Guruisms
for the week of 15-03-09
I don’t mind telling you where
I think the gold is but you gotta do your own digging!
G
We’ve all heard that when there
is a gold rush on the real money is in selling shovels. I bet the guys selling
maps didn’t do too bad either.
G
'Tis
better to be silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt.
Attributed to Abraham Lincoln.
Never
try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and annoys the pig.
My Grandma
Why Would I Stop Buying From Who I Used to Buy From and Start Buying From You?
The single biggest thing about my
lack of a life as an SEO that has always amazed me is when I ask a prospective
client to tell me why I would want to buy from them instead of buying from
their competitor, in other words, what makes their offer better than someone else’s,
no one, not a single person who has sought me out as an SEO has EVER been able to
answer that simple question without my having to prompt them.
SEO is not a way to “get around”
having a business plan or a solid, value-driven product or service. In fact, if
you don’t have a USP,(unique selling proposition), SEO is the last thing you
need! You might as well invest in TV viewing as investing in SEO. If you can’t
answer that question, it pays about the same.
I have tried so many times in so
many ways for so long to get that across to anyone that would listen that one
would think I’d just give it up. But like flies to stink, I just can’t pass it by.
I have recently had yet one more
opportunity to step to the virtual podium and preach. As the aforementioned
flies, I carpe diemed.
I think LinkedIn, like so many other
great web ideas, has turned into little more than a poor man’s ad trough. So
many of the questions are thinly disguised self promotional offerings of the
fecal persuasion designed to impress readers with the posters acumen for their
business du jour, be it tech, design, SEO or whatever. The idea of course being
to ask and answer your own question. OOOOHHHH so clever!
That is why primarily why I spend
little time there any longer.
However, LinkedIn, not to be
outdone by their own members at spamming you and trying to make it appear as “help”
to avoid having to actually pay for advertising, send me emails of topics I was
interested in some 4 years ago and every now and then I get sucked in by the
title of a question and finding myself re-affirming my belief that so-called
seo’s can be some of the absolute worst marketers on the planet.
NOTE: If I offended you by saying that, maybe you should be honest with
yourself and go read The Purple Cow http://www.amazon.com/Purple-Cow-Transform-Business-Remarkable/dp/159184021X
On one such recent occasion I
uncharacteristically replied in the hopes it may have a positive impact on
somebody somewhere and I’d like to share it now for the same reason.
I
hope I’m not infringing on anyone’s copyrights but you’d think they would
appreciate the link. Anyway, I’ve removed the names to protect the guilty.
With internet marketing getting bigger by the day
& loads of options available- What should one really do to promote a
business/website online optimally? A lot of our clients keep asking..
The following would be our
recommendation to get started (in this sequence) -
1. Optimize your website for Search Engines. This has to be done while the
website is being built since it involves laying the right foundation. Basically
search engines should be able to clearly ‘read’ through the context of the
website and through the key content elements of the website. This link should
give you an idea about some of the basics that need to be done. http://www.magnoninternational.com/on-page-optimization-services.asp
2. Set up a Google Ad Words Account and start experimenting with the
effectiveness of various keywords. You can fix your daily/weekly/monthly spends
depending on the amount of money you would like to spend.
3. Submit to other free/paid directories. This is some free Online Advertising.
4. If you have some kind of a ‘relevant’ database, get a nice looking mailshot
designed with the right message and visual appeal. Use an application like Verticxxxxponse.com to shoot out the Email.
5. Create a Blog on your website- put in user friendly content that relates to
your website. Remember good content attracts people.. This should work as a
good ‘pull’ mechanism. Blogs are usually picked up very easily by Search
Engines as they are content intensive. This will also help your efforts for
Step 1. Check our blog.xxxxxxxx.com
6. Social Marketing - The buzz about Web 2.0 marketing is for real. Try using
Social Networking sites like LinkedIn (like you are now), Facebook, Twitter,
Digg etc. These are some ways of Free Advertising. Get an agency to do this for
you if you would like to do a lot of volume of work here.
If you liked this piece of information or want to add on to it, or have
thoughts contrary to what we think - please leave your comments on our Blog
{G comment---- notice the link drops to his emailspam aff site and his own blog. A lesson in just how thin a thinly disguised ad can be?}
To which I replied
>What should one really do to promote a
business/website online optimally?<
If we're talking optimally, then you're way off. Optimally -- how about knowing
you have something worth promoting. Doing a little market research and then
developing a strategy with measurable milestones.
BUT if you are referring to optimally in terms of another get out of debt/texas
holdem/college degree affiliate site, then what you're describing is still sooo
2007.
Optimally, you want a site that engages the visitor by offering unique value
PLUS something more. All those things you mentioned are efforts in traffic
generation, (except #4 anyway. that is spamming and if we're taking that
approach why build a site at all?). Traffic is too easy to get and not worth
that much effort. Hell, if you want traffic just buy it.
The hard part is being able to offer real value in a hyper competitive arena.
Unless you just WANT to make less money than the next poorest competitor, and
plan to make sales by selling based solely on having the cheapest price, then
you have to find something that makes it worth spending more for your stuff
than they would spend for the other guys stuff.
Once you have that figured out, promoting is easy and even 2007 techniques will
work just fine.
If you're clients are asking, you may THINK they are asking about seo, ,
(because they are looking for some kind of magic fairy dust), BUT what they are
really asking is for you to give them a way "around" the hard stuff I
just mentioned.
PS
if you don't have that product worth promoting thingee down --- then spamming
people from a "relevant" database as suggested in #4 isn't going to
do it for you either.
{end reply}
Peach Y’all
G
PS
Now I’ll get back to talking
about the, “sound and graphics to illicit a somatic response” stuff I promised
in my next post. I’m also looking forward to talking about subliminal messages!
Go git your Sunday
school clothes on and you BETTER NOT git ‘em dirty before we git there!