Marketing With Blogs and RSS - The Hot New Tools of 2005
In case you haven't heard, the net is buzzing with talk of
blogging and RSS. Once the province strictly of people who
got a kick out of publishing online diaries, and later of
political and social commentarists, blogs and RSS are being
adopted by the internet marketing community. This is the hot new trend for 2005. The word "blog" was
actually selected as the word of the year for 2004, and
2005 promises to be the year of the blog. So what is all the fuss about? Well, especially with the
increasing restrictions on email marketing, including ISP
blocking of mail amounting to estimates of 40% of all email
never getting delivered, marketers began to look for new
avenues to get their message out. Enter blogs and RSS. Delivered straight to a user's desktop, the content of an
RSS feed is unfiltered by anyone. Users can subscribe and
unsubscribe anonymously, with the click of a mouse, and
have no fear that their personal information will be
shared. RSS is "pull" technology, meaning that the user
asks for it, in contrast to email, which is often unasked
for, and thus is often "push" technology. Blogs, which are usually publicized by way of an RSS feed,
among other venues, are the current darlings for the search
engine spiders. Search engines love blogs, because they
are full of content, are frequently changing, are devoid of
"flash", graphics, and other distractions, and are full of
outgoing links. If you know anything about search engine optimization, you know
that those are the characteristics that should you strive for
when optimizing a conventional page for the search engines.
The pages in a blog are that way by their very nature, and thus
attract the search engine spiders. Why do marketers love blogs? Numerous reasons. They are simple to create and maintain. They afford the
opportunity to publish links to other sites, and to the
interior pages of other sites. Their popularity with human
visitors makes them natural targets for traffic. Their
constantly changing content attracts the search engine
spiders, which then follow the links that they find, and
index the pages of other websites. Many savvy internet marketing experts have suggested that
the best way to capture an audience of potential customers
is to provide them free information, either through a
"content site" that does little direct selling, or through
publication of an informative email newsletter that gives
free information and at most employs a "soft sell" when
endorsing products. A blog is the perfect blend of the two. It has often been
suggested that the best way to start an online business is
with a free newsletter, which allows you to develop your
"list". While a blog doesn't develop your "list" in quite
the same way, it does afford you the opportunity to develop
a loyal following among your readers, which accomplishes
much the same purpose as having a "list". Whether you announce or endorse a product through an email
list or a blog, you are announcing it to people who want to
hear what you have to say. Your blog readers are probably
more eager, in many cases, than are readers of your mass
emails. I could go on and on about the merits of blogs. If you are
promoting any product or service online, you owe it to yourself
to check out what can be done with blogs and RSS. John Barbour, Ph.D. is the author of a new blogging guide
which teaches people how to promote any product or service
online using blogs and RSS. John also maintains several internet marketing educational
websites, and manages a new directory for blogs related to
internet marketing. Visit the emarketing blog directory and
find an interesting blog, or submit your own for inclusion.
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RSS for Newbies; A Quick Tutorial
"RSS" stands for "Really Simple Syndication". It is a new way to distribute content. Any content: websites, blogs, forums, etc.
To explain what this means, for once let's start at the end.
Introduction to Really Simple Syndication (RSS)
Really Simple Syndication is exactly what it's name states. A very simple way to syndicate your websites contents to other websites and news reading programs. This article describes the benefits of creating an RSS feed, and not how to produce one, or integrate other peoples RSS feeds in to your website.
What Is A Blog?
Blogs can be described in many definitions and they are all correct.
Im a Failed Blogger!
I've never been popular in my whole life. I think there must be something inside me that didn't get enough attention as a kid or something because I seem to find myself looking for it all the time. I think about some of the career paths I have walked down: I've been a musician, a pastor (who gets to get on a platform and talk to people ? getting attention ? even if I do have something selfless to say ? I like the feeling I get when I feel like people "get it" ? anybody else have this in common?), I've been a stand-up comedian (here, there's a real pressure to get people to like you because if they don't, they let you know fast). I even started "blogging" because a lot of great bloggers are out there and they seem to know how to type just the right things to get lots and lots of feedback. Heck, I figured I'd tried everything else, why not see if I get some feedback, too. And you know what I found out?
Steps To Creating and Promoting RSS Feeds
RSS, or Really Simple Syndication as it is commonly known, is a technology that gives webmasters the ability to easily distribute and publish syndicated content on the Internet. It seems like all Internet businesses now have RSS feeds available; at least your competitors do. You have finally made the decision that you have to have one. Where do you start?
