcast emails to people, ou are sending them offers or pro#iding information that is pertinent to a particular date" B using a decent autoresponder, if ou ha#e a list of 1 to a million people, ou can send a personali)ed broadcast email on a particular issue to our group of subscribers within an hour" If I were sending an email for the first time to a list that is business to business, ou can perhaps send one email introducing ourself, our product and7or our ser#ices, without an unsubscribe option" -Elease check our own countr for legislation appropriate for ou". ,owe#er, ou should not send emails to pri#ate e(mail addresses who ha#en&t alread agreed to recei#e an email from ou" A good autoresponder ser#ice will automaticall include an unsubscribe option in all of our emails, to allow recipients to easil remo#e themsel#es from our mailing list if the decide that the do not want to hear from ou again in the future" As ou do not want to ha#e our email address flagged as a *EAM sender, this is wise to do"
- 58 Eewsletters
Email >ewsletters are generall a little bit more formal, but can be built into an autoresponder process as well" 1ou can load newsletters into an autoresponder, so that the will be deli#ered either on a certain date or within a certain period of time after people ha#e subscribed to that se/uence" If ou ha#e a period of time a#ailable -perhaps a /uiet time in our business ear. ou can complete the work of writing a series of newsletters for the whole ear" These can be uploaded to our autoresponder, and the recipients will automaticall get the newsletters at specified times throughout the ear" ,mail marketin! so(tware 0hich autoresponder should ou use@ One that I recommend, probabl the most popular one a#ailable, is called A0eber, -'igure N"1. which is probabl the world&s most popular autoresponder ser#ice" -Jisit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarN to #iew up(to(date recommendations". )i!ure 8*1 ! 04e.er*com
04e.er Communications
Pillar #4 Autoresponders The disadvanta!e with usin! your own server to deliver email
- 59 -
If ou are using our own ser#er to send emails to our list at the moment then ou&re at a serious disad#antage" 1our ser#ers will not be trusted enough b other email programs to get the kind of deli#er rate that as ser#ice like A0eber can gi#e ou" If ou&re currentl sending emails from our own domain, ou ma be struggling to deli#er up to half of our emails without knowing it" This is probabl partl due to our domain&s IE address not being trusted enough b *EAM filters" 0dvanta!es o( usin! an e&perienced email marketin! company7s server Because an e$perienced email marketing 7 autoresponder ser#ice has been established for man ears, this has gi#en them an opportunit to build a trusted relationship with man email pro#iders" This means that ser#ices like ,otmail and <mail will know that when an email is sent through a ser#ice like A0eber, the person who is recei#ing the correspondence has re/uested to recei#e it" This is +ust one of the reasons wh if ou are thinking of building up an email list, then I ad#ise that hosting that email list on an on an e$perienced email marketing compan &s ser#er, and sending e(mails out from that ser#er is the best approach" Emails being sent b such as ser#ice can still look as if the are being sent from ou" The can still appear to come from our email address, and ou can still recei#e replies to our own email address" ,owe#er ou are using someone else&s more trusted ser#er to ensure that the #ast ma+orit of emails reach the person the are intended for" :ore a.out 04e.er A0eber pro#ides autoresponder and newsletter functionalit " It supplies ,TM5 templates for newsletters as well, so ou can easil design our own newsletter, upload it, and deli#er it whene#er ou want" Another thing ou can do with A0eber, which is worthwhile considering if ou ha#e or are going to ha#e a blog, is to import A** feeds into the ser#ice, and automate the deli#er of these posts as a newsletter" Man people prefer to subscribe to email updates rather than an A** feed, and A0eber can pro#ide ou with the functionalit to gi#e our subscribers this opportunit " Of course Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 60 -
offering this ser#ice also encourages people to +oin our email list ! and pro#ides ou with a bigger subscriber list for future marketing campaigns" )i!ure 8*3 4ritin! an email usin! 04e.er
04e.er Communications Personali9in! your automated emails After ou create an account and login to A0eber, ou ma wish to write our email content in our normal word processer before cop ing and pasting it into A0eber&s te$t editor" -'igure N"8. ,ere ou will ha#e the option to include Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 61 -
personali)ed fields such as the names of people ou wish to send our emails to" 1ou can use a greeting e"g" X,i,X or and then a #ariable for their name, which will automaticall insert their name from our email list" The #ariable that ou use in order to automaticall include a subscriber&s first name within the email is :;#ir!tname<#i2=" This #ariable will include a subscriber&s personali)ed first name in each email, but also ensures that a capital letter is used at the beginning of the name after it is inserted" $endin! 'T: newsletters A0eber lets ou send ,TM5 email newsletters as well as plain te$t newsletters" A ,TM5 email allows ou to use more color and create more #isuall attracti#e designs" ,owe#er, it&s #er important that ou test deli#erabilit rates and the actual design that our subscribers see in different t pes of email reading software" -E"g" Outlook, Entourage, <mail, ,otmail etc". :ust because something looks good on our computer, don&t assume that it looks +ust the same on other people&s computers" An important rule of thumb is to alwa s send a plain te$t #ersion of the newsletter as well as the ,TM5 #ersion" This means that if the ,TM5 #ersion gets stuck in *EAM filters ! or for some other reason isn&t able to be displa ed ! then the plain te$t #ersion should reach our subscriber"
$ettin! !oals (or your newsletters In addition to being useful and informati#e, the content and format of our newsletter should relate to the action ou wish our subscribers to take after the read our newsletter" If ou wish them to browse through our website na#igate through our items for sale, ou should consider including a mini na#igation menu in our newsletter which replicates the selection of choices a#ailable in our website na#igation" There is no definiti#e answer on whether an ,TM5 or plain te$t email campaign will work best for ou business ! the onl wa to know for sure is to test, and good email software like A0eber will ha#e an inbuilt split testing capabilit build into its program"
- 62 $et an o./ective
0hen sending out emails ou should ha#e a certain target or ob+ecti#e in mind" 1ou need to consider our intention behind sending that email when creating and formatting the content" Bo ou want them to click on a link@ If ou wish them to #isit a certain page on our website, ou should mention the link at least twice within the email ! and feature it prominentl , describing the benefit for our subscriber to click on the link" :ore reasons to communicate with your audience on a re!ular .asis 1ou can use regular email contact with our subscribers #ia an autoresponder for #irtuall an reason ! email is a great tool to build relationships" Man long(term, successful email marketing campaigns often send out two or three emails in a row which ha#e no end(goal to %sell& an thing" The primar purpose of these emails is to build a relationship with the subscriber b offering good, solid, reliable information" The ad#antage with offering such #aluable, useful content is when ou do decide to recommend a particular product or ser#ice in a future email, our subscriber is much more likel to trust our recommendation and make a purchase decision" Build relationships (irst A significant ad#antage with using autoresponders is that the gi#e ou the abilit to build relationships people on with our email list ! without ha#ing to make personal contact with them" An autoresponder se/uence can increase the le#el of trust that our subscribers feel for ou" This increased le#el of trust, in turn, greatl impro#es the likelihood of that subscriber con#erting to a customer in the future" An important tip is to get started on building our email subscriber list at the earliest opportunit " E#en though ou don&t ha#e a future email marketing strateg , b building up a bank of subscribers, ou&re safeguarding our business& future"
Pillar #4 Autoresponders Installin! an opt"in (orm on your we.site
- 63 -
A0eber -and other autoresponder and email software ser#ices. will suppl ou with some code to paste on our web pages" This code displa s a simple opt(in form -'igure N"2." 1ou can personali)e the te$t used to suit our needs" In this e$ample I&#e chosen to use %'ree Tips R Fpdates&" ,a#ing this t pe of form on our website will let our #isitors subscribe to our future updates ! assuming the like our present website content" The can simpl enter their names and email addresses" This in turn allows ou to start to build an opt(in list" )i!ure 8*5 0n opt"in (orm on the Purple Internet :arketin! we.site
www*PurpleInternet:arketin!*com Dou.le opt"in or sin!le opt"inB A0eber insists on something called a double opt(in, which means that when people enter their name and email address into our form, the are not automaticall subscribed e#en when the select %submit&" Instead, our want(to( be subscriber gets an email back to their email address sa ing something like, C0e want to make sure that ou did actuall re/uest to subscribe to this list, so please click on this link to confirmD" 1our intended subscriber has to click on that link before the are added to our list" The double opt(in not onl decreases the risk for A0eber that their ser#ers are being used to send *EAM email" It increases the /ualit of our own email subscribers" A double opt(in is not legall necessar , but it is ad#ised b man
- 64 -
because ou can demonstrate that our recipients ha#e definitel opted(in to recei#e our email updates" There are, howe#er, pros and cons with using single or double opt(ins when collecting subscriber data" If ou use a single opt(in, ou&re probabl going to get more subscribers ! and ou will be able to import subscribers from pre#ious campaigns to our new email software" If ou&re using double opt(in, our list won&t be as big ! but it will be of better /ualit " 0hich e#er wa ou choose to go -double or single opt(in. will ha#e its benefits and drawbacks" If ou are particularl good at managing data, and send regular updates to our subscribers like clockwork then single opt(in ma well be best for ou" ,owe#er, this is where it&s probabl best to seek the ad#ice of a professional internet marketing consultant before making the decision on what&s the correct choice for our business"
'ow to .uild a .i!!er su.scri.er list :ust ha#ing the one opt(in bo$ on our site is not going to ma$imi)e our number of subscribers" B solel rel ing on the one opt(in bo$ on our website sidebar ou&ll be luck if ou get more than one percent of our website #isitors who choose to subscribe to our updates" There are much /uicker wa s to build an email list" *tart b focusing on an indi#idual market segment" If ou are a reasonable(si)ed business ou are likel to ha#e a range of products and ser#ices within our portfolio" 1ou should aim to focus on niche markets within our portfolio b targeting indi#idual pages and offer an incenti#e for people to recei#e for information about the sub+ect matter that interests them" 'igure N"N is a screenshot of what the www"12pillars"com website looked like before this book was released" It was +ust a single(page website which had one main purpose ! telling people to subscribe to updates if the wanted to be made aware as soon as the book launched" Because there was +ust the one re/uested action ! and because the incenti#e was significant -a big free ebook., a significant percentage of people who #isited this page decided to opt(in to the subscriber list"
- 65 -
)i!ure 8*8 The 13 Pillars of Internet Marketing pre"launch screenshot
www*15pillars*com 2ptimi9in! your opt"in reFuest There are man different on(page aspects that ou can impro#e in order to increase the likelihood of somebod deciding to submit their personal details into one of our forms" 'irstl , ou need to ensure that our persuasi#e reason to opt(in is targeted at e$actl the right audience" *econdl , ou need to ensure that the reason to enter their details in our form is as compelling as possible" If building an emails list is important to our business model ! and it should be ! then ou should be prepared to test e#er aspect of our opt(in page or page section in order to ma$imi)e our con#ersion rates" This topic is re#iewed in much greater depth in the 2>-(eek Internet Marketing Plan" -www"89weekplan"com. Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 66 -
Increasin! dou.le"opt"in conversion rates If ou&re using a double(opt(in autoresponder ser#ice like A0eber, our sign( ups will reach a page after the complete the form" And ou ha#e the option of personali)ing this page in an manner that ou see fit" *hould ou wish to, ou can use this %space& to tr to sell a product or ser#ice, or direct our interested parties towards the best free content on our website" Alternati#el , what I would recommend if ou are running a double(opt(in process is to tell people to go to their email ser#ice and click on a link in an email that ou ha#e +ust sent them" This confirms the opt(in" -,ence double opt(in. )i!ure 8*< Increasin! dou.le"opt"in percenta!es
0n e&ample o( how to increase your dou.le"opt"in conversion rates 'igure N"M shows a screenshot from a page which attempts to ma$imi)e double opt(in con#ersion rates" This is an e$ample of a page that people might see once the ha#e completed the first stage of the double(opt(in -filled out the form. but ha#e et to click on the link in their email to complete the +oining of the list" B now ou should know that if ou do decide to use a double(opt(in
- 67 -
autoresponder then there are prod and cons" One of the cons in that ou are ne#er going to be able to get e#er one who completes the first stage of the double(opt(in process to complete the second stage" *ome people ha#e an inherent distrust of clicking links belonging to website domains that the don&t know" All ou can do is tr to ma$imi)e the percentage of people to go on to complete the double opt(in" It&s ne#er going to be 1IIP" ,owe#er, selling the double opt(in process to the people that complete our form -as in the page seen in figure N"M. should hopefull mean that LMP of these people go back to their inbo$ and click on the link in their email" Aemember ! this double opt(in process is protecting ou as well as our subscribers" It means that ou won&t be in an danger of a competitor tr ing to list ou as a *EAM sender b subscribing people to our list who ha#en&t asked to be subscribed" It also means that ou won&t be tr ing to send emails to fake email addresses" :ore ways to encoura!e people to opt"in The more that our opt(in focus is targeted towards a niche market segment, the higher our con#ersion rates should be" ,owe#er, it&s good practice that ou should also consider ha#ing lots of different methods of encouraging our #isitors to subscribe to the same list" 'or e$ample, ou can gi#e awa a free eBook as an incenti#e to +oin our list" This can be deli#ered in the form of a EB' and the whole deli#er process can be automated through our autoresponder software" An addition or instead to a free eBook how about a free email course, deli#ered on a dail or weekl basis for a set period of time@ Again, once ou set this up with our autoresponder the whole process is automated" An email course has the added benefit o#er an eBook of continuall reminding people about ou ! and thus automaticall building a better relationship with our subscribers" 4hat to do a(ter people opt"in It&s one thing building an email list and another thing entirel continuing a relationship with that email list o#er a period of time" It&s imperati#e to determine a long(term newsletter or email content strateg for our
- 68 -
correspondence with our subscribers" 1ou need to decide on our message, our communication st le and our message sending schedule ! prior to starting a campaign" It&s a big mistake to alter an of these 2 areas significantl after ou start" One of our aims should be to tr to be dependable and predictable for our subscribers" It?s impossible to sa that ou should onl send so man emails per da , week or month to our list" *ome people are /uite comfortable recei#ing an email e#er da if it is good, free information and if it is appropriate to the particular market segment ou are aiming at" If ou train our list to e$pect one email per week, then that is what ou should send" If ou train our list to e$pect one email per da , then that is what ou should send" Buildin! automated relationships and minimi9in! 6unsu.scri.es7 Once tool I alwa s make use of when gi#ing awa free eBooks #ia an autoresponder is the automation of a few messages in the da s and weeks that follow after the free eBook has been deli#ered" It&s all well and good to get people to fill out the form, perform the double opt(in if appropriate, recei#e our eBook and then be subscribed to our updates" ,owe#er, if our new subscriber recei#es an email that isn&t much to do with his free eBook shortl after subscribing, there&s a #er good chance that this new prospect ! a prospect ou&#e worked #er hard to obtain ! will instantaneousl decide to unsubscribe from recei#ing future correspondence" 1ou need to remember that the people who ha#e +ust decided to fill out a form to recei#e our free eBook probabl ha#en&t heard of ou before ! and almost certainl ha#en&t subscribed to our email updates before" Because of this, in order to tr to minimi)e the likelihood of our new lead deciding to unsubscribe immediatel , ou should deli#er some email correspondence initiall that relates directl to the eBook ! or adds #alue to the eBook" 'or e$ample, a week after deli#ering the eBook ou ma want to automate the sending of an email that co#ers the common /uestions that people ha#e from the eBook" A week after that perhaps ou ma wish to deli#er a follow(up chapter" Eerhaps after that ou could ask our new subscriber for some feedback on the eBook" All this communication continues to build a relationship with our new prospect while training them to e$pect good, rele#ant information from ou on a weekl basis" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
Pillar #4 Autoresponders Buildin! Relationships .y $urveyin!
- 69 -
As per the pre#ious paragraph I suggested that ou ma be able to re/uest some customer feedback as part of our autoresponder se/uence" In other words, ou can continue to build relationships with our list of subscribers b sur#e ing" 'or e$ample, ou ma wish to send out a sur#e to our longer term subscribers sa ing something like, %0e are thinking of offering these products in the future and we are considering between these three or four different widgets to include as part of the product features ! which features would ou prefer@& This is fantastic tool for market research as it targets our e$isting customers" >ot onl is it market research, it&s a great wa of building relationships with our list at the same time" Eerhaps ou want to consider building a monthl sur#e into our regular email communication with our subscribers" This will pro#ide in#aluable information and the whole process can be automated through our autoresponder" The onl ca#eat I&d put on implementation of this is not to do it too often ! perhaps a ma$imum of one in e#er four emails" $urvey so(tware Another method of starting to add sur#e s to our online marketing strateg is to publish them as a blog post ! this has added #alue because ou&re displa ing %social proof& when ou demonstrate to other readers that ou ha#e man people who are interested in participating in the #ote" If ou use 0ordEress then ou can add a sur#e as a plugin" One of the most popular 0ordEress sur#e plugins is called *ur#e <i)mo" B adding a sur#e as part of our website interaction, it encourages our users to become a little more %stick & ! that is, a little more likel to stick around for longer" Eeople will be more likel come back to our websites in the future" If ou wanted to add a sur#e to a stand(alone website, -where there isn&t a 0ordEress blog installed. there is a good free ser#ice called *ur#e Monke -'igure N"9. that ou should consider using" >ote6 *ur#e Monke also offer a paid ser#ice as well, which will let ou create e#er thing with our own branding as well as recei#ing more sur#e results" ,owe#er, the free #ersion is great too"
- 70 -
THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING )i!ure 8*= $urvey:onkey*com
%ou can use survey monkey to easily create online surveys 4hy .uildin! a list o( interested su.scri.ers is so important If ou build a list of rele#ant, interested subscribers it means ou won&t ha#e to rel on the search engines in the long term for our Internet marketing" And like an business, if ou ha#e +ust one customer, or ou ha#e one source of customers, and that source suddenl dries up, then our business will suffer" If ou are fortunate enough to be able to dri#e lots of #isitors to our website from search engines, then take ad#antage of that b preparing for an uncertain future ! +ust in case" =on#ert those website #isitors into leads b using an autoresponder to deli#er additional content that isn&t a#ailable elsewhere" B doing so ou&re reclaiming greater control o#er our website #isitor traffic"
- 71 -
Pillar #8 0utoresponders $ummary Autoresponders are a great wa for ou to build relationships with our customers" The can deli#er #irtuall an thing b email on an automated, pre(meditated and usuall personali)ed basis" Broadcast Emails are informal emails which are usuall personali)ed to the recei#er" The are great for sending up(to(date news and building better business relationships" 0hen creating the te$t for e(mails the should be as personali)ed and rele#ant as possible to cement the relationship" >ewsletters are a more formal, professional method of keeping in touch with our client list and are a great reason for regular communication with our customers" A newsletter can be sent immediatel , or pre(loaded into ou autoresponder to be deli#ered on a certain date" The can also be part of an autoresponder se/uence, deli#ered so man da s, weeks or months after the initial sign(up" One of the autoresponder which I recommend which is specificall built for email marketing is called A0eber" 'ind links to A0eber and other recommended email marketing resources here6 http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarN Building a list of rele#ant subscribers is an essential aspect of successful internet marketing, and ou can greatl speed this process up b offering free bonus content or a EB' eBook as an incenti#e for people to subscriber to our newsletter or email updates" ,a#ing a large, responsi#e email database will take the onus off rel ing on search engines for traffic in the future" It&s ne#er good to ha#e total reliance on something that brings in a lot of business which ou don&t control" B building a thoughtful, rele#ant autoresponder se/uence into our new subscriber process ou will be automaticall building business brand lo alt without ha#ing to speak to our subscribers personall " Fse autoresponders to sur#e our subscribers" This is a great wa of conducting market research in addition to continuing to grow the /ualit of our subscriber relationships"
- 72 -
Pillar #<
Paid 0dvertisin!
Pillar #5 Paid Advertising
- 73 -
Pillar #< Paid 0dvertisin!

