More Dirt Cheap Ways to Get Traffic to Your Website

There are so many ways to market your website that if you were to actually participate in all of these marketing activities you’d probably wouldn't have time to brush your teeth.

 My last two blog posts had at least 10 different ways that you could use to market your site for free, or at least dirt cheap.

In my opinion, you should pick the ones that you know how to use the best and run with them.  You don’t want to spread yourself out too thin trying to do everything.  However, if you use a calendar, you can schedule what days you’re going to use these different tools.  That way if you do use quite a few of them or even all of them you won’t burn yourself out.  Cycling through as many free method works, it just takes a bit of planning.

Here is the link to the two previous posts in case you missed them:

More Ways to Get Free Traffic to Your Website 

How to Get Free Traffic to Your Website

Another Batch of Free Tools

Use Google + to Get Maximum Exposure to Your Site – If you haven’t been using Google + you’ve really been missing out.  Just like Facebook and Twitter, Google + has emerged as one of the main players in the social media food chain. 

It’s very easy to make friends that have the same interests as you do on Google + because it has different categories called “circles”, that you can put them into.  This way, you can keep people that you are more intimate with in a different category than people that you merely do business with. 

Not only that, but you can actually create your own categories to put people into.  For example, I created a category called “Marketing Friends” since I have so many people I communicate on there about business and marketing.

The other tool I like using on Google + is a section called “Communities”.  This is a section wherein you can join up and communicate in online groups that have people interested in the same things you’re interested in. 

It’s a great place to post and share thoughts, videos, art, just about anything you can think of!  Like Facebook you’ll have to devote and spend time and effort developing and nurturing relationships, but in the long run it’ll generate traffic and prospects to your site.

Use Twitter to Get Eyes onto Your Website – if you can get involved with a group of people that have similar interests as you on Twitter, you may have an easy and fast way of getting some traffic to your blog.  There are a few things you’ll need to learn about how to use their hashtag system, but once you figure that out, leaving relevant posts are duck soup. 

TIP: Here’s an idea that’ll help you get noticed on Twitter.  If you know of a TV

show that you and others are interested in you can use the hashtag to post to people on Twitter that are also interested in the same TV show.  However, the show and Twitter conversation should be relevant to your business. 

For example, I write advertising copy.  Therefore any TV shows lie The Apprentice, Shark Tank or Undercover Boss are applicable for me to talk about.  Awhile back, I logged in during Undercover Boss, and used the appropriate hashtags and made good comments.

I got so many people to start following me on Twitter, that I was very surprised. These are basically people that are subscribing to my posts (or as Twitter calls them, “Tweets”) that every time I leave a comment or a link to my blog, they will see them.   This is one of the easiest and simplest ways of getting traffic cheaply to your site.

Set Up and Develop Joint Ventures – Joint ventures can benefit more than one person’s website at a time. It’s what you would call a win-win situation for both partners involved.  For example, you could team up with another person and develop a course, and split the work between you.  Both parties using their sites as a springboard for selling or showcasing the course.  If you were writing a book together, both parties could brand the eBook for both websites. 

I’ve seen joint venture books of this nature where different writers contributed their own individual chapter of the document.  Of course, within that chapter they mention their business and website where the readers can get even more information on the subject matter. 

The beauty of this is that the idea that multiple experts wrote a chapter is even better than on expert writing the whole book.  Not only that, but each expert reinforces and supports the other with testimonials, which adds more credibility to the eBook. 

You don’t just have to make eBooks either.  You can create video courses, guest blog posts etc.  The ideas are limitless!

Leave World-Class Comments on Other People’s Blogs – This is an easy method in theory, but it takes time and expertise to pull off.  It takes time to sit, think and then write for a blog comment.  Not only that, but you must make absolutely sure that you know what you’re talking about. 

If you try to come off as an expert and you don’t really know what you’re talking about, people that do know will call you out. So, write excellent blog comments, leave your URL if they’ll let you and for gosh sakes, make sure you know what you’re talking about.

