Behind Every Pixel...

...is a simple idea. Unique ideas for unique people, just like you and me. Imaginative, effective web sites to express, sell, communicate, inspire... It's that simple!

Your clients are the focus of our work and relationship with you. That's what empowers our creation. Understanding who your customers are, their needs, how they interact with you, your business. We help answer their question "What's in it for me?" After all, answering that is paramount to any successful online endeavour...

Do you have an eCommerce website?  Do you provide a service?  Do you provide specialized products or need to promote newsletters or other services?  Effective content results from focusing on the specific goals of your website and staying focused! Effective content will not only assist you in increasing the number of visitors to your site but also in building relations with potential clients and supporting existing clients.

Writing effective web copy begins with an understanding of what the focus of your website as and what specific audience you are targeting.

Do you intend to attract product or service purchasers?  Do you intend to attract company employees?   Is your website informational?  Is it intended to provide an interactive forum?

In most cases a website is intended to garner an individuals interest towards building a relationship with you or your business.

In many ways it’s important to note that most aspects of writing marketing material apply here, however there are some caveats we need to take into consideration.

Websites are dynamic, they are not intended to be used like static print media.  Regularly update your site as needed!

“What’s in it for me?”
Your website should focus on the benefits your product or service provide, features are not of prime interest.  In other words tell your web visitors what’s in it for them, not what the product or service is about.

An ineffective example: “We can repair you equipment faster.”

An effective example: “Our faster equipment service, saves you time and money.”

Web visitors want to know how your product or service will make them more productive, save them time and money, make them happy/healthy, etc.

“Get to the point!”
There’s nothing more annoying for web visitors then having to wade through excessive text to get the information they want.  Statistically, you have about 10 seconds to capture the reader’s interest.

If you have a lot of text, it’s better to have a few lines of it and then a “Read more…” link the visitor can click to read the full version of the document.

For those selling a product or service, this is where your “10 Second Advertisement” skills are best used.

Write from “You” to your visitor.

Write your copy as if you are conversing with the web visitor in person.  Cater your writing style and tone to that expected within your field.  Always, try to place “call to actions” within your copy.

An ineffective example:

“There are several colours, sizes and styles of sweaters.  And we are able to send them within 24 hours of ordering.  Please visit the catalogue page to see the full range of offerings”.

An effective example:

“Our most popular sweater (seen here) is the “Red Knit” from Peru, which we can ship to you within 24 hours.  All sizes available for you.  Click here to read more or visit the online catalogue to view other current special deals.”

Write with “Search Engine Keywords” in mind.
Search engines such as Google have shifted focus to your content itself.  Don’t rely on Meta Tags.  Instead, pay careful attention to include words of substance.  And always stay on subject (for each page), if you need to digress, make that a link to other content on your website.

The following example shows poorly worded copy:

“This gift basket (shown here) is customized to your specific needs.  If requested we can make any substitutions you require as a variety of popcorn types are available.  We hand deliver your basket locally and can ship internationally.”

The following example has a “richer” keyword content:

“This elegant, hand delivered basket holds many types of popcorn, including caramel popcorn, spicy popcorn and honey popcorn. Sure to please every popcorn lover. Gourmet popcorn of various kinds adorn this lavish gift basket. When the popcorn is all gone, this gift basket is a beautiful decorative piece.”

(Granted that the use of the word “popcorn” is excessive, the intent was to give you an idea of better keyword content).

“Cross Linking” is expected, give the people what they want.

Select the appropriate keywords within your copy to link to further content within your site.  Link to external websites sparingly.  The current trend (Google.com) appears to be that relevant inbound links from other sites may be an endorsement of your site.  Attempt to garner as many relevant inbound links as possible.  Include a link to your website copy in any material you send out.

Send out summaries not the full document, this provides a “call to action”!

When sending out information, the best approach is to send a short one-paragraph summary.  Provide a direct link to the full version so that visitors may read the completed copy.

This allows visitors to easily find your copy if they wish to reread or send on to another individual.

Also, a short “introductory” description peaks interest, prompting a visit to your site so that you may display your full range of services or products.

If you need the copy fast, it will always be available online.

“Zip up your titles”, if the titles are bland, so is the copy.

These two examples say it all:

An ineffective title: “A Guide to Affordable Sign Printing Made Easy”

An effective title:  “How to Save Money and Print Signs the Easy Way”

Make sure your titles are descriptive (and not too long – keep it to a maximum of around 8 words).  Statistics have shown that web visitors scan titles first.  If a title catches their eye, only then will they read the document summary (or first paragraph) – After that your 10 seconds are up.  Catch them while they’re hot!

“Spice it up baby”, make it easy and enjoyable to read.

Don’t be afraid to spice your copy up.  Remember, sell the benefits of your product or service.  Visitors want to hear that your service or product makes them healthy, informed, happy, save money, etc.  Take a look at the websites of your competitors, doing so improves your research and helps to make your web copy more effective.

Most web visitors are impatient, grab their interest.  Effective content drives your visitors (theres that call to action again).  Write your copy with this in mind.

For example, if your goal is to have visitors subscribe to your newsletter.  Each page within your site should drive the visitor to “subscribe”.

“Change is good”, visitors like variety.

