When I get a new project, I estimate a completion time and start working. I always strive to finish before the deadline, but when it’s time to click “SEND”, I want to be sure that the finished product is “it”. But what exactly is “it”?

“Design something fast.”

“Step out of your comfort zone.”

“Stop obsessing about perfect pixels.”

“Wait. Analyze. Start again.”

All this was new to me, because I’d mostly worked with advertising agencies, where when a project was finished it was never meant to be changed or improved.

Yes, I agree. It’s time to change how we design products. Instead of talking about finishing User Interface design and never coming back, we must talk about changes, the improvement, endless iterations, quick turn-arounds. When I joined Zemanta, I had to overcome typical boundaries and become familiar with the build-measure-learn process.

Problem & Solution

You are our number one user. For every problem we must find a solution. We discuss different ideas, we imagine likely scenarios, we think about the impact of new features and then we connect with our users. We need their feedback. When our solution works on paper, we move on to the next phase.

In the name of pixels

Beautiful visual design without function is like having a house with a pretty facade, but without foundations. That doesn’t mean that we don’t take time for design. We do. But function always wins out over a pretty product image. Well, from an engineering perspective every minute spent on design is a minute too long. Will one more pixel bring us greater click-through or increase the number of new users?

Coding, prototypes

Lots of code lines, lots of coffee, lots of new debates until you can click and use it.

Users, come fast!

It’s time to face the users, get lots of new feedback. That thrilling time when you watch real-time statistics and you are happy for every new user that comes and stays.

The day, but not the day

The day that you do a small, but important step forward. The day when you realize that everything works. Or not. That you made a mistake, or ten, or maybe a hundred. It frustrates you. You go on and analyze what was good and why some things went wrong. You get another chance to turn it all around.

Continuous discovery and analysis

The goal is to find what’s wrong as soon as possible. Why are the results so bad?Why can’t users get things done? Would it be better with a different layout? Would it be better, if I spent 5 minutes more on design? A lot of “what if” questions and looking for the right direction. We are not the smartest people and that is why we need you to help us understand what is going on when you use our product.

The feeling when I am right in the middle of design and development process is awesome. Working within a startup environment is like getting a permission to fail and have a chance to continuously improve. Without this engagement, I couldn’t learn why users sometimes don’t care about the missing pixel if everything else works like a charm.

In the end, it’s all about growing up – keeping promises, respect, clear voice, having a reliable and efficient product. Pretty visual design definitely makes every website or product credible; fighting in the name of pixels is never a waste of time. An obsession with pixel-perfection pushes me to the limits of my abilities and drives me further every single day.

Now it’s time to start all over again.

The post When a Designer Joins a Startup: In the name of pixels appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Lately, I’ve read quite a few posts featuring measures that are, honestly, outdated, such as a number of comments left under your posts. Some even still argue (or they simply copy paste) that a number of comments is a measure of quality of your blog.

Seriously?

The truth is that comments are NOT a real measure of how good your posts are. They are not!

I know, it’s nice to get them. Almost as much as Likes on your Facebook page.

According to Michael Dick’s Rules of Engagement, 75% of readers are passive and only 5% are somehow engaged.

So many different factors can make someone leave a comment:

• the reader (strongly) disagrees with your message or arguments
• the reader rejects your examples
• you made the reader angry
• the reader is a backlink seeker
• you or your brand is so important, especially in the niche you cover, that the reader feels it’s in their best interest to leave a comment
• the post is so good/relevant that the reader wants at least to thank you for your contribution to the conversation.

These are only a few reasons why someone may leave a comment. Therefore, how many you get them isn’t and can’t be a criterion for your blog’s quality.

For example, my personal blog, where I write about content marketing for the Slovenian market, got only 2 comments in its first year. Two!

Should I’ve given up? Was this the sign that my blog sucked? I probably believed that in the beginning, but I noticed something else. The analytics showed a gradual increase in the number of unique visitors, it showed that readers on average spend minutes reading individual posts. I was getting more and more work as I positioned myself as an expert in the field through the blog. Moreover, readers (my potential clients) didn’t leave comments on the blog, they rather contacted me directly, by email, saying something like, “First, let me tell you, I’ve been reading your blog regularly. I reall like it. That’s why I’d like to invite you to meet and discuss a project…”

Therefore, there are many other ways that may signal that you’re doing a good job with your blog/website’s content. You must define your goals and the measures that will let you know if you’re on the right track. And even then you must be careful how you interpret those numbers. If the traffic is going down, you can’t just intepret it as the decline in your blog’s quality. Maybe there is another explanation for that. What changed and why?

Focus on the meaningful numbers, follow them and most of all understand their context.

And reject tips like “People start commenting on your blog if you do some good job on a topic.”

The post Comments Are Not a Measure of Your Blog’s Quality appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

“I am very happy to be joining Zemanta because it is at the intersection of three massively important trends for online publishers and advertisers: the increasing use of content marketing, the rise and importance of native advertising and the rise of mobile,” wrote Todd Sawicki, President, Zemanta.

He puts three biggest challenges for (online) publishers and advertisers together. Sawicki believes that native advertising “will solve mobile monetization for publishers”. This is in line with the more and more popular belief in the “intersection” between the trends Sawicki mentions: content marketing, mobile and native advertising. “Content works better than banners, and on mobile, content works even better,” said Jon Steinberg, president of Buzzfeed.

Content marketing or brand journalism is about brands becoming publishers. However, classic publishers have taken notice while trying to figure out how to save themselves from impending doom as online advertising doesn’t bring as much revenue as they’d like. Publishers like The Huffington Post, Buzzfeed, and even Forbes and Associated Press now create content for brands and run them as posts.

Five years ago, Associated Press developed a mobile app that drives them, especially lately, into a consumer-media destination. Jim Kennedy, AP, who will join the panel on Content Marketing for publishers on Thursday, May 23, at Went Native New York: “We felt as we moved into selling our own advertising and sponsorships, there was another opportunity to service the brands we do business with through other things AP does.”

Forbes have developed a set of services to help marketers become brand journalists, including content development, SEO optimization, distribution and syndication opportunities through text syndication, content ads and social promotion. “We are constantly looking to grow and evolve our BrandVoice thought leadership platform to better meet the needs of our marketing partners,” said Mark Howard, Forbes Media Senior Vice President of Digital Strategy. Dozens of companies have used BrandVoice since its launch more than two years ago.

Todd Sawicki recently stressed, “The biggest hurdle is for publishers to realize the old school print/traditional media divide between editorial and publishing is a false division. For native advertising to work – editorial needs to be involved to judge branded content to make sure it doesn’t harm the editorial brand of the site.”

There are additional challenges within the mobile environment. Sawicki believes that content marketing may be the right platform for the mobile.

Two years ago, Joe Pulizzi of Content Marketing Institute challenged publishers with the article titled Content Marketing Has Arrived. Should Publishers Be Worried? “For publishers, the opportunity to partner with brands on these initiatives is clear. What will you do? “

Indeed, what can publishers do, what are the challenges, and how can they be overcome? Kyle Monson of Knock Twice will discuss these issues during the panel Content Marketing for Publishers with Jim Kennedy, Associated Press, Mark Howard, Forbes, Tom Allcock, Say Media, and Todd Sawicki, Zemanta, at AdNative New York, a half day conversation about native advertising, co-hosted by Zemanta. Join us next Thursday, May 23, 2013.

The post Publishers’ Challenges: Content Marketing, Native Advertising and the Rise of Mobile appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

So, let’s say your end goal is to drive more traffic and overall unique visitors. There’s a ton of data that can help you reach this, but you need to filter out only the most important data: the data that will help you reach your goals more efficiently without breaking the bank. I’ll show how you can leverage big data from free competitive intelligence tools to drive more traffic to your website.

Traditional SEO strategies like adding in keywords and building links on related sites are really powerful for driving organic traffic, but the research process is highly time consuming and not scalable without data to support your efforts. This is where big data comes in handy. Free competitive intelligence tools like MixRank and SEMrush allow you to see what related or competitive sites advertisers are bidding on and which keywords have the most volume for their target audiences.

The value of paying attention to the keywords that advertisers are bidding on gives you an idea of how competitive a keyword is – imagine if you could instantly identify all of the most highly sought after keywords and high-traffic sites that advertisers are willing to pay for within seconds. By focusing on where the ad budgets are being spent and concentrated on, you can easily uncover highly relevant sites and keywords that will shorten research time when creating content, and help you grow your reach.

Here are two key data points that you should take a look at to snatch highly targeted traffic.

1. High Traffic Related Publishers

MixRank crawls over 100,000 publishers daily, and categorizes all of the publishers in the publisher directory. This is a great free resource you can use to find other publishers and blogs in your industry that you can build links on. Finding high traffic sites are easy, but finding those that are directly correlated to your site can be hard. Use the Subcategories to drill down to the most relevant sites.

By clicking on a publisher in the directory, you can see more stats about the site’s traffic and demographic data to reveal if this is a site worth building a link on. Link building on the most relevant sites that have high traffic is a cost-effective way to drive traffic. The previous time consuming challenges of finding and researching these sites are now eliminated with a free Publisher Directory.

2. Top Keywords

Both MixRank and SEMrush have easy-to-use search engines that allow you to search for any keyword related to your website. The main difference between the two tools is that MixRank indexes contextual keywords while SEMrush indexes search keywords. So, while neither of the tools provides the same type of keyword research, both keyword types are proven and innovative when building content on your site. Conducting a search within SEMrush is quite simple. Just enter the keyword you’d like to see data for and you’ll see an overview page of the CPC, exact volume, phrase match keywords and related keywords. These stats can provide you instant ideas on what keywords to publish content about.

Within MixRank, the process is quite similar. Perform a keyword search and within the search results, click on the Keywords section on the left to see a list of keywords and the number of ads that are bidding on the keyword. These metrics suggest how popular the keywords are in the industry, and what keywords you should be using in the content of your site.

By clicking on any keyword, you’ll be directed to a keyword report, where you have access to Related Keywords that you can start growing your content on. You can even uncover how competitive each keyword is based on the amount of  advertisers and ads that are bidding on them.

You can even take this one step further and look at a single advertiser’s keywords to understand how much traffic an advertiser in this niche is buying. Simply click on the Advertisers section on the left, and click on any advertiser’s domain.  In this example here, we can see gohealthinsurance.com is bidding on over 11,000 keywords and 17,000 websites.

Within seconds, you can see tens of thousands of keywords and sites to expand your reach towards. MixRank helps you uncover those hard-to-find traffic sources and out-of-the-box keywords that will reach lateral audiences. It’s worth expanding your content to include keywords you may have never thought about, while investing some time to build links on these sites that already reach your target audience.

As we know, big data can’t literally drive traffic. It’s all about how you leverage it and take action on it, which will provide returns. As SEO becomes more and more time-consuming to improve search engine rankings, the ongoing process of building links on other relevant sites and creating powerful content with the right keywords can be done more rapidly with big data competitive intelligence tools.

So, wouldn’t it be nice to start using free data that would provide significant time savings when trying to find the most targeted sites in your industry or the keywords with the most volume?

The post How to Leverage Big Data from Intelligence Tools to Drive Traffic appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Here are 25 mobile & content marketing facts:

1. Within 4 years, more consumers will access internet content via mobile devices than PCs (Source: Brightcove)
2. People spend more time on mobile apps (94 minutes/day) than desktop and mobile web (72 minutes/day) (Source: Brightcove)
3. 43% of B2C marketers use mobile content as a content marketing tactic (Source: CMI)
4. 42% of B2C marketers use mobile apps as a content marketing tactic (Source: CMI)
5. 33% of B2B marketers use mobile content as a content marketing tactic (Source: CMI)
6. 26% of B2B marketers use mobile apps as a content marketing tactic (Source: CMI)
7. From 2011 to 2012, the use of mobile as a tactic by B2B marketers has increased from 15% to 33% (Source: CMI)
8. 30% of marketing managers think that branded mobile apps is the most important channel for engaging consumers (Source: The CMA)
9. There are 5x as many cell phones in the world as there are PCs (Source: Impiger Mobile)
10. 82% of US adults own a cell phone (Source: Pew Internet)
11. 49% of the mobile subscribers in the US own a smartphone (Source: MobiThinking)
12. 25% of Americans ONLY use mobile devices to access the internet (Source: GoMo News)
13. 73% of smartphone users said they used mobile web to shop rather than an app (Source: Yahoo)
14. 72% of smartphone users in the US use the device to look up directions or maps (Source: zmags)
15. 56% of global online consumers watch video on mobile at least once a month (Source: Brightcove)
16. 28% of global online consumers watch video on mobile at least once a day (Source: Brightcove)
17. 60% of web users say they expect a site to load on their mobile phone in 3 seconds or less (Source: Compuware)
18. 74% are only willing to wait 5 seconds or less for a web page to load before leading the site (Source: Compuware)
19. Time spent on mobile apps is largely dominated by games and social networking (49% and 30% resp.) (Source: HubSpot)
20. 72% of smartphone users in the US use the device to go online while traveling (Source: zmags)
21. 64% of smartphone users in the US use the device to go online while in a restaurant or coffee shop (Source: zmags)
22. 63% of smartphone users in the US use the device to go online while in a store when shopping (Source: zmags)
23. 74% of smartphone users use their phone to help with shopping – 79% ultimately making a purchase as a result (Source: Impiger Mobile)
24. 9 out of 10 mobile searches lead to action and over half lead to purchase (Source: Search Engine Land)
25. 70% of mobile searches lead to action within one hour – It takes one month for the same percentage of desktop users to catch up (Source: Mobile Marketer)

Hopefully this list of facts will convince you that you need to begin placing a strong emphasis on mobile. And you can start with adding Zemanta! Not only are our related posts optimized for mobile, but they are customizable and look stunning on any mobile device.

The post 25 Content Marketing Facts That Will Make You Seriously Consider Mobile appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

As regular readers of this blog already know, Zemanta makes connections. We connect authors with engaging content to include in new articles. We connect publishers with new readers & revenues and we connect marketers with new consumers. We’re able to do this because we understand content & context and are able to weave together meaningful connections through the natural relationships that words, images and links generate online. Ours is a Network connected through content. So I’m quite pleased to be part of the Family. Also, I look good in orange.

I first got to know and respect the Zemanta team in my last role as GM of Typepad at Say Media. There I integrated Zemanta’s technology directly into the Typepad Compose experience as it represented a great opportunity to deliver more value to the platform, its bloggers and their audiences. Of course I was not alone in realizing this, as Zemanta is also activated by default for all new WordPress.com accounts. When the opportunity arose to join this innovative team I jumped at the chance. Recently, Todd Sawicki also joined the team as President. In his introductory post he summed up why now is such an exciting time for Zemanta:

[Zemanta] is at the intersection of three massively important trends for online publishers and advertisers: the increasing use of content marketing, the rise and importance of native advertising and the rise of mobile (and its monetization challenges).

Just as the rise of the web some 15 years ago altered the media landscape. New forces are at play reshaping it yet again. As readers turn more and more to social networks for discovery and mobile devices for consumption, publishers must adapt. As readers become increasingly less tolerant of interuptive experiences, publishers and the marketers who support them must find better solutions.

We’re hard at work to be part of a better solution – one that respects the reader and seeks to build new connections, new relationships, through content.

If you’re a publisher, platform, network or marketer please get in touch with us about joining our ever-growing Zemanta Family. I just did and look forward to welcoming you.

The post Jeff Reine Joins Zemanta as VP of Publisher & Corporate Development appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Magazines are increasingly becoming, in a world where content is unlimited and free, a premium that commands, because it is an enjoyable experience. Because as long as you have an internet connection, you can get as much mediocre content as you want. But to have a package that’s been curated and skillfully written, reported, edited and fact checked… well, that’s a value added. And that’s the magazine experience. It’s not just the random grabbing of this and that, but it’s the packaging of everything together. And that’s an enjoyable experience. Randall Lane, Editor of Forbes Magazine

This may be true (full disclosure: I am a magazine junkie). But what caught my attention in this statement from this great interview by Mr. Magazine was: “Because as long as you have an internet connection, you can get as much mediocre content as you want.”

Lately, quite a few have written about the inevitable backlash against content marketing or online publishing.

Robert Rose, Content Marketing Institute, writes: “As with most new approaches (think social media, or cloud services, or “big data”), we have seen clearly thought-out practices being evangelized right alongside the short-sighted strategies of trend-obsessed hangers-on. Naturally, this is resulting in ample frustration in our industry. /…/ everywhere the trend is clear: Content marketing is now staring down a “Valley of Disillusionment.”

Christopher S. Penn, writes: “Content marketing. It was the darling of the marketing world in 2012, but it’s fallen on hard times lately. Why? Mostly because marketers are struggling with it, and as a result generating terrible content, which in turn is making people unhappy.”

Honestly, I am not panicking. Terrible content by others makes me nervous only if there are too many hacks, and brands infer that publishing doesn’t work, unless you’re Red Bull or Coca Cola.

It works if you do it right.

Instead of worrying how others, even your competition, do it, focus on your own content strategy. In the end, if you’re going to reap reward, others will follow; they may try and copy yours, but they will realize, sooner or later, that they have to do what’s right for them.

All you have to worry about are the following 4 pillars of successful content marketing and publishing strategy:

1. Plan

Planning is essential. No matter how much we may want to ignore it or be spontaneous, sooner or later (better sooner), you’ll discover it is necessary. Tons of people have already stressed this dozens of times, many of us based on our own experience. I’ve really learned this the hard way.

Planning includes a comprehensive long-term content strategy and, during the execution phase, a detailed editorial calendar.

Highly recommended further reading:

• How to Build a Content Marketing Strategy
• The Top 10 Content Marketing Strategy Lessons from the Last 15 Years
• Not All Business Blogs Fail, Do It Right Before You Can Say It’s BS

2. Execute

Only after you have a confirmed and sensible long-term comprehensive content strategy you can begin to implement it.

Highly recommended further reading:

• The Advanced Guide to Content Marketing
• How to Write 100 Blog Articles in Under 5 Hours: An Amazing Content Marketing Story
• Content Strategy: 9 Secrets for Awesome Blog Post Titles

3. Assess

Just doing it, won’t be enough. In the end, even the greatest content marketing or publishing strategy in the world won’t suffice, not even the best editorial calendar ever if you don’t regularly assess its impact.

Highly recommended further reading:

• 7 Updates to make to Google Analytics After Coffee To-day!
• 28 Content-Related Measures to Track 
• 65 Metrics To Track Blog Success

4. Adapt

Why measure, you ask? So that you can adapt immediately, and improve, get better results and achieve or even surpass your business and marketing goals.

Highly recommended further reading:

• Adapt a Top-Tier Content Strategy and Make It Your Own: 3 Key Ideas
• Optimizing Zemanta Image Campaign by Thinking Like a Blogger: A Case Study
• 2 Unique Ways to Find Content Topics That Will Resonate Well With Your Readers

The post This Is What Matters: 4 Pillars of Your Content Marketing Success appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

At Distilled, our main business is SEO, and it can still be overwhelming sometimes. But here’s how we like to think of SEO, at it’s core: search engine optimization is usability for search engines. In order for search engines to be as enchanted with your site as your human visitors, they have to be able to find, read, and understand your content.

To help you check that your content is findable and relevant, we have prepared a guide on how to see what search engines see, and how to fix any problems you may run into. Knowing that most of you aren’t SEOs, we’ve done our best to provide as many free tools to help you as possible.

As a publisher, you already know how to write valuable content, and probably have a fair idea of how to choose the right content for your visitors. But a website that is easy to read for people can be surprisingly confusing to search engines, if you make a few technical mistakes. To help you check that your content is findable and understandable to search engines, we have put together a list of typical issues that publishers run into.

Part I: It’s all about Indexation (Findability)

Just because your webpage exists it doesn’t mean that search engines will find it, or find it valuable enough to list in their results pages. Most sites are going to have one or two pages that aren’t indexed: big sites often have a handful of pages that are too difficult for search engines to find, and small sites are often overlooked. Regardless of how strong or weak your site is, your first step is to check how many of your webpages are indexed.

Here’s how:

1. Get a list of all URLs on your site

If you’re using a good content management system  (for example, WordPress or Drupal)  you may be able to get a list of your URLs easily. If not, at Distilled we like to use a tool called Screaming Frog, which will scan your site and get a list of all of the URLs. Be aware however, Screaming Frog uses internal links off the homepage, so if you have a page unconnected with the other pages on your site, Screaming Frog won’t find it.

For more detail instructions on how to use Screaming Frog, please check their step-by-step guide. It is pretty intuitive to use and entirely free for the first 500 URLS.

You can also get a list of URLs by using one of any number of tools that build XML sitemaps and stripping out the XML content. XML-sitemaps.com is a good, free tool for this.

2. Check to see what hasn’t been indexed

If you have a fairly small site, you can test to make sure that each page is indexed by simply typing in “site:http://www.mysite.com/my-page” in Google or Bing. Starting with “site:” means they will only return that page, so if it isn’t in their index, you’ll get a “not found” message:

If you have a bigger site, open a free account with both Google and Bing Webmaster Tools and submit your XML sitemap. Google will count the number of URLs that you provided in the sitemap and compare that to the number of URLs it has in its index with a bar graph. Bing will be more helpful and identify which links you submitted that it doesn’t have indexed. Don’t assume that Bing and Google will index in the same way, though.

3. Get pages indexed

If you find some pages that aren’t indexed, ask yourself a couple of questions:

A. Is the page new?

Search engines only crawl small sites every so often, so it could take a few days for new content to get noticed. If you want something noticed as soon as possible, make sure it’s in an XML sitemap that you’ve submitted to Google/Bing Webmaster Tools. “Noticed” doesn’t necessarily mean “indexed,” though, so make sure that it’s a high quality page, with at least 750 words of unique text, and multiple links to it.

To get an idea of how long it will take before your new page is indexed, Google and Bing Webmaster Tools both tell you how often they crawl your site:

If you don’t have Bing or Google Webmaster Tools set up for your site, you can see when Google last crawled your site by searching for “cache:http://www.mysite.com/.” Google will load its cached version of the homepage and the date it was last crawled at the top of the page. If you do this regularly you can get a sense of the maximum crawl frequency for your site. In the image below, you can see that when we accessed it on May 3, distilled.net was crawled on May 3.

B. Is the link to the page buried?

If you have a page that is only linked to in the footer of a few pages, or in the body of one of the relatively minor pages on the site, search engines may not notice it. Make sure that all of your pages (or, all important pages, if your site is large) have links in your top or side navigation, and cross link between similar pages as well.

If your top and/or side navigation is loaded with JavaScript, there’s a chance that search engines can’t read it. Load Google’s cache (“cache:http://www.mysite.com/mypage”) of the page, and see if Google was able to recreate your navigation. If it isn’t in the cache, there’s a good chance Google can’t read it.

Note: If your page is using a heavy dose of JavaScript, it’s possible that Google will load it improperly and wipe the entire page blank. Check the Text Version to be absolutely sure that Google cannot read a page.

C. Does an older page 302 (temporarily) redirect to the missing page?

A 302 redirect tells search engines: “the URL you tried to access is temporarily unavailable, so load this page instead.” If you have an old page that was indexed pointing to a new page, search engines will index the old page instead of the new page. Change that 302 redirect to a 301 (permanent) redirect and the problem will go away.

For a full description of redirects, here’s SEOmoz’s infographic explaining it.

4. Get Content Indexed

Simply making sure that a URL is indexed often isn’t enough. There are a number of ways that your site loads content that makes it difficult for search engines to understand it. Unfortunately, there isn’t an easy tool like Screaming Frog to help you with this for your entire site at once. Instead, look at the Google or Bing’s cached version of your pages and see what’s there.

Here are some of the most common reasons for content to not get indexed:

A. It’s Not Text

Search engines aren’t good at understanding anything that isn’t text. If text is a part of an image, loaded in Flash, or in a video, you should assume that search engines cannot understand it. (Quick tip to see if something is HTML text or not: try to highlight it with your mouse. If it’s text, the text will lighten and the background will darken.)

Instead:

• If you want text on images to be read by search engines, load the picture without text and put the text in HTML below the image, then use CSS to float the text over the picture
• Build pages in HTML first, then layer Flash to make it prettier. Sites built primarily on Flash typically have a hard time ranking well.
• Include a text transcript beneath your videos. It will be helpful to impaired users and lets search engines know what you’re talking about in the video.

B. The Text is Loaded with JavaScript or is in iFrames

Text loaded in iFrames technically comes from somewhere off of that page, so search engines can read it, but choose to ignore it. JavaScript, on the other hand, is difficult for Google to render. To test to see if search engines can read some text on your page, copy a long snippet of it into Google or Bing’s search box, and put the snippet in quotes. This asks search engines to only return sites that use that exact text, so it will limit the results to pages that it can find with that text only.

If the text can’t be read, it won’t return the page.

Note: This is also a great way to check if someone is scraping your site, if search engines have accidentally indexed the same page of your site twice, or if you have duplicate versions of the same page, with different URLS, competing with each other.

Part II: Marking Up Content

There are several fields within a standard web page – primarily: title tags, headers, meta descriptions – that are used by the search engines to assess the content of the page. This post by Paddy Moogan explains page structure in more detail. By using these fields properly, you can highlight more important phrases to search engines, which helps them understand how to categorize your pages.

Write Your Snippet on Search Engine Results Pages

You’re able to customize what search engines show on their results pages with the <title> meta tag and the meta description (<meta name=”description”>). In the image below, the meta description is in the red box and the page title is the bolded, purple text.

To test how your page title and description will look on actual search engine results pages (SERPs), use the Snippet Optimizer.

Page Titles

Search engines will display approximately 70 characters on their results pages, but it’s really more about pixel width than character length. Try titles on the snippet optimizer to see what will fit well.

Page titles significantly impact the way search engines interpret the content of your page. If you build a page to target a specific keyword phrase that you would like to rank for, that should absolutely be in the page title. Otherwise, title your page with the most commonly used phrase. You can check the popularity of different phrases with Google Trends (which compares different phrases to each other, or based on the time of the year) or Google’s AdWords Keyword Tool.

We also recommend that you include your brand or site name at the end of each page title. If searchers already know of your site, they’ll be more likely to click on your link if they know it’s you.

Meta Descriptions

Search engines will display up to 156 characters of your meta description. If the description is longer than that, it will end the description after the last full word that can fit, then add an ellipsis ( “…”).

Unlike page titles, search engines don’t read meta descriptions, so they don’t directly influence your rankings at all. However, search engines do pay attention to click through rates. If your meta description is well written and convinces visitors to click through to your page, your page will rank higher.

You should also be aware that writing a meta description doesn’t necessarily mean that your meta description will display for all searches. If searchers use phrases that are on your page rather than in the meta description, Google or Bing may choose to display that snippet of text from your page instead.

Identify Text on the Page

On the page, search engines can read your text, but they don’t have the understanding of a human to be able to pull out the larger message without other clues. They will look at the size of text, the placement of it (higher on the page is seen as more important), and they will look at the number of times the same or similar phrases are repeated. But, you can help them along.

Header Tags <h1>, <h2>, …, <h#>

You’re probably using these already, because if you’re using a Word-like editor in your content management system, making some text a “heading” automatically applies this tag. But, if you decide to style the header yourself, you could be missing the tag. Check the HTML of your pages to see if a piece of text uses an <h#> tag before a header, or if it only uses a standard paragraph tag <p>.

Search engines see headers as an outline of your page, so the phrases used in header tags are interpreted as a better indication of the content on your page. Make sure that the title of your page really describes what you’re talking about, and put it in an <h1> tag.

Alt Text and File Names <img src=”descriptive-name.jpg” alt=”alternative title”>

The alternative text on images and their file names are often ignored, because human visitors understand the message of the image without any more words. Search engines, though, can’t see images, and need text to guide them. Make sure that you name your files something descriptive, and use alternative text to describe the photo.

Do Not Use Meta Keyword Tags

Google didn’t look at meta keywords in 2003, much less in 2013, and Bing never has. At best, meta keyword tags won’t do anything; at worst, your competitors will see which search terms you’re targeting, and search engines may see your site as spammy and lower your rankings. It’s best to leave them out entirely.

Technical SEO Doesn’t Have to be Hard

By paying close attention to indexation and on-page mark up, you can communicate more effectively with search engines, improving your chances of ranking well on their results pages. Use this guide to clean up your site as it currently stands and to watch how you post content in the future. You’ll be surprised at how much little changes can help your organic traffic increase!

The post A Step-by-step Guide to a Technical SEO Audit for Publishers appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Like any process, the first step is one of the most important and can often make or break the success of your efforts. This is especially the case in deciding on the topics you are going to write about on your blog. After all, if you choose a topic that your audience isn’t interested in, it is pretty obvious that they probably aren’t going to read it.

Generating Relevant Content Topics Using Twitter & Email

Like most brands, we have a content strategy that both resonates with our readers and aligns with our overall marketing goals. Unfortunately, it is very easy to lose focus and create disparity between what we think our readers want and what they actually want. Yes, we can check to see how our blog posts are doing on our social channels or check out the various engagement metrics on Google Analytics, but that’s not always enough. Sometimes we need more than just the numbers we rely on daily to make educated decisions. So, that is why we decided to explore the same avenue only in a different direction using two of our main promotion channels.

Twitter

I’m going to start with a platform that most, if not all, bloggers and publishers are using – Twitter. One good way to find out what kind of content your followers value is to export your click data for your tweets and see if there are any trends. Although this does work, there are also many factors that may impact your click rate like time of day, day of week, the amount of characters, and the use of hashtags. For that reason, we decided to analyze the data that nearly every one of our Twitter followers provides that is not affected by any of the previously mentioned factors – the bio.

Step 1: Export the Data

There are many ways to do this, but we used Simply Measured’s Free Twitter Follower Report. I recommend this tool because it is free, it provides you with all the data that you need in order to complete this analysis, and it provides you with a lot of other data that you may not already have.

Step 2: Compile the Bios

After you have exported the Excel file, go to the tab titled “Follower List”. This is all of the raw data that supports the other worksheets in the report. You can explore all of the data that it offers you, but for the purpose of this analysis, we only need the bios. Copy all of that data and put it in a separate spreadsheet.

Step 3: Clean Up the Data

This is a tedious and, depending on how many followers you have, time-consuming part. You need to separate each word of every bio into its own cell. We used Excel’s “Text to Columns” feature (Data -> Text to Columns…) with a space selected as the delimiter. From there, we copied all of this data into one column, and then removed any unnecessary symbols. After you have done all of this, you should have a fairly extensive list (our list was a little over 65,000) of keywords all in a single column.

Step 4: Aggregate the Data

Make a copy of the worksheet with all of the keywords and remove all duplicates so that you have a list of the unique keywords. Then, drawing the data from the full list of keywords, use a “=countif” equation to get the number of times that each keyword appeared. From here, order the list by count from highest to lowest and voila! You now have a list of the most popular words that appear in your followers’ bios.

Step 5: Clean Some More & Visualize

I consider this last step optional, but am sharing because I think it is a cool way to further visualize the results of your data. We removed any stop words or other words that have no meaning (a, an, of, is, at, the, etc.) and got a list of the top 100 words. From there, we copied these into Word It Out and formed a word cloud which you can find above.

What do you think? If you follow Zemanta on Twitter, or are a regular reader of our blog, do you think this is an accurate summary of content that you would be interested in?

Email

This approach is probably not applicable to many of you, but I decided I would include it anyway in hopes that I would either inspire you or spark some productive brainstorming. As many of our readers know, we have a pretty awesome newsletter that we send out every week. This newsletter promotes not only our content that was created during the week, but also content that we find around the web that we think our subscribers will find interesting. By doing this, not only are we able to see which content to feature in our newsletter, but we also gain an insight as to what content we should produce that will resonate well with our subscribers.

Step 1: Export the Data

First, we exported all of the newsletter data from the past 6 months and put that into a spreadsheet. This could be pretty tedious depending on what email client you use. We use MailChimp and as far as I know, you have to export a separate report for each email blast you send out.

Step 2: Aggregate (and clean) the Data

After getting all of the raw data into a spreadsheet, we combined it and organized it so that we had 6 primary columns: URL, Domain, Blog Post Title, Content Focus, Clicks and % Total of Clicks. This allowed us to see the URL of the link that was provided in the newsletter, the domain of that blog post so that we could see which external domains were providing the best results, the title of the blog post, the content focus (I will get to this in the next step), the total amount of clicks that URL received, and the percentage of the total amount of clicks that issue of the newsletter received (for comparisons sake).

Step 3: Label by Content Focus

Now you need to get the only data that isn’t provided during the export: the “Content Focus”. In order to get this, we went through each of the URLs and attempted to label it with a content focus – basically, what is the main category of the content. This was a bit tedious, and a bit difficult to come up with the labels and apply only one per blog post, but definitely worth it at the end.

Step 4: Combine and Analyze the Data

You can now aggregate this data to see which categories received the highest share of clicks from each newsletter. This may not be as effective for someone that only has a few emails worth of data, but we had six months’ worth so it provided a pretty good look as to what content our subscribers were clicking on the most.

Final Analysis

Now that you have a good idea of what both your Twitter followers and your email subscribers find valuable, you can begin to make decisions. For us, it is quite obvious that our Twitter followers value marketing, social media, blogging, technology, and SEO the most and that our email subscribers value PR, blogging, tools, content marketing and social media the most. Combine insights from both of these analyses and you have a good idea of what topics we should focus on in order to drive engagement and provide value to our audience.

So far it has worked fairly well. After seeing the results from this analysis, we decided to do a post on the best tools for content marketing and blogging. What happened? We saw the largest spike in traffic and engagement for that blog post than we have seen for any other in months.

The post 2 Unique Ways to Find Content Topics That Will Resonate Well With Your Readers appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

1. 40 Killer Content Marketing & Blogging Tools That You’ll Fall in Love With

First, it was just an idea. And when it was finished, we just knew Zach Eberhart had put together an amazing list that would resonate with you. So many useful tools in one blog post, so many yet to be tested by many of us. Two enthusiastic thumbs up!

2. How to Maximize Your Content Exposure by Leveraging Other Websites

After more than a year, John Doherty of Distilled is back on Zemanta blog with a new helpful post. He looks at a few ways how to leverage other websites in order to expose your content to new audiences.

3. 7 Tips for Creating User-friendly Mobile Content

“By 2014, people will connect to the Internet more from their mobile devices than their desktop devices,” writes Jessica Davis of Godot Media. Are you ready? She also argues that “creating great mobile content is not rocket science” and lists seven tips that will help you create such content.

4. Content Marketing: What If You’re Not Doing It Wrong

Josh Harcus of Hüify takes a different approach. He writes, “Our email inboxes are full of blog titles that seem to tell us only one thing – you’re doing it WRONG! I am, on the other hand, going to share an approach that will compliment what you are already doing, instead of changing it. ”

5. Bloggers, You’ve Got the Power: Rise up to the Challenge

Natasa Briski of Metina Lista argues that consumers are interested in your opinions more than in the opinions by the mass media. Herein lies a great opportunity for you, bloggers.

The post 5 Most Popular Zemanta Posts from April You Should Read appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Three years ago, the Content Marketing Institute partnered with MarketingProfs to develop a benchmark study for the content marketing industry. Today, this research is shared and engaged in by more marketing professionals than any other piece of industry research.

According to this content marketing research, 44% of business marketers employ some kind of research as part of their marketing program. This number has almost doubled in the last 12 months. Why? Marketers are finding that good, sound research can be the core, compelling subject for an ongoing content marketing program.

How to Approach Research

So many times, companies engage in a research project to prove out a key product feature or benefit. If you want your research output to be shared and talked about, don’t go this direction. Research projects should answer key questions from your customers. Think about:

• Who will primarily read your research?
• What do you want to tell your readers? What’s your hypothesis on the research? For example, our CMI research hypothesis was that marketers are spending more time and resources on content marketing.
• Do you understand the key informational needs of the target audience? What are their pain points? If you can solve the pain points of your audience with your research, that will make all the difference.
• Do you have a firm grasp on the types of keywords to focus on that your customers are searching for? (see Google’s Keyword Tool) This is important in determining critical topics for your research.
• What kind of research has already been done in this area? How can your research story be different? (Please don’t duplicate another study!)
• What is your ultimate goal in doing the research? Is it brand awareness, lead generation, link building, thought leadership? Whatever the reason, make sure you put your objective into some kind of metric goal. This could be a number of leads, number of particular companies, links from direct coverage and so on.

Research Process

You’ll find that most companies will just use a web survey tool (like Survey Monkey), send out to a few lists a couple times, and that’s that. If you want your research to be credible at all, work with a third party to handle the distribution of the survey and tallying the final results. You can save money by creating the survey questions yourself, but we run everything by a professional research firm to make sure everything is as it should be. The worst thing that could happen is someone questioning your research practices.

Here’s a few best practices:

• Only ask questions integral to your research.
• Limit the amount of questions to no more than 10 if possible.
• In your initial direct email, tell them exactly how much time it will take to complete the survey.
• Whatever email system you send from, make sure you don’t send reminders to people who’ve already completed the survey.  Any basic email provider should be able to handle this.
• Set a time limit, like seven days, for them to complete the survey. Honestly, if they don’t open the email right then and complete, they probably won’t get to it…so create a sense of importance and urgency.
• For completion, give the responders early access or full access to the results. In my experience, that’s always been the best incentive.

