In my previous article, I have tried to look at the origin or evolution of e-commerce from where it started up to where it is now, In this article, I want to look at the different types of e-commerce classifications that you should know as a Digital Marketer. Follow me as we are going to look at that in this article.

#1 Business To Business

This type of e-commerce model allows businesses to transact businesses together. When this happens, it is very possible that the two businesses are online or one of the businesses are online. Take, for example, the relationship between Jumia and DHL. DHL can assist Jumia in delivering products that are sold online to their doorsteps. This can help in increasing sales turnover for the online business.

#2 Business To Consumer 

We can also have businesses leveraging on the internet in order to serve their customers. In this kind of business model, individuals might be asked to sign up in order to be able to buy products and services and get more from what the organisation has to offer. A good example is e-commerce websites such as Jumia and Amazon where customers can visit and purchase products and services that they have for sale. 

#3 Consumer To Business 

This is another type of business model classification when it comes to e-commerce. Here, individuals can offer their services to businesses and get paid in return. Take, for example, we have individuals that register on freelance platforms such as Fiverr and Elance and they are paid for services they are rendering on those platforms. Some Bloggers also have Google Adsense and Admob accounts that allow Google to display ads on their blogs and Apps.

#4 Consumer To Consumer

This is an electronic e-commerce platform where a single organisation is able to create a platform that allows two customers to transact businesses together. In this kind of platform, the customers always exchange old products in return for money. Take, for example, I have an old router that I want to sell. I can always upload it to a Consumer to Consumer platform and get paid for such products or services.

Action Point
PS: If you would like to have an online course on any of the courses that you found on this blog, I will be glad to do that on an individual and corporate level, I will be very glad to do that I have trained several individuals and groups and they are doing well in their various fields of endeavour. Some of those that I have trained includes staff of Dangote Refinery, FCMB, Zenith Bank, New Horizons Nigeria among others. Please come on Whatsapp and let’s talk about your training. You can reach me on Whatsapp HERE. Please note that I will be using Microsoft Team to facilitate the training. 

I know you might agree with some of the points that I have raised in this article. You might not agree with some of the issues raised. Let me know your views about the topic discussed. We will appreciate it if you can drop your comment. Thanks in anticipation.

CRMNIGERIA is committed to fact-checking in a fair, transparent and non-partisan manner. Therefore, if you’ve found an error in any of our reports, be it factual, editorial, or an outdated post, please contact us to tell us about it.

Becoming a Digital marketer is one of the greatest decisions that you can ever make as a person. But despite the fact that it is highly rewarding when you decide that you want to be a Digital Marketer, it is not really easy to make an impact as a Digital Marketing professional. The reason is that it requires some other skills to be highly successful as a Digital marketer. In this article, I want to look at some of the must-have skills for a Digital Marketer. Follow me as we are going to look at that in this article. 

Now the skills…

#1 Dealing with data

As a Digital Marketer, you will have to deal with alot of data. At times, you will have to compare the data that you have before running a campaign with what you have after you might have run a campaign for some time. This will help you to decide whether your campaign was a success or not. If you do not know how to analyse data, you might find it difficult to make decisions based on the data that you have. That is why you need a good working knowledge of Data Analysis as a Digital marketer. 

#2 Email Delivery 

One other vital skill that a good Digital Marketer needs to survive is a working knowledge of email marketing. Most people open and check their emails more than they check any other applications. You have to know how to use email to grab the attention of your target audience. If you don’t know how to craft an email that can sustain the attention of your Leads and your loyal customers, you might not be successful as a digital marketer. 

#3 Consumer behaviour drivers

Just like I said, as a Digital Marketer, you will be working with alot of data. You need to be able to look into this data and identify the various drivers of consumers behaviour. This will assist you in advising top management on what you need to do in order to drive more sales. It will also increase the turnover of the organisation and boost customer engagement at all levels of the organisation. 

#4 Knowledge of market segmentation

Another critical knowledge for a digital marketer is the knowledge of market segmentation. Most at time, Digital marketing can not be a kind of one cap fits all. You need to know the characteristics that each of your customers has in common. This will allow you to identify products and services that will appeal to them as a group. This will allow you to save alot of money on marketing campaigns. It will also increase the ROI of your marketing campaigns. 

#5 Production Abilities

Another essential skill for a good digital marketer is production abilities and digital marketing skills. A good digital marketer must be able to run campaigns from the beginning to the end. He must be able to carry stakeholders along and engage all parties that are going to be part of the team. He has to be able to work independently and interdependently on any campaign that comes his way.

#6 Media Planning and buying skills

Another major skill that you need as a Digital marketer is your ability to engage in media skills in order to run a successful campaign. You really need to know how both traditional and digital marketing works in order to succeed. You must also develop your buying skills. This is due to the fact that you will have to outsource some of the skills that you need in order to be successful with your blog. 

#7 Data Visualisation

A good digital marketer must also have a working knowledge of data visualisation. It is not every time that you will have time to do through figures. You should be able to look at charts and understand the message that they are trying to pass across. This will allow you to make decisions without bugging yourself down with data. It will also earn you respect from other stakeholders that you will be working with from time to time as well.

If there is one thing that revolutionalised how business is being done generally, it is the introduction of e-commerce. This process allows products and services to be bought from anywhere around the world. It is really a game-changer. In this article, I want to look at the evolution of e-commerce. We want to look at how we begin the journey until we get to where we are now. Follow me as we are going to look at that in this article. 

Now the stages…

#1 Late 1970s

At this stage, e-commerce is limited to facilitation of the commercial transactions. It is only limited only to buying and selling of products and services. At this stage, technologies such as EDI and EDT is being used to facilitate commerce. 

#2 In the 1980s

At this stage, credit cards Automated Teller Machine and telephone banking was being introduced to e-commerce. This allows banks to play major roles in commercial transactions. This also increases the volume of sales globally.

#3 From the 1990s

At this stage, e-commerce now included Enterprise Resource Planning Systems, data mining and data warehousing. This was when organisations such as Amazon, and Yahoo among others launched out.

#4 1998-2000

At this time, a substantial number of businesses around the world started embracing e-commerce. It was also around this time that Google came around and change the internet business landscape generally.

#5 2000-2002

This was the period that Wikipedia was launched. it was also the period that paypal.com came around as well. It marks the beginning of internet marketing.

#6 2002 onward

This was when mobile commerce and social commerce were launched. Now people can purchase products and services using mobile phones. It now becomes possible for people to purchase products and services through social media platforms.
Action Point

I know you might agree with some of the points raised in this article. You might not agree with some of the issues raised. Let me know your views about the topic discussed. We will appreciate it if you can drop your comment. Thanks in anticipation.

CRMNIGERIA is committed to fact-checking in a fair, transparent and non-partisan manner. Therefore, if you’ve found an error in any of our reports, be it factual, editorial, or an outdated post, please contact us to tell us about it.

15 Tips On How To Run A Successful Blog

There are over 100 million blogs online, and they cannot all be successful. Some of the blogs have a good start, and then they simply can no longer cope with their competitors. Some bloggers give up when they face obstacles or might get discouraged by a slow start.

To make sure you stay motivated and you continue optimizing your blog like successful bloggers do, follow these tips:

#1 Have a responsive blog

Almost half of your blog visitors will arrive from mobile devices nowadays. The percentage will increase in the coming years. What it means is that responsive blog design is a must if you want your blog to be successful. You have to publish content that is mobile-friendly, to make sure you offer the same user experience to both desktop and mobile users.

