If the gymnastics and swimming weren’t enough to get you in the spirit of the Olympics, at least take a look at some of the many lessons the Olympics have brought to Internet marketers. Because the Olympics are so widely known, perhaps the most widely known brand of our time, they don’t have to do as much marketing as your traditional company. However, the Olympics have sparked other companies to incorporate the games into their marketing strategies. In addition, the games themselves offer up some important teachings for those in the marketing industry. Consider a few of the lessons you can take away:
Business owners can expand their horizons by accepting credit cards. Credit cards may be accepted in a store front or on a website or blog. Many blogs charge companies to place a link (even if it’s within the copy) on the blog, and other blogs simply need to accept payments for services they provide. Here are five cheap payment processors for in-store payment processing and online payment processing curated by some of my favorite folks at CreditCards.co.uk, a UK based website designed to provide help in choosing a card based on your personal circumstances.
As most Blog Herald readers probably know, I am a full-time guest blogger. I have at present written approximately 440 guest articles that have been scattered over almost 130 different blogs. Now I am not here to brag about how great this is, and if it was your full-time job, you would be in the exact same position (if you aren’t already). I am simply telling you this to give you a perspective on just how many different publishers I have worked with and how many different blogs I have gone out and analyzed both before and after my guest post went live.
I thought it would be helpful to compile a list for the blogging community to help those who need to guest post. I have therefore created a list of my top ten favorite blogs to offer up a guest post. I based my decisions on three things:
As a full-time guest blogger, I sometimes feel like I’ve seen it all—fake names, odd responses, rude comments, the absent-minded who forgot who I was—but the majority are, of course, normal. However, editors asking me, the writer, to pay to put my content on their site has been a growing trend. Quite frankly, I found this a bit odd. Many websites are thrilled to have my content because they feel it is quality content, I promote the content to a new audience, and the site does not have to put in the work of creating content.
Just the other day and editor explained to me that my content could be featured on the blog for $700, and a few weeks earlier an editor wanted to charge me $250. Naturally, both blogs were very authoritative and had a list of reasons why their blog was so wonderful, but I couldn’t help but think to myself: Shouldn’t you be paying me?
As a full-time blogger I see this all the time: Someone works hard to get an article on a blog, the blog goes live, and then you never see the author again. There are many bloggers who don’t fall into this category, but nonetheless this is something common amongst bloggers. The reason this is so common is because many people are guest blogging simply for the backlink. Backlinks are a great way to improve the search engine optimization (SEO) of a website, and guest posting is one of the easiest ways to make this happen. Therefore, it makes sense that many bloggers wouldn’t worry about the article after it is live—they got the backlink, which is what they came for.
If you don’t watch NBC’s The Office—well you should. If not for the hilariousness, you should at least watch it for the many life lessons. Just a few weeks ago one of the main characters was opening a store with new electronics (very similar to Apple products), and it was all about the bloggers. For the intense hopeful Vice President of the company, Dwight Schrute, the most important people to impress were the bloggers. If the bloggers didn’t find the device appealing, the store wasn’t going to succeed. According to Schrute, “[b]loggers are gross. Bloggers are obese. Bloggers have halitosis. You’re gonna love them.”
Many people blog as a hobby. Blogging can be therapeutic, a great way to stay in touch with friends, great way to keep your memories organized, and a great way to connect with like-minded people on the Internet. For this reason, many try to make money online through blogging. There are three ways to make money as a blogger:
1. Work as a blogger for a company. The company will pay you to contribute articles to blogs across the Internet. All you need to do is incorporate a link back to the company for SEO purposes.
2. Do freelance writing/blogging. Many websites will offer payment for quality content.
3. Own and manage your own blog. By owning and managing your own blog you are setting yourself up for a platform for advertisers. However, this takes a great deal of time, money, and work to create a profitable blog.
Now starting a business and creating a profitable blog is a long and sometimes frustrating process. In other words, most bloggers begin their careers as one of those first two options. I am one of the lucky bloggers because I blog for a company who pays me full-time. No matter how many articles I get placed and no matter where they get placed, I know I’m getting paid. Unfortunately, most bloggers aren’t quite so lucky and they have to jump from blog to blog to try and find websites that will pay for content. read more
As a business owner do you understand all this technological terminology? Do you know what SEO stands for or what copywriters do? Do you understand the importance of SEO copywriters when it comes to promoting your business online?
To survive in the current market you probably already know that you have to do it online, almost every home has a computer with internet access, which means that whether they’re looking for a plumber or shopping for groceries, the majority of people will do the searches online. read more
Regardless of how fair and neutral you are about anything, there is always going to be someone who doesn’t like you, for any number of reasons. In the Internet era, blogs and social media have become virtual soap boxes for people to vent their frustration on. Just from being around people who blog, and from my own experiences, I’ve learned a few lessons that I want to share with you. read more
There is a reason why journalists must study journalism before any serious news outlet even considers hiring them. That is because journalism involves more than simply observing and reporting in your own words. However, there are bloggers abound who operate news blogs, or write news blog posts, that never studied journalism and it shows. It may seem harmless, but humans have a nasty habit of believing anything they read at face value. This includes news blogs. These same readers then regurgitate what they’ve read on their own blogs, and the snowball effect gets under way. These bloggers would benefit from learning the following things that every journalist already knows:
Fact Checking
This is of prime importance. To avoid perpetuating false information, you must make sure that you have the facts 100% accurate or at the very least mention that your information was of the “to the best of my knowledge” type. In the newspaper industry, multiple people check and re-check all the factual information in a reporter’s story before printing it. Of course, many bloggers don’t have the luxury of an office staff, but a good substitute would be to check at least 2 independent sources.
News is News, Opinion is Opinion
If you are writing a news piece, you should remain as objective as possible throughout. The intended purpose of news is to offer the reader the facts, so they can then decide for themselves how they feel about it. Stick to the facts, don’t embellish, or sensationalize anything; that is the hallmark of a good news writer and blogger.
Strive for Balance
Even if you just report the facts, be sure to get facts from both sides of the issue whenever possible. Without intending to do so, you could influence the reader’s opinion by omitting the facts from the other side of the equation. For instance, has there ever been a time where you were bombarded with news about a particular issue and formed a strong opinion just from what you’ve read, but then later on heard new information that made you go “Wait a minute! I didn’t know that, this changes the whole issue”? So, just by reporting one side (even though all of it was factual) of the issue, the writer persuaded you by just omitting facts from the opposing view. Good news writers and bloggers don’t do that.
These 3 core concepts are the foundation of every good news writer and blogger. Just because you didn’t study journalism, if you write any kind of news then you are essentially a journalist. Hold yourself to the same standards, and you will be noticed for it.
If the gymnastics and swimming weren’t enough to get you in the spirit of the Olympics, at least take a look at some of the many lessons the Olympics have brought to Internet marketers. Because the Olympics are so widely known, perhaps the most widely known brand of our time, they don’t have to do as much marketing as your traditional company. However, the Olympics have sparked other companies to incorporate the games into their marketing strategies. In addition, the games themselves offer up some important teachings for those in the marketing industry. Consider a few of the lessons you can take away:
