Digging for Dollars: Links Are The Bees, Content Is The Honey

The word is getting out:  Content is Everything

To most of my readers, this is old news.  But then, my honey attracts a specialized and rare bee - the motivated DIY website publisher.

What I mean is that the greater internet community is catching on finally and it is even spilling over into print media.  Or rather flooding into it.

In his Business 2.0 article “Cashing in on the Zeitgeist” (April 2007) Paul Sloan covers Daniel Kovach’s strategy to bring the buzz to his scholarship information site.

Kovach’s strategy is cashing in on trends and buzz in the “how to find a scholarship” market.

He does this by finding stories that get him links from social sites like Digg.

In the Business 2.0 article, Sloan outlines one of Kovach’s biggest successes in generating a high ranking for a trend in the scholarship arena:  Boston University’s whites-only scholarship.

This story, as you can imagine, was generating heated discussion, lots of news coverage, and a lot of searches on the web related to the topic.

Kovach had a piece written for his site called “The White Man’s Guide To Getting A Minority Scholarship,” and got it into Digg where it hit the front page.

As most people in our industry know, hitting the front of Digg is pay dirt.

And it pays to be a “scholar” of your niche in order to turn up stories and ideas for linkbait like Kovach does.

I’ve outlined how you can be a media sleuth for your market and turn up pieces of gold that you can turn into links and higher rankings in other posts.

There is a lot of truth in Kovach’s statement about being on top of all the information flowing in your market:  “You have to sift through it all.  No one is going to hand you pieces of trend gold.”

I think this is the big lesson for most content providers and future authority site hopefuls.

In order to be the authority you have to do in your niche what no one else is willing or able to do:  monitor and capture trends as they are hitting in order to take advantage of the buzz and be one of, if not the first to visibly hit the web with it.

I say “visibly” because there is a lot that goes unnoticed on the web by the majority of every market niche.

Which means there is a massive opportunity in building and marketing sites that help people find things.

The search engines all have different ways to displaying their idea of the top ten for any search term.

Most searches are casual and interest tends to fizzle out past the first page or two of results.

People quickly get frustrated by their results even if they are on what they consider to be the best search engine on the planet.

That’s where the authority site publisher comes in.

Not only is an authority site publisher good at isolating and capitalizing on trends in a market, but they are search engine savvy and can put themselves on the front page of the engines for their desired search terms.

The combination of the two is a deadly one.  It’s a one-two punch that cannot be defeated except by other rare publishers with this skill set.

And there’s 9 spots available in the top ten for that kind of competition.  To this day, despite the plethora of search engine optimization firms and free SEO advice galore, search engine rankings are mostly accidental.

When you marry buzzworthy content skills with the ability to control your search result destiny, there’s not much anyone can do to stop you from dominating your niche.

That means traffic, and a lot of it.  Which leads to monetization through advertising, product creation, affiliate marketing, and lead generation.

It is a formula.  Although it has a lot of moving parts, it is the only formula for assured domination in any market on the web that will be viable even after 10 more generations of fly-by-night cheating strategies come and go.

The way to learn this art and science is to hang out in places where people actually practice it successfully.

The ideal would be to find a place where publishers practice it almost religiously.  There you can key in on how to best put it to use to bump your site(s) in rankings and traffic by watching what the core is doing.

Tags: authority site building, blog marketing, business 2.0, creating buzz, social media, website promotion

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Free Social Marketing Course Update

I am having a blast with our latest free social marketing course “Authority Black Book.”

The comments, kudos, and results are showing up every day over at the Authority Black Book Blog and it seems we really hit a home run with thousands and thousands of downloads in one week.

There are now too many blogs mentioning the ABB to mention here and now, but I will try to get all of you guys linked here ASAP after the dust settles!

Want some idea of how big this thing has gotten? Google results for the exact phrase “authority black book.”

Today over 42,000 pages reference it.  In 1 week.

Its become a “movement” in a week!

And it was done without a single major JV partner (with a list over 200,000) to date, although they are coming on board and I don’t know what’s going to happen then!

People are Sick and Tired

People are so sick and tired of gimmicks and crappy free products used only to get them on a list.

Then the list owner proceeds to hammer them over the head with mail after mail for more and more junk they don’t need to succeed with their online business.

That’s why we call ABB a movement. It is a statement that things can be different.

That people can provide ultra high quality free products and still be ok.

In fact, we are doing much better than ok, because as soon as people saw what we are giving away for free, they started signing up for Authority Site Center en masse this week.

The lesson is:

Provide something to your market that is so high quality that your credibility is never in question so you can rise above the hucksters in your market who are presently ripping their customers off big time.

The way to stand out is to stand up and raise the bar higher than the scammers can ever reach. It’s because they just don’t understand, and never will, the simple principle of giving before asking for trust.

There will be more lessons from the field as this progresses. So far we have only hit a tiny portion of the market.

When the major players online pick up on how promoting our guide helps their credibility with their own lists, the thing is going to blow up!

Thanks to everyone who has downloaded Authority Black Book so far.

You haven’t seen anything yet! 1.1 is coming soon!

