A weekly roundup of craft, design, and business related news and links:
3 Steps to Take Today Even if You Plan to Work Forever – Have you thought about retirement? It doesn’t matter how far in the future it is, you should plan for it now.
The Biology of Effective Tweets – OK, now you’re tweeting, but why should other people care?
Here are a couple of links concerning your email newsletter. You do send one out, don’t you?
5 Reasons Why No One Is Reading Your Email Newsletter – What NOT to do
What Should I Put in My Company Newsletter? – Some ideas of what you SHOULD do
5 Mistakes That Weaken Your Writing – Mistakes we all make in all kinds of writing
Want to take your Facebook marketing to another level, but you don’t live on your computer? Here are 10 ways to schedule Facebook status updates in advance.
Looking for some extra cash? Here are 10 Ways to Finance Your Business (I don’t necessarily agree with them all, but you should know your options)
And two more links about starting a blog (even if you’ve been doing it for awhile, check out how yours stands up to the list) and filling it with great content:
14 Attention-Grabbing Tactics for Launching a New Business Blog
Hello friend 🙂
Thanks for linking our article 🙂 I am glad that my hard work are giving me results slowly 😉
Tweeted 🙂
Thanks for the links! Very helpful, as always.
Good links today, especially (for me) the ones about blogging. My blog is new-ish and I’m still exploring how to pull it all together. I’m loving it though and these links had some great ideas. Thanks!
I’m happy that everyone is digging my links while I guest post for Megan. I do tend to include a lot of social media/blogging links, but that’s the way I think marketing is going right now. I’ve been blogging for more than two years now and I find that I can still learn from articles aimed at beginners. There’s always something that you forgot or didn’t think of.
Hi Wendy,
Great article finds I have spent all morning reading through them! I wanted to get your (and everyone’s) thoughts on some of the things I read.
I really found the post “14 Attention-Grabbing Tactics for Launching a New Business Blog” packed full of awesome information. It included everything from beginning blogging advice to tips for expanding growth. I noticed a lot of suggestions about uploading more content than just pictures and text. It mentions uploading pod-cast’s, creating webinars, hosting live video events, even creating your own online radio show. Do you think audio and video content is sort of the next step for stimulating and engaging our audiences? Should we focus a lot of attention on these types of content?
Also this article talks about “re-purposing your content.” It goes on to suggest submitting your articles to sites like Ezine etc. and has a link to more ways of redistributing your blog content. I have always been nervous about this because I though that search engines do not like duplicate content…so would it be bad if my blog postings are then redistributed in multiple places on the web?
I would love to hear your thoughts. I am new here and am loving reading through your posts! Thanks so much!
Cody – First, the repurposing your content. I think the best thing to do in this case is not to just copy it, but either expand on, tailor it to a specific audience, or tweak it slightly in some other way so that it isn’t duplicate content. That way you can appeal more directly to the specific audience of the other sites.
As for the different kinds of content, I really think that it should be something that you feel comfortable doing. A lot of people like to share videos and it helps them to see tutorials or how you make something visually. Others like to download audio files to listen to on their ipods while driving, or painting, or gardening, etc. But ultimately, if it doesn’t make sense for your site, don’t do it. If you aren’t comfortable doing it, don’t do it. The key is to keep your content engaging to your readers.
If you do want to branch out into these other media realms, do some research and practice first. Your blog looks very professional and you don’t want a video that looks like you made it in your mother’s basement to ruin the vibe. Reach out to your readers and try to find out what sort of things they would like to see on your site. Or snoop around and see what sort of links they like to share or look at if you know who some of them are on social networking sites. That way they’ll think, “wow, that’s just what I was looking for!”
Wendy,
Wow really great advice! Thank you so much! I think that makes perfect sense. After reading your response about “tailoring” the content I went back through and read the article again with a different perspective and I get it now. Thanks for explaining that! I also really like your suggestions about learning our readers and knowing what they like and what they are looking for. I am definitely going to work on your suggestions
Cant thank you enough!