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An increasing number of social media websites are finding that the only real way to structure advertisements so that they have any significant ROI for sponsors is to integrate them into the social nature of the website itself. StumbleUpon did this through the use of “paid stumbles” where they charged $.05 a visitor from the StumbleUpon toolbar and Digg rolled out a similar program soon after showcasing “sponsored stories” amongst the other submissions on the home page.

If you are going to pay to advertise on social media websites, this is the way it is to be done. This is the only way to force readers to seriously consider clicking on your “advertisement” as it is essentially part of the content, essentially being the key word. To retain any sort of credibility, any social media website adopting such advertising forms will display a visible, although often times discrete, “sponsored post” message to let users know the link is an ad. However, since the ad is part of the content, users can’t help but to take notice of it and thus if intrigued they will click. This is a far cry from traditional sidebar banner advertisements which many users will glance over without any consideration.

The key to successful social media marketing through the purchase of paid advertisements is discretion. Simply getting users to read your ad isn’t enough, you need them to click through. This is especially true for sites like Digg where the ad is featured in a list of links people are looking to click on. The traditional 5% click through ratio does not apply here. Social media users hate advertisements so how does one go about promoting a product in this form? Through NOT trying to make a sale.

The moment your social media submission focuses to discussing prices or making a purchase, you have lost the potential visitor. Instead, you need to focus on what value you can add to the visitor assuming they won’t buy anything, while EDUCATING them about your product so that they can if they are interested.

The best way to see this is through an example so take a look at two recent sponsored posts on Digg. One, an advertisement for Virgin Atlanic airlines reads, “Bubbly Low Fares from $49” with a description that says, “Fly in style with WiFi, movies, on demand food and drinks, and more–all for a fabulously low fare”, while another for the HTC Google phone reads, “Who Knows You Better than your Phone” with a description that says, “See you from the perspective of your phone”. The Virgin Atlantic post has amassed 250 Diggs, while the HTC ad has done twice as well, generating over 575 diggs and 360,000 views on YouTube.

Why? Simple, Virgin Atlantic was simply trying to sell its product and even with the popularity of the brand in the tech community, its ad was not as highly rated as the HTC ad that took the reader to a cleverly put together short video on YouTube which served as the video advertisement for the company’s phone. The HTC ad also allowed the user to interact with the brand on two social media sites, Digg and YouTube, where the user could view and subscribe to the official HTC channel.

Here is more information on the most effective marketing techniques for start-ups .

This post was written by Aditya Mahesh, founder of AMBeat.com, one of the web’s most popular entrepreneurship blogs.

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How To Do Paid Social Media Marketing Right

So tonight myself and Mikkel did another live episode of Strikepoint on Webmasterradio. Apologies for the slight lag in the show, sometimes it’s really hard to keep the conversation flowing when there is a time delay but we try to work around it, plus in the last segment I dropped out for a few minutes [...]

WebmasterRadio.fm Strikepoint Show February 8th is a post from: Dave Naylor’s SEO Blog.

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WebmasterRadio.fm Strikepoint Show February 8th

Yahoo Promotes Hacked site ! wtf : I was doing quick search for the Strikepoint radioshow and saw thisThe Jobsite is a hacked server and Yahoo are giving them a side box listing what the HELL ! When I click the link I get 100’s of hacked server pages :Dave
Buy windows 7 – part2 is [...]

Buy windows 7 – part2 is a post from: Dave Naylor’s SEO Blog.

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Buy windows 7 – part2

One of the most important things a small business can do with its listing in the Google Local Business Center is choose the right category(ies). In fact, “Associating LBL w/Proper Categories” scored very highly in last year’s Local Search Ranking Factors survey (see image at right).

Mike Blumenthal, aka Professor Maps, has just released a tool that he previewed last week at GetListed Local University in Spokane. It’s a searchable database of categories in Google’s Local Business Center. If you’re not sure how to choose the right category for your business, this tool makes it easier so you can get your listing correct right from the start.

You can access the tool here. And here’s Mike’s brief explanation of how it works.

Add this one to your bookmark folder of “Local Search Tools.” Good stuff.

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This is a post from Matt McGee’s blog, Small Business Search Marketing.

