{!date dayname+0}, {!date long+0} Dear {!firstname_fix} I hope all is well with you. If you are an England rugby fan you'll be happy today after last night's win; sorry if you are from Wales...! Well, I'm not that sorry...! Even with the name Jones, you'd expect me to support Wales - but I'm not Welsh, boyo. And if you thought I was Welsh, well that's an assumption - and only the other day I was challenging people not to build their online business based on assumption. Few businesses actually seem to find out all they need to know about their customers and potential customers. How much do you really, really, truly know about yours? Hand on heart?
YOUR QUESTIONS ANSWERED: What's the difference between content and blogging? Everywhere you look these days online there is advice on adding "content" to your website. Meanwhile, internet marketing gurus will tell you that you need to blog. But is a blog separate to your website? Is a blog something different to "content"? Can a blog also be "content"? The problem is, these terms have grown up online side-by-side and there is the impression that they are different. But quite simply, they are not. Blogging is adding content; adding content is blogging. It's all one and the same. Indeed, some of the most well-known blogging applications, such as WordPress, are in fact "content management systems" - they help you manage your content. You might call it a "blog" or you might call it "news" or you may call it your "video diary" - who cares. What matters is that you add content. Content is anything which you add to your website - whether it is a "journal" as in a traditional kind of blog, or pictures or videos or articles or slideshows or white papers or case studies or research reports or podcasts or...you get the picture. But why should you add content? Adding content to your website has several benefit. Firstly, it provides new material for your readers. Secondly, it increases the overall size of your site making you appear bigger and better to search engines and human beings alike. Plus, adding new content to your website increases your visibility, your credibility and your standing as an expert. Sites that do not add content are often perceived as inactive, out-of-date and lacking knowledge. So, even the simple addition of a blog to your website will boost your status amongst your readers. But if you don't want to add blogging software or learn new applications, just add material to your website using your existing systems. You don't have to blog - but you do have to add extra content. Whether you do this through blogging software or not is irrelevant - what matters is you add content. So, call it blogging, call it content management, call it website writing, call it anything you like - it all amounts to the same thing...! Oh - and one more thing - test any set of keywords you like on Google. You will find that generally, the sites at the top are the ones with the most content. That's worth a thought on its own.
WHAT I LEARNED THIS WEEK: Customers deserve real solutions - not sticking plasters It has been a difficult couple of weeks - you might have missed an email or two from me. Whoops - sorry. However, it is a story I think we can all learn from - I certainly have learned. At the start of each year I review my webhosting requirements and suppliers. My business has changed somewhat in the past year and the hosting suppliers I used - though fantastic - did not have the right mix of products I needed in the coming year ahead. So I decided to change things. Some of my files - such as video and audio - are now hosted at Amazon's S3 service - brilliant, reliable and highly cost effective as they only charge for the amount of traffic; storage itself is zero cost. I then moved some of my websites to a new hosting company and some to another. I have always split my hosting, so that in the event of failure at one host I can move the site reasonably quickly to the alternative. Equally I can use one host as a backup. However, my main new hosting company has been a shambles. I chose them after checking hosting speeds; one of the issues with Google these days is that it uses the speed of delivery of your website as one of its ranking factors. We need to be on fast servers. So I checked the speed and reliability of various hosting companies before making my decision. Indeed, I looked at review sites and even asked people "in the know". I moved my sites and thought all was well. But within hours things started to collapse. Some sites went down. Email bounced. People could not access my sites and were posting messages on Twitter detailing the failures. I moved my site to my backup host while the main host got it sorted. They promised it was fixed. I moved everything back. Later that day - failure again. This has been the pattern of events every day for the past two weeks. Indeed, as I write this newsletter, all my websites are down, I have no email and my hosting company says they have no idea as to when my site will be up and running again. I am talking about one of the biggest hosting companies in the world here, with rave reviews....! The strange thing is, I have a second account with the same firm which runs like a dream. It appears there is a problem with one server, but they will not admit it. Why not? They seem to want to constantly fob me off and spend time fixing things, without actually providing a solution. It is sticking-plaster support - and that is not good enough. Inevitably I am in the midst of moving my main hosting company - again. But what I have learned is two-fold: even if people recommend a service and you have down your homework, nothing beats personal experience to decide whether or not something is really worthwhile. And secondly, if in my business my customers suffer some kind of problem, I really need to solve it - not just cover it up with some kind of temporary, sticking-plaster stop-gap.
THIS WEEK'S "MUST BUY": Content Rules As I said earlier, content is essential to your website. There are plenty of books advising you on how to produce blogs, or how to run podcasts but few books are on all aspects of web content production. Of the ones that exist, this new book "Content Rules" is undoubtedly the best one I have ever seen. Indeed, I was so absorbed I read it from cover to cover in one sitting..! Not only is it crammed full of advice and hints and tips, there are several detailed case studies showing exactly how businesses have benefited from a solid content strategy. If you want to engage your online audience, you need this book. To find out more about this book visit: http://uklik.me/contentrulesbook
SPECIAL NOTE: Join me for breakfast Fancy Breakfast in Basingstoke? On 8th February I shall be one of the speakers at the North Hants Expo at The Anvil Theatre. I'll be talking about The Future of Social Media and how it will impact on your business. Best of all, the breakfast event is free to attend as i the Expo itself. See http://www.northhantsexpo.biz/ for more information and perhaps I'll see you there. Kind Regards
Graham Jones Web: grahamjones.co.uk Tel: +44 118 336 9710 If you no longer wish to receive this newsletter than you can delete your name from the mailing list by clicking this link: {!remove_web} Affiliate Links: Some of the links in this newsletter are affiliate links providing me with a small commission when you purchase the item. However, I only use affiliate links for products which I personally value. |