________________________________________________________________________
aid ad#ertising is an essential part of most internet marketing campaigns" I
would like to focus on two ke paid ad#ertising methods, both of which I consider to be an essential part of an internet marketing campaign" 1G Pay per click advertisin! ( using ser#ices like <oogle Ad0ords 3G :a/or directory su.missions ! getting our website featured in ma+or directories such as the 1ahoo4 director " Pay per click Although there are hundreds of different pa per click networks, I&d like to concentrate of three of the biggest3 <oogle Ad0ords 1ahoo *earch Marketing Microsoft Ad=enter
+oo!le 0d4ords <oogle Ad0ords is b far the largest pa per click network ! it has access to the largest amount of prospecti#e customers, so it&s the best place to start"
- 74 -
In order to use <oogle Ad0ords, ou need to create a <oogle account ! it&s free to do this" Once ou login ou will be able to #iew instructions of how to get going with our campaign" In the sign up wi)ard ou will be able to target our ad#ert to a specific countr , area or town -'igure M"1." )i!ure <*1 +oo!le 0d4ords
$tartin! your +oo!le 0d4ords campai!n 4ritin! your advert After selecting our location and language, it&s time to write our ad#ert" ,owe#er, before ou do this ou should consider our target market and the ke word phrases appropriate for our campaign" Fsing the 0ordtracker ser#ice discussed in Pillar $1 %eyword &e!ear"h, ou need to obtain a list of ke word phrases suitable to describe what ou are going to ad#ertise" 1our landing page, hence our ad#ert should be targeted towards a #er specific market segment, gi#ing ou the best opportunit to con#ert our #isitors
Pillar #5 Paid Advertising through to our particular goals for the campaign" :a&imi9in! your conversion rates
- 75 -
1ou will ma$imi)e our con#ersion rates b designing a uni/ue landing page for each area of pa per click focus" Once ou ha#e designed our landing page and are comfortable with our ke word phrases, ou need to ensure that the correct landing page FA5 is used with each EE= -pa per click. ad"
$ettin! your .ud!et After researching our ke word phrases using 0ordtracker, ou then insert these in the bo$ titled %Enter as man specific words or phrases as ou like, one per link& -'igure M"8." >e$t choose our currenc and set our budget" It doesn&t ha#e to be a significant in#estment to begin with, but it&s a good idea to start a campaign wit our budget spread throughout the week to tr and determine optimum con#ersion periods" )i!ure <*3 +oo!le 0d4ords
$electin! your keywords in +oo!le 0d4ords Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 76 Calculatin! your ma&imum .id
1our cost that ou will ha#e to pa per click in order to ha#e to appear on the first page of pa per click results will #ar considerable depending on what industr with are wishing to target" One industr sector that&s notoriousl costl is finance where ou ma e#en ha#e to pa more than V1I per click for certain ke words" ,owe#er, bear in mind that ou ma be pa ing an e$orbitant amount to take the top listing" I often find that ou get best #alue for a decent #olume of traffic b aiming to appear in the third position" Three ,ssential 0d4ords Tips Aunning a successful pa per click ad#ertising campaign can take a great deal of time, but there a few things that ou can be doing to mo#e ahead of the competition" 1. Fse s/uare brackets I recommend placing s/uare brackets around all of our ke word phrases ! at least until ou can pro#e that our campaign is reaching our initial ob+ecti#es" e"g" -lu2ury "rui!e to mar!. instead of lu2ury "rui!e to mar! 0ithout the s/uare brackets, this e$ample ad#ert will appear for an one that t pes in an of the lu2ury "rui!e to mar! words into a search engine" ,owe#er, with the s/uare brackets ou are aiming for a much more specific market, as the ad#ert will onl appear when people t pe that specific phrase into <oogle" Fsing the s/uare brackets will narrow our focus and allow ou to aim our campaign at a #er specific market segment" This should help to optimi)e our con#ersion rates" Onl once ou ha#e started to create a profit from our %e$act match& ke word phrases then ou can test mo#ing towards more of a %broad match& option" A broad match ad#ert will bring in more traffic, but it will be less targeted traffic" That&s the reason that there&s no point in getting a broad match campaign up and running unless ou can make a profit out of an e$act match ke word campaign"
Pillar #5 Paid Advertising 8. Test our ads constantl
- 77 -
There&s no point in assuming that +ust because ou&#e got an ad#ert which is generating high enough con#ersion rates to gi#e ou a decent profit that there still aren&t an impro#ements that ou can make to our <oogle Ad0ords campaign" <oogle Ad0ords has a built(in functionalit -A6B split(testing. which lets ou split(test different parts of our ad#erts with alternati#e #ersions in order to determine the optimum #ersion of that ad#ert" 1ou are able to split(test our ad title, description and FA5 ! and it&s important to test all 2 aspects of our ad#ert at different times in order to de#elop our o#erall winner"
Testin! your ad title *tart with our title" 0hen ou&re testing our ad title, ou need to ensure that our description and FA5 is the same in all #ersion of the ad that ou&re testing" 1ou&d be surprised at how such a small change can make such an incredibl large difference to our con#ersion rates" 'or e$ample, something as simple as a /uestion mark at the end of our ad title has the power to significantl alter our ad click(through rates" The trick thing about our ad title is that it can be no more than around 8M characters in length" This significantl impacts what ou can sa ! and the chances are that ou won&t be able to sa as much as ou want to" This limit in length makes it e#en more important to ensure that ou&re ma$imi)ing the potential of this little piece of sales space" 0hen ou are testing one ad against the other ! and all ou are changing is the title, ou ma well be shocked at the differences in click(through rate percentages" The <oogle Ad0ords software will pro#ide ou with all the stats and control measures that ou re/uire in order to determine which of our ad titles ou should choose to use o#er the longer(term" The important thing when ou&re doing our testing is to absolutel make sure that ou change +ust the one #ariable" That wa ou&ll be 1IIP sure what is ha#ing the impact on our click(through rates"
- 78 Testin! your ad description
After ou&re comfortable with our ad title, the ne$t thing to work on is our ad description" Again, +ust like the title, there aren&t man words to work with" 1ou&ll be luck to manage to s/uee)e in 1I words, so these 1I words will ha#e to be thought o#er #er carefull " Because ou are so limited b space, it&s important not to think that ou ha#e to ha#e perfect English" The most important thing is con#ersion rates, so +ust because our description doesn&t work as a sentence, it doesn&t mean that it&s not worth testing" *ometimes doing something as simple as swapping round the first and second lines of the description can increase the click(through rates enough to turn a loss(making campaign in to a profit(making one" Another significant aspect of running the most efficient EE= campaign possible is to ha#e an additional focus on <oogle&s ?uality !"ore" <oogle wants to ensure that although it&s making mone from its EE= ser#ice, its users feel that the are getting #alue from the EE= ad#erts ! in other words the ad#erts are for what the claim to be" In order to tr to ensure that the ad#erts are as rele#ant as possible, <oogle will consider the /ualit and rele#ance of the landing page in addition to the /ualit and rele#ance of the ad#ert as well as the bid amount and click(through rate in order to determine where to position the ad#ert in their listings" Because of this, ou should tr to include the ke word phrase that ou are targeting in our description ! and ideall in our ad title and FA5 as well" Testin! your 1R Once ou&#e tested our ad title and description, ne$t in line is our ad FA5" One of m website addresses -FA5s. is www"EurpleInternetMarketing"com" ,owe#er, that&s not necessaril going to be the best website address to use in a <oogle Ad0ords ad#ert" Although this Eurple Internet Marketing website address includes the words %Internet Marketing& it isn&t from a countr (specific T5B -top(le#el domain ! i"e" the "com part." It also doesn&t indicate what t pe of internet marketing ser#ice that the compan speciali)es in" Alternati#e options to test would include using a countr specific T5B like "co"uk
- 79 -
if the ser#ice was tailored towards that particular F;(based market segment" Another possibilit would be to ha#e a domain name which specificall describes the ser#ice being offered -e"g" emarketingseminars"co"uk." Although testing different website addresses in our ad#ert is the last thing that ou should be testing, and ou should onl bother testing a different website address if ou&re alread happ with our con#ersion rates from our e$isting ad#ert, it is certainl worth bearing in mind that the FA5 that ou are displa ing underneath our ad#ert could be significantl impacting our con#ersion rates" :ust because ou&re alread making a profit from our campaign doesn&t mean that ou couldn&t be making more mone b further impro#ing our click( through rates" 2. Fse negati#e matches It&s also worthwhile testing descriptions to include reasons not to "li"k on your ad0ert" This sounds counter(intuiti#e, but it pa s to remember that ou&re looking for customers ! not clicks4 'or e$ample, if somebod is specificall searching for something for free, there is #er little point in encouraging them to click on our ad#ert if all ou offer is paid products" Including a price in our description ma reduce our click through(rates but it will probabl increase the /ualit of those clicks" This means that ou aren&t pa ing as much for our traffic -as ou&ll be pa ing for fewer clicks." This strateg does howe#er ha#e to be used in con+unction with anal )ing the effect it is ha#ing on our <oogle Ad0ords /ualit score" The lower our click( through rates, the lower position that <oogle is likel to show our ad" To test a negati#e match strateg , all ou ha#e to do is include a negati#e s mbol in front of the ke word that ou don&t want our ad to appear for if the t pe it into a search engine" 'or instance, if ou don&t want our ad#ert to appear when somebod includes the word #ree as part of their web search, then ou&d include '#ree in our list of <oogle Ad0ords ke words" >ote that this strateg does not appl for e$act phrase match campaigns as will alread ha#e chosen the specific phrases for which ou want our ad to appear"
- 80 +oo!le 0d4ords summary
Because it&s the biggest and can dri#e ou the most /ualit traffic, <oogle Ad0ords should alwa s be our first port of call when it comes to pa (per(click marketing" Onl once ou&re confident that ou&re dri#ing as much EE= traffic from <oogle Ad0ords as possible should ou start trialing other ser#ices found at http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarM" If ou are struggling to make mone from <oogle Ad0ords, then ou should re#isit whether or not ou&#e thoroughl tested all the different aspects of our campaign to tr to impro#e ou con#ersion rates" <oogle Ad0ords works for millions of businesses, and the chances are that if it doesn&t work for ou then it&s something that ou&re doing wrong, not something that&s wrong with <oogle Ad0ords4 :a/or Directories Another form of important paid ad#ertising that is ma+or director submissions" *earch engines like <oogle crawl all the ma+or website directories, and if our website features in a rele#ant ma+or director categor then this will enhance our website&s reputation in the e es of the search engine" There are man significant directories getting our website listed in" ,owe#er man ou choose to tr to get listed in will depend on our budget and time" 'our ma+or directories that I would alwa s ad#ise tr ing to get our website listed in are BMOY -The Open Birector Ero+ect., 1ahoo Birector , Business"com Birector and Best of the 0eb -BOT0"org." D:2H BMOY -the Open Birector Ero+ect ! 'igure M"2. is the biggest free(to(get(listed website director " ,owe#er, free often has its downside" On this instance it&s the fact that the editing and publishing of these free submissions are made b #olunteers" This means that submissions ha#e taken a #er long time to get published in the past ! sometimes o#er 9 months and some editors ha#e been accused of being less than neutral when it comes to deciding which sites to publish" All in all with BMOY, the best thing to do is to make sure ou find the correct categor , write and independent website description and submit our website" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 81 -
Then forget about it" It ma get listed, it might not" 1ou can&t do an thing more about it after ou make our submission, so once ou do so, +ust mo#e on and start to concentrate on other directories" )i!ure <*5 D:2H*or!
D:2H The 2pen Directory Pro/ect %ahoo directory The ne$t ma+or director that ou tr to get our website listed in should be the 1ahoo director " Although there is a free submission option with 1ahoo, in realit if ou do that there&s hardl an chance that ou&ll manage to get our website listed" The best thing to do with the 1ahoo director is to forget that the free submission Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 82 -
option e$ists and pa the V8HH annual fee for guaranteed re#iew within O da s" :ust bear in mind that if the decide not to list our site ou will not get our mone back" In m e$perience as long as ou are not o#ertl selling in our title or our description of our website, and our website does what it sa s in the description, and it belongs to the categor ou submit it to then ou should get it listed without an problem"
$u.mittin! a we.site to the %ahoo directory Fsing the fictitious case stud of 'redd 'aldo with his golf e/uipment shop ( he would use the 1ahoo director and browse to find his initial categor ( *ports" )i!ure <*8 The %ahooI directory
)indin! the 6$ports7 su."cate!ory in the %ahooI directory ,e would then browse through the #arious sub(categories within the sports categor , browsing his wa through %<olf&, %*hopping and *er#ices&, %E/uipment& and %Aetailers&"
- 83 -
B browsing all the different sub(categories within the 1ahoo4 director 'reddie takes the time and effort to ensure that he has chosen to submit his website to the most appropriate categor for his business" This, along with ensuring that his website title and description is accurate and contains no h pe should mean that 'reddie shouldn&t ha#e an problems with getting his website listed in 1ahoo" Although getting listed in the 1ahoo director should help our website&s search engine rankings, the traffic that ou get directl from the 1ahoo director should +ustif the listing fee alone, assuming that our website model is re#enue(based" )i!ure <*< .usiness*com
Business*com more aimed at .usiness"to".usiness services The Business*com directory The Business"com director -'igure M"M. is another e$tremel popular website director which is well thought of b search engines" ,owe#er, as the name suggests, it is a website director which largel focuses on businesses, which means that if ou offer a business(to(consumer ser#ices, it probabl wouldn&t be worth our time or mone submitting our website"
- 84 Best o( the we. directory
The last ma+or director that I&d like to co#er in this segment is called 6e!t o# the (e) -botw"org ! figure M"9." Again, in a similar manner to getting our website listed in the 1ahoo Birector , it&s important to browse through the site and select a website categor which is particularl rele#ant for our business in order to get our listing appro#ed" )i!ure <*= .otw*or!
Best o( the we. another worthwhile directory At the time of writing Best of the 0eb charges either a one(time re#iew fee of V8NH"HM or an annual fee of VHH"HM" 5inks to all the abo#e directories and man more up(to(date director resources can be found at http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarM"
- 85 -
Pillar #< Paid 0dvertisin! $ummary <oogle Ad0ords should be our primar initial focus for pa (per(click website traffic" Onl when ou&#e mastered Ad0ords should ou mo#e onto other ser#ices like 1ahoo *earch Marketing, Microsoft Ad=enter and 'acebook Ad#ertising" 0hen creating our <oogle Ad0ords ad, use s/uare brackets to get an e$act match of our ke word phrase" Alwa s test our ads to work out which strategies work best b remembering to take ad#antage of the <oogle Ad0ords A6B split testing functionalit " It&s incredibl important to optimi)e our ad landing pages as well as our pa (per(click ad#erts" In an ideal world ou&ll ha#e a landing page which has been designed with a specific ad#ert in mind" Ma+or director submission should form part of an serious internet marketing campaign" 'or a list of updated ma+or website directories #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarM"
- 86 -
Pillar #=
Press Releases
Pillar #6 Press Releases
- 87 -
Pillar #= Press Releases

________________________________________________________________________
nline press releases are slightl different to con#entional offline press
releases" =on#entional press releases are targeted at encouraging a +ournalist to reprint part or all of our release in their publication" ,owe#er, in addition to targeting +ournalists, an online press release also needs to focus on tow other areas6 1) 7he end reader ! our target market ma end up reading our online press release on a press release website" 2) /ear"h engine optimi@ation ! man press release websites ha#e significant authorit with search engines because of the #olume of original material which is regularl published" Because of this, an online press release should be structured in an optimi)ed manner" Online press releases should also help ou b increasing our brand awareness, and increasing our number of leads" 2nline press releases as part o( your internet marketin! strate!y An online press release can be one of the most effecti#e methods of promoting a new website" And one of the great things about an online press release submission is that it doesn&t ha#e to cost an thing near to the cost of submitting a press release through a con#entional EA agenc " An online press release doesn&t ha#e to be completel uni/ue, but it should ha#e Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 88 -
a uni/ue angle, something which will encourage +ournalists to consider republishing a segment from our release" If writing a press release is our forte, ou m well find that +ust half an hour per week focused in writing and submitting press releases could be an e$tremel effecti#e form of internet marketing" < online press release tips The following are M characteristics which embod an effecti#e press release3 1. ,a#e a great, e e catching title ! and include our ke word phrase 1our headline needs to be targeted at +ournalists, end readers, and search engines" In other words, in needs to be engaging enough for both +ournalists and other interested readers to be encouraged to read further ! and it needs to include a ke word phrase that ou deem suitable for the stor " 8. Briefl describe the stor in the first two lines, again including our ke word phrase The first two lines of our press release should contain absolutel no waffle" It should tr to summari)e our whole press release stor while also including a reason to read further" 'inall , in should also include the same ke word phrase that ou included in the title" 2. ;eep all paragraphs short and to the point All the paragraphs from our press release should be as simple as possible, with no more than three or four lines per paragraph" It is difficult for a reader to browse through long bits or chunks of te$t online, and +ournalists are e#en more likel to stop and mo#e on to the ne$t release if the percei#e ours to be e#en the slightest bit dull" Eliminate an thing that doesn&t contribute to our stor "
N. Include a call to action A well(constructed press release will ha#e two distinct calls to action for a +ournalist" 'irstl , an eas (to(capture section within our press release of which Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
Pillar #6 Press Releases
- 89 -
the +ournalist use as a section within one of their own articles" *econdl , a source for more information on the specific sub+ect matter being discussed in our press release" 1ou also need to include a call to action for readers who are interested in our sub+ect matter on a personal le#el" To achie#e this, ou need to include a rather subtle mention of not onl ou and our compan ! but also what our compan does" An e$ample of a call to action which ma be of interest to both +ournalists and readers would be something like an in#itation to read a full report on the sub+ect matter discussed in the press release" M. Include a non(,TM5 FA5 link It&s e$tremel important to include a non(,TM5 full httpABB #ersion of our FA5 in our online press release" This is our domain name with httpABB and perhaps www. -depending on our chosen website address format. in front of it" The reason being, if +ournalists or bloggers republish our press release online, /uite often, this FA5 will automaticall be con#erted into a li#e link" 4here to pu.lish PR4e. Erobabl the biggest press release site in the world is EA0eb -'igure 9"1." EA0eb is good for a broad range of press releases as it has a wide audience of +ournalists and end readers interested in a broad range of sub+ect matter" PR4e. .asic visi.ility packa!e- JKC The VLI EA0eb press release option pro#ides ou with a reasonable le#el of #isibilit " As well as making our release a#ailable to <oogle >ews and 1ahoo >ews, it gets s ndicated to up to M industr specific targets and 8 regional targets" This s ndication allows ou to gain #isibilit in front of +ournalists who ha#e specificall re/uested to be made aware when a press release from those industr sectors ha#e been published" EA0eb ha#e thousands of +ournalists worldwide who are subscribing to the #arious industr and regional channels, ensuring that ou ha#e an increased chance to get our stor in front of the most rele#ant pairs of e es"
- 90 -
At the time of writing, EA0eb ha#e N different le#els of press release distribution" These ser#ices range from VLI to V29I" )i!ure =*1 PR4e.
PR4e. is the lar!est press release we.site I would recommend for ou to tr the VLI press release distribution ser#ice initiall " I wouldn&t recommend going for the higher cost distribution ser#ices until ou can pro#e to ourself that the EA0eb ser#ice will offer a positi#e outcome for our region and industr sector" 4here else to pu.lish your press releaseB 'or F; targeted businesses, another website to publish our press release on in EressBo$" -'igure 9"8. All through not as wide(reaching as EA0eb, the EressBo$ ser#ice is completel free of charge to use, so it&s certainl worth a go" Again, like EA0eb, +ournalists can subscribe to EressBo$ categor feeds, which means that ou&re able to target our press release to +ournalists interested in specific industr sectors" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
Pillar #6 Press Releases )i!ure =*3 PressBo&
- 91 -
PressBo& can .e used to release press releases Trackin! the success o( your online press release with +oo!le 0lerts It&s important not +ust to write what ou think is an e$cellent press release, submit it to all the top online press release ser#ices and site back to wait until our website traffic pours in" Online press release marketing can sometimes appear to be fickle when tr ing to determine wh it has or hasn&t been a success" 1ou ha#e to be able to anal )e what the reason behind a particular press release&s success was, so that ou are able to replicate the success in the future" One of the wa s that ou should be measuring the impact of our release is through a ser#ice called %<oogle Alerts&" <oogle Alerts is a ser#ice where <oogle will alert ou as soon as a particular term is published in a news stor on the web" This means that if ou put the title of our press release as our alert term in <oogle Alerts, <oogle will send ou an email with a link to that stor as soon as it finds it"
- 92 -
If ou use our press release heading as our <oogle Alert, then the chances are that this will be one of the onl stories with that heading, meaning that ou shouldn&t recei#e man false alerts"
Comparin! the success o( online press release distri.ution services If ou decide to use different press release websites at the same time -to tr to achie#e the ma$imum possible distribution #olumes for our online press release., ou need to know which ser#ice has pro#en to be the most #aluable" In order to be able to be able to compare the success of multiple press release distribution ser#ices, there are 8 tools that I would recommend ou to consider" The first option to implement is to amend a sentence within our press release #er slightl before submitting the different #ersions to different release ser#ices" Once submitted, ou set up a <oogle Alert for each of the different phrases and take note of which #ersion is republished more often" The ne$t method of tracking the success of a press release distribution ser#ice is to use a different call to action in each #ersion of our press release" 'or instance, if ou ha#e 8 different website addresses ou can gi#e a different address in each of the different press release #ersions ! and then track to see how man #isits were recei#ed to each web page" The importance o( the personal touch Once ou start to use <oogle Alerts on a regular basis, and ou start to submit a few press releases, ou&ll hopefull start to #iew a #ariet of different publications which reprint our material" 1ou should contact these publications directl to tr and create more of a strategic relationship with them, aiming to submit our press release to them on an indi#idual basis rather than through a third part , so that ou build our own portfolio of people that want to accept our press release in the future" B de#eloping a personal relationship with these publications, ou&re making it more likel for them to think of ou in the future when the need a /uote from our industr sector" 1ou&re also reducing our reliance on the press release distribution sites, potentiall sa#ing ou future EA costs"
Pillar #6 Press Releases 2nline press releases not a direct replacement (or o((line press releases
- 93 -
Although online press releases can be a #er important part of our internet marketing arsenal, this tool ma ne#er totall replace the knowledge that a local or industr focused EA professional can pro#ide ou with" An online press release strateg should be #iewed as an augmentation to an offline EA strateg , and not a direct replacement of con#entional press releases" ,owe#er, it should be remembered that online press releases also offer the significant additional benefits of search engine optimi)ation and automated tracking"
- 94 -
Pillar #= Press Releases $ummary Online press releases are a great wa of generating awareness and traffic directl to our site" B including a non ,TM5 FA5 link with httpABB ou can also impro#e our off(site search engine optimi)ation as some republishing sites will automaticall con#ert that website mention into a li#e, *EO friendl link" EA0eb is the largest and most popular website for submitting online press releases" *electing the VLI ser#ice should be sufficient for our initial needsK although if ou find that it&s successful ou should then test the higher(cost ser#ices" Include a descripti#e title for our online press release that includes a ke word phrase" The first couple of sentences of our press release should be short punch , pro#ide an o#er#iew to our whole stor and also include our ke word phrase" Alwa s include a call(to(action for +ournalists as well as our end readers" This could be in the form of additional information or a free related report a#ailable at a website address" Fse <oogle Alerts to track the success of our press releases" 1ou will be able to #iew who is publishing our article and ou can use this to build direct relationships with publishers for the future" 1ou can also use <oogle Alerts to test the effecti#eness of different online press release distribution ser#ices" Online press releases aren&t a replacement for con#entional EA agencies ! the should be #iewed as an augmentation of this ser#ice 'or up(to(date links to recommended online press release resources #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar9"
Pillar #7 Link Building
- 95 -
Pillar #>
ink Buildin!
- 96 -
Pillar #> ink Buildin!

