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Believe it or not, online marketing is a lot easier than it might seem. In fact, here are 3 simple steps.

The major hurdle for people is getting past the marketing aspect of a blog or website. People dread marketing for many reasons. Either it is too much work, they don’t know where to start, or they are afraid to present the wrong image. I am going to make it as simple as possible (A.S.A.P.) instead of oh my god this is ridiculous (O.M.G.T.I.R.).

1. Provide Valuable Information

This is often overlooked as a new blogger sets up a site to start making the big bucks. If the average person knows as much about your topic as you write about, you will have problems. So find a subject you know the most about and share all you know about it. The more you learn and share about your subject, the more you and your blog will grow in both presence and authority.

2. Entertain

What does entertaining your guests mean anyways? This means to deliver your message in the best way you possibly can, as well as in many different forms as possible. If you like to make videos and audio recordings, develop your skills and make your presentations the best you possibly can. Nothing zaps the life out of you quicker than reading a text book or listening to a boring lecture, so don’t put your audience through this. Each person has his or her own abilities and talents. Now it is time to develop yours.

3. Build Relationships

The days of old where you plaster you logo everywhere like Coke-a-Cola and hope that people recognize it and want to have a drink are dying. The sites and blogs that build a community around them are able to leverage that community into cash. Ask a lot of questions, find like blogs and talk with them, respond to comments and follow suit, start swapping guest posts and any other way possible to encourage interaction. Then when you have a great idea or product to sell, you have a community that respects your opinion and will consider motivating themselves behind you. Imagine the marketing and advertising possibilities possible if 10 bloggers work really well together.

These steps are not an overnight success, but with focus they can be achieved in a short time. Keep them on the front of your mind or even write them down on a piece of paper next to your computer. If you want steady growth and income, there is no magic elixir. But there is community, and community is the thing that will bring you to success. Now harness that power.

Popularity: 17% [?]

I will make this sort and sweet. I spent the last week moving out of one apartment and into another. I am sure most everyone who reads this has moved at some point and understand the labor intensive work that goes along with such activities.

Sitehoppin Toolbar was released. I have a few invite codes if you would like to try it out. Each time Max releases a new version of the toolbar, you can use the same invite link and code to download the newest version. The toolbar is only being given to 1,000 beta testers and 3/4 are left, so don’t hesitate.

I am going to be cutting back on the video posts for now and mostly stick to using videos for tutorials and guides. I feel that they have been a good success and will continue to do some posts in video form. The 10-day trial netted me about 15,000 video views. Overall, a success, I would say.

Current projects:

I am reviewing / interviewing 1-2 marketing blog each day for the next week, as well as interviewing the CEO of a local capital investment firm. I am continuing to build and promote a number of sites in various forms of construction.

Goals and achievements:

I love goals, and since April has ended, I will be revisiting those. I achieved one of the goals on my list and others that weren’t on my list. I’ll start with those. This last week Google released a new update of Page Ranks for websites and blogs. I was completely blown away that the first ever Page Rank for joshwhitford.com was 4. Not only was my blog given a PR4, but so was www.thatmutt.com. Last month I spent a lot of time building backlinks for both our blogs, and it sure seemed to help with our page rankings.  

Another cool happenings actually occurred yesterday on Tim Ferriss’s blog. He had posted about meeting Warren Buffett, the world’s richest person according to Forbes. Some might recall that around Christmas time I sent a letter and postcard to Warren Buffett. I posted a comment on Tim’s blog to which he approved and then included in another post about Becoming an Eco Bounty Hunter. I am pretty excited about all of that and had a great time reading the flood of new comments on my blog. When I woke up this morning I had 10 new RSS subscribers. Yay!

At the time of posting my goals for the month of April, I was completely on the fix that traffic means success, I now know a little better and have focused my efforts on gaining true readers and subscribers. My goal was to have 75,000 page views to which I received 54,657. I also made it my goal to be under 90,000 on Alexa. I was pretty confident that would take place until its new algorithm was released and put a kibosh on that. Now I am at 197,672, such is life. Another goal was to reach 160 RSS readers, and I am currently standing at 134. Another goal was to get a Technorati  authority of 200 with a rank under 100,000. I did get a rank of 77,789 and an authority of 106. This is also my 75th day of blogging, not bad for just a couple of months.

What a great week, and I can’t wait to see what yet another week brings. Until next time work smarter, not harder.

Popularity: 11% [?]

As most of you who visit my blog often know, I am a huge fan of goals and achievements. I am starting to review 1-2 different blogs a day related to my niche subject, marketing. The first blog and the only blog listed higher than me in the Marketing section of Entrecard is 1 Million Readers in 365 Days.

Here is blog and a blogger with a goal of reaching a million views in 365 days. That is a pretty high and lofty goal for a first-time blogger. Do I think he can do it? Absolutely, I know he can. I currently have no idea how close he is to achieving his goal or what results he has achieved through his various trials and errors. I believe that blogging about his successes and failures would be a great testament and record of how he achieved his goal.

Here are a couple things I would recommend for the site.

1. Put a huge logo or counter at the top of the site to let people know how close to his goal he is, perhaps a big percentage bar like the Habitat for Humanity sponsored houses.
2. A post weekly about different trial and errors that have been attempted and the results he received.
3. I’m not sure if he has or hasn’t spent money on the project, but I could imagine $40 spent a couple different ways would provide a lot of residual traffic. If spending money is not allowed, I think bartering would work the same way.
4. I would like to see some posts about the break down in his traffic as well.
5. Also contests and controversy are great ways to gain traffic.

Overall, I can’t wait to see what happens and how he reaches his goal. I think declaring your goals and ambitions is a great motivating factor. If you haven’t already visited the site you should (1,000,000 visitors is a big number).

Popularity: 9% [?]