Edit your copy as needed.  Always add new copy.  This keeps your website fresh for visitors and attractive to search engines.

Always have other people read your copy prior to posting in on your website.  Other individuals can help you catch errors.

Always listen to your clients and visitors, they will tell you what copy they want to read.

Always review your web visitor (hosting) statistics monthly, it will tell you what copy is effective and what needs tweaking.

I received an email message from a client asking me if I had any solutions for an eNewsletter system that could be run under their own domain name. Some of the features suggested were:

Automated subscription management (subscribe/unsubscribe).
Statistics/Click through rate.
Ability to send in both text and html (at the same time).
No installation of software on their PC.
Automated server transmission of email.
Automated server management of bounced email addresses.

And the list goes on…

Suffice to say, it did make me think about some of the aspects I’ve experienced in emailed newsletter subscriptions, good and bad. In many cases I’ve observed individuals launch a newsletter – full of excitement! Only, later to find that they did not garner their anticipated results. Inevitably, after review, it became evident that the root causes of an unsuccessful newsletter system was in poor planing.

In every public seminar I present, I almost always touch on the importance of solid planning (and sticking to the plan!). It does not matter how small or large the project is, it always needs a plan. Which brings to mind the old adage…

“If you want some exercise walk around, if you want to get somewhere, plan your route!“

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not suggesting this particular client has poor planning skills (quite the opposite in fact!), rather it led me to posting about my experiences and how I’d suggest people could build an effective, successful online newsletter system; one that best promotes their business, interest, website, blog, etc. Hopefully some of the points will help you.

Note: While I am a Certified Network Engineer (MCSE, N+, MCP+I), I’ve endeavoured not to delve too much into the technical aspects. However I don’t mind fielding such questions as I do operate my own servers as well as providing web/blog development, online solutions and hosting services for other clients.

In my opinion one crux of a successful newsletter must be to ask yourself “Why do I want to launch a newsletter?” Remember that the potential subscriber of that newsletter is going to ask themselves “What’s in it for me?” – Make sure you provide enough benefits to answer their needs; and in doing so, remember the mantra:

“Benefits sell, features don’t”.

What makes your newsletter better than any other newsletter? – Do something that makes you stand out and get noticed.

When I first read their email and considered the newsletter angle, several questions jumped to the forefront:

Why don’t they just promote their RSS feed? (They don’t have one – For those that don’t know, here is a great resource showing you what an RSS feed is: RSS Feeds in Plain English).
Why don’t they just blog about it? (Their site is not a blog platform).
Newsletters are not an “A <–> B” conversation, rather one-way. (Sure but newsletters remind readers to return).
Newsletters are old-fashioned. (That may be, but they are familiar venues to many people).
Newsletters are simply sending information already on the web site or blog, that’s not interesting is it? (It is interesting if you use the newsletter to build interest – such as announcements about what’s coming, etc. – or Information not currently on the site).
The content may not be of interest to all the recipients, many will simply delete the email. (But that’s really a benefit! You can target specific “groups” of readers with specific “targeted” content – You’ve always got to try and look at the upside of things).

For a moment, let’s expand on some of those questions and comments.

One thing I learned from my other blog, is that I had (and still do have) a lot of one-time visitors. These are visitors that find my blog via search engines (Google) or from links in other blogs, forums, etc. They visit my site and on average view 3.25 pages and then leave, never returning. On tool that could help turn them into repeat visitors is a newsletter. I’m not suggesting that every one of them will subscribe, rather a blog (or website) containing quality content and a well written subscription “call to action“, may motivate some of them to subscribe. Much in the same way that product manufacturers work to improve brand loyalty, newsletters are one tool you can use to promote reader loyalty.

As I mentioned, newsletters have the ability to share information that is not yet on the site. They compliment the site. One way of facilitating this could be to induce interest by keeping your readers in the loop on new events, upcoming features, etc. This can be very powerful as it helps to build media buzz and interest. Just look at how the movie industry uses this… They announce an upcoming movie and let you see just a few of the really good bits as teasers, then you’re kept in suspense, interest captured until the new movie is finally available and you’re able to watch it.

Newsletters help you to build a community or business network, so much so, that a good newsletter should actively encourage feedback (and perhaps, pre-stage that membership for a future forum environment ). In my opinion, people like to be part of a community; and they arguably will be the most loyal visitors, who will encourage others to become regular visitors. (Nothing like a good debate or discussion elicited by your newsletter).

Obviously there are several reasons (or motivators) why we would want to launch a newsletter, once we’ve made the call however, there are several things to consider in order to bring our newsletter plans to fruition.

In my opinion, there are ten steps to successful and effective enewsletter marketing.

1) Plan your key objectives and stay within them.

What is the purpose of your newsletter? What tangible, measurable goal(s) are you building towards? As I’ve mentioned, there are several objectives your newsletter can be used to help reach, some examples being:

Are you building a business network or community?
Improve/Increase traffic statistics of your site or blog?
Garnering greater public awareness?
Elicit greater feedback and interactivity?
Enhance media PR marketing?
Appealing to a new niche of specific people?
Capturing readers who do not use your feeds (RSS)?