________________________________________________________________________
here are a #ariet of right and wrong wa s to build links to our website"
Building up good /ualit , rele#ant links has to be an integral part of an search engine optimi)ation strateg " ,owe#er, bear this in mind ! link building is about /ualit , rele#ant links and not about the number of links" 0hile I belie#e it to be a little easier to %game& 1ahoo or M*> search with simpl generating a large #olume of links that point to our website, this is a short(term game" Although it didn&t in the past, <oogle certainl now prefers /ualit o#er /uantit ! and that isn&t going to change in the future" The consistent approach works .est 1ou need to #iew our link building strateg as an ongoing pro+ect" Attempting to get 1,III links to our site this week and then thinking %that&s m link building done4& will ha#e little or no impact" 0hen de#eloping our link building strateg ou need to think about how links would e#ol#e to a web page naturall , and do our best to tr to mimic the e#ol#ement of links in a similar manner" 1ou ha#e to remember that <oogle and other ma+or search engines ha#e now been going for more that 1I ears, and in that time the &#e continuall impro#ed the manner in which their software works" <ood search engines do this for 8 reasons" 'irstl , to continuall impro#e the user e$perience and tr to sta ahead
- 97 -
of the competition" *econdl , to tr and sta one step ahead of those who tr to game the search engine results with underhand -often called %black hat&. search engine optimi)ation tricks" Because of this, the focus on search engines ha#e been to tr and stud how links e#ol#e naturall , and tr and determine link building patterns which don&t appear to be #er natural at all" The lesson from this with regards to link building is not to tr to do things that ha#e no chance of happening naturall " That wa our link building techni/ues ha#e a better chance of fl ing underneath the search engine radar" ink .uildin! methods discussed in this chapter Eillar GO -this chapter. discusses M wa s in which ou can build links to our website6 'ree Birectories ! where to find rele#ant directories that offer ou free website listings ,ow to anal )e a competitors& links to their website ! ,ow to establish who is linking to our competitors& websites and how to get the same web pages to link ou our site ,ow to ac/uire links from respected institutions and wh these links are often a lot more #aluable in the e es of a search engine ,ow top ac/uire links b gi#ing testimonials to other people&s products ,ow to search <oogle and other search engines to find other rele#ant web pages that ma consider linking to ou )ree Directories There are 8 main sorts of free directories that are worthwhile focusing on to build our inbound links6 1G Industry speci(ic directories 3G ocal speci(ic directories
- 98 -
1. Industr specific directories There is a useful website called Birector =ritic, -director critic"com. which is actuall a director of directories -'igure O"1." Fse this resource to search for directories within a niche that is most rele#ant for our business t pe" )i!ure >*1 Directory Critic
Directory Critic is the directory o( directories Aele#ant industr (specific director link building is a useful and worthwhile place to start" *earch engines regularl crawl directories, and these director links will start to educate search engines about our website topic" The more rele#ant the links are, the better the /ualit of the link" This is because if search engines are able to make a reasonable assumption about our website topic, our site will be more likel to rank more highl for that topic in search engine results pages"
4here else to (ind industry speci(ic we.site directories Another incredibl eas method of disco#ering new directories suitable for our industr is to search <oogle for a ke word phrase that describes our industr , Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 99 -
and adding the word %director & at the end" 5et&s consider an e$ample of this using our old fictitious fa#ourite, 'reddie 'aldo the golf shop owner"
$earchin! (or a !ol( directory After searching for %golf director & in <oogle, one of the first websites I found was a website called Cour Dol# *ire"tory -'igure O"8." To get his golf e/uipment shop listed within this director , 'reddie should simpl na#igate to the categor called %golf e/uipment and accessories& ( and then complete a form with a little information about his website before submitting his details" )i!ure >*3 %our +ol( Directory
$earchin! (or the correct cate!ory on %our +ol( Directory There are often a number of options when submitting our link for possible inclusion in the director " If paid links aren&t too e$pensi#e, and for that ou Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 100 -
recei#e a more prominent position on a rele#ant, #aluable website and a comparabl rapid re#iew time, then it ma be worthwhile +ust going for the paid re#iew option" 1ou&re +ust going to ha#e to +udge whether or not ou think that this is of #alue" Reciprocal links 'i#e to ten ears ago, one of the easiest methods of %gaming& the search engines was to swap links with as man websites as ou possibl could ! no matter whether the content on either website had an thing in common at all4 E$changing links is generall referred to as re"ipro"al linking" Aeciprocal links worked so well because it was much easier to persuade other webmasters to link to our site if ou were prepared to link to their site" ,owe#er, because search engines ga#e a reciprocal link the same amount of weighting as a one(wa link, this acti#el encouraged reciprocal linking as a form of search engine optimi)ation" Other websites /uickl e#ol#ed which functioned as a meeting place for people who were interested in trading links" As a result, this acti#el encouraged webmasters to tr to short(cut their wa to the top of <oogle search results" As a result, in order to tr to continue to deli#er the best possible search results to their users, <oogle decided that it needed to radicall change its search engine ranking algorithm" And the first stage in this significant algorithm change was the reduction in #alue of reciprocal links ! and the reduction in #alue of links from website deemed to be not from the same industr sector" Choosin! to link (or the ri!ht reasons If a website chooses to link to our home page, or another page on our site because the find it to be a #aluable resource for their own #isitors then that&s the right reason for wanting to link to a web page" The secret is to tr and replicate that linking ideolog and st le in future links that point to our site" That&s in addition to tr ing to replicate the st le of sites and locations of links on those sites that point to our web pages ! replicate the natural building of links and ou can&t go too far long4
Pillar #7 Link Building Don7t think it7s always a .ad idea to e&chan!e links
- 101 -
1ou shouldn&t think that it&s alwa s a bad idea to e$change links" As long as if ou ha#e links from lots of other sources, it&s /uite acceptable to ha#e one or two link e$change pages on our site that feature rele#ant link partners" As a rule of thumb, as long as if less than /uarter of our links are from link e$changes, and hand(on(heart ou could sa that each link which ou include on our own site could be a useful resource for #isitors, then this #olume and /ualit of reciprocal links should onl ha#e a positi#e effect" B participating in a minimal amount of industr (rele#ant link e$changes, it demonstrates to <oogle that ou are an independent authorit within our industr , because ou are comfortable linking out to other websites in the same industr sector and spreading some %link lo#e&" 0nother e&ample o( an industry"speci(ic directory 'igure O"2 is another e$ample of searching for an industr (related director , using the case stud of :ane :obs? sales e$ecuti#e recruitment compan " ,a#ing searched <oogle for %sales recruitment director &, one of the first search engine results I encountered was a website called *ales0ork, which contains a list of useful links of where to find sales work" Aemember, whate#er our business is, search for our industr sector ke word and the word %director & in <oogle or another search engine, and ou will hopefull find at least 1I good, rele#ant directories that ou can get decent one(wa links from to our site" 'or these t pes of links ou need a combination between /ualit and /uantit ! so be selecti#e ! but not too selecti#e" 2ptimi9in! your link te&t LtitleG and description Another thing to bear in mind when ou are submitting our site to #arious directories is to tr to ensure that ou #ar the title te$t and the description of our submission details" Because ou&re submitting our own website for prospecti#e inclusion in a director , the chances are that if the director owner decides to include our website in their listings, the &ll choose to use our suggested title and description instead of bothering to write one for themsel#es"
- 102 -
This gi#es ou a fantastic opportunit to influence our off(site search engine optimi)ation -i"e" controlling the links and te$t in the links from other sites witch point to our site." To ma$imi)e the search engine optimi)ation impact from our director submissions ou should use a mi$ture of different ke word phrases within our title and description choices" This is because if ou +ust used the same title and description in all of our director submissions, search engines could easil assume that it&s ou that&s been doing the submitting" ,owe#er, if ou mi$ things up a bit, it ma well be percei#ed b the search engines as being the director owners choosing to link to ou" )i!ure >*5 $ales 4ork 4e.site
The (ree link e&chan!e (orm on the $ales4ork we.site
- 103 -
*earch engines ha#e lots of different wa s of deciding whether or not it looks as if ou&#e been building links ourself, or other sites ha#e chosen to link to ou" One eas method that the use is to anal )e the te$t within the links that point to our pages ! if most websites use e$actl the same phrase then that ma be percei#ed as representing unnatural link building" Another rule I go b is to ne#er ha#e more than MIP of m te$t links to an one page linking using the same ke word phrase" Comparin! Directories There are 2 main methods which ou should use whene#er ou need to anal )e the potential effecti#eness of getting listed in a director " 1G :anual review (or relevance and suita.ility 3G +oo!le Pa!e Rank 5G 0le&a Rank 1. Manual re#iew for rele#ance and suitabilit As alread briefl co#ered, ou need to tr to ensure that our website is being featured in the right neighborhoods" That&s on sites which alread feature a reasonable /uantit of sub+ect matter in our chosen field, and don&t displa material that ou aren&t comfortable ha#ing our business associated with" 8. <oogle Eage Aank <oogle Eage Aank is a method of ranking indi#idual web pages between I and 1I, 1I being the highest score and I being the lowest" It is an appro$imation, according to <oogle, of their percei#ed #alue of a page" It is not a #er accurate method of measuring, but it does gi#e ou an indication of the potential #alue of ha#ing a link to our site on the page" One of the easiest wa s to determine the Eage Aank of an indi#idual web page is to download the <oogle Toolbar" -*impl search for %<oogle toolbar& in an search engine." The <oogle Toolbar is a small software program which adds on additional functionalit to the top of our website browser ! there is a #ersion for both Internet E$plorer and 'irefo$"
- 104 -
As part of the toolbar ou will be able to #iew the Eage Aank of each web page ou #isit #ia a small green line representing the Eage Aank score" The length of the green line indicates the /uantit of Eage Aank that the web page has been awarded b <oogle" ,owe#er, bear in mind, Eage Aank is onl updated about e#er three months" This therefore means that Eage Aank isn&t an accurate present(da representation of what <oogle currentl feels about the page, but it pro#ides a reasonable starting point for anal sis" It&s also important to remember that +ust because a web page doesn&t ha#e an Eage AankK it doesn&t mean that ou shouldn&t bother tr ing to get our website listed on that page" It could be a #er popular site that gets lots of #isitors, and there ma be some technical reason wh <oogle isn&t choosing to gi#e the web page in /uestion an Eage Aank" That&s wh ou still need to use our gut instinct ! along with one other method of rating the #alue of a website ! Ale$a Aank" 2. Ale$a Aank Fnlike <oogle Eage Aank, Ale$a Aank gi#es ou a rating score for the popularit of a website as a whole" It can also gi#e ou a reasonable estimate of how popular a website is in a particular countr " Ale$a ranks the top se#eral million websites, and it will gi#e ou an appro$imate traffic ranking #alue for our website" If it is number one this means it is the best website in the world4 To show ou how it compares websites against each other, 'igure O"N is an Ale$a Aank graph showing a ranking comparison between the <oogle"com, 1ahoo"com, and M*>"com websites o#er a fi#e( ear period" The great thing about Ale$a is that ou can #iew how much websites ha#e increased in popularit -or decreased in popularit . o#er a period of time" This will allow ou to make more of an informed decision on whether or not it ma be #aluable to approach a website, and ask the owner to link to our site" Ale$a has is limits though" 0hen a website has a ranking of much lower than 8II,III, Ale$a struggles to produce a graph to represent the popularit of that website o#er time"
Pillar #7 Link Building )i!ure >*8 0le&a*com
- 105 -
0le&a !raphs comparin! tra((ic o( +oo!leD %ahoo and :$E 8. 5ocal specific directories ,a#ing co#ered ma+or directories in pillar $E, and industr directories o#er the few pre#ious pages, local directories are the final t pe of directories to which ou need to submit our website" If ou are a business with a ph sical address then there are 8 local directories I would class as being #er important to tr and get our website listed in ! <oogle 5ocal and 1ahoo4 5ocal" 1ou can also search Birector =ritic -as pre#iousl discussed. to find different local directories" As well as ha#ing industr (specific director categories,
- 106 -
Birector =ritic has a section for countr (specific regional directories" And once again, in a similar manner to what was suggested to find more industr (specific directories, ou can easil find additional local(specific directories b searching for them in <oogle" +oo!le ocal Directory 1ou can add our business to the <oogle 5ocal director at http677www"google"com7local7add7 -'igure O"M." To do this, ou will need to create a free <oogle account" ,a#ing done so, ou will be able to fill in our business name, description and our address" <oogle then sends ou a ph sical postcard to our business address with a pin code" 1ou need to log back into our <oogle account and enter this EI> code to make our listing li#e" )i!ure >*< +oo!le ocal Directory
+oo!le ocal Directory one o( the most important local directories <etting our business listed in <oogle 5ocal will onl become more important in the future as being featured will also mean that ou will be able to appear in associated ser#ices like <oogle Maps" It could be argued that local mobile search is the ne$t Internet frontier, and getting our business listed in all the big online Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 107 -
local directories now will gi#e ou a head(start in the ne$t stage of local director e#ol#ement" %ahooI ocal Directory 1ahoo4 5ocal -'igure O"9. works in a similar wa to <oogle 5ocal ! and when our business is listed on this director it should appear in 1ahoo4 Maps" )i!ure >*= The %ahooI ocal Directory
The %ahooI ocal Directory is important local directory Don7t (or!et Directory Critic and the 3 reasons why you7re .uildin! links Aemember not to forget the Birector =ritic website when ou&re searching for local(specific directories" These t pes of links should be able to offer ou 8 main benefits" 'irstl , the search engine optimi)ation benefits, and secondl , the #isitors who click on the links through to our website"
- 108 -
:ore ocal Directories As with industr directories, ou can find other local directories using search engines" Below -'igure O"O. shows the <oogle search results when ou search for C<lasgow director D" )i!ure >*> +oo!le $earch results
$earchin! (or local directories in +oo!le <lasgow, of course is +ust an e$ample" 1ou can conduct a similar search for an other cit in the world" This search will help ou find specific directories that are often run b local people on a non(profit basis who are simpl interested in pro#iding great information about their local area" 5inks from these t pes of sites can be e$tremel #aluable for a number of reasons" 'or instance, in addition to the benefits of helping to educate search engines about the localit of our business, these directories often ha#e categor ( specific sections which will be better for our *EO"
Pillar #7 Link Building 6+las!ow Tradin!7
- 109 -
'igure O"L below shows the categories found on the <lasgow Trading website" Aemember, when ou&re re#iewing local directories which ma be appropriate for our business, make sure that ou take time to browse and find the most appropriate categor for inclusion in" )i!ure >*K +las!ow Tradin!
$election the most appropriate cate!ory on +las!ow Tradin! Ae#iewing the categories on the <lasgow Trading website, ou can see that once ou click on %Erofessional *er#ices&, there are plent of options to choose from including %Accountanc &, %Ad#ertising&, %Architects& etc" To submit our website to a great, rele#ant local director like this, it&s often +ust the case of na#igating our wa to the most rele#ant categor , and them looking for a %submit& button" 1ou will then be presented with an online form which re/uests the title and description of our website" Because it&s a local director , it ma also ask ou for our business address and telephone number ! and perhaps a password so that ou can return to the site in the future to edit our business information" -*ee figure H for completing a submission form on <lasgow Trading.
- 110 -
THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING )i!ure >*M +las!ow Tradin!
Completin! a we.site su.mission (orm on +las!ow tradin! Aemember to bear search engines in mind when ou&re submitting our website to local directories" As well as selection the optimum categor for our business, it&s important to remember to tr to include a rele#ant ke word phrase in our submission title and description" Another thing to bear in mind is that if ou&re planning of tr ing to get listed in lots of local directories, it ma be a prudent idea to replicate our submission strateg that ou ha#e with other directories b rotating our titles and descriptions"
Pillar #7 Link Building )i!ure >*1C +las!ow Tradin!
- 111 -
0n e&ample o( a company listin! on +las!ow Tradin! 'igure O"1I shows ou wh it&s worthwhile spending some time to come up with a /ualit , length description for our business prior to submission to local directories" As well as gi#ing each director submission ha#ing their own web page -with a uni/ue FA5., the web page also contains a link that #isitors can click to see a location map of the business" Although this particular local director e$ample doesn&t actuall gi#e ou a ke word rich link back ou our website, it does pass on %link +uice&" 1ou can tell this because if ou #iew the source code of the listing, the link ,TM5 doesn&t use a %nofollow& attribute" Competitor .acklinks Another important part of a successful link building campaign is to be able to anal )e the links that are pointing to our competitorsK -backlinks. determine which ones are most #aluable and come up with a strateg to tr to encourage these web pages to link to our site too" 5et&s take a look at our fictitious e$ample 'redd 'aldo, and how he would anal )e which websites to target using the ke word phrase %golf e/uipment&" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 112 -
Fsing the pre#iousl mentioned <oogle Toolbar, after ha#ing loaded one of his competitor&s home pages, 'reddie would begin b selecting the drop(down menu on the right(hand side of the EageAank icon" Then clicking on %backward links&, he would be able to #iew a list of se#eral other respected websites which link to his chosen competitor -'igure O"11." )i!ure >*11 The +ol( $hop 2nline
$earchin! (or competitor .acklinks usin! +oo!le tool.ar Don7t /ust rely on +oo!le to analy9e your competitor7s .acklinks It&s important to note that <oogle chooses not to displa all the links -according to their data. which link to our competitor&s home page" In fact, <oogle ma onl displa around fi#e percent of the links that the know about" *o ou shouldn&t +ust rel on <oogle when ou&re anal )ing our competitor&s backlinks4 ,owe#er, the good news is that 1ahoo is a lot more willing to di#ulge its link count information, so collating the 1ahoo and <oogle results together means that ou will be able to get a good feel for who&s linking to our competitors" 1ou&re better off downloading all this research onto a spreadsheet ! or it ma be a good idea to use semi(automated search engine optimi)ation software like *EO Elite to carr out this task, as suggested at http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarO" This *EO software ! or the added time in#estment to create our own spreadsheet will help to make sure that ou don&t miss out on as man link building opportunities as ou otherwise would do"
- 113 -
0naly9in! the num.er o( links pointin! to a competitor7s we.site usin! %ahoo To anal )e the number of links pointing to a competitor&s website using the 1ahoo search engine, all ou ha#e to do is #isit http677sitee$plorer"search" ahoo"com7, and then t pe in linkdomainA and then the full FA5 of our competitor&s home page ! for e$ample this search would look something like linkdomainAhttpABBwww."ompetitor!domain."om" Once ou&#e selected a number of competitors, and downloaded all of their backlinks according to both <oogle and 1ahoo onto our spreadsheet, ou need to sort them in order of #alue" This is generall done b using a combination of <oogle EageAank and Ale$a Aank" -This is probabl the point where ou choose to definitel select some semi( automated time(sa#ing *EO software instead of doing all of this manuall 4. Contactin! the we.sites that link to your competitors *o, ou&#e sol#ed half of the pu))le ! ou&#e disco#ered which websites are linking to our competitors, and that&s the main reason wh our competitors are ranking so well" The ne$t half of the pu))le though is to work out a strateg that is most likel to get ou competitor&s link partners to want to link to ou too" One of the biggest mistakes that businesses make when the &re tr ing to encourage other websites to link to them, is the send out generic emails sa ing something like6 F+iG I really like your !ite and wondered i# you might )e intere!ted in !wapping link!HI 0ebmasters recei#e emails like the abo#e one far too often" And because there isn&t one degree of personali)ation ! or indication that the message sender has e#en looked at the recipient&s website, the chances are e$tremel small that the message will be treated with an serious consideration" Alternati#el , if ou took +ust a little time to #isit each web page on which ou wanted to get our business listed, decided how e$actl how our competitor&s links came to be and educated ourself on the business model of the website in /uestion, then ou would be phenomenall more likel to obtain a link back to our website" This is because our new email to the website on which ou would like to get Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 114 -
listed would look something like6 F+i *a0idG IJd like to "ompliment you on the !et o# u!e#ul re!our"e! that you are li!ting at httpABBwww.)uildyourown)u!ine!!.)i@B"atBinde2B >BKntrepreneur-9rti"le!.php. I regularly re0i!it your entrepreneur arti"le! ' theyJre #ull o# really in#ormati0e "ontent. I e!pe"ially like the mo!t re"ent arti"le )y Laurie +aye! on Lhow !imple noJ! "an "hange your li#e and )u!ine!!J. I run the we)!ite www.)u!ine!!#o"u!time."om whi"h help! )u!ine!!e! )rain!torm with ea"h other to try to impro0e their long-term )u!ine!! model!. I wa! hoping that you #eel that my we)!ite would )e a really u!e#ul re!our"e #or your reader! ' and that youJd )e happy to link to thi! re!our"e #rom your Kntrepreneur 9rti"le! !e"tion. In anti"ipation that youJd )e happy to do thi! IJd like to o##er you a "omplimentary )ottle o# wine a! a thank you; Mu!t reply !howing our li0e linkG your pre#eren"e #or red or white wineG and an addre!! to !end the )ottle to and IJll get it in the po!t; Many thank! and keep up the good work with 6uild Cour Nwn 6u!ine!!; Craig 7homa! NwnerG 6u!ine!! Oo"u! 7imeI If ou approach people in the right manner, sa wh their site is #aluable and e$plain wh the should want to link to ou, then ask them to potentiall add our link as well, ou might be surprised at the number of websites that will gi#e ou a link to our website" -An incenti#e like a free bottle of wine might help too4. Taking a personal approach and ensuring that ou are focused in our re/uests will be much more successful that using automated software to re/uest links" 5ike building an kind of relationship, ou onl ha#e one chance to make a first impression, so be sure ou do not spam people with generic e(mails" Take the time to find out a little about the website that ou want to appear on ! and the person who runs the website before ou make contact" It will make the world of difference to our link re/uest con#ersion rates"
Pillar #7 Link Building 'ow to discover the owners o( we.sites
- 115 -
1ou don&t +ust ha#e to rel on finding a website owner 7 manager&s contact details on their website" Bon&t forget the often forgotten tool to assist ou with an internet marketing campaign ! a telephone4 It&s alwa s worthwhile phoning up a head office to see if ou can tr to disco#er the name of the person responsible for looking after the website" Another option that ou ha#e if ou +ust can&t find out who&s responsible for managing the website is to look up a ser#ice that ma tell ou the person responsible for the site admin according to the domain registration" )i!ure >*13 easywhois*com
ookin! up the contact details (or the domain purpleinternetmarketin!*com 0hene#er ou register a domain, ou ha#e to submit some contact information" Most people don&t hide this contact information, meaning that it&s possible for the general public to #iew ! as long as if people know where to look" This is called the 0,OI* of a domain ! where ou can see who is registered as the administrati#e contact for an indi#idual domain"
- 116 -
One of the places where it&s possible to #iew this information is through a ser#ice called eas whois"com" -'igure O"18. As ou can see, from this screenshot, the admin contact email address for the domain purpleinternetmarketing"com adminZpurpleinternetmarketing"com, with the contact name being me, Ba#id Bain" If ou wanted to re/uest a link from this website ou now ha#e a contact name and email address with which to proceed from" Although looking up these contact details in a ser#ice like this shouldn&t be our first port of call when tr ing to make contact with a website owner ! as the details are often wrong and it can come across as a little bit impersonal to contact someone after finding them here ! if this is the onl option ou ha#e, it&s certainl worthwhile" Respected institutions It&s all about thinking out of the bo$ when it comes to attracting #aluable, one( wa links" *earch engines often #alue links on educational, charit or go#ernment(run websites a little higher than links on other websites" There is a lot of opinion on wh this is the case" Aeasons ha#e been cited including the length of time that a domain has been around for and the /ualit of links that point to the website of the respected institution" Either wa , it&s not important wh these links are often deemed to be more #aluable b search engines" 0hat&s important is the fact that the are, and that getting links from these t pes of websites are #er good for our own website&s ranking" One wa to obtain links from a respected institution is to tr to forge a relationship with a uni#ersit , perhaps offering to gi#e a seminar to a group of students about a particular topic in e$change for them mentioning ou on their website and gi#ing ou a link to our site" 5ibraries often ha#e local directories which ou can get listed in for free" There are numerous business networks that ou can +oin, man for free, that will gi#e a one(wa link ! all ou ha#e to do is ask" A local =hambers of =ommerce can also be #er useful ! the often ha#e a director of businesses which are members and an additional director of members which are willing to offer special discounts to other chamber members" This is et another method of creating a #aluable, one(wa link to our site"
Pillar #7 Link Building Testimonials
- 117 -
Another great wa of getting one(a links to our site is through gi#ing testimonials" An product or ser#ice ou bu will no(doubt be happ to hear positi#e re#iews on what ou though about our purchase" *ending an unsolicited, positi#e testimonial about a product or ser#ice that ou ha#e purchased to a marketing director ! not the customer ser#ice department ! can be #er effecti#e" A receipt of a positi#e testimonial b a compan &s marketing department ma prompt them to use it as part of their future promotional material" 0hen ou&re lea#ing our testimonial, alwa s lea#e our website address rather than our phone number for our contact details" That wa , if our testimonial is published, readers will be able to #isit our website to find out more ! hopefull #ia a li#e one(wa link" )i!ure >*15 a(!s*com
0 Fuick online search will (ind you more link .uildin! opportunities
- 118 -
$earchin! +oo!le (or more link partners *earching <oogle ! or other search engines ! can /uickl find ou additional, rele#ant link building opportunities" Tr searching <oogle for our ke word phrase and the phrase %add FA5&, or our ke word phrase and the phrase %add site&" 'or instance, using 'reddie 'aldo and the golf e$ample, if ou search <oogle for %golf& and %add FA5&, what ou are searching for is an pages that mention the word %golf&, but also mention the phrase %add FA5&, or the phrase %add site&" <enerall , these t pes of web pages will be about golf ! and be looking for link partners" 'igure O"12 is one of the first pages that we find when we conduct a <oogle search for %golf& and %add FA5&" The afgs"com website -America&s fa#orite golf schools. offers a link building opportunit " The ask for our website name, site description, and a reciprocal link" 0hen ou search for link building opportunities like this online, ou&ll often find that websites look for a reciprocal link" That&s& not a bad thing ! it&s +ust not as good as a one(wa link from them to our site" As long as if ou build links in lots of different wa s, that an reciprocal links are rele#ant resources for our readers and that reciprocal links are the minorit of links that point to our site, this can still be part of an effecti#e internet marketing strateg "
- 119 -
Pillar #> ink Buildin! $ummary To achie#e good, consistent search engine rankings it is important to get /ualit links from rele#ant sites to our website" ,owe#er, large numbers of non(rele#ant links pointing to our site can ha#e a negati#e effect on our search engine rankings" *ubmit our website to free directories, such as local or industr (specific directories" Fse Birector =ritic"com to search for niche industr directories" Both <oogle 5ocal and 1ahoo 5ocal are #aluable local directories" Birector =ritic"com can also be used to find more local directories" Aesearching the links that point to our competitor&s site can be a good wa to disco#er which sites might be willing to link to our site" 1ou can contact these site owners b using contact forms on their website, or using the eas whois"com ser#ice" Aespected institutions such as uni#ersities, libraries, or business networks are often willing to link to our site if ou&re willing to help them out b gi#ing a free lecture or seminar on our speciali)ed sub+ect" Eerhaps ou can offer these organi)ations something else of #alue in e$change for a link@ Aemember to send a testimonial for an product or ser#ice that our business in#ests in" *end our testimonial to the marketing director and include our website address to make it much more likel to gi#e ou a free one(wa link" *earch <oogle for our ke word phrase plus the phrases %add url& or the phrase %add site& to find websites that are acti#el looking for link partners" If the site is rele#ant for our readers then consider arranging a reciprocal link" This offers #alue as long as if is part of a wider link building campaign, and not the primar focus of the campaign" 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date link building resources and ser#ices #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarO"
- 120 -
Pillar #K
0rticle $u.mission
Pillar #8 Article Submission
- 121 -
Pillar #K 0rticle $u.mission