How To Display RSS Feeds on Your Website
This article is intended as a guide for webmasters who want to display automatically updated content on their website in the form of RSS feeds. In this article I will cover the easiest method to implement using javascript for displaying RSS on websites to create additional dynamic content. This will allow you to display headlines from syndicated content around the web on your website.
RSS to Javascript.
By far the easiest method is to use client side javascript to parse and display the headlines on your site. To achieve this all you need to do is cut and paste some HTML or javascript code into the web page where you want the RSS feed headlines to display.
To achieve this there are several sites that offer a free service that will allow you to select a few options to choose your feed source and display formatting parameters. You will then be presented with some javascript code that you can cut and paste into your website.
Now before I give you the address of the sites that offer this service freely there are a few points I need to clarify with you. Although you will achieve your goal of displaying dynamic content on your site in a few short minutes there are some downsides to this method.
Javascript is not search engine friendly.
As you may or may not already know, javascript is not visible to search engine spiders. They will not see the RSS feed you have parsed into your site and so this will not benefit you if you are doing this to better your search engine rankings.
You are using a third party service.
The second potential downside is that although the javascript is on your site you are actually calling a script on another server. This could lead to a couple of potential problems. If the server is busy it will mean the news feed will take longer to display on your site. The other point is if the third party server fails or disappears altogether then your feed will not be displayed at all.
In summary there are a few downsides, but if you do not code and want some feeds on your site quickly then this is the way to go. Ok, so now you understand what is involved here are the links to the sites that provide the free RSS to javascript service. All you need to do is follow the on site instructions.
Feed2JS
RSS2HTML
RSS-to-Javascript
FeedSweep
RSS Xpress Lite
How To Add Random RSS Content To Your Site
Most savvy internet marketers will know how important it is to have fresh content added to their sites on a daily basis but the problem sometimes is to find the time and/or content. Adding an RSS feed is a good way to add fresh content to a site, but the problem again is that most of them only get updated on a weekly basis.
6 Ways That Blogging Can Save You Money
Even though I've had several personal blogs for years, I've only been officially business blogging since 2003. So in going back over expenses for the last quarter, you can imagine my shock when I realized that my overall business costs were down about 19%. What saved me so much money? Surprisingly, blogging.
How can you save money with your blog? It's pretty simple, so I'll be brief.
Attract search engine traffic without paying the big bucks
If you want Google, Yahoo and MSN to pay attention to you, blog.
It doesn't have to be a whole new site, just add a directory to your existing site and start blogging. Most blog software solutions are either cheap or free.
And you can find out most basic blog information online for free (really, sometimes just typing your question into Google will do it.) by people who've actually done it. For less than $100, you can build a small library of blog tips and secrets, written by successful business bloggers.
Instead of buying links, get one-way links from blog search engines and directories, as well as getting your RSS feed content displayed at other sites.
Linking is a great way to get search engine attention and click traffic. Some people get links by trading; others by including their links at the end of freely distributed articles. Others pay to be listed, or to get linked.
In each of these scenarios, some type of trade takes place, money, free content, or a link back.
When you blog, you'll find plenty of search engines and directories that are willing to list you free of charge. For the most part you won't need to link back - you'll get a one-way link from site favored by search engines, often using text that you select yourself.
If 90 or more of these free, legitimate links back to your site is worth your time, then get you blog in motion.
Not only that, if you update frequently, other sites may want to display your RSS feed content on their sites. To encourage them to do so, put a link on your page with instructions on how to do so. Ever since I put one on the front of my site, various feeds from my main site have turned up in the most unexpected places.
Cheaper way to study your audience.
As your blog gets more popular, you may start to find that on any given day, you have a representative cross-section of prospects and clients at your site. If you have a question for them, you can just... ask.
True, you can post a link to a survey in your newsletter or on your site, but these are not as interactive as the ability for your audience to comment. They will comment, and you can reply to ask them to expand, or clarify. Conversation gets going and before you know it, a bond is formed, a much stronger bond than occurs in a one-way conversation.
Cheaper (and faster) way to start a resource or authority site.
Five years ago, if you wanted to start an authority site, your best bet was to build a portal with a specialized directory at its core. Three years ago, you were better off starting a forum with a resource section attached to it. Last year, your top bet was a feed-enabled content management system, especially as more parts of content management systems began to have content feeds related to them. (I have 12 feeds for each of my PHP-Nuke based sites, though they don't work as well with Google Tap.)
Now, if you want to be the expert, you want to start a blog.
