Archive for Blog/Article Marketing
Personal Branding Is a Must in the Creative Economy
Posted by: | CommentsThe subject of personal branding has been coming up recently with my clients. I’m noticing more of a need for solo-professionals to brand their identity and image.
With the way the economy has shifted in the past year, a strong personal brand is needed more than ever. It used to be okay to be general and undifferentiated, but not any more. You need a clear, compelling message and a strong brand to capture people’s attention quickly. And, you need ongoing branded communication to hold their attention.
Some of the branding mistakes that I see professionals make include:
- Too broad a target market
- Being too general and not specialized enough
- Not being relevant
- Not taking a stand on issues
- Lack of clarity in their marketing message
- Not bringing enough of their personality, passion and purpose into their communication
Patsi Krakoff wrote a very good blog post on “6 Deadly Blog Branding Mistakes to Avoid” for professionals and entrepreneurs. Patsi specializes in helping professionals and entrepreneurs use content marketing and blogs to position themselves and their brand.
If you’re not leading with your purpose and standing out with your message and your brand, you may notice that you capture less and less of the attention of your marketplace.
Attract Lots More Clients and Opportunities by Publishing Articles – Teleseminar
Posted by: | Comments| Sep ’09 |
| 29 |
| 5:00 pm |
“Attract Lots More Clients and Opportunities by Publishing Articles” – Teleseminar with Jan Marie Dore
Tuesday, September 29th at 5pm Eastern / 2pm Pacific
Writing articles on the web is one of the best ways for solo-professionals to attract more clients and attention for their business. Strategically placing articles can literally explode your business. It’s a great way to generate interest in your services and products and to establish yourself as an expert in your field.
You’ll learn the secrets and best practices for writing and publishing effective articles to promote your business. Discover insider article marketing secrets that will establish you as an authority in your area of specialty and attract more qualified visitors to your website. You’ll also get access to the list of the top article sites to submit to.
To get access to this live interview with Q & A, the CD, transcript or learning guide and members forum, become a member of our *Marketing Mastery Teleseminar Training Program*. Sign Up Now for our special 60 Day Membership trial and receive 4 CD’s. You’ll get instant access to our full library of expert interviews, transcripts, training manuals, online resources, masterminding and networking so you can attract more clients and income!
Article Marketing Tip: Write a Top Ten List
Posted by: | CommentsHave you ever had a mental block when you sat down to write an article for your ezine or blog? This can happen if you don’t have a plan for what topics you want to write about.
An easy way to break through this barrier is to write a top 10 list. A top ten list — as we all know from David Letterman — is a list of 10 items on a particular subject.
Examples might be:
- The Top Ten Ways to Strengthen Your Relationship
- Ten Ideas to Jumpstart Your Creativity
- Ten Teambuilding Activities for Leadership Teams
- The Top Ten Ways to Grow Your Business
You get the idea. Once you have your specific title, it’s easy to write up a quick list. Then, just fill in a sentence or two under each bullet point, and you have your article. It’s a really quick way to break through the mental barrier of feeling that you have nothing to say.
Try it and you’ll see. It doesn’t get any simpler than that!
Here’s a great resource from Chris Knight @ezinearticles. It’s a worksheet called
“My Next Ten Article Ideas“.
Content Marketing for Your Business Blog
Posted by: | CommentsA question I hear a lot from my clients is “If I’m publishing both a blog and an ezine, can I use the same content for both?”
I used to think I could, but now I realize that my blog content needs to be different than the articles I publish in my ezine. Blogs are meant to be more conversational, ezines more informational.
Ezine articles are typically designed to inform and educate your readers. Blog posts, on the other hand, are designed to build better relationships with your audience in a more conversational style by sharing your thoughts, experiences and resources. You need to let your personality as well as your expertise shine through on your blog.
Patsi Krakoff at her blog “Writing on the Web” made a great post on “7 Keys to Content Marketing on a Business Blog: Why a blog is not a newsletter“.
Here is Patsi’s list of 7:
Content marketing on your business blog means you must do all of these things:
- Establish your expertise
- Connect and build relationships with readers
- Tell personal stories and share experiences
- Relate to the problems and experiences of readers
- Provide solutions generously (digital downloads, links to other sites and resources)
- Show your personality (video clips, audio interviews)
- Have conversations rather than promote or market
Read Patsi’s full blog post here and share your thoughts and questions below.