________________________________________________________________________
illar GL co#ers article submission ! an e$cellent wa of increasing the links
that are pointing to our site, and guaranteeing that there are ke word(rich links which point to our site" Article submission is one of the most consistentl popular and effecti#e wa s of impro#ing our industr respectabilit and predictabl increasing the number of our back links" The great thing about allowing our article to be reprinted is that there are an unlimited number of websites that ma then be willing to republish our article" Effecti#e article marketing can be e$tremel #iral in nature" 0rticle marketin! .ack!round Article marketing used to be one of the most consistentl successful forms of internet marketing for man ears" Between the ears 8III and 8IIN, before search engines like <oogle started to de#elop more comple$ algorithms, link building was largel a numbers game" Because of this, publishing our articles on other sites which included links back to our site was one of the easiest wa s to build up back(links that mattered to search engines" Article marketing is still is an e$tremel effecti#e wa of internet marketing, and still one of the best wa s to control the links that point to our website" The onl Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 122 -
issue is that nowada s ou can&t get awa with getting credit from search engines for the same article that appears on hundreds of different directories" *o in summar there&s not /uite as much search engine optimi)ation benefit as there used to be from article marketing ! but some *EO benefits still e$ist" Moreo#er, article marketing can also dri#e rele#ant readers directl to our site" 0rticle marketin! overview 0hen submitting articles to free reprint directories it&s essential that ou +ust focus on sub+ect areas that are particularl pertinent to our own website #isitors" There&s no point in tr ing to dri#e #isitors to our site who ha#e +ust read an article which has nothing to do with the sub+ect matter that the will be finding out more about on our own website" 'irst(things(first is to decide on our sub+ect matter ! there are plent of tips to help ou with choosing that later on in this pillar" After ou complete our article, ensuring that ou optimi)e it with rele#ant ke words, the ne$t thing that ou need to think of is our author bio ! this should include a brief summar about ou, our website and two links back to our site" 0uthor .io (ormat It&s important to careful consider our author bios ! and the e$act nature of the links that point to our website from within our author bios" I alwa s recommend including a ke word rich ,TM5 link back to our site and a full http677 #ersion of our FA5 within our author bio" The ,TM5 for an author bio in this format would look something like6 *a0id 6ain i! the #ounder o# the Pa hre#QIhttpABBwww.PurpleInternetMarketing."omI,Internet Marketing 7rainingPBa, Company httpABBwww.PurpleInternetMarketing."om If the article director that ou are submitting our articles to accepts ,TM5 within their author bios, then the code abo#e will produce the phrase %Internet Marketing Training& that links to http677www"EurpleInternetMarketing"com" The reason that ou also want to include a full http677 #ersion of our FA5 within our author bio is that if article directories ignore our ,TM5, then the still
- 123 -
might decide to create li#e links from mentions of our domain name ! and the &re more likel to do this if ou include the full FA5 -with http677 at the front of it." This is especiall applicable if ou are submitting our article to an article reprint director which is especiall popular with e)ine publishers" Below is what the e$ample author bio would look like if both the ,TM5 and the full mention of the FA5 became li#e links" *a0id 6ain i! the #ounder o# the Internet Marketing 7raining Company httpABBwww.PurpleInternetMarketing."om The ideal author .io (ormat Ideall , ou want our author bios to be in a format which includes6 A ke word(rich link to our home page" A ke word(rich link to an internal page on our site ! this is in addition to the ke word rich link to our home page" ,a#ing links to internal pages on our website is a great wa of getting one(wa , search engine friendl links to internal pages within our website" A non(,TM5 full FA5 -including http677. mention of our website address"
Bearing this strateg in mind, ou should be ensuring that ou submit at least one article to an article director for e#er single categor on our website ! with a ke word rich link back to each of our website categories Fsing the www"Build1ourOwnBusiness"bi) website as an e$ample, if I wanted to link directl to the change management articles section, I would link to the page http677www"build ourownbusiness"bi)7cat7inde$7287=hange(Management( Articles"php using the ke word phrase %change management articles& from at least one of m submitted author bios" 0rticle )ormat The optimum length for the kind of article that ou would submit to an article director should be around MII to LII words in length" An less than MII words
- 124 -
ma not be deemed to be of sufficient /ualit b some article directories" More than LII words and readers ma get bored with our article ! and ma not e#en reach our author bio at the bottom4 1our article should ha#e an informati#e introductor paragraph which will appeal to our own website target market as well as acting as a s nopsis for the whole article" The /ualit of our article title is imperati#e ! a well(though(out article title should appeal to both readers and search engines" %,ow to& or %Top 1I wa s of doing something& works reall well" Tr to include a rele#ant, targeted ke word phrase" All paragraphs within the article should be short, punch and to the point" 1ou should tr to include the same ke word phrase that ou are using in our title within our article bod ! once near the beginning, once somewhere in the middle" 0hen reading articles online, people do not like to scroll through paragraphs" Aeaders prefer to be personal, straight(to(the(point articles, so be careful if our natural language st le is /uite formal ! ou might want to tone things down a bit" )i!ure K*1 ,9ine 0rticles
,9ine 0rticlesD .y (ar the most popular o( the article directories
Pillar #8 Article Submission ,9ine 0rticles the .est startin! point
- 125 -
There are se#eral hundred different %free article reprint& directories" At the time of writing, E)ine Articles -figure L"1. is b far the biggest and probabl offers the best #alue for our time in#estment" 'or the #ast ma+orit of no#ice article marketers, E)ine Articles is the best starting point" 1ou will need to create an account before ou get started" After ou&#e registered ou&ll be able to choose from hundreds of different categories in which to include each article, so there should be a categor that is able to house most niche topics" )i!ure K*3 ,9ine 0rticles
$u.mittin! your article to ,9ine 0rticles
- 126 -
Researchin! keyword phrases (or your articles :ust like ou do when ou&re tr ing to impro#e the search engine optimi)ation of the pages on our own website, ou can use the 0ordtracker ser#ice to research a ke word phrase to include within our article title and content" 'or articles published elsewhere ou&re generall better off aiming for an e$tremel rele#ant long(tail ke word phrase" In other words, a ke word phrase that&s particularl rele#ant for our article, et not that difficult to hit the top of search engine results with" Aemember to include our chosen ke word phrase in our title and in the content of our article so that when the article is republished it is more likel to be found b search engines" )ormattin! your articles E)ine Articles allow ou to use some ,TM5 tags within our article" This means that ou are able to emphasi)e different areas within our articles such as subheadings with st les such as bold and italics" This is an e$tremel important tool when ou submit our articles to E)ine Articles as most article publishers will be too la) to make use of them ! meaning that our article will stand out b looking a lot more professional than the #ast ma+orit of the other articles" 2ther ma/or article su.mission sites The ne$t of the ma+or article submission sites which I also recommend using is called i*nare -figure L"2." But i*nare isn&t +ust an articles director ! it&s also an article distribution ser#ice" This means that when ou submit our article to i*nare, as well as getting our article published in their director , if ou pa for their article distribution ser#ice ! which costs a ma$imum of V8 per article ! ou&ll also get our article distributed to up to NI,III other publishers" That&s not to sa that our article will appear on NI,III other websites ! it +ust means that NI,III other publishers will be made aware of the fact that ou ha#e +ust published a free(to(reprint article" Technicall , i*nare works in a similar manner to E)ine Articles" In other words, Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 127 -
ou need to create a free account, sign in to our account and submit our article" Although ou are able to submit the same articles to i*nare as ou do to E)ine Articles, in an ideal world, to pro#ide uni/ue content for search engines it ma be worthwhile considering submitting different articles to each ser#ice" ,owe#er, if ou do want to tr submitting the same article to both E)ine Articles and i*nare, it&s a good idea to tr to track which ser#ice is encouraging the most other websites to reprint our article" An effecti#e free wa of doing this is b using <oogle Alerts to track the amount of times that our article title is used on the web" If ou use a different article title for each submission ser#ice, this will let ou track which ser#ice works best for ou" )i!ure K*5 " i$nare
i$nare*com There are about 2I different categories on i*nare" The reason that the can&t offer as man categories as E)ine Articles is that the ha#e to tie up their categories with their distribution partner&s categories" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 128 -
Another thing that i*nare offers ou is the facilit to choose a pen name instead of using our real name ! and the let ou associate multiple pen names with the same account" ,ditin! tips (or i$nare ,owe#er, i*nare don&t allow an ,TM5 to be included within our article bod ! that&s because man of their publishers ma wish to republish our article as an email to their list, and our ,TM5 therefore might not displa as intended" But that&s not to sa that ou&re not able to ha#e some kind of design control o#er our article" If ou +ust think a little bit creati#el then ou&ll disco#er that b adding a couple of dashes either side of our subheadings, or b including numbered lists, our article will stand out as being head and shoulders better than the competition" This means that it&s got a better chance of being re( published" *omething else to bear in mind with i*nare is that ou get asked to complete 8 author bios ! and it&s important that ou complete both author bios" One author bio allows ,TM5 ! this is generall for publishers who wish to re(publish our article online" The option that doesn&t allow ,TM5 is generall for publishers who choose to reprint our article as an email" :ust remember for the no(,TM5 #ersion to include our full FA5 which might be re(published as a li#e link" Eiche article sites Although less general, and more %niche& article sites won&t ha#e as much total traffic to their sites, the ma well ha#e +ust as much rele0ant traffic as other, much larger sites like E)ine Articles" 'or e$ample if ou wish to submit an article about %*ales management ad#ice&, ou ma be better off searching <oogle for rele#ant sales management article sites" >ot onl could this dri#e more rele#ant traffic to our site, it could end up being more beneficial to ou from a search engine optimi)ation perspecti#e due to the close o#erall rele#ance of the site on which our inbound link sits" The importance o( trackin! tra((ic (rom article sites It&s important not to spend a great deal of effort submitting our articles to the same article site without anal )ing the /uantit and /ualit of the resultant Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 129 -
#isitors from that site" 'or instance, some sites will dri#e a lot of #isitors, but the ma not sta on our site for #er long" Other sites ma send a great deal less #isitors ! but a large percentage of them ma turn out to be lo al customers" 1ou can anal )e this b setting up %goals& with <oogle Anal tics" =onsistenc is the ke with article marketing" To gain a good return from article marketing ou need to be prepared to submit articles to reprint sites on an ongoing basis ! at least one per week" And ou ha#e to submit original articles" *ubmitting articles that ha#e alread been published elsewhere, or re(hashed articles will simpl not work as well" The .ene(it o( su.mittin! uniFue articles to individual article directories It&s a good idea to use the free <oogle Alerts ser#ice to track the republishing of our release" As pre#iousl mentioned, if ou enter the titles of our articles as our <oogle Alerts, this will let ou keep track on when and where our articles ha#e been republished" This will help ou decide which article directories ma be worthwhile building a one(one one relationship with, and submitting uni/ue articles to for their sole(use in the future" Aemember that uni/ue content is more likel to get ranked more highl b search engines" B offering uni/ue content to specificall targeted niche article directories ou are working on building up much better /ualit links to our site" It ma take time to build these uni/ue articles and links up, but in the long(run, it&s certainl worthwhile"
- 130 -
Pillar #K 0rticle $u.mission $ummary *tart our article marketing b submitting a minimum of one article per week to E)ine Articles" Aim to make our articles between MII and LII words long" Include an author bio at the bottom of all our articles which contains a ke word link to our home page, a ke word link to a categor page on our site and a non(,TM5 link to our home page" Effecti#e articles are often formatted in the %,ow to3& and %Top 1I wa s of3& doing something" Fse subheadings, keep our paragraphs short and remember not to be too formal in our tone of language" Think /ualit and /uantit " [ualit will help our article to stand out from the competition, and gi#e ou a much bigger chance of getting our article re( published on other sites" [uantit is important too ! this will keep our articles featured on the home pages of the #arious article directories and start to get ou featured as a top author on #arious sites" After ou submit articles to top general article directories, offer to submit additional uni/ue articles to other highl respected industr specific websites" This uni/ue content and uni/ue links will dri#e good /ualit , rele#ant traffic from the sites and ha#e an e$tremel positi#e effect on our search engine optimi)ation" Aemember to use <oogle Alerts to track the republishing of our articles" This will help ou to identif sites to which it would be worthwhile to offer uni/ue content to in the future" 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date article marketing resources #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarL"
Pillar #9 Group Interaction
- 131 -
Pillar #M
+roup Interaction
- 132 -
Pillar #M +roup Interaction

________________________________________________________________________
<

roup interaction allows ou to form relationships with prospecti#e
customers before the &re e#en aware of ou or our compan " Eillar GH, <roup Interaction co#ers6 Earticipating in discussion forums *ocial networking groups Answering /uestions posed b other people =ommenting on other people&s blogs
Participatin! in discussion (orums Biscussion forums are websites on which that ou can interact on to build up our reputation as a figure of authorit within our own industr " One thing that ou should ensure that ou take ad#antage of is something called a signature message" A signature message is a common footer, which appears at the bottom of e#er post made on a forum" The great benefit of ha#ing a signature messages is that ou can generall also include a ke word(rich link back to our website" This means that as well as dri#ing #isitors back to our website from these forums, the search engine optimi)ation benefits are also e$tremel #aluable"
Pillar #9 Group Interaction Industry $peci(ic )orums
- 133 -
The important aspect of using forums as an effecti#e form of internet marketing is to make sure that ou interact on forums that are rele#ant for our business" In other words, think about our target market, and the kinds of forums where ou target are likel to gather" 1ou should use search engines to find the right forums for our industr ! b entering our ke word phrase and the term %forum&" 'or e$ample ou could search for %golf e/uipment& and the word %forum& or %sales management& and the word %forum&" The e$act ke word phrase of course depends on our industr ! and our own 0ordtracker research" Decidin! which (orum is ri!ht (or you Once ou&#e made a list of a few forums which ma be worthwhile to interact on, the ne$t step is to decide which of those forums would be most beneficial for ou" The first method of %weeding out& less #aluable forums isn&t tangible" It&s simple a matter of ou browsing through each of the selected forums and deciding which of the forums house participants which are more likel to be our customers in the future" Once ou&#e reduce the list to no more than around fi#e forums, it&s time to anal )e the appro$imate amount of #isitors that each of the forums gets" The can be done b using a combination of <oogle Eage Aank and Ale$a Aank" In m personal e$perience, an Ale$a Aank of lower than 8II,III -the lower the better. and a <oogle Aank of four or better indicates that a forum could pro#ide a reasonable return to make it worthwhile participating in on an ongoing basis" 'ow many (orumsB 1ou should tr to find about ten forums to begin with in search engines ! this should ensure that ou limit the chance of missing out and not disco#ering forums that are #er rele#ant for our business" After choosing our ten forums, manuall knock a few forums off this list after re#iewing some of the posts before reducing the list further b choosing the forums with the best <oogle Eage Aanks and Ale$a Aanks" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 134 -
$tartin! to interact on (orums Once ou&#e reduced our list of forums down to about three, double(check that each of the forums allow li#e signature links, then register a profile of each on our chosen forums and start interacting with the e$isting members" Bear the following thought in mind, though" A forum is a tool where members meet, interact and help each other on a particular topic area" Bo not o#ertl talk about ou&re our own products and ser#ices ! and certainl not within our first few posts" If ou simpl contribute in a gi#ing manner in forums posts then fellow members will be able to find out more about ou from our signature link" That&s all the self(promotion that ou should participate in" Case study " how )reddie )aldo discovers and interacts on !ol( (orums If 'reddie 'aldo wanted to disco#er the best golf forum for him to participate in online, he&d begin b searching for %golf forums& on <oogle" One of the first forums which comes up after conducting this search is golfforum"com -'igure H"1." )i!ure M*1 The +ol( )orum 2nline
0 sample post (rom 6The +ol( )orum7
- 135 -
B interacting on this forum, he can see that some people use the signature link to describe the golf clubs that the use" This means that if 'reddie has a golf e/uipment shop, he could use his signature link to describe the kind of e/uipment on offer in his shop" 'reddie should ideall use ke word phrases that link to specific categories on his <olf E/uipment website" This too ma be a #aluable method of building ke word(rich links to our website" Aemember that the less common the signature links are on the forum ou choose to interact on, the more chance ou ha#e of dri#ing #isitors through to our website from that signature link" In other words, if ou&re in#ol#ed in an industr which generall isn&t that knowledgeable of different methods of internet marketing, signature links on forum posts are more likel to be fruitful when it comes to dri#ing traffic to our site" Case study Nane No.s O $ales Recruitment )orums 5ike 'reddie 'aldo, :ane :obs should search for forums that are appropriate for her business, using a search term like %*ales Aecruitment 'orums&" 0hen ou conduct this search using <oogle, one of the first forums which ou should come across is called highprobsell"com ( a *ales Biscussion Board which ma well be an ideal discussion area for her industr sector" :y e&ample Di!ital Point )orums One of the forums which I ha#e consistentl posted at in the past is called Bigital Eoint 'orums ( forums"digitalpoint"com -'igure H"8." At the bottom of e#er post that I make, I ha#e a message which sa s C'ree Aeport ! The 1I Biggest *EO MistakesD and a link to where to download that report" I&#e made a few hundred posts so far on the Bigital 5ook 'orums, which means I ha#e a few hundred posts that contain this marketing message at the bottom of each forum post" As long as if our chosen forum supports signature links, the will appear on e#er post ou make in that forum" *earch engines can pick up these signature links easil when the crawl the forum, making it another great " In addition to m %1I Biggest *EO Mistakes& link on m signature in figure H"8 ou can also see two other links ( Internet Marketing =onsultant, and 0ebsite Eromotion Marketing" These are linked to different categor sections on m Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 136 -
website, meaning that I&m ma$imi)ing the *EO potential from m signature link opportunit ! as well as tr ing to make the content rele#ant and useful for reader" )i!ure M*3 (orums*di!italpoint*com
0 sample o( one o( my posts on the Di!ital ook (orums we.site Develop credi.ility There are other reasons apart from search engine optimi)ation of wh contributing to forums on an ongoing basis will benefit our business" If ou submit posts on an almost dail basis, people will start to respect ou more and treat ou as a figure of authorit within our industr " 5ooking back at figure H"8, ou can see that the discussion topic was article marketing" In m post ! a response to another forum member, I said6 FK@ine arti"le! worked great #or thi!. I alway! in"lude a non-+7ML 4&LG a keyword link to the home page and a keyword link to an internal page in my author )io.I 5ooking further down the same forum thread, one of the other forum users has /uoted me, adding6 FK2"ellent ad0i"e Ru!t the way that I !et my 9uthor )o2e! up #or !ome time now and it work! great.I B /uoting m post in his post, and agreeing with me, he has made me +ust a little bit more of a figure of authorit within the forum, and b default within the internet marketing communit "
- 137 -
If ou participate in different forums which are rele#ant for our industr sector, and offer good, free ad#ice without tr ing to sell something, then forum readers will be more likel to #isit our website ! o#ertl selling our own ser#ice in forums is likel to be of no use ! and perhaps e#en counter(producti#e" Re!ister and post ,a#ing found the forum that is right for our business ou will generall need register with the forum prior to being able to submit our own posts" This is a good thing as the effort that it takes to register is enough in itself to put(off man spammers" [uite often there are forum rules that onl allow the use of signature links after so man posts ! commonl 1I, 8I or MI" This is again to put off spammers ! not man spammers would be willing to put in the effort to write 1I posts before being able to get a link" Make sure that ou offer especiall great #alue content in our first few posts" This is the stage where ou de#elop a reputation /uickl ! good or bad" Three key reasons to participate in (orums In summar , the following are three ke reasons to participate in forums6 1. Build up our reputation Once ou ha#e researched, selected and registered with appropriate forums, start participating on these forums ( asking and answering /uestions from other users making sure that ou offer good, independent ad#ice" Aemember ! do not acti#el market our own website outwith our signature link" *tart participating b demonstrating that ou are a respected figure of authorit within our industr "
8. Bri#e rele#ant #isitors directl to our site Ensure that when ou&re gi#en the opportunit to include links within our signature file that ou don&t waste the opportunit " Include as man rele#ant links as ou can ! while maintaining the readabilit of the signature ! and Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 138 -
remember to use the ke word phrases which are most appropriate for our landing pages" 'inall , if allowed to, ou ma wish to #ar the colors of our signature links so that the %stand out from the crowd&" 2. Impro#e our search engine ranking As mentioned abo#e, it&s highl recommended that ou include links to our website in our signature file" If ou take the time to research ke word phrases using a tool like 0ordtracker, these links will be much more likel to offer search engine optimi)ation benefits"
$ocial Eetworkin! +roups Another increasingl important element within online group interaction is social networking" *ocial networking represents represent another important route to generate additional brand awareness, trust and more #isitors" Two ke e$amples of social networking sites are M *pace and 'acebook, both of which I&d like to e$amine in a little more details below" M *pace Although appearing to be slightl on the wane, M *pace is still an incredibl popular website, ranked appro$imatel the eighth most popular website in the world at the time of writing" 0hen ou #isit M *pace and na#igate towards the %<roups& categor , ou can literall #iew hundreds of thousands of special( interest groups which ha#e been set up b M *pace users" 'or instance, at the time of writing there are 8H,L82 groups in the Business and Entrepreneurs categor and NL,OIM members in the top group within this categor " One of the top groups on M *pace is called Online *kill <ame Business -figure H"2." The business strateg behind their M *pace <roup is to use it as a launch pad for a future online game launch" That&s +ust one of what ou can use a M *pace <roup for" One benefit of building our group membership on M *pace is that M *pace offer ou the abilit to send a message to all of our group members" 'or instance, ou can send broadcast emails to our members alerting them to Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 139 -
different e#ents and special offers" As long as if ou gi#e people a reason 7 a benefit to +oin our group, our membership le#el should grow" 5ike a rolling snowball gathering pace, if more people +oin our group, more people will tell their friends and the pace at which our group increases in si)e with grow considerabl " )i!ure M*5 :y$pace +roup Pa!e
2nline $kill +ame Business are usin! :y$pace to advertise an upcomin! product The difficult part is recruiting our first few hundred members ! after that the #iral effect of current members recruiting new members should take effect" That is one of the reasons wh ou should tr to build up a good relationship with our list of email subscribers" If ou continuall pro#ide people with good, #aluable free content, then the &re more likel to be willing to take action on an re/uests that ou might ha#e ! such as +oining new groups" Imagine if ou ha#e a list of MIII subscribers, and +ust MP of those subscribers are willing to +oin our new M *pace <roup" That would mean that ou immediatel ha#e 8MI group members ! enough to kick(start things nicel "
- 140 'acebook
Although much ounger than its ri#al M *pace, 'acebook is alread more popular" It does howe#er depend on where our target market is more likel to %hang out& that reall determines the best social networking site for our business" There are pros and cons to each network, with M *pace starting to position itself as more of a site for music lo#ers" :ust as there are thousands of different groups, some with hundreds of thousands of members on M *pace, there are also thousands of similar si)ed groups on 'acebook" 'igure H"N shows a group on 'acebook called %'acebook for Business&" It offers information about how ou can conduct business on 'acebook and ad#ice on how promote our business on 'acebook" Eart of this group is also an online forum discussing topics related to 'acebook for business use" )i!ure M*8 " )ace.ook
0 )ace.ook !roup discussin! 6)ace.ook (or .usiness7 If ou #iew the Biscussion Boards on this 'acebook group, once of the first posts discusses tips for growing 'acebook group membership numbers ! so ou can see it ma e#en be a #er useful group for ou to +oin"
Pillar #9 Group Interaction 0nswerin! Puestions 2nline
- 141 -
Another part of group interaction and indeed interacti#e marketing is answering /uestions online" There are se#eral websites which speciali)e in /uestions and answers on #arious topics" *ome /uestion(based websites are on speciali)ed sub+ect areas ! others offer more generali)ed /uestions on which #irtuall an thing can be asked or answered" )i!ure M*< %ahooI 0nswers
%ahooI 0nswers
- 142 -
As long as if ou take the time to search for the right /uestion, ou will find /uestions which relate specificall to our industr segment, enabling ou to interact on a topic that relates to our business ! which allows ou to demonstrate that ou are an authorit in our field" %ahoo 0nswers In 1ahoo4 Answers 3#igure 9.E5 there are man /uestions and man different categories" =ategories include %ad#ertising in marketing& and %careers and emplo ment&" All ou need to do to begin answering /uestions on 1ahoo4 Answers is register for our own free account" 1ou can then browse through to find out what /uestions are being asked and begin answering /uestions" :ust remember that our answers should be carefull though out and rele#ant to the /uestion" 1ou shouldn&t tr to sell our compan ! allow our profile to do that" The wa that 1ahoo4 Answers works means that the person who asked the /uestion #iews all the answers before picking the answer which in their opinion is the best answer ( the most rele#ant response to their /uestion" If our answer is selected as the best response in the opinion of the /uestion poser then it will be displa ed as the most appropriate answer to that /uestion fore#er" And other users will be able to #iew our profile from our answer and find out more about ou from there" :ust remember that it&s not about selling our business within the answerK it&s about getting our profile together in the first instance ! and then answering /uestions in a knowledgeable, unbiased manner" If people appreciate our answer, there is a good change that the will want to #iew our profile" inkedIn 5inkedIn offers a #er similar /uestion asking and answering ser#ice to 1ahoo4 Answers" It&s effecti#el a social networking communit for business ! an online networking ser#ice where ou can build relationships and meet potential new business partners online" To participate on 5inkedIn, ou begin b in#iting our friends and colleagues to participate with ou on the ser#ice" Once ou start to build our list of contacts who ou know personall , ou are able to #iew who our own contacts know - our second(tier contacts on 5inkedIn. and who their contacts know - our third(tier contacts." 1ou&re not able to contact those second and third tier contacts directl , but ou can, +ust like Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 143 -
traditional networking, ask for an introduction to these contacts through the people who are alread our personal contacts on 5inkedIn" Because of the wa that 5inkedIn works, if ou&re looking to meet someone with a particular skillset, ou should be able to get introduced to them through someone ou know" It could e#en be argued that 5inkedIn is a more efficient form of networking than traditional face(to(face networking" Imagine 5inkedIn as being like traditional business networking, but with e#er one pinning a list of their own contacts on their lapels" )i!ure M*= " inkedIn
inkedIn a social networkin! community (or .usiness Although 5inkedIn pro#ides a great wa to meet new business contacts, it also offers an opportunit for ou to demonstrate our knowledge on a particular sub+ect matter" 5inkedIn has a %5inkedIn Answers section& -'igure H"9. which is #er similar to 1ahoo4 Answers" 0hen ou use the 5inkedIn Answers ser#ice, like 1ahoo4 Answers, do not attempt to sell our compan or our ser#ices o#ertl " 1ou&re much better off rel ing on our 5inkedIn profile to sell our business on our behalf ! people
- 144 -
will click through to look at our profile if ou pro#ide enough rele#ant #alue in our answer to somebod &s /uestion" There are people on 5inkedIn that answer o#er a hundred /uestions a week on the site ! so ob#iousl the find it a reall effecti#e marketing tool for their businesses" Answering /uestions ma or ma not be the right approach for our business but ou should certainl test it to see if it works for ou" Blo! comment marketin! The final important part of group interaction is blog comment marketing" B blog comment marketing I mean participating and interacting on other people&s blogs ! I&m not talking about our own blog here" 0ith blog comment marketing, like with answering /uestions on 1ahoo4 Answers and 5inkedIn Answers, make sure ou a#oid the temptation to market our own products or ser#ices within our blog comments" If ou make comments on rele#ant, popular posts which are timel and add #alue, then people who read our comments will be likel to click through to find out more about ou from our name" -0ith an blog comment ou make ou get to add our name and our website address ! our name automaticall links to our website address in the #ast ma+orit of blog s stems". Aemember to register on the ser#ice M Blog5og that we talked about in EillarG2 if ou want an a#atar - our personal image ! perhaps our compan logo or our picture. to appear beside comments that ou make on other people?s blogs" 'ow to (ind the .est .lo! posts to comment on Technorati"com is a great pace to find fresh, rele#ant, popular blog posts on which to lea#e a comment" Technorati is essentiall a director of the latest blog posts from the ma+orit of the top blog in the world" The posts are categori)ed in a manner which means that ou don&t ha#e to wade through piles of irrele#ant posts before finding something that&s worthwhile to comment on" At the time of writing there are around 1II million different blogs which appear on Technorati" 1ou&re bond to find at least some blogs that are worthwhile participating on4 Fsing the pre#iousl mentioned case stud of 'reddie 'aldo ! the fictitious golf shop owner ! we&ll tr searching Technorati for blogs which talk about golf" 0hen conduction a search on Technorati for golf blogs, one of the first blogs we come across is called %The <olf Blog&" -'igure H"O. Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 145 -
This would be a great blog for 'reddie 'aldo to start interacting on ! he&d be bound to find a recent blog post on a sub+ect matter which was of particular interest to him" )i!ure M*> The +ol( Blo!
The +ol( Blo!D where )reddie )aldo can leave comments on The more 'reddie interacts and adds a #aluable contribution to each rele#ant blog post, the more he will enhance his reputation in his industr , and the more targeted traffic he will dri#e back to his website" Although it&s #er important to alwa s include our website address in the form that submits our blog post Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 146 -
comments, the #ast ma+orit of these links to our website will include %nofollow& tags" In other words, broadl speaking, these links will not help with our search engine optimi)ation" ,owe#er, blog comments are still #aluable links ! the dri#e rele#ant #isitors to our website who are interested in finding out more about ou" $u.scri.e to the most relevant .lo!s I&d ad#ise ou to take the time to so find ten different blogs rele#ant to our business" B rele#ant to our business I mean blogs that our target market is likel to read as well as blogs from our industr segment" Technorati should be our first port of call to find these 1I blogs" Another great place to find rele#ant blogs is the blog director on Blog=atalog"com" Once ou ha#e found our chosen blogs, ou can subscribe to their A** feeds, which means ou will not ha#e to #isit their blog e#er time ou want to find out if the ha#e updated their content b publishing a new post" The most efficient wa to sta updated as soon as our chosen blogs ha#e updated their content is to use A** feed reading software" An e$ample of this is <oogle Aeader" 1ou can ha#e <oogle Aeader installed on our personali)ed i<oogle home page which means that ou see whene#er these blogs ha#e been updated as soon as ou open up our internet browser" Be consistent with your addin! o( .lo! comments 0hen ou decide that it is appropriate to start adding our comments to blog posts on a particular blog ou should do so consistentl " Once people who often read that blog see that ou add comments on a regular basis, the &ll start to take ou more seriousl and will be more likel to remember ou" Also, note that man blogs also offer ou the facilit to subscribe to comments s well as blog posts" That wa , if ou do add a comment, and ou wish to keep tabs on whether or not someone has replied to our comment, then it is a good idea to subscribe to the comments feed for indi#idual posts as well" That wa , ou can keep track of an responses to our comments and immediatel choose whether ou wish to re#isit the post and add to our initial comment"
- 147 -
Pillar # M +roup Interaction $ummary 'orum Earticipation can be a great wa of building up our reputation in our industr " B posting good /ualit , rele#ant posts in a forum -which is rele#ant for our industr segment. together with using a good signature which links to our site with a ke word phrase, ou will be generating direct traffic to our site as well as tremendousl helping our search engine rankings" *ocial networking groups such as M *pace and 'acebook can help to create awareness of our compan " The can be used to promote new products that ou are releasing in the future as well as be a good wa of allowing people to let their friends know of our business" :ust make sure that ou initiall interact with people b aiming to assist people rather than aiming to sell them something" =onsider dri#ing people on our email list towards good forum posts that ou&#e made" This will encourage interaction and /uickl increase our credibilit in that forum" Answering /uestions on 1ahoo4 Answers and 5inkedIn Answers is another wa to increase our credibilit " 1ou should post good /ualit answers on rele#ant topics" Bon&t promote our own business in the answers ! aim to dri#e people to our site from our profile" If our answers are good enough and rele#ant enough people will want to read our profile" Blog comment marketing ! posting comments on blogs that are rele#ant to our business can also help raise our industr awareness and dri#e traffic to our site" 1ou should aim to select about 1I rele#ant blogs and subscribe to them" E#er time there is a rele#ant post, make sure ou add a #aluable comment" The ke with making this a success is consistenc " 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date group interaction -social marketing resources. #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarH"
- 148 -
Pillar #1C
;iral :arketin!
Pillar #10 Viral Marketing
- 149 -
Pillar #1C ;iral :arketin!