Mark “Elmo” Ellis

"When it Comes to High-Response Copy - I've Got Your Back!"

www.MarkEllisCopy.com

(859) 797-9560

elmo033057@gmail.com

Web Savvy Content Generating Ideas That’ll Drive Free Traffic to Your Site

It appears that we are moving toward a more sophisticated economy.  About a year ago I watched a fascinating expose on how our education system MUST change.  It appears that we have been graduating from schools that are based on the Industrial Revolution production mindset.   The speech was given by Sir Ken Robinson, a man that was described as a “world-renowned education and creativity expert”. 

The premise of his speech was that basically, our education system was built to fuel factories with more warm bodies.  We had a factory driven, industry based economy and it was the civic duty of our leaders, government, and citizens to perpetuate it.

(If you are wondering why I am starting down this road instead of jumping right into the subject matter outlined in the title of this post, please stay with me.  I always want to tell you why you should do a thing before you go out and do it.)

Our Industrial Based Thinking Sucks

Anyway, we went to school, went from one class to another in lines, and with kids that were the same age as we were, and we were programmed.  Follow the rules, do what you’re told, sit at your desk, keep up or be left out, and DON”T BE DIFFERENT!!!

In the ‘60’s rebellion kicked in.  The “in” thing was dropping out and letting your hair hang down.  However, most of it was rather pointless.  As a matter of fact, some people could objectively look at the 60’s rebellion and call it another form of conformity, but that’s getting too deep.

Hence, the Industrial Revolution conditioning stuck and the education and labor system that we have become used to is still in place today. 

To see the video by Sir Ken Robinson on our industrial revolution school system click here:

The reason why I’m bringing this up is because our brains seem to think along the same business model/economic lines.  We still look at doing business the same way we were always trained:

Draw people to our site, try to sell them something, move on to another victim…er…customer or client, contact your previous prospects, try to upsell them something more expensive, and leave never to return. (Except when you want to sell them something else.)

People are catching on.  They know when you are merely looking at them like a piece of raw meat that you can suck the life from. 

Undercover Boss - The Bad Side of Things

The trouble with this business model is that there is a very high burn out rate, mainly because you’re just churning out CRAP. Even if you finally make a lot of money getting people to buy into your scheme, you’ll still have to fight like the dickens to keep replenishing your clients and prospects. 

And what kind of entrepreneur will you become as a result of this?

A perfect example of this was on a 2015 episode of the TV show, Undercover Boss.  Without going into too much detail, the show highlighted a seminar/real estate tycoon that was obviously a charlatan.  

He bragged about himself so much, you wouldn't believe it. He announced that if he died he’d want to be reincarnated as himself, because he was the “&%$#*” luckiest man on earth.  His claims were that he made about 40 million or so and was getting richer every day.  He charged attendees of his real estate seminar $43,000 per seat, for a 2 day session.

You should have seen the poor, deceived people he was fleecing.  Some of them looked like they were living out of their cars.  Some admitted that they were running up their credit cards to feed the beast.

(Not only that, but as the show was running, I was following the comments of people on Twitter about this show, and you wouldn't believe how hated this man was, especially by women.  The comments ran on and on and NOBODY had anything nice to say about him or his business.)

It was sad.

One of the reasons it was so sad, is because ANYONE COULD HAVE GIVEN THOSE POOR PEOPLE THE EXACT SAME REAL ESTATE INVESTING INFORMATION FROM AMAZON USED BOOKS FOR LESS THAN $20.00!!!! Actually, the information from the books would have been better than the info they would have gotten from HIS seminar. I guarantee it.

Why Am I Telling You This?

The reason I’m telling you all of this is because, your mindset has got to change!  

Gone are the days of merely taking people’s money and forgetting about them.  If you are just in this for the fast in and out, just be aware that people are becoming attuned to the fact that they are getting fleeced.  It’s little wonder why the term “Internet Marketing Guru” is now considered to be a negative term and the gurus are doing their best to distance themselves from that moniker.

