Ask Tanzz: Internet Marketing Mentor

Jun/10

Inside Scoop From The Google Insider

The exciting part of being connected to the internet marketing network is the opportunity to meet and share experiences with the industry superstars. Over the last weekend, I had the pleasure to meet Simon Leung – an internet marketing whiz-kid and an ex-Google employee who built a million dollar empire within the first year of his business.

Known in the internet marketing circles as the Google Insider, he is one of ’The’ Google Adwords gurus going around and is today a widely sought after consultant, author, speaker, coach and a mentor. Following are excerpts from my interaction with Simon.

One of the gems that I picked from him was this – Google is Google’s biggest fan. And it would help your cause if you can give them a bit of ego-massaging. Would you mind doing so if the reward is a higher ranking on the greatest marketing machine on planet earth? I guess not.

So how to do it? Simple. Make sure that Google is amply covered on your website.

- Have blogs on blogger.com. If you have a self-hosted blog, have links to your blogger account
- Link pictures on your site to Picasa
- Put videos from YouTube
- Show Buzz widgets/icons
- Get iGoogle and Knol represented on your site

In short keep your content Google-rich and have plenty of backlinks to your site from those sources.

Search engines and especially Google likes navigational links which adds to the user experience. Follow a consistent structure with templates which has a good number of navigational links which is intuitive and easy enough for the visitors. And those links should be linking to pages within your site and outside. Also, if you’re having outbound links, make it point to do that within specific posts and articles instead of having them on the template and getting repeated on all pages as this lower your ranking on Google.

Google loves content and they love constantly changing content. You should keep the Google spider busy that it finds something new on each of its hop to your site. The caveat is that the content needs to pass the originality test. Google’s algorithms for checking plagiarism and duplicate content are so powerful and ever evolving that there is no fixed formula to get around it. So instead of trying to beat Google at their game, the better and easier option is to have fresh and original content.

Personalize your brand – This is something which struck an immediate cord with me since I’ve been someone who always believed that the most prospective strategy in your internet marketing career is to build your own brand because people buy into people more than anything else. Some of the quick and easy ways of implementing this are,

- Promote your site before anything else.
Eg: You.com/Facebook & You.com/Twitter instead of Facebook.com/You & Twitter.com/You
- Association with industry leaders and experts which helps to build your credibility

Lastly Simon acknowledged that the apprehension of Adwords being an expensive medium is due to the fact that the vast majority of the Ad campaigns are not maximized for results on Adwords. This stems from a lot of misconceptions and misplaced notions that people have about the tool. The Adwords guru’s suggestions were easy – Keep it simple, laser target the audience, keep the promise on your Ad and constantly monitor and optimize.

The interaction was very casual and he seemed a very chilled out guy. And interestingly, he said that one of the reasons of him quitting Google was their shift from a relaxed, laid-back environment to a formal, uptight setup of a corporate giant and that’s not the in-thing with internet marketers. I couldn’t agree with him more.

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Jun/10

Getting Started with Blogging

by Tanzz under Blogging, Internet Marketing

First things first. What are these blogs all about? See this quick intro.

Hope that gave some perspective to start with.

But there are millions and millions of blogs out there for every niche that you can possibly think of. So is it worth joining the bandwagon and add another one and more importantly how will you ensure that your voice is heard and won’t be drowned in such a crowded and noisy place?

Let’s go through some of the basics assoicated with putting up your blog.

Why on earth do I require a blog?
First and foremost, it helps if you have a presence online. People need to be aware that you exist and unless you’re a Kobe Bryant or a Brad Pitt in your field, you will need to make your target audience aware of you. Further, your blog speaks of your personality and says what you’re all about which creates that personal branding. And when people likes or appreciates your thoughts and views, you create a space of influence for you in the niche you’re in. I think those are enough reasons to have a blog.

What next? Choosing your audience.

Pick your niche
The checkpoints here are,

Do you have genuine interest and valuable information about the niche?

Is there an actual online demand for the same?