Blog responsiveness is often associated with blog speed as well. A responsive blog is the one that loads fast, so this is another aspect to take into account when thinking about blog responsiveness. Things that might be slowing your blog speed include:

• Image size
• Image format
• Slow server
• Too many plugins
• Coding issues
• Not using browser caching

#2 Publish consistently

Consistency in publishing a blog is necessary to maintain your readership. Blogs now have the status newspapers once did. They provide a daily dose of entertainment, fun, news, latest updates, industry news, creative ideas, etc. If someone becomes your regular visitor, that person expects the blog to be regularly updated. After all, why would they visit again if it were not for the new content?

Most marketing experts agree that consistency in publishing is important, but what they do not agree upon is the pace at which you should publish. There is no official recommendation on an ideal publishing pace. However, it is worth reflecting upon one statistic from this book’s chapter 1, where it is stated that companies that publish more content (16+ blog posts per month) get more traffic (3.5x more).

Try to create and publish as frequently as you can. However, try to maintain a bit of predictability so the readers can expect your post. For example, if you go for one post a week, choose a specific day when you publish.

#3 Work on building influence

If you want to become a blogger who is also an influencer, you will need to develop a personalized approach and find new ways to connect with your audience. For starters, create author profiles for each author on your blog. Each author profile should have a picture and additional information.

Other factors that can help you build your influence include:

• Gaining trust among online users
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• Providing accurate and up-to-date information
• Publishing regularly and sticking to your niche
• Extending your influence to the social networks

#4 Make contacts

Making contacts is another way to help you run a successful blog. These connections help you find new collaboration opportunities, new ideas or simply get someone to exchange experience about blogging and pitfalls you might come across. Although contacts from your niche are the people you want to focus on, always try to extend your influence. You never know how lucrative these connections might turn out to be.

#5 Start a newsletter

One of the most powerful tools of every blogger is his or her mailing list. This is why you should start a newsletter. It can help you encourage people to apply and stay in touch with you through emails. Offering some exclusive materials and insights is a helpful way to encourage more sign-ups.
Additionally, email marketing can become another medium to monetize your blog, especially if you have a great reputation and influence among your subscribers.

#6 Engage through social networks

Social networks are one of the ways you can increase traffic to your blog. Start by sharing your blog posts on the social media accounts you manage. Each social media post should have text added to it, as well as an image (or a video). These will help you engage your users and encourage them to click on the link to read the full article, which they can find on your blog.

Unlike search engines, where you are likely to reach users who look for specific terms that take them to your content, social networks help with reaching users without them initiating the search. While organic reach on social media has its limitations, and sometimes even those who follow you might not receive your status updates in their news feed, paid reach on social media can always be used as an alternative. With advanced targeting options and engaging CTAs (CTA = Call To Action), boosting the reach of your status updates through paid campaigns can significantly help you increase engagement on social networks and bring traffic to your blog.

#7 Optimize your blog with the right plugins

Plugins are an absolute necessity of any successful blog, as they enhance its performance and add useful features that are not a part of the basic blogging platform. This is why you should explore the plugins available for your blogging platform and install those you will find most helpful for your type of blog.

One thing is important to have in mind. Plugins can, and often do, slow down your blog. Still, they provide some features you cannot live without. The ideal solution is to install only those plugins that you genuinely use. Also, make sure you install new, updated versions of those plugins as soon as they are available.

#8 Consider security before it is too late

Security is an important part of having a blog. You want your content to stay secure and available to online users. The possibility of your blog being hacked always exists, but there are a few things you can do to increase security before that happens.
• Secure the login details
• Hide the information about the version of the CMS you are using
• Backup your website regularly
• Be cautious when installing plugins

• Keep your CMS platform and all the plugins updated
• Get an SSL certificate for your blog
Use catchy titles
Titles can help you a lot with getting organic traffic from the search engines. You should do some research before you decide on a title.
• Determine the focus keyword you want to use
• Explore the search engines to avoid using a title that already exists
• Use online tools to get title ideas and optimize your title

Besides their effect on search engines, blog titles are also the most prominent part when sharing a blog post on social media.

The main purpose of the title is to draw attention, to encourage people to click on the link and start reading the article. Therefore, think about these goals when choosing a title for your next blog article.

#9 Format to enhance readability

How the blog content looks is just as important as the message you convey with it. When the users click on a link to read your article, they will first quickly skim through the text. For them, it is essential that the article is readable. You will achieve this with:

• Headings
• Bold and italic text
• Bullets
• Short paragraphs

When they skim the text, they can get the gist. In fact, some visitors will be happy with the gist and will not even bother reading the whole thing. However, presenting the content in a reader-friendly way, you increase the chance of people reading it. When you organize information in logical units, i.e., paragraphs, and highlight the most important things, you provide an organized message and provide better reader experience. Those who are reading will be able to keep up with the flow of the text and to remember the key aspects of it.

#10 Proofread all your posts over and over again

Proofreading is an absolute must for all your content, including the about us page, contact page, etc. You want to present content of high quality to your readers, which also means that this content should be free of typos and any mistakes. Errors leave a negative impression because the article might seem written in haste. This kind of attitude does not work well for you and your credibility, because it will seem that you do not care too much about the content you have published, nor do you see it valuable. And if you see it that way, your readers might start too.

You should proofread the content yourself, or hire someone to do that for you. You can even use software that detects minor errors and typos.

#11 Avoid cluttering your blog

Think about how each blog page looks like. First, there is a top part which usually features the main menu, or featured articles. Then there is the article page. You might also have content in the sidebar, in the footer, etc. You can also have a pop-up window, usually with a CTA (CTA = Call To Action).

Although these are all possible places to show off content or even promote some ads, try to avoid cluttering your blog. You want the focus of your readers to be the article they are about to read. Limit the design of the page to only the content that is the most relevant to the readers. For example, you might keep the pop-up that helps you generate emails, but you might want to lose the sidebar ad that hardly gets any clicks. You can test different approaches, and see what works best for you.

#12 Get to know your readers to create better content

When starting out, you will focus on the content you think your audience will find most helpful and most interesting. As you start getting visitors, you will get a chance to know them better which will enable you to create better content. For you to succeed in this, try using several methods:
• Ask your readers how useful that content is. Can it be applied to their business? To their life? Etc. These kind of questions are usually added at the end of the article
• Start interaction with your readers in the comments section, which is usually found below the article, to find out their opinion

• Conduct a survey asking questions that will help you get to know your readers
• Send an email asking subscribers questions directly or asking them to participate in a survey
• Analyze the statistics and detect the articles with the best statistics (the highest conversion rate, the longest session duration, etc.)

The content you create is designed for your readers and for that content to achieve the best performance, it needs to be tailored to appeal to your audience. As much as you think you know what useful content is for your audience, you might be surprised by the results. Also, this is a handy way to get some new ideas, when you have trouble finding new topics to write about. Listening and learning from your target audience is never a bad thing.

#13 Be patient and realistic when setting up goals

You want your blog to be successful. Each blogger does. But not everyone makes it. Not everyone manages to turn blogging into a profitable career. This is why you have to be realistic

when starting out. You should not get carried away by examples of bloggers, who made it really fast. Also, do not get discouraged by a slow start.
Instead, when you start a blog, set up goals.

Try to be as realistic as possible. Even though it might be difficult for you to foresee what you can expect in a month or two, try to determine some achievements you want to reach. This should all be a part of your blogging strategy. The goals you want to achieve should then be used as a guideline to develop your strategy and use the methods that will help you achieve your goals.

Also, have in mind that it takes time for a blog to start off. Once you hit that live button, there might be days before you see any visits. It takes time for search engines to index the new pages, and even more time to reach page 1 in Google, Bing or one of the other search engines. It takes time for those pages to reach your online users.
Implementing different promotional strategies will help you with spreading the word about your blog and achieving your goals.

#14 Keep an eye on the statistics

Blog statistics provide a glimpse into how your readers are interacting with the content. The information you get this way include the following:
• Data about the readers (location, demographics, etc.)

