5 Question & Answer Sites to Help You Build Authority in Internet Marketing

I love Question & Answer sites for two reasons. First of all, they allow you to build your authority in almost any niche by letting you demonstrate your expertise on any given topic to those who are seeking answers. Second, they provide a hotbed for discovering popular topics to write about on your blog. The following ten Q&A networks should have questions for people seeking to answer them in any niche.

LinkedIn Answers

If you have a LinkedIn profile, you’re already set to participate in LinkedIn Answers. This professional network covers categories ranging from Administration to Technology, including Blogging, Internet Marketing, and Search Marketing. Those whose answers are selected as the best answer have the chance to be listed as the category experts.

Tips to maximize your LinkedIn Answers experience include:

• Be sure to complete your LinkedIn profile prior to participating & make sure it is public. This way anyone who enjoys your answers can learn more about you and head on over to your website! Pay particular attention to creating a crafty headline as this will be shown next to your name when you answer questions.
• If you have a blog post that supports an answer you give, add it as a web resource.
• Great answers can lead to job opportunities, clients, and leads, so make your answers count!

Quora

Quora is a Q&A network with an estimated 1.5 million unique visitors per month. Their network covers a wide range of topics from A to Z including SEO, Web Marketing, and Blogging.

Tips to maximize your Quora experience include:

• Filling out your profile. This includes adding links within your bio information to your website and top social profiles so people can check out your website.
• When you follow a topic, go back to your profile and click on the Topics link. Then add a quick blurb for each topic in the “Describe your experience” area. This will be added next to your name when you answer questions within that topic.

Focus

Focus is a community that connects businesses with experts. Their Q&A network covers over tons of business-related topics including Internet Marketing, SEO, and Link Building.

Tips to maximize your Focus experience include:

• Fill out your profile completely. Your job title will be listed next to your name when you answer questions. Your profile also allows you two dofollow links, so choose them wisely.
• You can add links to your answers as well – just paste in the full URL and it will be hyperlinked automatically.

Stack Overflow

When you think of Q&A networks, Stack Overflow may not come to mind at first. But with 8.1 million unique visitors per month, it should. Their community is mostly focused towards developers and programmers, but it does include questions tagged with SEO, SEO Friendly, and Social Networking.

Tips to maximize your Stack Overflow experience include:

• Subscribe to your favorite question tags via RSS. That way you can keep up with new questions without having to visit the site daily.
• Prepare to talk to a very technical audience as most of these people are developers, not Internet marketers.

Yahoo Answers

While the Yahoo Answers community is not always professional, it is still the Q&A network whose questions get featured in search results often. Hence it doesn’t hurt to keep an eye on the Search Engine Optimization category to see if there are good questions to answer.

Tips to maximize your Yahoo Answers experience include:

• Get your 250 points early by answering easy questions. Once you get 250 points, you reach Level 2 and can add links to your answers. Before you reach Level 2, your links will not be active.
• People seem to prefer cartoon avatars over actual photos. You’ll be in the minority if you put a real pic on your account.

Do you use Q&A networks? What other networks would you suggest for helping build authority, find blog topic ideas, and building links?

5 Industries That Should Use Pinterest

I have a new addiction – Pinterest. I’m so addicted to pinning I’m recruiting friends and family members. It’s bad. Real bad. I’ve even started thinking of ways brands can use the site. Yikes!

Over the past few days I’ve done a bit of research for an upcoming post on SearchEngineWatch.com, brainstorming ideas on how brands can use Pinterest. In the end I found there are 5 or so industries that hands down should be using Pinterest for some of their social media marketing efforts. Whether it’s to help sell products or services, this new social networking site can be put to good use. Let’s examine these 5 industries.

Wedding

When I first started exploring the site a few months ago my immediate thought was – wow this would be a great site for someone planning a wedding and that’s exactly what I’m using it for. My baby sister is getting married soon and as the maid-of-honor it’s my duty to keep her up on all the hip wedding trends, but when you live 1,000+ miles away that can be difficult. That’s where Pinterest comes in. She and I share our ideas on a board and look to other boards for ideas. Simple and painless – well sort of. This whole wedding planning thing is stressful!

Creating inspiration boards to establish your wedding style is all the rage. Imagine as a wedding dress designer, photographer, jewelry designer, event planner, caterer, baker, etc… using the site for something similar but to cater to your customer or prospects needs. Brides can repin your pins, click through to your website and purchase your products or services. Anyone in the wedding industry really should consider using Pinterest.