I have a passion for internet network marketing and there is a huge market for this industry – which qualifies my blog I guess

Once you’ve chosen the niche, stay true to it by focusing on topics which are directly concerning the niche or closely related to it. A targeted niche or a sub niche would have a more dedicated but lesser audience than a broad one but will have the advantage of lesser competition.

Format and Readability
Though the unique content that you have to offer should be the USP of your blog, it should be embellished by the way it is formatted and structured so that readers have a pleasant experience the time they spend on your blog. A few things to note are,

Theme - This should be consistent with your topic and personality. Quite obviously, a funky looking theme with weird color combinations wouldn’t be ideal for a business blog.

Structure - The content should have a proper intro, body and a conclusion which make for pleasant reading; this doesn’t mean that you cannot go a bit offbeat with your structure once in a while though.

Categories - Organising your blog posts into relevant categories makes it easy for the audience to find the information that they need.

Manage Your Expectation
So if you’ve decided on having a blog, it is important that you set your expectations right. What is that you’re looking for? Is it for money or for a career change or for freedom? Trust me, it is NOT a get rich quick scheme and if anybody says so he or she is just selling dreams. The truth is that a blog can give all of the above provided you’re commited to work hard and be patient and persistent. It is a really rewarding one if done for the right reasons.

Happy blogging!!

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Jun/10

SEO or Social Media?

by Tanzz under Internet Marketing, Social Media

As an internet marketer, you are spoilt for choice when it comes to the methods that you can employ to advertise. There are scores of them and each one has its own set of pros and cons. But it’s important that you have an overall picture of the marketing environment because it helps you categorize the options available and understand the strengths and pitfalls of each before you draw out your marketing strategy.

Let’s examine the two major areas namely, Search engines and Social media.

Search Engines
Search engines are unarguably the primary marketing avenue due to their sheer global reach. It is the first stop for people looking for anything under the sun. The global coverage of search engines is 92% which means that 92 out of 100 people on the web use them. This market is dominated by Google (65%) followed by Yahoo(12%) and Microsoft Bing(10%). Digging further, marketing options on the search engines are broadly two – SEO and PPC.

SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
These are the organic results based on the user’s search keywords and is based on a number of factors both on your site as well as off your site. Though it takes considerable effort to get your site optimised for search engines and get on top, nothing gives better exposure to your business if you achieve this. You’re not paying the search engines to get this listing since you’ve reached there on merit so to speak.

PPC (Pay Per Click)
The faster way to get on top of search engine listings is to use sponsored advertising in which you pay for your Ads. This could be either PPC where you pay everytime a user clicks on your Ad or PPM where you are charged for a specified number of times your Ad is shown on the search engine’s content network. PPC is far more effective than PPM since it is targetted to an audience who is actively looking for products and services. PPM Ads are placed on websites which have content related to the Ad that you have and so the user might not be actively seeking for them. The best part of PPC/PPM is that it can be used to laser target your market based on geography and timing.

Which brings us to the next big marketing medium which is literally exploding the web and giving a serious challenge to the search engines in the battle for marketing medium supremacy. Yes, the booming world of social media.

Social Media
Statistics show that people frequent and spend more time on social media than search engines or even their emails. But have this translated to them being a viable alternative as a marketing medium? The answer is a resounding yes. The attraction of social media is that it provides a platform for like-minded people to gather which generates a sense of community. The viral nature of the connection between individuals and groups gives this medium an incredible amount of power. Added to this is the possibility of targeting the market based on demographic factors like age, gender, likes and dislikes, company or even social status is something the search engines cannot claim to.

Facebook with over 500 million users worldwide is head and shoulders above the competition in this field. Other big players in this niche are MySpace, Twitter (micro-blogging site) and LinkedIn (more targeted to professional networks). Most of the social media do have paid advertising (PPC/PPM) as well but it works more like the content network attached to the search engines. But this is rapidly changing which is why it presents such a potent challenge to the search engines.

Blurring of boundaries
That said, the distinction between the search engines and social media are getting more and more blurred as the respective players are filling the missing gaps in their portfolio. This is exemplified by Google’s acquisition of the video sharing site YouTube which broadens their video search capabilities and the Web 2.0 features plus their venture into the social media with Buzz.