________________________________________________________________________
iral marketing and #iral ad#ertising refer to marketing techni/ues that use
pre(e$isting social networks to increase brand awareness, through a self( replicating #iral processes" Jiral marketing is often known as word(of(mouth marketing, in fact it&s an medium which our e$isting customers use that enables a peer(to(peer recommendation to be made" Jiral marketing means that our customers do our marketing on our behalf" The process of encouraging #iral marketing to take place is to make it as eas as possible for our customers to tell their friends about ou ! and to gi#e them a reason to do so" Eillar G1I co#ers what #iral marketing is and how ou can use it as part of our o#erall internet marketing strateg " I would like to focus on two main #iral marketing opportunities" 'irstl *ocial bookmarking ! something that ou can easil build into our blog with ease and secondl Jideo marketing" B dri#ing people towards our #ideos on #ideo sharing sites like 1ouTube ou increase the ranking of our #ideos on those sites b increasing our number of #iews" This increased ranking of our #ideo makes it more likel to be found on 1ouTube b people who ha#en&t heard of ou before" 1ou then ha#e an opportunit to dri#e people back ou our site after #iewing our #ideo"
0n early e&ample o( e((ective ;iral :arketin! 'otmail One of the first e$amples of a super(successful #iral marketing campaign came back in the late 1HHI?s" ,otmail was +ust de#eloping as a compan and doing O;
- 150 -
! until the hit upon an idea" 0h not automaticall add a little bit of te$t at the bottom of each email that people sent sa ing something like, C0ould ou like a free email account too@ Jisit www"hotmail"comD At the time -the late 1HHI&s. man people still paid for an email account" *o, this fact, combined with the Cfree emailD message at the bottom of each mail e$ploded ,otmail&s business" ,otmail&s message spread like a #irus ! hence #iral marketing" This one idea is probabl the main reason wh ,otmail became so big so /uickl " ,ence, in m opinion, this one line of te$t is the reason that Microsoft paid millions of dollars to bu ,otmail" *o, a simple email signature worked for ,otmail" But that&s not necessaril what I&m recommending for ou" 1our #iral marketing strateg does not necessaril ha#e to re#ol#e around an e(mail signature" Aemember that a #iral marketing campaign can be an thing that encourages our users to pass on information about ou, our business or our business& products to their friends" The /uestion is what&s the right #iral marketing strateg for ou@ $ocial .ookmarkin! *ocial bookmarking allows an one who #iews web pages the opportunit to sa#e a list of their fa#orite pages online, and at the same time, if the wish to do so, to share these fa#orite web pages with their friends" Two e$amples of social bookmarking tools 7 websites are *tumbleFpon"com and Belicious"com" There are two main reasons wh it&s a good idea to encourage our website #isitors to book our web pages online" 'irstl , other users of these social bookmarking ser#ices can see to most recentl popular web pages that ha#e been bookmarked" This pro#ides a wa for other people to disco#er our web pages on these social bookmarking sites" *econdl , search engines also like these social bookmarking sites because t shows which web pages are popular with users at an gi#en moment in time" Therefore, if search engines crawl these social bookmarking sites and find that lots of users are bookmarking our site, then our site will be more likel to be ranked higher in search engines ! social bookmarking also helps with our search engine optimi)ation" Bon&t think that social bookmarking is the same as traditional bookmarking where people sa#e their fa#orite websites on their internet browser software"
- 151 -
That wa of sa#ing bookmarks is +ust for their personal use as the information is stored on their internet browser software on their computer" *earch engines can onl crawl bookmarks that are stored online ! so that&s the kind of bookmarking that ou want to encourage" $ocial .ookmarkin! and ta!s Another great reason wh social bookmarking is so good is the use of %tags& with each bookmark" A tag is a word or a phrase that a user associates with a web page" Again using 'reddie 'aldo&s golf shop site as an e$ample, people ma decide to sa#e his home page on their bookmarks and add the 2 tags %golf&, %golf clubs& and %golf shop& to the bookmark" This tag addition will make it easier for them to find our website in their bookmarks in the future ! it&s like listing the web page in multiple categories" It&s a more modern, more user(friendl #ersion of storing web pages in folders" )i!ure 1C*1 Delicious*com a popular social .ookmarkin! site
- 152 -
THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING Browsin! popular .ookmarks on Delicious*com
Another reason wh tags are great is that the help to educate search engines about the sub+ect matter on our website" i"e" if lots of different people are sa#ing our home page on a social bookmaking site using the tag %golf store&, then this will gi#e search engines more of a reason to rank our home page higher for the ke word phrase %golf store&" Delicious*com 'igure 1I"1 shows the Belicious"com social bookmarking site homepage" This is a great e$ample of the kind of website I ha#e been referring to" But how do ou encourage our website #isitors to sa#e our website pages@ Apart from producing great, #aluable content that people will want to come back to and regularl re#isit in the future, the ne$t thing that ou should do is make it eas for people to bookmark our web pages" )i!ure 1C*3 0ddThis*com
0ddThis*com is easy to inte!rate into your we.site Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
Pillar #10 Viral Marketing 0ddThis*com
- 153 -
1ou ma well ha#e noticed on web pages ! especiall on blog posts that ou are occasionall in#ited to bookmark the page or share it with our friends" 0ebsites commonl link directl to the %add& page on social bookmarking sites to increase the chances that people will bookmark the page" One popular free ser#ice that makes it eas to add this ser#ice to our website is AddThis"com -figure 1I"8." AddThis is a ser#ice that people ma recogni)e when ou add it to our website ! because it&s alread #er popular and on lots of other websites" Once a user clicks on it for the first time, it gi#es ou a list of the social bookmarking ser#ice for them to select the one that the regularl use -figure 1I"8." If it&s Belicious"com then once someone selects the Belicious icon in the AddThis window, the &ll proceed to a window like figure 1I"2" )i!ure 1C*5 0ddin! a we. pa!e to Delicious*com .ookmarks
,nterin! a .ookmark7s 1R D title and notes on Delicious*com After ou select our chosen bookmarking ser#ice through the AddThis ser#ice, AddThis will remember our bookmarking ser#ice for ne$t time" This reduces the amount of clicks that it takes for someone to sa#e our web page to their bookmarks" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 154 $tum.le1pon
*tumbleFpon -'igure 1I"N. offers a similar ser#ice to Belicious"com" *tumbleFpon lets users %randoml find& other people?s bookmarks b searching the *tumbleFpon website within certain categories" The ser#ice will then recommend other websites that people ha#e alread tagged in a similar manner" The more that ou can get people to %stumble& -bookmark. our web pages, the more likel it will be that *tumbleFpon will recommend our web pages" )i!ure 1C*8 $tum.le1pon*com
$tum.le1pon lets users 6stum.le upon7 newD related we. pa!es 0 special reFuest to all readers This is probabl a good time to ask for our assistance to help me get the 1 Pillar! o# Internet Marketing free ebook in as man people&s hands as possible" If ou&#e found this book #aluable so far I&d reall appreciate if ou could share http677www"12pillars"com with a few of our friends" Thanks4
Pillar #10 Viral Marketing ;ideo :arketin!
- 155 -
Thanks to e#er (increasing broadband capacit , online #ideo is becoming more and more the norm" At the time of writing around 1I of the top 1II websites in the world are #ideo(based" This means that ignoring #ideo as a medium to dri#e traffic towards our website could be a significant mistake" I&d like to share with ou a few of the top online #ideo sharing sites, show ou how eas it is to create our own #ideos for these sites, share with ou how to include a %call to action& within our #ideo and recommend a great free ser#ice that les ou upload our #ideo to man of these sites at the same time, tracking our #ideo #iews too" )i!ure 1C*< %ouTu.e
%ouTu.e the most popular video sharin! we.site .y (ar %ouTu.e 1ouTube is the granddadd of all online #ideo sharing sites" In fact, it was MI percent more popular than all other #ideo sites combined, according to ,itwise in :une 8IIO" But e#en though 1ouTube is still miles ahead of other #ideo sharing sites in terms of #isitor numbers at the moment, as a content producer it
- 156 -
would be foll +ust to rel on 1ouTube as a marketing medium" I&d ad#ise on distributing our #ideos to at least 1I #ideo sharing sites" I&m assuming that ou&#e seen it before, but figure 1I"M shows ou what the 1ouTube website looks like" I published the #ideo http677www" outube"com7watch@#ToheBB,B(IYF -An introduction the 1 Pillar! o# Internet Marketing. in Ma 8IIO, and o#er the first ear it was on the first page of 1ouTube search results for the phrase %internet marketing&" At the time of writing it&s now had o#er 1N,III #iews" 'ow to make your videos more popular on %ouTu.e There are a few small things that I did to make the introduction to the 12 Eillars #ideo more popular of 1ouTube and dri#e more #isitors back to m website" I&d like to share them with ou now3 1) 1ouTube is one of the websites which will reprint our FA5 as a li#e link if ou include %http677& in front of it" If ou include this link in the description of our #ideo ou will get a li#e link back to our website, meaning that people will be much more likel to #isit our website after #iewing our #ideo" Although it&s a %nofollow& link, it will still increase our website #isitor numbers" 8. Include our ke word phrase in our #ideo title and our #ideo description" i"e" Including %internet marketing& within the #ideo title and description made 1ouTube much more likel to rank it more highl in searches for that ke word phrase" 3) Bri#e #isitors to our newl published #ideo and ask them to help ou b rating the #ideo, adding the #ideo as one of their fa#orites and adding a comment to the #ideo" All these measures are indicators to 1ouTube of our #ideo&s popularit " And if our #ideo /uickl becomes popular then 1ouTube are much more likel to rank it highl themsel#es" Once of the best wa s of dri#ing #isitors to our #ideo is to ha#e our own email list of appreciati#e subscribers" If ou regularl o#er(deli#er, ou&ll find that members of our list are much more likel to be willing to help ou when ou ask a fa#or from them" This is +ust one of the reasons wh it&s an e$tremel #aluable thing for our business to build up a list of subscribers ! e#en although ou don&t ha#e an email marketing strateg at the moment"
Pillar #10 Viral Marketing 2ther ;ideo $ites
- 157 -
As mentioned alread , there are other popular #ideo sites a#ailable apart from 1ouTube ! get our #ideos in as man places as possible4 *o which sites apart from 1ouTube should ou be using to host our #ideos@ 1ahoo4 Jideo )i!ure 1C*= %ahooI ;ideo
http-##video*yahoo*com# 1ahoo4 Jideo originall began as a search engine during 8IIM" It combined traditional search engine techni/ues to crawl other websites to look for #ideos on other sites together with a web 8"I facilit that allows users to upload, share, tag and host their own #ideos on 1ahoo4 ,owe#er, as part of a recent upgrade, 1ahoo is inde$ing more #ideo from se#eral new media sources, including =B* >ews, MTJ, the Bisco#er =hannel and The 'ood >etwork which the users of 1ahoo4 can see embedded within the 1ahoo4 #ideo pla er"
- 158 M *pace Jideo
)i!ure 1C*> " :y$pace ;ideo
http-##vids*myspace*com# In earl 8IIO, M *pace introduced M *paceTJ" *ince launch it has been rebranded to M *pace Jideo" -'igure 1I"O. M *pace Jideo works in the same wa as most of the other #ideo sharing sites" ,owe#er, because it&s part of the M *pace network, ou need a M *pace account to upload #ideos" ,owe#er, this also means that if ou are alread an acti#e M *pace user, when ou up load #ideos to the M *pace Jideos ser#ice, ou can share these #ideos with our e$isting M *pace contacts"
Pillar #10 Viral Marketing Metacafe )i!ure 1C*K :etaca(e
- 159 -
http-##www*metaca(e*com# Metacafe -'igure 1I"L. is another similar online #ideo sharing ser#ice" ,owe#er, it does ha#e a couple of policies that differentiate it6 Fsing its uni/ue %JideoAank& s stem, Metacafe attempts to gauge #iewer reactions to #ideos in order to feature those that pro#e most popular to its #iewers" Additionall , Metacafe pa s #ideo creators for original work that has e$ceeded a certain threshold of both total #iews and Jideorank score #ia its Eroducer Aewards Erogram" An #ideo that is #iewed a minimum of 8I,III times, and has achie#ed a Jideor( ank rating of 2"II or higher -and does not #iolate an cop rights or other Meta( cafe communit standards. is awarded VM for e#er 1,III #iews"
- 160 Ae##er
)i!ure 1C*M Revver
http-##revver*com# Ae##er -'igure 1I"H. is another popular #ideo sharing website that hosts user( generated content" It attaches ad#ertising to user(submitted #ideo clips and shares all ad re#enue MI7MI with the creators" Ae##er includes ad#erts on all its #ideos, whether ou like it or not which ma be a problem for ou depending on what our business offers" Each #ideo is automaticall made a#ailable in both 'lash and [uickTime formats and ou are gi#en the ,TM5 code to embed either format along with the abilit to add our own branding or logo into the 'lash pla er interface" Fploading to Ae##er is eas and it pro#ides a progress bar to show our upload status" The re#iew all #ideos before making them li#e and this process can take up to 8N hours"
Pillar #10 Viral Marketing Bail Motion )i!ure 1C*1C Daily:otion
- 161 -
http-##www*dailymotion*com# Bail Motion -'igure 1I"1I. is a 'rench(based #ideo website which was founded in 8IIM" The #ideos that it features on its site are often of good /ualit in comparison to man other #ideo sites" As of April 8IIH Bail Motion was ranked b Ale$a Aank as being the 9Oth most popular website in the world"
- 162 Blip TJ
)i!ure 1C*11 Blip T;
http-##.lip*tv# Blip"t# -'igure 1I"11. is a #ideo sharing site which features #ideos that tend to be more professional in /ualit rather than simple clips" On Blip"t# the #ideos are like mini TJ series and often #er entertaining" 1ou can search for our fa#orite episodes b categor , use the search bo$ or search b popular tags" 1ou can also become a subscriber to our fa#orite shows so ou do not miss an episode" If ou like to produce #ideos, ou can create our own show and ad#ertise it to others through a trailer or ou can participate as a critic and rate the shows" Blip"t# also offers ad#ertising schemes with profit being split MI7MI between ou and them" 1ou can also submit our #ideos to iTunes through Blip"t#, creating a #ideo podcast"
Pillar #10 Viral Marketing Brightco#e )i!ure 1C*13 Bri!htcove
- 163 -
http-##www*.ri!htcove*com#
Brightco#e -'igure 1I"18. was originall a compan who helped create #ideo content on websites such as the >ew 1ork Times and MTJ but the &#e recentl launched a #ideo ser#ice with the motto %*hare our #ideos in st le&" E#er publisher who creates a Brightco#e account is assigned a "hannel, their own page on Brightco#e"t#" Eublishers can customi)e their channel through the Brightco#e =onsole" *imple details like the channel?s name, logo, and description can be updated in the user?s profile" The content of a channel is defined b changing the settings of indi#idu( al titles, lineups, and pla ers to allow distribution and promotion on Brightco#( e"t#" Brightco#e"t# ( along with s ndication, search engine inde$ing and a user?s own site ( ser#es as a distribution and promotion tool for #ideo publishers"
- 164 Jeoh
)i!ure 1C*15 ;eoh
http-##www*veoh*com#
Jeoh -'igure 1I"12. lets ou upload a range of #ideo formats with no limits on file si)e, resolution, or length" If our #ideo is o#er NM minutes a #iewer will need to download it to watch the full #ideo" To download and watch #ideos on our computer rather than watch #ideos on( line, users must use the JeohTJ desktop application" JeohTJ is also what ou need to be using to upload #ideos o#er 1IIMB" 1ou can also upload #ideos dir( ectl from a FA5 or if ou ha#e a Jeoh Ero account ou can upload #ia an A** feed" A Jeoh Ero account is free" ,owe#er, it re/uires a credit card account number to confirm our address" 0hen that is gi#en, ou can then take ad#antage of ad( #ertising programs where ou can share re#enue MI7MI and sell or rent #ideo downloads through Jeoh?s e(commerce s stem - ou keep OI percent of the sale price." As a Jeoh Ero account holder, our uploaded #ideo will be transcoded
- 165 -
into 'lash L #ideo" 'lash L is superior to the 'lash O format used for con#erting #ideo submitted b basic Jeoh users"
Imeem )i!ure 1C*18 Imeem
http-##www*imeem*com# Imeem -'igure 1I"1N. is a #ideo sharing ser#ice where users interact with each other b watching, posting, and sharing content of all media t pes, including blogs, photos, audio and #ideos" 5aunched in October 8IIN, the ser#ice has a social network structure as well as a content browsing7filtering structure similar to that of 1ouTube" It works on an ad#ertising(based business model and is free to use" Imeem pro#ides a broader range of pri#ac options and incorporates peer(to( peer technolog for better securit and unlimited bandwidth"
- 166 ,ditin! video
'or E= users ou probabl alread ha#e a piece of software installed on our computer ! 0indows Mo#ie Maker -'igure 1I"1M." This allows ou to edit and produce our own #ideo" If ou ha#e a Mac the alternati#e is 'inal =ut *tudio and if ou are using 5inu$ then there are plent of open source programs that ou can simpl download for free ! tr searching Bownload"com" All these #ideo editing software will allow ou to import our own #ideos into the program, add titles, endings or music to it" The will also allow ou to create #ideos out of still photos as well" )i!ure 1C*1< 4indows :ovie :aker
4indows :edia Player the (ree video editin! so(tware (rom :icroso(t If ou ha#e a number of still photos that ou want to create a mo#ie with, ou can import the photos into our mo#ie editing software and then drag the photos into our #ideo timeline" Then ou can then choose #ideo transitions from our software to include in(between our photos" Transitions mean that each new photo can appear either from the side, up or down or in fact in one of an manner of options pre(installed in our #ideo editing software" 1ou can also appl effects to our indi#idual photos such as slowl )ooming in or out"
- 167 -
0hen ou create a se/uence of photos and ass multiple effects, ou will be surprised at how /uickl our photos start to become a #ideo ! and how /uickl and eas the process is" After ou&re satisfied with our #ideo se/uence it&s also eas to add beginning titles and end credits should ou wish to do so" It&s also eas to import audio" )i!ure 1C*1= Podsa(e0udio*com
Podsa(e0udio*com is a !reat place to (ind royalty"(ree .ackin! music 0ddin! audio to your video Bearing in mind cop right restrictions, ou should be careful about the audio ou use with our #ideo" ,owe#er, there is a website called EodsafeAudio"com -figure 1I"19. that download and use an of the audio tracks on the website ! as long as if ou credit the artist" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 168 -
*impl mention the artist name and song title at the end of our #ideo clip to use the audio legall " There are lots of great audio tracks on EodsafeAudio"com including some great tracks from unsigned, independent new artists" *impl download the audio that ou wish to use in ME2 format to be able to use it as a backing track for our #ideo" Includin! a 6call"to"action7 in your videos It&s important to include a %call(to(action& in our #ideo ! a call(to(action is simpl asking the #iewer to do something after the ha#e #iewed our #ideo" This must be measurable, and of potential benefit to our business" I&d certainl recommend including an eas (to(remember domain name as a subheading throughout our #ideo in additional to a clip at the end of our #ideo telling the #iewer wh the should #isit that domain" ,owe#er, if ou find that #ideo marketing is an important part of our o#erall marketing mi$ I&d sa that it&s important to ha#e a uni/ue FA5 within our #ideo i"e" a FA5, domain name that is not mentioned an where on our website, or an where else" That wa , when people #isit that website address ou know that it can onl be our #ideos which are responsible for dri#ing those #isitors" 'or e$ample, our #ideo could be an introduction to a sub+ect matter and for more information the can #isit our website address to watch more #ideos or perhaps download a free report" :ust remember to make the first free #ideo #aluable and informati#e" A common successful strateg for the web pages that #iewers are asked to #isit after #iewing an informati#e #ideo is to ask for someone&s name and email address in e$change for more great content" Aemember that if there is no link to this website address from an where else online, ou know that our #isitors ha#e landed on our web page because the #iewed one of our #ideos on a #ideo sharing site like 1ouTube" More information about tracking our #isitors will be co#ered in Pillar $11 ' 1i!itor 9naly!i!."
$avin! your video in the optimum (ormat There are literall tens of different formats in which to sa#e our #ideo ! and then there are so man different si)es of #ideos" Fntil recentl , 28I$8NI pi$els
- 169 -
was the si)e that most #ideo sharing sites preferred" This happens to be in the traditional N$2 tele#ision screen si)e" ,owe#er, more recentl #ideo sites ha#e started to prefer #ideos in widescreen format which is 19$H screen si)e" As broadband speeds ha#e increased, so ha#e the number of pi$els per #ideo" 19$H #ideos for online distribution are now most commonl uploaded in 9NI$29I pi$els si)e" At the time of writing -April 8IIH. that&s the si)e which I&d recommend" 0hen it comes to #ideo format man file t pes will work +ust fine, but most #ideo sharing sites recommend MEN format with h.264 codec" ,owe#er, ou&ll probabl find that 0MJ or AJI will work +ust fine" If ou&re worried about our #ideo format compatibilit it& probabl best to create a test 1ouTube #ideo site first(of(all to confirm what our #ideo will look like when it&s published" )i!ure 1C*1> Tu.e:o!ul*com
'elpin! you upload your videos to multiple sites and track video views
- 170 -
1ploadin! you video to video sharin! sites I&#e alread introduced ou to se#eral #ideo sites ! and it&s worthwhile to upload our #ideo to se#eral of those #ideo sites and more" ,owe#er, if ou ha#en&t done so alread ou&ll start to reali)e that uploading #ideos to #ideo sharing sites can take a great deal of time and resources" Man internet connections upload files at much slower speeds that the download files" This means that it could take ou a da +ust to upload one ten( minute #ideo to all the #ideo sharing sites that ou want our #ideo to feature on" ,owe#er, help is at hand" There&s a great free(to(use -for their basic ser#ice. website called TubeMogul"com which will upload our #ideo to se#eral #ideo sites at the same time" All ou ha#e to do is upload our #ideo to TubeMogul, enter our usernames and passwords for the #arious #ideo sharing sites and TubeMogul will upload our #ideos to se#eral sites on our behalf" This makes the whole process a great deal easier and a lot less time consuming" As a bonus TubeMogul will also track our #ideo #iews on each of the sites, meaning that ou&ll be able to /uickl and easil track our con#ersion rates for our call(to(action" Of course TubeMogul ha#e a partiall free ser#ice for a reason ! the want ou to sign(up for a more comprehensi#e ser#ice that offers more" ,owe#er, whether ou choose to upgrade or not, as it stands their free ser#ice is great"
2ther video sites Assuming that ou decide not to upgrade to TubeMogul&s paid ser#ice, it&s probabl a good idea for ou to manuall upload our #ideo to a few other ser#ices" Jiddler -http677www"#iddler"com7. is another good general #ideo sharing site and MMin -http677www"Mmin"com7. calls itself a one(stop shop for instructional #ideos and BI1 pro+ects" 'or this reason, ou ma well find MMin to be a good site for uploading informati#e business #ideos" 1ou ma also find that there are other #ideo sharing sites that are aimed specificall at our industr segment" 'or instance, I ha#e also uploaded the 1 Pillar! o# Internet Marketing seminar #ideos to a #ideo sharing site called IM 6road"a!t -Internet Marketing Broadcast." 1ou can see m 12 Eillars #ideos here6 http677www"imbroadcast"com7users712pillars7#ideos7public" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 171 -
*o make sure that if ou&re in sales recruitment like :ane :obs then ou search for a #ideo sharing site that speciali)es in sales ad#ice" And if ou own a golf shop like 'reddie 'aldo then check to see if there&s a #ideo sharing site that speciali)es in golf #ideos" Tweakin! your conversions After testing #ideo marketing as a form of internet marketing ou find that ou&re finding it to be a producti#e tool for our business, then it&s important to tr to impro#e our con#ersion rates" Test including different calls(to(action for different #ideos" 'or e$ample, tr including a free report as the incenti#e at the end of the #ideo instead of more #ideos" Eerhaps ou should also tr to dri#e #iewers towards our main website" Aemember that if ou increase our con#ersion rates from 1P to 8P then that&s 1IIP more potential customers dri#en towards our business from our #ideo marketing efforts"
- 172 -
Pillar #1C ;iral :arketin! $ummary Jiral marketing uses word(of(mouth, peer(to(peer communication to ad#ertise our website" *ocial bookmarking and #ideo marketing are two e$amples of what ou can use to encourage #iral marketing to take place" Aim to impro#e our number of returning #isitors using social bookmarking( b allowing people to /uickl and easil make our site one of their fa#orites" Tr incorporating the AddThis"com tool within our blog" Aemember to kick(start the popularit of our #ideos on #ideo sharing sites like 1ouTube b dri#ing people on our email list to our #ideos and asking them to add comments" Be efficient in the uploading of our #ideos ! make sure that ou use the free TubeMogul uploading and tracking ser#ice" Bon&t +ust upload our #ideos to 1ouTube" There are lots of other sources of #ideo #iewers and some sites will con#ert a lot better than 1ouTube e#en though the don&t necessaril bring as man #ideo #iews" ,a#e ou included a call(to(action in our #ideos@ Bo people know who has uploaded the #ideo and what else the could get from ou if the #isited our website@ 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date #iral marketing resources #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar1I"
Pillar #11 Visitor Analysis
- 173 -
Pillar #11
;isitor 0nalysis
- 174 -
Pillar #11 ;isitor 0nalysis