Tags: authority black book review, authority site building, free marketing course, free seo course, website promotion

Get More Links!

66 Ways to Get More Links and 101 Link Building Tips - all in one post.  That’s “High Quality Web 2.0!”  (Adam Sandler, Waterboy)

I read a lot of resource posts. You know, posts with a big list of links that everyone links to if the list is good, or even moderately good.

Most of them are there only for the sake of getting more links for themselves and nothing more. (i.e. their quality and usefulness to readers is debatable.)

But Brandon could have SO gotten away with far less link building information than this and still gotten a lot of links.

I think somewhere in there the guy must actually care about his fellow marketers. :)  If you want to know how the biggest and the best promoters online get more links, here’s a big chunk of the answer.

(Don’t you DARE forget who told you about this!)

• Read It Here To Get More Links
• 101 Link Building Tips - this is a popular post for a reason… it rocks!  Read it, put it to use, and get more links by morning.
  

Tags: get more links, getting links, link building, seo tools

Tuesday Power Linking

Below is an example of me taking the day off. All top bloggers do it. Few others understand it.

Well, in short, we get tired or busy and have to post something, so we “Power Link” to each other and share killer resources without having to write a totally original piece from scratch.

Enjoy!

• What Does It Mean To Optimize A Blog Post? - Excellent article by Aaron Wall
• Content Spinning: A Warning You Should Heed! - This is an excellent article from Brandon over at SEOFeed.com.
• CopyBlogger’s Lazy Sunday Linkage Post - Great resources here. Watch for the link to Seth Godin’s Purple Cow promotion to see if you are really promoting yourself in every way possible.
• Example of YouTube promotion strategy - Michelle MacPhearson shares how you drive traffic from YouTube with a case study.
• John Carlton on the Care and Feeding of Your Future - Very good article, as always, from John Carlton.
• 10 Spam Stopping Techniques For Your Blog - Don’t just manage your spam. Destroy it!
• Finally, something funny - These headlines are hilarious!

Have a great day everyone!

I am going to catch up on all my email that piled up while I was in Orlando speaking to a great group of people at Mark Hendricks’ ISS Mastermind Group.

Tags: blogging tips, copyblogger, john carlton, marketing tips, problogger, seth godin, spam tips

Who’s Afraid of the Big Black Book? (Your Competition Is!)

Apparently not Michel Fortin.  He reviewed the Authority Black Book and our Web 2.0-ish sales letter for ASC.

Read Fortin’s “Birth of a Better Salesletter” to see what he thinks of both!

I’m proud on both counts for the mention by one of the web’s greatest copywriters… ever.

—

Mark Hendricks likes the black book.   We used a lot of it today when I presented Social Power Linking tactics as a VIP guest speaker here in Orlando at his awesome ISS event.

—

Carl Galletti went through the whole Authority Black Book and teased his readers with tiny snippets of gold.

“Last night I read what I think is the best and most valuable
book I’ve ever seen on linking and getting traffic to your
site.”

—

It seemed to please one of the hardest to please guys on the web…

“Jack, this ebook is fantastic. I’ve downloaded a LOT of crap lately and this free, did I just say free? ebook is simply awesome. I’m not sure what your angle is. I don’t know what the backend product will be. I just don’t really care. This resource is simply amazing.
I threw a post up on my blog saying as much.
http://lostballinhighweeds.com/

I think it will help with not only Lost Ball but all my other blog efforts. Thanks again for a fabulous read.”

—

Other mentions for Authority Black Book:

• Authority Site Center Offers Free Report - Black Book of Web 2.0
• Learn Web 2.0 Insider Power Tools
• The Most Amazing FREE report EVER!

Tags: authority black book, authority site building, internet marekting, social marketing, web 2.0, website promotion

Web 2.0 Blogger Asks “Is Web 2.0 Your Enemy?”

From Laura Childs at StampedeSecret.com:

“Is Web 2.0 Your Enemy?

Web 2.0 sites are your competition (for eyeballs and positioning in the search engines), but they’re not your enemy. After all, you could build your own Web 2.0 site, market the snot out of it and take back your rightful position…”

In her post, Laura makes it clear that Web 2.0 is not a thing to fear, but to adopt as part of your own marketing plan.

Since it isn’t going anywhere (interactive, user-controlled sites are being popped out onto the web at a break-neck pace) everyone with a website and formerly great rankings needs to understand and utilize the positives about Web 2.0 instead of trying to bully their way through their markets with old tactics that don’t work anymore.

There are many good points made by Laura in her post, and she also has a lot of other great information to help online marketers understand where the web has been, where it is now, and where it’s going.

Further Web 2.0 Marketing Resources

• Great Web 2.0 Marketing Sites
• StumbleUpon Some Web 2.0 Traffic!
• The Free Authority Black Book:  I bet you’ve never seen a better free guide to Web 2.0 marketing in your life!

Tags: getting links, getting traffic, laura childs, social marketing, social media marketing, web 2.0, web 2.0 marketing

7 Crucial Wordpress Hacks: Video Tutorials

You can find a bounty of how-to videos for Wordpress users over at Tubetorial.com.