People want to feel like they know you and they want to feel that they are a part of something.  They‘re sick and tired of being thought of as nothing more than a consumer that’s there to line somebody’s pocket with money. 

Consider a Facebook ad that looks like this:

Actual ad from Facebook- (URL removed). Apparently they were using Shutterstock’s pics without even paying.

Do you really think that anyone is going to feel connected to this, much less believe it?

The reason why I’m telling you this is because you are going to have to give, connect, respond, enrich, enliven, educate and HELP people if you really want true success.  And when you do sell them something, your product should be the best it can possibly be.  

You don’t want to cut any corners, and when you do sell somebody your wares or services, you’ll want to be extremely concerned that it is doing every single thing you said it would.

Hey, here’s a new concept:  After the sale, follow up and ask your customers how it’s working.

Generating Content – It’s Not Expensive to Give This Away

This brings me around to the subject matter at hand, generating content ideas.  The cheapest way for you to help people out and educate them about what you do, is to give them excellent, mind-blowing content.

 Here are a few ideas to help you get started:

• Cruise forums that are specific to your niche and read the questions that people are asking.  If you keep seeing the same question asked over and over again an excellent, FREE, well-written article will be something they’ll benefit from.

• If you have a list of people that have already purchased your products or services, ask them questions about what they thought the product lacked or helped them with the most.  This will give you fertile ground for subjects you can write about.  Make sure that you send this information out to people on your lists.

• Sit down and brainstorm a list of benefits that your product or service gives, as well as a list of problems that it solves.  Remember the color or size of your product isn't usually a benefit it’s a feature. Benefits are things that your product will do for you.

• Go on Amazon or eBay and look at products and services similar to yours. What benefits do you see vendors talking about the most? (NOTE: If you are rendering services, look at the books related to your services that are being sold.  Use the “Look Inside” feature of Amazon and look at the table of contents. There’s loads of ideas you can write about there.)   

Also, look at the comments sections of the products and see what people are complaining about the most.  That‘s pure gold for content creation.

Make a List and Create Your Programming

Once you have gone through these content generating ideas, use a calendar and make a schedule of the subjects you’ll be talking about on your blog, podcast or website.  Since I’ve already written a post about this, I won’t bore you by repeating myself, you can read it here:

Using a Calendar to Create a Content Schedule  

I hope you find this message enlightening and it has helped you in some way.  If you’d like to fire some ideas or comments at me please feel free to do so.  

Send them to:

Elmo033057@gmail.com

To Your Success!

Mark “Elmo” Ellis

"When it Comes to High-Response Copy - I've Got Your Back!"

www.MarkEllisCopy.com

 (859) 797-9560

How to Turn Your Zombie Facebook Presence into a Living Being!

If you are going to use Facebook to influence people and move them in a direction that you want them to go, you really need to pay attention to this post.  There is a distinct reason why so many companies actually hire people to run their social media marketing programs.  That reason is it takes time.

If you are going to use social media to influence people in a major way, it will take a lot of your time.  Continuous, daily, scheduled time.  You've got to show up…regularly and keep showing up.  This is a relationship game that requires a dedicated time investment.

So, just like all other forms of Internet marketing, the more they see, love, and trust you the better off you’ll be.  This leads me to my topic subject, transforming your zombie like Facebook presence into a persona that people can relate to.

I love meeting people.  Online, offline, I just love human interaction.  In my humble opinion, nothing is worse than talking to a piece of cardboard.  Actually, there is something worse: READING something that was written by a piece of cardboard!

I must confess, this is a facet of writing Blog posts that I need to be more conscious of, myself.  If you can somehow inject some of your REAL personality into your social media efforts, you’ll find that you will have success at a much faster rate. 

On the local news that I watch every morning before starting work, I watch the local news, mostly to see how bad the weather is going to be for the day.  Most of the newscasters or warm and friendly, even when they are reporting accidents and crime in the area (Some of them almost report the death and destruction with glee…but I digress.) 