________________________________________________________________________
isitor anal sis is absolutel essential if ou want to disco#er which of our
internet marketing acti#ities is pro#ing to be the most #aluable for our business" B tracking which websites are pro#iding ou with most traffic, knowing which websites our users are #isiting prior to our site, which websites the are lea#ing our site for, and which inbound links are pro#iding the most #aluable #isitors, ou can target specific areas and focus future marketing campaigns" ,ere are +ust a few of the things that ou should be finding out about our website #isitors6 0here did a #isitor come from@ ,ow long did the sta when the #isited our site@ 0hich page-s. did the #isit on our website@ ,a#e the #isited our site before@ =an ou impro#e our con#ersion rate@ Bid the complete a specific action on our website@ -i"e" bu a product, complete a ser#ice en/uir form, download a free report. Eerhaps some of our #isitors opted(out half(wa through an order process@ Is so, that&s essential information" ,opefull ou will understand the #aluable nature of this information" If ou&re
- 175 -
looking at it from a business efficienc perspecti#e then b pa ing attention to which of our marketing acti#ities is pro#iding the most high(/ualit #isitors, then ou will know where to concentrate a lot more of our energ in the future" If ou&re thinking about this from a marketing managers& perspecti#e, then b being aware of where our website #isitors are coming from and what the do will be able to +ustif a greater in#estment in certain areas in the future" )i!ure 11*1 +oo!le 0nalytics
The +oo!le 0nalytics Dash.oard +oo!le 0nalytics The most popular method of gathering good /ualit #isitor anal sis data is to use the free anal sis software from <oogle called <oogle Anal tics -'igure 11"1." All ou need to access the <oogle Anal tics ser#ice is to ha#e our own free <oogle Account ! ou will alread ha#e one if ou&re started a <oogle Adwords pa (per(click campaign" A small number of businesses or other organi)ation aren&t comfortable with Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 176 -
letting <oogle ha#e access to their website&s and their #isitor&s data" Fnless this is the case for ou, there&s no reason wh ou shouldn&t install the <oogle Anal tics code on our website" At least then ! e#en if ou decide to go for a paid alternati#e ! ou&ll ha#e some alternati#e data to be able to compare against our preferred #isitor tracking software" $ettin! up your +oo!le 0nalytics service ,a#ing registered our website with <oogle Anal tics, the first things to do is to insert some tracking code on the footer of each page on our site" It&s fairl eas to do ! <oogle pro#ides ou with a step(b (step guide of how to get things going" The also pro#ide an e$cellent help section should ou get stuck" )i!ure 11*3 +oo!le 0nalytics
$ettin! up a !oal on +oo!le 0nalytics The importance o( settin! !oals with +oo!le 0nalytics 0ith regards to <oogle Anal tics, a goal is a page on our website that follows a specific action that ou want our #isitors to take" An e$ample of a goal might be something like our %thank ou page& that people see the once the complete an en/uir form on our website" E"g" the path of FA5s that our #isitors take to reach our goal FA5 might look
Pillar #11 Visitor Analysis something like this6 1. http677www" ourdomain"com 8. http677www" ourdomain"com7en/uir _form"htm
- 177 -
2. http677www" ourdomain"com7thanks_for_completing_en/uir _form"htm In the abo#e e$ample the page http677www" ourdomain"com7thanks_for_completing_en/uir _form"htm might include the following te$t6 L7hank! #or #illing out your in#ormation. (eJll re!pond to your en?uiry a! ?ui"kly a! po!!i)le. In the meantimeG ha0e you downloaded our #ree reportH That is our goal page" 1ou enter the FA5 of this page into our <oogle Anal tics control panel, in our goal settings" 1ou then gi#e our goal a name so ou can differentiate it if 7 when ou set up additional goals"
De(ine your !oal (unnel Once ou&#e decided on our goal page, and taken a note of our goal FA5 ou&ll need to do something called %defining our goal funnel& -figure 11"2." Befining our goal funnel tells <oogle Anal tics the path from our #isitor entrance page to our goal page" Befining our funnel will help ou determine if there is an specific part of the path towards our goal page at which our #isitors tend to drop off" An e$ample of a simple goal funnel is the abo#e FA5 path which looks at someone when the enter our site on our home page, then #isiting an en/uir form page, through to completing the en/uir form and therefore #isiting the %thank ou for completing our details& page" A slightl more complicated goal funnel path might be as follows6 1. 1our website home page 2. =ategor page 3. Eroduct page N" Fpselling page Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 178 -
M" Eurchase confirmation page 6. =redit card details page 7. Thank ou for purchasing page )i!ure 11*5 +oo!le 0nalytics
De(inin! your !oal (unnel on +oo!le 0nalytics 0naly9in! your (unnel .locka!es Once ou ha#e defined our funnel ou can anal )e which steps of our funnel are blockages ! in other words which steps of our funnel people stop at and for whate#er reason do not proceed an further" Eerhaps it&s not ob#ious what our shipping charges are@ Ma be people would Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 179 -
like to see a better picture of our product before the make a decision to purchase@ Eerhaps ou&re re/uesting too much information when ou&re asking people to complete an en/uir form@ 0hate#er it is it&s our +ob to tr and find out what the main problem areas are on our website and defining accurate funnels of <oogle Anal tics can help ou do this" Plu!!in! your (unnel leaks But remember, determining the problem is onl half the +ob" There&s no point in working out where people are lea#ing our goal funnel unless ou do something to tr to plug the leaks" Erobabl the best wa to tr to impro#e the situation is to split(test the aspect that isn&t performing too well against an alternati#e option" <oogle&s recentl introduced some software called <oogle 0ebsite Optimi)er -http677www"<oogle"com70ebsiteOptimi)er. which will allow ou to split(test different aspects within the same page at the same time"
$et a monetary value (or each o( your !oals One other essential aspect of setting a goal is setting a monetar #alue for the goal" 1ou can enter a monetar #alue at the bottom of our goal settings -see bottom of figure 11"8." This #alue is how much it&s worth to our business if a website #isitor completes the <oogle Anal tics goal in /uestion" 0hat do ou mean ou don&t how much the people who complete our <oogle Anal tics goals are worth to our business financiall 4@ If ou don& know e$actl how much the people who complete our <oogle Anal tics goals are worth ou our business financiall then ou need to take an educated guess" Because if ou don&t include a monetar #alue then a lot of the reports that <oogle Anal tics can produce for ou won&t be a#ailable" Takin! an educated !uess on how much completed !oals are worth to you If ou don&t know e$actl , it&s important to take an educated guess as to how much people who complete our <oogle Anal tics goals are worth to ou financiall " *o how do ou guestimate this #alue@ If we assume that we&re talking about a completed en/uir form as a goal, then ou should alread know Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 180 -
how man people who complete our en/uir form go on to make a purchase" And ou should also know the a#erage order #alue for our business" Therefore, for e$ample, if for e#er 8I people that en/uire about our ser#ice one person bu s, and that our a#erage transaction #alue represents W1,III profit then ou know that each person who en/uires about our product or ser#ice is worth WMI to ou, so our goal #alue will be WMI"
Ee&t work out your conversion rates to determine your advertisin! .ud!et The ne$t thing to work out is our con#ersion rates from someone #isiting our home page to completing our en/uir form" 1ou should be able to easil get this figure from our <oogle Anal tics stats ! assuming that ou&#e set up our goal correctl " *a ou see that 8P of our website #isitors go on to complete our en/uir form" Because ou&#e alread determined that each of our completed goals is worth WMI to ou, that means that ou know that, on a#erage, each new website #isitor is worth W1 to our business" Therefore if ou decide to pa for some website traffic in the future, ou ha#e a good idea of how much ou can afford to pa for the ad#ertising" Knowin! where you are now !ives you somethin! to aim (or in the (uture The great thing about knowing that a completed goal is worth an a#erage of WMI profit to our business and that 8P of our website #isitors go on to reach this goal is that it gi#es ou something to aim for ! it means that ou can turn our focus towards impro#ing our a#erage transaction profit #alue and increasing our #isitor to goal con#ersion rates" Increasing our goal con#ersion rates could be incredibl important for our business" 'or e$ample, if ou can increase our a#erage goal con#ersion rates from 8P to NP, then this in turn increases our a#erage #isitor #alue from W1 to W8" This increase in a#erage #isitor #alue ma well open up our access to thousands of more #isitors" If our a#erage #isitor #alue increases, so does our abilit to pa more for traffic, meaning that ou will ha#e access to bigger networks of paid traffic sources" Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 181 -
'ave you inserted your +oo!le 0nalytics trackin! code on your we.site yetB Of course all this talk about impro#ing our goal con#ersion rates is pointless unless ou&#e inserted our <oogle Anal tics tracking code on our website and set up our goals ! so if ou ha#en&t done this alread , do it now4 Insert the <oogle Anal tics tracking at the bottom of each page on our site -if ou can&t figure out how to do this ourself an website coder will find it fairl simple to do." This isn&t as time consuming as ou would think ! most pages on our website will ha#e what is called a common footer which is replicated on all the pages" This common footer means the code onl has to be pasted in one place for it to be automaticall included on e#er page on our site ( allowing ou to track #isits to indi#idual pages" B setting goals and tracking our #isitors ou can determine which aspects of our internet marketing campaign are most successful, and which aspects aren&t working so well" It&s e$tremel important to undertake this anal sis to optimi)e the success of our internet marketing campaign" ookin! at an e&ample o( stats on +oo!le 0nalytics Fsing the website www"Build1ourOwnBusiness"bi) as an e$ample -figure 11"N. ou can see that o#er a set period of time, 188,1HN website #isits ha#e been referred from 1,MLN traffic sources" The same screenshot shows that the a#erage #isitor #iewed 8"81 pages and spent 8 minutes and 11 seconds on the site" 1ou can get a lot more information about our #isitors from <oogle Anal tics including which countr the &re from and what browser the &re using to #iew our web pages" 1ou can also see in figure 11"N that L9"MNP of the website #isits were from people who hadn&t been to the website before ! and that 9L"LMP of #isitors left the website before choosing to #iew another page -that&s called the bounce rate." Although these stats are encouraging in terms of the /uantit of #isitors, it&s a bit concerning that so man people are choosing to lea#e the website after #iewing +ust the one page" It&s e#en more concerning that onl 12"N9P of #isitors choose to come back and #isit the website again" ,ere ou see the ad#antage of using a good #isitor tracking s stem like <oogle Anal tics" Fnless ou&re aware of the statistics that ou could impro#e on, Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 182 -
there&s #er little chance that ou&ll know which changes to implement on our website to tr to change things for the better" )i!ure 11*8 +oo!le 0nalytics
ookin! at www*Build%our2wnBusiness*.i9 tra((ic sources Keyword Phrases *omething else that <oogle Anal tics allows ou to do is to anal )e the ke word phrases that people are using to find our website in search engines" B re#iewing which ke word phrases ha#e been dri#ing the most traffic to our website through search engines -'igure 11"M., ou&ll be able to see how successful our search engine optimi)ation strateg has been so far" As ou can see in figure 11"M, the most successful ke word phrase b far is %business articles&, the phrase that has dri#en o#er 1I,III #isits from search engines" The ne$t best ke word phrase has dri#en +ust 999 #isits"
- 183 -
On the face of it, this isn&t good" If ou rel too hea#il on traffic from +ust the one ke word phrase, then if search engines ! for whate#er reason ! decide to rank our website in a lower position for that ke word phrase then ou ma take a big hit on the o#erall amount of #isitors to our website" )i!ure 11*< ookin! at keyword phrases on +oo!le 0nalytics
ookin! at the keyword phrases drivin! tra((ic (rom search en!ines 'ortunatel though, this isn&t the case for the www"Build1ourOwnBusiness"bi) website" If ou look more closel at figure 11"M ou can see that although 1I,21H #isits ha#e been generated #ia the ke word phrase %business articles&, this is from a total of HN,8LM #isits" The %business articles& ke word phrase therefore represents +ust under 11P of all the organic -free traffic as apposed to pa per click. #isits from search engines" The e$tremel positi#e thing from an organic *EO perspecti#e for this website is the /uantit of different ke word phrases which are dri#ing traffic" M8,I1M different ke word phrases ha#e referred website #isits" 1ou can also see that the categor pages are well optimi)ed" 'or instance, the Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 184 -
ke word phrase %business law articles& referred MH8 #isits, %free business articles& referred MI9 #isits and %operations management articles& referred NHO #isits" This pro#ides a #er important lesson ! if ou +ust focus on optimi)ing for +ust the one ke word phrase, and +ust the one page -i"e" our home page. then e#en if ou manage to hit the top of <oogle for our chosen ke word phrase, the chances are that ou&ll still be missing out on HIP of our potential search engine traffic because ou ha#en&t considered longer(tail ke word phrases" Broadening the /uantit of ke word phrases that people use to find our website in search engines has an additional benefit" >ot onl will ou be dri#ing more #isitors to our site, ou&ll also be safeguarding our traffic from search engines" In short, the more routes into our website, the less ou risk ha#ing our business seriousl affected if ou lose the high search engine ranking of ne ke word phrase" 0naly9in! tra((ic (rom links to your site 1et another important use of #isitor anal sis software like <oogle Anal tics is to anal )e the /uantit and /ualit of traffic dri#en to our site directl from links as opposed to search engines" B selecting %traffic sources& and then %referring sites& in <oogle Anal tics ou can #iew all the different websites that are dri#ing traffic to our site" 'rom there ou can click on one of the listed links and drill down further" If the website that ou&re anal )ing sent traffic from multiple pages, ou&ll be able to see which pages sent the most traffic" 1ou&ll also be able to anal )e the /ualit of traffic from each indi#idual page that sends ou traffic" 'or instance, some websites ma send ou traffic which on a#erage #iews man more pages" Other website man send ou #isitors that are much more likel to con#ert to our <oogle Anal tics goal target" Reviewin! the Fuality o( tra((ic (rom Top1C$ales0rticles*com B re#iewing the /ualit of traffic deli#ered from the website Top1I*alesArticles"com in <oogle Anal tics -'igure 11"9. we can see how much better -or worse. traffic from an indi#idual link is compared with other sources" 'or instance, we can se that the a#erage amount of time that a #isitor from this Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 185 -
site spends on the Build1ourOwnBusiness website is 8 minutes and H seconds" This compares with an a#erage of 1 minute and MI seconds from traffic from search engines" )i!ure 11*= +oo!le 0nalytics
Reviewin! the Fuality o( tra((ic (rom Top1C$ales0rticles*com 1ou can also see that the bounce rate of traffic from this site is slightl higher ! ON"8IP compared with a bounce rate of 9L"LMP from all traffic" These statistics are interesting, and information about the /ualit of the landing page can be inferred from the data" 'or instance, it could be argued that the /ualit of the home page on the Build1ourOwnBusiness website isn&t encouraging enough #isitors to click through and #iew other pages ! it therefore Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 186 -
needs to be impro#ed" Eot all tra((ic to your we.site is eFual This little e$ercise of re#iewing the differences in website traffic to Build1ourOwnBusiness from #ar ing sources shows that it&s important for ou to be aware that not all traffic to our website is e/ual" If ou are full aware of the /ualit of traffic deli#ered from a certain website ! including how much on a#erage each #isitor is worth to ou, ou ma be able to +ustif an increased affiliate referral fee for that website" Jisitor #alue knowledge is power" This again emphasi)es how important it is to set up a monetar #alue with our <oogle Anal tics goals" Fnless ou include this, ou&ll find it a lot harder to differentiate between the #alue of traffic from different sources ! and therefore much harder to make highl informed future marketing spend decisions" =an ou list the top 1I websites that refer traffic to our website@ If so, what ha#e ou done to tr to increase the #olume of traffic from these sources@ Is your we.site as clearly laid out as it should .eB *omething else that&s reall important to consider is the pages that our #isitors tend to #iew on our website ! for instance, is there a link from our home page which tends to be #isited more than an other@ If so, ou need to know wh " Eerhaps ou&re website&s as not as clearl laid out as it needs to be" =heck how long people sta on their second page for" If& it&s onl a manner of seconds then ou should /uestion the #alue and rele#ance of the information on that page" 'ave you tested your we.site in di((erent .rowsersB =heck if there&s an significant difference between people who #iew our web pages in less common web browsers" If ou notice an ma+or difference then ou should do some usabilit testing ! test that our site performs and looks +ust as good in different scenarios" That&s wh testing our site before ou start marketing it to the general public is
- 187 -
so #er important" 1ou can put off /uite a few #isitors if our website doesn&t displa properl in 'irefo$ or *afari" It&s eas to forget that +ust because ou might be using 0indows and Internet E$plorer to #iew our web pages, man of our #isitors might not be" 0ebsite coding is an art as well as a science" In other words, there&s not necessaril a logical reason wh certain parts of our web page might look significantl different, or act in a significantl different manner when #iewed through different de#ices" I recall that for se#eral months a ma+or F; supermarket&s website +ust didn&t work properl at all when #iewed through the 'ire'o$ browser" That meant that the ma ha#e alienated 2IP of their website #isitors simpl because their website wasn&t thoroughl tested4
:o.ile .rowsin! devices Bepending on the technical profile of our audience, ou ma find that a significant percentage of our website #isits come through mobile internet de#ices" Bo ou know what our website looks like in a mobile phone@ ,ow /uickl does it load@ Bo people #iewing our web pages on mobile phones ha#e to scroll before being able to read an thing worthwhile@ If being able to #iew and operate our website from a mobile phone is important for our business -or likel to become important for our business in the future. then ou should consider ha#ing a special #ersion of our site designed for these de#ices with less images and straight(to(the(point te$t" Don7t !uess make an in(ormed decision There reall isn&t an e$cuse for guessing when it comes to impro#ing our website for our #isitors" Anal )ing the statistics from our current #isitors should pro#ide ou with all the information that ou re/uire to make an informed decision to impro#e things" And e#en if ou&re not entirel sure, ou should use that split(test software which I mentioned earlier -<oogle 0ebsite Optimi)er. to test different impro#ement options" Thorough website #isitor anal sis is a must if ou want our website to reach an where near its full potential"
- 188 -
Pillar #11 ;isitor 0nalysis $ummary Fsing <oogle Anal tics ou can track man #ital #isitor statistics like where our #isitors come from and how long the sta " 1ou can then use this #aluable information to find weak spots in our website like impro#ing important con#ersion rates" Once ou ha#e identified our weak spots or disco#ered a blockage on the site ou can amend our website to impro#e our con#ersion rates" This is probabl something that our competitors aren&t doing" 1ou can track the sources of traffic to our site, and more specificall which websites our #isitors are coming from, as well as ke word phrases used in search engines to find our site" 1ou can use this to help ou determine which ke word phrases to focus on in the future for our *EO" Aemember that it&s imperati#e to set goals for our site ! and gi#e them a monetar #alue" Make sure ou test what our website looks like and performs like on different browsers ! this includes mobile phone browsers" Bon&t dela on getting our #isitor tracking set up ! unless ou set it up now, ou won&t ha#e an comparable historical data to anal )e in the future" Fse <oogle Anal tics to help ou pinpoint the most #aluable sources of traffic to our site ! ou might be able to make a decision that ou can afford to pa more for traffic from certain sources if ou can +ustif it" ,ow can ou +ustif an future marketing spend unless ou track its performance" Online marketing is uni/ue ! the ma+orit of it is entirel trackable and therefore +ustifiable" 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date #isitor anal sis resources #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar11"
Pillar #12 Continuous Content
- 189 -
Pillar #13
Continuous Content
- 190 -

