Learn how to blog and become a…. PRO Blogger

10 Exciting Pro Blogger Tips on Social Media Marketing

Did you know that 82% of marketers who blog consistently (at least on a weekly basis) -acquired a customer from using their blog, as opposed to 57% of marketers who blog sporadically or only monthly?

I do believe this but have been unable to do so due to being very ill recently. I am feeling better but re-publishing this article today. Hope to get back to my regular duties of blogging and working at the Power Affiliate Club.

Businesses that blog get 97% more inbound links – And since social media and blogging are so closely tied together, you’ll also want to track which of your posts are being shared the most on social media. More on this …

1. Do Your Homework – Keyword Research
One of the biggest benefits of blogging…it brings organic traffic from the search engines. Having your site seen much more is relevant to your industry.  Google loves this. One of the first steps in the process of getting more search traffic through blogging is by doing your keyword research well.

So What Is Keyword Research?
It is the process of finding the different search phrases and terms that your customers would use to find your website.  So write blog topics that target these specific phrases. If one of your keywords is “social media branding.” That might inspire a blog post called ” Ultimate Guide to Personal Social Media Branding.”

Most marketers start with Google AdWords Keyword Planner as their keyword tool of choice because it’s free and produced by the leading search engine. You will need a Google AdWords account to use this tool, but all you need to do is create the account — you do not have to run any ads, you just use the research tool for your keywords. Some keywords I chose for this article – blog  1M-10M Low  / how to become a blogger  1K – 10K Medium/pro blogger   1K – 10K low

2. Learn From Your Competitors
If your competitors are blogging, and they’re successful, then you should spend some time examining what they’re doing. Try to implement similar strategies on your own blog.

For example, if you notice a lot of your competitors’ blog posts are lists, and they’re getting shared heavily on social media, then it’s probably a good idea to start creating some “Social media…” list posts for your own blog. eg. 8 ways to…. Or if you see that they’re marketing heavily on Facebook to push traffic to their blog, then you ought to be getting more familiar with Facebook and it’s Ads using the Power Editor.

I follow many successful marketers. I get great ideas from seeing what successful marketers are doing. I sign up for their newsletters and my email box gives me many ideas on what to work on adding my own twist.

3. Let Your Own Personality Shine Through
There’s nothing worse than reading a  bland, boring blog post. In a world where companies tip-toe around saying the wrong thing, many businesses are afraid of being a little edgy or entertaining with their content. However, the companies that are really seeing the most success with their blogs are the ones that inject humor and fun into them. FUN! Think of the commercials for Bud Wiser with their horses.

4. Remember to Grow Your Email List
Building your email list is HUGE. Setting up an email subscribe form on your blog should be your #one priority. If you come up with an irresistible gift, people are happy to join your list so you can have them get to know who you are and what you can do for them. More on this below.

While people will find your blog through the Google search engine, social media or links from other sites, if they leave your site after getting their information, well you just lost a lead. Give something away: Create a free report, offer a coupon code or make a free guide to entice people to sign up to your list. Get their email address by offering something of great value that they won’t refuse.  Give them your best info for FREE. They will be interested in what else you have and buy from you later on.

That is why there is a HUGE focus being put on getting people to follow you or your company on Twitter, or like your Facebook Page. Rightfully so!

Social media marketing is VERY important, but email gives you an even closer way to connect with your audience because you can contact them directly. There are 3x the number of emails out there as there are Facebook and Twitter accounts combined. Be sure to stand out with your email titles.

Here Are Some Tips On Growing Your Email List:
Make a strong CTA -Call To Action: People are very understandably protective of giving out their email address. Make your call-to-action so appealing that they can’t resist. Offer something irresistible.

Experiment: Try placing forms as pop-ups, in your sidebar, before/after blog posts, the top of the screen and other locations to see what converts the best. SumoMe  http://sumome.com/ It also comes as a plugin, for WordPress.

Keep In Touch: If you’re only sending out emails once every three months, your list won’t pick up much traction. Try emailing a few times a week, or at least once a week. See my sign up form for emails on weekends. Marketing and social media tips and tricks. 

