Creating content

Often the hardest thing about blogging is thinking up content. Obviously, if you are launching a new product or service - there's plenty to blog about. But, what if you are just working away - what can you possibly write about?

• Events and happenings in your industry or consider creating a calendar for your industry.
• Use Google Alerts to stay on top of relevant keywords and comment on media stories about your niche.
• Create a FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) section to your blog to explain acronyms and common questions about your business.
• Seek a broad range of people for interviews, including industry leaders, emerging entrepreneurs and researchers.
• Discuss local issues with the organizations and people relevant to your business.
  

Getting creative

When times get tough, entrepreneurs need to get creative.

Industry conferences and seminar can be expensive, but they are also great ways to network and stay abreast of what's the newest trends. In tough economic times, our marketing budgets can't always support the ticket price. However, many conferences will let you attend if you volunteer some hours to the conference.

For the cost of a couple of hours of your time - you still get to network, you still get to be seen by your peers, you get a little closer to the event organizers and you haven't drained the bank account.

Blogging matters

For those of you following our little traffic ranking exercise -

When we started this exercise (9/22), Dohertyassoc.com has a Alexa traffic rank of: 3,740,178. In October, it had a traffic rank of 1,969,422, January 2009 was 1,183,946, April we had gotten to 869,376.

Currently Doherty's traffic rank is 1,696,815

So what happened? We got busy, and let the website slide and lo and behold - no new content, traffic slips.

April Update

Like every small business - when we get busy we tend to market less - bad, bad bad! We know, it has been crazy!! Here is a quick update on just a few of our projects:

• SF Business Services is updated weekly with the latest SF Business News and Events.
• FitBizTools has been busy with a large eCommerce project providing the customer an opportunity to market to numerous channels from a single database. So what if we have to import a few thousand SKUs - it's not like were busy blogging!
• PlusStuff is back - providing a portal to the plus size community. Great to be back in the LOHAS world - Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability.

For those of you following our little traffic ranking exercise -

At the time (9/22), Dohertyassoc.com has a Alexa traffic rank of: 3,740,178. In October, it had a traffic rank of 1,969,422, January 2009 was 1,183,946.

Currently Doherty's traffic rank is 869,376.

Internet Strategies

It’s not about building websites - it’s about building online businesses . . .

How many of you have a website? Uh huh. How many of you have updated it in the last month? Exactly. What is your page rank?, your Alexa ranking? or even your link building strategy? Not sure, call us we can help!

Internet Strategies

Are keywords dead?

I wouldn't say they are dead. I like what Scott said. "They're not feeling well". Content is key when engineered properly for search engine optimization. Keeping in mind your title and descriptions in both the code and content do play a major role in your search engine optimization. Izzy Macaluso

· Keywords are not dead, but content is far more crucial in this ever-changing world of the search engine game. If you are delivering good content to your target market, no search algorithm can afford to ignore you!! Sanjay Mehta

· Meta tags are not 100% dead, but have very little weighting- for now. I suspect this was in response to keyword stuffing/abuse & the fact that they are not visible to the user and therefore not part of the user experience. IMHO SEO is about 3 things- in order:
1. Content- drives SERP & volume- still king.
2. Linking- drives popularity, although more challenging now with global "no-follows" on many social sites (i.e. flickr)
3. Site Architecture- drives accessibility. Building a well formatted, 'bot friendly' site Marco Bailetti

What do you do different?

I teach business planning to entrepreneurs. What do you do different? This is always the first question I ask. Are you faster? Cheaper? Better?

Understanding how we differentiate ourselves in the market is key to developing a successful marketing strategy and ultimately a successful business. If your customers have three options (or some amazing multiple thanks to the Internet) why do they do business with you? Why do they come back? Do they come back?

One of the key ways a new business can differentiate itself is through customer service. Call any major corporation for assistance and if you are lucky enough to get a human - you are likely talking to a remote call center half way across the world – once the operator grills you on such things as what is your mother’s maiden name, where did you go to high school, and what is the name of your first pet – you will then get to enjoy their scripted dialogue which does little to solve your problem.

When your customers call your business, do you answer the phone? With Caller ID, I can typically answer the phone “Hey, Bob – what’s up?” I am connected to my customers, they are talking to the key decision maker – OK, I am also the chief bottle washer and all around guy Friday – but I’m still the decision maker.

If your not sure what makes you different – ask! You may get some amazing insights.