And finally (I can’t stress this enough), work with partners on your research. Find other organizations that help give your project credibility or access to a database for responses. You may even consider partnering with a leading trade magazine or media company on the research (for that added credibility). If funding is a problem, work with a partner who can contribute funds to cover the costs of the research.

How to Package and Distribute the Results

This is where most organizations go wrong. A company puts so much time and effort into the creation of the data, they forget best practices when it comes to distribution and marketing. The result = no one reads or shares the results.

Best practices on packaging and distribution include:

• The new format is the eBook (not the white paper format). Use a horizontal setup, with high quality design. Make it look sexy. If it looks like the same old boring report, no one will share it.
• Before distribution, solicit feedback from key industry influencers. Ask to include their comments in the back of the research.  This will assist you in getting the project shared and spread.
• Look at your content assets for the research. The end-result (eBook) is just one form to use. From the eBook, you can develop multiple infographics, charts, short reports, blog posts, interviews and more from the report. Any sound research report should generate at least 20 pieces of content to use.
• Paid Distribution – Look at using tools like Outbrain, Zemanta or even Pay-Per-Click to help spread your research to targeted searchers.
• SlideShare is a must. You may get your best sharing and downloading of the research there.
• Don’t Gate It – it’s so tempting to put a form in front of your research. Don’t. If you do, recognize that the content won’t be shared at all, which will hurt your search rankings. If leads are a must, then create two versions, one gated and one un-gated as a teaser, but with enough information that people will actively share.
• Good Old PR – It’s worthwhile to send your results out on the wire (using a service like PR Newswire) with a link to your report.
• Media Relations – Connect individual with key industry influencers and media sites about the report.  Be personal, and consider sending an abstract of what the story should be for that particular audience.

In summary, research reports can and should be a core part of your content marketing program. If you decide to invest in this area, use the points above to do it right. So many research programs die silently…make sure yours is not one of them.

The post How to Develop Research as a Core Part of Your Content Marketing Strategy appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

RSS Readers

Google Reader

This is a tool that I’ve been using since last year and it quickly became one of my favorite Google products. For anyone who does a lot of blog reading, an RSS reader will not only save you time, but it will make reading several blog posts a lot easier. Unfortunately, Google is killing this product on July 1st. For that reason, I have included a popular alternative (and the one I am attempting to switch to), Feedly, on this list.

Feedly

This is a popular alternative to Google Reader. It’s the solution that many disgruntled Reader users are moving to. Not only is it very similar, it is (in my opinion) better in a lot of ways with a cleaner interface and more options. They also make moving from Reader a painless process by offering a synchronization option.

Content Ideas

Trapit

This is a tool that I am very fond of and have been using since its inception. It allows you to “trap” various topics and it aggregates articles from around the web on these trapped topics. What I like about it is it allows you to discover new blogs, discover trends within a particular niche, and it offers you the opportunity to trap very specific topics – something that other similar services do not.

Pulse

This is something that I have only recently discovered but have immediately enjoyed using. It is very similar to Trapit only without the opportunity for specific subjects. It also seems to get the majority of its content from more of the major blogs/publishers so you don’t have to sort through some of the lower quality blogs like you do in Trapit. This application is also a great way to discover trends within your industry or niche.

Google Trends

If you have never used Google Trends before than I would highly recommend starting. Anyone who has ever hit a brick wall while coming up with a good title/post idea from the Google Keyword Tool often finds success here. The tool allows you to enter a phrase and Google will show you how it is trending on their search engine and other related keywords that are “rising”. Use this in combination with the previous tools (discover trends, then use this tool to see more opportunities) to stay on the pulse within your niche.

Google Alerts

Google Alerts is another Google product that will help you discover some of the trends within your niche. If you aren’t already using this for content marketing, and we have highly suggested it in the past, then we suggest start using it right now. Use this tool to get constant alerts on terms and sites of your choosing to see what other bloggers are writing about. Unfortunately, with the reliability of the service declining, many are speculating that Google is going to kill this tool as well.

Talkwalker Alerts

Thankfully, like Feedly for Reader, we have a solution that is a perfectly good replacement for Alerts. This replacement is so similar to Alerts, if you visit their website (save for the minor design differences) you would think you were setting up an alert using Google. I have been experimenting with this tool for a few weeks now and I have to say that it works quite well and the difference from Alerts is minimal, if not non-existant.

Quora

We have already recommended Quora as a solution for content ideas before. And we stand by that. According to Bostjan, “Quora is an online forum that aggregates questions and answers to specific topics. Users can collaborate by editing questions and suggesting edits to other users’ answers. The forum is organized by people and their interests so everybody can find, collect, and share the information most valuable to each and every individual.”

Inbound.org

This is a website/tool that unfortunately is exclusive to content that I have been writing about recently (SEO, digital marketing, content marketing, etc.). I have decided to include it anyway in hopes that you may realize that there is a similar website in your niche that you can get inspiration for content from. This is useful because if you visit it enough, you may start to notice which topics your niche finds most valuable. Primarily because the community “upvotes” an article or discussion that they find valuable.

Reddit

I included this because it is not a typical website that people may think of for content ideas and also because the system of “upvoting” is very similar to Inbound. Although at first glance Reddit may seem like a bunch of liberal, technologically savvy guys that love cats, further inspection reveals that there is a subreddit (or topic/subject/niche) for every thing you could possibly think of – and then some. So find a relevant subreddit, see what people are talking about/upvoting, and get inspired.

Organization/Productivity

Evernote

I’m sure many of you have heard of Evernote or use it, but I am going to mention it anyway because I love it. This is a tool that allows you to keep track of just about any thought, link, or image (just to name a few) that you want into an organized system of notes. Use this to keep track of content ideas that you come up with, articles that you come across that you love, and just about any other thing that you need to remember.

Wunderlist

When I have a lot of things to do, I create lists. Not only does this allow me to organize and visualize all of the things that I need to accomplish, but it feels really good to cross something off your list after finishing it. That is why I love to do lists and for me Wunderlist is my favorite. Its delightfully minimalistic approach makes creating and organizing lists a breeze and has helped to increase my productivity for quite some time now.

Google Calendar

This tool is also something that we have recommended in the past and we stand by that recommendation as well. Use this tool to create editorial calendars (especially useful for the blogs with multiple authors), keep your future blog posts organized, and keep you on track for publishing.

Self Control

This is another tool that is not among the typically recommended but it is one that has helped me so I am happy to suggest using it. Use this when you really need to get something done and cannot risk the temptations of your favorite distractors. This application allows you to blacklist any website you want for a set period of time (for up to one day). Make sure you really want to blacklist it though because once you hit the start button you will not be able to reach that website in any way on any browser until that timer runs out.

Focus Booster

Focus Booster is something that I have used before but unfortunately have not really gotten that great of results from. However, many people swear by it so I am including it on this list anyway. Use this tool to effectively utilize the Pomodoro Technique to maintain productivity throughout the day.

Writing

Google Docs

If your blog or website has multiple authors or editors, this is an excellent tool for collaboration. You can use this to begin writing a post and have any other person that the document is “shared” with to contribute on it in real-time. This is especially useful for real-time collaboration with remote employees.

After the Deadline

After the Deadline is a tool that I only recently began using but have quickly learned to love. Install the browser extension and activate it whenever you want instant contextual spell checking, advanced style checking, and intelligent grammar checking on the blog post you are writing. This is a great tool that acts as an additional defense against grammar and spelling mistakes.

Plagium

I haven’t really used this tool recently because I am no longer managing content for any sites, but when I did it was a great (and free!) tool that allowed you to quickly check if a block of text was already published elsewhere on the web. With the recent spike in guest blogging I would highly recommend using this if your blog frequently accepts guest blog posts in order to avoid accepting plagiarized blog posts. The quick use of this product will save you a lot of headaches in the future!

SourceBottle

Although this isn’t a tool that I have used in the past, the concept of it seemed very unique and many may find value in it so I figured I would include it on this list. SourceBottle provides journalists (or publishers) with sources for content that they are writing and experts on a topic an opportunity to be a source (great if you want to build authority within your niche). Unfortunately, I cannot provide a full review because I have not had the chance to use it, but the general sentiment on the web seems to be positive.

Images

GIMP

I’m not sure if I love this tool because it is what I learned to edit images on and it is what I have been using since I began blogging/web development or if it really is the best open source image editor available. Sure, there are a lot more features with Photoshop but for the average blogger, they are definitely overkill and not worth the investment. That is why I recommend GIMP. It is easy to use, open source, and it offers a considerable amount of support and documentation for a free product.

Pixlr

For those who love web-based applications, this is one of the best when it comes to free image editing solutions. Pixlr offers three different solutions: Pixlr-o-matic, Pixlr Express, and Pixlr Editor which is for the “playful”, “efficient”, and advanced user, respectively. This web-based image editor is a great solution for bloggers who want to quickly edit images on the fly without starting up RAM heavy image editors.

ThingLink

This is actually a really cool tool that I only recently discovered that I think many will find use in. What it does is allow you to “create rich images with music, video, sound, text and more.” It does this by allowing you to tag images with touch points that give more life and context to the image. I see this as a great way to further engage your readers in a fun and unique way. Although I have not yet found an opportunity to use it on the Zemanta blog before this post, I certainly look for every opportunity because they are actually a lot of fun to make and give your blog a way to stick out from the competition.

Aspect Ratio Calculator

This, and the subsequent two tools, is actually a very simple tool that is dedicated to only one thing. Although it has many other uses, I use it to quickly find the correct dimensions of an image that I want to scale using HTML markup. Although I have more frequently (and this recommended) scaled the actual image using an editor, this is a great way to quickly find the appropriate dimensions.

Page Ruler

Another simple tool, and unfortunately only for those with Chrome (though I’m sure you can find something similar for Firefox), is Page Ruler. Activate this tool and you can quickly get the width or height in pixels of whatever is on screen. This is also a good way to see what dimensions would look best when you are previewing your blog post which can save some time by not having to guess and test.

Color Picker

Also a Chrome extension, this wonderful tool allows you to quickly see the hex code for any color that is on screen. This allows for quick CSS markup or it can save you the time of taking a screenshot, opening that in an image editor and then discovering the color from there (well, this is what I did before I discovered this tool).

SEO

Google Keyword Tool

This is a must-have tool for any blogger. If you haven’t heard of it then I strongly encourage its use. It makes it possible for you to enter search phrases (or parts of a potential blog post title) and see how much search traffic it gets during a month. Moreover, it offers other keyword suggestions; if there is a better search phrase that is similar, Google will let you know! This tool is also very useful to see what terms are worth optimizing on your site and the respective competitiveness for each one.

Ubersuggest

Having trouble thinking of a blog post title even after using Google’s Keyword Tool? Have a good title but it isn’t as relevant as you would like it to be? Enter key search phrases or any other ideas that you may have using this tool and get hundreds of similar search phrases. This tool is one of my favorites and is highly recommended. Especially if you are considering a PPC campaign and need to perform keyword research. Pro tip: use wildcards (search terms using an asterisk to represent any word) with this tool to get amazing results.

Soovle

Similar to Ubersuggest, this is a tool that returns you the most popular search terms that are most closely related to whatever you enter. The good thing about this tool is that it is not exclusive to Google. It also provides you results from Amazon, Yahoo, Bing, YouTube, Answers.com, and Wikipedia.

WordPress SEO (Yoast)

Easily one of the best SEO plugins for any WordPress user (sorry other blogging platforms!), this tool makes it easy for a typical blogger to optimize their post for SEO and see how their blog post will appear on the search engine results page. After you choose a focus keyword (or whatever keyword phrase you wish to optimize the page for), the tool shows you where it may be useful to include that phrase (mostly in the meta data) and reminds you of basic SEO best practices.

Majestic SEO

After you have published your post, you are going to want to see how it is doing on the web right? Well use this tool (my personal favorite when it comes to site exploration), to see how many backlinks your posts are getting, where they are coming from, and a plethora of other information that is useful to anyone engaged in search engine optimization. This tool is free with registration for the basic features but requires a membership for anyone who wants more information.

Open Site Explorer

This SEOmoz tool is one that is similar to MajesticSEO but offers fewer features to the blogger on a budget. One immediate benefit is that it offers you the site’s domain authority and the page’s page authority – something that MajesticSEO does not do. Some drawbacks are that it is not updated nearly as often as Majestic and it restricts a lot more features. However, for anyone looking to throw down the cash for a SEOmoz membership, it is definitely a great tool in your SEO arsenal.

Marketing

SproutSocial

This is definitely my favorite tool for social media monitoring and is what we here at Zemanta use. This tool does it all when it comes to social media: get a quick overview of all of your accounts on the dashboard, check out your smart inbox (a quick way to see all of the places your social media accounts are engaged with/mentioned and to track any terms that you want), see how your tweets or updates to your timeline are doing, schedule your messages, and get full reports. And these are just a few of the things that you can do. SproutSocial is also very committed to a good user experience and are constantly updating their service (they recently added engagement reports and breakdown by team member). Although it does cost money, it is well worth it and they do offer you the chance to try out their product for 30 days.

MailChimp

If you are considering email marketing then look no further. MailChimp is one of the best and most frequently used for amateur bloggers and SMBs alike. Worried about being able to design a good email? MailChimp offers you templates to choose from. Worried that you won’t be able to customize every little thing and make it exactly how you please? MailChimp allows you to do that too (just subscribe to our newsletter to see the potential awesomeness). The reporting features that are offered are also very thorough and they make A/B testing your emails easy and fun.

Lucky Orange

I’ll be honest, this is a tool product that I have not yet had the opportunity to check out, but it seemed very interesting and I thought some of you would find value in it so here you are. Lucky Orange provides unique analytics about your site that you may not see in Google Analytics – all at a fairly reasonable price. Two of the most notable features are the mouse heat maps and the visitor recordings.

Wibiya

This is another cool product that has only recently come onto my radar. If you spend enough time on the web, then you are almost guaranteed to run into this sooner or later. It places a bar at the bottom of the browser window encouraging visitors to make a certain action. There are several options available as of now, including social buttons, discount offers, and recommended readings. This would be a great way to increase site engagement and place your social buttons in an easy to find location.

Other

Zemanta

Zemanta (both Related Posts and Editorial Assistant) is a wonderful tool that we of course love quite dearly. What we do is provide related posts at the bottom of your blog post (like you can see below) which helps you to increase user engagement, increase traffic from other related sites, keep track of all this using our real-time analytics, and optimize for mobile. All with complete customization and editorial control. We think it is pretty awesome.

Disqus

Another awesome tool that doesn’t quite fit into the above categories is Disqus. This tool provides a wonderful commenting system at the end of your blog posts. It’s what we use on our site and we love it, so check it out!
 
 

Polldaddy

Do you ever wonder what your customers or readers are thinking? I’m going to go ahead and guess that the answer is just about every day. Which is why I’m including PollDaddy on the list. Not only can you provide surveys to get customer and reader feedback, but you can also use it to create unique surveys which you can then turn into blog posts that your audience will be interested in.

Odosketch

This is a pretty cool tool that I haven’t really had the chance to use on anything that has been published but I have certainly gotten good use out of it. Odosketch provides a canvas and a set of cool brushes and lets you go to town. The cool thing is you can share these sketches and see the process that the artist went through in creating it. It’s a really cool tool and I strongly encourage trying it out. Warning: Do not click on link if you wish to be productive for the next 20 minutes.

Quickmeme

I know many people hate memes, but there are also a lot of people that love them. Using them in your blog posts can be a great way to show that you are in tune with popular interent culture. You have to know how each meme is used, and you have to have some good copy in mind, but if you have a blog post that it will work with well, I definitely recommend trying it out.

The post 40 Killer Content Marketing & Blogging Tools That You’ll Fall in Love With appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

His astounding NBA performance (five regular-season MVPs and three All-Star MVPs) and hot endorsement deals make Michael Jordan appear to be a super human. Yet, here are some of the things most people don’t know about Michael:

• He didn’t make it into the sophomore High School basketball team due to his size.
• Went through an expensive divorce.
• Scored only 2 points in a game, twice, the lowest score of his career.
• Missed more than 9,000 shots in his career and lost almost 300 games.
• He once said he can accept failure, but cannot accept not trying.
• According to Forbes, Jordan earned an estimated $80 million last year from corporate partnerships.
• Owns 6 restaurants, a motorsports team, a car dealership, and 80% of the Charlotte Bobcats, basketball team.
• Michael Jordan’s official Facebook page counts over 22 million likes, and is still growing.

Here are 5 key lessons you can learn from Jordan about social media success that will hopefully take your business to the next level or enhance your current marketing campaign.

LESSON #1 Play to achieve goals

“I play to win, whether during practice or a real game.” Michael Jordan

Facebook is not a pond to be neglected; its user base grew considerably from 58 million to 1 billion in the last 5 years alone. Regardless, lots of entrepreneurs and small business owners are blindly following the trend, and step into social media without having a proper plan or strategy. Weeks or months later, they quit, going back to blogging, or whatever they were doing before.

The right way of starting with social media is to have realistic goals and specific methods set into place, otherwise you could be making lots of assumptions and wrong decisions.

For example, I have a dedicated team member that once a day goes through my blog’s archives as well as through other niche relevant sites, grabs the hottest posts, and shares the goodies with my fans.

She only spends about 30 minutes a day doing so, strategically.

I truly believe business is about winning and keeping customers, not just making money. Your sole option should be entering to win the game; only then social media become viable and can fructify your outcome.

LESSON #2 Stick to the Basics

“The minute you get away from fundamentals – whether it’s proper technique, work ethic or mental preparation – the bottom can fall out of your game, your schoolwork, your job, whatever you’re doing.” Michael Jordan

Once you’re into the social media game, there’s no turning back. You either win the game, or somebody else will. In fact, if you don’t play to win the game (hint: achieve your objectives) then social media would be just another “tactic” added to your marketing that may, or may not work.

The Right Mindset

Do you think positive thinking sucks? Then what happens if you don’t believe Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn is worth the effort? You won’t try. And where there’s no pain, there’s no gain.

Think about it: if others found a way to make social media work for them, there’s a chance you’ll find your way through as well.

If I’d had given up on “list building” and SEO, then I’d have lost access to a loyal following of 12k + “fans” that are waiting to hear from me, count on me, trust me, and buy from me.

Therefore, start building your list. You can then funnel the traffic back to your Twitter and Facebook profiles, and vice versa, growing your fans into the thousands, and tens of thousands. Ok, numbers do count, but the quality of your members is far more important.

The basics (e.g. profile completion and customization)

I cannot emphasize enough how important it is to get the most out of your social media accounts. Of course, that requires you to complete your profiles, from A to Z, and more importantly customize your header, and background images. Your profiles need to reflect your brand image, otherwise they’re falling into the “me too” category.

As a marketing author and speaker, Seth Godin, would say: you’re either remarkable or you don’t exist.

The goals you’d like to achieve
This goes back to the first advice. Have realistic (daily, weekly, monthly and yearly) goals and follow them accordingly. Make no excuses.

LESSON #3: Take action

“Some people want it to happen, some wish it would happen, and others make it happen.” — Michael Jordan

I have a flexible plan of action which enables my team to know exactly what to do on a daily, weekly, monthly and yearly basis.

For example, once a day, we use BufferApp to schedule the most important information and share links of interest with our Twitter followers and Facebook fans. This grows our database over time and helps nurture relationships.

Once or twice a week, another team member goes into content sharing and social bookmarking sites (e.g. SERPD, BizSugar, StumbleUpon, Reddit) to spread the word about our best content, as well as industry insights that we find valuable.

This method brings additional traffic, word of mouth, and revenue.

Monthly, we monitor our brand and niche. HootSuite and other similar tools are used to check the competition, find red-hot content ideas and discover mentions of our brands, products and services all over the web. Priceless!

Once a year, you can meet with your team for two or three days and immerse yourself into analytics. You’ll compare the best vs. worst traffic sources, check out related metrics, and analyze the content that got the most popular with social media, and in the blogosphere world…

You cannot really take action unless you have a specific game plan set in the right place.

LESSON #4 Diversify

“We estimate that Jordan earned $60 million over the past year (2010-2011) mainly through his endorsement deals with Nike, Gatorade, Hanes, Upper Deck, 2K Sports and Five Star Fragrances. He also owns five restaurants and a car dealership in North Carolina.” Forbes

I cannot amplify and highlight enough why you need to get people onto your mailing list and funnel them through to different offers and special products based on their level (beginner, intermediate, and advanced). This is the true key to generating multiple streams of income, and building targeted lists and social media profiles.

I almost want to cry when I see businesses having one source of revenue (their blog or their Facebook account) or one source of traffic (Twitter or guest posts).

One day they could be kicked out of the game because they didn’t play it cautiously. The best backup plan is to have your mailing list your main focus, the ideal asset most can only dream about.

Diversify and funnel traffic between your social media accounts, mailing list and website/blog. That’s how I’ve been able to build a loyal tribe of leads and customers. And I’m just getting started… If I ever lose my site or social media accounts, I can always rely on my mailing lists and keep nurturing the relationships.

In my opinion, the most essential assets in order of importance are:

1. Your mailing lists (yes, build more than just one per project)
2. Your site/blog
3. Your social media profiles

LESSON #5 Fail to succeed

“I’ve missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.” Michael Jordan

At the beginning of last year, McDonalds started a sponsored Twitter campaign with the hashtag #McDStories and #MeetTheFarmers. Users were asked to share feedback with their Happy Meals experiences.

The campaign quickly turned wrong; Twitter got flooded with criticism and negative comments, coming from anti-McDonalds “activists”.

So what could we learn from the McDonalds’ case? Social media is a constantly evolving industry. It’s also open to risks. Once you say something, you cannot really take it back. Plus, you can have your account hacked, or competitors talk bad about you and your brand, as in the case of McDonalds, regardless of the reality of the matter.

This does NOT mean you have to stop or quit social media because of its transparency!

If you want to be on top of things and one step ahead of your competitors, then focus on mastering the basics, (and monitoring your brand and the conversation), while leaving the others struggling with non essentials.

Set clear goals and follow your game plan. You’re here to win, not to make friends!

The post 5 Key Social Media Lessons from One of the Greatest – Michael Jordan appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

If you’re interested in joining us as a new sales coordinator/client services manager, you should have a knowledge of digital and social media, or you’re at least very willing to learn!

Who we’re looking for

• Ideally you’re a recent college graduate.
• You possess a fantastic attitude, you work hard to get a job done.
• You’re organized and able to handle multiple tasks simultaneously.
• You’re comfortable talking to clients via e-mail and telephone.
• You can communicate complex ideas in a concise way.
• You proactively look to make improvements around the business, find jobs without being asked.
• You care deeply about team culture and atmosphere.
• You want to join a startup with huge potential and can help us get there through hard work and positive energy.
• You can enjoy Thirsty Thursdays and contribute to a good Spotify mix in the office.

Be part of a great team
At Zemanta, we strongly believe in teamwork, so we expect you to feel comfortable working with other people take on complex challenges, while being self-reliant the rest of the time.

What we offer

• Full time employment, NYC based
• Occasional travel
• Full benefits – Health, Dental, Vision
• Opportunity to work on an exciting global project
• Acquire new knowledge and experience by competing with other start-ups
• Flexible schedule
• Competitive salary
• Working with a team of bright peers from both sides of the Atlantic and cutting edge tech.
• Some (positive) stress and adrenaline

More info at jobs@zemanta.com.

The post New Job Opening at Zemanta: Sales Coordinator/Client Services Manager appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Are you overwhelmed by all the tools and frequent launches of new tools that ‘they’ say you should use as part of your content marketing efforts?

If it helps, you’re not alone. Although you know how to separate the wheat from the chaff, you may feel like you’re not doing it right, like you’re falling behind.

I’ve had clients who want action NOW, who want results NOW, who even want all available communication channels to be used NOW, simultaneously.

Based on my experience, their capacities and available budget, my usual approach is to slow them down. I’ve witnessed how all-encompassing projects have simply fallen apart. There are only a few big brands that can play this game, but most of you are mini, small or a medium-sized company at best. And you need to play it smart.

It’s been pointed out so many times, albeit obviously not enough, that content marketing is a marathon, not a sprint. It takes a lot of effort, testing, adapting, listening, patience and, above all, time to do it “properly”, to make it effective; effective means that you reach or even surpass your well defined goals.

Instead of panicking and feeling helpless, you should go back to the drawing board and approach your publishing efforts in a step-by-step manner.

You shouldn’t be overwhelmed by all the “you-should” tips you find online. Let them inspire you, rather than trying to follow them blindly; apply only what makes sense in your case (budget-wise, staff-wise, based on well defined goals, etc.).

If you’re in a state of panic attack or if you feel lost, stop what you’re doing right now, calm down, go over your content marketing strategy, and adapt accordingly.

Here are 3 necessary things you must consider thoroughly before you make any further content marketing decisions.

1. Who are your customers?

“C’mon Nenad, we’ve already read this like hundreds of times,” you may react.

However, I’ve witnessed this urge to start doing something as soon as possible without actually knowing WELL, who you’re doing it for. It’s a constant.

Please, slow down. Go back and think, do you really know who you’re targeting? Who are they? What are they interested in? What exactly are their interests in your products/services? What are their pain points?

A BOOK THAT CAN HELP YOU: To learn how to define your target audience, how to collect data on them and what to do with this data, I’d suggest that you read Precision Marketing by Sandra Zoratti and Lee Gallagher.

2. How do they consume information?

Where do your prospects/customers ‘hang out’? Where do they look for information?

That is how you choose the channels you’re going to use to spread your content. If the majority of your customers don’t use Vine, you probably shouldn’t spend so much time and effort on producing content for this new channel (unless you believe you may attract new customers this way). If your prospects/customers don’t like to read much and prefer videos, then perhaps YouTube and video producing is your best bet.

Instead of being overwhelmed by all the new channels being launched daily, by all the tips you find on blogs you follow on a daily basis telling you how “you should” use Slideshare, or Vine, or Pinterest, take a step back and think whether the proposed channel makes sense in your case. If it doesn’t, don’t fuss about it. Rather apply what you can learn from those tips to your own case, to a different channel that you will use.

A BOOK THAT CAN HELP YOU: On choosing appropriate communication channels read Managing Content Marketing by Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose.

3. How can you help them?

Then think how you can help them live/work better? Marcus Sheridan would advise you to start collecting your prospects/customers’ questions and answer them. That is, educate them.

A BOOK THAT CAN HELP YOU: Sharon Tanton and Sonja Jefferson write in their new book Valuable Content Marketing, “If you want success from your marketing, stop ‘selling’ and start helping instead.”

What’s new here, you may ask. I’m not saying that what I wrote here is new, but I think it is necessary to say it.

Many marketers, bloggers, publishers I’ve met or talked to lately, seem to be confused or overwhelmed. They want to do content marketing, publishing well, they want to be effective, but they got lost in the onslaught of “you should” tips. They, including many of you, thus feel like they’re not doing their job well. Strategies fall apart even before they are implemented, or worse, before they’re even outlined.

Therefore, don’t jump on the bandwagon. Think carefully what really makes sense in your content marketing strategy, what makes sense in your case.

Take all the time that you need to make a good decision and if necessary go back to the drawing board. Just don’t panic!

The post How to Overcome the Flood of “You Should” Content Marketing Tips appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Content marketing is all the rage in internet marketing circles today. Many publishers are saying. “But we’ve been doing content forever! In fact, we’re content companies at our core.” This is true of magazines and news outlets especially.

Every company investing in content should ask themselves frequently “How can I become the go-to authority for (insert vertical here)?” A company like CNN should ask themselves, “How can we become the go-to authority for breaking news?” A company like The Onion should ask themselves, “How can we become the go-to authority for smart satirical political banter?”

Of course, the answer starts with an amazing editorial team, whether internally or freelance. But once this is in place and you are producing top-notch editorial content that is well-written, edited, and designed (yes, it needs to look pretty), then what? How do you get distribution to have your content around the Internet so that people see it?

Let’s look at a few ways that publishers should leverage other websites to expose their content to new audiences.

Paid Social Discovery

Inbound marketers don’t often talk about paid discovery, but I believe that paid discovery, especially via social channels, can augment the discovery of content very well. The best ways to do this are:

• Facebook ads
• Promoted tweets that are not sales-y
• StumbleUpon

Imagine this. You’ve just published a piece of content that has taken you a lot of time and effort, like SEOmoz’s Beginner’s Guide to SEO or the New York Times’ visualization of how the states have swung during elections going back to the 1970s.

This type of content deserves a broader audience, and paid social discovery can be a great way to highlight it.

The key, though, is to not be sales-y when promoting this content. Social network users do not respond well to a sales pitch, but they do respond well to targeted content that they find useful to their interest.

Here are some places to promote content to your audience.

Promoted Tweets
Twitter has recently allowed businesses with monthly budgets smaller than $15,000 to promote tweets to their followers and others. While most businesses attempt to do direct conversion tweets, promoting something for sale, your company can stand out and build traffic and your brand affinity by promoting content that your users will find useful instead of selling to them.

Here is an example tweet:

We must remember that while this content is not directly conversion-oriented, you should be able to measure success from micro-conversions (NBED link to Avinash’s post about micro-conversions) such as signups to your email list or new Twitter followers. The content conversion funnel is often much slower and less direct than a normal funnel.

Facebook Ads
Another way to promote your editorial content pieces is through Facebook Ads, which we have all seen on the right side of our Facebook feeds and within our mobile devices through the Facebook app:

Similar to the Twitter strategy talked about above, the goal here is to bring people into the top of your content conversion funnel and convert them through a micro-conversion of a social media follow (“Like” on Facebook) or signing up to an email list.

Paid Content Distribution

Another way to promote your content is through paid promotion placement on other websites. Many websites will allow you to promote your content on their platform on a pay-per-impression basis. These sites are incentivized to promote content by being paid based on the traffic that they send to other websites (read: yours!).

Many services, including Zemanta, nRelate, and OutBrain exist to provide a way to promote your content on this pay per impressionbasis. If you look closely at a lot of larger publishers these days, they have a section on the bottom of articles that refers the user to other articles of interest, often on another website.

For example, look at CNN.com:

This traffic can be bought quite cheap and used to discover what kind of content people consume, link to, and convert from into a micro-conversion. While this traffic is often less qualified, it can drive branded awareness and begin to establish you as an authority in your space.

StumbleUpon Paid Discovery

Another option is StumbleUpon Paid Discovery, which can be very cheap on a per-click basis. You define the content and your budget, and StumbleUpon sends the traffic:

You are able to laser-target your content to your audience beginning with a large “Interest”, and then beyond that to specific keywords that your users would use.

Influencer Marketing

If you’re looking to get more mileage out of your content, but want to do so in a more organic way, influencer marketing could be the right direction for you. Whether you’re promoting a product or a piece of content, you can use influencer marketing to not only get more exposure for your content, but also links from their websites with the right services and circles.

Building a little black book of contacts and influencers takes time. If you don’t have time, or are at the beginning of investing in building a list of influencer contacts, using paid services like Social Reactor can be a good option to fill in the gaps until you can build your own assets.

Aggregators and Apps

A third way to drive users to your content is through either web-based content aggregators like HackerNews, Reddit and Digg or mobile-based applications such as Flipboard or Pulse.me.

Aggregators

Web-based content aggregators can be one of the best ways to drive large amounts of traffic to your website. By creating content that is targeted at specific audiences, you can gain visibility in front of people who are your ideal audience and could become a brand advocate for you.

On my own personal website, I have created content that I knew would get onto the homepage of HackerNews. As you can see from the screenshot below, HackerNews is to thank for the highest traffic days on my site:

Every vertical online has their own version of HackerNews. There’s Inbound.org for marketers, but also a signs subreddit, Digg for news, Pinterest for fashion, and more. For some verticals, a social network with a specific group, like LinkedIn, can be a place to connect with influencers.

Alltop is another aggregator that offers many topic options. Your site can be listed by submitting an RSS feed for approval. Go here to submit to AllTop. A protip is to connect with the curators mentioned here, who are often influencers with wider followings on social media.

Apps

A final great way to increase your audience size is through app distribution. Some of the most well-known in today’s world are Flipboard and Pulse.me.

Syndicating your content through these apps is a breeze to set up, and by promoting your Flipboard app you can gain access to a large audience.

The best way to drive traffic through these apps is to get your content listed in the Featured Apps like FlipPhotos (for images) or FlipTech for technology news. These are much harder to gain access to, but can bring you a lot of targeted and interested traffic.

The post How to Maximize Your Content Exposure by Leveraging Other Websites appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Since October of last year we were trying diligently to gain acceptance to Facebook Studio, an agency education platform. We were in. Our future with storytelling and social content creation had just begun.

Now that you are here with me, let’s change topics and talk about some of the buzzwords that all of us have been hearing. Since being accepted to Facebook Studio I’ve been able to glean invaluable knowledge about how a large-scale social network ecosystems function. Our email inboxes are full of blog titles like: “The Art of Storytelling”, “Grow your blog traffic through Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Vine, etc”, or “Vine is the future for content marketing,”. All of this seems to tell us only one thing – you’re doing it WRONG!

*Stop, take a deep breath* I would like to take a minute to share an approach that will compliment what you are already doing, instead of changing it. In other words, let’s keep you doing what is right and improve upon it!!

Content Consumption

The web is morphing as people are growing in their rate of content adoption. “We have never produced more content nor consumed it more than we do now,” stated Levi Mills in Friends Don’t Let Friends Curate (FB’s Redesign) and he couldn’t be more right. We, the people, are putting our lives online. Ranging from our daily doggy walks to political movements, everything that we identify ourselves with is being published one click at a time.

So why is this important for us, publishers and content creators? So what?! People use the web more… *pause* We need to analyze the way people are consuming this information and then put the “cookies on the bottom shelf”.

Content “storytelling” seems to be among the many marketing buzzwords these days, but when it is harnessed it can be a very strong advocate. The relational makeup that each individual has is driving interaction on social platforms, but the flood of content is creating an Attention Deficit Disorder to the consumption process.

This is where we can be creative with learning how to adapt and recreate our content as we disperse our beacons on our different channels. Beacons telling people the same message… read more, on the blog.

Image Tells 1,000 Words

To strengthen your content’s story, images are the best weapon in your war against audience neglect (social media ADD). The saying “a picture is worth a thousand words” goes back to 1911 from a newspaper editor (go figure) discussing journalism and publicity, and it still is true with the internet today. Joseph Heinl, former Account Manager at Facebook, said in a brief interview, “… it’s not only about ‘what’ content users are reading, it’s ‘how’ they are discovering, consuming, and sharing.” Being discovered is what your blog desires, so allow us, inquisitive creatures (the readers), to discover it and join in your story.

How to Begin Storytelling

Start with the K.I.S.S. (Keep It Simple Stupid) method, and then expand only in the areas that you see later success. Posting short bite sized quotes from your blog post with a large image (preferably also from your blog post) and a call-to-action (CTA) to “read and learn more” will provide your audience with all of the essentials to discover the buried treasure that you have written in your blog (almost like a cover of a book).

You will find two great examples of the implementation of this CTA strategy displayed by the Facebook pages of Closet Cooking and Blog of Francesco Mugnai. Both of these blogs do a great job of posting vibrant pictures with short captions/copy of what the reader should expect when clicking on their links (back to the blog). Mugnai will even go as far as posting different pictures from the same article during selected times of the day on his Facebook page. ž

This is a brilliant strategy taking into account people’s behavior: looking at their news feeds at different times during the day, and might otherwise miss his content. It also establishes familiarity and curiosity with his readers. “That’s interesting, but I’ll keep scrolling…. oh, another amazing shot (photo) from the same link, okay now I must check into this blog post,” I find myself thinking this quite often while scrolling through my news feed as I see Mugnai’s work and am instantly drawn into the author’s storytelling style.

Facebook’s new releases (News Feed, Graph Search, Updated Timeline, etc) remind us that we must learn how to adapt to each platform and utilize the medium’s benefits whenever, wherever you can. Facebook Open Graph integration with a blog is a perfect example of this, because of the effects it can have on broadening the social reach and virality of great content. Focusing on where your audience interacts socially and then establishing your presence will be the biggest step.

Just as I started this post with a detailed story, use your personal experiences to add a voice and flavor to your blog.

“How can I apply this?” you might ask.

Here are 7 universal tips that will help you leverage storytelling and blog outreach.

1. Write posts that include personalized details to draw the audience in.
2. Include personal experiences to tap into the reader’s emotional experience.
3. Analyze where your audience is socializing online.
4. Use large pictures wherever you can.
5. Make your Call-to-actions clear and short.
6. Engage every piece of content that comes back to you.
7. Make your content easily digestible, consumable, and sharable.

The post Content Marketing: What If You’re Not Doing It Wrong appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Andrew, welcome to Zemanta. How do you usually introduce yourself on the first date?
I’m a pretty curious person so I’ll typically be asking someone else about themselves first to get a feel for who they are. I’m also obsessed with fitness and I read…a lot.

Where do you come from?
I was born and raised in central New Jersey. I used to live in Florida and Mexico as well, but New Jersey is my home. Now I live in Hoboken where I’m trying my best to stay out of trouble.