5. Create a Blogging Schedule
Being consistent in blogging, it keeps people coming back. Not only that but publishing blogs on a regular schedule can even lead to more subscribers. They get to know like and trust you and enjoy visiting your blog on a regular basis.

From  (Be a Better Blogger), the company tested the difference between posting five days a week versus once a week. Here are the results:
. Social shares increased 84%
. Comments increased 119%
. Traffic increased 46%

Posting five days a week can be a challenge,  I posted on a regular basis for a PAC Challenge for a few weeks.  Ideally, you should push for two to five new posts a week. But if you can publish at least once a week, you’re still doing better than companies that only blog once a month or less.

6. Don’t be all about the Sale
While your blog is a promotional tool. Blogging does generate leads, however, that is not the purpose of the blog. If you want people to know about your services, they should be able to go to your services page and read about them there.

Your blog is where you provide helpful information that they can benefit from somehow. So offer your audience and your potential customers’ value through your free content, and once you have built up that know like and trust factor, then the sales process doesn’t feel forced it will seem very natural.

7. Make Your Blog Posts Look Good
Too many blog posts are huge walls of text. Reading a blog post shouldn’t be like reading through a college research paper. What do you like to see on any blog?  Images that are beautiful or interesting.

Your blog posts should be visually appealing.
That means:
Using lists
Using images
Using bold and italics
Using Headings
Using a nice sized font (preferably 16px)
Keeping paragraphs short and sweet (two to four sentences)

If You’re Having Trouble Coming Up With Great Blog Post Title:
You can use tools like HubSpot’s Blog Topic Generator. Simply enter up to three of your keyword phrases, and HubSpot will start by suggesting some good titles.

http://www.hubspot.com/blog-topic-generator

Or you can use Co-Schedules Free Headline Analyser. http://coschedule.com/headline-analyzer#

It gives you a list of what you try.

61 -10 Exciting Tips Pro Bloggers use in Content Marketing
62 – 10 Exciting Tips That Pro Bloggers use in Content Marketing
65 -10 Exciting Tips That Pro Bloggers us in Social Media Marketing
69 -10 Exciting Pro Blogger Tips on social media marketing
63 – 10 Pro Blogger Tips on content and social media marketing
54 – 10 Pro Blogger Tips on content marketing + social media marketing + SEO?

8. Track Your Efforts
The only way to judge whether or not your blogging efforts are actually working is to have some type of analytics installed to measure your ROI. Google Analytics is free and you can start seeing which posts are the most popular, which posts people are staying on the longest and even which posts are performing well.

9. How to Optimize Your Blog Post for SEO
As mentioned, blogging is a very good way to get some organic search traffic. In addition, your blog posts should be optimized for search engines. There are step by step ways to do this if you want to know how to become a blogger.

How to optimize
. Put your main keyword in the post title
. Include related keywords in the content
. Use appropriate subheadings h2, h3
. Optimize images –https://yoast.com/image-seo/
. Include internal links
. Link out to authoritative websites
. Include your main keyword in the URL

10. In addition to your on-page SEO you will also want to make sure that you’re sharing your blog posts as much as possible through social media. Use blog comments or anywhere else you can to get the word out. The more people that find out about your content, the higher chances of them linking to it.

And since social media and blogging are so closely tied together, you’ll also want to track which of your posts are being shared the most on social media. A quick way to do this is with the Quicksprout social media analysis tool.
http://www.quicksprout.com/

Just paste in your site’s URL, then click on the social media analysis tab. You’ll see a list of the social shares each of your posts has organized by social media site.

Never sacrifice the quality of your blog. People want quality content, not a poorly written fluff that doesn’t provide any type of value. Take the time to create thoughtful content that has a purpose and you will have much better success with your blog like a Pro Blogger.

Sourced information from  http://sproutsocial.com/insights/blogging-tips/

About Kathryn Maclean http://www.facebook.com/marketingofflineonline
A blogger with WordPress /domains & hosting for web development. A certified Social Media Campaign specialist sing Facebook, Twitter Pinterest and Google + Also an Affiliate & Network Marketer using resources such as: the  Power Affiliate Club. PAC  Expert Author and Coordinator for  Power Affiliate Club

Are you an Affiliate?