• Data about the visit (session duration, page viewed per visit, etc.)
• How the visitors interact with the content (which pages they click on, which content they share, download, etc.)

All of these details are helpful to determine what kind of content performs best, as well as how the readers are consuming the content. You might notice that longer posts get more visits, or that shorter posts generate more leads. The idea is to find out more about your blog through the statistics and to use that knowledge to create even better-performing content.

Action Point
PS: If you would like to have an online course on any of the courses that you found on this blog, I will be glad to do that on an individual and corporate level, I will be very glad to do that because I have trained several individuals and groups and they are doing well in their various fields of endeavour. Some of those that I have trained include the staff of Dangote Refinery, FCMB, Zenith Bank, and New Horizons Nigeria among others. Please come on Whatsapp and let’s talk about your training. You can reach me on Whatsapp HERE. Please note that I will be using Microsoft Team to facilitate the training.

I know you might agree with some of the points that I have raised in this article. You might not agree with some of the issues raised. Let me know your views about the topic discussed. We will appreciate it if you can drop your comment. Thanks in anticipation.

CRMNUGGETS is committed to fact-checking in a fair, transparent and non-partisan manner. Therefore, if you’ve found an error in any of our reports, be it factual, editorial, or an outdated post, please contact us to tell us about it.

The strategies above offer multiple ideas to turn blogging into a business and earn from it. Still, there are a couple of tips to help you boost your income, regardless of the strategy you choose for blog monetization. In this article, I want to talk about how to boost profit from Blogging. 

#1 Consider a long-term strategy

When you think about the best way to monetize your blog, think in the long run. Consider how you want your blog to grow and evolve, to make sure that this monetization tactic is really the way to go forward.

For example, you should not use a sponsored post strategy to promote an ebook about your niche if your long-term goal is to write an ebook yourself. Additionally, expecting a windfall, months after you start a blog, is usually unrealistic. As you probably already know: “Rome wasn’t built in a day”. Bloggers often need time to generate visits, to gain influence and to eventually turn that influence into income. Hence the need to consider your long-term strategy.

#2 Use multiple monetization tactics

There is no rule saying that you can only use one monetization tactic. Instead, consider all of the strategies you can benefit from. What is crucial when selecting a monetization tactic is profitability. If you realize that several monetization tactics can be profitable, test them all and select those, which give the best results for maximizing your income through blogging.

#3 Focus on your niche

Just like with creating blogging content, choosing a niche of the products you promote is very important. It gives you a better chance of tailoring your content to your target group. When  you use monetization tactics, make sure you only use those that enable you to stay in your niche and keep targeting your blog audience. Relevant products or services you are promoting have more chance of converting your visitors and thus earning you profit.

#4 Build a community

Building a community is a very important step in defining your online influence. A community is more than just blog readers. Those are the readers that are genuinely interested in your content, they respect you, and they take the time to participate in the community. They are also the highest-converting visitors, helping you increase your profit through different monetization tactics. Building a community starts with your blog, but other platforms can be used for interaction as well, such as a comment plugin, Facebook groups, emails, live chat sessions, etc. Community access can be free, with an option to promote content and products to members.

Another way to monetize the community is to create a premium club. The users will have to pay a membership fee to join, after which they get access to specific perks, such as consultation, exclusive materials, downloadable content, discounts, etc.

It is important to have in mind that each of these monetization strategies requires time to plan and implement. Although this is a necessary step, it is not something that should disrupt your blogging strategy. Also, you should not overwhelm your readers with selling all sort of things and a ton of promotional content. They are your blog readers (and supporters) first, and then your customers.

Still, monetization tactics are an essential part of blogging because they enable bloggers to earn their living through blogging and focus all of their time on their blog. They can quit their job that was supporting them as soon as the blog’s monetization tactics can replace this income. This gives more freedom to bloggers and an opportunity to turn blogging into a full-time, profitable career.

Action Point
PS: If you would like to have an online course on any of the courses that you found on this blog, I will be glad to do that on an individual and corporate level, I will be very glad to do that because I have trained several individuals and groups and they are doing well in their various fields of endeavour. Some of those that I have trained include the staff of Dangote Refinery, FCMB, Zenith Bank, and New Horizons Nigeria among others. Please come on Whatsapp and let’s talk about your training. You can reach me on Whatsapp HERE. Please note that I will be using Microsoft Team to facilitate the training.

I know you might agree with some of the points that I have raised in this article. You might not agree with some of the issues raised. Let me know your views about the topic discussed. We will appreciate it if you can drop your comment. Thanks in anticipation.

CRMNUGGETS is committed to fact-checking in a fair, transparent and non-partisan manner. Therefore, if you’ve found an error in any of our reports, be it factual, editorial, or an outdated post, please contact us to tell us about it.

From a hobby popularized during the early 2000s to one of the most desirable careers of the 2010s, blogging has opened up so many opportunities for people to earn money online. Today, a lot of blogs are created as businesses, with making money through blogging being one of the goals from the start. The opportunities depend on the type of blog, the language you write in and the audience you are targeting. However, there are a couple of commonly used tactics to make a living through blogging, which are the ones you should explore first.

Blog monetization tactics
Blog monetization tactics enable you to cash in on your blog popularity in multiple ways. When you first start blogging, these might not seem as profitable, but the number of visits is crucial for the success of these tactics. The more visitors you can attract, the more likely you are to earn money from these tactics.

#1 Affiliate marketing

Affiliate marketing is a very popular monetization tactic for bloggers who do not have products of their own to sell. Instead, they recommend and link to the products on third-party websites in exchange for a percentage of the sale.

In affiliate marketing, there are two roles. Merchants, i.e., those who own the product or service that is promoted and affiliates, who promote those products or services. Bloggers are affiliates. They join an affiliate program, obtain affiliate links and promote them through the blog content. Once the blog visitor clicks on the affiliate link, this is recorded using cookies.

This way, the blogger is attributed the conversion, and the merchant then pays out the agreed commission, which is a percentage of the sale price. In this case, the blog visitors do not have any additional cost. The blogger’s income is based on the profit shared by the merchant in exchange for the promotion.

When you decide to use affiliate marketing to monetize your blog, these are the aspects you should have in mind:
• Promote the products/services that your audience will be interested in to maximize the number of conversions
• Promote the products/services you can vouch for (i.e., high-quality is a norm)
• Join affiliate programs that offer the best terms (the highest commission, the longest cookie life, etc.)

#2 Sponsored posts

The idea with this blog monetization tactic is to create a blog post which will promote a particular business, product, or service. You as a blogger will receive an agreed commission for this post. Bloggers usually choose to include a disclaimer within the post notifying the readers that the content is paid by a specific brand featured in the post. However, this is not obligatory.

There are a lot of opportunities when it comes to blog monetization through sponsored posts. Bloggers usually have fixed rates for a sponsored post, and they often prefer writing the content themselves. Still, the blogger and the brand can agree on different terms. For example, the brand might provide content or have a say in the content created by the blogger. Or instead of monetary compensation, the blogger can be given the product or granted free access to the service.

This type of post is very popular among travel bloggers who receive free accommodation in exchange for a post on their blog about the accommodation in question.
Each sponsored post has a link back to the website where the product (or service) can be bought. Unlike affiliate marketing, where the clicks on the links are tracked, based on which the commission is paid out, with sponsored post it is irrelevant whether the readers will click the link or not. The blogger is paid for the actual post with the link and the content about the product (or service) that is promoted, regardless of the number of visits and conversions.

#3 AdSense

Once a commonly used way to earn passive income through blogging, AdSense is not the most profitable strategy at the moment, but still offers a chance to monetize your visits by including ad space on your blog. It is a service offered by Google, which means that companies that want to advertise with Google AdWords program are the advertisers who will bid for the space on your blog. The ads are displayed for both desktop and mobile users.