Many of us will try to include more than one objective. I learned the hard way, always have one primary objective that you work towards. It should take precedence over some of your secondary objectives. I’ll say it again… ALWAYS focus on the prime objective.

2) Create content that is scannable.

Most individuals (including myself) quickly scan the contents of messages first. Doing so helps us to evaluate when the message should be acted upon (the importance level) and if it’s interesting enough for us to read. Think about it a moment, when you pick up a newspaper don’t you quickly scan the article to see what it’s about – and then read it if it captures your interest?

Scannable content does not just refer to the text itself, it refers to the visual (esthetic) elements as well. Elements such as bolding, icons, highlighting on backgrounds, etc. Ever used a magic marker to highlight key text when studying? ;)

3) Tell people what you enewsletter focuses on, what it’s about.

I’m sure you’ll want to keep your subscribers. Tell them up front what the newsletter is about, what topic ranges it covers and how the newsletter will benefit the reader. And stick to that commitment! Time and time again, I’ve subscribed to newsletters that promised content, features and benefits that I was interested. And time again I’ve unsubscribed because they did not deliver. This brings to mind a very salient issue:

It’s better to have a smaller number of subscribers who receive the content they expected than those who unsubscribed because you didn’t follow through with your offerings (some of whom think they got – forgive the expression – suckered into signing up with empty promises). Be genuine… that small group may help your newsletter marketing more than you realize.

4) Be consistent and regular.

If your newsletter is monthly, make sure you always deliver.
If your newsletter is quarterly, make sure you always deliver and so on…

There’s nothing worse than haphazard delivery. For those of us who have printed newspaper subscriptions, I’m sure they can attest to the annoyance when the newspaper fails to be delivered or is often delivered late.

By consistent, I’m referring to the style and content. It’s a good idea to use the same style of writing as used in your web site or blog. Why? That’s probably what people expect. There’s nothing wrong with having a guest writer contribute (that’s often a good idea), but think for a moment, if people like your site content writing style, then they’ll also like that same style in your newsletter. In some ways, this also touches on branding issues (albeit that’s a whole discussion in itself) – branding does not refer just to graphics, rather your whole packaging – including the writing style.

5) Build interest with titles.

Newspapers are the masters of capturing interest with titles and describing the content with titles. They’ve had centuries to perfect. Your title is a critical component as it will be the primary deciding factor as to whether someone will read your newsletter or not.

Using RSS feeds as an example, I subscribe to about 12 feeds from various blogs that I am seriously interested in. Each morning I review the new articles and decide which I will return to read in the evening, and which I delete. The only thing I read is the title, that’s it! If the title captures me I save it for reading, if not, I delete it right away.

Note: In addition to titles, please keep in mind that content in the top of your newsletter (above the fold) will receive more immediate interest than below the fold. Similarly, links near the top will also be clicked more often. This is also a good SEO strategy, namely to pack your best punch in your first paragraph.

One caveat to watch out for, with newsletters (as opposed to RSS feeds), is the title you give your newsletter blast. It’s important to be able to “brand” and identify your newsletter right away (because readers are expecting it and need to easily find it within their email), however there also needs to be some description of the content itself. Try experimenting to achieve a balance between the two. If BloggerSavvy (another site I own) had a newsletter, I’d initially try an enewsletter subject line that reads something like this example:

“BloggerSavvy Newsletter – 10 sizzling marketing tips, New blog contest, How to get featured on Digg, and more…”

The above example clearly indicates who the newsletter is from and highlights some of the top content that may most capture interest.

6) Use standard, reliable tools.

Evidently a component upon which you should place a fair bit of emphasis is the engine that runs your newsletter and subscriptions. While many people use a third party subscription service, I personally don’t think that is the best way to go. Why? In my opinion:

1. It’s a privacy issue. Third-parties do not need to control my database of subscribers.
2. In the past I have had large numbers of people unsubscribing because the domain sending newsletters was not the same domain as the one that creates the newsletter.
3. In my opinion (with regards to point #2) it also looks very unprofessional when my domain is xxx.com but the domain sending the newsletter is yyy.com – in my opinion, it just does not come across as professional.
4. It’s not the best choice to operate a newsletter under the behest of a third party. What happens if they change the rules, sell their business, go out of business. (Think: Who owns the actual database?)
5. From personal experience, I have often encountered unreliable services from such providers.
6. Using third party services often increases your costs.

What would I suggest?

Use you own newsletter service. I often suggest PHPList as a viable, reliable alternative; in great part because you can install it under your own domain and it easily integrates with the premier blogging platform, WordPress. Some of my favourite phplist features are noted on the home page of their web site as:

Double opt-in subscription mechanism
Scheduling
RSS
User Specific Content
Click-tracking
Attachments
Bounce management
Domain Throttling
Server Throttling

While a search on Google should provide you with dozens of systems, I’ve personally found that this package works both in terms of reliability and features. One benefit is that the system is virtually automated (including double opt-in – more about that below) and all you have to do is provide content – It will even archive your newsletters! More features of that package are here: phplist.com/details and for all the WordPress users the plugin to integrate the system (into WordPress) is called WP-PHPList. It’s also interesting to note that this open source package also integrates into many other platforms, including ecommerce, forums and CMS related engines.