What to look out for with affiliate marketing because it is misunderstood and it can be misused. If you are looking at the income above all else, rather than an attitude of serving, this is what has given affiliate marketing a negative connotation.

Affiliate marketing is the process of promoting other people products, for which you earn a commission.

If you have a product that you are happy to use in your business. Would this be a reason to earn a commission by promoting it to others? Yes and No.

Affiliate marketing predates the Internet, but it is the world of digital marketing, analytics, and cookies that have made it a billion-dollar industry. A company running an affiliate marketing program can track which links bring in leads and, through internal analytics, see how many leads are converted into sales.

Read more: Affiliate Marketing Definition | Investopedia

A very smart video about Affiliate Marketing… with John Chow (like how he says his name)

Promoting a software may sound like a great idea…

But what if they sell the company and the new owners don’t run something like the old owners did. This actually happened to a person I know online.Your people start to complain to you and so you deal with the new owners. You can spend quite a lot of time doing this. If it was a one time sale, it was likely not a high commission. You see the problem. It wouldn’t be a good use of your time.

You should base your recommendations solely on products in the context of “How you use them in your business.” So start with the product, not the commission. What does your audience need? Analyze your target market. What are their pain points? Find out how you can help them solve their problems.

The commission that you earn will vary between the different programs. Affiliate marketing is marketing a product that someone else has created, not your own product. You pick one that will be helpful for your target audience You make a commission one time or an ongoing commission depending on what the product or company state.

Another good aspect of affiliate marketing is that there is no customer service, no follow up or dealing with payments This is all taken care of by the company you are promoting or recommending.

The company also keeps track of who is sending traffic to their product through a unique identifier link. Each company has their own affiliate program that you sign up to join. The fact that it is so easy to do this, is why affiliate marketing has earned a negative connotation, as there are a lot of unscrupulous people doing this.

Some of what you share will not include an affiliate link but you want to share content because you want to be helpful and some of your solutions will include affiliate links. Some solutions might be things you create, your own products, and some might be solutions that other people have already created.

“You can be an affiliate for Amazon but because Amazon is in so many countries now, books hardware, and almost anything else, it’s a real balancing act. Setting all that up is rather complicated. Using Amazon to promote a book that works with a product you are promoting is fine. You really have to be an expert in affiliate marketing to really make it work with Amazon. –  Planting your garden in someone else’s soil. ” Steve Dotto

 Your most important asset is “what builds trust with your audience.”  That Know Like and Trust. That is the reason why they subscribe and the reason why they will give you honest feedback.  Sharing a product that you do not use and stand behind is a poor strategy. Your reputation means everything in this business.

 My recommendations list

Treat the products that you recommend as if they were your own.

If you would like to chat for 15 for free about affiliate marketing see my contact page.

About Kathryn Maclean http://www.facebook.com/marketingofflineonline
A certified Social Media Campaign specialist using Facebook, Twitter Pinterest and Google +. Affiliate Network Marketing using resources such as PAC Power Affiliate Club – PAC Welcome Coordinator.

  Did you reach your goals for the year?

Business Organization

1.  Be Crystal Clear About Your Goals
If you are selling an item,  whether it’s an idea, or your company’s product or your own service. Writing content that adds email subscribers to your list is the way to go. Each email is a potential client or sale so you see how important this tip is.

How well did you do with your email list?

I started with yet another email client. I will be working on building my email list using  Convert Kit. Features are built by bloggers, for bloggers. They know what it takes to grow a successful online business. They have an app with features tailored to our needs as bloggers.

Too many email marketing tools get in your way. I have tried many different types and yes they do make it complicated. ConvertKit’s email automation tool is simple but powerful. With our visual automation builder, you can send well-timed, targeted content to the humans in your audience so you can stay focused on what matters most: growing your online business. I have an email course lined up for someone who has a simple to use course with ConvertKit. 