Google uses complex algorithms to determine which ads will appear to your blog visitors and when. Since the system is designed to maximize profit, it will automatically select ads that are most relevant to your visitors, ensuring the highest conversion rate. You do not have a direct say in which ads will be posted on your blog and which will not, however you have the option of selecting and deselecting ads based on categories (more on this later).

Joining the AdSense program allows you a certain level of control. You choose where the ads appear on your blog, and you format the style of the ad to match your blog. You can choose categories of ads you want to allow on your blog. You can even block the ads you do not want your visitors to see. You earn money when the ads are seen or clicked, depending on the type of campaign.
To get started with AdSense, you will need:

• A Google account
• Blog with original content that complies with the program policies
• A phone number and a mailing address, so you can get paid
Payments are sent once you reach a minimum amount, which is determined by the reporting currency. You can monitor earnings through an app which includes alerts, performance reports, etc.

#4 Banners

Another way to use blog space to earn money is to offer a banner space for sale. In this case, you get contacted by companies interested in having their banner placed on your blog in exchange for payment. This type of advertising is similar to AdSense visually. Both have a banner displayed on your blog.

The main difference is that AdSense offers dynamic ads which constantly change. Also, the amount of profit earned this way is cumulative. On the other hand, when you sell banner space on your blog, you will have the same banner displayed all the time during the period the contract between you and the company is active. The same banner will be shown to all the users at any moment they visit the blog. The banner can be featured on the home page, on specific blog pages, or even on all blog pages.

In terms of income, you earn a fixed income from the company interested in advertising this way, usually paid in advance.
Another alternative is to have a banner which will also feature an affiliate link. In this case, you would earn through affiliate marketing, but instead of a text link, you will attach the link to the image.

With both Google AdSense and banner advertising, it is helpful to place the ad in a position that will attract the most views/clicks. This is why banners are usually placed strategically, often below the main menu and before the blog content. You can always experiment with placing the banner in different locations on your website, to see, which position converts the best.

#5 Email marketing

Email marketing as a strategy in online marketing is known to have the highest conversion rate. What this means is that you are more likely to earn income through email marketing than through other types of online promotion. Of course, there are a couple of conditions that need to be met for an email campaign to be successful:

• Have a relevant mailing list
• Segment the mailing list
• Create a good reputation as a sender
• Write an email that is convincing and trustworthy
• Promote high-quality and relevant products
This is how you can earn with email marketing. It all starts with your blog.

You will need some original content of high quality that will attract your readers. They will then sign up for your newsletter. Besides a signup button, you can use other lead generation strategies, such as free download, organizing a giveaway, etc. Once you have the email addresses of your blog visitors, this gives you a chance to create a more personalized approach with them through emails. Becoming a respectable sender means that your blog readers are likely to open and read your emails. This means that you can reach them. Have in mind that each person sends and receives more than 200 emails per day (Source). It is difficult to reach email recipients. The more success you have at this, the more profitable your email marketing strategy will be.

Two of the most popular strategies you can use to monetize your email marketing campaign:
• Promote a product (and get paid to do so)
• Affiliate links
Email marketing is connected with blogging in the sense that you generate email addresses through your blog. Blogging helps you create a base of subscribers, and this is where the blogging strategy ends, and email marketing begins as another segment of marketing allowing you to reach and convert online users.

Action Point
PS: If you would like to have an online course on any of the courses that you found on this blog, I will be glad to do that on an individual and corporate level, I will be very glad to do that because I have trained several individuals and groups and they are doing well in their various fields of endeavour. Some of those that I have trained include the staff of Dangote Refinery, FCMB, Zenith Bank, and New Horizons Nigeria among others. Please come on Whatsapp and let’s talk about your training. You can reach me on Whatsapp HERE. Please note that I will be using Microsoft Team to facilitate the training.

I know you might agree with some of the points that I have raised in this article. You might not agree with some of the issues raised. Let me know your views about the topic discussed. We will appreciate it if you can drop your comment. Thanks in anticipation.

CRMNUGGETS is committed to fact-checking in a fair, transparent and non-partisan manner. Therefore, if you’ve found an error in any of our reports, be it factual, editorial, or an outdated post, please contact us to tell us about it.

Everyone is witnessing the remarkable growth of video on the internet. Just to illustrate this omnipresence of video, it is reported that 500 million people are watching videos on Facebook every day (Source). It is also important to add YouTube statistics. As the most popular video sharing platform, YouTube reports that one billion hours of videos are watched daily on this platform alone.

Like with blogging, vlogging is a content format that has been affected by technology development. As soon as the technology necessary for video content production became widely available, video as a content format became increasingly used.

What is a vlog?

Vlog is short for a video blog. It is a content format which uses video as the medium. Even though vlogging started in the early 2000s, it was not until the introduction of YouTube that vlogs became increasingly popular. Apart from YouTube, many CMS platforms have started integrating a video format enabling vloggers to publish their content easily.

Vlogging is quite similar to blogging in many aspects. In fact, many bloggers have become vloggers, and many vloggers also have a blog. The main distinction is the presentation of content. Although blogging has a lot of benefits and presents an amazing opportunity for creators to express themselves, vlogging gives an extra dimension to this presentation. Using video enables a more interactive experience and possibility to connect with the vlogger more deeply.
There is a variety of vlog topics and styles. We can differentiate between two main types of vlogs.

Recorded videos

These are the videos that are recorded by the vlogger, usually in a setting that is prepared. This kind of video can also be recorded in public, during events, performances, i.e., in the situation where the vlogger does not prepare the set. The topic and the style of this type of vlog can vary, so there can be many subtypes of recorded videos. Still, the main characteristic and the main advantage of such videos is the full control the vlogger has over the content that is created. Once the content is recorded, the vlogger has the time to edit the video before it is made public.

Live broadcasting

Live broadcasting vlogs are more spontaneous as they are not edited before publishing. Instead, they are broadcast in the moment of recording. A huge benefit of such vlogs is a possibility to broadcast events in real time. Live streaming also supports community interaction through live chat that allows an opportunity to involve the viewers in the moment of broadcasting. This could also be a drawback because there is no room for errors. The content cannot be edited later on, like with recorded videos.

Why is vlogging popular?

Many reasons have contributed to such massive popularity of vlogging.

Easy to create

Depending on the content idea and presentation, videos can be quite easy to create, especially live broadcasting vlogs. All you need is your phone, and you are ready to start. Of course, vlogs can involve a more complex setting than that, so extra lights or props can be used. If the video is recorded, video editing software is used to edit the material. Even though the video production can get advanced and complex, vlogging is essentially an easy-to-create type of content. Hence, its popularity and the number of vloggers which is continuously on the rise.

Vlogging is affordable

With no other equipment than your phone and no other software than YouTube, vlogging is a very affordable type of content. You can start vlogging with no budget at all. Just like with blogging, starting with a budget or investment can make a difference later on.

People love videos

Over 70 000 videos are viewed in 1 second on YouTube (Source). The video format is easy to digest, it is easy to view on the go, and it attracts more attention than written content. This is why people love videos.

Visual content performs better – Exploring blogging statistics, you will soon discover that visual content performs better. While most bloggers leverage the use of photos and use them to complement their written content, vlogs can do the same job, if not even better. Vlogs can be an excellent addition to your blog in the form of engaging content, while at the same time blogs can be a useful platform to promote your vlogs. This is how the two complement.

How to use vlogging in business?

Vlogging, like blogging, has opened up so many opportunities for people looking to build an online career. A lot of successful vloggers nowadays started this as a hobby, but have managed to turn this hobby into international fame, career, or online business.
However, if you are a business looking for ways to leverage vlogging in your business, here are some helpful ideas on how you can do so.