If you're blogging consistently, you have a hub of information collected that will inspire return traffic. You have a collection of links to articles, sites, and tools. You can constantly write up your own opinion editorials on each of these items, as well as fact-based analysis of news and events that can help your audience make better choices.
As blog software matures you can now categorize, and alphabetize your links, and with the ability to ping multiple sources as well as leave trackback links to other sites, you can send your readers through a ring of related, freshly updated information that ultimately leads back to you.
Spend less money on advertising as your blog becomes more popular
I can't promise you that you'll never spend another red cent on advertising costs. However, the amount of free advertising you get from having your blog link or RSS feed listed in dozens of search engines and directories, and popping up in feed readers is not to be underestimated.
You'll probably still want to do some ezine advertising when your new ebook or software release is debuted. But you may not need to buy as much advertising or purchase as often.
Then there is the fact that many newsletters that are also published to RSS feeds have wider reach. I've found that it's worth the extra money to appear in both versions ? ask your favorite publisher for details. For publications that allow this, it's normally only 20% extra
Save money by retaining visitors
You've probably heard a thousand times that it is easier to sell repeatedly to an existing client than it is to find a new one. So how do you get that visitor to come back, and possibly buy again?
A constant stream of new information on a particular topic work is enough to keep people buying a daily newspaper, subscribing to a magazine or viewing a television series.
Frequent updates can work the same way for your site.
With bloggers being named People of the Year by Time magazine last year, if you're not blogging in 2005, you're going to be left in the dust by other sites in your industry that do. It doesn't have to take up a lot of extra time, and the time it does takes is made up for in the money you can save.
The Real Bloggers Must Come From Another Planet - I Can?t Find Any Here On Earth
What in the world is up with the world of blogs? Blogs are meant to be this great new technology where people can share their ideas and interests with others around the globe. As far as I'm concerned the state of blogs is one of chaos, confusion, and anti-interactivity. The other day I decided to do some research on the Web and try to connect to some blog writers out there that interested me. Let me tell you it was not an enjoyable task as I had envisioned. I spent four painful hours surfing through around a thousand on-line journals, and I found only a few that interested me. What are we doing out there people?
Top 7 Reasons Why Your Business Should Use RSS
In today's online world of high-speed websites and giant portals, every established Internet business boasts of delivering content via RSS.
Marketing With Blogs and RSS - The Hot New Tools of 2005
In case you haven't heard, the net is buzzing with talk of
blogging and RSS. Once the province strictly of people who
got a kick out of publishing online diaries, and later of
political and social commentarists, blogs and RSS are being
adopted by the internet marketing community.
For Wordpress users version 1.5 new feature ?Pages?
After many requests from wordpress users, the latest version of wordpress has a build in option to create static pages. You can use static pages for an about page, contact page, a links page, etc. This dreamhost review page is an example of a stand alone static page. The advantages are that you can add stand alone content to its own page, outside the normal weblog hierarchy. Pages have the same editing options, plug-in functionality and themes as posts. Or you can customize the stand alone page as much as you want. Static pages also help search engine indexing, as opposed to dynamic urls.
Blog Construction
Blogs like all forms of writing are an art form that takes knowledge and practice to do well.
What is an RSS Aggregator or RSS Reader?
I keep hearing about RSS, XML and RSS feeds. I just barely have a clue what they
are,
but when people then start talking about RSS aggregators, what are they talking
about and why would I want one? Do you use an aggregator, and if so, which one?
10 Benefits of Being a Blogger
I have been a blogger since September 2004 but only began to take it seriously this year. My blogging journey began when I stumbled upon a company owned by Google named Blogger.com that offered free tools to build a website.
RSS And The Billion Channel Internet
The real potential of RSS lies in Broadcasting.
Strategic RSS Positioning: How to Hotwire Your Site to Google!
There's no denying it, the Internet has changed. The change was so
subtle most people missed it. It was no great momentous event, just
a slight sideways flex in how information is exchanged on the web.
However, this slight shift has significant ramifications for anyone
trying to achieve top rankings in the different search engines.
So keep reading to find out how you can use this new SEO wildcard to
'hotwire' your site to the major search engines such as Google, Msn
and Yahoo.
Blogging Your Way To Success Part 2
(Continued from Blogging Your Way To Success Part 1)
How To Build Traffic To Your Blog
RSS Responder is a new script that allows you to keep in touch and follow-up with your subscribers without the hassle of email.
15 Top Blog Marketing Tips
1. Place all your feeds on the following website and the directories listed on this page - http://www.rss-feeds-directory.com/blog_lists.html
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