You’re a philosopher, right? How does this help you professionally?
Yep, I am. A lot of my philosophy classes had debates which forced me to internalize multiple perspectives on complex issues, develop my viewpoint on them, and then prove why my viewpoint was the right one. All of that on the fly. It comes in pretty handy when clients are asking tough questions.

What did you do before Zemanta? What skills and experience did you bring along?
Before Zemanta I was a working both as a trainer and in a sales/marketing capacity with Intrepid Gym in Hoboken. I’ve been working with them since the gym was founded. I also did enterprise software sales for another younger company, AvePoint. Both experiences taught me how to not only be persistent, put yourself out there, but also roll with the punches when a business evolves quickly.

How did you get involved with Zemanta? Did you hear of Zemanta before joining the team?
I was looking to break into startups in online media, so I start reaching out to people to see if it was really something I’d like. From there I got introduced to Greg Gortz, who is our VP of sales. I already knew about the Zemanta plugin from blogging myself and absolutely loved it. It turned out to be a great fit and I’m pumped to be onboard.

What is your role at Zemanta?
I’m joining Zemanta as an Account Executive. I’ll be working with the sales team to not only drive revenue, but also partner with advertisers to leverage our tool for their content marketing efforts.

You’re also a blogger. What do you blog about and why?
I blog about fitness and nutrition for the office folk. As someone who’s worked in the office and is obsessed with fitness, I realized that it’s hard to find simple information for people who just want to lead a healthy lifestyle.That’s really what it’s all about anyways, isn’t it? A lot of fitness information is geared towards people who are advanced in those fields, so I decided to start sharing things I’ve learned along the way, simplifying health information and making it entertaining too.

What blogs do you otherwise follow and would gladly recommend to others?

•     Mark’s Daily Apply
•     James Altucher
•     Penelope Trunk
•     Ramit Sethi

What’s your message to Zemanta users?
Quality content, that’s what it’s all about.

The post Meet Zemanta Team: Andrew Kobylarz, New Account Executive appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Many news organizations and journalists decry the rise of “citizen jornalism”; a triumph of amateurism over professionalism is what they call it. I disagree wholeheartedly with that. My own experience (looking for talents within the alternative media landscape in Slovenia) tells me there are so many smart minds out there it would be a waste of time looking for the best and the brightest only among the few who write for the traditional media.

An abundance of information requires new ways of thinking, an entirely different mindset. Traditional publishers don’t have the advantage they used to. There are now many more players in the field, barriers to enter the game are lower than ever, the price to gain mass distribution is close to zero. Therein lies the opportunity.

Think of Nate Silver, a statistician, a polling data guru, who started a blog Fivethirtyeight.com just before the elections 2008. He regularly published detailed electoral analyses rarely seen in traditional news outlets up to that point. He gained national prominence after he correctly predicted the winner of all 35 U.S. Senate races and the winner of 49 of the 50 states. In 2010, The New York Times offered to host his blog - the  deal that paid off big time during the 2012 election cycle. His blog was drawing massive traffic to the NYT site: “one in five visitors to the sixth-most-trafficked U.S. news site took a look at Silver’s blog”!

Readers are deserting traditional news outlets because they no longer provide the information they had grown accustomed to receiving.

“We have shifted from a world in which the information and news were held by a few and distributed to millions to a world where the information is held by millions and distributed to a few (niche markets).” Erik Qualman, Socialnomics

In October 2012, the BBC Today programme ran a segment on a female issue; it was discussed exclusively by men. For two days in a row they couldn’t find a female expert(!?). So a graduate student, a freelance journalist and a blogger, Caroline Criado-Perez, who was dissapointed by an obvious gender imbalance, co-founded The Women’s Room, a website dedicated to provide a database of women experts “because women are clearly under-represented in the big media”. Only a few months later, that is about a month ago, guess what happened! BBC launched its own “expert women database and a related YouTube channel to try to get more female sources on air”.

This is how things get changed. You don’t need to wait for the big guys to notice you, they are just too comfortable where they are.

Just start doing it! And they will come to you.

Create meaningful and original content, choose the platform that suits you best and publish, publish, publish.

The post Bloggers, You’ve Got the Power: Rise up to the Challenge appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Latest estimates show that there are four mobile devices for every laptop or computer. Also, people always carry their mobile devices with them wherever they are unlike laptops or desktops. The mobile trend has given rise to information snacking where people are consuming content via their mobile phones in their spare time and people want bite-sized information as quickly as possible.

Mobile users are known to abandon their attempts to visit any website if it takes more than a few seconds to load and often do not return to websites that gave them a buggy user experience the first time. Companies and content marketers must start creating mobile-friendly content to be published on mobile-friendly websites so that they do not lose out on a large customer base.

Content that is compatible with desktop devices does not cut it anymore as people cannot view it or engage with it from their mobile devices. Creating responsive or mobile-friendly websites is essential and they must be filled with content that is mobile-friendly too.

Creating great mobile content is not rocket science and here are seven tips that will help you create such content.

1. Reduce the number of images

Content marketers know that visual content is the most appealing. However, adding large images and replacing textual content with pictures is great on websites meant to be viewed only from desktop devices and not if you want to build great mobile content.

Infographics, images, graphs, etc. are extremely large files that take a long time to load on mobile devices as these devices have limited bandwidths.

Also, large images mean that the person viewing your website has to scroll a lot to view the images in their entirety. A website with many large images is hard to view and navigate via small mobile devices and can frustrate mobile users.

2. Reduce size of images

Mobile screens do not offer the same resolution as desktop devices and such mobile devices will resize large, high-resolution images to fit small mobile screens. This can negatively impact the quality of the images.

Make it a point not to include too many large images or high resolution images with your content and stick to textual content as much as possible.

3. Eliminate flash components

Flash animation, video and navigation content are absolutely incompatible with mobile devices. Adobe Flash is used to create rich media content and they work fine on desktop devices but on mobile devices they can ruin the user’s experience with the online content.

Another reason to stop creating and publishing flash-based content is the fact that Apple has stopped flash compatibility on all its mobile devices and Google has also followed suit by removing Flash from its Android operating system.

Use HTML 5 to create rich media content that is extremely mobile friendly.

4. Keep textual content short and simple

Mobile devices offer only a few square inches in area to view content. This makes it very hard for mobile users to view long textual content and most users lose patience when they have to navigate and scroll too many times to view content on any website.

To create excellent mobile content, make sure that the content is succinct and short so that mobile users do not have to scroll too much to get all the information. Highlight important points and make sure that the font is big enough so that users can read the content without having to zoom in.

5. Break up textual content

Readers looking for online content have no patience to go through long textual content and this is even harder to do on mobile screens.

Make sure to break up your content into small, easy-to-digest paragraphs and do not tackle too many points in one paragraph. Use bullet points, numbered lists, informative subheads and highlighted text to get the most important points across to mobile users reading your content from mobile devices. Also, using these bullet points and numbered lists also reduces the amount of text needed to describe something and less text always increases the mobile-friendliness of the content. Hire a good copywriter to create short, punchy mobile content.

6. Include mobile plug-ins

There are many plug-ins on the Internet that allow people to create mobile-friendly content by allowing users to engage more easily with content from their mobile devices.

One of the most widely used plug-ins is WPTouch that is perfect for creating mobile content that needs to be published on WordPress. It makes content more mobile-friendly by removing large design components and allows the content creator to customize the content for mobile visitors. Although content customized via WPTouch may not be very visually appealing, it is compatible with all mobile platforms.

7. Make video content more mobile-friendly

Video content is one of the most popular forms of content that is being published as it allows companies to create more personal relationships with customers and readers. However as mentioned before, Flash is a complete no-no for creating mobile content. Mobile video content consumption has risen exponentially so you should ensure that all your videos can be viewed easily on small mobile screens. With Custom CSS and HTML 5, videos can be made to resize automatically to fit any mobile device screen.

The post 7 Tips for Creating User-friendly Mobile Content appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

“Free” can be debated . . . later – for now I’m going to talk about how to lower anxiety about being assigned to produce content from an event experience and getting the right photos to compliment that content.

Many of us are familiar with the anxiety that comes from meeting content marketing strategy goals using expo experiences – because you never know how the event will play out.

After the event is over and all is well, there is one final anxiety causing step in the process. It is the part where you begin sifting for the right photo that matches your content. This is not the time to settle for “close enough”. The photo that you need positions you and your company as expert, insightful influencers with an authentic firsthand, original point of view.

You are a winner. “Close enough” is no longer in your vocabulary. You will be requesting assignments from conferences and expos. And as soon as you know it, you’ll be seeking out press passes to fill your desire to get even better at this.

Let’s fix this together, friend.

Planning – Be Flexible

Create a flexible editorial plan that reflects how you think the event will play out and the blog post(s) that you can write from it.

Example – via New York International Auto Show 2013:

First post: “Top 10 Must See Cars at the New York International Auto Show”
Type of photos: standard full car, low profile, upper body, internal (back light needed)

Follow up A: “How to Write About The Great Industry Events You Attend”
Type of photos: one shot with banner, one shot from media room

Follow up B: “Publisher Guide to Taking Photos at Auto Shows”
Type of photos: animated gif, low profile, front grill, internal

Remember, this is a pre-event editorial plan that you can use as a map for getting information to deliver the posts on time.

Sticking too closely to this early plan could result in photos that don’t necessarily match the recollected experience. This is bad for everyone.

Gear – Be Mobile

This isn’t the time to bust out something new or fancy that you haven’t spent much time with. Also, ditch the tripod.

Bring the camera that you are most comfortable with to maximize every photo opportunity. Curating photos after the event and realizing that you took a couple hundred, *before* you figured out the angles and lighting are wrong, is not winning.

Example – gear we use regularly:
Sony A77
18-135mm or 50mm fixed prime lens
Neewer LCD fixed light
Neewer Macro Ring

If the camera that you are most comfortable with is your mobile phone, or you’re best at rocking an SLR, then that is what you should shoot with.

What you want for your posts are the photos that will support your ideas and bring home another thousand words that you won’t have to write yourself.

Authentic Aesthetic – Lighting & Perspective

Lighting and perspective go hand in hand to create an authentic aesthetic that cements a visual of firsthand experience. It is also what helps to separate your post from others being written by showing unique images that have many similar characteristics.

For this post we’re using examples of producing content from the New York International Auto Show where the lighting in each booth is set up by design professionals – lighting this good is not happening at the Network Security Conference.

Why did we mention the lights above if the lighting at the auto show is so good?

We discussed in our planning (above) what type of images we needed to support our content strategy. Many of the types of photos require additional lighting as the angle would provide low or no lighting.

Quantity – Take Many

The first time you think you have taken enough photos or have gotten the shot, take more. Storage is cheap and you will thank yourself later because you won’t be settling for that “close enough” picture.

Example:

Sample Results

A proposed editorial plan before the event:

Before I get too deep into this I wanted to point out that this is the flexible editorial plan that we made before attending the press events at our example event.

First post: “Top 10 Must See Cars at the New York International Auto Show”
Type of photos: standard full car, low profile, upper body, internal (back light needed)

Follow up A: “How to Write About The Great Industry Events You Attend”
Type of photos: one shot with banner, one shot from media room

Follow up B: “Publisher Guide to Taking Photos at Auto Shows”
Type of photos: animated gif, low profile, front grill, internal

The actual editorial plan after the event:

First Post: “Publisher Guide to Taking Photos at an Expo” (was ”Publisher Guide to Taking Photos at Auto Shows”)
Type of photos: front grill, photo viewer (seen above)

Follow up A: “How to Write About The Great Industry Events You Attend”
Type of photos: expo banner (below), media room (fail)

Even with all of our planning, in the heat of the event we forgot to get a shot of the media room in action. Which is a shame because there were over 200 press related workers cutting up video, writing articles and interviewing automobile manufacturers.

This is a reminder that even though we’ve planned to get the right photo, sometimes we get no photo at all and this makes it even harder to make a point without supporting elements.

However, we did win by getting an expo banner photo which you can see below.

Follow up B: “Top 10 Must See Cars at the New York International Auto Show”
Type of photos: standard full car, low profile, upper body, internal (below, grouped)

This is the first post a short series of writing about conferences and expos. Taking photos and getting the right photo is an integral part of this.

The post Publisher Guide to Taking Photos at an Expo appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

If you’re interested in joining us as a software engineer, you should have at least two years of experience in software development and be familiar with JavaScript, Python, Django, and SQL.

It’s a big plus if you also happen to have first-hand experience with Hadoop/Hive, Cassandra, RabbitMQ, Lucene/Solr, Unix shell programming, Java, PHP, or C/C++.

Be part of a great team
At Zemanta, we strongly believe in teamwork, so we expect you to feel comfortable working with other people take on complex challenges, while being self-reliant the rest of the time.

What we offer

• An opportunity to work on an exciting global project.
• Acquire new knowledge and experience by competing with other start-ups.
• A flexible schedule.
• A competitive salary.
• Working with a team of bright peers and cutting edge tech.
• Some (positive) stress and adrenaline.

Where you will work
You will be located in Ljubljana, Slovenia.

It doesn’t matter where you’re from
Our team is international. Applications from outside Slovenia are welcome.

Please, submit your application in English.

We are especially interested in your hobbies, student or open source side projects.

And please, do not forget to mention if you’ve taken part in IOI, ACM ICPC, or ImagineCup

More info at jobs@zemanta.com.

The post New Job Opening at Zemanta: Software Engineer appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

My grad school advisor once said to me, “Getting you to write code is like pulling teeth but you’re actually good at this stuff… I can’t wait to see what it’s like when you find something you love.” It was the gift and the curse of being young, a girl, and a geek.  Now, years later, it’s so much more obvious. I just wish I saw it earlier.

Fashion. Publishing. Entertainment. Journalism. Education. Social Justice. Non-Profit. Dating. Personal Finances. Grocery Shopping. Life. We live in a day where essentially every element of our life is touched, influenced, and potentially made possible by technology, code, microprocessors even.

Creation in the hands of few

We live in a technology enabled society and arguably world. While the consumption of tech is becoming more widespread and even accessible, the creation still remains in the hands of a few. Women and minorities are still playing a larger role in the consumption game as the digital divide widens and its impact deepens.

The thing is this hurts us all. There is a critical asset of talent and thus innovation and creative solutions that is missing from the world; it’s unseen and unheard.

Venus Meets Isis (VXI) is a mentoring and internship network for teen girls centered on media and technology. The mission of the network is to create a pipeline of teen girls that have a stake in the media and technology industries. In VXI our core belief is that when students are given the access to media and tech in a way that is relatable to their lives and interests, it creates a new paradigm and relationship with the information.

Tech becomes a tool to be embraced, learned, and studied in relation to creating impact, having a voice, and living their dreams. Imagine to find out at 14, 15, even 16 that the ideas you have, the things you are concerned about, can actually take physical form and make a difference.

As someone who began coding at 16 (which is arguably late), I will say it gives you, if nothing else, the mindset that you can be a creator. It provides a leveling that the systems and technology you interact with everyday are not outside of you. It is designed, created, and developed by people like you. It’s something that sounds so simple and is tremendous when you truly get it for yourself.

In the book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell speaks of well known founders such as Steve Jobs and Bill Gates relating their early access and exposure to computers as strong factors in their role in leading the development of their industry. Bill Gates was in high school when he was granted access to ‘computer time’ to write code, something that was only available on mainframes at the time. Steve Jobs built computers on an assembly line at Hewlett Packard as a student.

In the conversation of women and minorities in tech, the digital divide, and the basic economic health of our society, I say, let’s begin early and create the future tech leaders and industry innovators on a community level.

Venus Meets Isis: Success stories

At VXI we have graduated our first cohort and many of them are headed off to college. After graduating our program one young lady, Ashley, articulated her aspirations of wanting to own a fashion magazine and live in Paris. It was something she told me the day I met her, but to her parents and teachers she shared that she wanted to be an English teacher. She saw running a magazine as something outside of her reach. Simply walking into our program shifted that. In the program she created a site Vogue Elegance where she has a community following her fashion profiles and tips mixed with inspirational advice.

Another young lady, Denisse, also our VXI Creative Director, is highly creative and self-proclaimed “weird”. Her senior year in school she is taking a Python class and considering majoring in Computer Science when she attends college in VT this Fall. At the end of the program she shared, “I never saw myself writing code or HTML. I thought that was for geeks.” She is interested in owning her own media communications company one day. Denisse has targeted Levo League or the Daily Muse as companies she would like to intern with.

I received an email from another alum, Daniela. It read, “I wanted to take this time to thank you for showing me a way my writing could be published and teaching me who to target and how to catch their attention.” She will be majoring in Journalism and Public Relations in college this Fall.

Giving teens the opportunity to create something that speaks to their personal interests then coupling that with internships where they gain exposure to the insides of companies that are leading the conversation we can create a pipeline of women that own their place in the media and technology industries. One that contributes actively to the conversation, creates, understands and knows.  No longer an afterthought on the consumption side but a leader on the creation side.

Venus Meets Isis is launching our second summer on July 5th with a media-tech conference at NYU for our teens and their industry mentors. Any interested teens can apply here. We are also looking for mentors and internship sponsors. We are also looking for mentors and internship sponsors, if interested email mentor[at]tiffanycrawford[dot]com. Whether through VXI or on your own mentor a teen and consider taking on an intern. You can change their life.

The post Girls, Media, Tech: Creators Not Just Consumers appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Are you looking for an experience this summer where you can learn and earn at the same time? Our internships provide valuable work experience while you prepare for life after graduation.

Who’s eligible?

• You’re enrolled in high school or college.
• You’re a programming prodigy.
• You’re great at computer science competitions.
• You run a successful web business from your dorm room.
• Your Github account is hyperactive.

If at least two of the above are true, then you should apply.

What’s available?

Join us and spend a month with the best programmers who develop software that is used by hundreds of thousands publishers round the world.

Other great perks

• 4-week program with flexible dates during summer 2013
• Experienced mentors will teach you the tricks of the trade
• Meeting and networking with Zemanta guys from both sides of the Atlantic
• Enjoying summer in Ljubljana, Slovenia by doing what you love the most

Apply for internship at Zemanta NOW!

More info jobs@zemanta.com

The post Summer Internship: Zemanta Wants You appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

1. What is Zemanta Related Posts & Why You Need It On Your Site

Hot off the heels of the very exciting launch of our Content Discovery Network, Zach went into more details as to what exactly the Zemanta Related Posts plugin is – and why you need it on your site.

2. Zemanta Hires Todd Sawicki as President

Early this month Zemanta and Todd Sawicky announced that he was joining the company as President. He took the time to explain his decision.

3. Why Zemanta Recommendation Network Is Your Best Bet [Infographic]

The infographic that is only two days old, but has already taken the Web by storm. Nate Riggs even tweeted: “Zemanta is using infographics as a direct promotional vehicle. Interesting.” Would you like us to do more infographics?

4. When Bloggers Become Publishers

Bostjan argues that ‘bloggers’ are significantly different from ‘publishers’, especially as the online landscape has been clearly changing for the past year or so. Do you agree?

5. Guest Posting from A to Z: What to Look out for Before You Do It

John Gibb, author of The Road to Success, created “the largest online acronym” on guest posting. A very helpful post.

The post 5 Most Popular Zemanta Posts from March You Should Read appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Consider the multitude of things that could be involved in overhauling your website: deciding on design and navigation, updating content, plunking down the money to make it happen, getting feedback on the new design. Why invest so much time and resources when the site you have now is fine, right?

What to consider when assessing your site

The problem is that your site might not be fine—or maybe you’re leaving a lot on the table by not making it better than average. The thing to remember is that, whether it’s an outdated design or counterintuitive functionality, no one’s going to go out of their way to tell you that your site needs updating. A lack of complaints does not mean there aren’t problems.

Below are 4 of the main factors to help you decide if you need a new website design:

1. What does your core audience think about your site?

It should go without saying, but get feedback! This goes beyond sending the link to a few friends and family members and asking, “What do you think?” To get useful feedback, the best bet is to ask pointed questions—and to ask them of the people your site is targeting. Try offering an incentive for taking a quick online survey. If possible, have someone who hasn’t seen your site visit and take note of what they look at, where they navigate and what gets their attention.

Of course, analytics will give you some insight into visitor behavior, but the time spent on each page, bounce rate and conversion rate can be influenced by a number of factors. Analytics won’t tell you that a visitor bounced because “the site felt like it was built in 2003”, but a survey might. Check out this infographic from KISSmetrics about the top reasons people leave a site to get some inspiration as to what you might ask your site visitors.

2. Is your site reflecting the right image?

First impressions are critical, so it’s important to regularly assess what image and brand association your website is creating and what impression you want to establish with your audience. As your brand evolves, so should your site. If your website is old and you’ve made gradual tweaks rather than investing in a real redesign when it was warranted, that’s going to show.

3. Is your site responsive?

According to the Adobe Digital Index, 8% of global web traffic in February 2013 was from tablets and 7% was from smartphones—and these numbers are expected to continue to rise. If you do not have responsive design that allows for optimal viewing across desktops, tablets and smart phones, it’s time to invest in a new site.

4. Is your site ranking well in search results?

Strong, optimized, shareable content is obviously a big part positioning your site to attract search traffic, but the site structure itself also affects how well it ranks.

For example, website navigation with descriptive labels and no drop down menus tend to do better in search results than navigation with drop downs and non-descriptive labels like “services” and “about us.” If it’s a good site, it will be flexible and navigation changes like this shouldn’t be a problem. If it is a problem to make these updates, it’s time to invest in a new website.

The Right Mindset

If you’re a serious blogger or publisher, having a strong website is a priority. This means having the right mindset when it comes to upkeep and investment. A website isn’t a pair of jeans that you’re trying to wear for as long as possible before you have to throw out. If the site is starting to feel dated, set aside some budget and start writing down a wish list for your new site. It’s worth it.

The post You Might Need a New Website Design: 4 Warning Signs appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

The post Why Zemanta Recommendation Network Is Your Best Bet [Infographic] appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

More than a month ago, I argued that quantity, or even better, the frequency, doesn’t determine quality. Since then, I’ve been struggling with this question.

As a brand editor, I make daily decisions about the quality and relevancy of an impressive array of texts, podcasts and videos by also considering the brand’s overall story, their prospects and customers, and channels the content is intended for.

Last month, I twisted Joe Pulizzi’s argument, “Everywhere I go, I find marketers who are challenged with creating more content. More blog posts, more eBooks, more videos, more podcasts … more, more, more. … I’m done with more.” I focused on the correlation between ‘more’ and ‘good’.

It didn’t end there. I’ve been bothered by this a lot. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. And then last week, I came to the same conclusion as Joe. Quality first, frequency second (depending on high quality content that is ready for publication).

It’s not like this is new, but many brand editors and content marketers are under pressure to post new content as many times per week as possible; research shows that even a modest increase in publishing increases leads.

But last week I made peace with myself; it was probably my d’oh moment: as editor you shouldn’t succumb to pressure to publish more. Your main concern should be the quality – not saying yes because there’s nothing else to post but you’re expected to post something.

I’m not saying I’ve been doing that; I just talked to many content marketers who are responsible for sourcing and even writing original content for their site and that’s exactly the pressure they’ve been feeling lately.

It’s like, damn if you do, damn if you don’t. I strongly believe that you should pay more attention to high quality and relevancy, taking all other factors into account. Great quality makes readers come back.

You may say, “D’oh, Nenad.” Well, it isn’t as obvious as you may think. Many are struggling with this. According to B2B Content Marketing Benchmarks, Budgets and Trends Research Report, for example, producing enough content is the biggest challenge across B2B marketers.

Each one of you have to find what’s best for your case. It’s good to look around and see what worked and what didn’t for others. Just because Content Marketing Institute can publish seven quality posts a week (and they worked hard to get to this point), it doesn’t mean you should “copy” them. Every case is unique.

So, if a day or two or three or even more pass by without publishing new content, you shouldn’t panic, unless you promised too much. Rather post when you have something relevant to say. And say it well.

The post Content Marketing Strategy: The Final Word on Quality Vs. Frequency appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

A year ago I discussed the differences between ‘bloggers’ and ‘journalists’. I wrote: “Choosing a catchy name for your blog doesn’t make you a blogger. Just because you’re writing doesn’t make you a blogger. The audience, your readers make you a blogger. If you’re a columnist or a journalist, it is the publication you write for that brings you your audience.”

In the last twelve months especially, however, we have observed monumental changes on the Internet that may not be as clear to some.

So, who are publishers?

Traditionally, a publisher refers to the owner of a media brand or publishing house; she manages the writing, production, and sale of books, newspapers, magazines, etc.

Has the Internet changed this traditional view of the publisher – a media capitalist, to put it bluntly? Do publishers still exist in the world of free information (Is there such a thing as FREE information?) and the technology that is being upgraded daily?

Of course they do! And I don’t mean only traditional publishers who have turned into digital ones.

This post is about true, Internet-born-and-raised publishers. You shouldn’t liken them to bloggers gone pro. Well, not really.

When we say bloggers, we still understand the word in accordance with the old and widely accepted definition of a web log/personal journal. That’s how it all started almost 20 years ago.

Since then, the best of those personal blogs or online diaries have grown into true media brands. Great examples are TechCrunch, Lifehacker, and Engadget.

How or when do bloggers become publishers? In the past year, I’ve observed three common scenarios:

1. When true costs arise

Eventually your readership grows so much that you have to pay someone for hosting the CMS. Indeed, WordPress.com will get you far, but then maybe you’ll want to pay them to be able to customize your site. However you turn it, when you get ‘serious’, your costs increase too.

2. When real revenues start rolling in

When you make a living out of blogging, you’re not just in it for the fun and self-expression alone. Business made you a publisher.

3. Your audience grows noticeably  

For some, the point of change is when you realize you have an audience. This may happen before the previous two scenarios kick in.

I see this happening over and over again: a blog starts as a random collection of ramblings and musings, but with a special, appealing twist that attracts readership. Then slowly, but surely, the blogger starts listening to the crowd; you become aware of them in advance, while working on your next post. I believe this changes your activity from musing to writing.

On the other hand, let’s not forget the brands who set up their own blogs because they have a marketing budget to spend, or they covet ad revenues, or they want to influence the public opinion.

Let me end with a quote from my last year’s post: “In the end, what someone is called is the matter of the industry terminology. It’s more about the relationship between content and consumers. It’s about the quality of the content you are producing and sharing. Not so much about who did it. We’re all publishers. Journalism, social media and blogging mean publishing. It’s about content creation and content sharing. And that’s all it matters.”

The post When Bloggers Become Publishers appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Whether you have been running a blog for years or you are planning on starting a new one, one topic has surely come to your attention at least once. And that is the topic of search engine optimization. But the real question arises in what you are to do about it, do you tackle the abstract science by yourself or do you hire a seo expert?

In today’s digital age, abiding by the compounding rules of search engines is becoming more and more daunting – every few months a new update or refresh to Google’s algorithm comes along. Although this may seem like a pain to everyone that owns or operates a website, in reality all the search engines are trying to do is improve their product which therefore increases their user experience.

So, don’t panic whenever you hear news of a new update on the horizon. As long as you are continually focusing on quality the experience of your users, you should not have to worry. One piece of advice is to form a content policy, one that all blog contributors follow. Not only will this help to keep your content uniform, but it will also help to stay focused on your readers. Try asking yourself these four questions:

• What is its purpose?
• Who is your target market?
• Are you helping them out or providing them value?
• Are you reaching to them through the appropriate channels?

Here are a few quick and easy fixes so that you don’t have to hire a SEO expert:

Content

Although search engines pay attention to content, the real incentive to creating valuable content is the benefit of having your readers link to it – whether through the social networks they are engaged in or through blogs or websites that they operate.

Try to put yourself in the reader’s shoes. Approach your content from a different perspective and ask yourself if you would share it if you hadn’t created it. If you are having trouble doing that, ask a friend (ideally someone who didn’t know that you owned the blog) what they think about your site.

Integrity

Don’t give in to the various out-dated SEO strategies that you will find online. Gone are the days when keyword stuffing (both in meta data and in the content itself) is effective. Focusing on a certain topic or keyword for a new blog post is still an effective way to bring in organic traffic, but make sure you are not giving up user experience in the process.

Backend

Although content is king, you do still have to make sure that your blog is accessible to crawlers and bots.

Most modern day CMS platforms are fairly SEO-friendly so most bloggers don’t have to worry here, but you should still do all you can to ensure accessibility. Take full advantage of tools like Google’s Webmaster Tools, broken link checkers, and your robots.txt file.

Also, be sure to do what you can to get and keep search bots on your site. Link around your site and make use of related posts and site indexing tools.

However, don’t make a spider-web of links on your blog; keep things simple and remember to always focus on your content and user experience.

Theme and Host

As a final note, and this is especially for people who are considering creating a new site, make sure that you have a clean and professional looking site on hosting that is speedy and reliable.

Be sure to settle for nothing less than high quality web hosting for your blog. Not only will your readers be happy, but it will have a positive effect on your SEO.

The post Bloggers, You Don’t Need to Hire a SEO Expert appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Growing a blog takes a combination of skill, hard work, and – perhaps most importantly – a favorable topic or genre. If you’re an ambitious blogger looking to make an impact, sway influence, and even generate a viable source of income, give yourself a fighting chance by taking care in choosing a topic with potential.

Here are 3 universal tips so that you can cultivate a popular blog:

1. Stay Within Your Wheelhouse

The topic you choose to build your blog around must emanate from your core interests and authority. You don’t need a PhD on the subject – just genuine insight and enthusiasm.

Draw from your range of knowledge, experience, and expertise, confirming that you have the passion to develop consistent content and promote it to the audience at large. It’s good to stretch yourself or take on a challenge, but be sure to know what type of blogger you are and be sure to not stray too far from your comfort zone, if you do it’s only a matter of time until you repel your audience.

For example, take Mario Armando Lavandiera, Jr., aka, Perez Hilton. He took his interest and experience in entertainment and media relations, combined it with a gift for sensational commentary and self-promotion, and parlayed it into one of the most successful celebrity gossip blogs the world has ever known. Not only does the chosen topic for PerezHilton have a historic record for garnering mass interest, but also it’s sustainable, producing new stories, personalities, and angles to hold both the blogger and audience captivated over the long haul.

2. Pick a Winner

When focusing on creating a popular blog, some topics profile better than others. A Google search can provide you with lists, facts, and figures on which blogs generate the most traffic or hold the highest potential for making money, such as finance, entertainment, gadgets, and how-to. These subjects not only have proven to resonate with massive online audiences, but provide extensive opportunities for generating advertising revenues and affiliate relationships.

While sometimes a blog can find solid ground by remaining very focused, serving a dedicated industry or interest group, it’s often wise to take an open-ended approach to draw more diverse traffic, demographics, revenue streams, and partner relationships.

Consider Money Crashers, a personal finance blog dedicated to providing commentary on financially responsible decision-making. It not only appeals to the widest spectrum of human beings on the most basic levels (people care about money), but it’s a natural gateway to an array of subtopics, ranging from careers and money management, to real estate and lifestyle. There’s something for just about everyone to sink their teeth into, plus it creates endless opportunities to collaborate with more subject-specific, high-volume websites in order to drive traffic exponentially.

3. Demonstrate a Unique Perspective

While it is encouraging that there exists an ever-growing pool of potential online users, there are millions of blogs competing for their attention. You can choose a promising topic and have the perfect combination of communication and social media marketing skills, but as it is with so many endeavors, there’s typically a “secret ingredient” to sustainable success. Anyone can simply report facts on well-covered topics and attempt to ride the momentum of trending stories. It’s when you dig deeper personally, cultivating a polished, original voice to extract what’s humorous, humane, or even infuriating in each story, that your perspective comes to the surface and elevates your work.

Whether you’re considering the Huffington Post, TMZ, or Engadget, developing a brand identity is essential, considering everything from the logo and slogan, to a mission statement and style guide. While you want to build your popularity by driving traffic from the most traveled highways and byways on the Web, you need to apply your personal touch to supply content that grabs attention, elicits reaction, and keeps the crowd coming back for more.

Just Do It

Opportunity, recognition, and financial reward await top bloggers who succeed in building a large and sustainable audience. By understanding your strengths, identifying a topic with the potential for growth, and perfecting your niche within it, you can put yourself firmly on a path to accomplishing your goals.

The post How to Cultivate a Popular Blog That Reaches Its Full Potential appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

The best test I’ve seen when it comes to this kind of advertising is “Will my readers naturally share this content?” If the answer is yes, then congrats, you have found a great form of advertising that your readers will appreciate. If the answer is no, then you risk annoying your users and generating a negative sentiment. And for large publishers that have millions of readers, that is a lot of annoyed people.

Why you should use Zemanta Related Posts plugin

Relevance

Because relevance is key, it is our primary goal.

The plugin is based on our award-winning semantic algorithm. We have built a network of over 300,000 publishers and we have over five years of experience; there is no denying that we are trusted for delivering only the most relevant related posts. If you want to get your content in our recommendation engine, you have to get past our dedicated spam-kill team that blacklists hundreds of sites daily – and they will certainly tell you, there are a lot of spammy sites on the Web.

Editorial Control

If you aren’t convinced that we will recommend only the most relevant content, then we have a solution for that too. If you are not satisfied with a certain recommendation (or all of them, and we sincerely apologize if this is the case!), then feel free to take complete control. Simply click “Edit Related Posts” from the reader side and add or remove any posts that you either love or hate. If there is a site in particular that you find that we continue to recommend to you despite your continuous removal, then we also offer the ability to blacklist the site from your recommendations. And yes, this applies to both organic and promoted recommendations. As we’ve mentioned before, as it is your site, you should have complete control over what goes on it.

If you are curious about the process of adding and removing related posts that are displayed, check out a screen shot of the window that appears when you choose to edit your related posts.

Focus on Mobile

One of the other major components where many other related posts plugins fall flat is mobile optimization. Google is signaling loud and clear that mobile is only going to become more and more important; so your related posts must perform as well on mobile devices as they do on any desktop. With that in mind, we’ve made mobile a priority and have fully optimized it, giving you, the publisher several options to customize it on your side. Want to see our mobile related posts in action? Whip out your phone and check out any one of our blog posts!

Revenue and Traffic Options

Of course, it may be difficult to sell you on quality recommendations and mobile optimization alone. Like most things, the real incentive comes in the numbers and with Zemanta you’re getting two different kinds – both in revenue and analytics.

In addition to earning revenue from any promoted recommendations on your site, there is also the opportunity to enroll in our Reader Exchange network. It connects you with other websites and publishers in your niche and allows you to exchange relevant traffic. You will only receive traffic from a site where your post was a relevant recommendation and for every click you give out, you get one in return. Therefore, it’s not just about giving you a chance to increase your revenue, but also grow your audience – which of course may increase your revenue as well.

The post Why Large Publishers Should be Using Zemanta Related Posts appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

When I was 15, I met a guy at school who eventually became my friend. We had a lot in common, especially in the area of music. One day, I was invited to his home after school. When I walked through the door, his older brother was sitting in a chair in the living room playing the guitar. I was immediately fascinated and wanted to learn how to play. I started visiting frequently on the weekends and started learning to play. I was so obsessed that my parents bought me a guitar and a small practice amp. And so I played, and played, and played. I haven’t stopped since, and that was 27 years ago.

Here are 5 lessons I’ve learned by playing music that can make you a better publisher:

1. Passion
After a year or two of playing, I thought I was getting pretty good. It turned out I thought I was better than I really was.

When a fellow guitarist watched me play he had this to say, “You’re pretty good, but you’re missing something. You gotta feel the music.”

Ah, feel the music. I thought about it and it made sense. It changed everything. A real game changer.

LESSON #1: There’s a difference between being good and being really good. Passion makes the difference. Whether its music or blogging, you will do much better when you really care about it. One of the most passionate bloggers I’ve encountered is Ti Roberts.

2. Technique
Combine passion with technique. Sure, I had plenty of technique. I had learned how to do things with the guitar. Bends, hammer-ons, harmonics, pick harmonics, power chords. You name it. I experimented with it.

LESSON #2: We all can learn technique. How to do stuff.

And sometimes we can get creative and find another way of doing things. Another technique. Another way to blog, or say something different.

Examples of technique can be found on sites, such as: Man Vs. Debt, 2Createawebsite, Think Traffic, Brian Clark, and John Morrow. Which brings us to my next item, being unique.

3. Uniqueness
Another thing I’ve learned from playing music is to be unique. There are a lot of people that play the guitar, but there’s only one person that plays the way you do.

LESSON #3: You have to find what makes you different and expand on it, hone it, and make it your own. Just as there are a lot of publishers blogging about their niche and their experiences. Their life at times.

No two experiences are exactly the same.

No two people are exactly the same.

You have something to say that’s different from the rest? Say it! This is one of the more challenging things about blogging. Will you be unique with every post? No, but your voice will emerge as you write.

4. Art, Creativity, and Value
Music is an art. A work of creativity. Is it always a masterpiece that millions of people listen to in awe? No, not always. But that doesn’t mean that music can’t still be good and enjoyable to listen to.

LESSON #4: Blogging is also an art and creative work. Some bloggers have touched the hearts of others with their experiences. You can feel their words and their pain. A great example is Jon Morrow’s post, “On Dying, Mothers, and Fighting for Your Ideas.”

