Archive for September, 2009

When You Write Articles You Want to get more website traffic and more prospects now right? When you write articles, you will attract more attention and get more website traffic, online publicity and profits.

BUT, if you want to write articles that get read and keep your audience coming back for more, you must follow these basic rules of writing for an online audience.

7 Article Writing Tips to Ensure Your Targeted Audience Reads What You Write & Buys What You Are Selling:

1. Use conversational copy. Talk to your readers. Use words that people know. Absolutely, do not use jargon. It is boring. You will lose your audience’s attention immediately. So, use words that people are familiar with and can connect to. Write like you talk and let your personality and experience shine through. You will make a better connection with your readers.

2.Go active. Words have power. Find specific active verbs to paint your copy. This will make your article exciting and lively. Action verbs are more engaging and will move the reader along. And, by using action verbs, you will automatically reduce the number of words it will take to get your message across. For example, “John loves Mary” is stronger than “Mary is loved by John.”

3. Make your copy benefit oriented. Honestly, your readers don’t care how many awards you have won. They don’t care how many degrees you have or how many books you have written. All they care about is how you can help them solve their problems. So include a strong benefit in your article title. Include benefits in your article. And add benefits to your “About the Author” section.

4. Connect with your readers’ emotions. We all want to feel smarter, richer, happier and thinner. Use these emotions to connect with your reader. For example, “Do you feel paralyzed every time you have to go shopping? Do you hate trying on clothes? Does stepping in front of that three way mirror strike fear inside you? Here are my 7 top tips to help you lose weight now…”

5. Keep sentences and paragraphs short. When your readers see articles with long sentences, long paragraphs and no bullet points or sub-headings, they will automatically skip that article. Here’s why? – Large chunks of information scare them. – It overwhelms them. – It takes too much time and effort to read that article. And that’s the psychology of most readers online. So make your sentences and paragraphs short. If your sentences are longer than 20 words, cut them up into two sentences. You can also add lists and bullet points. And, use subheadings that will attract readers when they scan articles, just like I have done with this article.

6. Front-load your point. When you make readers wade through paragraph after paragraph of unrelated anecdotes before you get to your point, you’ve lost your audience’s attention. Yes, Mark Twain pulled that stunt all the time. But, your name is not Mark Twain. You want to tease your readers with bits of information they need to know. This way they’ll stick around to the end. They’ll then want to click on the link in your “About the Author” section and buy your products or services.

7. Simplify. Worried you’re not using the right words? Use simpler words. Worried that your sentences are not clear? Make simpler sentences. Worried that people won’t see your point? Make your point simpler. Make things simpler and your writing problems will vanish. That’s why every newspaper in the world is written so a sixth grader can understand. I’m not telling you to boil everything down to “see spot run” simplicity. But, if you can’t make people understand what you write, it’s not because the world is filled with morons. It’s because your messages are not clear.

Andreana has been with our company for almost two years. She is one of our top Affiliate Managers. We all love Andreana. She does a wonderful job and we’re lucky to have her on our team. Andreana manages over 200 RevenueStreet affiliates. Please feel free to contact Andreana. She would love to hear from you.

Meet Andreana Warren, AKA "A"

YourHealthNews.com is LIVE! This is the newest co-registration site developed by TheMediaCrew. YourHealthNews.com will specifically target the health and medical industry. The goal of the site is the generate high volume and high quality health and medical co-registration data for its advertisers. Please contact your account manager if you’re interested in learning more :-)

As an internet marketing company, we rely heavily on our reputation to gain new clients and advertisers. A big part of building your reputation is increasing the amount of trust and credibility you or your business has in the industry. This reputation is the foundation to a successful and trusted partnership with your clients or employer. You can improve and maintain your reputation by following the 4 main trust principles outlined:

1. Integrity – This just happens to be one of our shared values. We pledge to always speak the truth and communicate openly and honestly with each other. In addition, integrity has to do with having congruency and “practicing what you preach.” Would you promote a campaign you would not run yourself?

2. Intent – What is your agenda, motive, and behavior? It is important in the online world to effectively communicate your agenda and the overall process being used to deliver the product or service.
“There are no moral shortcuts in the game of business – or life. There are basically, three kinds of people: the unsuccessful, the temporarily successful, and those who become and remain successful. The difference is character.” Jon Huntsman, Chairman, Huntsman Capital

3. Capabilities – Are you great at what you do? Do you provide industry knowledge and skills necessary to provide value to your customer/clients? You should constantly be improving your knowledge base and skills.

4. Results – What is your Track Record? Are you providing services in the time promised? Do you have systems in place to monitor and maintain time commitments? When you can establish a positive reputation of performing and being a producer, your reputation will precede you.

Take some time and ask yourself if you follow these 4 trust principles. This process will help you recognize your own credibility and focus on areas for improvement.

By: Rustam Irani| COO| TheMediaCrew

Deliverability remains a hot topic in the e-mail realm. Every other e-mail whitepaper these days has deliverability as the theme. But what to do when you’re not in control of the delivery? How do you send a stand-alone e-mail to a rented list and guarantee your message to new prospects gets delivered? Here are a few “must-do’s” to get the best results for your next prospecting e-mail campaign:

On the creative end, sending HTML e-mails with clean and favorable coding increases response rates significantly. Also, studies show you have less than three seconds to hook a reader. Many recipients view e-mails through preview screens while others only view a message’s top portion before deciding whether to scroll down or delete your message. Design enhancement can help maximize your message and increase response.

Also, avoid spam trap words. An oldie yet a goodie — avoiding specific words in the subject line and the body copy remains critical. For example, avoid the following: “FREE”; using the dollar sign character in the subject line; multiple exclamation points; “offer” or the excessive use of “click here.”

Budget in “send time.” When planning your campaign, allow at least four days to complete delivery for best results. The major Internet service providers — Yahoo, Hotmail, AOL, etc. — have all recently clamped down on allowing too much commercial e-mail to come through. Take a page from the retention gurus and mail out over a series of days instead of hours.

Rememner, follow-up is more important than ever. Send a follow-up message to those who open your e-mail, with a new subject line and possibly a sweetened offer. Studies on this practice have proven at least a 15% increase in response to a multi-message strategy.

Spread out risk and send from multiple list sources, using a variety of ESPs to ensure success. Also, ask your list provider when these populations last received mailings, as using a list which has not been contacted for several months greatly increases your chances of causing spam complaints to ISPs or to spam watch groups.

Finally, be certain to use a centralized tracking tool to track results real-time online. This way, you’ll have visibility on opens and clicks. Many e-mail list rental vendors will have this tool. This way, you can monitor what lists remain in keeping with industry response rates as soon as they start deploying. Combined with always using reputable lists, these “must-dos” will increase the likelihood of your finding prospecting success and will help you achieve that ROI goal.