Inbound Marketing – Guest Blogging and Article Writing

Inbound marketing makes it easy for your website to be found and a decent tactic to achieve this is through correct link building is guest blogging and article writing one of many channels of Inbound Marketing

Guest Blogging and Article Writing

Since Panda and Penguin algorithm updates the search engine optimisation of on page factors are still very important but must be part of a wider content distribution and inbound marketing strategy – more off page optimisation is needed.

Search engines after Panda and Penguin are better at distinguishing tricks like keyword stuffing and punish you for them. Poor and poorly written content, imperfect site optimisation and improper linking are degradable offences in Google eyes. This has been true for a long time and the SEO business has reacted favourably and most reputable companies follow the on page recommendations well.

Off Page Factors Have Gained Prominence

Many webmasters having optimised their websites for on page factors turn their attention to off-page factors to gain relevant links – many choose guest blogging as a means to acquiring relevant links to their websites.

Link Building

There are as many ways to get links but in the aftermath of Panda and Penguin submitting guest articles or guest blogging is slowly becoming best practice. The trend is driven by a desire to follow the pack. Guest blog posts, all by themselves, do increase rankings.

Guest Blogging – writing blogs or articles for other sites

The strength in guest blogging to blogs or websites that have a decent following is that the posts are read immediately and it can be launched without delay avoiding the embarrassment of blog posts that no one comments on. However, the guest-blog-only strategy has two fatal weaknesses:

• There is an obviously fixed ratio of one linking domain per article placed,
• You reach rapidly diminishing returns.

 Furthermore, using the ideal blog to post is difficult to find. They are a scarce resource. You can post to lesser blogs but expect lesser returns.

Content Strategy

A pure content strategy can be frustrating simply because the results and rewards are slow to be recognised. The best strategy is to create great content and to distribute it using all the marketing channels available: that means using inbound marketing as depicted in this info graphic – courtesy of Hubspot:

  

With great content, your guest posts will be more effective. So will your email marketing campaigns, paid search traffic, and referral traffic. We can think of content as a multiplier that adds to almost any other marketing tactic.

The advantages of unique content happen with guest posting or article writing are:

• Bloggers will be more likely to accept posts and talk about/to you if your target site has its own credible content.  
• Users from the host blog will share and re-share your content if your site offers something they can be excited about. 
• People will want to link to you.

 Make Content a Pre-Requisite 

Where are we headed, and what should we do next?

You should not publish and wait. Building relevant links through blogging and guest blogging matters. You must engage in other channels to distribute your unique content. Use all the channels in the info graphic that’s appropriate to your business and raise your precious content out of obscurity.

SEO is growing, link building is essential and inbound marketing is thriving. The Search engine optimisation industry is moving towards sustainability growth and capable of providing solutions, recommendations and results that are going to have a far bigger impact than raising the rankings for a couple tracked keywords.

It seems highly unlikely that Google will penalize guest posts or articles writing or for that matter any form of distributing good relevant content. After all distributing good content does increase users experience.

About the Author

Minke Oving is an Online Reputation expert at SEO Synovation and guest blogger for a number of clients.

She is a regular contributor to this blog and can be contact at m.oving@kpnmail.nl

Brand Image

Brand Image is an essential ingredient in managing your business profitably. It’s not only manifested online but also in products and in the opinions of other market leaders. There is a very close relationship between the Search Engine Optimisation, SEO in other words, and building a brand image to enhance your online reputation. The techniques and the tactics adopted in SEO can be and are applied in defending and repairing your online reputation.

Premess

Say you are an ecommerce merchant or a multi national conglomerate with an angry customer. The customer is so angry; he posts bad, negative reviews on the Internet about your company that are not true. Your online reputation is damaged. Your brand image is dented. What can you do? How can you combat it? What would we do about it? When your online reputation is damaged there are four actions:

 Do nothing 

 Defend it 

 Repair it 

 Monitor it 

First you employ a specialist agency like ours. Secondly we will defend, repair and monitor your online reputation. Thirdly on your behalf we will create a strategy to repair your online reputation and lastly in the following paragraphs we will show you how we do it that and how that links to search engine optimisation projects. 

Our professionals at SEO Synovation can suppress those negative listings or reviews and push them back in the search engines, where no one is ever going to see them. Statistics show that 85 percent of online searches never go past the first page. We create positive, truthful and legal online messages so that harmful listings are never seen on page 1. This is often very effective. 

Personal Approach. 

Research shows that only 85% of internet users go beyond the first pages of search engine results. Our strategy and goals are to decrease the number of negative comments that appear on the first three pages of a search engine results page. We do this by attacking negative comments of three fronts:

Existing and future websites 

Engaging in Social networks 

Promoting the brand and product 

This is the same approach adopted by SEO Synovation for a search engine optimisation project. Our team of fifteen professionals based in five countries and operating in eleven markets have the accumulated experience of more than one hundred and fifty years in marketing, internet marketing and online reputation management. 