Does this mean you have to write a tear-jerking post, every post? No, but value is the key to success for a publisher. Sometimes it’s not  what you say or how you say it, but how valuable it is. Even if the purpose of your writing is just plain inspiration or motivation. Are you providing value to what you write?

5. Success is Learned and Practiced
No one person knows how to do things without learning. We are not born with the knowledge we need to be successful until we learn it, expand on it, and make it work for us. Success is based on learning the things you need to know to achieve it.

LESSON #5: There is a basic set of steps to follow and beyond that, be creative.

When I first started playing music, I learned how to use techniques, add passion, and put it into practice. Put it into action. Corbett Barr of Think Traffic has a great post on “21 Quick Actions You Can Do Today to Set Your Blog Up for Massive Success.”

Success is taking the knowledge you gain and doing something with it. Knowledge without action is just knowledge, not success.

The post 5 Lessons Publishers Can Learn from Musicians appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

I have two answers for them:

If done right, guest posting can bring so much traffic that it could freeze your web server and make you jump up and down like a kid in a candy store.

If done wrong, it can waste your time and may even lower your confidence in yourself. Next thing you know, you quit, and start looking for the next best thing.

The norm with guest posting works like this:

The profile of the average guest blogger is either a solo freelance writer, or someone hired by a company to write and submit content on their behalf.

Both ways, the approach is similar…

The writer lacks a system of researching for relevant sites. Most guest post authors are randomly selecting sites, looking to land guest posting opportunities for back-links – and because of that, they are caring less about the relevancy of the site.

The right way to guest post for back-links is to actually look up and research related posts and diversify your hyperlinks. Otherwise, Google will catch on to your method and will either penalize your rankings, or they might not even take into account the extra back-links.

This guy’s 6-month experiment proves how guest blogging for inbound links works better than generating direct (referral) traffic, and details the right way of doing it…

The result of the challenge was an increase of 100+ daily visitors from search just 10 days after the challenge, and a total increase of around 60,000 visitors from search just 6 months after the challenge. That works out to be around 2,000 visitors per guest post in 6 months from publication, when the highest I’ve ever gotten from any guest post on a big blog is 1,500 visitors; and these days, I get less than 10% of that from most big blogs.

 Bamidele Onibalusi

How to inspect the top sites, extensively, before writing for them…

It’s painful to have your guest post rejected, or bring little results from your efforts. That’s what happens when you lack a proper system of identifying the right sites.

In order to help YOU overcome these challenges and find relevant blogs to guest post on, I’ve created the largest online acronym you can read next.

Alexa Rank

Alexa ranking is a key factor (but not the most important, nor the only one) when determining if a top blog is worth guest posting for. Their proprietary system ranks sites on the number of visits and page view numbers. It doesn’t reflect the quality of the traffic though.

For example, Google, Facebook and YouTube are the top 3 ranked sites by Alexa.

A site with Alexa ranking of 100 is more popular (and better for you to post on) than one with a 5,000 rank. Major blogs (in most industries) have an Alexa ranking under 25,000.

CopyBlogger for example ranks at 3,580.

ProBlogger, 3,906.

FourHourWorkWeek, 6,831.

FreelanceFolder, 24,879.

Big audience

Major exposure is what all guest authors crave for.

All the large sites out there have their Facebook, Twitter, and RSS numbers show up, publicly. This gives you an estimate of the average audience. Check them out, and make notes.

Comments

What’s the average number of comments per post? This will give you an idea of how active the blog community is, and their particular needs, wants and issues.

Distinct voice

Is the blog you aim for an authority in the field? Does it offer unique views and talk on a specific topic or subject? Not all blogs are niche oriented. Some might blog on freelance writing, SEO or affiliate marketing. Others are more general, and write on all these topics combined.

If you want to stand out, find your niche, and guest post on general sites to attract a wider audience interested in your sub-niche topic.

Ever-green content

Some large and bigger sites are news centered. That means your content needs to cover current topics and seasoned events. If your objective is to create content that gets recurring, long-term traffic, then stick with sites accepting ever-green posts.

Focus on the audience

It’s not easy to understand your audience when it’s not yours. It takes time to read past blog posts and grasp the (recurring and unique) needs, wants and challenges of the people you aim to write for. You have to feel the readers you’re publishing for, otherwise all the other aspects I’ll cover next will not help much.

Guidelines

The guidelines page is the first thing you should be looking at after checking Alexa, comments and audience numbers. Read that page with close attention. Stick to their rules, and you’ll increase your chance to have your post approved and published.

Most bloggers don’t get their post accepted on large sites because they don’t read or overlook the guidelines.

Headline

Before writing your guest post, even before pitching your content ideas, you need to research past articles, and make note of the most appealing headlines. Why do they attract your attention? Which ones make you click? Which ones don’t? Copy-cat the winning model and form your headline writing style. The headline is the actual title for your guest post.

Interlinking

By reading the guidelines page you can see if the publisher allows links pointing to other pages or posts on your web site. This will help strengthening your overall page rank and Google rankings. If not, inspect previous guest posts and notice if the author has embed self-serving links. That’s a sign the site could accept your links, if they’re relevant, useful and complementary to your post.

Jargon

Pay close attention to how the audience of the blog you aim to write for is talking. Inspect past approved guest posts.

Is the language clean and common? Is the author using any industry specific lingo? Give thought to these little details, otherwise your content might not sound right, or it might not express the right meaning.

Example: if you want to write on blogging related topics, then you have to understand and master the specific terminology (e.g. WP dashboard, plugins, php code, widgets, etc.)

Keywords

Keyword research is the oxygen of your guest post. Target the right, relevant key terms and you stand a chance of getting more traffic from your guest posts. Inspect previous guest posts, and notice if the authors bold and italicize their keywords. That’s a sign of “on-page” optimization. It plays a significant role in search engine ranking, along with other factors like back-links, and co-occurrence.

Luv

You’ve probably already noticed some big sites managing their comments using a plugin called CommentLuv. This is an advantage for both the publisher and its readers, as more people will want to comment if they’re given the “keyword insertion” and “latest post featuring” benefits.

Metrics

Open Site Explorer is a useful tool I use to compare the number and quality of any blog’s backlinks and top pages. It helps analyze the web site you want to write for, and find their top popular content.

Other similar tools I like: Topsy and Tweetreach. They provide you with Twitter insights (referrals, tweets, re-tweets, etc.) into your posts as well as into other people’s content.

All these tools will help you identify the high “authority” sites worth guest posting to. This doesn’t mean you have to base your selection criteria on such metrics alone.

Numbers

Without a concrete strategy, guest posting would be another method of getting traffic that may or not work. Your mission is to estimate the average number of monthly sites you need to guest post for in order to reach your goals (Google rankings, traffic numbers, leads, sales, etc.)

Nobody knows this better than you. You know your numbers, if you reverse engineer your marketing and funnel system. Tracking conversions with Google Analytics or Clicky plays a key role here.

Objective

What’s your monthly quota?

You might need 10 back-links, if you solely guest post for search engine rankings. You might need 100 leads if you are into the mortgage industry. Or, you might need to drive 50 sales if you have your own product, (or add 20 members to your monthly recurring program.) Based on your needs, you’ll be able to define a clear objective, and then work your way up to achieving the numbers and conversions.

Once again, analytics tools are essential. You’ll know precisely which blog brings the most traffic compared with the best visitors that generate sales, leads or whatever. It also gives you the keywords people type in to find you on the search engines, and other insightful data. True gold nuggets!

Page Rank

I prefer to look up for blogs with a page rank of minimum 3. This doesn’t mean I’ll completely neglect the rest. However, when you’re starting to guest post for top sites, it’s good to aim for page rank 3+ sites, and at the same time, take into account all the other metrics and issues covered herein.

NOTE: a high PR blog doesn’t necessarily mean that the site receives high traffic, unless their Alexa ranking is low at the same time.

Quantcast

Quantcast is a comprehensive analytics service, giving you free access into other people’s site metrics including visitor, traffic stats, and demographics.

Armed with this info, you will know how to better write for a particular site and its audience. Never skip this site when writing for top blogs.

Relevancy

Look out for the relation between the audience (their wants, needs, and challenges) and your expertise. Your content should fill in the gap between the two.

Leo, co-founder of BufferApp knew what their Twitter tool was capable of, and how its features and advantages can benefit a wide range of audiences, not just Twitter users, or Twitter related blogs. No wonder his guest posting efforts brought the company 100k customers within a year.

Always look out for the “relevancy” factor when guest posting for big blogs. You’ll be able to find sites which are not related to your niche, but quite relevant to your ideas, products, services or tools.

With this approach, you can see correlations between sites that have nothing to do with each other altogether. Like, fitness and business, Yoga and blogging, or technology and dog training.

Skills

How skilled and knowledgeable is the audience you’ll be talking to?

Based on your previous research, you’ll be able to determine the average skills and knowledge level: beginner, intermediary or advanced. And you’ll be writing accordingly.

Example: if you wanted to write for MenWithPens, you will not share basic insights with an advanced audience, understand?

Time

By reading each blog’s (guest posting) guidelines page and noticing the average guest post length, you’ll be able to estimate the average time it’ll take you to research and write your guest post. Doing so, you can prepare in advance, and not get caught on stressful deadlines or juggle with multiple posts a day.

I prefer to write one post a day, maximum two, in order to produce quality, and meaty content.

Updates

How often is the blog publishing new content? Big blogs usually come up with at least one post a week, if not two. Some larger blogs publish daily. There are pro and cons to both models. You could also target those big blogs that haven’t posted in weeks (for various reasons) and propose some content ideas.

Visuals

Are the top blogs you aim writing for embedding infographics, illustrations, cartoons or videos within their content? You’ll have a higher chance to get your guest post accepted if you can produce or obtain the rights of such within your own content.

I’m not talking about the “standard” type of graphics such as photos and snapshots. Most, if not all major blogs are already using these elements to add the extra touch to their content. The visuals I referred to are the next element that most blogs are missing.

Wow

The best guest authors are individuals who are always on the look out for not just sharing information, but inspiring and arousing an audience through their content. Did you ever think to use comics and cartoons within your posts? The advantages are multiple: you’ll stand out, motivate readers and stir audiences.

What we can do is check out TheOatMeal and other similar sites for inspiration. Then work with an artist to create custom cartoons and comics that features your link. You’ll also benefit from additional traffic and brand exposure. Using “ready-made” cartoons or comics won’t have this advantage.

Xerox

Even the top blogs in the industry will sometimes cover the same subjects or copy what their competitors are writing about. You’ll stand a higher chance to have your guest post more than welcomed when coming up with new angles and unexpected ideas.

Find the “relevancy” factor!

For example you could inject (relevant) stories and anecdotes within your guest post, and add that personal flavor. Or, make (viable) connections with two unrelated topics.

Yin-Yang

Chinese philosophy teaches us the interconnection and interdependence of contrary forces like female and male, dark and light, cold and hot, etc.

Look out for the Yin-Yang elements on the blogs which you’re targeting. Read the latest guest posts.

Are there any elements left out? Are there any explanations not fully covered?

Did an author talk only on the pros of a subject? Did the blog not cover all of them?

You can take charge, and bring new elements or explanations through a new guest post. That’s your advantage, go for it!

Zone

What happens when you get out of your comfort zone?

You feel anxious, and probably insecure, right?

You don’t feel confident when having to write on a topic which you’re not that knowledgeable about, right?

You don’t feel at ease when having to think about how to connect two unrelated topics and create new meanings.

You don’t feel good when you have to take an extra step and enhance your content.

We’re used to staying within our comfort zone. The same with everybody else! That’s why they’ll not get different or remarkable results.

Want to succeed with guest posting? Get out of your comfort zone. There’s no other option. You have to up your thinking, writing and research skills all together.

This is the most important yet hardest advice to implement. Start with this one first, I’d say.

No more excuses! These ideas will help you to identify the right blogs and guest post for results.

“Lack of direction, not lack of time, is the problem. We all have twenty-four hour days.”

Zig Ziglar

The post Guest Posting from A to Z: What to Look out for Before You Do It appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Yes, we all come back to sites that have great content that is relevant to us; it is either helpful, interesting, funny or “all of the above”.

We’re also visual beings. Once someone told me that we’re actually going back to where we started. For a long time in human history, we were visual beings; in the 19th Century texts, especially in newspapers, became dominant. Today, with the new media, with the easier way to take pics, record videos, draw infographics etc., the images are again becoming more and more significant.

We’re charmed by beautiful things. That’s why we are attracted to beautiful design.

That’s why I think the quote: “People don’t come to your website to look at your logo or navigation, they are there for your content,” is partially right. Yes, content matters. A lot. Without valuable content, your site can be the most beautiful in the world, it still wouldn’t matter much. 

On the other hand, great content deserves and needs awesome design to highlight that great content.

Basically, content and design are like a happy, loving couple; you must not see them as separate entities, rather they complete each other.

Develop them together.

That’s why it’s so important that a designer and the editor/author are partners!

The post Great Content Needs Awesome Design and Vice Versa appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Female publishers are the most actively engaged group online as over 80% have a presence on Facebook and over 30% are Twitter users. Although they are the most influential brand ambassadors on social media, it is extremely difficult for brands to find the right publishers for their social media campaigns.

There are the three key hurdles companies face: access to publishers, finding the right influencers, and working with them.

1. Access to bloggers

Even though there are 20 million women publishers in the US alone, it is still not easy to find them. It is a highly fragmented and niche-based market where only the top 100 are known and rest are hidden in the Internet black hole.

The Digital Impact Conference recently conducted a survey highlighting that about 10% of publishers have been pitched more than 100 times a year, and about half of them accept less than 20% of the pitches received. In other words, brands keep pitching to same publishers multiple times without much success.

2. Finding the right influencers

If limited access to publishers is a problem, then it is compounded by the lack of ability to find the right ones. A deal site approaching a publisher focused on high-end fashion has little chance of getting her attention and connecting with her blog audience.

The key is to find the right publisher that fits your product or service for a win-win partnership. While many sites are trying to create a database of publishers, an ideal solution would be a user-curated, deep and accurate classification of influencers for brands to find and connect with the right influencer for their services.

3. Working with bloggers

Finally, if you are fortunate enough to find the right publishers, the remaining challenge is how to work with them. While big companies can hand off all communication to their PR firms or inside specialists, the small and mid-sized brands struggle to manage and measure such relationships. How to pitch, what to expect, and how to measure results continue to be a challenges in working with publishers.

A solution

Brands can reach thousands of customers, optimize spend, and improve ROI by leveraging brand-publisher relationships, if theses hurdles can be removed. Such service is for example provided by Sverve; they bring thousands of publishers on their platform, creating a deep and accurate classification of influencers based on their areas of influence, and providing brands a platform to collaborate and communicate with influencers, and also track their social media campaigns.

The post Influencers: A Solution for Accessing and Working with Female Publishers appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

We have been in the business of delivering semantically matched related posts for over five years now, and with a network of over 300,000 publishers, there is no denying that many find our tools useful and beneficial to their site. But first, why would anyone want to add related posts to their site? And more importantly, why should you choose us?

There are several reasons why it is beneficial to have related posts on your site. There is a reason why nearly every major publisher is using them. With the advent of content marketing and how important it has become in any digital marketing strategy, I would actually be impressed to find a blog that isn’t using it. After all, why wouldn’t a publisher do anything that they can to keep you reading?

Increased Engagement

One of the most frequently stated benefits of having related posts is the increased engagement and readership that you earn from having them on your site. This is important whether you are a publisher or a brand engaged in content marketing. Even a small boost engagement can go a long way.

Think of how much more likely a reader is to click through to one of your posts that he sees if every time he is on your site he reads two or three articles rather than just reading one and then bouncing. That site recognition goes a long way, especially if you are a beginner blogger battling major news sources, big brands, and tenured publishers.

Less Bounce, More Views

That brings me to two other frequently stated benefits of having related posts: a lower bounce rate and more pageviews.

If more engagement didn’t get your attention, then a boost in traffic most certainly will. I think it’s pretty safe to say that most, if not all, bloggers would love to have more traffic – the search term “how to increase traffic” is searched on Google over 60,000 times a month alone!

According to Search Engine Journal, “Many studies have shown that after a web visitor has finished reading your post, they are in action mode – they want to do something.” This makes sense.

Personally, I know that if I reach the end of a post while I am a visitor of another site and a related post catches my eye, I am very likely to click through. I can actually think of several occasions when I catch myself realizing that I just spent the last 20 minutes reading through posts on a site all because I kept on seeing related, interesting content. And if this happens, not only am I likely to trust the site and recognize it at a later date, but if I really liked the content, then I am likely to subscribe to it – either through social media, email, or RSS.

The Available Options

So now that I have convinced you that you need some kind of related posts on your site, you have two options: either manually insert and format your own related posts, or use an existing, established plugin.

Let’s explore the first option. Sure, it sounds enticing at first, you have full control, you don’t have to rely on a third party service, you have the freedom to make it however you want. While all of these things may be true, there is also a lot of work there. You have to comb through your posts and posts around the web, you have to add them using the proper formatting and CSS, you will need to find, and possibly edit, the featured images that you will use as the thumbnails, and then you need to make sure that it displays correctly in all browsers. Of course, this is all on top of all the research, writing, image searching, and any other work you might do for the blog post itself!

Luckily, we have a solution to all of this, and that comes in a fancy new plugin called Zemanta Related Posts.

Why You Need Zemanta Related Posts

We would like to think that Zemanta Related Posts is the best related posts plugin you’ll find and of course, we have many reasons for that.

More Traffic

I’m going to start with the one that everyone wants to hear, more traffic. And we don’t just do that by keeping users on your site. Nope, we also bring in traffic from other sites that are also using our plugin. This is quality traffic too, because of our semantic technology, all posts to and from your site are going to be related to what you are writing about – increasing the likelihood of the visitor engaging with your post and finding other related articles on your site.

In fact, many users of our plugin experience an internal traffic increase of up to 10%. Not only does this increase your reach and readership of people who otherwise may have never seen your blog, but it places you in a network of similar bloggers that will appreciate the exchange of traffic just as much as you do. Oh, and if you want to check to see how many visitors Zemanta brought you, you can check that directly through the plugin dashboard.

Real-Time Analytics

One thing that many related posts plugins are lacking are analytics. Most people would like to see how many users who make it to the end of your post actually click through to a related post. For that reason, we decided to include real-time analytics directly in the plugin dashboard. Check out a screenshot of our statistics for the past 30 days.

Mobile Optimization

With the rapid adoption and use of mobile browsing, it is more important now than ever to optimize your site for both desktop and mobile use. Thankfully, Zemanta Related Posts are customizable and fully optimized for mobile use, and as you can see above, we even offer you mobile analytics.

Complete Customization

Another benefit of using Zemanta Related Posts is the complete customization that we offer you through the plugin dashboard. It is on your site so we believe that you should have full control of how it looks on your site. That is why we offer seven different designs and, if you really have something special in mind, an option to customize the plain design via CSS.

Check out all six of our awesome designs:

Complete Editorial Control

Last, and certainly not least, is the full editorial control that you get with Zemanta Related Posts. One of the biggest complaints about related posts plugins is that you do not have any control over which posts are actually displayed. We think that it is very important that you, the owner of the site, should have complete control over what is shown on your site. So we made it simple to add or remove any of the related posts that we suggested to you using our semantic engine.

Simply click “Edit Related Posts” in the right corner of the related posts and drag and drop whatever you want. And if you would also like to restrict the posts that we recommend to a certain date range (for example, only posts from the last 3 months), you can do that from the plugin dashboard.

So, what do you think?

By now, I hope I have convinced you that not only are related posts a necessity on your site, but Zemanta Related Posts are the best option. We offer you the ability to get more traffic from our network of over 300,000 bloggers with analytics to prove it, we offer you mobile optimization and full customization, and most importantly we offer you full control to truly make Zemanta yours.

The post What is Zemanta Related Posts & Why You Need It On Your Site appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

I am very happy to be joining Zemanta because it is at the intersection of three massively important trends for online publishers and advertisers: the increasing use of content marketing, the rise and importance of native advertising and the rise of mobile (and it’s monetization challenges). With the recent launch of Zemanta’s Content Discovery Network, I am incredibly excited about it’s ability to help publishers and advertisers better promote and monetize online content.

Some Background

My relationship with Zemanta goes back to 2008 Seedcamp in London. Zemanta’s co-founders, Bostjan, Andraz and I were all mentors for the startups competing for that year’s competition and kept in touch ever since. It seemed whenever Bostjan had a question about the business of online advertising he would ask me. He must have been a fan of my take on the history of online advertising from an Ignite NYC presentation. Then when Bostjan heard that I had left Cheezburger last fall, he recruited me to help advise Zemanta on the development and launch of their Content Discovery Network.

The Link is an original Native Ad Format

Early on I had a key realization about Zemanta and the future of Content Discovery Networks. Zemanta’s VP of Engineering Dusan Omercevic and I were talking about how Related Posts by Zemanta (the product powered by the Content Discovery Network) performed on mobile. It turns out that Zemanta’s mobile content recommendations had CTR’s as high as 6%. Yes, that is a CTR for essentially an ad unit. My reaction:

A 6% CTR definitely made me stop and think. And then it came together – links are as native to the Internet as LOLcat photos. They are such an expected part of the content experience that content without links looks and feels odd to readers. And in mobile where navigation requires a long scroll and swipe to the top of the web page, links even begin to represent navigation. Related Content becomes something so much more than just something readers expect to find at the end of each article they read online.

Native Advertising and Mobile Made for Each Other

For anyone not familiar with the current state of mobile monetization for publishers – mobile banner ads are running at a huge – 1/3rd to 2/3rds lower CPM’s then their desktop counterparts. And given publishers can show only 10% as many ads per session as they can on the traditional web that means publishers are only making 5-10% the amount of money they used to. In my view, banners are DOA on mobile (except for maybe cross-promoting app installs).

As James Slavet of Greylock recently wrote - something will solve mobile monetization for publishers. Personally, I think native advertising will solve it. As I have said before, there’s just not enough screen real estate for banners to work they way did in traditional PCs. Native advertising – in the stream – should work and when you see and hear about 6% CTR’s that mean it can and does. So my bet is that Zemanta is one of the those companies that does figure mobile advertising out.

So Why Zemanta?

When looking at either starting a startup or joining one – you need to look at the product/vision, the team and the investors. I’ve just explained why I am big believer in the product and vision. Zemanta currently counts about 300,000 active publishers using its tools. Content Discovery Network launched with a reach of 1 billion page views.  These guys have a lot of wind at their sails.

Add on top of that the fact that Zemanta has one of the top product engineering teams for any startup across Europe and founders who I have gotten to know very well and respect over the last 4.5 years and I think it’s easy to say they check that box. And finally, the track records of their primary investors –  Fred Wilson of USV, Peter Jones of Eden Ventures and Robin Klein of TAG (the Ron Conway of early stage investing for Europe) – speak for themselves. Zemanta has all three – great product/vision, fantastic team and top notch investors. 3 for 3.

So Why Me?

It’s not everyday that a company gets to hire a Bravo TV reality star as President. (OK I’m as far as a star as anyone) More seriously though, I was the guy who was responsible for making millions of dollars from silly cat photos. As you can see on my CV, I was the CRO for Cheezburger where I was responsible for developing and promoting the rise of native advertising. I’ve worked and co-founded a number of startups in the digital media space from Lookery, a social advertising pioneer, to Loudeye, one of the first commercial platforms for distributing music online. I am active advisor and investor in startups with a focus on digital media.

So What’s Next

I am joining Zemanta in the role of President. Bostjan and Andraz are at the core the product and technical leaders of the company. I’m here to help them develop a great company to work at across the globe, a company that provides a powerful native advertising solution to hundreds of thousands of publishers and advertisers and company that help solves the puzzle of mobile monetization.

The post Zemanta Hires Todd Sawicki as President appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

1. Strategy: Zemanta Launches Content Discovery Network

No surprise here. At the beginning of February, Zemanta launched a new content recommendation network. It was really well received by you. Here Bostjan gives an overview of the new product.

2. Creating Your First Business Model Prototype: 3 Major Tips

Marko Savic in his debut post for this blog gives 3 major tips for generating your first business model prototype. Moreover, the post includes a wonderful story of a blogger who… Well, just read it. You won’t regret it.

3. 3 Types of Online Business Models

It looks like we should publish more on business models. Sara Bozanic describes three most commonly used business models on the Web: made for the Web, brand extension, and the transmedia model.

4. Content Marketing Strategy: You’re Asking Wrong Questions

I think you’re asking yourself wrong questions when it comes to developing your content marketing strategy. What should you be asking instead?

5. Content Delivery: Introducing a Simple Way to Get More Subscribers

Julien Genestoux introduces a new project – SubToMe. It is specifically designed for publishers. Check it out.

The post 5 Most Popular Zemanta Posts from February You Should Read appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

RankWP.com is an upgrade of the WordPress Plugin Directory; it augments its default information about the plugisn, with some never-seen-before data, that should make your plugin decision-making process much easier.

One of the best WordPress features is its extensibility through plugins; for just about anything you could think of there is a plugin or even several plugins. To me, WordPress Plugin Directory is like an app store for website owners – a true open, ever-growing and ever-improving repository of blogging goodness, where developers around the worlds build on top of previous efforts of likeminds.

However, thousands of plugins don’t make it easy to find the best one for your needs. I think it’s much easier if you know how popular an individual plugin is.

Therefore, we have built an algorithm that estimates the actual number of active users of each plugin. Plugins also become more or less popular over time, so we’ve been tracking their popularity rank and show you how that’s changing. Both of these information are available now for all the plugins for the very first time.

I’ve been a blogger since 2004, when I installed my first WordPress, version 1.0. The first product we’ve ever released at Zemanta was a WordPress plugin. And as you know, WordPress has a really great community, so I think it’s time to give something back to this community.

More on the RankWP.com from last week’s launch at the WordPress NYC Meetup in the following video.

Related articles

• Launching RankWP.com
• Zemanta Related Posts Is a Top 50 WordPress Plugin

The post WordPress Plugins Augmented: Introducing RankWP.com appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Harvard Business Review magazine published an article on the SAVE framework. It is a shift from the traditional 4 P’s marketing model. The authors claim that in today’s B2B world, the classic model (emphasizing product, place, price, and promotion) isn’t necessarily irrelevant, they just “need to be  reinterpreted to serve B2B marketers.”

Publishing and content marketing are a perfect example of this framework. According to the authors, “the SAVE framework is the centerpiece of a new solution-selling strategy.”

The SAVE framework fits like a glove to your publishing strategy. To attract your prospects/customers, to retain them, to make your content valuable and sharable, you should follow the SAVE framework. Many of you already do it, though not calling it as such.

Many others are still looking for the model that would work best for you, for the model that would help you draw a successful, effective and long-term content strategy. I believe that the SAVE framework can help you tremendously.

What is the SAVE framework? The emphasis from the 4 P’s model is shifted from “products to Solutions, place to Access, price to Value, and promotion to Education”.  In short, SAVE.

Here’s how the SAVE can guide your content strategy:

Instead of product, focus on Solution.
The SAVE framework says, “Define offerings by the needs they meet, not by their features, functions, or technological superiority”.

Therefore, your content strategy must be customer-centric. Ask yourself:

• Who are your prospects/customers?
• What are their main pain points?
• How can you help them live/work better?

Through helpful and relevant content help them learn the benefits of your products and services.

Instead of place, focus on Access.
The SAVE framework says, “Develop an integrated cross-channel presence that considers customers’ entire purchasing journey”.

I’ll twist this a bit and say this is about knowing where your prospects/customers hang out and what exactly they’re doing there. Your brand should be accessible there. This is basically a question of the content distribution.

Access is about the integration of all channels and tools available to you that are relevant to your prospects/customers. You should know what channels you’re present on (Facebook, blog, popup store, Twitter, Pinterest, printed magazine, email newsletter, etc.) and why. How is each channel used by your prospects/customers, at what point of their purchase journey they play a role and what that role is?

For example, what are you trying to accomplish by your presence on Facebook or with a blog, etc.? And what kind of content and engagement should you expect on each and every channel you use?

Instead of price, focus on Value.
The SAVE framework says, “Articulate the benefits relative to price, rather than stressing how price relates to production costs, profit margins, or competitor’s prices”.

Your prospects/customers need to sense that your content is valuable to them. According to Sharon Tanton, valuable content is:

• Helpful – It makes a difference, it answers a genuine question.
• Entertaining – Provokes a reaction. Smile, laugh, or think – people respond to it and want to share it.
• Authentic – Genuine and original. Written from the heart, it tells a story that people understand and respond to.
• Relevant-  It is rooted firmly in the client’s world, it makes perfect sense.
• Timely – it is sent out at the right time, it hits the audience when they are most receptive.

Instead of promotion, focus on Education.
The SAVE framework says, “Provide information relevant to customers’ specific needs at each point in the purchase cycle, rather than relying on advertising, PR…”

According to Marcus Sheridan, content marketing is about educating your prospects/customers, “We’re just teachers.”

Therefore, do just that. Answer your prospects/customers’ questions. As Marcus likes to say, if they ask, you answer. Ask everyone in your company who is in contact with your customers (in the calling center, the sales department, the lost & found department, etc.) to write down any questions your prospects/customers may have, no matter how insignificant they may be.

All in all, help them live/work better.

The post Effective Content Strategy Guided by The SAVE Framework appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

So, you’ve written a great piece of text. Congratulations! But to publish a great blog post you need to do much more.

You need to provide context:

1. Find images to make it visually appealing
2. Create links to relevant sites to provide further explanations
3. Tag the post with appropriate keywords to make it easy to find
4. Provide further reading to establish authority

These are the daunting tasks every publisher must do to get ahead. But you are not alone. Zemanta editorial assistant is with you.

Let Andraz and Kris tell you more about it.

The post Zemanta Hangout with Google: How The Editorial Assistant Helps Publishers appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

A business model is a system that explains how somebody captures, creates and delivers value. A busines model canvas is a tool that allows you to describe, design, challenge, invent, and pivot your business model. For more on on business model canvas watch this video.

And now to the story of Alexander Osterwalder. Alex is from Switzerland, one of the best countries in the world when it comes to inventions, often topping the world in comparison to most countries. Alexander was a PhD student, who wrote a blog about the subject of his thesis titled Business Model Ontology.

After his successful thesis defense, he quit blogging for a while. In the meantime he was doing workshops on designing business models. He was challenged by his students to write a book on the subject. His mentor argued that to prove his thesis he should invent a business model for book publishing. So that is exactly what he did.

How his book publishing business model came about

First, Osterwalder and his mentor prototyped eight different business models. Anyone can do it.

Then Alexander decided to re-launch his blog, where he announced that he will start writing a book within the next six months. In the meantime, he invited his readers to co-author his book. For a fee. Why the fee? He wanted serious writers that would help create a book that he would be proud of. Not just another business textbook.

After a few calculations, he estimated that he would need a budget of roughly €250,000. To get this he used a progressive pricing model where in the the first few months before he began writing, he would only charge a fee of $24 to become a co-author. It increased from there and during the final week of writing the fee was $250. Yes, $250.

The budget was there. Writing could start. With more than 400 co-authors. The rest is history.

Here are 3 major tips for generating your first business model prototype:

1. Don’t do it alone
Find a partner or two. You’ll need somebody who is more analytical, rational with some experience in finance, if possible. The other partner should be somebody who is good at synthesising, somebody who is good at seeing the big picture and is experienced with trusting their intuition. She should be responsible more for the right side of canvas, for the Channels, Customer Segments, Customer Relationships, and very importantly Revenue Streams. Your analytical partner should be more oriented towards Key Resources, Key Activities, Key Partners and to Cost Structure of your business model prototypes. Your main role in prototyping your business models is to define and pivot around your Value Proposition. You should also be the timekeeper of your prototyping party.

2. Set up a time limit
Don’t spend too much time on every single prototype. It is very important that you have at least six, if possible up to nine business model prototypes. It is a very good measure if you spend only 18 minutes or less on one business model prototype. To come into the mood to prototype business models start with a game called Crazy Cow.

Here are some basic rules for Crazy Cow (adpated by Danny Beckett Jr.):

• Instruct your partners that you will sketch out three different business models using a cow.
• Ask them to first define some characteristics of a cow (produces milk, eats all day, makes a mooing sound, etc.).
• Tell them to use these traits to come up with an innovative business model based on a cow.
• You have only three minutes for one business model prototype.
• Sketch three different business model prototypes of a crazy cow.
• Have a good laugh before your start prototyping your business models.

3. Never write on the business model canvas
There is no such thing as a perfect business model. It doesn’t exist. Therefore do not write on the Business Model Canvas. Use post-it notes or even better stattys pads.

When you’re done with prototyping one business model, document it. Take pictures, share it with your customers and partners, try to find out what would work and what wouldn’t.

And if your prototype doesn’t work, don’t worry. It happens. As long as you realize that if failed and are able to move on (hopefully without too much expense) and learn from the experience.

You should develop the circle: —Prototype—Fail—Learn—. The secret lies in how fast you are capable of turning this cycle around. Good luck.

The post Creating Your First Business Model Prototype: 3 Major Tips appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Distributing content isn’t easy. Although you do have several options like social media, SEO, and paid distribution, many of these options are either ineffective, time-consuming, expensive, or all of the above.

Although many people find a lot of value in distribution via social mediums, the reach can certainly be questionable at times. Many of these networks have limits which may prove them too be a lot less effective than many boast.

For example, when you post an update on Facebook, not all your friends or fans see it, only those whom Facebook think might be interested in. Similarly, people who follow you on Twitter may not be 100% interested in your blog and some of your most loyal fans may not even be on these networks.

Blogs actually have had a dedicated feature to subscriptions: RSS feeds, but they are usually hard to use for most people: they look weird in the browser if not using a proper reader and less savvy users sometimes find them too complicated.

Get More Subscribers Using SubToMe

A fantastic solution to these problems – specifically designed for you, the bloggers and publishers – is called SubToMe.

One of it’s central features is that it lets your readers choose the delivery mean: email, SMS, instant messaging, etc., based on the applications they already use.

By using this button, you don’t have to put a thousand follow mes on who knows how many buttons on your site; helping you to avoid turning your website into a Christmas tree.

Also, the button itself is constructed using HTML, allowing you to customize it in any way you want to make it fit your style.

Integrate it
Remember that this button works on any website, provided an RSS feed is included (any serious blogging platform does).

As you can see, it is quite small and it won’t affect the performance of your page in any way (it doesn’t load anything until after the user has clicked the button).

And if you use WordPress, you can quickly and easily integrate SubToMe with your site using this plugin.

The post Content Delivery: Introducing a Simple Way to Get More Subscribers appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Yes, you made Zemanta the 42nd most downloaded plugin out of over 23,000. Millions of websites and blogs are powered by these plugins. And we’re proud to assist 100,000s of yours.

The Plugintable explained
The periodic table is organized on the basis of their atomic numbers, electron configurations, and recurring chemical properties. Elements are presented in order of increasing atomic number (number of protons).

The plugintable, on the other hand, is ranked by the number of downloads. Zemanta Related Posts has been downloaded over 630,000 times. Now that’s what we like to hear. And we’re fast approaching the coveted Top 40. Then, we’ll be a bona fide hit.

Be careful and thorough
Part of the reason for the success of WordPress is the power of its plugins. You can find multiple plugins for virtually anything you want. However, when you install a plugin, it’s a commitment and risk. You grant it full access to your website, so it makes sense to be careful and thorough when choosing them.

Hence, tomorrow at the WordPress NYC Meetup, I am going to introduce a new project that is designed to make this easier.

Let me thank you, Zemanta users and fans, for your support and feedback in the past 6 years. You help Zemanta assist you better!

The post Zemanta Related Posts Is a Top 50 WordPress Plugin appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Media monitoring provides clients with copies of media content, which is of specific interest to them. I could joke and say that the Internet has shifted a relatively settled media trot to a gallop and that increasingly important social media have added another dimension to the speed of the dissemination of information – voice of the people. It can indeed be ruthless to brands, products and services, but it’s a fact which you can’t ignore no more.

Consistent media monitoring – of all communication channels – outlines a real public image of your brand, it provides new insights into the activities of your competitors and into the challenges that await you in the struggle for customers.

Indeed, media monitoring is so much more than just a daily review of articles about your brand. If you’re using it for just checking what the media (especially mass media) reported about you and counting the number of clips, then you’re not doing much. Those times have passed.

Here are 3 ways to effectively leverage online media monitoring to improve your brand:

1. To better understand your customers’ pain points

A few days ago, I met with a financial company. They told me right away, “We don’t know why we need media monitoring; we are hardly mentioned in the media.”

After only a few minutes, we jointly came to the conclusion that the company truly isn’t present much in the mass media; they, however, spend a lot of time monitoring financial behavioral trends. “Our goal is to educate the market, to let prospects know what our services mean and what they can gain by becoming our clients,” they said. So why not keep track of media content on this topic?

By monitoring the media (traditional and online/social), they will explore the market, find potential clients and obtain necessary data on what people really need when it comes to financial advice, what their most common pain points are. Armed with the data, the company will know how to address clients more effectively, detect niches that can be utilized, and find the arguments to improve the sales of their services.

