Content Magician, Freelance web content writers

Archive for the ‘Online Marketing’ Category

The economy is in a slump and people are turning to the internet to make some money. As a professional freelance writer, I sincerely feel that while it’s great that the internet is providing many people a rope to cling on during this troubling time, businesses trying to find professional freelance writers for their web content or online marketing methods should be cautious about it.

The internet has become a breeding ground for all sorts of aspiring professional freelance writer. I am not being jealous because I am, frankly, thankful that there is a whole pool of new talents out there for me to tap into. I love that part of the bargain. But based on my experience as a professional freelance writer, there are problems that we need to face. There are so many of them out there right now, how do we know who is a good professional freelance writer and who isn’t?

The line has been blurred once again. The only time I remember this happening was when blogs become popular. Everyone became a journalist! As fun as it was to read into the lives of all those people who write blogs, it’s hard to find one that really rocks.

I hire one or two professional freelance writers to help me out with my work sometimes when I am bogged down with work or when there’s an emergency. I value the availability of my professional freelance writer…but I’ve had my fair share of bad experiences in the past. Hiring a professional freelance writer who does not write well and writes for SEO purposes ONLY gives me a blinding headache! Thankfully, over the years, I’ve found some professional freelance writer who are, indeed, very professional about their work, puts their heart into every single word that they write.

SEO writing is fabulous, I know, but it’s hard to find someone who can write SEO stuff without compromising on the quality of the articles. The professional freelance writer has to be experienced in balancing out the SEO part of the writing process and also the connectivity of the article. There’s really no point in writing SEO articles without trying to make SOME sense.

So, before you hire a professional freelance writer, check into the writer’s background and ask for some samples. Don’t make the mistake of hiring the first SEO writer that promises you a low price because you may regret it, at the end of the day.

It’s been a long but enjoyable day. But before I pull the plug on this tremendously relaxing Saturday, I would to share something with you and it’s got to do with how people are going about this whole online marketing thing wrong.

It’s my personal opinion that there’s one way to turn people off online. The only surefire way to lose the fight in this very tiny battlefield is to stick to a formula that you know works. The old method used to work well, I know, but with the economy down in the gutter, everyone’s using the same formula. PLUS, the same formula is costing us too much money.

So, the traditional way of marketing is to knock down every single door you see and shove your products and services into their faces and refuse to leave until they succumb to your harassment. You could advertise in the newspaper but it’s getting expensive. You could hire a new marketing guy but it takes time to train someone new and you can’t exactly afford to hire anyone new at this point in time. You could revamp your brand but every single idea you’re going to have involves spending money.

The logical thing to do is to jump into the internet marketing bandwagon, right?

That’s the right thing to do, I am not saying you’re wrong, but don’t do it blindly and don’t just hand THE FIRST PERSON you know to do the job. You can’t because whatever they do online (and they can do this without waiting for a memo to be passed during a Board of Directors’ meeting) will affect your image! Hire the wrong person and you’re screwed.

In online social media, or the Web 2.0 as some people prefer to call it, it’s imperative that you sell yourself correctly. But you’re not selling your products and services, you’re selling a brand. You’re promoting loyalty. You’re encouraging people to get to know you better. You want to create a personality….a sort of stickiness on the internet that helps people remember you and come back for more.

With more and more people with the same social media marketing modus operandi, you can only create awareness by selling YOURSELF as a brand. You connect with people. You make yourself heard. You make friends and help people understand what kind of person YOU ARE before you get them to understand what you do for a living.

It doesn’t matter whether you’re a business or a freelancer! You’ve got to make that CONNECTION with others in order to get online social media marketing to work for you. Shall I say it again for good measure? OK. CONNECTION!

For a business, you can hire someone (or use someone who is currently on your payroll) to create an online persona for your business. And this personality is to connect with people, share his or her experience (on a personal or professional level) with people he or she knows.

It’s plain and simple.

The old method of PUSHING no longer works. Writing notes or blog posts about how WONDERFUL YOU ARE and how amazing your products and services are, shoving your potential clients’ faces into the brochures, flyers, profiles….they don’t work anymore. Blow your own trumpet and watch flocks of potential customers run off in the opposite direction!

It’s now time for some PULLING instead. And friends….the only way to pull is to attract. The only way to attract is to get personal.

