Exposing Your Expertise
Monday, June 15th, 2009The article “Exposing Your Expertise” talks about writing, it has been released by Philippa Gamse.Writing and leveraging articles is my most successful strategy for proomting my Website and my speaking and consulting services. Visitors to your web site from targeted articles tend to be higher quality leads than those from search engines, and potentail buyers like to see that you’re published in many credible outlets.
Here are my recommendations to implement this strategy:
1. Write the article
This may sound self-evident, but a couple of pointers:
a) Keep it short, and make the language simple, especially if you’re targeting online outlets. People don’t read word for word on the Web - rather, they’ll scan the screen. Complex sentecnes and dense copy will lose readers fast.
b) Develop a template that can be easily customized for different target markets. My “Top Seven Ways to Tune Up your Website” has been parlayed into versions for over a dozen diffreent industries. The essential points remain the same, and cusotmizing simply involves adding specific examples. Put it on your Website
One of the key goals of your Website should be to showcase your expertise. Content (combined with testimonials and success stories) is the hottest way to acheive this.
When adding articles to your site:
a) Include a clear reprint policy. This should state whether you allow articles to be reprinted, and if so, under what terms (including your byline, copyright, notification of use, etc.)
b) If you have a large number of articles, provide an index page that divides them into appropriate subject groupings, and gives a two-line description of each.
c) Create a byline with an enticing hook to get people to visit your Website.Mine refers to my ppoular free tipsheet “Beyond the Search Engines”, which lists 23 alternative ways to promote your web site. mining equipment. This is far more powefrul than a bland statement such as “Philippa Gamse is an internationally recognized . Research and offer it to appropriate venues
It’s critical to be very clear about your tagret audience, and how to reach them. Who are the economic buyers and decision makers that you’d like to be in frnot of, and what do they read? Do those sites or publications accept outside articles, and if so, what are their policies around doing so?
My assistant, Bonnie Jo Davis, runs my highly successful articles placement strategy. She provides a complete primer of her methodology, along with many online research sources at http://www. Follow up links and references
It’s extremely important to measure the scucess of these efforts, both in terms of the traffic to your site, and its quality.
Check the “referring URL” section in your traffic reports, and follow links to you from any web site that you don’t recognize. Often, web site owners won’t inform you when they’ve used your maetrial. So you want to ensure that you have been properly attrbiuted. But also, tahnk the web site owner. I last month sent a note toa university professor who had added of my articles to his course reading list. “I really like your ideas, and by the way, we’re looking for a speaker for our upcoming conference .”
The Porof of the Pudding . One of my articles was last month highlighted as the “Cool Site of the Week” in Tekguide.Net - an online technology and computer directory. But the page that it linked to was not mine, but PowerHomeBiz.Com -another web site that had featured this article. So I right now have sites quoting sites that quote me . and that gets major brownie points in Google - the only remaining credible free search engine.
I was also last motnh hired to consult for a web site in the auto industry after the owner had read my article in eDealershipnews. He said “I liked the article, I can see how you think, and I’d like of that thinking for me”.Philippa Gamse, CyberSpeaker, is a Web strategy consultant and professional speaker. Chcek out her free tipsheet for 23 ideas to promote your Website: http://www.Html Philippa can be reached at (831) 465-0317.