2. To improve your business

Media content is rich with information about you and your products/services, which you may not be aware of. You may not even realize that your users/clients/buyers/readers are affected by them or find them important. Listening to communication on social media, records on forums, industry blogs, reading user reviews, equips you with information that can be your point of reference, for you to become stronger and better.

Imagine a bakery that runs out of buns by 5 pm every day. This is a seemingly insignificant detail, but since this has been going on for a few weeks, customers start complaining. In the past, people would write letters, maybe ask to see the manager. Now they post their comments on a forum, Facebook, or simply tweet about it.

The bakery can do two things – ignore online chatter or do something about it. Was the estimate of how much the bakery can sell wrong? Would it be a good idea to bake a different type of bread in smaller amounts and increase the number of baked buns?

The mirror that media content shows you can be merciless. But if you know how to utilize it, you can act appropriately and improve your business. Are you capable of enough self-reflection to chew over processes, review procedures and change something within the organization?

3. To improve your products/services

A pool of information from social media can help find new ways to improve your products/services. Moreover, it can be a great source of information not only for marketing and PR departments, but also for other departments, such as product development, sales, etc.

People talk about their lives online, not only (or even not mainly) about brands. They discuss with others what they use, what they experience and how happy they are with available solutions.

For example, what side effects are caused by individual drugs? What conclusions can young mothers list when testing different means for eliminating seizures in infants, what works and what doesn’t? How helpful is a call center agent when a client complains about the Internet connection? Can a bank teller answer financial questions satisfactorily?

I like the idea of the development departments looking at their users’ comments and fish for their own personalized adaptations of many products they use. I am often surprised how detailed the user experiences are, how they can find new ways to adapt products to their needs – their solutions are a great feedback how to upgrade your products and services.

Media monitoring is so much more than just a list of mentions of your brand in the media. If you can effectively put the clippings to good use, strategically, they will help you adapt your activites in order to further your business.

The post 3 Tips to Effectively Leverage Online Media Monitoring to Improve Your Business appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Who is Andrea Naomi?
I’m a digital marketer, blogger, mom, and wife. Prior to being a digital marketer I was a financial manager and served in the US Air Force. In 2007, my husband and I decided to start a business online and since then the internet is where we live our entrepreneurial lives. We’ve gone through a long journey influenced largely by different aspects of internet marketing including affiliate marketing, network marketing, and social media marketing. With this digital experience under our belt we hope to build a supportive network for other entrepreneurs who’ve shared similar experiences.

I like the name B2B Kingdom. How did you come up with it? What does it mean?
The premise of B2B Kingdom is building attractive online business with an emphasis on Christian entrepreneurship; B2B Kingdom is essentially a melding together of our blog’s dual purpose.

Your goal is “to empower Christian Entrepreneurs to embrace biblical principles in business”. Why is this so important today?
Yes, that’s exactly our goal. The reason why we believe it’s so important today is because unfortunately many “online takers” prey upon the hopes and dreams of aspiring entrepreneurs by focusing on selling them the idea of making money on the beach literally overnight. Most of us who have experience in the industry understand that push button success is not necessarily the reality of our industry. We truly believe that digital entrepreneurs can build a successful business online if they trust in god’s answers – it’s as God said in Jeremiah 33:3 ” Call onto me and I will answer thee and show thee great and mighty things that thou knowest not ”

Was “to empower” the reason to set up a blog?
Yes, empowerment is a pivotal force in every business and life for that matter. Ultimately we want to make a positive difference for others even if it’s just a small impact, we’re genuinely grateful for the opportunity to serve.

What goals did you achieve with the blog? What’s in its future?
Our blog allows us to publish our mission and meet individuals who share a common purpose. In the future, God willing, we hope to scale our reach through other forms of media (e.g. podcasting and video) as well as offer more training courses.

Why blogging?  
We choose blogging because it’s accessible, not only for us but for everyone. We want to set an example that’s achievable for every business owner or aspiring entrepreneur; if you want to get your message out there you can blog about it!

Can you tell us more about your Training Library?
The training library is a simple library that anyone who wants to set up a blog can use for free to kickstart their venture. We routinely add more information as the blogging world is always changing and growing.

When did you start using Zemanta?
We began using Zemanta about a month ago. It’s been an really great experience thus far.

How does Zemanta help you blog better/easier?
Zemanta is a godsend for us because it helps us provide messages that are well-recieved and contextually understandable to our audience. It also helps us create media rich content with increased engagement and keeps our audience entertained visually. It’s also a huge time saver because it basically makes the “old post preparation” process obsolete which saves me so much time not having to dig up media files and link research.

Please share a Zemanta tip!
A great Zemanta tip I found very useful is to think outside the box when you’re searching for images. For example, if you’re creating a post about the holiday season you can use the search feature inside the browser to look up similar search related queries like “christmas tree” or  “ornaments”. Learning how to use Zemanta search features creatively can make an ever greater impact on your blog posts! Thanks

The post Empowerment: How a Zemanta User Does it with a Blog appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Joe Pulizzi, Content Marketing Institute, argues that “more content is better” is a fallacy. He explains: “Everywhere I go, I find marketers who are challenged with creating more content. More blog posts, more eBooks, more videos, more podcasts … more, more, more. … I’m done with more.”

My first reaction was, “What?” According to HubSpot’s 2012 Marketing Benchmarks from 7,000+ Businesses research report:

• Companies that update their blog frequently generate 5 times the web traffic of companies that don’t blog. Small businesses tend to see the biggest gains when they increase the frequency of posts.
• Even a modest increase in blogging increases inbound leads. By increasing blog frequency from 3-5 posts/month to 6-8 posts/month, companies experience a 55% increase in lead generation. B2B companies that post only once or twice a month generate 70% more leads than companies that don’t blog at all.
• As companies increase their total blog posts from 11-20 to 21-50, web traffic typically grows by 45%. And companies with more than 200 articles generate five times the leads of companies with ten or fewer total blog posts.

But what about quality? Yes, the right question. Joe surprised me at first. I thought, “Why does he suddenly equate frequency with quality?” “More content is better” doesn’t necessarily mean “more content of whatever quality is better”. Moreover, more doesn’t necessarily equal bad quality.

Joe continues with a discussion of “epic” content. However, he doesn’t really explain what epic content means, save that is better than what others do. That’s not necessarily a good benchmark either, is it?

That’s why I really liked a post by Sharon Tanton (it was the most popular Zemanta post in January) What Is Valuable Content:

•     helpful
•     entertaining
•     authentic
•     relevant
•     timely

The most important part of her post is: “The key to producing valuable content is a deep understanding of your client and customer base.”

Once I asked Michael Hoefflich, Forum Corporate Publishing, what custom magazine is a good magazine. He simply said, “The one that readers love to read.” That’s it.

So, when you are developing your content marketing strategy, instead of obsessing about frequency and the size, look for answers to the following questions first:

1. Who is going to produce content?

• How much can you leverage talents, skills and knowledge of your employees?
• Do you have any employees or is it just you?
• Is/are they working on other things?
• How much time can they allocate to producing “epic” content?
• What is each of them best at (writing, brainstorming, videotaping, talking, etc.)?
• Can you regularly produce valuable content alone or do you need external help?

2. How much money can you invest and what can you get for it?

3. How much content does your average prospect/buyer expect/need?

• How much great content can they absorb in a week/month?
• Is your average follower a web junkie?

4. And of course what kind of content do they want/need/expect?

The answers to the above questions are paramount, not how many times, how many channels or what is the best size for the post! Not that these don’t matter, they just depend on the answers to the questions above.

Related articles

• No Doubt: Blogging Is Good for Business
• A Letter by a Selfish Consumer: Why I Prefer Company Blogs (Vs. Websites)
• The Difference Between Content Marketing and Blogging
• 4 Common Misunderstandings About Content Marketing
• 50 Most Memorable Blogging Tips from Zemanta in 2012

The post Content Marketing Strategy: You’re Asking Wrong Questions appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

There are three most commonly used business models on the Web: made for the Web, brand extension, and the transmedia model.

You’re probably asking yourself, why would anyone with a blog or other type of website have to know about online business models?

Well, the more you understand the ecosystems you design for, the better the results.

Here are 3 major online business models with real examples from tourism (maybe I just a need a rest somewhere far away):

1. Made for the Web

The service monetization which happens strictly and only online. The service is produced to live and develop within the online ecosystem.

Look at the Airbnb platform. Airbnb was founded in 2008 and soon grew into the biggest community marketplace for online accommodation booking (or via a mobile phone). They have transformed the old fashioned technique of renting apartments and adjusted it to the online communications with an innovative business approach.

For the users they are “a community marketplace for unique spaces”, while for the renters they “let you make money renting out your place”.

The listing of your accommodation is free of charge. The renters are charged a 3% fee when the reservation is processed. All the bookings happen through the platform. In order to provide the best service and rent the accommodation as good as possible, Airbnb even offers a free photoshoot of your accommodation in most countries.

Airbnb is a great example of an innovative approach to the made for Web business model. They are quite ahead of their competitors (Flipkey etc.). They made a strategic shift while giving the service out for free and earning when their partners/renters do.

LESSON: Effective made for web business models are based on building strong communities.

2. Brand Extension Model

This is the most commonly used online business model. Everybody more or less employs it, no matter the size of the company.

The brand communication of a core product or service is extended online through a variety of media channels.

Look at Small Luxury Hotels of the World. SLH offers a selection of over 520 of the world’s finest small independent hotels in more than 70 countries. They communicate through their website, while they extend the communication on other media channels like Facebook, G+, Twitter etc. Users can even book a hotel room directly from their iPhone app. They use extended communication in order to engage with their audience and monetize.

Communication of this type that I fancy is the Disney’s. On their Facebook Fan page one can recognize such a strategic approach. They don’t speak for themselves; no, they rather post what their heroes supposedly say; The Little Girl Squirrel “Oh, that’s alright. He can call me a flower if he wants to. I don’t mind.”

LESSON: Brand extension models have weak ROI if they’re not based on a good social media strategy.

3. Transmedia Model

Transmedia is a design concept, a technique, which happens across multiple media platforms, but in a platform appropriate way. It’s a communication that never sleeps, that constantly travels from one medium to another, from online to offline and vice versa; the goal is to engage the audiences in co-creating stories and benefit from them.

The following example is still in the development phase. It’s a story about WhooArt brand. WhooArt apartment is an apartment for rent rental on the island Vis in Croatia, whereas the WhooArt Gallery is an online gallery that sells works of selected artists. During the summer season, the apartment is used as the exhibition space. So each customer that rents the apartment has the opportunity to rent the vacational space and experience his own private exhibition of selected artists from the gallery.

The story about art travels from the apartment to the online gallery and back. Communication about the service is spread around through many media channels and invites users to share their own story on the art experience. Have you ever dreamt about sleeping in Mel Ramos’s exhibition room?

This online business model is part of the transmedia window model. Individual services can live on their own (within separate browser windows), however, only in cohesion they can form a unique experience.

LESSON: Tap into an unknown with strong design. Don’t be afraid to experiment with a variety of media channels, but bear in mind that without a good story you’ll have nothing to communicate. Design a strong narrative and experiment!

Related articles

• Transmedia Storytelling Cookbook: from Digital to a Multiplatform Approach
• The Difference Between Content Marketing and Blogging
• The Branded business model at Morrisons
• Growing Your Digital Business Model? Fertile Ground Helps!

The post 3 Types of Online Business Models appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

This is what you’ve been used to and cherished: Zemanta dynamically scans the web during the writing process to ensure that your content is optimized, linked to by others and shared on social media. Our network of 300,000 publishers represents 1 billion pageviews; on average you’ve got a 5% increase in readership and a 10% increase in pageviews.

Check Out the Dashboard
What is new? Well, it is a natural complement to what you’ve been used to. Zemanta’s new content discovery network presents a selection of recommended articles from the publisher itself, from around the web, and from advertisers. You can select content manually, blacklist unwanted sites or simply rely on Zemanta’s automated and award-winning semantic algorithms.

With newly released WordPress plug-in (called Related Posts) you can leave it to Zemanta to select related posts automatically or exercise editorial control. Just click “Edit related posts” at the bottom of the widget after you publish!

It gets even better! Publishers can now choose a theme for related posts, whatever you think suits your blog the best. Even more, you have an option to customize the theme.

Mobile features
Zemanta now offers publishers mobile phone and tablet native recommendation formats that are optimized for faster load times and smaller display sizes of mobile web browsers.

“Our testing confirmed that users behave very differently on mobile platforms,” said Andraz Tori, CTO, Zemanta. “We included mobile optimized formats and algorithms that achieve dramatically better click-through and engagement rates than traditional ad units like banners.”

Awesome Analytics in Real Time
Acquiring and retaining users/readers is a core function of every publisher. There is more and more content and you are fighting with millions of others for readers’ attention. You can win this battle only with relevant and high-quality content that is credible to your target audience.

Hence, Zemanta now offers great analytics. You can follow the success of related posts and consequently the impact of your posts. And analytics display real-time data!

Earn Money
Publishers use content discovery networks to acquire and engage users/readers through content recommendations. Advertisers can promote their own content directly to users through Zemanta’s content discovery network.

If you choose a “promoted” related post, you earn money. When you surpass $50.00, you’ll be paid.

But don’t forget! You want to increase the traffic to your website, become/remain a credible and trusted source in your niche; therefore choosing only promoted related posts will only lead you in the opposite way.

The post Strategy: Zemanta Launches Content Discovery Network appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

How much of an article do you read? Do you read it all or just scan the title and bold items?

A friend of mine scans the Internet looking for news stories, but he only reads the titles. Yes, that’s all he reads.

For example, he’ll ask, “Have you heard about the recent state of the economy?”

I say, “No, I haven’t.”

He says, “Yeah, they’re saying that spending and tax cuts are to blame for the federal debt.”

I ask, “Really, how are they going to fix it?”

He says, “I don’t know, I just read the headline.”

Here are 5 ways how to write to attract readers who prefer shorter posts:

Micro information
Titles are micro information at its best, and it’s how most of us use the Internet today. Only the most eye-catching information gets by our filters. We are filtering information that we don’t see as important. It’s just too much information to process. We don’t have the time to read everything.

So, how do we make this work for us, bloggers? By cutting down our posts.

Edit out some sentences that seem to run on or don’t seem important to the post. Shave some conversation if it seems to ramble a bit.

Short paragraphs
Keeping information brief allows you to get to the point sooner. Keep your paragraphs down to a few sentences, and try to keep them short. This allows the reader to scan through the paragraph, but still get the “gist”. You want to keep their attention, not bore them to death. Although, if your copywriting skills are really good, you may be able to extend them a bit.

Bullet points
Do you know why list posts are so popular? Because when you have good bullet points, it allows the reader to scan to the points that are most important to them. We can’t stop a reader from scanning our posts. So, let’s make it easier for them. Readers are less likely to only scan your post if it’s short and valuable.

Shorter sentences
Use a conversational style of writing. If sentences seem to be long, try to find a way to say the same thing with fewer words. Don’t be afraid to be a bit relaxed with grammar to make things shorter. Each sentence should make a point and move on. Examine where you put commas – can you make it 2 short sentences?

Microblogging
Microblogging has become popular because it is a way of exchanging small elements of content. These posts are also called microposts, which can contain sentences, images, or video links. These small elements of content can be crafted to entice readers to want to know more, which can drive social media traffic to your site. Once there, the reader can then learn more about the topic.

An example would be a tweet. You are limited to 140 characters to say something, link something, and make it epic.

Related articles

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The post How to Blog: Keep It Brief appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

In creating Venus Meets Isis program I saw blogging as a gateway to so much more. Blogging is something that can be fun and creative, allowing you to learn about yourself and connect with others. At the same time it has a technical and even business component to it.

Any successful blogger knows that blogging requires some basic level of technical skills, maybe even some coding (CSS and HTML), it requires planning, oftentimes research on topics, as well as some marketing in building your audience. This coupled with my interest in building The Corporate Goddess is why when presented with the opportunity to work with teens I immediately created an internship program centered around blogging.

It serves two purposes I have in working with women and young girls:

• Creating the space where we are connecting with our unique talents and learning to honor our intrinsic self-worth.
• Creating exposure and access to media-tech tools that can and will create change and opportunity.

I am excited about the opportunities and impact that tech savvy women and girls can create for themselves, our communities, and thus our world.

In conversations with teachers, parents, student advisors I am learning there are other benefits in having youth blog; it gets them to write, have a voice, and be in action with an outlet. As simple and even cliche as it may sound, blogging, with the right guidance and curriculum, provides a lot of benefits and opportunities outside of just ‘being a blogger’.

Create a blogging or digital media club in your community
If you are interested in leveraging the benefits of blogging with your students, children, or even for yourself, start a club. There is tons of information on the internet on blogging and web development.

Below are 7 steps to follow to begin community and confidence building with friends and those you love.

1. Choose a focus for your club (ie other business owners, your students, a group of friends).
It is easiest to attract club members if you find a common ground that they can relate to. If you are a business owner and want to begin blogging for your business, create a business blogging group. If you are a teacher and want to see your students write more or learn web development, start a student club.

2. Set a meeting time and location.
Once you are clear on the focus of your group, begin to attract members. Set a time and location and even if it’s just two of you in the beginning, start meeting regularly. The group will grow and you will definitely grow.

3. Choose a blog platform.
I suggest WordPress, though there are other platforms such as Blogger. As the group leader you may already have a lot of experience in this, though it’s not mandatory. Create some ‘best practices’ or recommendations for members that may be new to the world of blogging.

4. During every meeting dedicate time to write and create.
One of the most challenging parts of being a blogger can be creating the time to write. Let this be easy by setting aside time even if it’s just 15-20 minutes for members to write and plan blog posts.

A few weeks ago on Today’s Creative Blog (which I found through Zemanta), I found a link to this blog planning tool which I’ve integrated into my 2013 planning. Planning and scheduling posts will be the easiest way to stay on track.

5.  Create an online forum.
You can do it via a Facebook Group or a Google Group where members can connect with each other in between groups. The group can be used for members to share ideas, get feedback on posts in progress, and to support each other’s growth. As the group leader, in the beginning, it will help to create the energy of the group. Post your stuff, share cool resources and articles, encourage engagement.

6. Bring in speakers.
As the group grows, it may be fun to bring in experts on different topics, related to blogging or the groups’ interests. It will make the meetings that much more fun and provide members the opportunity to learn new skills and network.

7. Encourage cross-promotion.
In the early days of blogging gaining an audience and traffic is something that many are concerned about. Inside of a group you have the advantage of each other. Support one another and cross-promote each other’s work. It will help you provide value to your audience providing new resources and it increases the success of the overall group.

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The post 7 Blogging Steps to Community and Confidence Building appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

1. What is Valuable Content? The Key to Producing Valuable Content That Sticks.

The most popular post of the month discusses what exactly valuable content is. Sharon Tanton, Valuable Content, argues that “the key to producing valuable content is a deep understanding of your client and customer base”, and she gives a detailed explanation what this means.

2. How to Use Google Alerts for Content Marketing: Collect & Store Content Ideas

One of the most shared Zemanta posts on social media in January is an awesome step-by-step tutorial how to use Google Alerts for content marketing. Ann Smarty, Internet Marketing Ninjas, believes that Google Alerts “provides the most useful features you could hope for, and sets the hook for gathering data you can use to adapt your content”.

3.Blogger Outreach: Free eBook

Based on Zach Eberhart’s popular blog series, here’s a free eBook you can download now. It gives detailed tips on how to find, contact and develop relationships with other bloggers to improve your brand/blog. Highly recommended.

4. 8 Proven Sources for Your Blog Post Ideas, So You’re Never Out of Ideas

The title says it all. I give you 8 suggestions how to find ideas for your future posts. It seems that a lot of us find ourselves in a situation when we have no clue what to write about. We should avoid such as much as possible.

5. 10 European Content Marketing Blogs You Should Read

A list of great European content marketing blogs in English that you should follow to further broaden your horizons no matter where you are.

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The post 5 Most Popular Zemanta Posts from January You Should Read Too appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

This has happened to me before. A few times. Because I was so surprised of the “success” of that post, and in a way as an editor I shouldn’t be, I started to think and went back to see what posts seem to be the most popular and engaging. Not just on this blog.

I perused, observed, analyzed and then it dawned on me that I already know well what posts attract readers, what kind of posts are engaging, interesting, read, and shared. I should never be surprised again (though I will be). If I didn’t know how to write an interesting post, I probably wouldn’t be in this business.

To increase blog engagement, always check whether it satisfies the following 3 criteria:

1. Does it include a (personal) story?

Write about stuff you know well, you have experienced or you’re doing. The post I mentioned in the intro was based on my own personal observations and frustrations.

Always (as much as it’s possible) start with a personal story. Make your readers identify with you. You don’t need to always write in first person; you can ask your readers whether they’re familiar with a specific situation.

The best blog posts are those that start with a story. I remember how I wanted to change an intro to a post by Swizec and he asked me not to do it, “I don’t like those fluffy intros,” he wrote. And he was right. He attracted the attention of tens of thousands of readers by beginning the post with a personal story.

Think about it. What posts attract your attention the most, grab you and don’t let you leave until the very end? Yes, an author, topic, etc. are key variables too, but there’s something about the post based on a personal observation, experience, personal story, that your readers can identify with. It always works.

2. Are you transparent?

I’ll never forget Marcus Sheridan‘s presentation at Content Marketing World in Columbus, Ohio, when he told the audience of 1,000+, “You don’t have a secret sauce. So, why do you pretend to have it?” I’m familiar with his writing, so this part made me laugh out loud.

Whenever I talk to brands, I face their genuine fear that someone out there will steal their secrets. And I always reply, “So what?”

Indeed, what secrets? My alma mater “hides” full course descriptions because “other universities copied ours”. And I am like, “So what? Let them.”

Don’t hide, show.

Don’t be selfish, share.

Be transparent.

Be open.

Readers, your prospects/buyers, can detect when you’re not transparent.

3. Be conversational

Write like you talk. I love English for that. No matter what industry you’re coming from, write the way you talk. Writing blog posts is like giving advice or/and making a point. I came across strictly medical and even law-related blogs and they are written the way we all talk and understand.

Your goal is to be understood. You want to get your message across. You can’t do so with a cold, bureacratic-like language.

You may think I wrote nothing new.

You may think these criteria are self-explanatory.

They may be, however, my experience is that this has to be made clear. As many times as possible.

I faced so many organizations where people seriously believe the more “sophisticated” “cold” writing is, the better it is. Frustrated people from some of those brands approached me and told me that their bosses are afraid to allow any texts that are “too easy, too conversational”.

Excuse me?

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The post Increase Blog Engagement: 3 Universal Criteria Your Blog Posts Must Always Satisfy appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

The rapid pace of change within the consumer technology sector has left many marketers struggling to keep pace. With so many different devices and channels available, making sure you are sending out consistent messaging across all your channels and effectively managing information and associated rich media assets, such as photos and videos, for all of your products is one of the biggest challenges facing marketers today.

Now more than ever, brands and retailers, you need to think like publishers and explore your workflows, publishing tools and business models to deliver your content consistently to the right media channels at the right time… and for most these aren’t necessarily skills that come naturally.

Managing customer facing content has evolved into an extremely complex process, driven in no small part by the fact that consumer expectations have risen exponentially. We now all want to be able to see the same content and have the same level of experience and engagement whether we are viewing a website or webshop on a laptop, a tablet or a smart phone.

To be able to cope with this, retailers and brands need to have a fully integrated approach to their content marketing, which covers all the channels they operate in, and ensures their story is told not only in an interactive way, but also a consistent way.  Once an overall content strategy has been created – which will be very much determined by your business objectives – only then can you focus on individual platforms and look at distributing your content across all channels.

A key part of this process involves putting in place a detailed editorial plan to ensure that customers are taken on an engaging journey and that the right content is distributed across on the right channels. And, as stated above, you need to remember that this content isn’t just words, but also pictures, video, info graphics, content to share, competitions and even coupons.

So what’s all the fuss about?

Effectively managing multi-channel content is crucial to your business on two distinct levels:

• Done correctly, it is one of the most effective forms of marketing: firstly, because it is pull rather than push marketing; secondly, because it drives engagement and word of mouth; and, thirdly, because it takes customers on a real and seamless journey of discovery through your brand.
• On top of this, it is hugely cost and time efficient as it means you simply create the content once and then distribute it across all relevant channels rather than constantly being forced to re-invent the wheel. For example, a video shoot can also involve photography that can be used across digital, mobile and print, driving return on investment and ensuring you get the most value from your marketing activities.

So, how can marketers effectively handle multi-channel content?

Before you do anything, decide on your business objectives first, what is it that you want your content to achieve? Only then can you drill down to focus on the individual channels.

Furthermore, you need to remember that relevancy is critical; if your content isn’t relevant for any particular channel it will just get lost, or worse ignored.

Once you’ve made it that far, it’s about systems and people; making sure that your team understands how to manage, create and distribute content and that they have the technologies in place to manage this. Ultimately, effectively managing your content flow is also about process management.

For most businesses, the content they produce is for their customers, and the harsh reality is that if these people aren’t getting the information they need from your online systems, they will simply go somewhere else. As the competition for people’s attention becomes more fiercely contested online and people demand more of their online experience, so getting your content in order is becoming increasingly important to your business.

Related articles

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The post Multi-channel Content: Why You Need to Rise Quickly to the Challenge appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

We have recently surveyed 100 of our UK business contacts, and asked: “Which methods have motivated you to buy products and services over the last six months?”

• 92% mentioned ‘online research’
• 71% ‘recommendations from people we trust’
• 43% ‘social networks’.

Only 5% said they’d bought in response to direct mail and a measly 1% were motivated to buy after receiving a telemarketing call.

With Forbes reporting that 60% of the sales process is now conducted online before engaging a sales rep, does this herald the death of the sales person? Definitely not in our book. It just means a change in the way people sell.

Using valuable content to open doors and close business

Great content is at the heart of effective business development practice today. If you share valuable content on the web you will draw people to your business. Executed in the right way, this is also a highly effective outbound strategy. Proactive sales contact is not dead, if you do it right.

Being in sales is tough. Clients and customers are increasingly busy, cynical and over-sold to.

Here are a few ideas on how to use valuable content – on and off the web – to help you sell.

1. Build relationships with valuable content, not brochures.

So you want to do business with someone who has never heard of you before? Valuable content is the perfect conversation-starter. This is the type of information that flies under an organisation’s anti-marketing defences, because it is useful – to them. Sending an interesting, relevant article, whitepaper, or guide is far more engaging than sending a brochure at first contact. It shows you understand their issues, demonstrates your expertise and motivates people to talk to you.

2. Keep in touch the valuable way.

Not everyone will buy after the first sales meeting. Inertia, lack of time, other pressing priorities – there are many valid reasons why first meeting doesn’t lead to an immediate sale. Instead of increasingly desperate demands for a decision, keep the dialogue open. Send them something they will value: a link to pertinent industry news or research; an article or new case study; invite them to join your mailing list with newsletters that build trust and keep you front of mind. Valuable content makes the perfect sales follow up until they are ready to buy.

3. Get on social media.

Social networking sites such as Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook offer a new way to build and deepen relationships and find out more about your customers’ world. It’s the perfect place to distribute all that great content you’ve been creating. If your customers aren’t there now they soon will be. Join the conversation. Remember, this is a place to engage, not to sell.

4. Make sure your website is up to the job.

If you pack your website with valuable content you will attract more inbound enquiries. Lots of good content helps you get found on the web (Google ranks relevant content) and ensures people like and trust you when they get to your site. Adding a blog is an easy way to add valuable content and keep your website up-to-date. Ask the marketing department to create one for your firm.

5. Sales people make the perfect content creators.

You hear first hand the questions that prospects and customers ask about your industry, your company, your products or services. Create valuable collateral that answers their questions:

• FAQs on your website
• Articles on your blog
• Case studies in written or video format, written from the customer point of view
• A short e-book or guide that gives them tips to solve a pertinent problem

Both marketing and sales people at the coalface of customer communication have a role to play here. Creating valuable content together is a great opportunity to get the two departments working closely.

Valuable content is the kind of information that customers appreciate and will help you get the sales results you need. Use it to help you open doors, nurture those leads and close sales and you will build stronger relationships with clients and customers.

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The post How to Use Valuable Content to Win Business: 5 Major Tips for Sales People appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

A blogger outreach campaign is the process of developing relationships with bloggers to offer them something of value to their audience to improve your brand. As I showed in the Everything Blogger Outreach series, blogger outreach campaigns can be organized into a set of steps and processes.

Due to your feedback and inquiries, we made our very first eBook! Introducing: Blogger Outreach Campaign: A Guide – Developing relationship with other bloggers to improve your brand.

You’re welcome to download it, read it here or print it. And be sure to share with your friends, followers, and friends of followers. We’re positive it will help you develop great relationships with your peers and any bloggers you wish to reach out to.

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The post Blogger Outreach: Free Ebook appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

I was involved in quite a few great content marketing projects and I know a lot of even greater ones. But some of them have had a fatal flaw. They may be awesome, I mean, seriously complex and awesome projects, but they’re just that – strategies.

Content marketing should be integrated with other marketing and business projects of an organization, not an isolated island. It shouldn’t be about tool/mediums employed, but about producing, owning, and leveraging content.

Most importantly, it should be about education; teaching not only prospects/customers, but also everybody within the organization! That’s the ultimate recipe for success!

Case # 1: A big financial institution hired a content marketing agency to help them set up a content marketing strategy. The institution has a really bad reputation in public. Its new strategy was innovative and should bring great results and a lot more positive image of their services in public. Honestly, it was a jaw-dropping project.

The project, however, was supported more or less by only a few senior managers, executed by a small department in the company, and it was kept alive by only one branch in one city. On the other hand, nothing (significantly) has changed within the company as a whole; it still operates like the project never existed. Only a handful of employees know/live it.

The corporate culture hasn’t changed, the public image of the institution and their services keeps deteriorating. Moreover, customer service for the most part continues to suck!

So, there’s this huge amount of money that goes into this otherwise tremendous project, bringing abysmal results. Not because the project itself is flawed, but because it didn’t change anything within the organization.

“Content Marketing is owning, as opposed to renting media. It’s a marketing process to attract and retain customers by consistently creating and curating content in order to change or enhance a consumer behavior.” Joe Pulizzi, Content Marketing Institute

As Joe says, “In short, instead of pitching your products or services, you are delivering information that makes your buyer more intelligent. The essence of this content strategy is the belief that if we, as businesses, deliver consistent, ongoing valuable information to buyers, they ultimately reward us with their business and loyalty.”

I think we should update this definition (I’m not good at writing them). I’m not the first to think so, there are dozens of posts out there talking about how support for content marketing within the organization is crucial.

The above definition should be updated in a way that includes the following: content marketing goals should include changing/adapting the corporate culture and customer service. Everyone in the organization should be part of it, should live it, not just a few. What is the point in having a great, content rich website and/or blog and/or customer magazine and/or profiles on social media if your customer service continues to suck or be ignorant of your content marketing strategy?

Case #2: A telecommunications company produces a really good customer digital magazine. However, they haven’t changed their customer service a bit! So, what have they achieved with the mag exactly, save it being great and spending a lot of money on it?

Case #3: A retail company produces a great customer print magazine. But they have no clue how to leverage it; like learning more about their customers… Their case tells me they don’t know what their business goals are, or how to do business. They’ve recently changed their senior management and it seems like they don’t understand why they should continue publishing the mag. Their website, though “renewed”, is clinically dead. What a waste, right?

The examples above remind me of what I witness every week: “We want a blog!” “We are thinking of a magazine.” “We want a Facebook page.” “We want to redesign our magazine!”

It’s all about tools/media, rather than content. My next question is: “Why?” “What do you plan to do with it?” After we talk, they start to think differently.

It’s been said so many times, but it needs to be said so many more times: it’s not about tools, rather it’s about content and how you can leverage the content.

Content should become your asset! Internally and externally!

It may not happen overnight. As much as you need time to attract attention of your (prospects)/customers, the same applies to your employees/business partners.

My experience is that when I get invited by a company to help them build a content marketing strategy (usually I deal with small companies), I am listened to by their senior management, I get their almost unconditional support and we start working together. However, it takes time for the rest of the company to follow suit. Which is totally understandable. That’s why I also advocate a step-by-step strategy, not all-at-once strategy.

Related articles

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The post Why Your Entire Organization Should Live Your Content Marketing Strategy appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Do you think content marketing is the same as blogging, for example? (It’s not.) Does launching a content marketing strategy seem either too easy or too hard? (It shouldn’t.) The truth is, most companies today are still a little fuzzy on what exactly content marketing means.

So to help you clarify your understanding, here’s a look at four of the most common content marketing misunderstandings!

1. Content Marketing = Blogging
Think that if you’re blogging, you’ve got content marketing covered? Think again. While blogging may be a powerful part of a good content marketing strategy, it is not the only part. Good content marketing reaches far beyond regular posts and can include video tutorials, email newsletters, a free ebook series, Web articles, whitepapers, podcasts, and more.

So if content marketing is more than blogging, what is it?
Think of content marketing as an overarching term or category, under which all content-based marketing strategies fit. Simply put, content marketing is the creation and sharing of content for the purpose of turning prospects into repeat clients. It’s all about winning over the potential customer, moving him or her to a place of trust with your brand.

2. Creating Content Is Easy—We’ll Just Throw Something Together
Too many firms make the mistake of churning out ho-hum content in the name of content marketing. The problem? Empty content, overstuffed with keywords, does more than harm you in the eyes of search engines; it destroys your value in the minds of your audience. When readers don’t think what you’re offering is actually useful, you may as well skip writing it because it does you no good.

What defines valuable content online?
Recognizing value isn’t hard—think about what you respond to online. Do you want to read another stale Web article on marketing, or do you want to read the case study of a brand that increased sales by 55%? Then, take that same logic and apply it to your audience and its desires. Offer your audience information that is relevant, to-the-point, and specific—in their eyes.

For more ideas on what valuable content looks like, check out what other experts have had to say:

“Valuable content is supercharged content. It is content with a bigger purpose; useful information created for a particular audience; content that hits the mark. By valuable content we mean the words, knowledge and information you choose to shape and share for your clients and customers: content that educates, helps or inspires them. Content they appreciate.” Sonja Jefferson, Business Zone

“Writing valuable content really comes down to one thing. Knowing who you’re writing to and what they find valuable.” Meagan Visser, MeaganVisser.com

“By thinking strategically about what your readers will actually use and enjoy, you’ll be seen as a thought leader and a source of inspiration. Try relating the content to your business somewhat indirectly. If your business has something to do with food, for example, share delicious family recipes or special cocktails that your readers can try at home and get excited about.” Loren Ridinger, Loren’s World

“If you want to attract and engage your prospects and lead them down the sales funnel, you need to focus on them and their problems. The more you create content that helps your prospects succeed, the more engaged they’ll become with your blog.” Rich Brooks, Social Media Examiner

3. Creating Content Is Hard—We Have Nothing to Say
If your industry is highly technical, specialized, and confusing to the masses that doesn’t matter. You’re not trying to reach the masses with your content; you’re trying to reach the specific niche of people who buy what you sell. Those are the people that matter—don’t you have something that would be interesting to them?

How to Come Up with Content:
The good news is that coming up with topics in your niche is as easy as recognizing the topics that relate to what you do every day. If you’re a catering company, post recipes or links to food blogs. If you’re an accounting firm, provide tips for financial planning. Here are a few other tips for brainstorming ideas:

• Stick to your industry
• Think about questions your clients ask
• Think about topics relevant to your industry
• Try to demonstrate your own knowledge and skill in the field by providing valuable insight

4. Content Marketing Means Losing Money
For many companies, the concept of content marketing seems counterintuitive. If the essence of content marketing is giving away valuable content for free, doesn’t that mean fewer sales? When you give your prospects what they’re looking for, why should they buy it?

The truth is, content marketing is about giving away enough valuable content or information to win over your audience—to get them to buy in before they buy. When done well, it communicates a strong sense of your authority and value, making your products or services more worthy of attention and purchase.

Here are some examples:

• A writer building a blog audience to sell a book
• A plumber teaching free workshops to promote his services
• A grocery store publishing cooking tutorials that show fans how to use ingredients

In other words, content marketing is all about demonstrating your value rather than just talking about it—when you show your audience what you offer, they’ll be much more likely to become clients.

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The post 4 Common Misunderstandings About Content Marketing appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Feel that beat? Feel that pounding sensation that goes boom, boom, boom? That’s rhythm. It makes your body feel as if it should keep time. It’s a universal language that everyone understands. It can be heard and felt by anyone. It echoes its message in our thoughts and emotions. Timing is everything.

Rhythm in music and writing is an essential element to a successful song or blog. In a song, the rhythm is the backbone. It is often created by the percussive instruments, like drums and bass. It is the foundation on which everything else is built, and keeps it solid and steady.

Your blog is a foundation and your articles make your key notes, your highlights. To break it down further, each article has its own rhythm that evokes emotion, creates trust, and authority. They contain the heartbeats of your style, knowledge, and enthusiasm.