Arts & Crafts

If you’re in the business of selling handmade items or art then Pinterest is perfect for you! Similar to Etsy, Pinterest allows users to browse products in their gift category section. Upload your wares and start selling – but not through the Pinterest site. You’ll need your own storefront or Etsy shop in order to accept payments and deal with those details. Pinterest is just a way to showcase your talents and let others see the products you want to sell. Simply add “$” to the Pin description and Pinterest will place your content in the gift category, along with a nice banner illustrating the price of your item. It’s that easy!

Fashion

The fashion industry is ripe with competition which makes it all the more important to have your style stand out. If you’re a clothing designer, stylist, clothing buyer, personal shopper, style editor or fashion blogger then Pinterest is perfect for you! The site allows you to show off your style in a clean and elegant way, which in turn can help you sell your own services or products. Connect with others that have similar styles and position yourself for opportunities to collaborate with others.

Travel & Hospitality

The travel and hospitality industry relies heavily on appearance. With Pinterest travel agents can set the mood for your next excursion by creating vacation inspiration boards full of fabulous pictures from the area or highlighting activities you can do when you get there. Additionally, a hotel could create similar inspiration boards, enticing web visitors to plan their next vacation. A spa might have photos of the area, activities around town, lodging and of course photos of spa services. It’s all about telling a story and Pinterest can help you do that if you’re in the travel & hospitality industry.

Real Estate

Last but certainly not least is the real estate industry. Selling a property takes a lot of effort, so why not make it easier on yourself by pinning photos of a featured real estate property? Take it a few steps further and pin photos of the area, the local school, areas of interest around town, community areas, or even pictures of possible upgrades the prospective homeowner can make to the home. Help to create a sense of what the home will look like after they’ve purchased it and prospective buyers can start to see themselves actually living there.

Well that makes 5 industries that should be using Pinterest. Have more to suggest to our readers? Add to the comments below!

5 Harsh Truths About Google’s ‘Search Plus Your World’ Update

The recent update by Google termed ‘Search Plus Your World’ has invited a lot of criticism from the SEO and the social media arena (Twitter is almost enraged!). While many feel that it would be a unique experience for them to see personalized results in Google searches, many others view the update as an ‘antitrust’ move. Though different people will have different thoughts on the Google+ content integration with Google searches, there are a couple of truths that (I think) nobody should deny.

Here are the five harsh truths that you really need to be aware of, if you just heard about the ‘Search Plus Your World’ update.

#1. It will Impact a Brand’s SEO
As the search results start to get personalized (content pulled in from the searcher’s Google+ network), it’s quite obvious that the public results will be pushed down the SERPs. Yes, if a major portion of your brand’s traffic comes from Google, you’re in trouble. Now, you’ll have a hard time as customers will see the personalized results towards the top by default (when logged into their Google accounts).

#2. Not Everyone Would Notice (or Use) the Toggle Button
The social search shift that’s happened does come along with a toggle button, which users can use to switch from personalized results to global results and vice versa. The bitter truth, however, is not every user will be able to notice or use the toggle button. You can never expect all your potential customers to be as savvy as to switch between personal and public results.

#3. Personalized Results May Not Always be Significant
Now this is a big problem! It’s fine that the personal results will display content shared by the people you know on Google Plus. What’s important to note is whether you trust everyone in your contacts list or circles for recommendations, as you may have thousands of people in your Google Plus network.

#4. Search Results will be Social only ‘Personally’ (not ‘Globally’)
The personalization of Google search results also sends a clear signal that a website won’t rank higher simply because it contains superior quality information. In fact, you won’t be able to see a lot of potential results (or information) while searching on Google logged into your Google account.

Instead of directly promoting Google+ content into the search results, Google could definitely use social data from their social network as signals to differentiate wheat from the chaff. The results that this social search shift will return are only ‘personally social’ and not ‘globally social’.

#5. Google has the Hammer to Make Us all Use Google Plus
Certainly, Google has a wide range of products that it can use to propel the growth of Google Plus further. According to a recent research, Google Plus will boast more than 400 million users by the end of 2012. So, you can never say ‘No’ to joining Google Plus at the cost of losing your organic rankings, can you?

What’s your take on this social search shift by Google? Please feel free to talk back in comments.

3 Ways to Make Me Unfriend You on Facebook

Whether you like it or not, Facebook is becoming a part of everyday life–personal and business. Even my last few friends who insisted they would never join the social media revolution are slowly giving in. Why? Because it’s an easy way to keep in touch with people without actually having to talk to them or put out any real effort. And it’s also a great way to acquire news.