Bottom line, while third party relayers, I’m sure do provide good service, I’d prefer to retain control of my own subscribers and manage them under my own domain and branding – for many of the reasons I listed above. In my opinion, this is a much more professional way to operate enewsletter transmissions.

7) Monitor and track your results.

Ensure that you use a combination of tools to monitor your activities; both from the newsletter system and the resulting server (your domain) that provides content such as images, video, audio, etc. I would suggest using the tracking tools that come with the newsletter mailing list (such as phplist) with Google Analytics and your own servers statistics. In my opinion, one of the better server based statistics package is called AWStats. Using a combination of tools (and not relaying on one tool) helps to provide a more realistic “picture” (as different tools gather and correlate data in different ways).

Paying attention to which links are clicked, will give you insight as to which pages provide the most in demand and valued content. They will also help when you’re “experimenting” with your content style and placement, etc.

As a quick practical example, knowing which content garners the greatest click through to a page will quickly tell you which pages and content could best be used to “announce” things to your readers. It will also tell you which content you may want to follow-up on or further capitalize upon (because of the heightened interest).

8) Ensure your newsletter provides double opt in subscription.

Double opt in is a subscription feature wherein the subscriber enters their subscription email address and then confirms that subscription via an email sent by the newsletter server. It’s primary purpose is to ensure that subscribers truly wish to subscribe. I think that here in Canada this (double opt in) is a requirement (but I’m not 100% sure about that).

You will want to do this as it prevents damage to your blog (or web site) occurring from users who are added to your subscribers list without permission.

I have often entered my contacts into only the subscription databases that I directly control, and always have the tools in place that allow them to unsubscribe. While technically this is a grey area, I’ve never had issues or complaints as my subscribers were always generally intelligent, forgiving individuals.

I have personally seen other newsletters fail because they purchased lists of email addresses and added them to the database, as such they ended up with a poisoned database that was overflowing with unqualified readers who did not care and were not interested in the content. In one case the domain name became blacklisted as a spam domain, which irreparably destroyed that blog’s brand and reputation.

9) Grow your benefits and quality.

There are several ways to help keep readership growing. Obviously, one way is to continue providing high quality, in demand content. Consistently give your readers something of value, something that benefits them.

You could provide them with new content in each newsletter or revisit existing content on your blog / website (or both). Personally, I tend to use a bit of both.

Why?

Statistics show me which topics are hot and would benefit from a follow-up.
New content keeps things fresh and interesting and provides incentive to subscribe as the content does not have appear on the blog until after the subscribers have received it.

One key is to always remain consistent, don’t procrastinate. As I alluded above, it can be very annoying (and make your newsletter appear really “flaky”) if it’s operated in a haphazard manner and if the content is not targeted. Content should be targeted.

Quite often newsletter content is not so much a matter of “What would I like to include in the newsletter this time?” rather it’s (in my opinion) more of an issue of “What do my subscribers want to read about?” “What interests them?” In other words select targeted content for targeted readers, that’s effective.

This leads to the final point… #10

10) Talk to your subscribers and get feedback.

Communicating with your readers may be an eye opening experience. While we can garner a fair bit of intelligence from review statistics, we can obtain some insight through reader input.

Don’t be afraid to contact your most loyal readers, ask them how you can improve the newsletter. Ask them what they would do. I’ve often been surprised at some of the beneficial things I’ve learned.

Equally, talk to those who have unsubscribed ask them if they wouldn’t mind telling you why. Sometimes you may not like what you hear, but if you listen, really listen, you’ll often discover other areas of improvement.

Obtaining feedback helps to ensure the effectiveness of your newsletter marketing as you’ll remain in touch with your readers. You will be talking to them, not at them.

You’ll be empowering them as a community and building brand loyalty and pride in ownership, which is probably one of the most powerful aspects of effective online newsletter marketing!

Whenever I present a seminar at the local business centre, one of the first questions I’m asked are what a blog is. Such questions are commonly asked by new business owners who are not as web savvy as they’d like to be. After all, they are experts in their own industries, not in blogging or Internet content dissemination systems in general.

I received a few email messages from friends this morning, after I told them about a new blog launch. To answer such a question, I could dive into the technical aspects (I’m a certified Network Engineer MCSE among other things), as much as the practical aspects (that would perhaps, make more sense to the business owner).

While googling does provide a lot of definitions, I’m not really sure that they grasp the meat and potatoes of blogging. To define a blog in its simplest terms:

A blog empowers a business to reach a wider audience and continue a conversation with them, by providing readers with in demand, quality, syndicated content. Blogs are beneficial in that they allow business owners to add content to their blogs as needed, without requiring the services of a web site developer or designer (to update the content). Therefore two evident benefits, are that blogs save business owners money and help market products or services.

Blogs are a way to continue a conversation with the audience. This is accomplished by the use of features, just some such of which include:

Readers providing comments and feedback.
Surveys and Polls.
Content written by and submitted for posting by guest writers from the audience.

In terms of features, many of them are beneficial. For example, blogs provide RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds. What’s an RSS feed and why is it beneficial? Wikipedia has a great blurb.