Vlog as your company

One way to use this format is to take up vlogging yourself. A couple of things you will have to think about are the following:

• Decide who the vlogger will be – Preferably, it should be one of the founders or team members who have been with the company the longest.
• Type of content you want to feature – Create a content strategy defining exactly what kind of content you want to create for your audience. This will help you coordinate vlogging with overall company goals.
• Vlog consistently – Vlogging helps you create an audience who will follow your activities through vlogs. To make sure you keep your audience engaged and for them to know what to expect, try to vlog consistently.

Benefits of vlogging as your company

This kind of an approach helps you make a connection with the audience. Unlike other ways to interact, such as email or social media profiles, vlogging provides a deeper connection with the audience. They can get to know you personally. You can also include them in the creative process, thus increasing the trust in your brand. Vlogging can help with highlighting your qualities and promoting your business to the online users. Furthermore, you have complete control over the content that is created and shared through a vlog.

Vlogging ideas for a business

If you are all out of ideas on how to use vlogging to promote your business, here are a couple of suggestions:
• Day-in-the-life video
• Follow-me-around video
• Broadcast of a live event (such as store opening, a meeting, a conference that you are hosting, etc.)
• Instructional (how-to) vlog
• An interview vlog
• Q&A video
• Behind the scene vlog

Work with vloggers

The alternative approach is to collaborate with vloggers on projects. The main advantage of this approach is that it requires much less involvement from you in the creative process. You do not need a vlogger, a strategy or equipment to record a vlog. Instead, you find a vlogger who can promote your business on your behalf.

In this case, either you can contact the vlogger to send the details about a possible collaborative project, or you can send products (provide free service) hoping to get the attention of the vlogger and being featured in one of the vlogs.

The first method offers more control over the content and how the product/service is integrated into a vlog. As you discuss the project details, payment can also be one of the points you should focus on. On the other hand, the second method is a more spontaneous. You do not set any conditions, you simply send your products and hope to get a positive review.

Benefits of working with vloggers

The most evident advantage of this kind of vlogging is that you can work with popular vloggers and instantly get noticed by their followers. When starting on your own, you will have to work hard to get that many views. Being promoted by the vloggers can help you a lot with expanding your reach and establishing your brand on the market. To get this kind of recognition, you will have to offer a high-quality product. Since vloggers often enjoy respect among their followers, they will not promote just about anything. Also, some vloggers will feature brands only as part

of a paid promotion, which is something you should plan with your budget when implementing video format in your online marketing.

It is safe to say that vlogging is a format that gives so many opportunities for businesses. From involving the viewers in the creative process to showing a more personalized image of your brand, vlogging is an incredible strategy to use in the online promotion of your business. Explore how it can be implemented, find vloggers you could work with, and make sure you analyze the performance of vlogs to evaluate their role in an overall content marketing strategy.

Action Point
PS: If you would like to have an online course on any of the courses that you found on this blog, I will be glad to do that on an individual and corporate level, I will be very glad to do that because I have trained several individuals and groups and they are doing well in their various fields of endeavour. Some of those that I have trained include the staff of Dangote Refinery, FCMB, Zenith Bank, and New Horizons Nigeria among others. Please come on Whatsapp and let’s talk about your training. You can reach me on Whatsapp HERE. Please note that I will be using Microsoft Team to facilitate the training.

I know you might agree with some of the points that I have raised in this article. You might not agree with some of the issues raised. Let me know your views about the topic discussed. We will appreciate it if you can drop your comment. Thanks in anticipation.

CRMNUGGETS is committed to fact-checking in a fair, transparent and non-partisan manner. Therefore, if you’ve found an error in any of our reports, be it factual, editorial, or an outdated post, please contact us to tell us about it.

If you want to explore opportunities these two tactics provide, you could join communities which feature these offers and an opportunity for bloggers and companies to connect.

#1 MyBlogGuest

This is a free community offering blog owners and guest bloggers access to a network that connects them and helps them to increase exposure.

#2 BlogDash

Specialized in blogger outreach, BlogDash is a platform that connects businesses with over 200,000 bloggers, helping them to build a relationship and work together on different projects.

#3 GroupHigh

With blog search engine, list building, and segment tools, this platform provides an opportunity to find bloggers, influencers, and new content.

#4 PostJoint

Connecting marketers who are trying to identify quality blogs, improve their content marketing and reach the new audience, with bloggers who offer fresh content, and are in pursue of a content monetization strategy, this platform represents an easy way for them to meet online.

#5 Blog Engage

Blog Engage is a blogging community where bloggers can submit their blog posts to increase exposure and gain traffic. Building relationships with other bloggers on the platform helps with reaching more people inside the community. There are groups for the members with common interests.

Action Point
PS: If you would like to have an online course on any of the courses that you found on this blog, I will be glad to do that on an individual and corporate level, I will be very glad to do that because I have trained several individuals and groups and they are doing well in their various fields of endeavour. Some of those that I have trained include the staff of Dangote Refinery, FCMB, Zenith Bank, and New Horizons Nigeria among others. Please come on Whatsapp and let’s talk about your training. You can reach me on Whatsapp HERE. Please note that I will be using Microsoft Team to facilitate the training.

I know you might agree with some of the points that I have raised in this article. You might not agree with some of the issues raised. Let me know your views about the topic discussed. We will appreciate it if you can drop your comment. Thanks in anticipation.

CRMNUGGETS is committed to fact-checking in a fair, transparent and non-partisan manner. Therefore, if you’ve found an error in any of our reports, be it factual, editorial, or an outdated post, please contact us to tell us about it.

Get the best of link building! We decided to put together all link building techniques we could think of. We currently have more than 60!
Your feedback and ideas will be highly appreciated. Let’s work together and make this ultimate checklist useful for as many people as possible.

Now the techniques…

1. Skyscraper technique

Skyscraper is almost a legendary link-building technique. It’s time-consuming, but if it’s done properly, you’ll get quality backlinks, targeted traffic and possible business connections.
It’s a combination of perfect content, research, competitor backlink analysis and email outreach. The process is covered in this link building guide.

These are the main 4 steps:

1. Find good content with quality backlinks
2. Find the contact details of the people behind these websites
3. Write better content
4. Outreach the prospects

We used this email in our recent skyscraper campaign:

Just in case you are not willing to invest your time the skyscraper techniques, you can always try link building services.

Benefit

5 / 5

Time efficiency

1 / 5

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2. Content-based link building

The hardest, yet the most efficient technique. Create content that will naturally attract readers, social shares, and referral traffic. Get inspired in our Learn SEO guide.
When you write, pay attention to readability. Content has to be well-structured and without grammar errors. There are many tools to help out. ShoutMeLoud made a nice list.
Watch out for flow, adverbs usage, passive voice index, unique words, or estimated reading time. Of course, this depends on your target audience.

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3. Top lists

There are many, but if you have unique and relevant data it should be a success. When we published the Top keywords list, it was our most visited blog post in 2016.
When writing top lists, think about timing and prepare to dig deep into data.

These are the most important tasks:

1. Analyze search results for your main keywords
2. Write something more comprehensive, unique
3. If you have your own data, the job will be easier
4. If your topic is time-sensitive, make sure you choose the right time

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4. Produce educational content

Google SERP is full of “How to” articles. Publishers think it’s easy to educate. Well, it can be, but the amount of recycled content out there won’t attract readers just like that.
On the other hand, you can always target a specific group of people with your own opinions and unique insights.

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5. Case studies

Case studies can be a backlink’s gold mine! That’s why I’ve dedicated a special point to them. Case studies are always unique and bring new information. Make sure to have proven data, do your research, try to experiment and test industry myths.

When writing a case study it’s good to list:

1. Challenge
2. Data background
3. Selected time frame
4. Results
5. Key takeaways

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6. So-called “Green content”

Yes, it’s content, but very specific and beneficial when it comes to gaining high-quality links. If it’s good enough and deals with the most up-to-date issues, not only environmentally-friendly organizations will share it.
Environmental threats such as climate change, water pollution or species extinction have been discussed widely for years. Who knows, maybe you will become an influencer who will help to save the Earth.