Are You An Author with a Blog? Try Amazon Connect
Posted by: | CommentsHave you heard about Amazon Connect for authors to pull their blog RSS feed into Amazon? It’s totally free! You do need to have an Amazon account.
Here’s what Amazon says at the AmazonConnect FAQ page:
What is AmazonConnect?:
AmazonConnect is a program for authors whose titles are sold on Amazon.com. By keeping an AmazonConnect blog, artists can communicate easily and directly with an audience of known customers who have bought their work from Amazon.com.
AmazonConnect is an unprecedented way for you to reach your fans and provides a unique opportunity to increase your customer base. If you already have a website or blog with an RSS feed, it’s easy to automatically have new content you post there appear in your AmazonConnect blog.
This program is free to anyone who has at least one title for sale on Amazon.com.
Find out more at Amazon Connect.
I’m working on my new book and plan to add my blog feed at Amazon when I’m finished.
Anatomy of a great article
Posted by: | CommentsI have found writing and publishing articles to be one of the best ways to get more visitors to my website. I want to share a few tips with you on what makes a great article.
Great articles include the following:
- A great title that highlights a benefit and gets attention
- A beginning, a middle and an end
- Good content that is concisely written, keyword dense, and provides value
- Short paragraphs
- Stay on topic
- Copyright notice
- Author resource box at the bottom
Check your articles to see if they are meeting all these criteria. Sometimes just a little tweaking here and there will turn a good article into a great article.
Happy writing!
Jan Marie
Does a Blog Make Sense for Your Business?
Posted by: | CommentsClick the arrow to listen to Jan Marie Dore reading this article
Everywhere you turn there is a new technology to learn. Web logs(called blogs for short) are among the latest developments that have become very popular in the past few years.
Blogs are the biggest outbreak of information since the internet began. According to Business Week “Blogs are a phenomenon that you cannot ignore, postpone, or delegate. Given the changes barreling down upon us, blogs are not a business elective. They’re a prerequisite.”
If you’re thinking about blogging for business, how can you be sure it won’t just be a waste of your precious time?
A blog can be used to develop a good, two-way relationship with prospects and clients and really connect with them. Blogs are a great way to engage your audience into two-way conversation instead of the old one-way conversation of a website. By inviting comments, you open the door to a dialogue, which in turn can lead to long lasting relationships with clients.
A blog can position you as an expert in your topic area. Business blogs can provide a commentary, opinion and advice on a specialized subject. As you regularly post and add content to your blog, over time it can raise your status and visibility in your area of expertise.
Blogs give you the opportunity to give your readers up to the minute news in your industry. That way, you can be seen as the ‘go to’ person on your specialized topic.
Having a blog will raise your profile and potentially get you noticed by the media and search engines. Blogging done right can enhance your business reputation and build your platform. It can be a huge boon to your business.
Is a blog the best use of your time right now?
There’s a downside to starting a blog. It requires a significant investment of time and making posts and keeping current in your specialty in order to stand out as a market leader. It also takes time to build readership and a community of people around your area of focus.
But, blogs are inexpensive to launch and can be easy to maintain. A blog can be managed in as little as an hour a week. You can write three short, concise posts and perhaps a longer article all at the same time and schedule them to go out every other day.
And, if you plan a strategy for growth over twelve months, before you know it you’ll be a top expert in your field from all the reading and writing you’ve done and you’ll have lots of readers.
The cost of publishing your valuable information is next to nothing. All it takes is some of your time – and you can delegate much of that.
If you are passionate about communicating on a subject you love, a blog is a great outlet to share your interest and your distinctive voice and spread your enthusiasm. Share your thoughts, insights and opinions and invite people to respond.
Publish, share, and influence. What could be more fun or more meaningful than that?
Technorati Tags: small business marketing, small business strategy, attract clients, blogging for business
| Jan ’09 |
| 7 |
| 5:00 pm |
How to Use Your Blog For More Than Just Blogging with Special Guest Expert Sandra de Freitas
One of the most important things professionals need in order to successfully market their service, product, a book or get speaking gigs, is a ready-made audience and systems for marketing their work. If you want to build an audience, attract the media and sell more products and services, blogging is one of the very best and least expensive platform-building and marketing strategies. And, you can do so much more with your blog!