From wikipedia:

“…Web feeds benefit publishers by letting them syndicate content quickly and automatically. They benefit readers who want to subscribe to timely updates from favored websites or to aggregate feeds from many sites into one place. RSS feeds can be read using software called an “RSS reader”, “feed reader”, or “aggregator”, which can be web-based or desktop-based…”

In other words, when we update the content in our blog, subscribers (of our RSS feed) are almost instantly notified!

One (initially) less visible benefit of blogging comes into play as the volume of quality content grows. The greater the amount of quality content available, the greater the amount of traffic (visitors) to the blog. Therefore, over time, a blog can become an increasingly powerful tool for the business owner!

To further clarify, I visited YouTube and searched for “What is a blog”. The first and best result returned was a great video from “CommonCraft”, titled “Blogs in Plain English”:

I should add that they also have a great video explaining RSS in Plain English.

Another video describing different types of blogs may also further explain some of the diversity in blogging:

In conclusion, it’s not a far stretch to realize that maintaining a conversation with your audience is the best way not only to grow traffic to your quality, in demand content, but also an incredibly effective way to promote products, services, charities, hobbies… in fact an endless list!

Last week I was presenting a seminar to the local business centre. The seminar explored the use of quality content to improve and increase search engine traffic. For years I’ve always espoused that one key element is content, content, content! That it’s a primary must to ensure that a web site (or blog) always ensures that the content is of high quality, that it’s in-demand, remains current, and fills a specific niche (preferably one with less competition, if possible).

I’m taking a couple months reprieve from the seminar track as I’ve a fair bit of work to catch up on. Doing so also presents me with the time to develop my seminar track for the next year “Blogging to Grow Your Business”. While developing the content (and bouncing ideas off some of my seminar regulars) on of them challenged a chapter I working on. In particular was the issue that the success of a blog (for that matter a web site too), was NOT incumbent solely on quality, in-demand content. Several others also voiced similar issues, and it occurred to me that we’re comparing apples and oranges.

Most would agree that in the most basic terms we can appreciate that search engines find quality content attractive, thereby directing more traffic to the page containing such content. That may have been a more realistic perception for SEO (Search Engine Optimization) but certainly not in today’s Social Web! Your online presence very much follows the general rules within the tangible world. Think about it… When I meet a prospective client in a brick & mortar environment, I need to be just as personable and professional as I am in my online blogging and web development environment.

The value and importance of networking does not end when we include online solutions (such as blogs) to grow our businesses. It’s the networking we do that in part that helps to ensure our blogs success. You could have all the content in the world, but are you really going to grow traffic if nobody knows about it?

Is it realistic to expect your sole source of traffic to be search engines? Of course not! The days of “Build it and they will come”, are long gone.

Needless to say, there were a flurry of email messages, so much so that I thought I’d post some answers.

First, lets break the issues down to the “features” and “benefits” issue. One of my mantras has always been:

“Benefits Sell, Features Don’t”

Think about it for a moment, all blogs have content -That’s a feature!

A blog that shows you how to save money or save time (for example), and thereby reach more people – Those are Benefits!

Which brings to mind the salient question (I think) all business owners should be asking themselves:

“What benefits can a blog provide my business?”

or

“If content is simply a feature and not the primary element of blog success, what’s in it for me?”

Subsequently this leads to some of the immediate questions that arose in our discussions, questions that I strongly feel are of the most basic surface benefits and do not really grasp the deeper concepts (which I’ll raise towards the end of this post).

Where do I get traffic (readers)?
Where do I get inbound links?
How do I become visible? and so on…

It’s important for any business owner contemplating a blog to remember some of the basic aspects of business (and blogging) promotion:

Design/Branding.
Titles/Content.
Interaction/Personality.
SEO/Structure.
Promotion/Marketing.

An aesthetically pleasing blog environment is one “surface” cornerstone. You could call it your packaging or “branding”. Your branding broadcasts a lot about you and your business. Blog branding directly reflects your business. If it looks horrible, that’s the message your sending to readers.

Titles are critical. Newspapers are masters at this. Think about it, when you look at a book, magazine or newspaper, the title is probably one of the first things you read. If the title captures interest, then readers will dig deeper into your content. Titles should try to include a call to action.

Interaction has always been a successful strategy. Using a blog to educate, inform, guide, demonstrate and so forth… is much the way successful business owners promote their operations. The same holds true in the virtual environment. Interaction shows that somebody is there to serve your clients.

SEO, if search engines know where your content is, what your most important content is and how to access it, this (among other SEO facets) goes a long way to helping search engine users (remember the focus should be on the people) find your most valuable content. The easier your blog is to navigate, the more likely readers can find the content they are looking for.

Promotion and marketing have always been important. Every business that has a blog is able to join the crowd. But, how do you get noticed in a crowd? You don’t. It’s important to bring to fruition the most important aspects that make your blog stand out and get noticed. Nobody is going to give you leadership, you have to earn it.

As I suggested, these are (in my opinion) some of the most common questions, the answers of which don’t really address the deeper aspects. Aspects that show us that it’s no longer content that’s the key to success, but rather a related web of elements.

In my experience, there are four intangible elements that contribute enormously to a blogs success. And arguably may be considered some of the most important elements!

Luck/Karma.
Charisma/Leadership.
Confidence/Trust.
Professionalism/Genuine.

Luck/Karma.

