Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Internet marketing, web development and maintenance of online communication

Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Internet marketing, web development and maintenance of online communication

But now that so many websites and companies are wise to the importance of producing content, you’ve got to be able to do one better. At the beginning of every industry (cars, shoes, books, etc.), he who has the biggest quantity wins. And just as with every industry, the competition grows, and it’s no longer about having the most but rather the best-however your vertical may define it.

That’s where content strategy comes in. You have a blog, and that’s good. So does (just about) everyone else. You have to make your blog and everything else you write very distinct. That goes beyond branding and right into content strategy.

Here’s the skinny on content strategy: first of all, everyone from an interactive agency to a baking supply company either has one or needs one. The content strategy streamlines your content production and gives it a purpose and a place. A content strategy is an integral part of a marketing strategy, and just like a marketing strategy, it is highly specific to each company. There are, however, some general principals to get you started.

First: Know what your market is looking for

If you sell anything related to technology, are you writing and distributing press releases on a regular basis? SEO companies need to be on top of the latest search engine algorithm updates, and they need to let their market know that they are ahead of the game. Send out a press release giving your take on the latest update, gadget, whatever and talk about what you’re doing to evolve. Some companies maybe don’t need a press release as much as they need a white paper or Webinar or blog post. Find out what you’re missing.

But almost every company could find a way to expand. That’s the second rule.

Second: Repurpose your content

You know how Seth Godin keeps preaching to work smart instead of hard? I would listen if I were you. Like I said earlier, it’s not about producing more content; you just need to produce something relevant. And whether you’re a one-man band or a 200-employee outfit, no one has the capacity to create everything from scratch. Host a Webinar, and then post the audio as a Podcast. Take the transcript and make it a blog post. You can reverse it and use a blog post as the base for a Webinar transcript. Don’t do the same work twice.

Third: Whatever you do, do it regularly

Going back to SEO, you can pick a keyword for which you want to rank and then spend a week, a month, or a quarter producing content around that very specific keyword. Offer to do guest blog posts for interested people in the market, and link back to yourself. You can thereby create more content on that keyword than anyone else in the market has. Visitors will come back to you week after week to find out the latest on a certain topic. Are you a mechanic? Write about spark plugs. Get in deep. Go so far into the topic that readers could practically rebuild a spark plug from a gum wrapper and a rubber band. You are now the authority, and visitors-and Google-will love you.

Have you been implementing a content strategy lately? Tell me about it or ask questions in the comments!

Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Internet marketing, web development and maintenance of online communication

1) Search Engine Optimization

I would venture to guess that most people don’t know what search engine optimization, but you as a business owner most definitely have. This is the process of choosing keywords that your website is relevant for, and causing Google and the other search engines to rank your site for those keywords (optimally yours would show up higher than your competitors.)

Many small businesses don’t even have a website, or have such a small budget allocated to Internet marketing that they won’t be able to tell if Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a viable marketing channel. Quite often SEO is viewed as a black box that is unknowable, so people don’t want to try it. SEO’s are difficult to gauge since there is no formal governing certification board. Some are good, some are bad. Some are dangerous, and some are high quality. Whoever is doing the hiring of the in-house member or consultant, make sure they are familiar with SEO. It’s the technical equivalent of a non-programmer hiring a programmer – you wouldn’t dare do it.

2) Pay-Per-Click Advertising

The model for pay-per-click (PPC) is simple: Advertisers tell search engines how much they are willing to spend per click from a search page onto the advertiser’s website. The more advertisers bidding on a keyword, the more that keyword costs. It’s like a perpetual auction for traffic to your website.

This is much simpler to start than SEO, so many small businesses venture into PPC with very little experience, and are sometimes successful. Depending on your service area and type of service, you can plan on paying between $0.10 and $4 per click.

The same rules apply here – be familiar with Google AdWords at the very least when looking to hire a consultant. Hiring an outside consultant often makes more sense with PPC because after several months of optimization, a campaign can function well on its own.

3) Local Maps Optimization

If you’re a locally focused business with a brick & mortar location, local maps optimization is a fantastic candidate for your business. It’s a no-brainer in fact. The funny part about this is that you’ve likely never heard of it.

When you complete a search on Google for a product or service, quite often you’ll see a map with local businesses plotted on it come up in the search results. This is similar to SEO where there are moves you can make algorithmically to prove yourself more relevant than competitors in Google’s eyes.

Find a consultant to help you set up and optimize your profiles. Make sure they can teach you about citations and site schemas so you know that they have expert knowledge. Checking a past portfolio never hurts either.

4) Affiliate

If your product or service is such that you can sell it online, affiliate programs may make a lot of sense to try out. The idea is that you offer a decent commission (upwards of 20% is usually in good taste), and then you allow other internet marketers to sell your products for you in exchange for that commission. This gives you a large, motivated sales force rather simply.

Working with someone who has affiliate managing experience is a good thing here because you can do a lot wrong. Offer too small of commissions and no one will bother selling your product. Offer too large and you’re throwing money away. Let too many affiliates come onboard, people trying to cheat will get lost in the sea of data. Let too few in and you won’t see the sales volumes you’re seeking.

Depending on the affiliate network, you’ll be paying between about $500-$1000 per month just for being listed, so it makes sense to do it right. Affiliates are excellent, though, because they’re a large sales force that you only pay when they sell something for you; whereas, with PPC, you’re paying just to have people visit your site, whether or not they make a purchase.