Having said that, with so many people joining, I’m finding my friends list getting way too long for its own good. So I’ve been trying to do some pre-spring cleaning. How am I deciding who gets the axe? Well, I’m looking for people who:

1.       Constantly complain—I’m a glass-half-full kind of guy. And as most of my friends can attest, I’m pretty much content in all aspects of my life (except I’d love to be rich—but who wouldn’t?). Having said that, I absolutely abhor when people bitch and moan on Facebook. Now make no mistake, I’ve had a few negative status updates in the past. But they’re few and far between. And being that I am generally positive, when I do update to complain about something…well, it matters a bit more as opposed to someone who is just a Negative Nelly. Newsflash, your life isn’t that bad. But mine is because I have to read your constant crap.

2.       Give soapbox status updates—I have one friend that I keep on my list only because she’s an old friend. But every time I see her updates, I cringe. Why? Well, they’re always a page or two long. And they’re always about whatever cause she has decided to take on for the day. Could be a certain candidate, a political issue, a news story, or whatever. The messed up thing is, even if I agree with what she has to say, after reading her rants it makes me want to change my stance—just to spite her.

3.       Do nothing but self-promote—In the last year, many businesses have started to view social media marketing as a legitimate part of building their brand. So along the way I’ve started liking various companies that have impacted me in one way or another. But I’m starting to regret it. Why? Because most of them post nothing but why I should go visit their place of business or send them my money. ANNOYING. I befriended you to get news on your products and…wait for it…DEALS. 

Want me to be your Facebook friend? Great, I’m all for it. Just don’t do any of the above and we’ll get along just fine.

What about you? What drives you crazy enough to push you over the edge and start unfriending?

*Stay tuned for next week when I post about all the stupid stuff I do on Facebook and Twitter that should make people unfriend and unfollow me!*

When to Ask for a Guest Post

Guest blogging is a great way to increase authority in your niche and beyond as well as build some great backlinks to your blog, business, or website. Sometimes, especially when it comes to larger site, the big question is when should you make your move. The following are great opportunities to get a guest post on one of your favorite blogs.

1. When the Blog Advertises the Need for Additional Contributors

Do you have your sights set on guest posting for a particular blog? Then one of the first things you should be doing is following that blog religiously. This means subscribing to them via RSS and following them on social media via the top networks (Twitter, Facebook, and Google+). Aside from getting to learn more about the blog, you will be the first to know if and when they invite contributors to their site. Whether they ask for guest bloggers or freelance writers, either invitation means they are looking for more content which makes it a prime time to strike!

2. When the Blog Features a Guest Post

When following your favorite blog, you might notice a day when they specifically say they have a guest post by someone who is not a regular on the site. This is a great opportunity to say that you have been following their blog for a while and were excited to see that they accepted guest bloggers. Could you be the next? You’ll get extra bonus points if you know one of the recent guest bloggers and you get them to introduce you to the blog owner.

3. When the Blog Has Mentioned You

If you have been commenting and interacting with a blog and its owners/writers/editors on social media, chances are one day, they might mention you in one of their posts. So long as the mention is in a positive light, this might be a good chance to jump in. Try sending them a personal email saying thanks for the mention, and then ask if you can write more about the topic at hand in a guest blog post!

4. When You’ve Been Listed

Just recently, I was listed as one of the 20 bloggers to watch in 2012 on ProBlogger. This was a pretty exciting acknowledgement, and one that I could easily use as part of a guest post pitch to another site. It’s essentially a very public testimonial!

5. When You Have a String of Successful Guest Posts Elsewhere

Think about approaching a guest post opportunity like you would a new job. Your first impression on that employer might be your portfolio of work samples. Present the blog that you are pitching a sample of your latest work – make sure those samples are within the same industry and (preferably) on sites that are just as well known. This will show the blog owner that not only have you written for other similar sites, but you had successful posts on those sites as well. There is nothing that a blog owner wants more than posts that will be a hit with their audience.

Have you found other times when the moment was right to ask for a guest post and you succeeded because of perfect timing? Please share your experiences in the comments!

5 More Local Link Building Tips

Does your site’s success depend on receiving traffic from users in the local area? Whether you have one storefront or nationwide locations, link building with a local focus is important to keep traffic numbers up. Maintaining your rankings for competitive local terms can require quite a bit of  effort. Last month I shared five tips on this very topic here on the SEM-Group.net blog, but I thought I’d give a few more. Here are five more tips on finding local link building opportunities.