________________________________________________________________________
ontinuous content is probabl the shortest of the 1 Pillar! o# Internet
Marketing in terms of length, but it should be one of the broadest pillars of our internet marketing strateg " B broadest I mean that not onl should it be ongoing, it also impacts other pillars" I( linkin! is FueenD content is kin! I can&t remember who I heard this /uote from first, but it certainl describes the high degree of importance of continuous content6 FI# Linking i! SueenG Content i! %ingI. 0hile the number of /ualit links to our website tells search engines that our site is likel to be important, search engines are less likel to rank our site highl for a continuous period of time unless ou continuall update our website with fresh, original, rele#ant content" 'resh information shows search engines that our website is more likel to be up(to(date, and therefore more rele#ant in our industr segment compared with our competitors" Blo! technolo!y makes your we.site easier to update One of the reasons I encourage ou to integrate blog technolog into our
- 191 -
website to make it eas to add new content to our site on a regular basis" B using a blogging s stem like 0ordEress, all ou ha#e to do is to log(in to our back office, enter a heading, some post content and press %submit&" That&s all it takes to create a new web page on our site through a blogging s stem" 0ith 0ordEress ou can e#en schedule posts to be published at different points in the future" 1ou +ust select our time of publication when ou upload our post and it will be made li#e at our chosen date and time" +reat new content will encoura!e naturalD or!anic linkin! 0hene#er ou add great /ualit new content to our site, and long as if it is good /ualit and useful, the more people that #iew it, the more likel it is that people will choose to link to it because the find it to be a #aluable resource" That&s one of the reasons wh man successful bloggers don&t ha#e to do an other form of internet marketing" Because the offer great content, and the &#e built up a band of lo al followers, as soon as the publish a new post, the suddenl obtain a build(up of new links to that new page" +rindin! out new content is worth it <rinding out fresh content on a regular basis is something which ou will ha#e to work hard at" It is /uite tough to begin with ! especiall if writing&s not our natural skill" But it doesn&t matter if ou&re ne#er going to be the world&s greatest no#elist, ou&ll still ha#e our own distincti#e st le" If for whate#er reason ou decide that ou +ust can&t product one new article per week for our website, ou can alwa s outsource the production of the content" :ust make sure that our business is represented in a professional, consistent manner" And that ou tr to get the same writer to write for ou all the time" There are lots of great outsourcing ser#ices where ou can find writers" 5inks to there can be found in the Eillars G18 resources section at http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar18"
- 192 -
Pillar #13 Continuous Content $ummary If %5inking is [ueen, =ontent is ;ing& ! links tell search engines that ou are important, but search engines are less likel to rank ou highl unless ou ha#e good content" =ontinuous new content on our site is so important" It needs to be updated as often as possible" *earch engines lo#e new content as a website with fresh content is more likel to be the most up(to(date in its industr " 'resh information T more rele#ance" <reat new content encourages natural, organic link building" Aemember to integrate blog technolog for ease uploading and effecti#e distribution" If ou are using 0ordEress then ou can pre(set our blog to release blog posts on certain dates in the future" 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date continuous content related and outsourcing resources #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar18"
Pillar #13 The Evolving Web
- 193 -
Pillar #15
The ,volvin! 4e.
- 194 -
Pillar #15 The ,volvin! 4e.

________________________________________________________________________
he e#ol#ing web means that the 0orld 0ide 0eb continues to rapidl
change ! and therefore so must also our internet marketing strateg " Three sta!es o( we. development There will be at least three stages of web e#ol#ement that ou need to be aware of" *o far there has onl been two distinct stages ! but the ne$t stage is +ust around the corner" The three stages of web de#elopment6 -from an internet marketing perspecti#e. $ta!e 1- 4e. 1*C ! 1HH9 to 8IIN $ta!e 3- 4e. 3*C ! 8IIN to @ $ta!e 5- 4e. 5*C ( @ to @ The evolvement o( the we. and how this impacts marketin! activities The web has e#ol#ed as a marketing medium since the mid 1HHIs" Back then the internet could be described more as one(wa source of information" 0eb pages were #iewed, read and7or printed out" The internet was a good resource for researching information" An marketing that occurred was based on e$isting offline ad#ertising techni/ues"
- 195 -
Eillar G12 ! The E#ol#ing 0eb re#iews how marketing techni/ues ha#e e#ol#ed since then, ensuring that ou sta up(to(date with to most effecti#e methods of marketing our business online" 4hy the we. chan!ed as a communications medium when 4e. 3*C arrived Aemember that 0eb 1"I was a one(wa communication process, like a newspaper" ,owe#er, when 0eb 8"I arri#ed it represented the mass( introduction of user(generated content" This is where blogging and social networking came in for the masses" Eeople formed their own communities on niche topics and began interacting between themsel#es" 4hat will 4e. 5*C look like and how will it impact internet marketin!B 0eb 2"I hasn&t happened et ! it might not happen for a while ! it might not happen e#er" But 0eb 2"I is a good term to describe what might be" It&s a useful term to represent the fact the web constantl changes, and it e#ol#ing into something else" M opinion is that the web is becoming more of a personali)ed e$perience" *ocial networks are offering more and more wa s to make each user&s e$perience more uni/ue" Eersonali)ed home pages are continuall offering more personali)ation" Eerhaps another impact of web e#ol#ement will ha#e a greater impact than personali)ation on internet marketing in the future" The essential part of Eillar G12 ! The E#ol#ing 0eb is to keep our ear to the ground and be prepared to adapt our internet marketing model in the future" 'ow 4e. 3*C marketin! di((ers (rom 4e. 1*C marketin! 0eb 8"I marketing lets ou do a lot more than speaking to our potential customers ! it allows ou to interact with our potential customers ! at a place where the feel at home" 5et&s use the golf course as an e$ample3 0hat ou need to be acutel aware of when it comes to interacting with our potential customers is that it&s like them in#iting ou out for a game of golf ! the &#e in#ited ou out because the like ou and the know that ou pla the game too" 1ou limber up on the first tee, and +ust as our new ac/uaintance is about to hit Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 196 -
his first dri#e, ou pull a flip chart out of our golf bag and start a sales presentation" This ma seem a bit cra) e$ample but it articulates how a lot of businesses are still wrongl approaching 0eb 8"I marketing" 0eb 8"I marketing is not about our ad#ertising our web ser#ices" It&s about ou de#eloping relationships with people and offering #alue ! free of charge with no catch" If people like ou and what ou represent then the &ll make the decision to find out more about ou from reading our profile on whate#er social network ou&re participating on" That&s where ou can sell our business" 4e. 1*C still e&ists it hasn7t !one and isn7t likely to !o away Although 0eb 8"I marketing is the %in thing&, 0eb 1"I marketing still e$ists" It hasn&t gone and it isn&t likel to go awa " 0eb 1"I includes search engine listings, press releases, banner ads and man other internet marketing techni/ues" I&d like to be clear that I&m not tr ing to persuade ou to disregard the use of 0eb 1"I internet marketing techni/ues" All I&m tr ing to get ou to do is to be aware of when to market in a 0eb 8"I st le and when to market in a 0eb 1"I st le" As long as if ou&re aware of where to use each marketing st le, then ou&re not going to look like an aggressi#e salesman on a golf course" $ome thou!hts on 4e. 5*C marketin! opportunities I&#e alread mentioned that I feel that the web is e#ol#ing to become a more personali)ed e$perience for each user" *o how will this personali)ed web e$perience manifest itself@ There are two main areas that I&d like to discuss within this et(to(be 0eb 2"I ! 1irtual &eality Marketing and something I call MyPage Marketing" ;irtual Reality :arketin! As computer abilities impro#e, and internet bandwidth increases, so does the /ualit of software programs that produce a #irtual realit e$perience" The more effecti#el that these #irtual realit programs simulate real life e$periences, or pro#ide thrills on a similar le#el to doing whate#er it is in real life, the longer and more often that people will use these #irtual realit programs"
Pillar #13 The Evolving Web $econd i(e and e&ample o( a virtual reality we.site
- 197 -
Once of the most popular and well known online #irtual realit programs is called *econd 5ife -figure 12"1." Although the *econd 5ife has been li#e for se#eral ears, it&s ne#er become as popular as the main social networking sites" It should therefore not be our primar focus in an internet marketing campaign" ,owe#er, it&s worth being aware of, because some companies ha#e alread in#ested significantl in the *econd 5ife pro+ect" )i!ure 15*1 $econd i(e*com
$econd i(e an early e&ample o( 4e. 5*CB In *econd 5ife ou can bu land, build our own house or build our own business" And here&s where it gets interesting ! ou can market our own *econd 5ife business" Belie#e it or not there are man people who are making Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 198 -
full(time incomes within *econd 5ife b selling ser#ices" Eresentl , much of the income is being made b graphic designers and programmers who assist with the design of a#atars and other images" Once ou +oin *econd 5ife ou can bid to bu #irtual land" Once ou own our own *econd 5ife land ou can build a business, emplo people, the imagination&s the limit" A lot of real(life companies ha#e actuall bought land in *econd 5ife to secure their #irtual retail space" The *econd 5ife website has some fre/uentl asked /uestions which will help ou start our own %second life&" The pro#ide e$amples of different businesses that are alread successful in *econd 5ife and ou can use these e$amples to see how ou could run our own *econd 5ife business" As mentioned, I would not recommend spending too much time marketing our business on *econd 5ife at the moment, but if ou can think of an angle that is a little bit different, something particularl rele#ant for ou, then it ma be worthwhile testing this as an online marketing medium" ,owe#er, if ou do decide to gi#e *econd 5ife a go make sure that ou carefull track time and mone spent" And make sure that ou set up a method of tracking the success of our marketing acti#ities" :yPa!e :arketin! The second e$ample of what ma be referred to as 0eb 2"I marketing is what I call M Eage Marketing" B M Eage Marketing I mean focusing the initial part of our marketing acti#ities on the personali)ed home pages or personal profile pages of social networking sites" M Eage Marketing falls flat on its face unless implemented flawlessl " In order for M Eage Marketing to be successful ou need to be offering our audience something fun or useful and free" +oo!le +ad!ets an e&ample o( :yPa!e :arketin! in action I would call <oogle <adgets an e$ample of M Eage Marketing in action" <oogle now offer their users the option to personali)e their home page ! the call this our i<oogle page -'igure 12"8." 1ou can choose from thousands of different independentl designed gadgets to use to personali)e our i<oogle page" *impl Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 199 -
select CAdd stuffD at the top right hand side of the page to search for gadgets hat are of interest to ou" )i!ure 15*3 " i+oo!le
Personali9e your i+oo!le pa!e .y selectin! @0dd stu((A One of the most popular <oogle <adgets is a simple to(do list" 'igure 12"2 shows a selection of some useful <oogle gadgets that ou can use to personali)e our i<oogle page" B clicking on the CAdd it nowD button, ou can add the to(do list to our personali)ed i<oogle page -'igure 12"N." This gadget allows ou to store our list of things to do electronicall , making them accessible when ou login to our home page on an computer" 1ou can find a <oogle gadget that will do +ust about an thing for ou" There are dictionar and thesaurus tools, weather forecast gadgets, share dealing gadgets, currenc con#erters" Most things ou can think of reall " But ou can design our own <oogle <adget ! or ha#e our own <oogle <adget designed for ou" That&s where the internet marketing opportunit is" Imagine if ou could design a <oogle <adget that was to useful or so fun that it was Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 200 -
downloaded b hundreds of thousands of users" 1ou ma be able to build one of these bespoke software programs -that&s in effect what a <oogle <adget is. to lead people down our internet marketing funnel" 1our <oogle <adget is a reall useful free tool ! but ou can also offer a more comple$ paid(for #ersion" )i!ure 15*5 " i+oo!le
The to"do list is the third option down on the @0dd stu((A pa!e Creatin! your own +oo!le +ad!et 0hen ou&re logged into our i<oogle page, ou also ha#e the option to create our own gadget" :ust click CTr it nowD to get started" This Ctr it nowD page shows ou different options for how ou can easil create our own personali)ed gadget" ,owe#er, this option probabl isn&t what ou&re looking for" 0hat most businesses will need is the C'or de#elopersD section which will show ou e$actl how our de#elopers can build gadgets" And it&s completel free of charge to submit our own gadget" Eerhaps ou can incorporate our website link at the bottom of our gadget with Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 201 -
an unobtrusi#e and optional call to action@ But remember, the important thing is for it to be useful for whoe#er chooses to install and see our gadget ! otherwise our gadget will be an e$ercise in negati#e publicit " If ou&re looking to market our ser#ices too o#ertl from within our gadget, ou&re much more likel for it to be a failure" )i!ure 15*8 " i+oo!le
The to"do list as seen on a personali9ed i+oo!le homepa!e One of our internet marketing ob+ecti#es should be to build a more responsi#e, trusting list of prospecti#e customers" And there&d hardl a better wa of doing this than offering our prospects something #aluable free(of(charge ! with no catch" That&s what <oogle <adgets allow ou to do" If ou can persuade +ust a hundred people from our list to download our <oogle <adget and ha#e it on their own i<oogle page, then it will rise up the popularit ranking within the <oogle <adgets search engine, allowing more people will become aware of it"
- 202 -
There are #irtuall no upside limits and costs for producing our own gadgets are minimal" The main constraint is our imagination ! what new <oogle <adget can ou design that would be useful to users and related to our industr @ The ,volvin! 4e. isn7t the place to start even i( it7s (unI 0eb 8"I is still a #er much an e#ol#ing field" 0eb 2"I barel e$ists ! and e#en if it does, it&s barel a concept" There is no point in acti#el focusing on these e#ol#ing areas as an internet marketing medium initiall K it would be a mistake not to focus most of our time of more con#entional forms of internet marketing at the start of our campaign" Things like directories, link building and article marketing are pro#en internet marketing techni/ues that should be among our initial areas of focus" 0lways test the success o( your campai!n ,owe#er, if ou do decide to test #irtual realit marketing or M Eage Marketing please remember to put in place as man methods to test the success of the campaign as possible" Track things like how man people ha#e #iewed our gadget description, downloaded our gadget and how man people ha#e gone on to complete a paid purchase at our site as a result of choosing to download our free gadget" There are man other metrics which ou should be testing" And with the K0ol0ing (e), like with nearl e#er other aspect of internet marketing, the more ou test and measure, the more ou will be able to optimi)e our campaign and achie#e the best possible results for our business in the future"
- 203 -
Pillar #15 The ,volvin! 4e. $ummary 0eb 1"I is represented b a one(wa communications process" 0eb 1"I marketing opportunities are therefore more like traditional ad#ertising opportunities, including things like submitting our website to directories, submitting online press releases and article marketing" 0eb 8"I represents the interacti#e web and marketing therefore started to recogni)e the importance of interacting in a communit and encouraging more interaction, +oining social networking groups, forming our own groups and thinking about the seeding of a #iral marketing campaign" 0eb 2"I represents the future" It doesn&t necessaril e$ist et, but I call it the personali)ed web" Marketing tools for 0eb 2"I could include #irtual realit marketing and something I call M EageMarketing ! pro#iding useful interaction from within someone&s personali)ed home page or personal profile on a social networking site" The K0ol0ing (e) means ou can ne#er assume ou know e#er thing about Internet marketing" Internet marketing techni/ues can change /uickl " If ou feel that ou&re up(to(date with things now, unless ou continue to stud more material -like the 89(0eek Internet Marketing Elan ! www"890eekElan"com. ou&ll #er /uickl find our knowledge to be out(of( date" Think laterall of how new opportunities in 0eb 2"I could impact our business" 1ou should test new methods of marketing and ensure ou find wa s to track our success when using those new forms of marketing" >e#er stand still" 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date links that relate to the K0ol0ing (e) #isit our %future of internet marketing& resources6 http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar12"
- 204 -
Q In a Eutshell Q
In A Nutshell
- 205 -
The 15 Pillars o( Internet :arketin! In a Eutshell