How to Choose the Right Category in Google’s Local Listings

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How to Choose the Right Category in Google’s Local Listings

The engineers at Porsche have developed a range-topping sports car designed to deliver the finest in terms of power, performance and driving dynamics: the 911 Turbo S. The heart of this exclusive high-performance athlete is the six-cylinder boxer engine boosted by two exhaust gas turbochargers with variable turbine geometry. The flat-six engine has an increase in power over the 911 Turbo by 30 to 530 hp and maximum torque is a most impressive 516 lb-ft.

Despite its significant increase in power and dynamic performance, the new 911 Turbo S does not consume any more fuel than the Porsche 911 Turbo, making it by far the most efficient sports car in its class. The 911 Turbo S Coupe is EPA rated at 17 mpg city, 24 highway.

The 911 Turbo S comes exclusively with the seven-speed Porsche-Doppelkupplungsgetriebe (just say PDK), Porsche’s Double-Clutch Gearbox, delivering power to the Porsche Traction Management (PTM) all-wheel drive system. The increase in driving enjoyment is ensured by the now standard Dynamic Engine Mounts and Porsche Torque Vectoring (PTV), including the standard mechanical differential lock on the rear axle. In conjunction with Launch Control, part of the standard Sport Chrono Package Turbo, the 911 Turbo S accelerates from a standstill to 60 mph in 3.1 seconds.

Top speed is 195 mph. Extra-light and fade resistant Porsche Ceramic Composite Brakes provides outstanding performance in terms of stopping power and controlled application of the brakes. Other standard equipment on the 911 Turbo S includes Dynamic Corning Lights, 19-inch RS Spyder wheels with central locking, a three-spoke sports steering wheel with gearshift paddles, adaptive sports seats, cruise control, and a CD/DVD changer. The special twin-tone leather upholstery in Black/Cream or Black/Titanium Blue, along with the new Ice Blue Metallic exterior color underlines the exclusivity of the first Turbo S in five years.

The new Porsche 911 Turbo S will be at dealerships as both a Coupe and Cabriolet in May 2010. The 2011 Turbo S Coupe and Turbo S Cabriolet prices are $159,100 and $170,200, respectively. Start saving those pennies!

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Porsche Unveils 911 Turbo S with 530 HP of Happiness

You’re writing a page about a new stadium in your City, soon to enjoy the sounds of crowds in the bleachers watching duels between batters and pitchers, hoping to watch balls batted over the centerfield fence, or shutouts pitched, or the perfect doubleplay.

Your page could simply contain a picture, a street address, and maybe a [...]

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Having Fun with -Onyms in Keyword Research

I’ve found it just doesn’t pay to crow too much about what I’ve accomplished.

Sure, I celebrate when things go well. But I’ve found that talking too much about my achievements leads not only to criticism, but to disappointment.

There’s always going to be someone who’s done more or worked harder. And until they carve my name into the side of the moon, I see no reason in puffing myself up. The minute you get a big head is the same minute that reality smacks you and you realize that you aren’t as cool as you think you are.

So self-adulation is something I try to stay away from. But self promotion? That’s a whole different story.

If you take a look at the most successful (or talked about) people in any field, you’ll almost always see someone incredibly talented in the art of self-promotion.

Robert Kiyosaki, author of the Rich Dad Poor Dad books, mentioned at one point that he’s a “bestselling author” and not a “best-writing author.” Dean Karnazes, known as “The Ultramarathon Man,” is not the best athlete in his field, but he is by far the best at self-promotion.

So what’s the difference?

The reason that self-promotion works and self-adulation doesn’t is because self-promotion is the art of spreading ideas, concepts, and a greater vision. Self-adulation is just the promotion of accomplishments, deeds that have already been done.

When you promote ideas, you give people something to cheer for. You give people a cause to support. People, in many ways, are selfish. They promote the things that make them feel good. Your accomplishments aren’t likely to make them feel good, but your ideas do.

Your ideas might inspire hope, thought, or action . . . but as a general rule, good ideas inspire something.

People promote Chris Brogan because he makes them feel good. His ideas inspire thought and that warm fuzzy feeling we all get when we make a sincere connection.

On the other hand, you and I aren’t going around bragging about how many books he’s sold or how many speeches he’s given. We don’t care about that because it’s the ideas that inspire . . . not the achievements.

How to create a self-promotion platform

1. The first step is to be confident. If you aren’t inspired by your actions or ideas, no one else will be either.

Look at Muhammad Ali, one of the greatest self-promoters in history. We loved him not just because he truly was “the greatest,” but also for his integrity and the boldness of his ideas.