I kid you not! My other blog had several posts go viral. In one case (shortly after I launched the blog) it was sheer luck that a reader posted the link on Digg and that the Digg community moved the post to the front page. That truly was luck. (Update: I’ll blog about this later, but another aspect of good luck was during the launch of this blog, I lost all my content – But Google cache and Live cache returned copies to me).

But can we control luck? Can we make it work to our advantage? I think we can. While this could easily be a separate discussion altogether, I’d still suggest that one way to illicit good luck is to communicate effectively. Tell everyone what you need, plan your goals towards your desires, be optimistic and relax, doing so will allow you to approach any setbacks with a positive attitude. In turn this will help you to turn lemons into lemonade (as your mentality will already be in a positive zone).

Charisma/Leadership.

Participate in your community. Be the mover and shaker. Earn leadership through your insight and wisdom. Don’t micro-manage, rather stand back and look at the whole picture. Connect the people around you into a community and empower their participation. Your blog can be among the best tools to this end.

Confidence/Trust.

When you blog about a topic, mean what you say and follow through. Be genuine in your relations with readers. Always be professional. If you’re writing a controversial post, do so in a positive fashion, comments written with negative or combative language, do not build confidence in you or trust in your blog. Invite guests to contribute content to your blog, doing so goes a long way to building trust and ensuring confidence.

Professionalism/Genuine.

Impart your knowledge in a positive manner. It’s not what you know, but how you express it that helps build your blog success. I am by no stretch of the imagination an expert in online business promotion, network engineering, web development/coding or even Linux blogging. But I’ve had years of training and/or experience in these areas. In particular, my linux blog has taught me that some of the most valuable content on occasion comes from my readers!

Finally, I’d like to clarify again, I’m not suggesting that the value of content has fallen by the way side! Rather that more blogs are savvy to the issue of quality content. Therefore an area that can further a blog’s success is to focus on empowering the four intangeable elements to your fullest potential. Doing so, in my opinion, is one step towards becomming bloggersavvy!

Most business owners are well aware of the role SEO (Search Engine Optimization) plays in promoting their website. That’s actually the number one issue raised by every single client I’ve ever had. They all want to rank high in Google. Some are so focused on SEO, to the exclusion of more effective site promotion tools, that they actually do their site harm! But they all want traffic…

Given the lure of increasing traffic to your website and the inherent increase in revenue that traffic can bring, it’s no wonder how this seems the priority focus when attempting to increase traffic (and revenue leads). SEO is but one aspect that can benefit any business, there are incredible tools to this effect, one of the most beneficial is to use a blog.

Side note: Don’t know what a blog is? Then, you might be interested in my next post “What is Blogging? What’s a Blog“. That post also has a short video showing how a blog performs.

In a future post on this blog (Quality Content is Not “the” Key to a Blog Success), I’ll suggest focusing on the intangible elements to help further increase traffic. It may logically follow therefore, that one of the biggest benefits blogging can provide business owners is the opportunity to develop a personal rapport with blog visitors. Like any business relationship, purchasers like to get to know their suppliers or providers a bit before investing in products and services. People are more likely to spend if they garner an inside peek – it’s a personal exchange. It builds confidence and trust among other things. Think about it for a moment… A web site, in essence is like a multi-page brochure. While that’s good to describe services or products, it does relatively little in terms of interaction, rapport building, social networking, and so forth. There’s really no Call to Action as each visit shows the same old content. Blogs on the other hand, encourage interactivity, communication and repeat visits as content is added on a regular basis.

A web site is one way communication. A blog is two way (actually it’s multiway communication). The blog owner (that’s the business) can talk to the visitor, who can respond AND visitors can communicate with each other as well.

For business owners, that content can include product or service updates, notifications, announcements, videos, personal introductions, podcasting, contests, guest writers, and the list goes on. Think of the scenario this way:

A potential client enters your business, you give them a brochure, they say nothing and leave. They may or may not return. That’s a web site.

No let’s look at the same scenario, from a blogging framework:

A potential client enters your business, you provide them the specific content they require. If they need content you don’t have, it’s a snap to add. The client communicates with you, and you respond. Both of you respond to another client, who replies. That sounds much more like the way things are supposed to be. Dynamic, interactive.

Over the years, I’ve seen time and again how blogs are able to better garner the traffic business owners are looking for. Why? That’s what they were designed for over the years – to be a social platform that allows people or businesses to communicate and build their connections. It’s one thing to read a book (or web site), but much more beneficial to communicate with the authors and visa versa.

To use an example, about a year ago one of my clients launched a web site and a blog a few weeks apart. To this day the blog is obtaining almost double the traffic of the web site. Statistically that seems to be supported in my opinion, when observing all of my clients sites and blogs. All of the blogs are at the top of the list traffic wise, with the sites trailing behind.

Obviously, due to privacy, I cannot divulge specific statistics of clients, I did take a look for some stats, to see if some of these observations are mirrored elsewhere. I found some pretty interesting results. Expansion+ (an Internet Marketing PR site) reported on a Business Blogging Survey. Did you know that “…Almost 89 percent of U.S. respondents and nearly 83 percent of U.K. respondents believe blogs are an important digital communication…”?

