How to Win Links and Influence Google
To be perfectly honest with you…
people just don’t want to listen to what you have to say.
Most online marketing is the electronic equivalent of people handing out fliers on the sidewalk. You take it, you smile and nod, throw a half-hearted glance over the material, and then you toss it into the nearest trash can.
Why is this the case, and how can you work around this?
Online marketing is the business of spreading information, but on the information superhighway, it is an abundant and saturated resource. How do you grab anyone’s attention? You offer solutions to their problems. You offer knowledge to thwart their ignorance. You give them something they want.
Yes, brand recognition has its place in online marketing, just like search engine optimization and smart copywriting do, but if you want your information to set the internet ablaze, you have to set the fire with something volatile.
Example:
A well established pharmaceutical company launches a killer online marketing campaign, a full on social media barrage, complete with a hip Facebook page, a suave looking blog, and a Twitter profile to make Perez Hilton jealous. They make a press release announcing a new LOLcat created in their name. Everybody is now within electronic earshot of this company, and they post often via different social networking media regarding discounts and products of their company.
Here comes a newly started pharmaceutical business. With their modest budget, they implement a toned down online marketing strategy. They only have a small website, but it has a blog, and it’s all designed with SEO in mind. They release one, and only one blog article, titled “How We Cured The Common Cold”.
Both companies will receive great brand recognition as a result of their efforts. The large company will build its brand one post, one inbound link at a time, with all their effort going into their killer online marketing strategy. The newer company will simply post their killer content, and let the online community market it for them.
Granted, not everyone can have content as important as a cure for the cold, but everyone can offer solutions relevant to their business. Come up with tutorials, explanations, informative articles for anything important to your industry, market your articles online, and if it is well-written, you can bet people will link to it.
Using an online marketing strategy to offer discounts and build brand recognition is smart, but using an online marketing strategy to establish your presence as an authority in your industry is pure genius.