If you think Ali’s success was only about his athletic ability, compare your feelings about Ali to your feelings about Mike Tyson. Tyson’s accomplishments were magnificent, but he never communicated a greater vision that made us cheer.

2. The next step is to start spreading your ideas. You can’t be wishy washy . . . you have to stand for something.

Make your vision as clear and as concise as possible. Brand yourself and your ideas as unique. (Remember, although few ideas are genuinely unique, your expression can be.) Seth Godin does this exceptionally well.

3. Once you have a platform, start your campaign. Use strong, descriptive language when explaining your ideas and plan of action. Build a tight and loyal community that believes in you, then inspire and empower them to take action.

Make it cool to be a fan, like Gary Vee did with his Vaynernation wristbands or like Lance Armstrong did with his yellow bracelets. Having a symbolic identifier like this is extremely powerful.

4. Lastly, don’t be afraid to talk about your ideas and spread the message. Just remember that it’s not about your world . . . it’s about how others can fit into it.

Creating buzz is essential, so reach out to power brokers and tell them why they should promote you. If they won’t, create power brokers from within. Build others up until they have the power to build you up. This last part is something that Oprah excels at, and it’s how she’s built a billion-dollar empire.

Your ideas need you

If you implement this plan successfully, you’ll probably take some flak. People might label you over-confident or cocky.

That’s good. Define yourself in such a way that people either love you or hate you.

There are fans out there for every self-promoter. Your task is to find them. That, and to make it easy for them to bring a friend.

Your ideas need you. If you have a vision, don’t let anyone stand in your way.

I know it sounds a bit “out there,” but I firmly believe that ideas are living things. They need you to get over your self-adulation, to get out there, and to fight for them. Are you ready?

About the Author: Nathan Hangen is the co-founder of Beyond Blogging, a resource that draws on some of the web’s most successful bloggers to tell you the truth about what it takes to get to their level. He writes about social entrepreneurship at NathanHangen.com.

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The Art of Shameless Self-Promotion

What Bestselling Authors Know About Writing Titles

They vary by genre, but the majority of bestselling authors and editors return to the same hooks time and again to routinely sell obscene amounts of books. On the recommendation of Clayton Makepeace, a celebrity in the web’s direct response copywriting world, I decided to visit a bookstore and peruse the titles on their shelves and take note of what titles grabbed me.

As Makepeace explains:

“Just step through the front doors and take a deep breath: Can’t you just SMELL the money?

“This year, we Americans will spend considerably more than $30 BILLION on books and magazines.

“For the numerically challenged among us, that’s thirty thousand MILLION dollars!

[...]

“As they’d say here in North Carolina, ‘That’s some powerful BIG binnus!’

“Now, with that many shekels at stake, you’d expect the competition to be ferocious. You’d be right.

“Take a look around the store. How many book and magazine titles do you figure you see? 10,000? 20,000?

“Guess again, oh Prescient One. This is one of the bigger temples.

“You are in the presence of nearly 200,000 titles! Lay one copy of each end-to-end, and they’d stretch out for some 25 miles!

“Imagine being the marketing guy or gal whose product is only one of 200,000 competing for your prospects’ attention …

“… AND being limited in your quest for A-I-D-A (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action) to a single thought that will fit on a book jacket – or worse – on its spine!”

(I’d just like to point out, for those of you self-conscious about pumping schlock by the barrel, that there are at least 5 different writing style tactics used in those few lines.)

I selected the following titles for their brass-knuckles-in-your-face aggressiveness in calling for attention. They’re augmented by some selections found on Amazon’s 2009 Best Seller List.

Self-Help Category – Hook: Improve Your Life

- How To Save Your Own Life: 15 Lessons On Finding Hope In Unexpected Places

- How To Talk To Anyone – 92 Tips

- Finish Your Old Year Wrong! Hangover Survival Guide

- Eat Out & Still Lose Weight

General – Hook: Curiosity About The Unknown

- Super Freakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance

- Born To Run: A Hidden Tribe, SuperAthletes And The Greatest Race The World Has Never Seen

- The True and Outstanding Adventures Of The Hunt Sisters

- Horse Soldiers: The Extraordinary Story Of A Band Of US Soldiers Who Rode To Victory In Afghanistan

- The Cure: How A Father Raised $100 Million And Bucked The Medical Establishment In A Quest To Save His Kids

This category particularly fascinates me, so I thought I’d add in my grain of salt as to why these titles work. I don’t know that you can generalize to all books in this category, but the following traits stand out to me at least in the above set of titles.