Also from their site:

“Ultimately, what this survey revealed was a need for communication professionals in both countries to step up to the plate and start integrating blogging practices into their strategic approach,” said Jacki Vause, managing director of Peppercom’s London office”.

While the survey they were discussing was specifically about “Business Blogging Survey Reveals Corporate Attitude to Social Media” and was intended to “…compare and contrast blogging communication practices in the U.S. and the U.K. and identify best practices…”, I couldn’t help but note some of the prevalent points.

I also looked at another site, which was more targeted to the subject of this blog post. Neville Hobson’s post “Blogs drive business opportunities: UK survey” where some of the key findings he noted included:

50% of companies undertake some form of blogging, either having a blog, or encouraging employees to comment on blogs.
80% of blog users visit blogs within work hours. Most blog users visit blogs at lunchtime (31%), or first thing in the morning (29%).
66% of businesses believe that blogs are becoming more influential as an information source.

Visit the link to his post (above) to see all his other noted findings (as they’re a good indicator of how business owners seem to deal with blogging).

Statistics aside, blogging is a great way for any business to increase traffic. It’s an interesting point to note, that when I conduct training seminars, a fair number of people seemed to have visited both my blogs, already garnering some feel for my business and my professional background – And it makes communication much more effective when I meet with them!

For business owners (actually for anyone) considering launching a blog, I’ve mentioned in other posts, but it’s apt here – Make sure you focus your blog towards a specific niche and target audience (within that niche). Obviously conent from my other blog (a Linux blog) would not work in this blog as it’s not of interest. Therefore, by using a blog, you’re able to provide an added benefit by targeting very specific audiences and therefore garnereing traffic that in many mays could be considered as “qualified leads“, since they may already be looking for what you’ve got.

What do these blog visitors want? I also found (via Google) the results of a German study about corporate blogging. For those who do not speak German, some of the key findings were:

95 % of respondents found it important that the blog they read be updated regularly.
91% of blog readers expect a fast, relevant/appropriate reply to their questions and comments.
90% of readers thought it was important to indicate a difference between commercial and private content.
58% of readers, read them to find news and information they can’t find elsewhere.
57% of respondents were interested in the personal opinions of the authors.
54% of blog visitors formulate their opinions about products and companies from blogs.
51% of readers visit product and/or corporate sites as a results of reading blogs.
43% of visitors were interested in the blog discussions.

Those are some eye opening numbers, that show how important blogs are to business owners. For example, would you like visitors to find out more about your business, it’s products and services elsewhere or from your blog directly? – A blog that can help them formulate an opinion about your business and it’s offerings.

I should note that one point not addressed in the site I reviewed was ROI. All business owners should be aware that the cost of operating a blog is drastically less that a traditional web site. You don’t have to spend the time to learn web coding or invest in designers and developers to update your site content. Using WordPress, it quite easy after the engine is installed. It’s very much like typing your content in an online editor and then clicking publish – Easy!

In conclusion, given the above, it appears that blogging provides the following key benefits to business owners.

Targeted audience.
improved PR (public relations).
Enhanced pre-sales.
Increased traffic due to social interaction.
Community building.
Cost effective ROI.
Improved brand awareness.

In my opinion, businesses that want to compete for attention and traffic in today’s online arena could best leverage the value of their investment by using a blog.

After all, do you want to be communicating with interested people and building your business or would you rather be standing on the corner handing brochures out. In my opinion, the choice is a no-brainer. ;)

I’ve been fielding several questions about the data centre used to house the hosting facilities, for those interested, some of the more interesting details follow below.

Currently  there are some upgrades in the works:

The new routing system powered by Cisco gear, enables a migration to 10 gigabits per second of transport capacity! And then to 40 gigabits per second when it becomes available later this year.

As our clients are aware, we just completed the server platform upgrades, where memory capacity and CPU cores on the servers were doubled.

Also, one excellent change that  impacts our clients is that we do not limit bandwidth usage. We chose this route as it became evident that some clients use less bandwidth, some use more. Overall, things level out. As such it no longer made sense to continue the old fashioned hosting styles which included bandwidth limitations.

A key ongoing issue is that the Internet is quickly running out of IPV4 addresses, as such network upgrades are continuing, increasing transport capacity and smoothing the transition to IPv6.

All servers are located in the “Double Density”, Green data center, Ashland, Virginia, USA. The new, modern facility can deliver 15 KW of power per cabinet, a big jump from the norm for other area facilities, of 6 KW per cabinet. This high-end facility supports mission critical Internet operations. Its professional grade data distribution, enables fast and scalable connections to any of the major carriers.

One issue that stands out is that the Data Centre in Green!

In providing Web Hosting, we do run web, email, etc. servers, and they generate a massive amount of carbon emissions. Understandably this is not best for our environment.

It was important to work with partners that actively reduce carbon emissions and be more eco friendly. We’re happy  about the following results:

As you’re aware we already upgraded our servers which are more energy efficient and thus are more eco friendly.
Renewable and recyclable products are being used.
The data centre architects where required to be LEED certified (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design), and only use LEED products.
However more was needed…

The energy supplier was brought into the mix and a request was tabled by the data centre, that all supplied energy be from renewable sources only (Solar, Wind, etc.). There is a solar and wind farm located near the data centre. As such, the servers are now 100% powered by renewable Wind and Solar energy!