2.What Is The Fastest Way To Grow Your Traffic?
Post somewhere, and then link it back. Social email and direct traffic will form your basis for a consistent traffic stream. However, the best way to attract a large number of new readers is to post on other sites with more traffic than your blog and then it link back. A good source of this type of traffic is done on something called a Round-Up post. You can do one yourself, simply email your list of bloggers and ask a simple question about how they achieved something.  Compile their answers with their pics and 1or 2 lines from them. They will distribute your article to their friends. Bringing in new readers is critical, without traffic your business will only be on your screen -alone!

Another idea would be to join a blogging community. These are very helpful for new bloggers just starting out, or even for bloggers with experience. See my signature for the Blogging Community that I am associated with. I am the welcome coordinator for this growing blog community.

3. Life Time Marketing Tools – Your BLOG or  your Facebook Page (s)
It doesn’t really matter what you may be selling, you should design your content to guide potential customers through a buying process. This is referred to as a buying funnel. Educate your customers about a product, cultivate people as an expert and convince them to buy your product or service and close the sale internally right on your site or re-direct people to your blog in the case of Facebook.

Some people use the personal page that Facebook gives to you when you join for business. It says in the TOS that the personal page is NOT for business use. They have Facebook Business pages that you create for doing business. These pages also have analytics so you can see what traffic you are getting. I do not post about business on my personal page, but others do share my articles, and they show on my personal page. I thank them for sharing. I have 5 business pages.

4. Resources – How To Find Awesome Content Sources
For Facebook posts try checking out Tumblr with its tons of content. The search tool helps find content using hashtags. Such as Most Popular, Most Recent, or sort by Text, Photos, Quotes, Links, Chat or Audio. Always remember to cite your source. Give credit where credit is due, always.

Also, another way that I find subjects for my articles is to use Google search. I also use another search engine  -Pinterest. Use of keywords for both works very well. A business listing with Google My Business is also a great idea. More on that next time.

5. A Marketers Group
Another source of business organization to use is Inbound.org. https://inbound.org/top  Content on the website is based on votes from users. You can receive email daily or weekly to your email box. Subjects on Inbound such as Marketing tools, Search, Social Media Tips, Content Marketing, Conversion, Analytics, Mobile and Startup Marketing. Google sends you information based on the keywords you ask.

6. Photos or Images
I use Free Digital Marketing.com – With a very large inventory of pics that you can use. It has paid photos or a pic free if you site the source including the artist’s name in your post.  Also, can use Flickr for photos or I use a lot of my own photographs.

Here is a list of other Free Photographs that I use.

7. Use a Good Mentor

I have found a few that I follow. I get to know them online from something they have posted, such as a blog post linked from Pinterest. I liked the way that they have branded themselves and the products that they have to sell. I have taken many courses that have helped me enormously. For the new year I have found one women that is very good at marketing. I have bought her courses and her book. You can read more about that here. (Goal setting and a  great planner.)

There are all kinds of ways of writing website content for your posts and blogs. Next time you have articles to write, gather these resources and you will find it a much easier way to write your content.

More from …Sourced from…http://tomtunguz.com/content-marketing-lessons-learned/

I hope your year-end business organization brings happiness and joy to you and your business.

About Kathryn R. Maclean  http://www.facebook.com/marketingofflineonline
Blogger with WordPress /domains & hosting. A certified Social Media Campaign specialist using Facebook, Twitter Pinterest and Google + & Instagram. Affiliate & Network Marketer using resources as The Power Affiliate Club – Expert Author & welcome coordinator.

Need some ideas on how to promote your business brand design or increase demand for your services?

Let’s start with 5 brand design graphics that will help your promotions for your business and increase your visibility. 

While there are many different ways to promote your offers. if you are just starting out, or you have been online marketing for a while, the promotional suggestions below will give you some great ideas.

First  “What is it that your potential customers need?”

• An ebook – on what you can help them with?
• A quick checklist – on what you provide?
• A high-quality content article  – or report?