1. We love stories. We grow up with them, science has proven we remember them better and so on. These books promise a story (or several)…

But not just any story!

2. These books promise a remarkable, quirky or otherwise unexpected story, often explicitly – with words like “outstanding adventures,” “extraordinary story,” and “quest”.

What really strikes me though is the variety of  implicit ways the titles make the promise of such a special story.

• “Patriotic prostitutes” makes me think, “Huh? That’s an unusual adjective to associate to prostitutes… “Global cooling” and “suicide bombers” buying life insurance are equally quirky. The book Spunk and Bite that I referred to in my previous post on schlock explains that to achieve this stylistic element you just need an unusual adjectives noun-pairing. The trick is to find a pair that isn’t contrived.

• “Hidden” and “the world has never seen” plays on our near-universal desire to know secrets, as any unimaginative marketing salesletter-page guru will tell you.

3. There seems to be a thread of ‘belonging’ or what Maslow’s hierarchy of needs addresses as “social needs” – the human desire for relationships with others.

Patriotic prostitutes belong to a nation.

A hidden tribe – well, that’s pretty explicit.

Sisters have family bonds.

We see a ‘band of soldiers’. Not just a group – an organized team with links between themselves.

The father was out saving his kids.

4. This may just be me, but I think there’s a bit of self-actualization (the peak of Maslow’s pyramid) hinted at or made explicit in each title. I’ll let you guys look them over and figure out the details.

Politics – Hook: Prove What They Believe

- Hot, Flat And Crowded: Why We Need A Green Revolution – And How It Can Renew America

- Liberal “Victims” And Their Assault On America (by Ann Coulter, naturally)

- The War On Success: How The Obama Administration Is Shattering The American Dream

- Obamanomics: How Barack Obama Is Bankrupting You And Enriching His Wall Street Friends, Corporate Lobbyists And Union Bosses

- An Invonvenient Book: Real Solutions To The World’s Biggest Problems

Essentially, these titles just repeat back to people what they believe or are concerned about. The right wing titles (which outnumbered the left wing books in the store I visited) also aim to boil readers’ blood.

The Obamanomics title repeats back the following widely held views. Many people are disgusted by the bonuses Wall Street paid itself from the average American’s taxes, which anger just boils even further when these same people hypocritically argue for fiscal restraint as concerns other Americans e.g. in terms of providing health insurance to the poor.

Thomas Friedman’s title does the same sort of preaching to the choir (“we need a green revolution”), and adds in the national-aspirational bit in a way that seems to simultaneously strike the ‘belonging’ and ’self-actualization’ chords.

Miscellanea:

- The Long Shadow Of the JFK Assassination – I liked the shadow image

- Crash Course: The American Automobile Industry’s Road From Glory To Disaster – I think this addresses our curiosity and incredulity at the near-failures of the Big Three.

- Knockout: Interviews With Doctors Who Are Curing Cancer – And How To Prevent Getting It In The First Place – This seems to be another hook targeted at incredulity, combined with a self-help hook. “Cure” cancer? Prevent it? Awesome!

Conclusion

If you’re ever rocking away in your chair trying to knit up a title to fit your piece, a trip to the bookstore might be just the inspiration you need!

Gab Goldenberg wrote this post on behalf of Red Fly Marketing, an online marketing company in Dublin offering savvy search engine optimisation and web design.

photo credit: Jean & Nathalie

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This post originally came from Michael Gray who is an SEO Consultant. Be sure not to miss the Thesis Wordpress Theme review.

The Tales Silently Told By The Cannons Of Titles

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A few days back I asked readers a question:

What Have You Been Putting Off and What’s Holding You Back?

Some of the responses to the question in comments (and via email and Twitter) revealed a lot of bloggers really wanting to step things up and get what they’ve been putting off done.

So – lets set some goals – what do you want to achieve by the end of February?

I’m not going to be calling you up to check up to see if you’re meeting your goals – but hopefully in putting them down publicly you’ll find yourself a little more spurred on to reach what you want to achieve.

My Goal for February: I want to get a new E-Book out the door by the end of the month.

Post from: Blog Tips at ProBlogger.

What Is Your Blogging Goal for February?

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What Is Your Blogging Goal for February?