What does this mean?

The removal of 375 cars from the road each year or
Powering 231 homes with clean and reliable energy for a year or
Saving around 3,571 barrels of oil or
Protecting 229 acres of forest per year.

Want your site on a Green, Carbon Neutral server?

You can review and select your hosting account – And can even request a specific custom setup, to meet your needs

Finally, all clients who host their sites on our servers are welcome to place the following code on their own sites:

<a href="http://rogerwheatley.com/web-server-hosting-data-centre/"><img style="border: 0pt none;" title="This is a Green, Carbon Neutral Website. Please click to learn more" src="http://rogerwheatley.com/img/carbon-neutral.png" alt="This is a Green, Carbon Neutral Website. Please click to learn more" width="140" height="50" /></a>

Great News!

For every one of our existing web hosting clients, if you refer someone to us, we will give you $90 if they retain our web hosting services! That’s not just for one client referral, you get $90 for each and every web hosting client you refer to us! If ten of your referrals purchase our hosting services, we give you $900. It’s that easy. Feel free to refer anybody you want, members of your mailing lists, your clients, friends, family, anybody! It’s a win-win. It costs you nothing other than a few minutes or seconds to pass on the information.

It’s a simple, easy way to get a super cash bonus!

Here’s how it works…

1. You (our client) refer someone to us for services.
2. Your referred client purchases a one-year or longer web hosting period from us.
3. We send you a cheque for $90.00 or simply credit your account.

It’s easy to refer anybody, just call me at 416.825.0013 or use the handy online contact form!

Again, please don’t hesitate to send referrals and pass this information to anybody you’d like to. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Any changes to the above will be posted on this page, therefore please recheck this from time-to-time.

As always…
Have a great day!

Roger

Here is how to set up Windows Mail to work with your email account.

You will need the following information to complete this setup guide:

Your email address.
Your email address login password.
The SMTP address of your ISP provider.
Your POP3 address.

1. From the Start menu, click the email Windows Mail icon.
2. Click “Tools”, then select “Accounts”.
3. In the “Internet Accounts” window, click “Add”.
4. Select “eMail Account”, then click “Next”.
5. Enter “Display name” information (usually that is your full name), then click “Next”
6. Enter email address (something@yourdomain.com), then click “Next”.
7. Select “POP3″ from the drop down menu. Now enter the Incoming and Outgoing mail server locations.Incoming mail server (POP3)
   Your incoming server is yourdomain.com, where “yourdomain.com” is the actual name of your domain.

   Outgoing mail server (SMTP)
   Enter smtp.yourISP.com for your outgoing mail server. Use the outgoing SMTP address your ISP provider gave you. (If you use Roger’s High Speed Internet, then you should enter: smtp.broadband.rogers.com).

   Click “Next”.

8. Enter email username. (That’s your full email address).
   Enter Password. (Your password is case sensitive).
   Select or deselect the Remember password box, depending on preferences.
   Click “Next”
9. Click “Do not download my email at this time”, then click “Finish”.

Roger Wheatley provides cutomized public seminars and presentations for businesses and organizations. If you would like to book a seminar for your business or organization, or are interested in learning more, please contact us.

Here is how to set up Microsoft Outlook to work with your email account (which is part of your hosting service). The version used is Microsoft Outlook 2003, but these settings are similar in other versions of Outlook as well, (previous versions of Outlook use the same settings).

1. Select Tools/eMail Accounts.
2. Select “Add a new eMail account” and click Next.
3. Select “POP3″ and click Next.
4. On “Internet eMail Settings (POP3)” window, enter your information as follows:

Your Name
Enter your first and last name.
eMail Address
Enter your web hosting related email address.
User Name
Enter your web hosting related email address, again.
Password
Enter the password you set up for your web hosting related email account.
Incoming mail server (POP3)
Your incoming server is yourdomain.com, where “yourdomain.com” is the actual name of your domain.
Outgoing mail server (SMTP)
Enter smtp.yourISP.com for your outgoing mail server. Use the outgoing SMTP address your ISP provider gave you. (If you use Roger’s High Speed Internet, then you should enter: smtp.broadband.rogers.com). Click “More Settings”

5. On the Internet eMail Settings window, select the “Outgoing Server” tab.
6. Select “My outgoing server (SMTP) requires authentication.”
7. Select “Log on Using” and enter the username and password for outgoing email (SMTP) provided by your ISP.
8. Select the “Advanced” tab and change the “Outgoing server (SMTP)” port to the port number your ISP gave you. If you are a Roger’s High Speed Internet client, your (SMTP) port number will be 587. If you wish to leave mail on the server for a few days, select the “Leave a copy of messages on the server” option and select a reasonable number of days.
9. Click “Okay”, click “Next”.
10. Click “Finish”.

Roger Wheatley provides cutomized public seminars and presentations for businesses and organizations. If you would like to book a seminar for your business or organization, or are interested in learning more, please contact us.

Solutions

• Blogging for business marketing
• Improving, Fixing, Migrating Wordpress
• eCommerce services
• Video media development
• Web development
• Graphic design
• Print media
• Web and Server hosting
• Web business consulting
• Copy and web content writing