I hope you’ve found these marketing channels informative and are considering trying them out on your small business! Let me know your thoughts in the comments.

Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Internet marketing, web development and maintenance of online communication

All downtimes are from iHostGreen.co.uk data centers. If there will be still issues, we will just switch web hosting provider.

PS. Coming soon: new hosting offers from our partner network!

Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Internet marketing, web development and maintenance of online communication

What SimpleMediaCode are looking for

From guest bloggers we will wait any tips, experience and expertise shared with and for Business and Small Business, freelancers and web entrepreneurs. In current state not interested in news posts about new Apple, Google, Facebook product or service, when post length of interest is just few weeks until next product relese.  What we are looking for is article * – well written in English with at least 500 words in magazine like style – with added value. We don’t want to limit of promoting new products or services, unless it’s nor “article distribution“. No one is getting benefit from duplicate content.

Can You write such article? Write for Us!

Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Internet marketing, web development and maintenance of online communication

Why should I migrate to Google Apps?

Reason #1: Achieve cost-efficiency

This reason in itself could convince even the most reluctant company decision makers to leave their previous infrastructure behind and adopt the innovative Google Apps platform. Heavy, on-site servers require a large capital investment for hardware in addition to recurring costs for labor and overhead. Not to mention maintenance of this equipment involves draining the most valuable resource of all – time. Google as well as other Google Apps Resellers provide the online product suite for $50 per user per year, a minimal investment compared to the surmounting costs of keeping and running on-premise servers. Because Google operates with economies of scale in both hardware and overhead, the cost savings can be passed down.

Reason #2: Security and reliability in the cloud

Google has led the charge on cloud computing for 10 years and is a trusted name in data storage and security. It is a core focus of the company to assure users that their information is kept safe and secure. Verified in a third-party SAS 70 Type II audit, Google has been proven to maintain the confidentiality and integrity of data. Google houses all information in data centers all over the world. Their data routing model allows for their guarantee of 99.9% uptime, highest in the industry.

Reason #3: Added functionality with add-ons from Google Apps Marketplace

The Google Apps Marketplace was launched by Google specifically for app developers to join a community where they could build upon the Google platform with products of their own. End-users on Google Apps can browse through the Marketplace by Top Installs or search for products by category and purpose. The number one install in the Admin Tools category is SherpaTools by Cloud Sherpas, an add-on product offering advanced IT management functions. Hundreds of add-ons exist in the Marketplace by companies of all different sizes and areas of expertise to provide users with the products they need to fill in the gaps of what Google Apps itself does not offer.

Reason #4: Instantaneous, hassle-free updates

Google updates their products frequently, and because they are cloud-based, everyone receives the update almost instantaneously, without the need for an IT team member to install new programs on every computer in the office. Time and effort can be freed up to focus on the core of the business instead of dealing with IT management issues.

Reason #5: Access data anywhere

The beauty of cloud computing is that information need not be locked down to a specific location. Users can get a hold of their email, files, and calendar from any browser or mobile phone with connection to the Internet. Productivity is unlimited when data can be accessed through multiple channels regardless of location.

How should I migrate to Google Apps?

Google sells the product suite for businesses, academic institutions, government agencies, and non-profit organizations. Businesses pay $50 per user per year for a licensing fee. However, an authorized Google Apps Reseller also offers the same productivity suite for the same price, but can provide a more tailored migration approach, customized support, and ongoing training for your Google Apps migration

Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Internet marketing, web development and maintenance of online communication

Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Internet marketing, web development and maintenance of online communication

New WordPress framework is smaller and faster with plug&play options

First of all our new framework will use other CSS framework – 1kb Grid, which is smaller and is almost same size as previous 960.gs. Our new WordPress theme is smaller and faster since instead of theme options we created several plugins, and working mainly only with WordPress hooks (filters, actions). So now it’s more like plug&play :) And yes, it’s WordPress 3.1 ready (tested with WordPress 3.1 RC3). OK, that was technical part.

New partners in 2011

In September 2010, we decided to open our network for new partners in cooperation and allowing sells-partners to resell our services to their clients, keeping some % from sale. IT WORKS!

Now we are looking for web developers and web designers to cooperate with. While this is long decision making process with skill tests and trust, we start small.

… and we are coming to Europe in 2011. Starting with Denmark!

New web services and web products

Two of our side projects are live: our small test CRM site my.mediabox.lv (billing system for clients) and another one will be announced later.

PS Our MediaBox.lv in January 2011 got Google PageRank 5 (if someone is interested in this fact :) )

Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Internet marketing, web development and maintenance of online communication

<FilesMatch "\.(jpg|png|gif)$">
ExpiresDefault A0
Header set Cache-Control "max-age=0,  no-cache, must-revalidate"
</FilesMatch>

Which mean, that expiration date is in access moment and set headers to 0 values. As You can see, here You can add more filetypes for static content

This example can also speed-up Your webpage just with few lines of code by setting longer expiration time:

ExpiresActive On
ExpiresDefault A0
ExpiresByType image/gif A2592000
ExpiresByType image/png A2592000
ExpiresByType image/jpg A2592000
ExpiresByType image/jpeg A2592000
ExpiresByType image/ico A2592000
ExpiresByType text/css A2592000
ExpiresByType text/javascript A2592000

Where A is access time and 2592000=60*60*24*30 or one month.

Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Web development blog of SimpleMediaCode.com - Internet marketing, web development and maintenance of online communication