Here are 4 ways on how to write like a songwriter:

1. Add Rhythmic Flow
You, as a copywriter, create rhythm with your words. Just like a good songwriter, your words will echo in the heads of your readers, and they will recall what they felt when they read your work.

In writing, rhythm and slight repetition helps your writing sink into the consciousness of your readers. Notice, I say slight repetition. Don’t overdo it!

Have you ever had a set of song lyrics or music that gets stuck in your head? Your goal as a writer is to get a similar response to your writing. Imagine a bouncing ball over the lyrics to a song. For example: She loves me yeah, yeah, yeah…, She loves me yeah, yeah, yeah…, She loves me yeah, yeah, yeah… (The Beatles) compared to: Sell Your Crap… Pay Off Your Debt… Do What You Love! (Man vs. Debt). These are short examples, but both of these evoke a rhythmic emotion.

2. Reduce Sentence Length
Beware of long sentences when developing rhythm for your writing. Long sentences tend to lose strength and effectiveness the longer they get.

Imagine that punctuation is a set of instruments. Your periods are the beats of a drum and commas are the tinkle of a cymbal. Long sentences require commas and sprinkle your writing with tinkles. Short sentences give your writing that pound of a drum. The drum is what you’re aiming for, but not too steady.

Writing varies a bit from music and has its own type of rhythm. Sentences of the same length will bore your readers, so you want to have a mixture of length. The following is an example from one of my posts, it’s like poetry:
You’re frustrated, I know.
You work your ass off and there is no one visiting your blog.
You fire up your analytics to see the dismal numbers.
You want to close your virtual doors to the world.
You want to quit.
Why not? No one cares, no one visits, no one reads…

3. Leave Sentence Fragments
Sentence fragments are also very effective at creating rhythm. Leaving just a little out makes it sound conversational and rhythmic. This is the way most people talk. If you take a look at some popular copywriters or bloggers, you’ll see this conversational style throughout their work. It connects with the reader on a personal level. Big time. And that’s the secret to most of their success.

Let’s take a look at how to do this:

“Hey everybody! Just got this great idea. Ever heard of inbound marketing? Cool stuff. Drives traffic to your site like crazy.”

Conversational, short, fragmented, and exciting. Compare it to this:

“Inbound marketing is a modern technique for increasing web traffic to a website.”

Boring. I think I fell asleep writing it. Try it for yourself.

4. Rhythm Techniques
Want more rhythm to your writing? Start by reading your writing out loud. You’d be surprised to find some hidden flaws when hearing your own words. Compare this to some of your favorite authors. Does it have the same rhythm, or does it feel jagged and unpolished? Re-write and shorten, or lengthen some areas.

We all have an internal sense of rhythm. We just need to tap, tap, tap along and get it into words.

Related articles

• How Long Should My Sentences Be?
• The Effects of Music on the Brain
• Building Sentences Worksheets and Printables
• They Said What?! 3 Examples of Brands Having Fun with Words
• Fragmentary Sentences and Sentence Fragments

The post Do You Feel That Beat? How to Write Like a Songwriter appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

“When Zemanta moved into our own office in NYC, we were finally able to share our office with friends who needed a space for a day or two,” says Tin Dizdarevic, Head of Marketing at Zemanta. He continues, “In that same light, we decided to share the space more permanently with a blogger who is doing something interesting and particularly something good. So this month we are launching our resident blogger program. Every three months, we will bring in a new exciting blogger and let him/her use our office space so that they focus on creating awesome content.”

Who can apply for the program? Tin says that in order to be selected, the bloggers need to have a non-profit slant, either helping out a greater cause or spending their time covering and/or creating arts and documenting that in a blog.

Tiffany Crawford is happy to be the first ever Zemanta resident blogger. Tin explains how she came to Zemanta, “Tiffany was our neighbor in our previous office and we followed her progress with Venus Meets Isis program. It seemed a natural fit to invite her to be our inaugural resident blogger.”

Tiffany Crawford describes herself: “I am passionate. I am driven, committed, focused. I can be charming at times.  I am a Dancer.  I am highly Intuitive and very sensitive.” No wonder she’s Zemanta’s first resident blogger; she cares deeply about people, social issues, and has a deep gratitude for life.

“I am reading Deepak Chopra’s book The Soul of Leadership, which I’m basing our student leadership curricula off of.  The beginning has a life purpose exercise and I got clear that my purpose is to ignite,” she says.

Tiffany, you were quite successful in your twenties already. How did you cope with business success at such a young age?

I didn’t think much about it.  I’ve always felt rushed. To where? I don’t know, but I felt this pressure to achieve a lot in my twenties.  So I never saw it as a lot of success, just as more to achieve.

I did have a lot of fun.  I travelled a lot, and did pretty much whatever I wanted to. It was fun, a tad reckless in terms of building for my future. I chose not to buy a house, and in hindsight I probably could’ve made some great investments had I planned differently.

Can you tell us more about your background in engineering? How did you get drawn to it?

Hmm, engineering.  Yes  I did (EE) Electrical Engineering undergrad and then EECS (Electrical Engineering and Computer Science) in grad school.  My emphasis was Digital Signal Processing; I was interested, and still am, in the mind-heart connection. When applying, I figured the body is an electrochemical signaling system and was interested in researching the connection. Specifically how the research could help humans leverage our ‘vibration’ to create more joy, focus when desired, and decreased fear and worry.  HeartMath stuff.

It was fun, hard, and created great opportunities.  I’m happy I did it.  Sometimes I think of finishing my Ph.D.

Let’s move from strictly business to your Corporate Goddess blog. I’m glad I’ve been introduced to it. This may be such a male question, but why do you think women still need mags and blogs that address “their” issues?

I don’t necessarily think women “need magazines or blogs about “their” issues”.  I think we benefit from community, reminders, and others to relate to. Women, we love community and we love collaboration.  Inside of that I’m committed to creating a community of women and men that have a sense of grounding, connection, and inner knowing in everything we do.  I think this is sometimes lost in a busy world with lots of distractions.

I just want to be the reminder to say hey, “I know you have that proposal or that presentation. Know that you’re always taken care of; bring that into all you do and that will have you flourish.”

Do you remember what made you start this blog?

Yes, I was jogging one day, a few months after I did the LA marathon. I was working on a project with a client that was stressful. I thought about how I personally at times cut off my knowing, grounded-ness, and inner connection when in certain environments. I wanted to be able to bring this to the table and not shut down, especially the trusting, knowing part of me, when in environments that have traditionally been stressful and competitive. I wondered how could I bring that to these situations and have that inner peace, even then.

How did you come up with the name?

It just came to me.  It was somewhat of a dichotomy, the corporate tending to be very masculine, and the goddess being the divine feminine.  It represented seemingly competing concepts that actually serve each other. I was curious as to what it looked like, as women, to leverage our femininity in traditionally masculine environments.

I mean collaboration instead of competition, trust instead of angst, intuition and creativity coupled with strategy and planning.  It was a thought that stuck and never went away. It has been pervasive since, with refinements of course.  It’s definitely been an evolution.

What goals did you achieve with the blog? What’s in the future for this blog?

This year I hope to grow the community in size and level of connection. I want it to arrive at a place where women are connecting online and offline in real time. I want it to become a space women come to for inspiration and grounding in moments of stress or worry. A reminder to stay grounded in their inner power not a forced, draining one.

In terms of the future, I’m actually excited about what’s on the horizon. I’m interested in ways to leverage mobile as a media outlet that offers unique capabilities.

Why do you like blogging so much?

Interesting. I don’t see it solely as blogging as much as I see it as sharing and creating a community. I guess when you look at it, that’s what blogging is. It’s an opportunity to share you and be a source of other people sharing themselves and creating community.

That’s why I love it.  The opportunity to connect with others in a way I wouldn’t have otherwise, and to foster the connections of others.

Do you ever sleep?! I mean, blogging alone can be tiring: planning, creating, writing, communicating… How do you find energy and strength for everything?

That’s a great question.  It will be a topic of a blog series I am planning this year.

I’ll give you a tip I learned it grad school. As an EECS major especially in DSP (digital signal processing) there were always problem sets, and one could easily take 10+ hours.  This was in addition to research, meetings, coding (for research), being the events coordinator for Berkeley’s Graduate Assembly, leading an after-school project for 8th graders, and any fun on the side.

I was overwhelmed and flustered, and often pulled all nighters. Then a senior student in my lab told me, “You know your mind is always thinking about things and processing things even when you are not actively working on it. You should leverage it. That’s the only way I get things done.” I will never forget that moment, we were on a bus going up Hearst towards Cory Hall.

I leverage the power of the subconscious and essentially the Universe on a spiritual tip. I review things, I pose questions, then walk away from it; the answer, the right person, or situation then comes.

And passion truly drives it.  With passion and commitment to a purpose, the energy and strength are always present.  It’s like you’re carried.

Venus Meets Isis – it is a really awesome project. Can you tell us a bit more about it?

Venus Meets Isis (VXI) is something I dream about all of the time.  It’s constantly growing and evolving.  The mission is to create a pipeline of women (and people of color, though we’re currently focused on girls), who have a stake in media and technology. Two fields which are closely intertwined.

The core belief of VXI is that if girls are provided the access to technology in an empowering and relatable context, with the right mentors, it will ignite their inherent contribution and involvement in industries where they are underrepresented and often misrepresented.

Can you reveal any inspiring stories related to VXI?

We piloted our program last August. It’s been amazing seeing our young ladies blossom. I would say the most inspiring story for me was seeing 12 young ladies from three different boroughs and 8 different schools become a family over the course of one month.

By the end when I asked for highlights they loved everything they learned, and one young lady put it best. “We’ve created something special.  It’s like we’ve become a family.”

It’s been amazing the way they have supported and encouraged each other, sharing tips and tools. Eleven of our twelve girls are seniors this year, and have been busy applying to college. Just before Christmas, one who just confirmed admission and a full scholarship to her top choice sent me an email saying, “My next order of business includes the fact that we need a winter trip with the girls. Whether that is to a museum again, skating, or even to a dance class…”

One mom shared with me, “Ashley really found herself in her class. Even her teachers have commented. She’s more outspoken and speaks her mind. Before she didn’t know what she wanted to do, she would jump around. Now she’s so clear and I think she’s found her niche.”

So, you’re at Zemanta now? How did you get here?

That’s a good question.  Well I’ve been a fan of Zemanta for some time. I loved the concept of suggesting related articles and pics. It was something I spent lots of time doing; searching for pics especially. It instantly became one of my favorite tech tools and I wanted to meet you all.

Then, a couple of months later I noticed the Zemanta office was the floor above mine at We Work on Grand. A few months after that, I changed offices to We Work Labs on Varick. They were in there too. I decided to introduce myself and share some user feedback. I met Bostjan, Greg, and Tin that day. Then, through being in the space I met Kris and Patrick, as well.

When they moved to the new space over by Union Square, I came to a meet-up to say hi and learn the cool tips and tricks they always share. Tin and I started chatting about how Zemanta could be involved with Venus Meets Isis, we had a meeting, and here I am. I guess it was in the making for some time. First I was a floor below, then down the hall, now in the office

What do you expect from this experience?

I think you guys are super smart, innovative, and so far I love the company culture. It seems like a community environment is supported here. I love how everyone claps when they make a sale. A transparent, supportive, and encouraging environment is apparent. Even down to some of the quotes and sayings on the walls and the fact that the office listens to music that everyone chooses collectively on the main speaker.

In saying yes to Tin, in accepting the Blogger in Residence post, I was saying yes to being in the environment of a successful start up with funding, active users, and a great community. It’s something that I am creating and intend to lead myself, one day soon. I intend to soak it up and learn as much as I can.

In that case, my intention is not necessarily expectation, it is to learn as much as I can and make new friends.

What can Zemanta learn from you?

That’s funny because after sitting in here for a little over a month, I have some thoughts and comments. The way you do things is great, I just see opportunity. My business mind is always on, so from a strategy perspective I always see possibility. I may share with Greg at some point.

Beyond that, on a simpler level, which I think you guys may know; a bit of diversity in the office would bring great perspective and value to the company culture, various stakeholders, and sales.

If you are interested in helping Tiffany with mentoring the girls in the program, please reach out to her. 

Related articles

• Zemanta Power User – Alan Berkson of Intelligist Group
• Zemanta Content Recommendations Tools Now Integrated Into TypePad
• My interview on Zemanta’s blog
• Zemanta Power Users’ Tips from 2012
• Zemanta Power User – Erik Renko of Brands & Films

The post Launching Zemanta Resident Blogger Program: An Interview appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

BlueGlass

BlueGlass UK is a content marketing agency. Their blog focuses on broad content marketing issues, SEO and link building. You must check their latest infographic tantilizingly titled Content Marketing: Are You in the 62%?

Valuable Content

Valuable Content is a blog by new authors of a content marketing book Valuable Content Marketing. Don’t miss short, but clear content marketing posts. A reminder, their Sharon Tanton authored a Zemanta blog guest post last week. And more is coming from them.

The CMA

A blog by the Content Marketing Association is just a small part of this otherwise ultimate European source on content marketing. Their posts by content marketing professionals from the UK are for the most part thought-provoking and very engaging. Highly recommended.

Fusion Marketing Experience

A Belgian blog that focuses on social business, “defined as the adoption of social networking tools and protocols across the enterprise to connect employees, customers, suppliers, sales prospects and others in order to make better, faster decisions”. It is the next wave of business process improvement based on online technologies. Not to be missed.

Velocity Partners

This is a UK B2B marketing blog promising “a joyride through the mean streets of B2B”. I mean you’d be crazy to miss posts like Crap: the single biggest threat to B2B content marketing or B2B meets B2C: an obscene video (for adults only .

Ecoconsultancy

This is not only a Europe-based blog. But they went global only 2 years ago. This blog must be bookmarked by content marketers interested in the digital world. There’s no choice here. Check it out and you’ll know what I mean.

NewsReach Blog

A 2-part series on the importance of website speed is a reason enough to bookmark this UK content marketing blog. They don’t post daily, but when they do, it’s worthwhile.

Internet Marketing Jam

A blog about blogging by Jim Connolly. It’s like our own Copyblogger.

Content Works

A blog by a real European who’s been in content business for a few decades now. She’s lived and worked in Switzerland, France and the UK. So she has a lot to say. And we should listen.

Cedar

Cedar is a creative and commercial content agency with offices in the UK, China and South Africa. They’ve been creative for 40 years.  Hence, it would be ridiculous not to pay attention to what they have to say and share with the rest of us.

Related articles

• Why Your Content Marketing Mission Statement Should Be About Why, Not What or How
• Top 10 Tips About Content Marketing Storytelling From London
• No Doubt: Blogging Is Good for Business
• How Blogging Brings Me Clients and Paid Projects
• Oh Hi, Ohio! 6 Content Production Myths Dispelled

The post 10 European Content Marketing Blogs You Should Read appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Alan Berkson has been using Zemanta for more than a year and a half on his blog Intelligent Catalyst. He has more than two decades of entrepreneurial experience in helping businesses maximize value from their core strengths and aiding the creative process.

Alan describes himself as “an ADD strategist just trying to make sense of the world”. He has diverse, eclectic interests: “I have a computer science degree, but I minored in English, History, Political Science, and Education. Ok. I didn’t minor in ALL those, but it was close.” He graduated college looking for journalism jobs and accidentally took a job writing software for Wall Street. “Go figure,” he adds.

It shows in his digital footprint. “On any given day I could be discussing entertainment and pop culture or digital age sociology and their generational impact. You might also get business strategy, education – yes, we have a LOT of work to do there – or talk about my hapless Mets and Jets. The legion of doom,” Alan jokes.

What are you particularly interested in?
In influence. I am fascinated by the incredible impact of something that is difficult to measure. In an era of pervasive data and metrics I am curious to see how the influence measurement genre plays out. I even coined the term Influence Measurement Optimization™, because I know people will try to game the influence “scores” like Klout and Peerindex.

My current focus is on the challenges of content and brand in the 21st Century. The age of broadcast is over. The challenges organizations now face in a world of ever-increasing, often involuntary transparency require new strategies and new tools. Words like “story” and “narrative” are being used more often now to describe how brands need to communicate. I’m very interested in the developing strategies necessary to manage this chaotic, pervasive communications environment

Do you consider yourself a blogger?
Yes, I consider myself a blogger.

What makes someone a blogger?
Regardless of what business you’re in, or even if you’re not in business at all, you have something to say. You have conversations with colleagues, customers, and prospects — and even friends. A blogger is simply someone who writes these down.

What is your assessment of the blogosphere today?
The world we live in today is about content. While there is diverse content being created — video, images, etc — the written word will still remain powerful. The challenge for bloggers moving forward is raising the bar in how specific their blog content meets the needs of their intended audience. Bloggers who focus their content on SEO are missing the point. Start by expressing the conversations you’re having with your ecosystem.

What made you launch a blog?
I started blogging because I kept getting asked the same questions and wanted to quit repeating myself. There’s truth in that jest. I maintain that the value in creating content is not only getting people to consume it, but getting people to share it. I used my original content as follow up to conversations I’ve had, to reinforce the message, as I discuss in the my Zemanta guest post: Who’s Going To Read My Blog?

It’s evolved since then. Now, it’s more of a sounding board. It gives me a place to lay out my thoughts and observations on trends I see or issues I feel are important. Now it becomes as much a conversation starter as it is reinforcement for conversations I’ve already had.

What are your blog’s objectives and who is it targeted to?
My blog is how people vet me. If you really want to know about me, it’s in there. What I think is important. What I feel strongly about. I’m not really sure who reads it outside of those with whom I directly share it. I’m generally interested in the intersection of technology and communication, which is the subject of most of my content. It’s not a high volume blog, but I get great feedback on the posts, both in blog comments and, more often, on social platforms.

What is a good blog? How can we separate the wheat from the chaff?
That’s the big question, isn’t it? How do we vet good content on the web? I think the best blogs are the ones that make it easier for us to do that. If I read your blog and wonder if what you’re saying is true, whether you’re just trying to sell me something, or whether you have some ulterior motive, then you’ve failed.

How does Zemanta help you blog better/easier?
I really like the “In-Text Links” feature, useful for putting links to topics directly in the post. I also really like the My Sources. While I don’t always add the links to my posts it allows me to see what the sources I think are important are saying about my post topic.

Can you share a Zemanta tip?
One of my favorite aspects of Zemanta is it allows me to use my Flickr and Instagram accounts as sources in the Media Gallery for images for my posts. Now, when I’m out and about, I sometimes take photos just because I think it might be a cool image to use in a post some time. So when I’m writing the post, there they are!

Related articles

• Guest Blog Post: 3 Reasons YOU Are Not A Thought Leader
• Using Zemanta to Find the Most Blogged-About Topics in Your Niche: A Case Study
• Zemanta Power User – Michele Neylon of Blacknight
• Zemanta Power User: Allison Boyer of BlogWorld and Blog Zombies
• Zemanta Power User of The Week: Aram Zucker-Scharff of George Mason University and HackText

The post Zemanta Power User – Alan Berkson of Intelligist Group appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

After 2 years, New Media Expo, formerly known as BlogWorld, returned to Las Vegas. Over three days, several dozen speakers covered topics as straightforward as podcasting basics, intense debates on the future of publishing and the importance of social media engagement for brands, small and large.

It was great to catch up with some of our old friends and partners like Joe Pulizzi and Marla Schulman, and meet new friends – Bob Dunn and Jure Klepic. We’re excited to work with them in the upcoming months.

While the focus of the conference has shifted away from blogging, it still dominated the conference halls. The major tangent this year was continued push towards quantifying the value of new media and its disciplines.

Ted Rubin, the father of ‘Return on Relationship’, was there spreading his gospel. C.C. Chapman continued his quest for content creators to do better and work on content that makes a difference. Tamsen Webster hosted a session to show how any brand, online or offline, can take advantage of new media to proactively reach out to their users.

Just as much as there was pressure on marketing execs to provide proof of new media effectiveness for their organization before, the pressure will only get stronger. But a slew of tools and technologies will get better and make the task easier. There will be more effective ways to manage influencer outreach, there will be better tools to help create compelling content and there will be new and better channels to distribute amazing content.

And considering that NMX was held right before CES, Vegas was exploding in afterparty activities keeping everyone in great spirits and excited for 2013.

Related articles

• New Media Expo was extremely informative. #VegasTech is inspiring! Ebook coming soon! #nmx
• Combining SEO + Community to Create the Perfect Marriage
• Jay Baer on Content Marketing, Youtility and Why Inbound Marketing Just Isn’t Enough #NMX
• Kevin Price Reporting from NMX Live in Las Vegas

The post Can You Prove That New Media Are Effective? A Report from NMX 2013 appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

For the last six months, SmartSign has been using Zemanta to promote our images and build deep links to many of our websites. Our images have been recommended 181,643 times and 137 of those have yielded links. When it’s good, it’s good: one of our most successful images caused a 464% increase in traffic to its page. But other tactics flopped; whole categories of images we submitted failed to garner links and recommendations.

In the spirit of the New Year, we’re looking back over our efforts and recalibrating. What we’ve learned has been both nuanced and surprising. Ultimately, appraising images for a successful campaign is radically different from optimizing our written content.

Lessons Learned

Images are harder to sell to bloggers than content. The evidence is in our numbers; over the same amount of time, with identical budgets, we yielded 185 more links from our written content campaign. But that makes sense — as a blogger, more is at stake when you’re picking an image. Unlike a related article situated at the bottom of a page, images are often the first thing a reader will see, and are instrumental in an almost instantaneous calculation of relevance and interest in the post. In other words, if they don’t like the picture, they may not read the article.

Of all our promoted images, bloggers keep choosing the same ones again and again. Two, in particular, have soared above the rest (and we’ve indexed over a hundred) in terms of yielding links; in fact, over 50% of our total campaign links come from them. At first glance, these two images seemed bafflingly random. What about them generated recommendations, attracted bloggers, and scored links?

The first sign, “Reserved Parking for Employee of the Month,” has a Link Conversion Rate (LCR) of .13%, while the “Smile You’re Losing Weight” sign has an LCR of .14%. Both are nearly twice the average of our other images.

One catalyst for their success is what they are not: photographs. Of the 26 images that yielded links, only two were photographs. This realization put a wrench in our original strategy.We had initially submitted an array of antique 3M photographs that depict old signs, traffic, and American life. The images are interesting, original, unusual—and completely ignored.

Ultimately, we were approaching the campaign the wrong way. We had to think like bloggers, and (conveniently!) as the director of SmartSign.com’s and MyParkingSign‘s blogs, I am one.

The Use of Images

When I blog, I use an image for one of two purposes (this is reductive, of course): as evidence, or as an illustration. Chances are, if I need to prove a point by providing a corresponding image — what I’m calling evidence — I won’t take up Zemanta on its recommendation. I’ll have something more specific in mind. (Here is a picture of the bridge that I say needs repairs. Here is a portrait of my subject, King Tut.) However, I’m far more likely to use a Zemanta recommendation if I’m looking for an image after the fact. I didn’t have an image in mind, but the post is ready to publish, and I know I need one.

When I’m trying to illustrate, I have a few goals in mind:

• providing a visual summary of my topic
• making the post more attractive and engaging
• slowing down a potential viewer
• enriching the SEO content of my page

Essentially, “illustrative” images work like stock images, with the added benefit of a link. They summarize, decorate, and add SEO value.

Why Images Do Well

We believe that this is the reason our two images are doing so well: they’re perfectly illustrative. Take a look at them in action.

Nexercise is a site that champions exercise with an emphasis on achieving results through a healthy mentality. They use our “Smile You’re Losing Weight” sign to headline a post on safe weight loss. It’s the illustrative effect in action. Fitness and weight loss are popular blog genres, but the specific concept of the post isn’t easily captured by a visual. Our sign helps summarize this popular abstraction: weight loss motivation and reward.

Similarly, our “Reserved Parking” sign was featured on a post on a blog that follows the graduate job market, Career Geek. Here, the image illustrates its abstract subject: career development. This image is also used on Progressive Radio Network’s site. Interestingly, the post has no text — it houses only a podcast (about jobs for veterans) and our sign. Again, our images are working in an illustrative capacity: providing visual summary of an abstract concept in this popular blogosphere.

This realization stands in stark contrast to what we learned from our content campaign. When a blogger chooses to link to our content, it’s because we’re a trusted, authoritative, and relevant source for topics in our industry, such as OSHA, biking, signs, and distracted driving. On the other hand, when a blogger chooses one of our images, our trustworthiness or authority on their topic is moot. They just want an image that enhances their own post.

Optimizing our Zemanta Image Campaign

With all this in mind, we’re changing our strategy. First, we are cleaning out our indexed images, and deleting the ineffectual ones, like our 3M and antique photographs. And now, rather than offering bloggers images that are relevant to our industry niche, we’re looking at how we can help visually supplement globally popular blogging trends. Since an “employee” sign was effective, why not tap more into career bloggers with a sign that mentions “workers”? What about surveillance signs, for tapping into technology blogs? Moreover, we’re considering new signs just for our image campaign: perhaps “Breastfeeding Allowed” for parenting blogs, or, “Caution: Google Is Collecting Your Data” for privacy blogs. Until the recent Congressional deal, “Beware of the Fiscal Cliff” might be a useful play on words for trendy political writers.

Promoted images aren’t like related articles which help bloggers open up their writing space to a larger conversation. They’re core elements that help a blogger define and identify their space. An image on a blog is part of the fabric of that post. It makes sense, then, that to successfully promote our images, we need to consider a blogger’s psychology.

Related articles

• Using Zemanta to Find the Most Blogged-About Topics in Your Niche: A Case Study
• Zemanta Blog Wants You! Guest Blogging at Zemanta.
• Vote for Your Favorite Zemanta Image of 2012
• Why Zemanta and Google Get Along So Well
• Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Start a Blogger Outreach Campaign

The post Optimizing Zemanta Image Campaign by Thinking Like a Blogger: A Case Study appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

There is no way you have missed the revolution that is content marketing. More fashionable and as ubiquitous as a Leopard Print Onesie – content marketing is the strategy that everyone everywhere is wearing.

In 2012 more and more companies realised the value of creating and sharing unique content across the web as a way of attracting and converting new customers and building their businesses. Pages and pages of new copy, blogs, videos, infographics, and ebooks were produced every day. Some of it is brilliant – most of it isn’t, and it’s certainly not all getting the results its creators hoped for.

Let’s go back to basics. ‘Content’ is the words on the page you are reading. It’s the copy on your website, the blog you posted last night, the videos and images that you share. When we’re talking about content we just mean words, knowledge and information.

What lifts a piece of content beyond the ordinary is the value it has to the person reading it. The term we use is ‘valuable content’. Valuable content is supercharged content – words, knowledge and information shaped for a particular audience. It is content with a bigger purpose, useful information created for a niche; content that hits the mark.

To be valuable, content must have uniqueness at the client level, and it must be meaningful.

Charles H Green, author of The Trusted Advisor.

The key to producing valuable content is a deep understanding of your client and customer base.

• What do they genuinely care about?
• What questions are they asking?
• What answers can you give that will really help them?

To find the answers you need to talk, listen and engage; you can’t create a successful content market strategy in a vacuum. It’s a shift in focus. Forget the self promotion. If you want to create content that your people will value, you need to put them and their needs above you and your business. Our content marketing mantra is ‘Help, don’t Sell. Talk, don’t Yell. Show, don’t Tell.’

So what does valuable content look like?

Whether it’s a blog article, ebook, Tweet, newsletter or web page, valuable content always shares certain attributes.

Valuable content is:

• Helpful – It makes a difference, it answers a genuine question.
• Entertaining – Provokes a reaction. Smile, laugh, or think – people respond to it and want to share it.
• Authentic – Genuine and original. Written from the heart, it tells a story that people understand and respond to.
• Relevant-  It is rooted firmly in the client’s world, it makes perfect sense.
• Timely – it is sent out at the right time, it hits the audience when they are most receptive.

In any combination, these attributes form the kind of content that gets read, shared and acted upon. Businesses that really win exhibit all these qualities across the variety of content they put out there. They start from a point of deep understanding and a desire to help, and then they get creative.

Where do you start?

Get to know your clients better, put valuable content at the heart of your marketing, and this thoughtful, joined up approach will pay dividends.

It takes work and commitment – it’s not all simple, you’ll need to take some risks and probably make a few mistakes along the way. Being valuable is not something you can pay lip service to, or tackle half heartedly, but you can make it work. Marketing with valuable content gives you the most fantastic opportunity to build your business, starting right now. Why not seize it?

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The post What is Valuable Content? The Key to Producing Valuable Content That Sticks. appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

There are many tools out there that are recommended for this process, but I have always found Google Alerts to be the best. It provides the most useful features you could hope for, and sets the hook for gathering data you can use to adapt your content.

Here are some ways that you can use Google Alerts for content marketing.

Google Alerts: Basics
“Google Alerts” is a free Google’s tool that sends you email alerts of the latest relevant Google results based on your search terms.

There are 5 options to set up:

1. Your search term
This is where you’ll provide your search terms. Mind that you can get really creative here as it supports major advanced operators general Google search engine does. Learn Google operators here. Also get some creative ideas on how to use them here (download the cheatsheet as well.)

2. Result type
You can search through news, blogs, videos, discussions, books or everything. Since we are talking about content brainstorming here, “Everything” might be the best option here (to get varied results), but keep experimenting!

3. Update frequency
You can receive alerts daily, weekly or as it happens. Your choice depends on how often you need to brainstorm and create content.

4. Result quality and quantity
This is a vague option but I’ve had more luck with “Best results”. Again, this one is worth experimenting with.

5. Deliver to: email / RSS
Since I have trouble finding time to check my RSS feeds, I’ve had more luck with email updates. You can’t escape it when it comes straight to your inbox!

Mind that you’ll see the result preview each time you search, so you can experiment with various options and search queries a lot before creating an actual alert.

Content Brainstorming
There’s nothing more inspiring than a post idea coming straight to your inbox: You just scroll down the list of results, scan search snippets and done: You feel enlightened!

Here are a few tips for you to craft a great brainstorming Google alert email:

1. Monitor Questions In Your Niche
You are probably already using sites like Quora or Yahoo Answers to keep an eye on what people want to know in your niche. For those already well visible on the web, you might even be using it to watch out for any mentions of your brand. But there is a way to expand your focus and see what questions are being asked anywhere, especially since Google began running forum and message board results on a higher priority a few years ago.

Set an alert to find any questions that are asked around the web that are relevant to your niche. Then use the chance to give the answers to market your content.

Example: ["how to * blog" OR "why * blog"]

(* will be substituted by any phrase that happen to be found by Google: Great for random brainstorming!)

2. Monitor Trends
New brands, concepts and designs are frequent. Some are long lasting, and some are a flash in the pan that die out before they really gain a footing. Either way, you should be looking to base some of your content on what is trending, both as a major niche and a subgenre of your own. It is a quick way to give yourself a shot in the arm by focusing on a popular item sure to attract attention, but also a way of finding additional niches that might be beneficial to you in the future.

Generic search example: [~diets]

(~ will tell Google to search for all possible synonyms of [diets] like [eating], [nutrition], [food], etc, so you’ll see random relevant results in your niche)

More ideas focusing on “popular”:

• ["best of * health"]
• ["popular * movies"]
• ["social * trends"], etc

3. Monitor Your Favorite Author(s)
Mind that watching active and popular bloggers in your niche doesn’t mean you are going to copy them. Remember that we are talking about brainstorming! Write reply-type posts if they are asking a question (and link to them), argue and discuss (and link to them), expand upon some points they slightly mentioned (and link to them). Remember linking is still one of the best ways to build relationships. Next thing you know it, you’ll notice power bloggers you are linking to share and promote your articles!

While there’s no way to force Google to search by author inside Google Alerts, try this trick:

Example: ["danny sullivan" -intitle:"danny sullivan"]

(This will force the author name in the body of the article)

Going Advanced
Getting a weekly email full of cool content ideas is already an effective brainstorming tactic. But since you have already started playing, why not try a few advanced ideas.

1. Get organized and motivated
Here’s my personal trick. If I get an email update with some nice idea I feel like giving a try, I will not remove the email message or mark it as read until I write that article. That’s a cool “get things done” tactic: I want my Thunderbird inbox to be empty and I want that so much that I will force myself to write that article!

2. Turn your Gmail account into a content brainstorming dashboard
Gmail filters and advanced operators will help you any time you feel stuck.

• Are you too busy for regular email ideas but still need to brainstorm from time to time? Create a filter that will force emails from:googlealerts-noreply@google.com to bypass inbox while being collected in a separate folder. Whenever you need an idea, simply go and search that folder!
• Do you need additional motivation to go through alerts and write an article? Create a filter to star your Google Alerts automatically and only unstar those you are done with.

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The post How to Use Google Alerts for Content Marketing: Collect & Store Content Ideas appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

When we re-categorized posts on this blog, I, a historian, enjoyed going back through all the posts that have been published on Zemanta blog since 2007. I discovered very quickly that there are many posts that are still very much relevant, but are lost somewhere around page 52.

I mean, how many readers do you know who go through all the pages to find useful posts? We don’t even move beyond page 2 on Google.

Business blogs in particular, if done well and if popular, are an incredible information repository of eternal truths and tips. Most posts, in my opinion, are not relevant just for a day or two. And there’s so much content, even quality content that you surely can miss daily.

In addition, if your blog develops and improves over time, you will surely get new readers, most of whom aren’t likely to browse the history of your blog and read posts you may have written months or even years ago.

Last week, when we sent a year-end newsletter to more than 25,000 subscribers with links to 12 most popular posts of the year, I noticed that many of those top 12 posts of 2012 attracted new readers and were shared on social media or commented on after more than half a year after they had been published.

Therefore, reviving old posts is important to your blog’s success. Your blog has to give a sense of depth and credibility. When new visitors find that old but still relevant content, they might just click around to read more recent content and could become loyal visitors.

So, here are my 5 simple tips how to make sure your old blog posts don’t become lost somewhere deep on your blog:

1. Schedule sharing on social media well ahead
This is what Deana Goldasich of Well Planned Web does so well, I think. I noticed her tweets about a particular post are tweeted many times during a long period of time. She understands how we consume information on Twitter well. I see Twitter as a 24-hour news medium. The majority of Twitter users don’t follow Twitter 24/7. So you have to make sure that you reach as many people as possible by repeating a message not just during one day but let people know about it or remind them about it many times in the longer period of time (not just a week, or month, even a year later if it makes sense). I think the same applies to LinkedIn; Facebook seems to be different though.

Anyway, tools like Sprout Social and Tweetdeck make scheduling a lot easier.

2. Take advantage of a renewed interest
When looking at Google Analytics or following mentions on Google Alerts or Twitter, did you notice that someone just read an old post and thought it was still relevant enough to share it even if many months have passed since its publication? Take advantage of this renewed interest and share the post on social media again to reach new readers.

3. Include them in newsletters
If your newsletter is popular (or even if it’s not), it is perfect for letting your followers know about great old, but still relevant content. New subscribers, especially, will be grateful for letting them know about content they might have otherwise missed.

4. Publish a book
Compile your best and still relevant posts into an e-book available to readers of your blog, or business partners. If your blog is well planned ahead, you may even be able to write a book out of it. I think this should be done at the end of every year. There are even tools such as Blog Booker that  automatically make a pdf out of your blog in just a few minutes, although it doesn’t give you an option to choose what posts to include.

5. Publish a white paper
Get posts on a particular topic together into a how-to-do white paper. Make it easy to your readers to download it (You can expect our first white paper in the next two weeks!).

The point is to leverage your content as much as possible for as long as it’s relevant. This is good for you, your business and very nice to your regular readers and great to gain new loyal readers/customers.

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The post How to Revive Your Old, but Still Relevant Blog Posts appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Are you one of those who are expected to come up with ideas/proposals for marketing or for the blog (alone)? Are you a chief content officer at your organization, no matter how small or big it is? Are you your organisation’s blog editor? If yes, this post is for you.

We should constantly think well ahead. There’s no way to fight against this notion. That’s why there’s a lot of talk about editorial calendars. We believe in them as well. Very much. They really make your life and work so much easier.

But we’re only human, aren’t we? So the time may come when you feel you’re out of ideas, topics. It’s nothing to be ashamed of, it happens to all of us. Yes, there will be those who say, you simply can’t allow for that to happen, giving you all kinds of advice how to avoid it. But it can still happen. Sometimes the time just catches up with you. And one of those moments is the transition, such as a new year.

So, I’m not going to preach how to avoid such situations. Rather, I think especially today is the perfect day to remind myself and all of you where you can find ideas for your next posts and white papers and schedule them in your editorial calendars.

Here are 8 sources of future blog post ideas:

1. Anybody working at your organization
You’ll discover most blog ideas among the people you work with, especially among those who have direct contact with customers. Therefore, it’s your job to talk to them regularly, if you prefer have regular informal meetings. How you approach this, depends on how big your company is. In today’s global village there’s no excuse for no communication. If you can’t meet in person, you can talk via vox.io or Skype or email or any other app and social media. Listen carefully what they have to say about customers, their questions, about developments within the company… Everything is a great potential for the next blog post.

2. Read your organization’s documents
Any document that is not top secret is a fair game, whether it’s an annual report, marketing strategy, CEO’s letters to employees, etc. Scan them for potential great blog post ideas.

