SEO - Getting Started
If you’re anything like most people getting started, you’ve probably created a brand new website, hoping that the search engines will happen by and just love your site and hoped that people would mysteriously show up at your site and buy whatever it is you were selling.
After a couple of weeks go by and only a few stragglers show up at your website. After continuing your research, you decide to try and “optimize” your website around your main keyword in hopes that you just might rank well in 1 of the millions of search engines.
Another couple of weeks go by and still no luck.
At this point you probably give up and decide to either build another website around a different target market or just lose all hope and quit.
Well, here’s a news flash for you, as you’ve probably figured out by now, this is not the way to go about doing things.
Let me give you a specific example of what your very first steps MUST be when creating any website.
Before we get into the details of SEO, let’s back up a step and talk about giving our eventual SEO work a fighting chance.
The idea behind our website endeavor is to make make money… and in order to that you’ve got to spend some quality time doing your keyword research.
Let’s take weight loss as an example. As you would guess, this is a huge market. It is inhabited by some very strong power hitters in the online game.
In our example we figure well sell an eBook or two and promote a couple quality affiliate partners. But if we head off building our site around the keyword ‘weigh loss’ … we’ll be in for long dry spell.
In our example you would never start out trying to optimize your page for ‘weight loss’.
Let’s take a quick peek at Google so I can show you exactly how many websites are competing for this keyword. If we go to Google and enter “weight loss”, you’ll see there are almost 2.7 million web pages competing for this keyword phrase!
By the end of this course you’ll be able to better take on the big time keywords, but when you are just getting started with your website, the goal is to get some air under your wings and experience some type of success… and grow from there.
The idea behind our website endeavor is to make make money… and in order to that you’ve got to spend some quality time doing your keyword research.
Let’s take weight loss as an example. As you would guess, this is a huge market. It is inhabited by some very strong power hitters in the online game.
In our example we figure well sell an eBook or two and promote a couple quality affiliate partners. But if we head off building our site around the keyword ‘weigh loss’ … we’ll be in for long dry spell.
In our example you would never start out trying to optimize your page for ‘weight loss’.
Let’s take a quick peek at Google so I can show you exactly how many websites are competing for this keyword. If we go to Google and enter “weight loss”, you’ll see there are almost 2.7 million web pages competing for this keyword phrase!
By the end of this course you’ll be able to better take on the big time keywords, but when you are just getting started with your website, the goal is to get some air under your wings and experience some type of success… and grow from there.
In order to give yourself your best chance at success, keyword research is at the core. Since beginning in my online business I have used Wordtracker and KeywordElite.
Wordtracker is a subscription service and has long been the industry standard in keyword research. If you’ve not seen or used Wordtracker before, here is a link to their free guide.
As for desktop applications, for my money Keywordelite is the way to go. I’ve used it for years, and can tell you this software is directly responsible for much of my online financial success with the websites I’ve developed.
So, take a step back from your rush to get a website out amongst the crowd… give yourself your best chance and do your keyword research first… the work you do on the front end will pay off much better for you on the back end.
What Is Niche Marketing - Do I Need It?
In ecology, a niche refers to the place or position occupied by an organism or a population within an ecological community called the ecosystem. It is the term which defines the role the organism or the population plays in the general scheme of things. The niche an organism or a population holds is the one responsible for dictating the ability of the species to survive. It is the one which spells whether an organism or a population will perish or thrive.
In marketing, a niche refers to a service or a product that occupies a special area of demand. It is that small corner in the market that accounts for a certain kind of specialty concerning an unmet customer need. To be able to attract a strong, solid market, the choice of a niche product should ultimately complement the website one owns. It is through this scheme that he is able to generate a specific market for the niche product he is trying to sell.
Niches are involved in niche marketing, the process of finding market segments that are small but potentially profitable nonetheless. To maintain a profitable quantity of sales, this marketing strategy relies on increasing the loyalty of customers so that their corporate objectives will be met or surpassed. Illustrative of this is the fact that the quality of the product or service sold will generate customer satisfaction and, consequently, customer loyalty. The result is profitability garnered through a solid market base that trusts in the ability of the product or service to really deliver.
One of the great things about niche marketing is that it encourages those who indulge in it to be unique and one-of-a-kind. Here one is not forced into the lion’s den and made to compete against established marketers. He is made to occupy a strong and secure position that ultimately wins him a real place in the market. Niche marketing differs from other online marketing strategies because this particular quality allows it to operate almost autonomously and without having to contend with corporate sharks that tear each other to pieces.