Network for Links
Industry or networking events in your local area are prime places to share your business card. Why not take it to the next level and use this as an opportunity to build links? Ask people you meet locally if they have websites or blogs. Can you offer up a guest blog post for them in the future? Maybe they have a partners/link/recommended section on their site. Do research on those you meet to find link building opportunities. Write this information on the back of their business card so you can reach out in the future for possible linking opportunities. Slowly but surely you can build buzz about your company just by offering to write a few posts on a few local blogs or links placed on local sites. Additionally you get some very juicy local links along the way.

Groupon for Links
Recently I attended a Groupon presentation and it was mentioned that local search rankings can sometimes increase when a Groupon is successful and catches on. Certainly makes sense – many sites pickup deals from Groupon and post about them, often with a link back to your site. Some of these sites are specific to your local area and can be the perfect local link for your site. Its reasonable to assume you’d see some possible ranking improvements. Note: some businesses certainly see Groupons diminishing their business rather than helping, so use at your own risk. Really take the time to examine all angles to determine if offering a deal is right for your niche.

Cover Local News
Do you have the resources to blog regularly and become a content publisher? Covering the news or local events is a way some have found success in garnering local links. Who else but local folks want to share news and events in the area. They’ll share your posts and some news might even get picked up by local blogs and news sites – linking back to you as the source. Submit your blog to Google News and get extra pickup and possible traffic.

Charity Tweetup
Have a local cause in mind? Organize a Tweetup at a local bar or restaurant, invite local vendors, bring in a local band and invite the community to get together for a good cause. Even if you don’t have the time to organize one you can take advantage of a good ol’ Tweetup. Look for local tweetups in your area and see if you can become a sponsor and get added to promotion efforts – and of course a link on the site. This higher tech crowd is good to network with and some are also likely to tweet, share on Facebook, write about it, take pictures, and otherwise possibly mention the event and your brand.

Colleges, Universities & Vocational Training Centers
Places of higher education are always looking for businesses in the local area who want to partner with students to help them learn skills for the workplace. Offering an internship program through a local college, university or vocational training center can present a link building opportunity. Proactively search out schools that have an area on their site where they feature businesses offering internships or on their thank you pages with links to their websites. Everyone knows that links from .edu websites can be some of the best – plus you’ll be helping to train tomorrows workforce or get some cheap labor out of the process.

Well, that makes 10 tips for local link building. Have more to add to the list? Please share with us in the comments below!

How to Find Out When a Blog Post Was Published

Maybe it is just me, but does it annoy you when you can’t find a blog post’s date? Sure, the advice to remove the date from your blog post was given by well-meaning people who wanted to help your content always look fresh, but let’s get real. For some niches, where the information is timeless, that isn’t such a bad thing.

But if your blog covers coding, SEO, social media, technology, health, etc., then there should be a date. Then there’s nothing worse than not being sure when something was published, especially if it is advice that could have stopped working about two application versions ago or doesn’t fit the new search engine algorithms. If you’ve seen a blog post with a screenshot, then went to the site and found everything has changed, you probably know what I mean.

So how can you find out when a blog post was published? Here are a few ways, starting from the easiest to the most time consuming.

1. Check out the URL

Sometimes, even though the blog post itself doesn’t have a timestamp, the URL does. You might at least get close enough to a month and a year.

This isn’t always a sure bet though, as most people don’t use a date.

2. Look at the Comments

While many blogs may find the way to hide the timestamp on the post, some of those might not have figured out how to remove it from the comments. Try to find the oldest comment on the post – that should be the closest date to when it was published.

3. Search Using Wolphram Alpha

For blogs that say 601 days ago, 6 months ago, etc., you can use the Wolfram Alpha search engine. Just type in the time period stated, and it will convert it into a date.

4. Google It

Try to search for site:domain.com intitle:keyword in Google. Sometimes the search results will display the date of the post.

5. Subscribe in Google Reader

If you really want to know when something was published, subscribe to the blog in Google Reader. Nine out of ten times, it will show you the post date. You might have to search for the post in question using the search box if you don’t want to scroll, but you should be able to get the date this way.

Some blogs, for some reason, will load only the latest 10 posts, all with the same date. If that happens, leave the feed and come back again… it might just take a few moments to populate all of the data.

The Alternative to Removing Your Post Date

What is the alternative to removing the date from your post and keeping your blog’s content fresh? If you can’t keep up with the post frequency, look to outside sources including guest bloggers and freelance writers. So long as you at least have one post per week, you should be set!

