Keyword research is a big part of SEO and internet marketing. What are the words people search on when they are looking for a business or service you offer? You have to do keyword research to find out all the terms being searched on. Your keyword list is gold and should always be expanded.

John Jonas recently created a keyword tool called Keywordtopia. The great thing about it is that it lets you pay per search on Wordtracker and Keyword Discovery. Normally you pay a yearly subscription fee. Glad to see this kind of work from Jonas. He’s an expert at keyword research and internet marketing.

He claims unless you’re doing 578 keyword lookups on Wordtracker or 883 lookups on KeywordDiscovery each month, you’ll save money by using Keywordtopia. I’m going to use it! The best part is there is a 30 day free trial. I wish I could say that there was an affiliate program (hint, hint, residual income affiliate program), but there’s not. This is valuable regardless. Check it out.

My friend Jordy blogged about a new company called Yepic. They let you buy content or sell content (like a blog post). Yepic helps you create, categorize, tag, price and sell your content. It looks like a lot of the content is free. If you need links to your blog or another place to promote it, this could help. It’s so new there is no pagerank on the site.

Interesting enough the request page sounds like people just want to learn something. They aren’t necessarily looking to put it on their site. That surprises me. They simply want expertise. I imagine you can sell the same article several times.

I’m going to try it. I have my 10-point internet marketing plan almost completed. If someone buys it and wants more detail, I’ll write an article on any point they want.

Questions: Can I repurpose content? Can people monetize and post the content they buy from you?  Can I put in affiliate or other links? I want to request articles in other languages.

It needs a more standard format to submit requests. Their aren’t enough details. How long of an article do people want? What specifically do they need to know (the main points)? How detailed or to what level? (101 or beginner? advanced?)

Has anyone tried Yepic (weird name but a great idea)? Bloggers, submit your most read article and let me know what you think.

I was recently highlighted on two lists of the best Utah bloggers. My bloglines numbers over 150 now. I have my favorites. Many are Utah-based and I know them personally now (thanks to this blog).

If I lived in your state and you blogged, I’d get to know you. I just get into whatever environment I’m in. For example, today Jason said that when I worked at my last job he could never reach me. I like to send down roots.

Here’s Josh’s list of Utah blogs he reads (thanks for including me).

Chris Knudsen is a friend and someone whose blog I love to read. I’m honored to be on his list of Utah’s best bloggers.

Quick roundup of Utah bloggers I read, an incomplete list: Paul Allen, Kelly Anderson, Pick! Me (Laura), Alex, Russell Page, Jason Alba, Carolynn Duncan, Brad McCall (and the Daily Brad). This is off the top of my head. I also read John Jonas, Phil 801, and Phil Windley (links to come, got to go). I’m waterskiing on this one.

When I meet a blogger they more quickly go from my bloglines into my head. Sometimes it’s tough to keep people straight! Of this list I haven’t met Laura, Alex, or Russell.

Feel free to list your favorite Utah blogs in the comments (even your own). I’m sure in my rush I’ve left some out. Even my blogroll needs some upkeep.

Warning: this post is a little all over the map.

While at RMAMA today (Rocky Mountain Association of Affiliate Marketers) I was thinking about a job interview. I now frame things in “this is what I can do for your company.” I have methods I know work and some of them I’ve learned recently. I need the game plan in one place.

I started listing the things I would do and in what order. Then I decided to write it all down with pertinent links. Next, I’m going to make it into a report for businesses.

Read more…

If your company needs a professional corporate blogger to increase your search engine rankings and traffic, keep reading.

A few months ago I started a corporate blog covering a subject I knew very little about (at first). I immediately found the most influential and pertinent bloggers in the space. I followed their conversations and links to other blogs.

In about a week I got the blog up and start blogging. In a few months it went from under 50 hits to over 200 hits a day. I added podcasts and keyword optimized my posts. It wasn’t my main job but I posted at least twice a week.

Read more…

Last week I hosted a conference call with Laura Sturaitis of Business Wire. Laura is the Vice President of New Media Development.

She talked about with traditional PR there is a short-lived spike in attention. In the first 12 hours the Associated Press, Reuters, and newspapers pick up a story. It’s about breaking news, popularity, being recent and relevant. When a story is published there’s an initial spike in interest. After about 2 days the attention drops off. Traditional press releases take your story wide.