The key is to coordinate your search engine optimization and social media, creating the maximum synergy between the two through an integrated approach. Not only does search engine optimization help you promote your website, it also helps you promote your social media content. Your website and your social media together constitute your web presence, and search engine optimization helps you to market your overall web presence. And conversely, social media helps your search engine optimization efforts with the off page factors discussed earlier. To conclude, both search engine and social media are indispensable to your internet marketing strategy and you’ll be missing out on a huge market if you overlook either of them.

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May/10

How To Deal With Information Overload?

by Tanzz under Personal Development

As entrepreneurs and home business owners/seekers, we all are engulfed with opportunities, strategies, tactics, tools and resources in internet marketing from all corners all the time. As a beginner you can easily get overawed by the sheer volume of information thrown at you and if you’re an experienced marketer, you’ll acknowledge that unless you’re meticulous in dealing with the information overload, you can be thrown off the tangent quickly and lose focus of what you’re trying to achieve.

So how do you deal with this information overload?

First and foremost, there is just no point complaining about the quantity of the content. We all are in some way or the other contributing to this content. So the point is to turn the issue around and learn to handle the content in our daily routine. As the saying goes, while dealing with a flood, you don’t curse the water but figure out a way to keep yourself away from it swallowing you.

Se here are some quick tips

Never Let Information Lead You

It’s good to have a fair idea of what you’re looking for. And set a limit to how much time you’ll spend to sort out the information. Then sift through the content and spend no more than 5-10 seconds on a piece. If the information cannot tell you what it has to offer within that time, probably it’s not worth your time. Simply do a “Shift + Delete”.

Remember that the more we try to do, the less we get done; and the more inundated we are with information, the less time we spend absorbing it.

Mind How and Where You Get Your Content

Basically there are 3 modes by which you find content. Either you explicitly seek for it (targetted), you stumbled upon something while navigating or en route to your targetted content (discovered) or that you received without you actively seeking for it (delivered) in the form of RSS feeds, newsletters or any other push technology service. So you have to decide what kind of information you want in what proportion and try to put a discipline around it.

Get A Handle on Your Content

Don’t let the quantity of the content bog you down. Just find away around managing it. A few titbits..

- Avoid being obsessive about the content. It’s not going anywhere
- Keep a specific time during the day to surf the information
- Keep focus of what you want and guard against getting sidetracked to other content
- Make note of interesting content and read within a week or else you’re never going to read them
- Be selective about your signups
- Organise content by categorising the topics for ease of use and reference later

Finally, content especially marketing content is out there for all kinds of people for all sorts of things. You need to be your own judge to decide if that content is within the relevant context and that makes sense to you.

Wisdom is with the discerning, alright?

Yours in Success..

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May/10

Beauty And The Geek

by Tanzz under Internet Marketing

At the outset, I have to confess that I’m not a huge fan of reality shows. It was still fine when it carried the novelty factor. But the concept has been beaten to death so much that I just cannot stand it any more. For all the dislike that I have for the concept (and not the beauties per se), interestingly enough I too had a tryst with a beauty albeit of a different kind not so long ago and the outcome wasn’t bad either.

Though not quite the “Ultimate Social Experiment” that the show was billed as, it was indeed challenging. For starters, the geek tag seemed apt on me – a quintessential IT guy with all the baggage that profile comes with. And the beauty was none other than this sexy, exciting and lucrative world of internet network marketing. And the theme song of the liaison was of course the same Pet Shop Boys favorite, Opportunities (Let’s Make Lots of Money).

Soon the geek realised that the general perception of she being an amiable creature that can easily be won over was merely a hoax. And all the tall claims and false promises of zillions of dollars in no time were indeed scams and people who were naive enough to have bought into it were actually chasing rainbows as there’s more to the beauty than what the glossy exterior revealed. Going back to the show, in fact the critics who question the authenticity of it argue that the beauties did fake stupidity as it is tough to believe that people can be that clueless. The same should’ve been apparent about our proverbial beauty as well.