Whenever someone writes up a content for their web page, they’re thinking, ALWAYS, about how many people are going to be seeing this thing. How many people are going to be READING the article….but how many, do you think, will think along the lines of ‘how many people will actually ACT and positively react to this article?’

It’s startling that even some really experienced internet marketers and freelance writers don’t look at the way people react to their online articles. All care and concerned is focused on keyword, keyword and keyword. And then it’s all about where is it on Google every month, every week and they hawk over the google pagerank…and THEN the site visits every day thinking again and again…how many people are reading this.

What we should be thinking about when we write up a web content is to think about the quality discussion, engagement and conversion (into fans or sale) because of that article. Isn’t THAT the ultimate deal in the first place…that your web content is converting your site visitors into customers? It’s really befuddling.

What some people do to convert their website visitors into customers is to put into a call to action. But this, at the end of the day relies on how credible people think you are based on your web content and how much you’ve written in that article to break past the resistance and skepticism to purchase from your website. A website does not have to have a million website visitors or ten thousand people who read the web content in order to make it big. Let’s face it, a small website can make tons more money than a high traffic website if the web traffic is good. It depends, as said, on the conversion rate, how you’ve established the connection with the website visitor with your web content and also how much effort you’ve put into the web content to convince them that you’re worth your salt.

If you’re using Google’s Analytics, you’ll see something called conversion. Not a lot of people look at that – instead they’ll head straight for the hit count or the number of page views. I would like many other website owners to realize that it means nothing in the dollar sense when no one’s believing a word you say nor are they talked into purchasing something from you….if you have something to offer, that is…which I am assuming you do if you’re reading this article till this particular sentence.

The next time you log into your web stats, take a look, also, at how long these people are staying on your pages. How many pages do they go through and what’s your web content’s conversion rate..

If you’re really good at what you do, usually, it results in being paid more for the same kind of stuff that other newbies have to offer simply because when you’re an experienced freelance web content writer or search engine marketer or online promoter, people have the assurance of knowing that you know what you’re doing. It’s as simple as that. But because many of my clients are new to internet marketing, they tend to compare.

Anyway, that’s not what I am gripping about today.

The thing with some website owners is that whenever they think of search engine marketing, they think that search engine optimization is the be-all and end-all. Sadly, I am here to tell you that THAT cannot be further from the truth.

Listen, if you expect loads of traffic and an incredible jump in sales just because you’ve had your website search engine optimized, you’re in for a big disappointed. There’s more to internet market than just SEO (search engine optimization).

SEO is merely when you get someone to make your website really search engine friendly….and also place some important keywords here and there. That, in itself, makes you an acquaintance with the spiders that crawl your pages. What you’re really, REALLY looking for if sales is your target, is for the search engines to fall in love with you.

As with a woman prettying herself up to impress a potential life partner, you need to promote your website or blog out there in cyberspace CONSISTENTLY. It’s a lot of work but if you do it right, I promise you that you will reap the rewards in a couple of months’ time.

So, in conclusion, I would like to help you understand that search engine optimization is not the end-all and be-all. It’s not a magic wand, and it’s only the start of a very intriguing, manipulative, challenging but profitable online presence.

Where I live, people…business people tend to be more than a little uncomfortable about trying out internet marketing ideas and search engine optimization tactics. They would rather sit it out and WAIT FOR SOMETHING TO HAPPEN to their websites. A relative, with whom I spoke extensively with about search engine optimization and internet marketing, said that it would be OK with him if he just waited it out and see if he could get lucky!

There is no such thing as getting lucky with internet marketing. It’s either you put effort into it or you DON’T. Look, the Internet is a wonderful stage for business website owners. It’s the single one available vehicle to us that allows us a stage as big as television….bigger. And everyone’s fighting for footspace in cyberspace.

My question would be this…how does LUCK come into the picture when there are tens of thousands, perhaps millions, of people fighting for the first three pages of a popular search engine results page? If it’s so easy, why don’t everyone just hold back on the search engine optimization and internet marketing startegies, save the money and just wait for Lady Luck to smile at them.

Who knows? Maybe she takes turns?

If one wants a piece of the pie in cyberspace, it’s imperative for one to out effort in promoting one’s website or blog online. It just does not appear on your lap for no resaon whatsoever.