Web 2.0 kicks in later with listings on Google and Yahoo News, search engines, blogs, etc. It “keeps the story alive longer in more places,” she said. SEO press releases take your story long. It gives it a permanent home online. Another benefit is the ease of archiving. It’s easy to find in a search engine than to find back issues of newspapers or magazines.
Here are some highlights:

• Use multimedia assets with your press releases, such as: PDFs, podcasts, calls to action, images, video
• Get links to and from your press release
• Use keywords especially in the headline, which should be short and punchy
• Allow comments on press releases

I got an idea during the call of a blog press release system. It would have bloggers breaking news and allow bloggers to subscribe to SEO press releases about topics that interest them by RSS. Bloggers break stories. Newspapers often don’t cite the source. Making a press release distribution geared towards bloggers would help bloggers gain more legitimacy and exposure.

Last night I attended the UVF (Utah Valley Entrepreunial Forum) dinner. The son (also Stephen) of Stephen R. Covey spoke about trust. Honestly, I wasn’t excited about the topic. I’m a little grouchy about entrepreneurialism right now (my trust is at an all-time low). Lack of trust makes organizations, families, people, and countries break down. In short, not trusting hampers and hurts relationships.

Despite my initial resistance I got very absorbed. I loved his basic premise: when you operate with trust it speeds up transactions and lowers the cost of doing business. The opposite is true: when trust is low you spend more time trying to cover all the bases, it’s slower and it costs more.

Read more…

So the shocker is to me and others, is today at 4:30 I got laid off. I write a post for my friend Jason about what I’d do if I lost my job. The same day he highlights my response, I actually do lose my job. The irony. Funny enough the night before I heard a pretty emotionally jarring story from a woman who lost her job. When she talked about the way it was resolved I thought, that’s what I hope happens to me if I lose my job. And now I have that opportunity.

I have worked for startups and entrepreneurs for years. For 5 straight years I always had a job. I rarely had to look, the only time it didn’t work out was when it wasn’t time. When it was jobs almost landed in my lap. That’s my experience. This year though is one of the most random yet. I saw a blog that said something like this: life is a jungle, consider it an adventure. That’s my motto.

I’m primarily a web marketer and writer. I’ve been a technical recruiter and a community organizer. Right now one thing I’d like to do: telecommute and write for a magazine, preferably about internet marketing (like ReveNews).

In the meantime I’ve been so busy at work I’ve put off a lot of things on my list. So my start is: I’m going to review an ebook every 2 days. I’m going to work on my affiliate site, write a letter I’ve needed to write, go to the gym every day, etc. etc.  I’ll also read through Jason’s blog carnival responses.

Honestly, what Seth Godin wrote about donating your time for 6 weeks sounds most appealing. I’m already thinking I don’t have time!

Carolyn called this morning with some solid advice about starting to see what companies you want to work for first. So I’m off to get a BusinessQ magazine (thanks for the list of Utah firms: http://jobs.utah.gov/firmfind/pgMain.asp?theSessionID=506097911).

I met Jason and Carolyn because of my blog Both of them have been really helpful plus good friends.  Thank you both.
The biggest question in my mind is: what do I want to do next? It’s not the same answer as it would be even 6 months ago. I have some ideas of what I think I want, but I will ponder this question over the weekend.

I have one last question: is this Groundhog day? and if it is, what’s the key to stop the variations and get on with the real story?

A catchy title sells your blog post or article. Did this one work?

I recently added Copyblogger to my Bloglines. I enjoyed this post with all sorts of ideas to making headlines that sell.

I’m trying out variations in my Google ads. Ideally they link to an article about the subject.

Have any favorite headlines you want to share?

Conference Call: PR 2.0: PR Tips, Tools and Strategies That Will Help You Get Noticed Online” by Laura Sturaitis, VP New Media Development, Business Wire

Free Conf Call, this Friday, Nov 10, 12pm P, 1pm MST, 2pm C, 3pm Eastern

I tried to get PRWeb but they wouldn’t bite, so we got businesswire, who have been great to work with. Since Businesswire uses PRWeb’s tools you should be good with either (but I don’t know the details of how it works, hopefully Laura will cover it). My friend Kelly is hosting a free conference call.

More info at Startup Princess. To get on the call, please plan to be on the line 5 minutes before the call begins.

Please call:
(402) 756-9100
Access Code: 679852#

Participant keys
#3 exit
#4 instructions
#6 mute