3. Read comments on your blog
All comments, including those what-a-great-post types, can be great source for your next blog post. Maybe there’s a topic that gets more comments than it’s usual for your blog. It means this topic stroke a chord with your audience. Do a follow-up of some sort. Also, write posts to address the concerns your readers leave in their comments.

4. Read comments on other blogs
Don’t pay attention only to comments on your blog. Read carefully comments on blogs in your niche. Take part in discussions and you’ll get additional ideas for your future posts.

5. Be active on social media
Social media are a tremendous source of ideas for potential blog posts; not only Twitter, or Facebook or even LinkedIn. Don’t ignore online social networks like Quora and Storify, even crazy videos on YouTube can spark ideas for your future posts.

6. Attend conferences
I learned this last year. Not all conferences are great, some are quite expensive. But, oh boy, are they a terrific source for your future posts. Just when you think you may have really run out of ideas, attending a conference gives you an unbelievable boost. It’s like all 5 sources above in one!

7. Be open-minded
Whatever the topic of your blog is, don’t focus on it too narrowly. Anything can inspire you. Think of analogies; how a problem from a different field that isn’t even closely related to yours can nevertheless be similar to what you’re writing about. For example, my post on sustainable blogging was inspired by articles I read on sustainable economy.

8.  Subscribe To E-Mail Newsletters
Subscribe to as many email newsletters in your niche as you can digest. You can get a great deal of valuable information, inspiration and quotes from these.

The rule, however, is to write down whatever you hear, observe, read… Write down immediately. An observation or a customer question/complaint, a fact may not evolve into a blog post idea or even into a blog post right away, but one day it may. And you’ll be ready.

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The post 8 Proven Sources for Your Blog Post Ideas, So You’re Never Out of Ideas appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

1. 5 Reasons Why You Should Consider Blogging

If you think that blogging is a think of the past, you couldn’t be more wrong. In the most popular post of the year on Zemanta blog, Bostjan Spetic, Zemanta CEO, shares his 5 main reasons why you should at least consider blogging if you’re not already doing it.

2. World Wide Wasteland

Swizec looks at the future of blogosphere and comes to the conslucion that Link Love is forever; he makes the case for related posts. Do you agree?

3. 5 Blogs You Can’t Live Without

In June, I shared my own personal Top 5 blogs on blogging – the blogs I check out daily. They’re the blogs I believe every serious blogger should subscribe to. It was my own personal opinion. Maybe I should do it again next June and see if it’s still the same Top 5?

4. Your Startup Needs a Dashboard

Swizec was impressed by 4 screens at the Zemanta office in Ljubljana that show “everything imaginable about the state of the system”. And he got an idea: how to make a dashboard of all your metrics. It’s surprisingly simple.

5. I Bet You Over-engineered Your Startup

Swizec says, “Simplify your architecture!” He explains why you should do it and how to approach this issue.

6. Why Founders Shouldn’t Be The Developers

Swizec in his latest post that is still trending online says, “Programming doesn’t require a lot of attention, it requires all of attention.” See it for yourself. He will make you think hard about the argument he gives in the headline. Some agree, some disagree, but no one is left cold by this post.

7. 5 Steps You Need to Follow to Snap out of Your Perfectionist State and Be More Productive

Oh boy, I really like number 5, don’t I? This was a self-therapeutical post that obviously stroke a chord with many. Honestly, it really helped me. I’m not “saved” yet, but I am on my way to a full “recovery”.

8. The Uncanny Valley of Web Scraping

Swizec explains what web scraping is and where and how to find help with it.

9. 3 Rules for Updating Your Blog More Often

According to Bostjan, “we should stop obsessing about quality to the detriment of rarely making ourselves write”. He shares 3 rules to follow to update your blog regularly:

• Don’t overthink
• Don’t overcommit yourself
• Guest blogging

10. So You Want to Offer a Public API…

Swizec gives advice how to properly offer an API.

11. 8 100-year-old Tips for Writing about Controversial Topics

Even two months after being posted, this guest post by Brad Shorr, Director of Content & Social Media at Straight North, is still one of the most read posts on this blog (based on daily stats). It’s about G.K. Chesterton, a leading journalist of the early 20th century. Via his quotes Brad shows how bloggers should approach controversial issues to promote debate rather than stifle it. Check it out!

12. RSS Will Never Die

According to Swizec, “this was supposed to be a post about translating a URL into a [good] RSS feed. After reading The War on RSS and some of the passionate debate it kicked off on HackerNews I decided to write something else. In short: RSS will never die.”

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The post 12 Most Trending Zemanta Posts from 2012 appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

“When doing journalistic work I often find additional sources, ways to enhance an article or leads for a new article by looking in the related content links. That area of Zemanta has always been hugely helpful to me. In addition, I just found out that I can use the WordPress Zemanta plugin to assign featured images for posts, which is going to be a huge time-saver in the future.” Aram Zucker-Scharff, HackText

“Use Zemanta from day one. It will save you time and energy. And if you are curious enough it will give you suggestions for the existing blog post and sometimes even ideas for future ones.” Erik Renko, Brands & Films

“I run my primary blog on WordPress, and Zemanta helps me connect with relevant content that works to make the content I’m working on more complete. I also run a creational sustainable blog on Tumblr. It works well for SEO purposes and to help me tap into the huge community in Tumblr made up of other curationists. On Tumblr, Zemanta’s tag suggestion tool is fantastic for getting your content aligned with the right audience. It’s amazing how many users of tumblr are in the dark about their system of tags and how to use them advantageously.

So, offer up your content. The more places your stuff has a chance to show up, the better chance you have of gaining a brand new audience. IF the brightest future of blogging is because of the community, then be a part of the community.” David Pennington, Bend and Brew

“Oh my! Zemanta is great. I don’t have to think about tags, keywords, or inline text links. Zemanta does the work for me. Having the Zemanta window within my blogging platform means I can stay on that page without toggling back and forth to find what I need for my blog post. Gotta love order and simplicity! Also, Zemanta lets me be in control of related content. I can choose to reference my own previously published post or someone else’s.

Looking for more images and not sure what to search for or use to complement your post? Take a hint from Zemanta’s suggested inline text links. Works for me. In one of my posts, I didn’t think to add a certain image until I saw the inline text link.” Jamie aka Model Me Girl

“Helping me from the very beginning was Zemanta. In seconds their program is linking similar topics and images to my current article. In doing so my readers stay longer on our blog. Having the Zemanta program installed on my site gives me a second set of hands. Over the years Zemanta has saved me so much time it is unbelievable.” Bill Cleary, CNBNews

“As I write, I keep a keen eye on the right hand side of my screen, because another source for proving what I’m writing about might pop up. Also, images are there, if I need one, and I sometimes do. I mostly like to buy my photography, if I don’t have my own images; my third point of reference is always Zemanta. Finally, being able to cite other stories that related to my own is valuable. The addition of small snapshot images in my further “Related Articles” from Zemanta is a feature I’ve been really enjoying, too. As my site has evolved and become content rich, so has Zemanta. I’ve enjoyed the relationship a lot.

So, keep a keen eye toward the right hand side of your screen as you write your stories. It will enrich your blog’s content; offering you handy images and additional proof that you’re onto something valuable. Simply hovering over their text offerings, and you might find solid evidence to back up your own theories or explanations.” Jo Diaz, Wine Blog

“I’m impressed with suggested images and related articles! I have no more problems with image rights and I don’t search around anymore to find appropriate photos. It’s all here in one place within WordPress. I also like related articles that offer a greater context for certain blog posts and access to others’ opinions on a related topic. All the tools Zemanta provides are helpful and can make your (blogging) life easier and more carefree.” Jure Doler, Fieldoo

“Zemanta helps me get linked to things relevant to what I am writing about. It’s very easy to link and also to include pictures etc. I remember originally, I used to go search for relevant images to put into my blog post but after I started using Zemanta, all that was a breeze. I also like Zemanta’s related articles feature; it provides some additional information to what I write about.

I always try to ensure the links provided by Zemanta refer to the context of what I am writing about. I know that it is easy to use, but it is the blogger’s responsibility to make sure that the links provided by Zemanta are in the right context for the blog post. I always try to include pictures and related news or other blogs as part of every post. The only power tip is make sure you have the Zemanta plugin for the blogging platform set up right so it does what it was originally intended to do.” Bala Kamallakharan, Startup Iceland

“Zemanta increases my options when it comes to illustrations to break up the text in posts. It suggests articles that link into the content I produce. I like the way it offers links to relevant websites and articles, bringing new layers of depth to my posts. If the first scan doesn’t pick up what you’re looking for, use the search facility, entering the key word(s) you need to illustrate and you’ll get a lot more choice.” Stuart Aken

“My Zemanta tip is to use the in-text links. I’ve noticed a difference in traffic since including them in my posts. The tags for WordPress and using the related posts round out the three main things I use on Zemanta that optimize my blog.” Coral Russell, Alchemyofscrawl

“Zemanta saves me time by giving me access to images and articles for which I would otherwise have to search. Zemanta tells me what I need to do to use a picture and it saves readers time with the related articles feature. The guys at Zemanta are always working to improve everything they do.  If you go to Blog World at BEA you should stop by their booth to learn more. Otherwise my advice is:

• If you see something like Cannot find editor just retry.
• Make sure your own blogs are followed for access to your own previous posts.
• If you are on Blogger and change  a picture’s size you can also change the size of its envelope in HTML mode. There are two width numbers and they should match.
• Make sure your Amazon affiliation is registered so that when a picture of a book cover says it is from Amazon you can use it as a buy link.” Stephanie, Fangs Wands & Fairy Dust

“Zemanta will increase your search engine presence; look at my 20+ sites that are getting well over 1.5 million hits a month.” Robert Richardson, eComTechnology

“We find that if we use a standard methodology for titling materials, that we can use Zemanta to create specially targeted lists of links. All that is required is a string-format for the beginning of the title, either a document number or date. When you create a new post with that style of title, Zemanta will auto suggest other posts from the same category and style, helping you create more targeted lists.” Lucas Whitefield Hixson, Enformable

“Become an Amazon affiliate. Zemanta works very well with Amazon and allows you to link to products which in term may help blogs generate revenue. Also, make sure to add your own site to the sources section so you can link to other content on you blog/site.” Richard Butler, My Take Radio

“Zemanta both saves me time by effortlessly making images and related content available to me and enhances my own content with the resources provided. It’s intuitive, and takes most of the work out of adding interest to my blog posts. When I find an image I wish to use, I right-click rather than left-click it, which gives me the freedom to then scroll through my work and choose the most appropriate place to paste it. Also, I adjust image size after I insert it into a post by clicking back into the image and adjusting the size percentage, so it doesn’t overwhelm the text.” Stephanie Bernaba, Momma Be Thy Name

“Take the time to setup your Zemanta account and fill out the preferences as completely as possible. By setting up your own profile you can improve the relevancy of the service’s suggestions while also saving yourself time.” Michele Neylon, Blacknight

Related articles

• Vote for Your Favorite Zemanta Image of 2012
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The post Zemanta Power Users’ Tips from 2012 appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

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The post Happy Holidays from Zemanta appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Romina Kavcic, Zemanta Product Designer and the illustrator of all Zemanta blog posts’ original images, was aksed to choose her favorite 10.

We ask YOU to tell us which of these 10 is your favorite. Just write a number of your favorite image in the comments below and if you can tell us why you like it the most.

At the end of next week we’ll let you know what your favorite image of the year is and explain thoroughly the power of images with regard to blogging.

Ho ho ho… As our gift to you during this holiday season – copy any image of the 10 images here and use it as you want (the only rule is to not crop it in any way).

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Related articles

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The post Vote for Your Favorite Zemanta Image of 2012 appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Nobody needs to tell us that content marketing is the current “it” thing—right now, it’s the marketing strategy as hot as skinny jeans, iPhones, and going gluten-free. It’s followed closely by blogging—Or, wait, aren’t content marketing and blogging the same thing? If you’ve got a blog, don’t you have content marketing covered?

In a word, no.

How Content Marketing and Blogging Differ

From their basic definitions to their goals, content marketing and blogging are different and unique. Here’s how.

Definitions
Let’s start with the basics. What exactly do we mean by the terms “content marketing” and “blogging”? What are they?

Simply put, content marketing is creating and sharing valuable, relevant content with prospects for the purpose of turning them into customers and regular buyers. Look at mega-grocer Whole Foods as an example. On the front page of their website, you see repeated invitations to how-to guides, recipes, blog articles, and more.

Blogging, on the other hand, is posting regular content to a specific site where it’s displayed on a chronological basis, from most recent to oldest. As part of its content marketing plan, Whole Foods keeps a blog featuring posts relevant to the time of year, seasonal promotions, tips, etc.

Purposes
What’s the point of content marketing? Why do people blog? Are the goals the same?

Whether you’re a writer looking for a book deal down the line or a company trying to boost sales today, the purpose of content marketing is getting your target audience to know, like, and trust you enough to want to buy from you. Your end game is turning prospects into loyal customers.

The purpose(s) for blogging vary dramatically. People may blog to promote a business, to establish authority, to find online community, none of those things, or all of those things. Sometimes, companies blog as part of their content marketing strategy—giving out shareable content that draws users back to their sites.

How Content Marketing and Blogging Overlap

Content marketing and blogging are not the same, but they are related. Think of content marketing as an umbrella term for all the marketing tactics that involve creating and sharing valuable content for a clearly defined purpose—this, of course, may include blogging, just as it may include video tutorials, email newsletters, and various other tools. Content marketing is all about distributing quality content that generates a specific response, and blogging can be a great way to do that.

What Content Marketing and Blogging Offer You

With careful planning and execution, content marketing and blogging can offer significant benefits. Take a look at these examples:

3 Main Benefits from Quality Content Marketing
What will a solid content marketing strategy achieve for your business? Does it really work? The answer is yes: Content marketing can provide real benefits. Here’s proof of just some of those rewards:

1. A stronger fan base
With its social newsroom website Virgin Mobile Live, Virgin Mobile has seen huge traffic—we’re talking over a million unique views each month, with 50,000+ fans on Facebook and Twitter and counting.

2. Brand credibility
When Intuit purchased Mint.com, the company decided to make “content marketing the core of its marketing efforts,” says Evergreen Search. “[B]rand credibility was earned because of its content, and they focused on creating shareable content that lit up social networking and social bookmarking websites.”

3. Greater Authority
Credit card giant American Express has become a thought leader in the business space through its OpenForum.com, a site filled with tools for small businesses (many of which tie to Amex products). Through the site’s engaging content, American Express is more than a place to get a credit card; it’s also a resource for information—one that business owners have become more likely to trust.

3 Main Benefits of Using Blogging in Your Content Marketing Plan
There’s no question content marketing is a useful tool, but how does blogging fit into its model? Why would a company want to include blogging in its content marketing strategy? Here are some of the benefits:

1.Broader Customer Reach
New Jersey-based specialty cake company Pink Cake Box started blogging as a way to differentiate itself from competitors. In time, though, it saw results like better SEO and traffic: “Our approach helped attract links from hobbyists that led to increased search engine visibility and ultimately more customers.”

2. New Leads
B2B brand Louis E. Page, a mesh and fencing distributor, incorporated a marketing strategy involving a blog—and saw an 850% increase in sales as a result.

3. Greater Website Traffic
Hinda Incentives, an incentive company focused on sales rewards and employee recognition, started blogging and saw valuable traffic increase by about 15 percent right away—what’s more, that traffic translated to as much as “a few hundred thousand dollars in sales opportunities” in one week.

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• Why Zemanta and Google Get Along So Well
• Oh Bye, Ohio: Top 10 Blogging Lessons from Content Marketing World 2012
• Why Your Content Marketing Mission Statement Should Be About Why, Not What or How
• Oh Hi, Ohio! Blogging Is One of the Most Used Content Marketing Tactics
• Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Start a Blogger Outreach Campaign

The post The Difference Between Content Marketing and Blogging appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

“Bloggers will realize that mobile traffic on their blogs is equally important as the Web, but that it behaves differently.” Bostjan Spetic, CEO

“Apple will buy Twitter or Foursquare. Curiosity will keep going. EU and euro too.” Andraz Tori, CTO

“I have just five words for 2013: up and to the right!” Gasper Koren, COO

“2013 is the year big brands and highly regulated industries embrace content marketing. Brands have been hesitant to become publishers for fear of negatively harming their brand image. This mindset will change, legal departments will cut the red tape, and we’ll see more brands become pubs.” Greg Gortz, VP Sales

“2013 will be an amazing year for Zemanta on all fronts! New products, new staff, new frontiers and opportunities and best of all another fun year with the whole Zemanta crew.” Tin Dizdarevic, Head of Marketing

“2013 will be the year of the happiest clients ever.” Patrick Reynolds, Sales Account Manager

“2013 is going to be the year of content marketing! To win in SEO, sites will embrace link earning, and stop focusing on link building.” Stephanie Diec, Sales Director

“In 2013, the mobile revolution will finally bring the Internet to the majority of human population. I expect some major breakthroughs coming from countries not traditionally at the forefront of technology. Especially Africa is quickly becoming the cradle of new ideas.” Dusan Omercevic, VP Engineering

“Zemanta ‘My Sources’ will be on steroids enabling users to access all their articles they’ve ever written. It sounds easy but it’s actually a huge technical undertaking. We will also live up to the promise and bring the full potential of Link Love to our users, improving your blogging impact by driving more users to your site. And last but not least, expect a gallery full of images that are not only related but also stunningly beautiful.” Gasper Setinc, Head of Backend Engineering

“To be perfectly honest, I didn’t do this kind of work before, but then again, it’s exactly what I’ve been doing all my life: listening to people’s wishes, complaints, confused inquiries, troubles, traumas (yes!), dragging information out of them, consulting with my coworkers, looking for viable solutions, pointing out problems, solving technical troubleshooting, video calling and solving a problem once in a while. Sure I think my work is personal — after all, for most of us blogging isn’t just a hobby. It’s more than that! And that’s what I always have to strive for. And yes — with pleasure!” Silvo Katalenic, Head of Support

“Assuming that there’s no bug in my pragmatic digital tarot cards application, based on randomly applied machine learning techniques to almost randomly selected data from completely randomly chosen research papers, I’d say we’ll survive the End of the world and we’ll possibly face outbursts of triskaidekaphobia, which can positively affect our business, because people will stay inside and blog out of boredom or fear or both and use Zemanta products extensively.

On a more serious note, I wish there’s no bug in my tarot cards application. Everything else depends on us, on our reacting to changes and challenges fast and good enough.”  Mateja Verlic, Head of Research

“Zemanta will become leaner and more efficient while growing even faster than in the past year. And the past year was really fast and very lean. Next year I expect to see some of our products grow and expand tremendously; others will have to be humanly euthanized. It’s a cycle of product life. We might change a lot in the next year, but we’ll always remain cute and handsome link love pimps that our bloggers know and love. ” Jure Vizintin, Product Manager

“The world unfortunately does not end. Cats are still incredibly popular being the lowest common denominator in the world so aggressively individualized. Most of our daily chores are done on mobile devices—at home. Dreams are the only place where multitasking yields interesting results. People develop allergies to types of content following a burst of thousands of “gluten-free content” experts. Designers are still underpaid. We gain weight. Fridges still have Twitter streams. It’s even harder to read on your phone while talking to relatives.” Rok Pregelj, Product Manager

“Next year will be orange, Zemanta orange. We, at Zemanta are lucky enough to be part of changes in the content world. Stay tuned, because we will link all the missing pieces together in one hell of an orange product. Be ready!” Romina Kavcic, Product Designer

“2013 is going to be the year Big Brands get it! Zemanta needs to be on the top of mind when these companies think about content distribution and blogger outreach. 2013 is the year of more meetings, more demos, and more sales. 2013 will be the year of six figure deals! Zemanta is going to grow technologically, to be able to provide better analytics and forecasting to clients. Zemanta will be able to fill more budgets and give great insight into how content shapes brand authority. 2013 is going to be the year Zemanta kills it!!!” Jason Bhatti, Sales Director

“I think 2013 will bring better customer service for our partners as a direct result of having a stronger grasp of the blogosphere. I think that the tools that we’re building now are strongly positioning us to know more about the blogosphere than anybody else, and as a result we’ll be able to deliver more to our partners than ever before, and at the same time offer better and more relevant content to our end-users. Additionally, a good portion of 2012 was spent hedging our bets from a product standpoint, so I think that the fruits of those labors will be seen in Zemanta’s offering in 2013. Packaged together with our existing products, Zemanta should move to the center of the blogging experience, in that if you’re not blogging with Zemanta, you’re doing it wrong. Happy and healthy, upward and onward.” Sam Sandberg, Software Engineer

“History will mark 2013 as the year that global culture followed the art world into a post-internet existence. Those that adopted technology early will be the first to treat the Internet with some disregard and use it for strict utility. No longer enthralled by its ubiquity, and celebrating it for being a thing, they will hide it in banal applications.” Kris Smith, Software Engineer

“Zemanta will be a must have asset for content marketing in 2013!” Tomaz Kovacic, Software Engineer

“What is my prediction for 2013? Well, what I would like to predict is also what I wish it would happen – I want 2013 to be totally awesome! But to wish, is to know… And I know that next year will be totally awesome! Actually it is not about wishing something, it’s about recognizing what you know you are at this very moment. So I wish to all people out there, be happy in the now! Happy New Year!” Miha Miklic, Software Engineer

Related articles

• Zemanta Blog Wants You! Guest Blogging at Zemanta.
• 50 Most Memorable Blogging Tips from Zemanta in 2012
• Why Zemanta and Google Get Along So Well
• Using Zemanta to Find the Most Blogged-About Topics in Your Niche: A Case Study
• Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Start a Blogger Outreach Campaign

The post What We’re Looking Forward to in 2013 appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Zemanta editorial provides marketers at large- and mid-sized B2B and B2C organizations, bloggers, individual or corporate, entrepreneurs, programmers and PR professionals from around the world with the insight, tools, and advice they need to blog better, easier and faster as well as help them work better and bring business results for themselves and their companies.

Why you should be Zemanta guest blogger
Zemanta blog has more than 40,000 unique views per month.

In the last 12 months, the monthly pageviews have increased by more than 400%. Our readers come from virtually all parts of the world. Think how many people, who may not know you yet, you can reach in the biggest cities around the world.

Besides, more than 25,000 people from all the world are subscribed to Zemanta weekly newsletter that also features the latest blog posts on Zemanta blog.

Topics we’re looking for

• Content Marketing
• Blogging
• Link Building
• Blogosphere
• SEO
• Social Media
• Web Coding
• Startups
• Analytics
• Research
• Data
• Marketing
• PR

If you’re interested in guest blogging at Zemanta, here are some basic instructions.

A post should be created in a how-to, or case study format.

A post can be thought-provoking – thinking or theorizing about a particular content marketing, programming, technological or blogging question.

A post can be a real anecdote that can serve as a teachable moment.

Promotion and Social Media Distribution
Zemanta will promote all posts via Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and other relevant social platforms. All authors are encouraged to promote their posts through their own networks, as well.

There is no monetary compensation for guest bloggers.

What to Send with Your Article Submission
Your bio: Bio should be up to 60 words and should include your Twitter and LinkedIn handle, as well as any other relevant links you wish to display (e.g., your blog; Facebook Page; website URL, etc.).

Your headshot: We use a site called Gravatar to manage our author’s headshots. New contributors should create an account there and upload a headshot. Once this is done, we’ll need the email address that was used to register the account, so we can associate your headshot with the author profile we will use in your posts. Make sure your headshot is G-rated.

Any images you want to include in your post should be royalty-free or you hold the copyright. If the image requires creator credit, please provide the necessary sourcing information, so that we can be sure to attribute it properly.

We’re looking forward to featuring more great posts and authors. Don’t miss this opportunity.

Related articles

• Why Zemanta and Google Get Along So Well
• What Kind of Blogger Are You? 7 Different Blogger Types Explained.
• 50 Most Memorable Blogging Tips from Zemanta in 2012
• Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Start a Blogger Outreach Campaign
• Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Pitch to Bloggers

The post Zemanta Blog Wants You! Guest Blogging at Zemanta. appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

The True Size of the Web

A few months ago, I wrote a post on my personal blog, investigating the true size of the Web. It attracted a lot of attention. I finally got around to do a follow-up, painting a bit more precise picture of how the web is used.

In the post (linked above) I presented the dataset and the findings based on the analysis of first 45% of worldwide traffic. We used a simple and straightforward taxonomy of 7 categories that seems to encompass well all the intentions any user of the Web has when visiting the site in question.

Here are new findings based on further analysis of 43% of traffic, bringing us to a total of 88.3% of all web traffic analyzed.

Top 515 websites generate 45% of all web traffic. To reach 88% we looked at another million websites. Since it’s practically impossible to classify one million sites, we had to resort to sampling.

Sampling

First, let’s look at the high level distribution of traffic, i.e. how many sites it takes to fill each subsequent 5% of the total global monthly pageviews:

To make the question manageable, we sampled up to and beyond 65% differently:

• #1-#515 – all sites were classified;
• #515-#12,000 – 100 sites at a time were classified at exponential breakpoints of 1200-1300, 3000-3100, 6000-6100, 12000-12100;
• beyond site #25,000 – only every 1000th site was included in the analysis.

The proposed taxonomy was found to be pretty much satisfactory, ‘unknown’ sites mainly consisting of non categorized not in English sites. This could be improved by spending more time investigating their true nature, possibly by using Google Translate. Otherwise we had no problems classifying sites into the mentioned 7 categories, and added one more, fun:

1. Search: e.g. Google, YouTube, Flickr… – the key activity is search for information;
2. Social: e.g. Facebook, Match.com, Stack Overflow… – the key activity is socialize with other members;
3. Media: e.g. NY Times, WordPress.com… – the key activity is content consumption;
4. Reference: e.g. Wikipedia, Microsoft.com… – the key activity is access data;
5. E-commerce: e.g. Amazon, eBay… – the key activity is purchase products and services;
6. Utility: e.g. Gmail, Zoho, Photobucket… – the key activity is use the online services;
7. Fun: e.g. Zynga, xxx… – the key activity is have fun and kill time.

Picture: Classification results.

Table: Raw traffic data.

Table: Average traffic by site.

Interesting notes

• As we suspected, search is extremely overrepresented at the top, and the vast majority of those pageviews belong to Google.
• Reference pages grow significantly towards the bottom of the Web, similarly e-commerce.
• Social is only really present at the top.
• Media pageviews per site are incredibly consistent across the Web.

Caveats

• To make this more reliable, someone would have to go trough thousands of ‘unknown’ sites, and categorize them manually.
• Alexa dataset is probably increasingly unreliable deeper into long tail. This means that individual sites might have misreported traffic, or are even missing from the list, because they are not accessed by Alexa users. The word on the street is that Alexa is skewed towards US traffic patterns.
• Fun feels underrepresented. It might be that Alexa filters out problematic sites.

The promised map

Our analysis shows there are two World Wide Webs: 60 per cent utility web (search, utility, e-commerce, reference) and 30 per cent consumption web (social, media fun).

To get to a full map of the Web, we need some more information. For now, we have only relied on the data about the top million websites published by Alexa, and the traffic published by Wikipedia. Based on this data, we can estimate that the largest single web destination today, Facebook, accounts for nearly 150 billion pageviews.

We need another boundary, an estimate for total number of websites. Based on Netcraft we can assume that number shall be 644,275,754 or to simplify, there are nearly 650 million websites on the web. Other sources cite down to 200 million. In any case, a lot.

Therefore, the map of web traffic isn’t the same as the map of the web. It speaks of web demand, rather than web content supply. So our next step will be to examine the latter and explore how many websites are out there by types and such.

Related articles

• Why Zemanta and Google Get Along So Well
• Report: Mobile Now Over 16 Percent Of Total Web Traffic
• Tumblr boasts nearly 170 million monthly visitors
• iPad is king of mobile web traffic, plus more intriguing data from OnSwipe
• Tumblr is now the 9th most popular site in the U.S.

The post The True Size of the Web appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Ha! What a silly notion! The whole point I’m doing this is so I get to hack on interesting technologies all day, learn a bunch of sexy new tools and get to work on something I care about.

Startups are often built using the latest and greatest technologies. A while back it was PHP in favour of static HTML, then Python in favour of PHP. Lately it’s been Ruby on Rails or node.js in favour of Python … in the future, who knows. I hear Scala is becoming very popular.

It seems, then, that a lot of technical founders start with the same romantic notions of coding freedom as I did. Seeking coding nirvana – that wistful notion of being your own boss, setting your own deadlines, choosing your own technologies. Solving only important or at least fun problems.

Reality for a founder is a bit different. Far from coding nirvana, it makes being a good programmer nearly impossible.

Mind share

• A founder must be pitching 50% of the time.
• A founder must keep the lights on.
• A founder must do customer development.
• A founder must tend to company vision.
• A founder must keep tabs on their industry.
• A founder must take responsibility.
• A founder is often _the_ customer support.

There’s a lot going on in a startup and because there’s nobody else to take care of it all, these things fall on the shoulders of founders. All of them take a lot of attention, if not time.

Programming is hard.

There’s no getting around that, no matter how good a programmer you are, no matter how experienced, it’s just hard. Programming doesn’t require a lot of attention, it requires all of attention.

After all, you’re dealing with vague ideas. Ideas that are hard to remember. Ideas that interact in delicate ways. Ideas you have to keep in your mind all at once.

The entire system must fit in your mind at least on some level of abstraction – you can’t code if you forget what a function does, or forget what your data looks like, or which file something is in…

Programming takes a lot of concentration. Period.

Have you ever tried concentrating when your mind was full of Important Stuff(tm)?

It doesn’t quite work, does it? You want to focus, you want to get real work done. Just that there’s this giant pink elephant in the room. It’s staring you right in the eye. No matter how hard you look the other way it won’t leave you alone.

In the end, after hours, you are left with no real work done and a giant pink elephant. Except now he’s taken a dump as well. Sure, you could take care of the elephant first, but then you aren’t producing any code. Sometimes for months.

There’s a reason why a lot of products stop dead in their tracks while the founders raise the first round.

Time
Another thing programming requires is time. Plenty of it. Long, uninterrupted chunks of time.

Four hours is a good chunk to start with. Plenty of time to load everything into your brain, get in flow for an hour or two, then wind down before your next thing. There’s even enough time for a break or two to make sure you don’t go mad.

Two hours… yeah, that’s okay. If you’re using the pomodoro technique and have found a way to get in flow five minutes after the clock starts ticking – then two hours is perfect. Marvelous even! Otherwise it can be a bit short.

An hour… well maybe you can fix a quick bug or two. But you won’t get anything hard done.

Half an hour… laughable.

Now, as the founder of a startup, one of the people in charge of keeping the place running, perhaps managing a coworker or two… How often do you think you will get four hours of pure uninterrupted time? With no meetings, no skype calls, no urgent emails, no servers crashing, nobody asking a question?

You will be extremely lucky to get two.

And remember, those two hours are useless if there’s something on your mind. An important meeting right after the two hours? Right before the two hours? Forget about it, you’re not getting anything done.

Solutions?
A good question. I don’t have a real solution.

Your best bet is conceding you are no longer at your most valuable as a programmer. Spend 30% of your time or less in the code just to maintain a feel for everything. Mess about with some light bugs when you have the time, otherwise leave it to your rockstars.

That doesn’t really work for fresh startups. The ones that can’t afford to hire programmers yet.

Then you must have a team of cofounders big enough so you can have one person worrying about things. The technical founder must be as free as a bird.

Do whatever it takes to get your mind off of things, meditate, partake in violent sports, go on long walks, anything that lets you focus on the code instead of worrying about the proverbial farm you’re betting.

Hire more programmers as soon as possible. Shield them from Real World Concerns(tm) at all cost.

Other than that… I hear some people can be founders during the day, programmers during the night. This leads straight to burnout and madness, you can’t do it for long.

Good luck.

Related articles

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• The plight of the non-technical founder: How to earn a hacker of your own
• I am a terrible programmer

The post Why Founders Shouldn’t Be The Developers appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Concluding Your Blogger Outreach Campaign

We are now over a month into the series and by now you should have gotten a few responses from your targeted bloggers. Although that is definitely worth celebrating, we are not done yet. There are still several things that should be done to properly assess the effectiveness of your campaign and to ensure that you keep the new relationships with the bloggers going.

First off, if the blogger has already published the article then it is important to stay engaged with the post. Respond to any appropriate comments, track the post’s performance, and engage with it on all channels that it was promoted. Not only does this ensure that the post gets the maximum amount of reach, but it shows the readers and the bloggers that you truly care about it’s success—something that shouldn’t be too far from the truth considering the amount of work that you have put in thus far. This also allows you to have some control over the conversation and gives you a chance to further promote yourself.

After the dust has settled, you must do something very important. You must follow up with the blogger and thank them. Though this may go without saying for many of you, it is a vital part of blogger outreach that some do forget. It doesn’t matter if they angrily rejected your post or happily accepted it, you should thank them either way—especially if its the latter. Of course if they did accept it, it would also be beneficial to lay down the groundwork for a continued relationship so that the next time you have something that would be perfect on their blog, they are only an email (or phone call or tweet) away. And depending on how well you develop the relationship, there is the potential to create a brand ambassador, one that will be excited to share any news about your awesome brand at the drop of a hat.

Assessing Your Campaign’s Success

Now that the post has been published, you have engaged with it throughout the peak of it’s digital life, and you have properly followed up with the blogger, it is time to see how successful your campaign was. Though this is completely dependent on the goals that you set in the beginning of your campaign, there are some key metrics that are worth identifying for every post and the campaign as a whole that can act as a benchmark for all future campaigns.

For this, I would suggest beginning another spreadsheet that you will use to track the success metrics of this and all future blogger outreach campaigns.

For the campaign as a whole:

• The percentage of bloggers that responded to your pitch.
• The percentage of bloggers that actually published something for you.
• The amount of bloggers that you didn’t pitch to that reacted to the story.
• The total potential reach.
• The amount of links that you received to your site
• Other relevant qualitative factors like whether or not the bloggers you thought were most likely to publish your pitch actually did.

For the individual blog posts:

• The amount of comments the post received and the general sentiment.
• The amount of shares that the post received on all utilized social channels.
• The amount of traffic you received due to the post.
• Other on-site engagement metrics of the referred traffic.

These are just a few of the basic things that you can track to judge the effectiveness of your campaign. Also, don’t forget to factor in the amount of traffic or social shares that the individual blogs normally get individual blog posts. You don’t want to write off a particular blog because they didn’t do as well as one that gets ten times the traffic.

You also want to be sure to analyze all your data and see if you can identify trends. Did a pitch fail miserably with some types of bloggers where it passed with flying colors for others? See if you can figure out why. Did your story resonate particularly well within a certain niche where there was practically no engagement in another? Find out the reason for it. If you are really perplexed, try asking the blogger why they rejected it, chances are they will happy to provide you with some constructive criticism. As with most things, it takes practice and with time hopefully you can understand what works well with certain bloggers, niches and audiences—ultimately allowing you to deliver the most value to each type of blogger.

And that is it! You are officially done your blogger outreach campaign (or at least you have all of the information to begin a successful one). As a final note, it is important to remember that the success of your campaign depends a lot on how much value you can provide to the blogger and their audience because in the end, that’s really what the blogger cares about. If you can tell a good story that is creative, original and valuable to the target audience, then what blogger wouldn’t accept that kind of pitch? Also, if you decided to begin an outreach campaign because of this series, I would love to hear about how it turned out and if any of the advice provided worked particularly well. And as always, if you have any additional advice, tips, or criticisms concerning this particular post I would love to hear about it in the comments.

Related articles

• Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Start a Blogger Outreach Campaign
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• Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Pitch to Bloggers
• Why Zemanta and Google Get Along So Well

The post Everything Blogger Outreach: Concluding Your Blogger Outreach Campaign appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

On the heels of new partnership with our friends at Curata, we’re super excited to also welcome InboundWriter to our circle of partners. Zemanta’s API is proving to be an invaluable piece of the puzzle in the content marketing environment.

Recently, folks at InboundWriter completed their integration of Zemanta’s API into their enterprise version of the tool. With the addition of Zemanta, InboundWriter’s users can insert images that best match the content and keywords that they are focusing on in the blog post.

Tin Dizdarevic, head of marketing, Zemanta, said, “We are thrilled that we’ve been able to work closely with the fantastic team at InboundWriter, as they have grown into a very valuable tool for content creators. We’re looking forward to our partnership as the two leading solutions for content marketing professionals.”

InboundWriter is a one-of-a-kind content optimization application for writers and online marketers. It lets you create and manage all your content securely within the comfort of your workflow and from the freedom of any browser, with real-time access to search and social media intelligence about your target audience. InboundWriter’s Enterprise software offering is designed specifically for prolific content producers in order to help enterprises take the guesswork out of online content optimization and improve the performance at scale.

With their recent integration announcement, InboundWriter has been able to pick up some great press for the announcement in eWeek, CMSWire and EContent.

For more information on the InboundWriter’s enterprise edition, please visit their website.