And frankly speaking, it’s not even that hard to do on your own. All it takes is a willing heart and an open mind….or is it the other way around.

Till this very day, I am still surprised with the number of people and companies in my own country’s, Malaysia, ignorance and indifference to the importance of search engine promotion. Malaysia search engine promotion industry is still at an infancy stage whereby the SEO industry and online marketing sector in other countries like Hong Kong, Singapore, Indonesia and Taiwan has grown tremendously over the years…well, after Facebook came about, I guess everyone started realizing just important it is to be ‘present’.

Not only should a Malaysia company focused on search engine promotion be ‘present’ ONE TIME but all the time, as many times as possible! I’ve said many times before and I guess I’ll waste those precious few taps to say it a few times again…it’s all about online activities and communication with the readers. Malaysian companies who are looking for search engine marketing and promotion methods should look beyond the ‘paid advertising’ method because there’s more to online marketing than placement of banners and text links.

I assure you, Malaysian companies, that the banner advertisement is the easier way to doing things but in terms of search engine marketing or a Malaysian company, that’s a short term solution and if you do your math, the ROI isn’t impressive at all.

Focus, instead of bringing in good content through good search engine marketing methods for your Malaysian website selling Malaysian products and services in the International arena. Rope the readers in and do everything you can, within your power, to keep the Malaysian or readers from other countries from clicking away and never coming back.

To me and to a lot of other search engine marketing experts, this is the essence of search engine optimization and building an online presence – regardless of whether you’re a Malaysian company serving only Malaysian companies or individuals or an International brand.

The world is your stage where internet is concerned and when you use the right internet marketing methods and search engine marketing strategy for your Malaysian-based website, you can reach beyond what you dream of.

Right now, the focus of your attention could be merely Malaysian consumers…but think in the long run. What happens when you are looking for foreign investors? What happens when you need help in terms of technology? How are people going to view your Malaysian company with very little internet marketing and search engine optimization done to your website if they see that you’re not innovative and quick enough to catch on the digital wave?

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
The author is a Malaysian-based freelance writer, graphic designer and occasional singer who’s been in the internet marketing, content development and search engine optimization field for more than a decade. For more info, visit her website at http://www.marshamaung.com or her blog at http://www.marshamaung.blogspot.com.

Many moons and circles of the moon around the earth ago, I came upon this term called ‘stickiness’. When you think sticky, you’re probably thinking about either honey or glue…never would I have imagined someone calling a website sticky. Sticky is annoying and if you have super glue on, I don’t think it’s a good kind of sticky we’re talking about.

So, where was I?

Oh. Yeah, stickiness of a website. Basically, when you read an article or a web content about stickiness, it’s referring to how ‘interesting’, ‘unique’ or ‘interesting’ the website is and are you doing enough to bring your readers back to the website. It also means that are you drawing a loyal crowd of readers to your website.

There are a lot of ways to make your website sticky.

• Creative content that is fast, accurate and don’t beat around the bush
• Interesting news that they can’t anywhere else just as fast
• Cute or funny pictures
• Cool tools that they can use for their website
• Music or cartoons
• Polls and interactive ‘online toys’ that they can play with or participate in
• Regular reply from the webmaster or the writer or the owner of the website that encourages interaction between owner/writer and reader/visitors.

There’s really no point in keeping a website going unless you put some effort to make it sticky. Just imagine this…if you want to promote a website that isn’t sticky, you’ll have to keep promoting the website to people you meet online and offline one million times before you get to see the ten thousand unique visitors that you’re looking for.

But if your website is sticky, then you promote the website one million times and you probably keep right about five hundred thousand of the visitors who come to your website.

Now, isn’t that an interesting fact?

Of course, I’m just pulling the figure out from nowhere but I am sure I am not at all that far off mark. If you search the internet, you’ll probably find some stats that can show you that online marketing and promotion of a website is about stickiness and how well you build connection with your site visitors and then build a bridge of loyalty between you and them so much so that they are willing to come back to your website time and time again…without you having to remind them or beg them to come back for another visit. 