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7. Thought-provoking, irritating, annoying content

This can be tricky. It can ruin your reputation when done wrong. Don’t try to abuse people, their struggles, and their opinions. Help them to solve their issues. Be careful on what you plan to profit. I recommend reading this article by Sean Hodge.

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8. White-papers

They’re widely used in the B2B world but you don’t need to be a corporation to conduct deep research in the industry, add your thoughts, charts, and knowledge others can benefit from. White papers are a great source of sharing opportunities and gaining valuable links.

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9. Reviews and comparisons

These two rank very high when done right. Your deep analysis, pros, cons and recommendations will solve decision paralysis of many readers. What’s more, if you’re good enough, businesses will be willing to pay for reviewing their products. And suddenly, you can be a thought leader.

Benefit

5 / 5

Time efficiency

2 / 5

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10. Create a dedicated blog section

There are many companies with useful content despite not having a blog. It’s time to use that potential! A dedicated blog is an engagement magnet.
Make sure to go through this very detailed guide on how to learn blogging if you aren’t sure how to start. This infographic on how to start a business blog is extremely useful as well.

Benefit

5 / 5

Time efficiency

1 / 5

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11. Make an interview

Try to partner with well-known authorities in the industry. It doesn’t need a superstar. The person will share the interview with their audience and might link to it on their website too.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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12. Guest posts

Guest posts represent a good way to earn backlinks. Do website research, write outstanding content and try to publish it on an authoritative website. They usually have strict guest blogging guidelines and it sometimes takes a lot of time to accept your submission.
It’s a bit more time consuming, but it definitely works. You will find lists of websites accepting guest posts but if you plan to target relevant ones, use Google search operators. Start with the focus keyword and add “write for us”.

You can specify your query with the operators: allintitle, intitle, inurl to find even more opportunities. Make sure to do a proper guest post outreach and focus on the quality of your email – it may be your only chance to get the attention and earn a backlink.
And now from the opposite point of view: If you publish guest content on your site and the same blogger publishes another content on a different site linking to the original article on your site, you’ll have a backlink.
Feel free to find some other great guest blogging opportunities.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

2 / 5

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13. Podcast guesting

We all know that podcasts are popular. They are easy to consume so you can gain a lot knowledge and get some cool industry news while cleaning your apartment or car. Doing podcast guesting means that you target podcasts relevant to your niche and outreach their creators to be part of them.
To be honest, I don’t like listening to podcasts. On the other hand,  I think it’s an underrated marketing technique that can bring a lot of exposure to you and your business. Make sure to read this podcast guesting guide.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

2 / 5

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Social

14. Social media outreach

Share your content on social media, promote it on Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, comment on relevant posts and create connections. I love these 4 powerful social media outreach tactics.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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15. On-site social sharing actions

Sharing buttons and widgets. You can’t skip them on your website. Besides sharing your content via social networks, people can place your widgets on their sites and link back to you.
AddThis is a useful plugin in which you can track the results of social engagement of your website.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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16. Share to download buttons

Give your users an opportunity to access exclusive materials, bonuses or discounts by asking them to share your website. Motivate them to share your stuff. We use Social Locker.

Benefit

2 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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17. Specialized discussion forums

Join Quora, Reddit, StackExchange, and others to ask and answer related questions. Be careful, these forums usually have strict spam rules and are full of professionals, so you can suddenly get banned. It happened to me as well. I should have read this guide before.

The most important things to keep in mind:

1. Prepare your submission, don’t just copy the text from your blog post
2. Personalize it according to readers’ preferences
3. Make sure the link is relevant so it’s not obvious you’re doing a self-promotion
4. Reply to comments

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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18. Links from forums

Forums, Q&A sites, content aggregators, etc. You can add the link there, but keep in mind that the majority of them are low-quality links, usually no-follow, so their benefits are questionable.

Benefit

1 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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19. Quizzes, surveys, tests

Yet another interactive way to gain not only social exposure. We did it some time ago and the response was fantastic. We added a certificate of completion to motivate people to share their success via their social profiles.
Though we made it on our own, you can use many tools such as SurveyMonkey.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

2 / 5

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20. Link to others

… and tag them in your social posts. It might not work for the first couple of times, but sooner or later they will notice you. If your content is good enough and relevant, they may link back or at least give you a shoutout on their social profiles.

Benefit

2 / 5

Time efficiency

5 / 5

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Marketing and branding

21. Contests and giveaways

Besides gaining a relevant link you have a promo for free. We were a part of a couple of giveaways and they generated subscriptions, as well. Research ongoing contests and giveaways and contact the organizers. Sometimes, these offers land in your inbox so you won’t spend any time.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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22. Discounts and coupons

Everyone loves discounts and discount codes! And it’s a great motivation to share your product, too! Moreover, discount coupons are great for additional affiliate program promotions.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

5 / 5

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23. Traditional (off-line) marketing activities

Leaflets, stickers or even guerilla marketing. Don’t forget where it all began. Creative marketing attracts people. They will talk about you and might link to your site.

Benefit

2 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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24. PR articles

PR articles written by professionals and published on sites with high authority will give you high-quality links too. But prepare some budget for this.

Benefit

5 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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25. Testimonials sections

Think about products you use, get in touch with people behind them and write testimonials to be published on their websites in exchange for a link. You’ll need to write a couple of emails and reminders but it can be very beneficial.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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26. Set up Google Alerts

Google Alerts is one of those tools we all heard about. However, not many of us use it to find brand mentions. Setting up the alerts is super easy. Select the term(s), choose from the listed options and add a valid email address to receive the alerts.
In our case the terms could be “kwfinder”, “kw finder”, “kwfinder.com”, etc.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

5 / 5

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27. Ask the ones you know

Yes, why not? Reach out your family, friends or people you know for a link. They might be willing to link to your site if it’s relevant and fits the context. Don’t try to link to a marketing blog from a clothes e-shop.

Benefit

2 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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28. Buy backlinks via paid blog posts

It’s similar to the previous technique, but this time you will have to pay for it. On the other hand, it won’t cost you almost any time. If you plan to be a writer and get paid, don’t forget to check these blogs that will pay you.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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29. Reciprocal links

It’s one of the techniques that do not work anymore and have a bad reputation.

Benefit

0 / 5

Time efficiency

5 / 5

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30. Launch an affiliate program

You’ll gain both links and revenue. Our affiliate program is one of the strongest sources of revenue, exposure and high-quality backlinks. There are many affiliates searching for a new source of income. Don’t forget to prepare an attractive commission system.

Benefit

5 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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31. Join an affiliate program

We mentioned our affiliate program is beneficial for us, but that’s because it’s attractive for our partners. As an affiliate marketer, you can earn a lot of money on commissions and your product reviews or comparisons can generate many backlinks.
Tung from cloudliving.com trains people to become successful in this field.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

2 / 5

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32. Research and find out what works for others

Spy on and analyze your competitors’ backlinks. You can focus on those you can replicate easily to save some time.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

2 / 5

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33. Brand mentions

Using search operator “brand name” -site:brandname.com will help you to find mentions of your brand. You need to check whether each mention is linked to your site. If not, contact these people to do so or to adjust the anchor correctly.

Benefit

2 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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34. Name mentions

I noticed that many websites mentioned founders or CEOs without linking to the company. Use this as an opportunity to thank them for mentioning you and for acquiring another link from a relevant source.