Here are 7 Wordpress hacks (video tutorials) you can use to boost traffic today:

1. How to Get More Search Engine Traffic With One Simple Tweak
2. How to Make More Money With AdSense
3. Feedvertising: Make Money With Your RSS Feed
4. More Feedback, Less Spam: WordPress Contact Form Plugin
5. How to Increase Comments and Page Views With One Quick and Easy Plugin
6. How to Stop Comment Spam without Lifting a Finger
7. Back Up Your Blog or Risk Losing It All

More blog marketing video tutorials.

Tags: blog marketing videos, how to videos, tubetorial.com, video tutorials, wordpress videos

How to subscribe to an RSS feed in FireFox

This is a great, easy tutorial on how to subscribe to an RSS feed in FireFox.

I am finding many people still don’t know how they can subscribe to feeds. And since it is anonymous and guarantees 100% deliverability, neither of which you can get from email, RSS feeds are the way to go when dealing with massive amounts of information from several sources.

(While saving your inbox from too many email subscriptions!)

Practice with The Friday Traffic Report! Subscribe to our feed.

Other Blog Marketing Tutorials

Tags: firefox, how to subscribe to rss feeds, RSS, rss and firefox, rss feed

Authority Site Review: CheatingWays.com is HOT!

How to build a hot traffic magnet 101

Find a hot market:  Cheating husbands, wives, girlfriends, and boyfriends and their other halves looking for information on how to deal, get even, or break it off.  (the relationship) 
Build a hot site:  CheatingWays.com

Provide hot content:  e.g. A recent post about an upskirt peek prank video.  Comedy and sex rolled into one.  A killer combo on the web, or anywhere.

CheatingWays.com is the brainchild of an ASC member who is experiencing some really amazing results with her new authority site, even though it is still a “baby” authority site.

It is a perfect example of isolating content a hungry market wants and providing original and 3rd party information on a platform the search engines love to death.

(Seriously, bandwidth is an issue if you own an authority site, which is why ASC is starting to offer dedicated servers for members who have outgrown their shared hosting accounts!)

Is sex the only thing that really sells on the web?

You know better than that.  But it is a great example of the formula:

hungry audience + killer content + tweaked out content management system = high traffic authority site

You can’t bring a stronger product to the market than one people feel they need badly.  The hit show “Cheaters” was all about rubber-necking at others misery and how they dealt with a cheating spouse.

Makes sense to bring it to the web.

And so far the stats are showing CheatingWays.com was a darn good idea.

It is getting links, daily traffic increases, and generating buzz.  All key components to early success with a baby authority site.

The design is killer too.  I think anyone can get the point of the site right off the bat!

Want a site like CheatingWays.com?

Here’s how it was created.

Tags: authority, authority site building, authority site review, authority sites

Web 2.0 Marketing and Traffic Generation Sites

Below are some of my top picks for the best Web 2.0 marketing sites for the Friday Traffic Report so far this year.

MyBlogLog - As you can see on the right, I get a lot of regular visitors from fellow bloggers registered at MyBlogLog.

Despite the spam scare early on, where someone would come in an sign up anonymously and visit each and every site each and every day, you can see that is not a problem. Everyone on the right has a face or an icon. And they are as targeted as you can get for readership for FTR.

Netscape - I started posting here after I opened my log files one day and noticed a nice big chunk of new visitors all coming from Netscape. Last time I used them was like 6 years ago, so I naturally wondered what the heck was going on. Turns out they are a Digg-like site now and someone had posted one of my posts there.

Then blammo! 500+ visits in less than 24 hours. From one posting. Get an account and use it like a real community member. Mark up other peoples’ posts as much as your own or you will get banned and rightly so.

Technorati - This is a no brainer. Technorati is the “google” of blogs. Simply posting content and tagging it properly gets a steady stream of traffic from Technorati each and every day.

StumbleUpon and Reddit - These are simply link engines. They, like most, have buttons you can put on your browser to instantly submit a new place to them and tag it with good keywords. Again though, using them just for your own stuff will get you far less love than using them as a real community member. Don’t be a spammer.

Here are some tips from Michelle MacPhearson on getting the most from StumbleUpon.

Plime - This is a relatively new place that really rocks. It is a Digg-like news story aggregator with news submitted by the 2006 person of the year - everyone.

Unique new twists to the user voting system and a ranking based on your participation in the community give this a ton more features than Digg. I am already seeing how giving people levels to achieve (based on activity) is making this community much tighter than most.

Digg - Hit and miss traffic if you don’t regularly publish geek-driven content. Although they have expanded their categories to weakly try and include more people in their community, this is a geek site through and through. It always will be.

So if you can turn on the geeks, you’ve got a massive traffic generator sitting there waiting for you. Learn their quirky community though. Mess up and they will rip your insides out in public and with glee.

OnlyWire - This is just a tool, not a community in and of itself. It allows you to post links to all the top social bookmarking sites on the web with the click of a button.

Authority Black Book - This is where all of my tactics for social media Web 2.0 marketing are listed.

Literally thousands of links and tips to drive your traffic-crazed brain haywire for months to come.

And it’s free.

So get it.

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