5  Brand Design Graphics You Need For Your Next Promotion:

1. BASIC BLOG POST COVER GRAPHIC ( top image)
For every post I create, I offer a Blog Post Cover Graphic. This Cover Graphic will help you get traction with your post – when scanning the graphic to Pinterest you can have another source of lead generation to your blog from the platform.

2. PROMOTION BOX
Include the optin or download to another blog post or within the different areas of your website. You can also include it in the blog post as you see it here. Put it near the top and again at the bottom.  People scanning your post only read the first little bit, they’re more likely to click on your optin offer if they see a promotion box.  (Click on the image promotion box below for a free checklist of what is offered here.)

A Freebie or content upgrade is used in creating a free opt-in to collect emails. This should be something that provides additional value, like a one-page checklist of what was covered in the blog post. Like the one below. Get your Graphics Checklist now.

What is the Best Platform to Promote From?

It depends on a lot of different factors.

3. Social Media Graphics
FACEBOOK ADS
If you post consistently on Facebook – a post or Ad graphics.(I create my own using my own photos or Stock Photos that can be used personally or professionally.)

If you are venturing into Facebook Ads or any other sort of online Social Ad Space, be aware that most have a 20% text rule. This rule is where there cannot be more than 20% of the text on your ad, otherwise, it might not appear for many of your target audience. Be strategic with the content you provide,  since you can always include the bulk of your messaging in the Ad copy that accompanies the graphic.

TWITTER
If you like to tweet, then you will want to include a Twitter graphic to promote your offer as well. Even with the limited amount of characters, it is great to include an eye-catching graphic in your Twitter feed. I have two Twitter accounts,  you can include a tweet within your post to Twitter.

BLOG POST COVER GRAPHIC FOR PINTEREST

It must be vertical for pinning on Pinterest. It will include your blog post title + your website Url.  A great stock photo for the background will really make your graphics do  look professional and stand out. Pinterest posts linked back to your blog posts are a great idea!  Measuring  600 x 900 Pixels.

Pinned images stay on Pinterest a long time and are searchable by keywords. A wonderful place to get inspired.

INSTAGRAM
Instagram is a great way to reach your audience. Then have them go somewhere to learn more about you and your business.  Facebook Groups stand out more as private and safe places to connect.

Creating a square graphic, you can post it to Instagram and also to Facebook, reaching both your audiences on both social media platforms.  1080 x 1080 pixels

On Instagram – if you have a great following or want to build one, invest your time there with image posts and stories to push your audience to your blog and direct them to your download/squeeze page to get them on your email list.  My  Instagram account  Instagram .

4.  BRAND IMAGE FOR BUSINESS BRANDING
When designing your offer,  be sure to check in with your brand styling. Be aware of what you are putting together as far as your brand colours and fonts. Are your pictures a good reflection of you and your business?

Use colour to draw the eye in and be clear with the call to action.If placed somewhere other than your blog be sure to include the website address or use your logo on all of your graphics.

I can use a simple layout for any social media post, it doesn’t have to just apply to Pinterest posts.Be sure to use a clear call to action for the best results. Leave no question as to what you want your audience to do –  tell them  – download the free checklist.

This part is so important for brand consistency so review and check your branding to make sure you are on the right track.

5. BLOGGING
In writing educational blog posts for my audience  I try to show my community I really am an expert and authority in my niche. With your offer in mind, I will write a blog post that will educate your audience and answer some questions/objections they may have. Always include a Graphic in your article.

I am the Welcome Coordinator for PAC Power Affiliate Club.

14 PAC Expert Authors compiled our first book together, it sells on Amazon. Click the link below to find out more…

CHECKLIST
To make your next promotion a success I have created a handy PDF Checklist for you to use while planning your graphics. All the sizes etc to make sure you have covered all the promotional ideas here.  Checklist  <  click here or the promotion box above.

There you have it, 5 Graphics ideas for your next promotion. I hope these have given you some inspiration to start putting together some ideas for your upcoming Promotional Plan using Brand Design Graphics.

If you want to get your hands on the information of the images I have used click here for Free Images.

This post was written by Kathryn Maclean of Marketing Offline Online.net Welcome Coordinator for the Power Affiliate Club.