There is one reporter that is usually at the site of the crime and just about every morning and when she reports the news like a bored zombie.  She looks like she just came from a funeral; her face is sullen and emotionless.  Every time we see her my says the same thing, “Is she really alive?”

So, you need to insert your personality in to your posts whenever you can.  

Talk About Other Things, Even if it’s “World War Z”!

Make sure you talk about off-topic issues once in a while.  Usually, if you do nothing but talk about your niche, no matter how great the information is, you’ll

be perceived as boring.  However, that’s not to say it can’t be related to your core topic in some way.

I used to get Dan Kennedy’s marketing newsletter on a regular basis, and I was always amazed at how easily and seamlessly he could shift to a subject that did not appear to be on the subject of marketing, but was.  He would talk about subjects that were related to his niche like: time management, celebrity issues, TV shows he liked or disliked, etc.  However, these issues did relate to his overall marketing message.

Current Events – Staying Sensitive to Things Around You

If there has been a horrible event caused by natural disasters, terrorism or even a Zombie apocalypse, you will be perceived as unthinking and uncaring if you continue talking about your business.  

So, be very careful when dealing with important social issues.  You can really damage all of the work, time and branding of your business if you ignore other people’s pain and anguish during trying times.

To Your Success!

Mark “Elmo” Ellis

"When it Comes to High-Response Copy - I've Got Your Back!"

www.MarkEllisCopy.com

(859) 797-9560

elmo033057@gmail.com

Web Savvy Facebook Scheduling Tactics to Help Jump Start Your Campaign

On my last post, I told you a few things about how you should be using social media to promote your business online.  I also told you that if you weren’t using social media to influence your clients, customers and prospects your competitors probably were.

You can read it here: Your Competitors Know How to Use Facebook...Should You?

Plan It Out

A planner with lots of room will let
you plan your posts to Facebook

I carry two planners around with me wherever I go.  That’s not an accident, I find that I am far more productive with one than without one.  I hate getting to the end of a day when I’m tired, realizing that I should have completed an important task and I still have to get it done.  

Not only that, but I find that the work I need to do will be done at a much higher level of quality than if I wait until I’m spent.

So, if you are planning on using a social media channel, you may want to plan what you are going to do as far as posting and doing follow ups with people on Facebook.

As I see it, there are 5 phases to gaining popularity on Facebook or any other social media site:

Phase 1 -- Set up your pages.

Phase 2 -- Locate influencers in your market.

Phase 3 -- Contribute to the influencers.

Phase 4 -- Invite them to your Facebook page.

Phase 5 -- Get them into your funnel.

Each of these phases will be expanded upon, but for now, I want to focus on the third phase, “contribute to the influencers”.

Giving Them Something for Nothing

The reason I’m talking about Phase 3, “Contribute to the Influencers” first, is because it’s the one that will take the most time in terms of planning, writing, connecting, and posting your high-value material.

Buy a Planning Book.  Get a planning book that you’ll have plenty of room to write in, and for starters try to write out a schedule of things you want to post about over the next week.  Many social media experts will tell you to try to plan for three to six months, but I feel that most people that are starting out in the social media or the Facebook arena will get overwhelmed. 

Here's how Internet Marketing Expert Michael Hyatt Plans his Posts:

It’s a far better idea to just schedule a week or two at first, so you won’t burn yourself out at the onset.  My way of thinking, is that if you get worn out trying to merely do the scheduling, you’ll never get started.  And if you never get started in social media, you’re leaving heaping piles of cash on the table for your competitors to scoop up.

So…

Step 1 Write out a one to two week schedule on what you’re going to post about. 

TIP: If you get hung up about what to write about in your chosen market, head on over to Amazon and look at books dedicated to your niche.  You need to look at the best sellers in your niche.  There is a wealth of information in the Table of Contents of those books.   You can easily get all sorts of ideas about what to write about by looking at those chapter titles.

Step 2 Research your topics.  Once you have a subject, do some extensive research on what you are going to write about. 