Benefit

2 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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35. Stolen images link reclamation

Technically, the link reclamation is when you try to locate broken backlinks, opportunities mentioned in #30 and #31, or if there is an improper backlink, misspelt domain or anchor text for any reason.
When it comes to images, it may happen some websites use your images without providing a source. It usually applies to infographics, charts and quality images. Last but not least, this technique makes sense for authoritative websites or if your images are a true inspiration for others.

Here’s a quick guide on how to find these images:

1. Create a list of the URLs of your images
2. Use Google image search by pasting the URL
3. Check the websites from search results whether they gave you a credit by looking for your domain in the HTML code.
4. If there’s no credit, reach out the authors.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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36. Get interviewed

No, you don’t need to be Britney Spears. Things happen really fast in the digital world. Take the advantage of it. You can become successful in a short time so getting interviewed with a link is definitely a good idea.
However, nothing comes for free so don’t wait to be interviewed. Research publishers and get in touch with them. This is a detailed guide by Ann Smarty you should go through.

Benefit

5 / 5

Time efficiency

2 / 5

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37. Gifts

How about sending gifts to your most valuable customers and partners? Use special occasions such as Christmas or birthdays and include a call-to-action to share it and link to you.

Benefit

2 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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38. Exchange

Exchange your products for a review or other promo activities leading to a link. Bloggers writing a review will usually include a link so you don’t need to ask them.
When it comes to affiliate partners, they tend to provide no-follow links.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

5 / 5

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39. Build a campaign microsite

Do you have a special discount, an event or a product launch? Build a microsite! Keep in mind that content should be 100% non-duplicate and you should also build a good link profile for the microsite.
Creating microsites from the SEO point of view isn’t as profitable as it was in the past but you should consider it when you are planning to build a long term authority website.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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40. Create a sitewide announcement link

Yeah, a sitewide link isn’t that good when it comes to the link strength but it’s perfect for a short term link placement to gain high traffic, i.e. you can do this with a short term special offer. Keep in mind that the linked sites should be related.

Benefit

2 / 5

Time efficiency

5 / 5

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41. Comment blog posts

In general, I think that comments with links don’t positively influence your SEO because they are deleted almost immediately. But if you select blog posts with high traffic, then you write a comment which is super relevant and boosts the discussion, it may end up providing a link that will add value to the discussion.
In this case, the moderator shouldn’t delete the comment. No one wants to stop a productive discussion under their blog post.

Benefit

1 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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42. Cooperate with courses, schools and teachers

What’s better than to be recommended to many students by well-known courses, universities or respected teachers? Not to mention that a backlink from the “.edu” domain can be a great signal for Google. The quality of website users referred to this way is unquestionable.
What’s more, you can prepare a special offer for the students. One last thing I would like to mention is that well-known teachers tend to speak at various events or conferences on which they can promote your website.
The amount of time you will need to invest into this depends on whether you are the outreached person or you plan to outreach them.

Benefit

5 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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Submissions

43. Content syndication

Content syndication is a great backlink source and you will get some additional traffic boost.

The most popular platforms are:

• GrowthHackers
• Medium
• LinkedIn
• Growthub
• Business2community

You can submit an excerpt of your original article or create a unique description, it’s up to you. In case of duplicate content, make sure to check whether the platform has implemented a “rel=canonical tag”, which links back to your original content.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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44. Beta lists and startup submissions

Links from these sites are usually no-follow but their overall influence helps a lot. There are highly focused people willing to test or support new products. Check Betalist, ProductHunt, or Erlibird.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

2 / 5

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45. Business listings and catalogues

They used to work in the past. It’s really time-consuming and benefits are usually minimal. However, it’s ok to be there, at least on the most relevant ones.

Benefit

1 / 5

Time efficiency

2 / 5

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46. Submit creatives

Infographics, ebooks or leaflets can be submitted on Slideshare, Issuu, Pinterest, Scribd and other alternatives. Reserve some time as you would need various digital formats, descriptions, and links.
In fact, creative formats like infographics can be incredibly powerful for link building. As long as you’re building an infographic that includes important information about your industry, you can generate more and more links and website traffic. Learn more about how to build links with infographics.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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47. Submit videos

Compared to the time needed for video production, the submission is nearly nothing. And it’s not only about YouTube. There are many sites where you can attract views such as Vimeo.

Here are some best practices when uploading a video:

1. Create a custom thumbnail
2. The title should be both appealing and well-optimized
3. Add at least a short description, not only the link
4. Consider adding an end screen and annotations

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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48. Develop and share

Have you developed something that works and looks like a charm? Share it on highly-focused forums such as GitHub, Bitbucket, or CodePen. It doesn’t directly make a link but helps build your personal brand and that means audience, clicks, and links.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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49. Wikipedia link building

Link building on Wikipedia isn’t complicated but you should think tactical. The biggest con is that linking from Wikipedia will automatically generate new links because your site will be used as a reference. Jon Cooper wrote a Wikipedia for SEO guide you simply have to read.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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50. Barnacle SEO

Many of the mentioned techniques in this category and some others are part of barnacle SEO. However, the main point of barnacle SEO is that you optimize someone else’s website and leverage its authority at the same time. That means you focus not only to get a backlink. You should help the website to rank high by improving it with quality content.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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Email

51. Email outreach

Email outreach is a time-consuming task. You need to do it as a part of many link building techniques mentioned in this article. It’s all about finding the right prospects, listing the potential link placement, researching email addresses and sending personalized emails. Get ready for sending reminders and don’t forget to track the results.
You’ll find many guides on this. Last time, we reached a 16% response rate. Therefore, I’ve formulated 9 actionable email outreach tips.

Benefit

5 / 5

Time efficiency

1 / 5

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52. Resource pages

There are thousands of pages listing guides or tools and linking to them. Use Google search operators such as exact match, allintitle, intitle, inurl with your keyword and you will find many pages on which you would like to have a backlink. Example:inurl:”seo resources”

Once you create a list of the pages, prepare personalized messages and outreach the authors.

Benefit

5 / 5

Time efficiency

1 / 5

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53. Top lists, how-tos, guides

Creating this kind of content attracts links so why not to have a backlink there? This technique is similar to #44 and it requires using the exact match, allintitle, intitle, inurl search operators. When creating the list of prospects, think about your website’s authority too. You should provide a value for the outreached person.
Besides using the search operators, you can try tools such as BuzzSumo.

Benefit

5 / 5

Time efficiency

1 / 5

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54. Email signatures

How many emails do you send per month? Imagine only a few of the recipients click on the link under your name. You get a couple of clicks and it costs you nothing. Keep in mind that email signatures don’t positively affect SEO.

Benefit

1 / 5

Time efficiency

5 / 5

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Technical

55. Internal linking

It’s a must! Internal linking means you rule anchors and add links where you want to. If you do it regularly, it’s a matter of seconds. In case your website is full of content without internal links, you’ll spend a couple of days fixing it. Before doing so, I recommend reading the Essential guide to internal content link building by Julia McCoy.
My advice: Don’t add more than 2-3 links per article. Avoid using a plugin which automatically links particular words. It’s annoying and ruins UX.
One more tip: Identify your most-viewed pages so you know where to put specific links.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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56. Breadcrumbs

Another internal link building tip is to use breadcrumbs. The site navigation is transparent thanks to them and you can optimize the anchor text distribution as well.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

5 / 5

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57. RSS feed

You probably have it but in case you don’t, create one. Sooner or later, somebody will scrape your content. But if you place internal links in the content, you’ll earn a link.

Benefit

2 / 5

Time efficiency

5 / 5

---

58. Create a sitemap

This is one of the internal linking methods and it’s extremely useful. Search engines like sitemaps. Moreover, it’s a good navigation for visitors. You can use one of the many WordPress plugins.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

5 / 5

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59. Broken link building

Identifying links leading to non-existing sites and linking them to your content can be a time-consuming but effective method. You can use search operators or various tools for this. This Ahrefs guide will help you with broken link building.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

2 / 5

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60. 404 errors

Check the Google Search Console if there are any. No one likes to land on 404 – Page not found.