Our Principles 

Our activity is founded on four overriding principles that guide us through every project namely:

Legality – we respect the letter and the morality of laws in Europe and published Google guidelines. 

Honesty – we tell the truth and nothing but the truth and avoid ambiguity.

Transparency – we show clients what we do and what the consequences of actions are.

Privacy - what we learn about your company, patents, and forthcoming projects is never made public, is never discussed, and never mentioned in general terms unless expressly approved in writing. We will sign a confidentiality agreement to that effect. 

Tactics of Search Engine Optimisation and Online Reputation Management -typical tactics we employ to suppress negative comments: 

1. We will optimise existing websites. 

2. We will create additional, promotional and positive websites to increase visibility of product and brand. 

3. We will create blogs to positively promote the brand. 

4. We will proactively engage in social networks to positively promote the brand and respond to negative comments. 

5. We will create videos to promote on influential video marketing sites. 

6. We will create presentations to promote the product on sharing platforms. 

7. We will create photographs to promote the product on photo sharing platforms.  

8. We will re-write and re-promote articles detailing the performance of the product. 

9. We will create linking strategy and obtain links to increase visibility of product and brand. 

10. We will engage with News Contributors and post contributions about the products/service. 

11. We will create press releases to increase visibility of product and brand and decrease the effects of negative comments. 

12. We will engage bloggers to engage in opinion sites to express an alternative view to negative comments. 

13. We will publish and provide clients a monthly status report of activities performed and the status of negative comments for the keywords agreed for the projects.

When your online reputation is damaged there are four actions: 

a. Do nothing 

b. Defend it 

c. Repair it 

d. Monitor it 

Our professionals can suppress those negative listings or reviews and push them back in the search engines, where no one is ever going to see them. Statistics show that 85 percent of online searches never go past the first page. We create positive, truthful and legal online messages so that harmful listings are never seen on page 1. This is often very effective.

Personal Approach To Projects 

What separates SEO Synovation is the personal approach to removing negative comments. There is no standard approach. Each Project is unique. Each campaign has its own set of peculiarities, such as the gravity and structure of the comments, the authoritativeness of the sites from which negative listings are coming from, and the depth of negative listings in search engine results pages.  

Creation of New Content. 

We create and launch new websites with content often with competing content. There are many components in these campaigns and are just limited to creating new websites. SEO Synovation copywriters create compelling content, relevant to the industry and to the company itself. We work with businesses in all sorts of different industries and we know what the search engines are going to view as compelling and relevant.  

After consultation with the client, about the marketing message that they want to portray and the branding efforts they want to disseminate we write the content for them, and then we promote is on the through the different sources, as quickly as possible and in a way that is not going to be flagged by any of the search engine’s spam teams. Then we create a linking strategy to the content created to effectively strengthen their presence. 

Is Every Company Defended? 

We are not lawyers that neither defend reputations in court nor judge the legal consequences of acts. We take the situation as it presented to us and appraise it on two fronts:

A. Is the potential client performing an illegal act?

B. Is the situation repairable?At SEO Synovation we have a strict code of ethics that we work with That code of ethics basically states that if what we do is going to perpetuate a crime or what we view to be unrealizable in any way, shape or form, we will not take on the campaign.

Opinion Websites 

There are many consumer complaints sites, where individuals can post complaints about a company. Anyone can post a complaint on those consumer complaint sites, and they are often untruthful, libellous and unverified. Their sources are often an unscrupulous competitor, a disgruntled ex-employee or just an unreasonable client.  

These comments get exposure, often on page 1 of search engines result pages due to the fact that within the search engines ranking algorithms, the websites are relevant and high ranking, and provide users with a useful, pertinent and valuable experience. 

When these negatives comments are posted online there’s no way for the business owner to protect himself, unless they contact a company like ours, to give them control, and give them the ability to formulate the correct message about their business.

How much does the service cost? 

The cost of campaigns depends upon the gravity of the situation. Our lowest priced campaign starts out at €950 per month. Contact SEO Synovation to learn more or receive a no obligation and free check of your online reputation.

About Vincent Sandford and SEO Synovation 

SEO Synovation is an agency specialising in Search Optimisation,  Online Reputation Management and Web Marketing. We help businesses and individuals fortify their web  marketing and personal or brand names online. What we do is we give people control of their online reputation. We train them in techniques to monitor their own reputation and web marketing, become aware of what’s out there. We show them how to create an effective marketing message to accurately portray their image and use it to increase search engine rankings. 

SEO Synovation was founded in 1993 originally as Synergy Innovation, marketing and IT consulting group. Since 2001 it has expanded into web marketing sphere as DukCon, the search engine optimisation SEO market as MarcheRustico and in 2010 as SEO Synovation with special focus on defending online reputations to serve the expanding markets of Europe. We are headquartered in Assen, The Netherlands and have representations in The Netherlands, Italy and England. At present we are a group of 15 professionals providing Online Reputation Management, Web Marketing and Search Optimisation.