What you’ll learn:
- How to use your blog for more than just blogging
- How to determine your Selling Strategy
- Selling and distributing your digital products from your blog
- Selling from your sidebar
- Creating a membership site using WordPress
About Sandra De Freitas
Sandra De Freitas is a top tech coach, speaker, trainer and expert in internet technology. She is the founder of TechCoachForCoaches.com, a successful coaching, consulting and training firm. Her clients include coaches, entrepreneurs, small business owners, online business owners and health care professionals.
Sandra gets a kick out of clients who walk into you her programs as self proclaimed “technophobes” and leave tech geniuses! She is fascinated by internet marketing, search engine optimization and WordPress. Sandra is the author of the book “Does This Blogsite Make My Wallet Look Fat?”
To purchase this audio program
- Download this teleseminar and many other special topic interviews, with a trial membership in the FemalePreneurs.com Ask The Experts Business Success Coaching Club.
- Or, to purchase this audio and transcript and other expert teleseminars visit our Online Store.
Technorati Tags: small business marketing, small business coaching, attract more clients, women entrepreneur
Article Marketing: Twelve Tips for Writing Articles to Grow Your Business
Posted by: | CommentsClick the arrow to listen to Jan Marie Dore reading this article
Writing articles is one of the best ways to market your professional services. Listing your articles online at article directories and article banks will drive traffic back to your website.
Here are twelve simple tips to get you started writing articles:
1) Treat Article Writing as a Creative Process
I like to write my articles in a different space from where I do my day to day work. I have a separate desk that has objects that call forth my writing muse, such as photos, colored markers and other colorful objects, and lots of space. I put on music that will inspire me to tap into the deeper message of what I want to say.
2) List Five Topics You Are Passionate About
An exercise I give to many of my clients is to write a long list of topics they could speak on or write about. Most are pleasantly surprised to discover that there are many things they could write about even if they thought they had nothing to say.
3) Start an Idea File
Gather ideas on these topics from websites or other articles you read. Save them in a paper folder or a folder on your computer. When the time comes to write, pull out your idea file to get your creative ideas flowing.
4) Block out Time to Write
Time blocking is an effective way to accomplish any task. Make an appointment with yourself to write, and don’t let anything interfere.
5) Just Start Writing
The hardest part of writing is getting started. Once you put that first word on the blank page, you’re half way there.
6) Write Quickly
Write a rough first draft quickly. Don’t edit or censor or format. Don’t be concerned on the first try with correct spelling or grammar. Just get what you want to say down on paper. The editing can come later when it won’t interfere with your creative process.
7) Think About the Questions Your Article Will Answer
Use your article to answer key questions that your clients are asking. Write out those questions, and provide them with solutions in your article.
.8) Give Concise, Useful Information
How-to articles are very popular and useful. Give your article an angle based on what your best clients want to know.
9) Write for a Targeted Niche
Create a profile of your ideal audience. Writing experts suggest that you write to just one person who would represent a composite of several of your clients.
10) Find an Accountability Partner
Find a writing accountability partner or writing support group to keep your focused and on task. If you can’t find a support group, start your own with other people you know who want to do more writing. You can review and give feedback on each other’s work.
11) Create Titles that Grab Attention
Start with a draft title. Once the article is written, give the title a little more punch by adding a benefit driven statement in the headline using your keywords.
12) Create an Editorial Calendar and Timeline
Plan ahead of time the topics you will write about and when you’ll write them. For example, if you plan to write one article a week, make a chart with the dates and the topics you will write about. This makes it much easier when the time comes to sit down and write.
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Want a great resource for promoting your business by publishing articles? See my ebook Article Marketing Simplified: the Eight Step System for Attracting More Clients and Sales by Writing Articles.
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Copyright © Jan Marie Dore ~ www.janmariedore.com ~ All rights reserved.Jan Marie Dore, ‘The Women Entrepreneurs’ Success Coach’, Master Certified Coach, Speaker, and Author, publishes valuable ideas to grow a professional service business and increase profitability in her newsletter ‘Success Secrets for Women Entrepreneurs’.
Jan Marie teaches self-employed female professionals to attract more clients and financial success, and as a result, live extraordinary lives. For free resources and programs on marketing a professional practice please visit Femalepreneurs.com and read the Blog Success Secrets.
Technorati Tags: small business marketing, article marketing, writing articles, publishing articles online
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Jan Marie Dore is a small business coaching expert and Master Certified Coach (MCC) who mentors creative, entrepreneurial women to attract more clients and design highly profitable businesses around their passion, purpose and expertise. Jan founded 