Step 3 Write your post.  For God’s sake, write a well-structured, thought out post.  Your audience is inundated with people that write crap.  I’m not saying that I write incredible masterpieces, but at least their coherent most of the time and I try to disseminate valuable tips and content that will benefit my audience. 

(Personally, if someone writes like a text book or a bestseller, the common man or woman out there might not relate to the message as well.)

Step 4 Post to Facebook and your other social networks.

In my next post, I’m going to show you the best way to set up your Facebook page so that you’ll be asking your herd to go to a page that adds value and enriches their lives.

Until then…

To Your Success!

Mark “Elmo” Ellis

"When it Comes to High-Response Copy - I've Got Your Back!"

www.MarkEllisCopy.com

(859) 797-9560

elmo033057@gmail.com

P.S.  Here's a two links on posts I've made on the subject of researching topics and niches and scheduling posts.

Your Competitors Know How to Use Facebook...Should You?

If you haven’t been thinking about using social media as a part of your marketing mix, you may want to reconsider.  It’s no mistake that almost all of the big business money and marketing efforts are geared toward Facebook, Google +, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Twitter, YouTube and any other fast-moving social media upstart that is rising.   

Facebook is clearly the “Big Kahuna” in the social media war, with over 1.19 Billion active users a month.  The reason for this is its age, overall broad mass appeal, ease of use, and other factors which make it the current social avenue of choice. You can see an obvious lead in this February, 2015 Google Trends graphic:

It doesn’t matter whether you’re running a big company or a small business, you’ll always want to spend time with your prospects and customers.  A good way to do that is to spend some time on Facebook.  Not only are your customers and potential prospects on Facebook, but their family and friends are too. 

And what are they doing?  Well, besides socializing, they are looking for and sharing information.  If prospects and clients that are active in your niche market aren’t asking you questions, or looking at your wares, who are they talking to?  I can guarantee you they are talking to your competitors and looking at what they have to offer.

So, it’s a no-brainer to say that being active on Facebook is beneficial to your marketing efforts.

Think About This Social Media Fact…

If you were to take all of the different marketing methods and line them up side

by side:  face to face selling, over the phone selling, direct mail, advertising, the Internet, etc.  The Internet was usually the big loser in the mix because a static web page had to do your selling for you. 

It was very easy for prospects to just click and move on.  On their own, Web pages usually don’t have much of a personal touch, much less have groups of people frequenting them that were related, or friends or reached out to one and other.  

Social media sites like Facebook, changed much of that.

Now, you can easily inject your personality into your marketing.  Prospects that like what you have to offer, refer to you personally and send their friends to where you hang out.  And the best thing about it is that there are loads of ways you can build relationships using Facebook, to help you connect with people and help build the brand and marketing of your business. 

Get a Grip On This Facebook Thing!

Warning:  Let’s think for a second.  As you know from reading my posts, there is no quick fix, or magic bullet solution to your marketing problems.  You’re building relationships, and depending on what type of business you’re in, THIS TAKES TIME!  So, just like any other type of marketing, you’ll need to take the time and plan out your strategy.  If you haven’t already done your due diligence on creating a USP, marketing plan, budget, then using Facebook and any other social media site won’t work out so well, either.

Building More than Just Brand

If you can understand one key concept about social media sites like Facebook, it’s not just about just building brand, it’s about building relationships.  I’ve always said that if people know, trust and love you, you can sell them much more easily. It’s just like looking for a job.  If you have a friend running the XYZ Zipper company and you want a job there, it’ll be infinitely easier to get a gig there than some unknown applicant.

So cultivating individual relationships and eventually a crowd of people that are familiar with you, your business, brand, etc. is what social media is all about. And as I said before, this will take time, but it will be worth it in the long run.

TIP:  Another great aspect of doing business on a site like Facebook, is that you can get almost immediate feedback on your product or service.  Not only that, but you can also correct problems quickly that would normally take weeks to fix through other channels of communication.   People that market their businesses through social media sites of this nature will also ask questions to find out what is needed in their industry or market.

People are almost more than willing to help you out, so you should make good use of social media feedback whenever you can.