One of the most important things that should be thought over by those involved in this type of business is the niche business that is going to be involved in the process. It is important to consider the type of business that one is going to work on to be able to ensure himself of the success that he hopes to have. It is also important for him to know everything about the niche business at hand. Learning the tricks of the trade in is one of the things that one could do to make a niche business prosper tremendously.
Being able to reach the niche market is another consideration to make. In doing so, one should know the exact phrases that people are searching for. The use of tools can help a lot in knowing the type of keywords that should be used to make the business profitable. Targeting the right keywords does a lot in making this type of business soar.
Those who engage in niche marketing know that determining the potential of a niche before doing everything else is a must if one wants to save all the time and effort that might be wasted if he plunges into everything head on. Building a niche marketing site that proves to be profitable should be done after an unsatisfied customer demand is identified, and marketing the site appropriately by reaching out to customers the best possible way is what niche marketers should consider if they want their business to reach skyrocketing success.
Is niche marketing needed in a world teeming with a hundred like systems designed for people to make money online? Those who know how the system works will answer in the affirmative, because niche marketing is the only system capable of filling up a gaping hole in the market by catering to the unsatisfied needs of customers - needs that are usually not given notice by those in the big league. Though niche marketing, one is able to gain a foothold in the market by being a needle in a haystack. Small and inconspicuous it may be, but its ability to sting someone so madly once it is found will render him more than surprised.
3 Things All Affiliate Marketers Need To Survive Online
Every affiliate marketer is always looking for the successful market that gives the biggest paycheck. Sometimes they think it is a magic formula that is readily available for them. Actually, it is more complicated than that. It is just good marketing practices that have been proven over years of hard work and dedication.
There are tactics that have worked before with online marketing and is continuing to work in the online affiliate marketing world of today. With these top three marketing tips, you will be able to able to increase your sales and survive in the affiliate marketing online.
What are these three tactics?
1. Using unique web pages to promote each separate product you are marketing. Do not lump all of it together just to save some money on web hosting. It is best to have a site focusing on each and every product and nothing more.
Always include product reviews on the website so visitors will have an initial understanding on what the product can do to those who buys them. Also include testimonials from users who have already tried the product. Be sure that these customers are more than willing to allow you to use their names and photos on the site of the specific product you are marketing.
You can also write articles highlighting the uses of the product and include them on the website as an additional page. Make the pages attractive compelling and include calls to act on the information. Each headline should attract the readers to try and read more, even contact you. Highlight your special points. This will help your readers to learn what the page is about and will want to find out more.
2. Offer free reports to your readers. If possible position them at the very top side of your page so it they simply cannot be missed. Try to create autoresponder messages that will be mailed to those who input their personal information into your sign up box. According to research, a sale is closed usually on the seventh contact with a prospect.
Only two things can possibly happen with the web page alone: closed sale or the prospect leaving the page and never return again. By placing useful information into their inboxes at certain specified period, you will remind them of the product they thought they want later and will find out that the sale is closed. Be sure that the content is directed toward specific reasons to buy the product. Do not make it sound like a sales pitch.
Focus on important points like how your product can make life and things easier and more enjoyable. Include compelling subject lines in the email. As much as possible, avoid using the word “free” because there are still older spam filters that dumps those kind of contents into the junk before even anyone reading them first. Convince those who signed up for your free reports that they will be missing something big if they do not avail of your products and services.
3. Get the kind of traffic that is targeted to your product. Just think, if the person who visited your website has no interest whatsoever in what you are offering, they will be among those who move on and never come back. Write articles for publication in e-zines and e-reports. This way you can locate publications that is focusing on your target customers and what you have put up might just grab their interest.
Try to write a minimum of 2 articles per week, with at least 300-600 words in length. By continuously writing and maintaining these articles you can generate as many as 100 targeted readers to your site in a day.
Always remember that only 1 out of 100 people are likely to buy your product or get your services. If you can generate as much as 1,000 targeted hits for your website in a day, that means you can made 10 sales based on the average statistic.
The tactics given above does not really sound very difficult to do, if you think about it. It just requires a little time and an action plan on your part.
Try to use these tips for several affiliate marketing programs. You can end maintaining a good source of income and surviving in this business that not all marketers can do.
Besides, think of the huge paychecks you will be receiving…