There are nuances in her make up that need to be understood, new skills that have to be learnt to master her and some key attributes like patience and perseverence that need to be inculcated within for me to make a lasting impression. Also there is nothing flippant about her preferences – she despices the loud, pushy, pesky lot as much as anyone and espouses the natural, honest and professional few who radiates probity, positivity and prosperity.

And three years into this seemingly weird affair, my love for the beauty has grown even stronger. But her love for me is conditional. She has made it in no unclear terms that she’ll be by my side and be my confidante only as long as I keep proving my worth and be of any value to the world that I existed. Well, that’s not bad. At least it keeps me on my toes and never let’s me drop my guard and take her for granted. I can now truly say with a fair amount of certainty that this engagement is for keeps. With or without the riches associated with it.

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May/10

Initiation to Cashflow Quadrant

by Tanzz under Financial Freedom

Around 3 years ago, we were having some sort of a reunion at a friend’s place. We were three of us who were mates at the Engineering college and were meeting after a long gap. All of us were having good jobs with reputed organisations; married with children and were quite happy with our personal lives. But there was another thing that was common among us which wasn’t quite pleasant. And it was this fact we were not happy with our financial status. It was a strange kind of a feeling. Here we were, 3 bright young men, qualified IT engineers placed in big corporates in a fledging city working our butts off but yet, far away from attaining the kind of financial status we thought our qualifications and jobs would give us. The topic just came up casually and it passed by without us delving into it.

But the thought lingered on and made me think on my way back home and for the next few days. Make no mistake – I wasn’t whining and I wasn’t hating my job. I kind of liked what I did and enjoyed the atmosphere that I worked in. Had a lot people around that I liked being with, had a lot of fun at the company events – get togthers, outings etc. And being in a firm with wings, I had the chance to travel, meet new people and explore new cultures. But the problem was a perennial one in that there was more month at the end of money. And it happened month after month after month. I was and I still am, a bit ambitious and for all the good things that I enjoyed with my job, it wasn’t helping me achieve my goals. I wasn’t building assets and I wasn’t getting wealthy. To sum it, my good job was falling short in helping me fulfill my aspirations.

All the more, it was startling to see people half as qualified or educated as I was, acquiring wealth and assets the way they did. And it was quite apparent being in a city like Dubai where you could find this whole breed of under qualified and under educated but super wealthy men. somehow this realisation dawned on me that something was amiss. It became clear to me that, if I really want to get my finances in order, if I really wanted to get wealthy and if I seriously wanted to fulfill my dreams, I need to do something. I had no clue what it was but I knew there should be a way.

And then in one of my casual forays on the web, I chanced upon a video of a gentleman called Robert Kiyosaki explaining the concept of Cashflow Quadrant. It immediately struck me since I could relate to what he was saying when he talked about the E or the Employee quadrant because I was an employee all my career. It seemed as though he was speaking directly to me on how I was. How the dual emotions of fear and greed were dominating my thoughts; how money had a stranglehold on my life; how I was repeating the same cycle over and over again without getting any better economically but getting worse emotionally since I was getting increasingly frustrating and desperate with my financial condition not improving; and how I am knowingly or otherwise involved in the same rat race that millions of others were in too.

I realised that in order to be financially free I needed to be financially intelligent and for that, I need to change my mindset before anything else and more than anything else. That was perhaps the biggest challenge that I had came across in my life because in order to shift from the Employee quadrant to the Business Owner quadrant I needed to transform myself into someone who is both mentally and emotionally far removed from the person I have been all my adult life and perhaps my formative years as well. And I can tell you that the journey has been a truly fascinating one and in many ways an experience in self realisation because I didn’t think that I had an entrepreneurial bone in my body until I set about becoming one. I can also tell you that it isn’t easy and takes a lot of heart and courage; but worth every minute in time and every ounce in effort. And as I began conditioning my mind and got the new sets of values and rules ingrained within, the rest seemed to fall in place as I took my first steps towards being an entrepreneur.

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