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• Zemanta Related Posts coming to Typepad

The post InboundWriter Joins the Pack appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

But however different we all are, we also have some similarities as bloggers. Most research on bloggers focus just on the blog’s content or the blogger’s interest.

We tried to go a bit further. Beside connecting our bloggers based on their blogging interests, we wanted to understand and connect the similarities between their blogging styles and their attitudes towards blogging.

7 different blogger types:

We’ve identified seven different types of bloggers based on what they write about and how they do it. Personas are interconnected; just about one third of all bloggers fit in a single persona, others most often switch between at least two.

I blog about life in general and its enjoyments.

Hedonists promote different lifestyles to enrich people’s daily routines. They are emotional and are not afraid to express feelings or reach out to others.

Tags: food, travel, sex, shopping, life, entertainment

I’m fascinated by new technologies and its applications to various personal and professional fields.

Techies don’t get much satisfaction from the writing process, but enjoy spreading their word, sharing knowledge and educating.

Tags: IT, gaming

Blogging is part of my job. 

Professionals present accomplishments and seek feedback from their followers. For them, blogging is all about making connections.

Tags: corporate, consultants, belletristics, copywriters

I comment on current topics in a certain field.

Preachers enjoy sharing content and interacting. They are all about studying content, presenting key viewpoints and opening a platform for further discussion.

Tags: politics, religion, culture, news, activism

I give instructions to followers (readers) on how to make life better.

Life improvers share know-how, give support and instruct people how to improve their life.
Tags: DIY, sports, health, psychology

I’m interested in everything beautiful and always on the hunt for aesthetic objects.

Beauty hunters create or promote beautiful things, educate others and exchange opinions.
Tags: art & design, fashion, beauty, photography

I’m blogging about my experience with life’s tasks.

Life stagers are focused on life task situations, such as parenting, student life, marriage, senior life, etc. They are focused on emotional benefits of blogging. They search for help or they want to share their experience and make someone else’s life easier.

Tags: mommy, student, senior… topics

Comparison of types

Some bloggers are more rational, others more emotional. Also they differ in the process of creating content – some are thinkers (studying concepts, collecting knowledge), others are doers – those who prefer to collect experiences and write about them.

Our conclusions are based on the preliminary research survey What kind of blogger are you? The results are based on responses of 200 bloggers who used Zemanta in May 2012. We are now running an extended survey on a bigger sample and soon we’ll present you some interesting findings.

Thanks to all our bloggers who’ve taken part. Special thanks for all the comments and product improvement suggestions. We are taking it seriously. Also, if you get a chance, please check out our latest plugin Zemanta Related Posts.

The post What Kind of Blogger Are You? 7 Different Blogger Types Explained. appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

According to Jeff Bullas, three million new blogs come online every month. Add to that the NetCraft estimate of 644 million current websites and you can see the magnitude of a blogger’s challenge. Time and attention are scarce resources in our warp-speed world.

How can your blog stand out in this enormous and growing, attention-challenged, fast-paced universe?

Today’s “on the go” world challenges us to know our customers better than ever. When it comes to blogging, this is essential. Your readers are your customers and to keep your audience, you need to give them what they want: content that engages them. Audiences have an overabundance of choice.

To be effective, it is paramount that your blogging:

• Reaches the right people.
• Engages them.
• Sustains their interest and interaction.

Here are 4 tenets to help ensure your blog accomplishes these three goals. These principles are a version of what I call Precision Marketing – using relevance to improve customer engagement.

1. Know Your Audience 
You are blogging for a reason. You want to reach a specific audience and engage them in conversation. You want to become a thought leader and, to quote the hugely successful Copyblogger, a “likable and trusted expert”. Everything revolved around your target audience, understanding them, respecting their needs, preferences and individualism. In order to find your audience and then build a long-term relationship with your readers, learn what audience wants through relentlessly listening on-line. By setting up your “listening posts”, you will know which type of content is most compelling to your audience and how and when to adjust your content.

2. Create Contagious Content
Contagious content happens when you leverage what you know about your audiences’ needs (thus dynamic listening is a forever-thing). Your content should show that you know your readers well by providing tailored content to them. To build long-term, sustainable, trustworthy relationships, you must constantly provide your audience what they want through clear, compelling and highly relevant posts. In addition to targeted writing and content curation, there are a bevy of experts, related content, expert links, headline techniques, etc. which can help you consistently create contagious content.

3. Integrate to Resonate
Your blog posts may take on (hopefully will take on) a life of their own once posted. They will be magnified across social media channels, websites and shared by advocates and detractors alike. Integrate your content. By connecting to relevant and related content and expertise, you can magnify your voice and your reach. Utilizing germane links, expert voices, connected content, videos, infographics, etc. can greatly enhance your content. Smart blog marketers are connectors and integrators who share and give voice and recognition to others. As a result, they harness the powerful avenues of social media and mobile communication.

4. Keep Learning
The Internet provides immediate feedback. Iterative learning. Actionable insights. Consumers who are bombarded with irrelevant information are likely to avoid – or worse, publicly discredit — the companies/individuals doing the bombarding. As important as it is to be persistent with your blogging, it’s wise to avoid the risk of overloading readers with excessive and irrelevant information for the sake of volume. Quality trumps quantity. And quality is relevance. Use your online tools to measure the impact, reaction, open rates of your blog content so that you can get smarter and smarter over time. Consumers have virtually limitless choices and a diminishing amount of trust and confidence. You must make every blog post count.

Blogs today are immensely powerful tools for engagement. Consumers will tell you and the world what they like and what they don’t. Listen attentively, deliver tailored content and integrate your content. You can then measure, learn and repeat, getting smarter and sharper each time. Start with these four principles and you are headed in the right direction to stand up and stand out in today’s vast blogosphere.

Related articles

• Why Zemanta and Google Get Along So Well
• 50 Most Memorable Blogging Tips from Zemanta in 2012
• 5 Other Tactics to Increase the Flow of Traffic to Your Blog: Introduction
• 3 Brands that Are Expanding Their Online Content Publishing Expertise
• 4 Big Reasons Why Your Company Should Set up an Internal Blog

The post 4 Tips for Building a Top-Notch Blog Using Precision Marketing appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

How to Pitch to Bloggers

If you have been with us the entire time, then you should be about a month into your blogger outreach campaign. You should have a well organized media list with all of the bloggers that you have chose to reach out to, along with the bloggers contact information. In this media list, you should also have the progress that you have made with each of these bloggers in terms of the relationship you are trying to build with them. And if think you are ready to finally reach out to the bloggers with your pitch (or whatever else you wish to collaborate with them on), you should have the confidence that the relationship you have been trying to build with them is a solid one and you feel like proceeding will lead to a success. If you believe that all of these things have been successfully completed, feel free to continue.

Considering that this is the make-it-or-break-it moment after weeks of hard work, we put a lot of thought into how to organize this blog post. And after careful planning and consideration, we have come to the conclusion that when pitching to bloggers there are some things that you should always try to do, and some things that you should never to do. With that being said, I felt that would be the best way to organize this blog post as well. And although I didn’t want this to be a typical best practices post, I have a feeling that is what it is going to become and frankly, that may be the best way to organize this information.

So, without further adieu, what you should always do when pitching to bloggers:

1. Know how they want to be pitched. I have mentioned this a few times so you may already have this information in your media list. Otherwise, you may have to do a little digging on their site. If you can’t find any mention of this, go with email, that usually garners the best results.
2. Make it personal. Remember that you are pitching to another person, a person that wants to feel like a real person. So, greet them with their name, you don’t want them to think that they are just one more person in a thousand blogger email blast. In fact, that is one of the worst things to happen as the blogger will most likely shut down at that point. BlueGlass suggests reading the pitch aloud after it is finished. If it doesn’t sound genuine to you after that, chances are the blogger will feel the same way.
3. Be honest & transparent. Don’t even try to lie to the blogger. Really, just don’t do it. It won’t work. If you are part of an agency, let them know. If you are a marketing/PR professional for a brand, let them know. Or if you are just another blogger or owner of a website, let them know. Even if the blogger doesn’t realize you aren’t who you say you are at first, they eventually will. Additionally, remember that ideally this will be the beginning of a relationship that lasts longer than a single blog post or feature.
4. Have a simple and to-the-point subject line. A simple subject line that doesn’t sound sales-y and gets to the point is best here. One article, The Anatomy of the Perfect Pitch, even goes as far as saying that the best subject line is as as simple as “Pitch: _____.”
5. Begin (and end) politely. What would turn the blogger off quicker than a pitch that sounds templated and impersonal? A pitch that is polite, aggressive and arrogant. It doesn’t matter if you are pitching to TechCrunch or a small blog with less than a thousand uniques a month, treat them all with equal respect and it will pay in dividends.
6. Try to Micromarket as much as possible. Yes, we have already mentioned this a few times, but it is one of (if not the most) the most important things. Try and make the pitches as personal and customized for that specific blogger as possible. This is very important and anything that sounds remotely templated will be put in the trash quicker than I-don’t-even-know-what.
7. Remember to deliver value. Keep in mind that when pitching the blogger, it is not about you, it is about them. They are trying to be successful as well and chances are they care deeply about their blog. That means that they aren’t going to want to engage in anything that is not mutually beneficial. You must be able to explain why what you are pitching is going to help their blog, deliver value to their readers, and make it a more awesome place to be on the web. If your content does especially well on social networks, providing the blogger with some social proof be a great thing to do here.
8. Exhibit readership. If you have been reading the previous posts (and following the points made in them) then you have been actively reading the blogger’s work. You know what they have written recently, you know what they like to write about, and you probably have some kind of opinion on their work. This is awesome. Let them know about it. Bloggers love to hear that what they are writing isn’t just published and then lost in the noise of the vast interwebs.
9. Make it easy for the blogger. The last thing a blogger wants to do is a lot of work for no reason. Remember that you are asking them to do something for you in your pitch. So make it easy for them! Provide them with any relevant links or articles or information that you mention and they might need. You might also want to consider providing them with something to share. Not only is this making it easier for the blogger, but you are also taking further steps to ensure that what you providing will create and deliver value.
10. Be real. Though this is the last point I am making, it is certainly not the least important. As I mentioned before, it is very important to remain polite and it is also important to act professional. But that doesn’t mean that you can’t show a little personality. Not only will this help with sounding genuine, but it will help to differentiate you from the crowd, make a lasting impression, and prove that you aren’t some boring robot cranking out outreach emails. And yes, I realize that may be redundant but I feel that point should be reiterated.

And those are all of things that you should always try to do when pitching to the blogger. Yes, I realize that the list is lengthy and that it may be difficult to do all of those things without coming off as overly loquacious, but the ability to be concise is an art and may take a bit of practice before you begin to feel comfortable and see real results. And if that wasn’t enough, there is still one more part to this blog post, the things that you should try to never do when pitching to a blogger.

So, without even further adieu, what you should try to never do when pitching to bloggers:

1. Begin with yourself. This is converse of point number seven above. You should never begin the pitch with yourself. Don’t begin listing the goals that you have and how what you are asking of them will help your brand. Chances are the blogger doesn’t care or has heard the same ol’ song and dance from a dozen other PRs earlier in the week.
2. Be arrogant. Sounding arrogant and acting entitled is a huge turn off for bloggers receiving the pitch. They are in the position of power and it is their blog that you want coverage on. If you sound entitled and assume that they will want to share your content, chances are they won’t.
3. Sound desperate. This is another good tip that we got from BlueGlass. You want to try to refrain from listing all of the possible ways that you could collaborate with them and how any publicity would help exponentially. Though you may be able collaborate with them in several different ways and it may be an incredible boost to your business, try and remain focused and under control.
4. Have attachments. Okay so before you jump to conclusions about how this slightly contradicts point number nine realize that one, this is speaking more towards first contact with the blogger and two, there are other ways of giving the blogger something to share without using attachments. If you really must do it, use some links—but do so sparingly, overzealousness will not work in your favor.
5. Be overexuberant. Though this should go without saying, the point still must be made. Any pitches that could be described as overexuberant most likely sound to sales-y, which is something that you don’t want to do if you wish to sound genuine. That means that you should leave out the exclamation marks!!!, WORDS IN ALL CAPS, and the ~ overly cre8ive ~ subject lines.

I realize many of the points that are in the never category are common sense, but you would be surprised how many people forget them. With the advent of new SEO practices, there is a lot of talk that focuses on writing for your readers rather than only focusing on optimizing for search engines. Well the same applies here. Put yourself in the bloggers shoes. What would it take for you to actually take the pitch seriously and respond to it? Of course there are always going to be bloggers who shut down even the most trenchant inquiries, but for the most part, most welcome new opportunities.

Many of these best practices focus on putting the blogger first and delivering value. And that is the way it should be. If there is nothing in it for them, then why would they respond? Also remember that ideally, this is the beginning of a relationship that will be mutually beneficial for (hopefully) an extended period of time. So treat it that way. If you approach this digital relationship the same way that you would and in-person relationship, I’m positive that you will receive better results than you would otherwise.

That is all for this part. I hope you enjoyed it and gained something from it. And of course, best of luck in reaching out to your chosen bloggers. As always, be sure to stop by next week for the next part in the series. I promise it will be just as awesome as the others! Oh, and if you have any feedback, criticisms or any other additional insights they are more than welcome in the comment section below.

Related articles

• Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Start a Blogger Outreach Campaign
• Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Develop Relationships With Bloggers
• Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Find Blogger Contact Information
• Pitching Bloggers vs. ‘Traditional’ Media: Four Things You Should Know
• Why Zemanta and Google Get Along So Well

The post Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Pitch to Bloggers appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

50 of the Best Blogging Tips from 2012:

1. Time on blog and pages per visit increase when you start using images.
2. Linking out to relevant content you cite or quote on your blog is a great way to get noticed by those sources and build an audience.
3. Reblogging adds more value and brings more credibility to you and your blog than retweeting.
4. Every business blog should have a conversion plan.
5. Blogging helps archive information you will sooner or later need again.
6. Blogging is a perfect opportunity to polish your storytelling skills.
7. There’s a direct correlation between blog post frequency and new customers acquired.
8. Bloggers are an indispensable source of boundless information.
9. Give easyXDM (Cross-Domain Messaging) a try.
10. Spice up your blog with multimedia.
11. Blogging beats advertising as highest ROI for online marketing.
12. Deep links help boost domain authority and improve SEO.
13. Deep links breathe life into older content that may otherwise be forgotten.
14. Longer posts are more likely to convert readers into your believers, evangelists.
15. A blog should be a multi-party conversation.
16. There’s nothing worse than a blog without an opinion.
17. At least from time to time stop doing what everyone else is doing.
18. Blog is like an ecosystem; know it well and it will have a long prosperous life.
19. Bloggers must know their community really well; they must fall in love with their readers.
20. A great blog comment starts with a point made by the author and expands on it, challenges it, or applies it to a different situation.
21. Authors and commenters frequently ask questions, hoping that someone in the community has a reliable answer. This is a great opportunity for you to showcase your skills.
22. In content marketing you can’t really be successful if you don’t plan ahead, define your goals.
23. Images make things sexier.
24. Pay attention to comments left on your blog.
25. Make sure the information from your blog is distributed online and offline as much as possible.
26. Realize that not all your posts will be popular, praised and shared.
27. Shorten the time you’d otherwise have for dreaming about the perfect post.
28. The audience, your readers make you a blogger.
29. Make an editorial calendar to help you plan content.
30. Regularly observe how your blog is consumed and adapt accordingly.
31. Quality comments continue/contribute to a conversation.
32. Guest blogging on the right blog may significantly increase your visibility and bring new readers to your blog.
33. Headlines should be as long as they need to be to tickle curiosity.
34. Write a compelling headline but deliver the quality content.
35. There’s nothing wrong with being personal or vulnerable.
36. When writer’s block hits, look to Twitter, which can be a great resource for coming up with new things to write about.
37. You’ll find most corporate blog ideas among the people you work with, especially among those who have direct contact with customers.
38. Your company should set up an internal blog.
39. See your posts as dots on a continuous line on a graph, as a planned storyline.
40. Never hit “publish”, always “schedule”.
41. It takes more than just great relevant content to steadily increase traffic to your blog and boost your business.
42. Being persistent and consistent signals more than passion; it signals belief – a recipe for a successful blog.
43. Offline promotion has been proven to be beneficial for bloggers.
44. Don’t discount the possibility of getting large spikes of traffic from old blog posts weeks or even months after you actively promoted them.
45. Bloggers should be active on Quora.
46. Link Love is the way you should roll.
47. Think of your blog as a niche news site.
48. A dash of humor will make your blog less detached and more inspiring.
49. Anyone who blogs for business needs a content marketing mission statement – an answer to WHY.
50. Business blogging positively attracts traffic to your website and considerably affects your lead goals.

Related articles

• Why Zemanta and Google Get Along So Well
• Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Start a Blogger Outreach Campaign
• Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Find Blogger Contact Information
• Top 10 Tips About Content Marketing Storytelling From London
• Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Develop Relationships With Bloggers

The post 50 Most Memorable Blogging Tips from Zemanta in 2012 appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

The Outbrain decision could eliminate up to 25% of its revenue. It’s a clear and important message. It’s about an ongoing war against spammers, in this case spammy marketers. The company has realized that some of the sites, their paying  customers, “were deceitful either in the headlines they were displaying or in the businesses they were marketing”.

“There’s a bunch of content that looks like real content, is pretty sophisticated, looks legit, and when you dig into it, it’s more deceiving than it seems,” said Outbrain CEO Yaron Galai for AdAge.

Different, post-Panda SEO
He’s not the first to think this way.

The Internet is overcrowded with content. What’s relevant and what isn’t, is in the eye of the beholder; however, many online groups, search and content-recommendation engines, such as Zemanta, have begun to pay attention. SEO, as we know it, isn’t enough any more. It’s been evolving; many content providers have become knowledgeable and learnt how to play the system and deceive Internet users who are constantly on the lookout for more relevant content.

This school of thought has been part of Zemanta since its inception in 2007. At Zemanta, we manually review blogs in our database “to let through” only high quality and original content. We also monitor abuse of our tool and remove users that we believe do not have the right intentions. It’s in the core of our business, hence, we’ve been constantly working on improvements.

In winter and spring, Google has released a long list of changes that the search engine made; Zemanta is compatible with the changes.

The Internet has been evolving, it will never stop. But the time has really come to separate the wheat from the chaff. It’s what we’ve been doing all along, and Google and Outbrain have joined us in this mission.

Quality content matters.

Because relevance matters.

The post New Warrior in the War against Spammy Content appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Top 10 content marketing storytelling tips:

1. PEOPLE TRUST OTHER PEOPLE THE MOST
Jon King, Story Worldwide, cited a Nielsen survey that asks consumers which media they trusted most. The top three answers were people you know, people’s opinions published online, and editorial. Therefore, write stories that will make people “talk” about them, and don’t ever underestimate the power of user testimonials.

2. SIMPLICITY RULES
Dave Trott, CSTTG, was blunt: “Stupid people think complicated things are better.” Well, they’re not, they only drive people away. Therefore, simplify to attract and to be understood, no matter how complicated your products or services may be.

3. WHERE’S THE BEEF
Content without strategy is just stuff, said Arjun Basu, Spafax. As I wrote earlier this year, content without context is hardly a king. Make plans. They’re a nuisance, but they exist for a reason – to be effective in the long run.

4. DON’T DO IT JUST BECAUSE YOU CAN
“Just because it’s there, you don’t have to have it,” said Basu. True marketers become very anxious when a new tool comes out, either Pinterest or Instagram, etc. First, you have to figure out whether a new tool/channel makes sense for you to join. If it doesn’t, then you DON’T have to do it.

5. EASY ACCESS
If you want your content to be consumed and shared, then make it easily accessible to all you’d like to reach, according to Nicola Murphy, The River Group.

6. BE AUTHENTIC
“People like authenticity,” said Melanie Stubbing, Weight Watchers Europe. Don’t fake it, use real stories by real people and you’ll see how your readers/consumers will respond favorably.

7. C=4m + 3v – 2(i-f) – 2a
This is a formula for conversion by Catherine Toole, Sticky Content.

C = conversion
m = motivation
v = value
i = incentive
f = friction
a = anxiety

8. WHO ARE THEY?
Do you know who your customers/blog readers are? Do you know what they’re REALLY thinking? Well, you should, according to Sara Cremer, Redwood. Only then you can write the right story at the right time to make it effective.

9. WHAT IS ENGAGEMENT?
I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s heard the word engagement plenty this year alone. But what does it really mean? Canvas8 and Weber Shandwick investigated the science of engagement. Check out their report. It’s awesome.

10. STORIES, NOT FACTS
Cremer: “People remember stories, not bald facts.” That’s why they’re so powerful.

Related articles

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The post Top 10 Tips About Content Marketing Storytelling appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

How to find blogger contact information

Developing relationships is great, but it would be all for none if you didn’t know the appropriate way to contact the blogger. Luckily for you, if you have been with us from the beginning you should already be well on your way to creating solid relationships with several of your targeted bloggers. But now you must embark on a quest to get the bloggers contact information—a feat that may seem easy in concept, but in reality it may be the most difficult—and the most frustrating.

The simple truth is that bloggers, especially those who have built a loyal fanbase and readership, are contacted a lot. And unfortunately for you, the person who has worked hard to make sure that the blogger is relevant and will find value in what you are pitching, the majority of the time these bloggers are contacted by spammers. So to prevent the often ridiculous messages / requests / pitches / other-various-spammy-content that spammers send, they make it difficult to be contacted in hopes that the challenge of finding the contact information will weed out the spammers from the those who are trying to send a serious proposal.

Fortunately for you, you have already done a considerable amount of research and might have a good idea of how the blogger likes to be contacted. Not only that, but you might also have a pretty good idea of where on their site you can find their contact information. If that is the case then you are off easy. Just grab their contact information, throw it into your media list and you’re all set!

Unfortunately for you, it rarely ever works that way. But I do recommend that you attempt to find their contact information on their site before you attempt to find it via any other way.

In today’s day and age, most bloggers prefer to be contacted one of two ways: email or social. The former often receives a better response rate and the latter is usually easier to discover (after all, most bloggers want you to follow/subscribe to them). So, considering how easy it is to figure out a blog’s social media contact information, the following five tools are a variety of the most effective at finding a bloggers email address.

1. Google Search: If you know the blogger’s name or other information about them like their username (many bloggers choose to blog under a pen name/username rather than their own), than a simple Google search – and a bit of time going through the results – may provide you with their contact information.
2. Whois: Anyone who has experience with hosting will know that this is an excellent tool to look up all of the basic information of a website. Fortunately, most blogs are owned and operated by one person making the information on Whois likely to be the author of the blog. You should be careful with this though, it is also likely that the email listed is their personal and many bloggers may be put off by first contact through their personal email.
3. Rapportive: This is probably my favorite way of finding someone’s contact information just because it is kind of exciting. Rapportive is an excellent Gmail plugin that gives a short profile of the contact that you are sending an email to. This is useful in finding a blogger’s contact information because most of the time people have their email address in similar formats. So, if you have the first and last name of the blogger you can try guessing their email address using common formats and when you get it correct, you will see their Rapporative profile.
4. Spokeo: Anyone that has ever heard of Spokeo knows that it is an very effective (albeit creepy and slightly disturbing) way of finding any and all information on the interwebs about a person. Note: You do need to upgrade to a membership if you wish to see email addresses.
5. TinEye: Finally, after you have exhausted all of your other options, and you happen to have a picture of the person (say a Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, or author profile picture), you can try to use TinEye. TinEye is a tool that allows you to upload an image of someone that they will then try to match against other images on the internet. It is a bit temperamental in it’s effectiveness, but is definitely worth the try.

And there you have it, a variety of the most common tools used to find a blogger’s contact information. There are a few other tools like Jigsaw, Pipl, and PeekYou that are fairly effective, though all are pretty basic look up services (Data.com‘s Jigsaw is a little different where you can’t get a prospect’s contact information until you offer up contact information of another).

If you can’t find the blogger’s email address using any of the above tools, chances are he or she does not want to get contacted via email. So, keep on developing your relationship with them through social channels and contact them through one of those or, if there is one, the contact form on their blog. Of course, creativity is welcome here as well – maybe add a call to action to a specific blogger that you really want to pitch to and link to their content. That would certainly get their attention!

Well that concludes part three of our blogger outreach series. Like always, be sure to leave any questions, feedback or criticisms below. We are especially welcome to any tools that are either new or different than the ones listed. Stop by next week for how to contact the blogger (the actual pitch).

Related articles

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• Why Zemanta and Google Get Along So Well

The post Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Find Blogger Contact Information appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Aren’t you sick of listening to almighty prophets who like to predict the end of the world is coming. It’s also very fashionable at the moment to call the dead of print. Just last week a Slovene TV news producer said print is history. Forgive my French, but that’s a bowl of bollocks.

Just because there’s a new medium in town it doesn’t mean “the old” one is going away. No; it just needs to learn how to adapt to the new situation. It’s how print, radio, TV, and movie industry have all already done; one by one.

Many have written how to repurpose and re-edit print content for the web, I am going to take an opposite direction and give you some tips how to re-edit web content for print.

First let me give you 5 clear reasons why you shouldn’t discard print, even though you may love and do everything online:

1. It gets attention.
2. Due to online overload, some find it to be rare, which means for many it feels special or, how ironic, new.
3. It allows you to dig deeper into issues you’ve already discussed online; just look at Google’s Think Quarterly and Harvard Business Review – both are strong online, but both have influential print editions.
4. Print still excites people; no matter what some would like to make us believe about the omnipresence of the web, research clearly shows that people no matter what age still get excited by print. Moreover, information in print seem to be still more credible than whatever is posted online.
5. With print, you can control the pace that the information comes at a reader.

So, without further ado, here are my 4 tips how to turn your blog into print:

1. Printed Magazine: C’mon, even Google does it with their limited edition quarterly magazine (they call it a book) Think Quarterly. Surprise your business partners and maybe very loyal customers with a high-quality, rich in content printed magazine. Dig deeper into issues you’ve already covered on your blog and that seem to be popular among your readers.
2. Book: what a great Christmas gift a collection of your best or most shared or most read posts would make, right? Choose them and publish them in a limited edition print book form.
3. How-to-do Book: why don’t you repurpose posts on a particular topic and make a great how-to-do book or brochure?
4. Customized Publication: Why don’t you produce a customized, one- of-a-kind printed publication based on your blog for your biggest business partners and your favorite readers/customers?

Just make sure that whatever you do, it’s still relevant to them and not just a pile of beautifully designed paper.

Related articles

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• Why our online startup releases a print product, and how we do it.

The post 5 Reasons & 4 Great Ideas on How to Turn Your Blog into Print appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

I did my first keyword search 20 years ago at the technical library of the University of Ljubljana. I still remember vividly the difficulties I encountered selecting the right words and scribbling them down on a small piece of paper. The library at my high school didn’t require to fill out any form if you wanted to borrow a book. You either knew the title or the author of the book in advance or you browsed through the shelves and picked the book you wanted to read.

According to Google Web History, my count of Google searches is at 49,375 and this number includes only data for the past five years.

Ubiquitous keywords
I’m a technological enthusiast and early Internet adopter, so my behavior is different than the behavior of the most. However, as a head of software development at a local search engine I’ve witnessed how large swaths of the population have over the past 10+ years learned how to use keywords for information foraging.

Keywords are so ubiquitous today, that it’s hard to imagine that they are only a recent invention.

Sitting at your desk in front of the computer, typing keywords on a large keyboard, it’s hard to imagine that there are other means of navigating the web. But lying on a sofa with an iPad in one hand, while the other arm supports your head, keyword-based search no longer seems as appealing. And it’s even less tempting to type keywords on the touchscreen of your mobile phone while commuting to work.

Desktop is about to disappear
At Zemanta, we’ve noticed that at least 25% of content consumption already happens on mobile devices. The Guardian has recently reported that at some times of a single day the majority of content is already consumed on mobile devices. The trend is clear: the desktop is disappearing and we’re in the midst of a mobile revolution.

Comparing AltaVista web search in 1995 with Google web search in 2012 shows that the web search hasn’t really changed in the past 15 years. As a search engine expert myself, I know that the underlying algorithms and tools used in modern search engines were developed already in the 1970s. The web search might stay with us in the same keywords-oriented way also on mobile devices. But I know that the transition to mobile that is happening at the moment is one of the best opportunities to try something new, something more user friendly then entering keywords in a search box.

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The post Navigating the Web with Keywords – Can Anything Replace It? appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Stephanie, you’re not from NYC right?
No. It feels like yesterday I moved to New York from a tiny college town in Florida, but it’s already been 8 months. I have been to a new restaurant almost everyday since I got here, and have “streeteasy’d” every cool building I see.

Where in Florida do you come from?
I grew up in Orlando, FL- known for Disney World, endless strip malls and being the biggest tourist trap ever. I went to school at the University of Florida, Go Gators! and during my tenure we won 2 basketball National Championships and 2 Football Championships; we’re kind of a big deal.

Where did you come from to Zemanta? What skills and experience have you brought along?
I started off out of college as every girl’s dream: working as a buyer for Macy’s. That lasted 6 months, and soon I was selling commission-only ads in publications nobody had ever heard of or cared about. In my first year, I sold more ads than anyone in their 39 year history. I’m a fast learner who listens to my clients, and am able to transfer my belief in my product to close.

How did you get involved with Zemanta? Did you know anything about it before joining us?
I was approached by a recruiter about the opportunity at Zemanta. I had never heard of Zemanta, but after doing my research, I knew this was something amazing and was excited to join the team.

Did you know Zemanta is for the most part a boys’ club?
My entire sales career has revolved around boys’ clubs, and I’ve always been the only Asian female on the sales team. After college I lived in a house with 5 other guys, and I learned the quickest way to a man’s heart: food.

What is your role at Zemanta?
Account Manager. I will be bringing in new business for the company.

What blogs do you follow and would gladly recommend to others?
One of my favorite blogs is written by James Altucher, a former chess champion, hedge fund millionaire, and former bankrupt startup founder. He lives a wild life and is an amazing writer.

What’s your message to Zemanta users?
Stay hungry, stay foolish.

The post Meet The Team: Stephanie Diec – Zemanta’s New Account Manager appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Gain Readership - Joe Pulizzi, Content Marketing Institute

“When I started blogging in 2007, my biggest challenge was gaining readership.  It took a solid 6 months to gain any kind of traction at all.  To solve this, I continued to blog, almost daily to build up subscription, as well as SEO placement on target keywords. Also, I started to build relationships with industry influencers and, after a while, they began to share my content.”

Fear of Technology - Jayme Soulati, Soulati Media, Inc.

Blog Regularly - Ron Feldman, Ron Feldman’s Blog

“Like many people, my biggest challenge is to consistently blog. I wish I had completely overcome it.

While I haven’t, Zemanta blogspire has been helpful in helping me generate ideas and write some quick posts.”

Establish Consistency in the Long Run - Marcus Sheridan, The Sales Lion

Structure and consistency - Will Taylor, Bright.Bazaar

“When I first started blogging my biggest challenge was working out how to bring structure and consistency to the site. I felt this was important so that readers could build a connection with the site; navigating it with the same ease that they do with their favourite features in a monthly magazine. I overcame this problem by introducing an editorial calendar. This not only helped me to plan the content I would need for the site in advance, but it also meant that readers knew which posts were published on which days, which allowed them to pick and choose the content that was most relevant to them.”

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The post 5 Bloggers Reveal How They Overcame Their Biggest Blogging Challenge appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

How to Develop Relationships with Bloggers

If running a blogger outreach campaign is like building a house, then the planning that goes into starting a campaign would have to be the blueprint—making the development of a relationship with the blogger the foundation. Without a solid foundation, not only is it likely to crumble causing the house to fall apart, but when it does, it will leave a mess that will take even more time and resources to clean up.

That is why it is very important to make sure that you foster an appropriate relationship with the bloggers that you have selected before contacting them with any kind of pitch. If you reach out too early only to be rejected, you lose all of the time and energy invested, leaving a mess to either clean up and start over or abandon and move on. With that being said, developing a relationship with the blogger is very important—And the first step in doing that? Research.

Do your research.

There are a lot of things that you are going to want to know about the blogger so that when it comes to contacting them with your pitch (or whatever you may be contacting them with), not only will you be well prepared, but you will be able to communicate with them in an effective manner that will earn results.

First, begin with basic research that you should want to know about the blogger (emphasis stemming from the fact that these bloggers and the people who share their content are going to have an impact on your brand). Pinpoint their vertical and do the appropriate amount of research on their niche (if it is the same as yours, this part should be easy). Find out who their competitors are and if anything is trending on their blogs. Find out what trends are impacting the blog, their niche, their competitors, the cognoscenti and how they are all reacting to them – and if they are reacting differently, find out how and why. Find out as much as you can about anything that you feel my be of use down the line. After all, if you took our advice from part one, the blogger should be at least somewhat relevant to your niche so naturally, any research done will have a positive spillover.

After you have a good idea of the environment that the targeted blogger blogs in, try and get a better feel for the blog itself. Though you should already have a pretty good idea of what the blogger blogs about, try and figure out what their favorite topics are (frequency would be a good indicator here), and the favorite topic of the blog’s audience (quantity/quality of comments would be a good indicator here).

One thing to keep in mind is that if a blogger just did a blog post on something, say a review of the best productivity chrome extensions, they most likely are not going to want to do another post on productivity chrome extensions for a while. So it is probably best to skip over them when sending your pitch—at least for now, of course it doesn’t hurt to begin nurturing the relationship now.

Commence the stalking.

Now that you know everything there is to know about the blogger and their blog, you’re going to want to begin to subscribe and interact. If you did the appropriate amount of research, you probably know all of the mediums that the blogger uses to promote their content—all you have to do is subscribe to those mediums. Follow them on Twitter, like them on Facebook and subscribe to their blog.

Depending on how many bloggers you are initially trying to develop a relationship with, it may be a good idea to create a Google Reader account (if you don’t already have one), create a folder specifically for the bloggers you intend to reach out to, subscribe to their blogs via Reader and then add them to that folder. This makes keeping up with all of the blogger’s content a lot easier by keeping everything in one place. Plus, Reader has a nice feature where it tells you which articles you have and have not read.

Once you are subscribed to all of their active channels, the next step is to interact with them. Did you just read a recently published article of theirs that you like? Share it on LinkedIn. See a tweet of theirs that you think your followers would interact with? Retweet it. Have something interesting to add to the conversation on their blog? Gather your thoughts and leave a comment (ideally one that will spark conversation). Put in some real effort to get their attention and begin a relationship with them.

One of the best things that you can do is to mention them in one of your blog posts and link to their content (bloggers really love when you link to their content) – this is especially the case if the reason you are mentioning them in a post is because you are writing something in reaction to something that you read on their blog. Remember that these bloggers are people too and the things that would make you feel good (like a blogger writing a reaction post to something you wrote AND linking back to your content) are most likely going to make them feel good as well and will earn their attention.

Keep track of what you do.

Depending on your ambition, and the amount of resources that you are allocating to blogger outreach, this can become a very intensive process. One that you are not going to be able to keep track of mentally. Luckily, you already have a media list with all of the bloggers that you are reaching out to. All you need to do now is add a column or two that keeps track of all of the touchpoints that you have with the blogger and update it every week or so. Not only will this be a great way for you to keep track of who you are interacting with and through what mediums, but it gives you a chance to review your progress week by week and improve on any areas you are lacking.

Well that concludes part two of Everything Blogger Outreach. Now you know how to find and select bloggers to reach out to and how to develop relationships with them so that when you finally decide to reach out them, they will accept your pitch enthusiastically. Come back next week to find out the best way to discover the blogger’s contact information so that reaching out to them is possible. If you have any questions, feedback, or criticisms, be sure to leave them below!

The post Everything Blogger Outreach: How to Develop Relationships With Bloggers appeared first on Zemanta Blog.

Earlier this year, we announced a partnership with the Typepad blogging platform. We gave Typepad bloggers a handy feature called Recommended Links. Recommended Links show up to Typepad bloggers beneath the editor window while they write, bringing back links to their own posts as well as links to external authoritative sources.

Recommended Links allows bloggers to add links to their text with a click of a button. They are really easy to use and the benefits of adding links to your posts, Wikipedia, Google maps and other great resources are numerous. Readers get triggers to research topics mentioned in the post, search engines have more respect for posts with such links and authors can focus on writing instead of dealing with manual linking.

Thanksgiving addition – Related Posts

During the Thanksgiving week, Zemanta on Typepad will get a new feature called Related Posts. Related Posts are awesome.  They show up below related links and are contextually related to the text you are currently working on. The posts come from your blog, from a vast network of bloggers and from other content sources.

This is how it all looks like:

The benefits of using Related Posts

You can add Related Posts to the bottom of your text with a click of a button to give your post more depth and provide clues to readers on where to get further opinions and information on the subject.

Other benefits of using related posts are again numerous. First and foremost your post gains on credibility but there is another hidden value: bloggers that you link out to will notice you. You will get attention from writers who are interested in the same topics as you. This often leads to more comments, reactions and backlinks but most of all to new important acquaintances.

It is the essence of what we call Link Love:

We hope Related Posts on TypePad will help your blog grow and your network expand.

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The post Zemanta Related Posts coming to Typepad appeared first on Zemanta Blog.