________________________________________________________________________
I
PI
f ou&d like a recap, or ou&re re#isiting the book for a /uick summar , here
are the 12 Eillars of Internet Marketing %in a nutshell&3
0R 1- Keyword Research
There are se#eral paid(for, and a couple of free ke word research tools that ou can use" But what is ke word research@ ;e word research and the correct posi( tioning of those ke word phrases makes sure that our web page is targeted to( wards the phrases that people actuall t pe into search engines" ;e word re( search tools work b anal )ing pre#ious search trends" ,ere&s a bullet(point summar of Pillar $1 ' %eyword &e!ear"h6 *tructure our site correctl to begin with" 1ou know what our business is about and what our home page is about" Make sure our ke words reflect our business purpose" 1ou should aim to structure our website in a logical manner for both users and for search engines" After ou choose our home page ke word phrase, choose our site categories" 0hat categories represent our business@ Brainstorm ideas and use resources such as an online thesaurus, ;0map, 0ordtracker and the <oogle E$ternal ;e word Tool to come up with 1I(2I rele#ant categories for our Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 206 site"
'ocus on our indi#idual pages after our categories" In an ideal world ou should de#ise a structure of 1I to 2I indi#idual pages within each of those categories" If ou want, and if our website is large enough, then ou can go for sub(categories within categories before drilling down to pages within that section" =onduct ke word research to come up with one ke word phrase per page" Be as specific as possible" B selecting long(tail ke word phrases, e#en if ou ha#e fewer #isitors to our site, ou will ha#e a higher con#ersion rate from the traffic ou do recei#e" In the long term bringing in a couple of #isitors per da to an indi#idual page, e/uals MII(9II #er rele#ant #isitors o#er a ear" Jisit all the resources mentioned in Pillar $1 %eyword &e!ear"h here6 http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar1 Eosition our ke word phrase in our site architecture ! and this is where we start Pillar $2 ' (e)!ite *e!ign" PI 0R 3- 4e.site Desi!n
There are two essential facets of good website design6 Eleasing design and effi( cient coding" 1our website needs to be pleasing to our consumer?s e es" It also needs to ?flow? nicel " Essential coding to pa attention to includes our page title, heading tags and na#igational links" ,ere&s a bullet(point summar of Pillar $2 ' (e)!ite *e!ign6 Take some time to think about our behind the scenes coding ! make our whole website as efficient as possible, which will help search engines when the crawl through our site" <et our na#igation structure right and make sure it?s logical for search engines and indi#idual users" Aemember that our website #isitors ma land on an indi#idual page #ia a search engine and good na#igation will allow them to /uickl understand where that page is in relation to the rest of our site" This will make our new #isitors more likel to stick around for longer"
In A Nutshell
- 207 -
Ensure that ou&re aware of the L essential aspects of onsite optimi)ation which will help to impro#e our search engine rankings" ,a#e ou considered the precise rele#ance of each page@ ,a#ing +ust the one topic per page will make life easier for both #isitors and search engines" B undertaking continuous testing and anal )ing what does and doesn&t work, ou can alter the structure of the site to ma$imi)e con#ersion rates" Jisit all the resources mentioned in Pillar $2 (e)!ite *e!ign here6 http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar8
PI
0R 5- Blo! Technolo!y
:ust because a website looks like a website doesn?t mean it?s +ust a website" It could be a blog too" Blogs ha#e lots of great tools built into them that make search engines like them a lot more than a static website" 'eatures like categor tags, A** feeds and the ?pinging? of new content to other sites means ou can?t af( ford to ignore the #alue of blogging as an internet marketing strateg " ,ere&s a bullet(point summar of Pillar $ ' 6log 7e"hnology6 A blog doesn&t necessaril ha#e to be published in a +ournal st le and displa ed in chronological order" The content of a blog can be an thing from articles to opinions and the most important aspect about a blog from a business standpoint is the technolog ! the inbuilt automated internet marketing capabilit 0ordpress"org is probabl the most appropriate blogging software for most businesses" It&s free to use, state(of(the(art and offers bespoke design and functionalit Elugins are small software programs designed b independent coders that add additional functionalit to our blog" There are thousands of plugins to choose from and most of them are free(of(charge" Einging and A** feeds can be used to help to automate our blog marketing" Einging is the process that makes a blog and news directories aware of the fact that ou&#e +ust published a new post" A** 'eeds let people subscribe to our content and allow them to #iew the content without actuall #isiting our site"
- 208 -
Eodcasting can be used as a wa to augment our blog posts" Eodcasts are generall audio -or #ideo. files, and the are published using A** so subscribers are alerted as soon as a new episode is published" Tools such as Audacit and *k pe can be used to create and edit podcasts" iTunes is the most popular software to use to subscribe to a podcast feed" Jisit all the resources mentioned in Pillar $ 6log 7e"hnology here6 http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar2
PI
0R 8- 0utoresponders
The ma+orit of marketing managers don?t know what autoresponders are" And that?s a big mistake" Autoresponders ha#e the power to build relationships with our customers when ou?re bus doing something else" 1ou could be on holi( da and come back to find that our customers ha#e placed orders ! all because of our autoresponder" ,ere&s a bullet(point summar of Pillar $8 ' 9utore!ponder!6 Autoresponders are a great wa for ou to build relationships with our customers" The can deli#er #irtuall an thing b email on an automated, pre(meditated and usuall personali)ed basis" Broadcast Emails are informal emails which are usuall personali)ed to the recei#er" The are great for sending up(to(date news and building better business relationships" 0hen creating the te$t for e(mails the should be as personali)ed and rele#ant as possible to cement the relationship" >ewsletters are a more formal, professional method of keeping in touch with our client list and are a great reason for regular communication with our customers" A newsletter can be sent immediatel , or pre(loaded into ou autoresponder to be deli#ered on a certain date" The can also be part of an autoresponder se/uence, deli#ered so man da s, weeks or months after the initial sign(up" One of the autoresponder which I recommend which is specificall built for email marketing is called A0eber" 'ind links to A0eber and other recommended email marketing resources here6 http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarN
In A Nutshell
- 209 -
Building a list of rele#ant subscribers is an essential aspect of successful internet marketing, and ou can greatl speed this process up b offering free bonus content or a EB' eBook as an incenti#e for people to subscriber to our newsletter or email updates" ,a#ing a large, responsi#e email database will take the onus off rel ing on search engines for traffic in the future" It&s ne#er good to ha#e total reliance on something that brings in a lot of business which ou don&t control" B building a thoughtful, rele#ant autoresponder se/uence into our new subscriber process ou will be automaticall building business brand lo alt without ha#ing to speak to our subscribers personall " Fse autoresponders to sur#e our subscribers" This is a great wa of conducting market research in addition to continuing to grow the /ualit of our subscriber relationships" Jisit all the resources mentioned in Pillar $8 9utore!ponder! here6 http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarN
PI
0R <- Paid 0dvertisin!
*ometimes the onl /uick wa of turning on the flow of website traffic is to pa for it" And that?s where pa (per(click, pa (per(impression and sponsored ad#ert( ising come in" It?s important to include paid ad#ertising as part of our internet marketing budget" But onl part of it" Ideall ou will be spending a lot initiall , but not so much after si$ months of our internet marketing campaign" ,ere&s a bullet(point summar of Pillar $E ' Paid 9d0erti!ing6 <oogle Ad0ords should be our primar initial focus for pa (per(click website traffic" Onl when ou&#e mastered Ad0ords should ou mo#e onto other ser#ices like 1ahoo *earch Marketing, Microsoft Ad=enter and 'acebook Ad#ertising" 0hen creating our <oogle Ad0ords ad, use s/uare brackets to get an e$act match of our ke word phrase" Alwa s test our ads to work out which strategies work best b remembering to take ad#antage of the <oogle Ad0ords A6B split testing functionalit " It&s incredibl important to optimi)e our ad landing pages for our pa (per( Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 210 -
click ad#erts" In an ideal world ou&ll ha#e a landing page which has been designed with a specific ad#ert in mind" Ma+or director submission should also form part of an serious internet market( ing campaign" 'or a list of updated ma+or website directories and other paid in( ternet marketing resources #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarM"
PI
0R =- Press Releases
One of the secrets to effecti#e internet marketing is to get other people talking about ou and our website" And one of the wa s to do that is to appeal to spe( cialist publications through the submission of a press release" Eress releases don?t ha#e to cost an thing and all the take is time and planning" ,ere&s a bullet(point summar of Pillar $> ' Pre!! &elea!e!6 Online press releases are a great wa of generating awareness and traffic directl to our site" B including a non ,TM5 FA5 link with httpABB ou can also impro#e our off(site search engine optimi)ation as some republishing sites will automaticall con#ert that website mention into a li#e, *EO friendl link" EA0eb is the largest and most popular website for submitting online press releases" *electing the VLI ser#ice should be sufficient for our initial needsK although if ou find that it&s successful ou should then test the higher(cost ser#ices" Include a descripti#e title for our online press release that includes a ke word phrase" The first couple of sentences of our press release should be short punch , pro#ide an o#er#iew to our whole stor and also include our ke word phrase" Alwa s include a call(to(action for +ournalists as well as our end readers" This could be in the form of additional information or a free related report a#ailable at a website address" Fse <oogle Alerts to track the success of our press releases" 1ou will be able to #iew who is publishing our article and ou can use this to build direct relationships with publishers for the future" 1ou can also use <oogle Alerts to Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
In A Nutshell
- 211 -
test the effecti#eness of different online press release distribution ser#ices" Online press releases aren&t a replacement for con#entional EA agencies ! the should be #iewed as an augmentation of this ser#ice 'or up(to(date links to recommended online press release resources #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar9"
PI
0R >- ink Buildin!
The heart of the internet pumps because of links" If websites didn?t link to each other, then search engines would find it #er difficult to determine which web( sites belong to an gi#en field" *earch engines would also find it #er difficult to decide which website is better" The long and short of it is ! the more rele#ant, /ualit links to our website, the higher our website will be ranked b search engines" ,ere&s a bullet(point summar of Pillar $7 ' Link 6uilding6 To achie#e good, consistent search engine rankings it is important to get /ualit links from rele#ant sites to our website" ,owe#er, large numbers of non(rele#ant links pointing to our site can ha#e a negati#e effect on our search engine rankings" *ubmit our website to free directories, such as local or industr (specific directories" Fse Birector =ritic"com to search for niche industr directories" Both <oogle 5ocal and 1ahoo 5ocal are #aluable local directories" Birector =ritic"com can also be used to find more local directories" Aesearching the links that point to our competitor&s site can be a good wa to disco#er which sites might be willing to link to our site" 1ou can contact these site owners b using contact forms on their website, or using the eas whois"com ser#ice" Aespected institutions such as uni#ersities, libraries, or business networks are often willing to link to our site if ou&re willing to help them out b gi#ing a free lecture or seminar on our speciali)ed sub+ect" Eerhaps ou can offer these organi)ations something else of #alue in e$change for a link@ Aemember to send a testimonial for an product or ser#ice that our business in#ests in" *end our testimonial to the marketing director and include our Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 212 -
website address to make it much more likel to gi#e ou a free one(wa link" *earch <oogle for our ke word phrase plus the phrases %add url& or the phrase %add site& to find websites that are acti#el looking for link partners" If the site is rele#ant for our readers then consider arranging a reciprocal link" This offers #alue as long as if is part of a wider link building campaign, and not the primar focus of the campaign" 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date link building resources #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarO"
PI
0R K- 0rticle $u.mission
Article submission is still one of the most effecti#e wa s to get both readers and search engines interested in our website" B submitting a /ualit article for pub( lication on the biggest and best -as well as sub+ect specific. article directories, ou increase our credibilit in our field as well as being gi#en the opportunit to link back to our own website" ,ere&s a bullet(point summar of Pillar $T ' 9rti"le /u)mi!!ion6 *tart our article marketing b submitting a minimum of one article per week to E)ine Articles" Aim to make our articles between MII and LII words long" Include an author bio at the bottom of all our articles which contains a ke word link to our home page, a ke word link to a categor page on our site and a non(,TM5 link to our home page" Effecti#e articles are often formatted in the %,ow to3& and %Top 1I wa s of3& doing something" Fse subheadings, keep our paragraphs short and remember not to be too formal in our tone of language" Think /ualit and /uantit " [ualit will help our article to stand out from the competition, and gi#e ou a much bigger chance of getting our article re( published on other sites" [uantit is important too ! this will keep our articles featured on the home pages of the #arious article directories and start to get ou featured as a top author on #arious sites" After ou submit articles to top general article directories, offer to submit additional uni/ue articles to other highl respected industr specific websites" This uni/ue content and uni/ue links will dri#e good /ualit , rele#ant traffic
In A Nutshell
- 213 -
from the sites and ha#e an e$tremel positi#e effect on our search engine optimi)ation" Aemember to use <oogle Alerts to track the republishing of our articles" This will help ou to identif sites to which it would be worthwhile to offer uni/ue content to in the future" 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date article marketing resources #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillarL"
PI
0R M- +roup Interaction
An additional wa to become respected in our field is to regularl participate in our industr groups and forums" B answering /ueries from less e$perienced people and ha#ing a link in our signature in the bottom of each post, again ou?re taking the opportunit to appeal to both readers and search engines" ,ere&s a bullet(point summar of Pillar $9 ' Droup Intera"tion6 'orum Earticipation can be a great wa of building up our reputation in our industr " B posting good /ualit , rele#ant posts in a forum -which is rele#ant for our industr segment. together with using a good signature which links to our site with a ke word phrase, ou will be generating direct traffic to our site as well as tremendousl helping our search engine rankings" *ocial networking groups such as M *pace and 'acebook can help to create awareness of our compan " The can be used to promote new products that ou are releasing in the future as well as be a good wa of allowing people to let their friends know of our business" :ust make sure that ou initiall interact with people b aiming to assist people rather than aiming to sell them something" =onsider dri#ing people on our email list towards good forum posts that ou&#e made" This will encourage interaction and /uickl increase our credibilit in that forum" Answering /uestions on 1ahoo4 Answers and 5inkedIn Answers is another wa to increase our credibilit " 1ou should post good /ualit answers on rele#ant topics" Bon&t promote our own business in the answers ! aim to
- 214 -
dri#e people to our site from our profile" If our answers are good enough and rele#ant enough people will want to read our profile" Blog comment marketing ! posting comments on blogs that are rele#ant to our business can also help raise our industr awareness and dri#e traffic to our site" 1ou should aim to select about 1I rele#ant blogs and subscribe to them" E#er time there is a rele#ant post, make sure ou add a #aluable comment" The ke with making this a success is consistenc " 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date group interaction -social marketing resources. #isit http677www"12pillars"com7re( sources7pillarH"
PI
0R 1C- ;iral :arketin!
Jiral marketing simpl means marketing that spreads like a #irus ! /uickl , from peer to peer and often unintentionall from a strategic perspecti#e" 1ou don?t necessaril ha#e to think of a world beating #iral marketing campaign to take ad#antage of the power of #iral marketing" :ust make it a bit easier for people to tell their friends about our ser#ice" And tr and gi#e them a reason to tell their friends" ,ere&s a bullet(point summar of Pillar $10 ' 1iral Marketing6 Jiral marketing uses word(of(mouth, peer(to(peer communication to ad#ertise our website" *ocial bookmarking and #ideo marketing are two e$amples of what ou can use to encourage #iral marketing to take place" Aim to impro#e our number of returning #isitors using social bookmarking( b allowing people to /uickl and easil make our site one of their fa#orites" Tr incorporating the AddThis"com tool within our blog" Aemember to kick(start the popularit of our #ideos on #ideo sharing sites like 1ouTube b dri#ing people on our email list to our #ideos and asking them to add comments" Be efficient in the uploading of our #ideos ! make sure that ou use the free TubeMogul uploading and tracking ser#ice" Bon&t +ust upload our #ideos to 1ouTube" There are lots of other sources of #ideo #iewers and some sites will Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
In A Nutshell
- 215 -
con#ert a lot better than 1ouTube e#en though the don&t necessaril bring as man #ideo #iews" ,a#e ou included a call(to(action in our #ideos@ Bo people know who has uploaded the #ideo and what else the could get from ou if the #isited our website@ 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date #iral marketing resources #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar1I"
PI
0R 11- ;isitor 0nalysis
If ou don?t know where our #isitors li#e, how the ?re finding our website and what the ?re doing when the ?re on our website, then how do ou know what to impro#e about our website@ Jisitor anal sis is ke to gaining the knowledge that helps ou make informed decisions on our future website strateg " ,ere&s a bullet(point summar of Pillar $11 ' 1i!itor 9naly!i!6 Fsing <oogle Anal tics ou can track man #ital #isitor statistics like where our #isitors come from and how long the sta " 1ou can then use this #aluable information to find weak spots in our website like impro#ing important con#ersion rates" Once ou ha#e identified our weak spots or disco#ered a blockage on the site ou can amend our website to impro#e our con#ersion rates" This is probabl something that our competitors aren&t doing" 1ou can track the sources of traffic to our site, and more specificall which websites our #isitors are coming from, as well as ke word phrases used in search engines to find our site" 1ou can use this to help ou determine which ke word phrases to focus on in the future for our *EO" Aemember that it&s imperati#e to set goals for our site ! and gi#e them a monetar #alue" Make sure ou test what our website looks like and performs like on different browsers ! this includes mobile phone browsers" Bon&t dela on getting our #isitor tracking set up ! unless ou set it up now, ou won&t ha#e an comparable historical data to anal )e in the future"
- 216 -
Fse <oogle Anal tics to help ou pinpoint the most #aluable sources of traffic to our site ! ou might be able to make a decision that ou can afford to pa more for traffic from certain sources if ou can +ustif it" ,ow can ou +ustif an future marketing spend unless ou track its performance" Online marketing is uni/ue ! the ma+orit of it is entirel trackable and therefore +ustifiable" 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date #isitor anal sis resources #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar11"
PI
0R 13- Continuous Content
*earch engines lo#e new content on our website" It shows them that our in( formation isn?t out of date and that ou?re tr ing to offer the best possible ser#ice to our readers" If ou ha#en?t updated our website for a ear or so then ou?re alwa s going to find it more difficult to get higher rankings from search engines" ,ere&s a bullet(point summar of Pillar $12 ' Continuou! Content6 If %5inking is [ueen, =ontent is ;ing& ! links tell search engines that ou are important, but search engines are less likel to rank ou highl unless ou ha#e good content" =ontinuous new content on our site is so important" It needs to be updated as often as possible" *earch engines lo#e new content as a website with fresh content is more likel to be the most up(to(date in its industr " 'resh information T more rele#ance" <reat new content encourages natural, organic link building" Aemember to integrate blog technolog for ease uploading and effecti#e distribution" If ou are using 0ordEress then ou can pre(set our blog to release blog posts on certain dates in the future" 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date continu( ous content related and outsourcing resources #isit http677www"12pillars"com7re( sources7pillar18"
In A Nutshell PI 0R 15- The ,volvin! 4e.
- 217 -
The internet ne#er sta s the same" That means that if ou continue to use the same online marketing channels, and ne#er re(anal )e the marketplace, ou?ll slowl lose our marketshare" 0hene#er ou see a new website ask ourself two /uestions ! firstl , is there an thing that I can learn from the wa that the do business@ And secondl , can I use their website as a marketing medium@ ,ere&s a bullet(point summar of Pillar $1 ' 7he K0ol0ing (e)6 0eb 1"I is represented b a one(wa communications process" 0eb 1"I marketing opportunities are therefore more like traditional ad#ertising opportunities, including things like submitting our website to directories, submitting online press releases and article marketing" 0eb 8"I represents the interacti#e web and marketing therefore started to recogni)e the importance of interacting in a communit and encouraging more interaction, +oining social networking groups, forming our own groups and thinking about the seeding of a #iral marketing campaign" 0eb 2"I represents the future" It doesn&t necessaril e$ist et, but I call it the personali)ed web" Marketing tools for 0eb 2"I could include #irtual realit marketing and something I call M EageMarketing ! pro#iding useful interaction from within someone&s personali)ed home page or personal profile on a social networking site" The K0ol0ing (e) means ou can ne#er assume ou know e#er thing about Internet marketing" Internet marketing techni/ues can change /uickl " If ou feel that ou&re up(to(date with things now, unless ou continue to stud more material -like the 89(0eek Internet Marketing Elan ! www"89weekplan"com. ou&ll #er /uickl find our knowledge to be out(of( date" Think laterall of how new opportunities in 0eb 2"I could impact our business" 1ou should test new methods of marketing and ensure ou find wa s to track our success when using those new forms of marketing" >e#er stand still" 'or links to the #arious websites mentioned in this pillar and up(to(date links that relate to the K0ol0ing (e) -the future of internet marketing. #isit http677www"12pillars"com7resources7pillar12"
- 218 -
The Ee&t $tep
The Next Step
- 219 -
The Ee&t $tep 0 $trate!ic Internet :arketin! Plan

________________________________________________________________________
&d like to take to congratulate ou for getting this far4 I sincerel hope that ou
ha#e found this book to be rele#ant and useful for our needs"
The 13 Pillars isn7t a strate!ic internet marketin! plan But please bear in mind that because the 1 Pillar! o# Internet Marketing book is aimed at pro#iding the reader with an general, broad introduction to internet marketing, it&s been structured in a manner which attempts to make the sub+ect matter as eas to understand as possible" This means that the order in which the 1 Pillar! appear in the book is most likel not the order in which ou would want to implement them in our business"
,sta.lishin! your own strate!ic internet marketin! plan Therefore, the ne$t step, after reading the 12 Eillars of Internet Marketing, is to establish our own internet marketing plan" Thankfull ou4 ou don&t ha#e to do that b ourself, because I&#e alread done it for
It&s called the 89(0eek Internet Marketing Elan, and it&s a free, weekl action( Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om
- 220 -
plan newsletter supported b #ideo tutorials" :ust #isit www"89weekplan"com to sign(up toda "
Internet marketin! techniFues never stand still As Pillar $1 7he K0ol0ing (e) discusses, internet marketing techni/ues ne#er stand still" *ometimes search engine algorithms are continuall altered to tr to counter spammers" On other occasions completel new online business models open up new internet marketing opportunities" That&s another reason wh ou should subscribe to the 89(0eek Internet Marketing Elan newsletter ! ou&ll be kept up to date with all the new techni/ues I consider to be important enough to incorporate into our ongoing strategic internet marketing plan" I look forward to catching up with ou on the www"89weekplan"com website" *a0id 6ain May 2009 OounderG Purple Internet Marketing www.1 pillar!."om U www.2>weekplan."om U www.purpleinternetmarketing."om P*$* If ou found the 1 Pillar! o# Internet Marketing to be #aluable, I&d like to ask one small fa#or3 would ou mind telling a few of our friends about this book@ Eerhaps ou&d be kind enough to share the http677www"12pillars"com link on 'acebook, Twitter or our fa#orite social bookmarking site@ Thanks4 It would be much appreciated4
About the Author
- 221 -
0.out the author
- 222 -
0.out the author

________________________________________________________________________
0.out the author

Ba#id Bain completed his MBA in 8IIM and has run successful internet marketing campaigns for nearl 1I ears" ,e began his internet marketing career b promoting his own websites, an e$ample of which is www"Build1ourOwnBusiness"bi)" In 8IIM, ha#ing alread successfull raised se#eral websites to the top of search engines for competiti#e ke word phrases he started pro#iding search engine optimi)ation ser#ices for clients"
Ba#id Bain
,owe#er, he became frustrated with the number of search engine optimi)ation firms pro#iding ser#ices that didn&t work" That prompted him towards internet marketing training and strateg consulting" Ba#id can be contacted through the 89(0eek Internet Marketing Elan website -www"89weekplan"com." 1ou can keep in touch with him through his Twitter updates at http677twitter"com7Ba#idBain"

13 Pillars

Enviado por

Dados do documento

Direitos autorais

Formatos disponíveis

Compartilhar este documento

Compartilhar ou incorporar documento

Opções de compartilhamento

Você considera este documento útil?

Este conteúdo é inapropriado?

Direitos autorais:

Formatos disponíveis

13 Pillars

Enviado por

Direitos autorais:

Formatos disponíveis

An Introduction to Internet Marketing for Marketing Managers, Business Owners and Entrepreneurs

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

he 1 Pillar! o# Internet Marketing offers a broad introduction to internet

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

Pillar #1 Keyword Research

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

Pillar #1 Keyword Research

Pillar #1 Keyword Research

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

Pillar #1 Keyword Research Determinin! su./ect areas to cover on your we.site

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

Pillar #1 Keyword Research

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

)i!ure 1*5 ! Keyword Tracker Tool

$earchin! (or the keyword 6!ol(7 in 4ordtracker

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

Pillar #1 Keyword Research

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

)i!ure 1*8 Keyword Tracker Tool

Results (rom 4ordtracker a(ter typin! in the term 6sales /o.s7

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

Pillar #1 Keyword Research

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

Pillar #2 Website Design

Pillar #3 4e.site Desi!n

- 22 The use o( cascadin! style sheets

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

;iew o( the pa!e source

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

Pillar #2 Website Design )i!ure 3*< Build%our2wnBusiness

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

Pillar #2 Website Design )i!ure 3*> www*Build%our2wnBusiness*.i9

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

Pillar #2 Website Design

Copyright 2007-2009 Purple Internet Marketing Limited www.1 pillar!."om

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING

Pillar #2 Website Design )i!ure 3> wwwBuild%our2wnBusiness*.i9

THE 13 PILLARS OF INTERNET MARKETING )i!ure 8= $urvey:onkeycom