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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61. Do you have robots.txt?

Review it whether there are any linked pages. Either contact webmasters of sites linking to them or consider allowing crawlers to index these pages.
robots.txt syntax:

User-agent: * (e.g. Googlebot)
Disallow: /  (e.g. /images/pizza.png)

Benefit

3 / 5

Time efficiency

4 / 5

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62. PBNs (Private Blog Network)

PBNs are a way as well but you have to be very careful. These links should look as natural as possible. PBNs are websites to implement links to other websites (ones that generate money). It’s an expensive technique. You need to pay for a domain, hosting and set of blog posts.
It can be risky because Google bans PBNs from time to time. Think wisely. The costs of PBNs can be higher than the income. That’s why I’d recommend reading the guide by Lion Zeal.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

1 / 5

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63. Expired domains

Look for expired domains with working links. All you had to do in the past was to find them and redirect them via 301. Nowadays, it’s more complicated. Watch out for relevancy.

Benefit

2 / 5

Time efficiency

3 / 5

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64. Create a free tool

Everyone loves free tools: free = buzz. That means it’s shared and likely to build a solid number of backlinks. So why not to create a free tool to use this potential of high website traffic and many backlinks for your own needs? You can link your other websites from it.
We did the same thing with RockingPage where we included links to our SEO tools.

Benefit

4 / 5

Time efficiency

1 / 5

How To Copy Your Competitors In Link Building

 

Backlinks are still an essential part of SEO.
And what is the best way to find them? By spying on the backlinks of your competitors.
In this quick step-by-step guide, we’ll take a look at how to check the competitors’ backlinks in a couple of minutes.
We’ll go through these 3 simple steps:

• How to find your competitors
• How to find your competitors’ backlinks
• How to replicate the backlinks

How to find your competitors in Google

When doing competitor analysis as a part of your link building strategy, you may struggle with the very first step:
Who are my competitors?
Here are some simple tips to find your competitors in a couple of seconds:

Websites in your niche

The first (and most obvious) step is to simply look for the main keyword of your niche in Google.
If you run a blog about a vegan lifestyle, just Google for “vegan lifestyle blog” and you’ll most probably find:

1. Blogs in this niche
2. Lists of blogs in this niche

If the results are not satisfactory, you can try a more advanced technique using the search operator.

The related: operator

This is quite a simple and neat technique you can use to find your competitors using a Google search operator. All you need to do is to insert the related: search operator + your domain to Google search form:

related:yoursite.com

The results will be websites topically related to the web used in the search query.
Here’s an example of websites related to chicvegan.com:

The results include sites such as supervegan.com or veganbeautyreview.com which are clearly the competitors from the vegan lifestyle niche.

Note: This search operator works only for websites with a certain amount of traffic. If you don’t find any websites related to your web, pick a big competitor from your niche and try with their website.

How to find competitors’ backlinks

I’ll be honest, doing a link building campaign isn’t my favourite part of the SEO process. It’s not 100% in your hands and it usually takes a lot of time.
However, there are handy tools such as LinkMiner that can make the whole process a lot easier.

Tip: You can create a free 10-day trial account (no credit card needed) and try LinkMiner yourself alongside this guide. You can check 500 backlinks per 24 hours for free.

All you need to do is to enter your competitor’s domain or a specific URL and the tool will show the backlinks pointing to it.
This brings us to the basic classification of competitors:

a) Domain competitors

Domain competitors are websites that compete in the same niche as your site. By checking their link profile, you can find interesting backlink opportunities.

b) Page competitors

Besides the general competitors, there are also competitors on a page level.
Let’s say you wrote a blog post with your vegan pizza recipe. A quick Google search will show you many other websites ranking for the term.

Just select the first one and run the URL through LinkMiner.
Now you have found backlinks pointing to that specific blog post. The minimalistbaker.com may not be your general competitor on a domain level (the blog is probably not only about vegan recipes) but it is your page competitor for a specific topic.

Now you can select backlinks that are interesting for you and add them to a list (by clicking on a little star next to the backlink row).

What to focus on when evaluating the backlinks:

Link Strength

Link Strength is a metric that calculates how powerful is the backlink from a certain website, based on the authority of that website. In simple words – the more authoritative is the linking website, the more authority will your web get if the site links to you.

Pro tip: Set up the filter to show only do-follow links. Nofollow links do not pass the authority, so they are irrelevant for your SEO efforts.

Link relevance

Even though the backlinks pointing to your competitor should be relevant, make sure they really are by checking the linking page. Trying to replicate an irrelevant backlink with no added value to the reader is a waste of time. These backlinks are useless.

Link placement

The right side of the LinkMiner interface offers a quick preview of the linking website with the placement of the backlink. The most valuable backlinks are those in the body of the text, while backlinks in sidebars and footers are not that effective nowadays.

In LinkMiner, you can check both relevance and link placement thanks to the right panel with the preview of the linking page and a highlighted anchor text.

How to replicate the backlinks

Now that you’ve selected the relevant, strong and well-placed backlinks of your competitors it’s time to replicate them!
How? With the good old email outreach.
You need to contact the website owners or the authors of the posts and ask them to:
a) Link to your website instead of the website of your competitor (this is called The Skyscraper Technique)
b) Add your website/post as an additional resource next to the link to your competitor

The Skyscraper Technique is a simple link building technique named by Brian Dean.
All you need to do is to find the best article on a certain topic and write an even better piece of content covering the topic. Then contact all the websites linking to your competitor and ask them to link to you instead.
Ways to make your content better:

• Make it longer
• Design it better
• Cover the topic more deeply
• Make the content more up-to-date

It’s like finding the tallest skyscraper in the town and building one that is even higher.

Email outreach is an overused link building technique. But there are many people who just do it wrong, which means you can shine easily.
Here are some basic email outreach tips you should follow:
Don’t use email templates – using an outreach email template is lazy and people you’re contacting don’t want to feel like they’re one of the 500 other contacts on your list. If you don’t bother to write a personalized message, why should they bother to link to you?

The Skyscraper Technique outreach template that’s been literally copy-pasted by too many lazy website owners.

Personalize the email – instead of using the templates, take the time to make every message well-crafted and personal. Quality always beats quantity and it’s especially true when it comes to email outreach.

Make it easy to link to you – the whole process should as easy as possible for the website owner you’re contacting. Tell him where the link could be placed, what anchor text to use or write a whole new paragraph to make the backlink fit naturally. All he needs to do is to copy and paste your text.
Follow up – if you don’t get an answer in a couple of days, give it another shot with a simple and polite follow-up email. One is just enough. Don’t be that annoying follow-up guy with 5 emails in 5 days.

That’s it

Link building is a long process that can last days, even weeks.
It may not be an activity you enjoy, but as long as links are a Google ranking factor, we have to do our best to play the “backlink game”.
I hope this quick guide will help you to find and replicate the quality backlinks of your competitors to boost your SEO efforts.

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Contribute to this link building checklist

What other link building techniques come to your mind? Share them in the comments below and we’ll update the post.

Action Point
PS: If you would like to have an online course on any of the courses that you found on this blog, I will be glad to do that on an individual and corporate level, I will be very glad to do that I have trained several individuals and groups and they are doing well in their various fields of endeavour. Some of those that I have trained includes staffs of Dangote Refinery, FCMB, Zenith Bank, New Horizons Nigeria among others. Please come on Whatsapp and let’s talk about your training. You can reach me on Whatsapp HERE. Please note that I will be using Microsoft Team to facilitate the training. 

I know you might agree with some of the points that I have raised in this article. You might not agree with some of the issues raised. Let me know your views about the topic discussed. We will appreciate it if you can drop your comment. Thanks in anticipation.

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