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Marsha Maung is a Malaysian-based freelance writer with two kids. She spends her time ferrying her kids around, watering her plants, writing web content, SEO stuff, ghostwriting books and also indulges in the occasional Facebook-ing. Visit her blog for more dirty details on the life and times of a mother, writer, designer, housekeeper, coffee-maker, poop-wiper, chef…and just about everything else under the sun. 

    href=”http://www.social-bookmark-script.com/” target=”_blank”>Social Bookmarks 

<a href=”http://www.social-bookmark-script.com/” target=”_blank”>Social Bookmarks</a>

While there aren’t too many reasons why one should change the content of one’s web content on a home page, especially if it’s listed well with the major search engine, I strongly encourage people to consider giving the web content of the important pages of their website a little bit of a facelift once in a while. Why? Well, here are some reasons.

Changes…the search engine might come back and find new web content

Search engines generally like to see some form of activity on a home page, especially when they come back from time to time to index your web pages. If you let the web content remain stagnant for too long, the search engines might think that you’ve abandoned the webpage or website hence, there will no longer be any changes to it….ultimately, without changes to the web content on your website, the search engines might think it’s either a dying one…or a dead one.

Readers love changes to the web content too

There’s nothing duller than to come back to a website to find the same web content over and over again. Not only is it a lackluster approach to marketing, it’s also the lazy man’s way of selling. If you want to keep your readers, it’s advisable for you to consider changing the web content to your web pages accordingly.

To add something new, inform potential clients and attract new results

If you have a good listing in major search engines, I can understand why you are apprehensive about changing ANYTHING in your website, not to mention the keywords! I know I would be thinking twice, three times no, ten times before I changed a single thing on the homepage of my website if it ranked well for the keyword that I wanted.

But this is the way it is. Sometimes you need to alter the web content a little bit here and there. Or you can take the opportunity to release some news bits or inform or excite your website visitors.

Web content is an extremely powerful marketing tool. Don’t believe a word I said, just ask around amongst the search engine marketing experts yourself!

***Tina Park***

<a href=”http://www.social-bookmark-script.com/” target=”_blank”>Social Bookmarks</a>

Social bookmarking is a big thing now and we should make every effort to wobble our way into this whole social bookmarking thing - especially when we’re a bunch of word weirdos, right? We’ve got all the content in the world so, why aren’t people coming back for more.

You see, there’s this really huge problem with writing. And the problem is called ‘writing well’ or ‘writing something worth reading’.

I see an incredibly half-hearted efforts out there that makes no attempt whatsoever at trying to inform, impress, entertain, educate or tickle the readers.

When we write the content for our blogs, we should imagine our readers and audience sitting right there in front of us…waiting to be entertained. It’s only when we make an effort to write good blog content and update the blog with writing worth reading and coming back for will we see an increase in traffic, better branding, increased sales and blog popularity.

It’s time to change the 5-minute blog posting thing unless it’s a personal site. If you’re in it for the business, it’s time to buy the thinking cap, put it on before you start writing for your blog.

Write well enough, my advice is, to get your blog or blog content bookmarked by others or emailed to others.

If you’ve set up your website and done a few ‘Google’ searches on Search Engine Rankings - you’ve probably learned that keywords are at the heart of Internet searches. They are the link between the searcher and their destination - the journey of any internet searcher starts with typing those few words into their favoured search engine. Everyone who has ever used the internet has started this journey so you are very well placed to appreciate the psychology of the process.

Let me make a simple but perhaps not obvious point in this article to help you choose the keywords to center your site around ( this is what you need to do to attract search engine traffic)

The pursuit of some common single keyword is often the goal of the new webmaster. To reach page one in Yahoo or Google for a common keyword is no easy task and it will definitely gain you traffic. Yet before you pour huge resources, time and effort into achieving this goal - step back and think about who would actually type these words into a search engine…

Some examples Double Glazing firm decides to target the keyword - ‘windows’. Firstly they are in for a shock if they hadn’t already realized they are now in direct competition with one of the World’s largest companies - Microsoft. Of course Microsoft probably don’t have an interest in installing double glazing in all the homes in Birmingham but that’s who you are competing against. The problem is the search engine has very little way of working out what the searcher wants if he types in just ‘windows’. Most will focus on the software but toss in a few high ranking non-software windows web sites just in case - try it and see what you get. This query is typed in approximately 9 million times a month - lets be honest how many of these are potential customers of our west midlands double glazing firm. Lets compare this with the phase ‘double glazed windows’ which is searched for by about 27,000 in the UK - which group would you want to view your website ? (please click the read more link below) (more…)