Does a missing post date drive you nuts when you find an article through search? Do you remove the date on your posts for a specific reason? Please share your thoughts and any additional ways to find a missing post date in the comments!

Marketing to College Students Online: 5 Tips

Today’s students are online more than ever, which makes online marketing a prime medium for advertising dollars. Marketing to the much sought after 18-30 year old demographic can be tricky and requires a bit of creativity. Also keeping up on popular trends is important too. If you’re just getting started in this space be sure to do your research.

Thankfully resources abound in this industry, with top higher education marketing blogs sharing case studies, blog posts, video and more on a regular basis. To add to the list, here are my 5 quick tips to help in your efforts to market to college students online.

Optimize for Mobile
Mobile phones with Internet access aren’t uncommon anymore. Just about every 18-30 year old has one (91% of Americans do, according to this survey). So don’t you think your website should be easily accessible and user friendly on a mobile device?

Consider mobile developing a mobile app, simplified navigation, reduced content or text, mobile only version of your site and mobile only features. If at this point you haven’t looked at your site on a mobile device or thought about mobile optimization – you should! (Just found this Google webinar about mobile optimization – check it out!).

Short and Concise
Getting right to the point within the context of your web copy is important if you’re marketing to college students. They don’t want to read flowery sales copy or cheesy testimonials. Get right to the point, be short and concise with your copy. Not only is long copy hard to read on a cell phone, it’s also often unnecessary to get your point across. Keep this in mind as you develop content not only on your website but offsite as well.

Think About Parents Too
Most students cannot afford college, it’s a fact of life. Parents often contribute to children’s education and should be in your thoughts as a marketer. Do you have sections on your site that cater to the parents of college students? Help answer their questions and give them the information they want to see. They’re the ones holding the purse strings.

Diversify
Don’t limit your efforts to just Facebook because you now that’s where a lot of people spend their time. Diversify your marketing efforts to include other social networking and offsite content marketing practices. Guest blogging can be big in this space too, so don’t count it out. Develop relationships with higher education bloggers and start writing content. Perform keyword research to find long tail phrases students and parents might be searching for, and develop content around those phrases.

Let Them Speak
A recent study found that college students want to hear from other students and that is can play a large role in their decision to attend. Similarly so, if you are marketing a product to this demographic you need to let them see what others are saying about you. Allow comments on your brands Facebook wall, monitor review websites and encourage engagement through social channels. When the need to respond to a comment arises be sure to use your best judgement. A negative review very well could turn into something worse if you don’t respond in the right way. Reviews can be a necessary evil in some cases.

These are just a few quick tips. Have some additional to add? I’d love to hear!

Publish Free Content and Win $1000 – MyBlogGuest Articles Gallery Contest

How would you like to win $1000 for publishing a guest post on your blog?

No, that wasn’t a typo; you don’t even have to write a post to win $1000!

While this is the first big blogging contest of 2012, it’s the coolest and simplest contest I’ve seen in a long time. Instead of wearing yourself out by trying to put together the perfect post, you can let the platform do the work for you.

So, what’s the catch? There’s not one. MyBlogGuest is an awesome site that’s holding an awesome contest. In case you haven’t had a chance to check them out before, MyBlogGuest connects bloggers with people who want to write guest posts. Instead of spending time sending out cold emails, MBG provides a thriving community of people who already want this content. What’s neat about MBG is you can benefit from both writing guest posts and accepting guest posts from others.

$1000 Contest Details

This contest is centered around a specific feature of MBG, which is the Articles Gallery. Here’s a quick video that shows how easy it is to use the Articles Gallery to find awesome free content to publish on your blog:

Yup, MBG really does make it that easy to find great content that’s 100% free. While you can use MBG all year long, for this contest you will want to publish your guest post anytime between now and February 15th; the contest itself officially ends on February 20th. Keep in mind that the earlier you put your post up, the more time you will have to promote it to your audience.

To participate in this contest, head over to MyBlogGuest to sign up for free. All you need is a PR2+ blog, Twitter & Facebook count buttons installed at the post level and a commenting system that doesn’t require registration.

The winner will be determined by a combination of Tweets, Facebook Likes, comments and how engaged you are with the post & the MBG community.

You can check out the 3 rules on the original announcement, but they’re nothing overly strict. Instead, they just boil down to don’t be a cheater!

Ann Smarty has done an awesome job with MyBlogGuest and this contest, so I’m pumped to see the posts you all enter!

Leave a comment with a link to the post you enter into the contest: