Round-Up of Newsletter 11 by Rachelle Money, 7 August 2008

Our main articles on blogging, using SEO agencies, and getting good media coverage got you writing in with your comments and suggestions.

Our lead article on ProBlogger, Chris Garrett inspired some of our readers to write in with their positive experiences of blogging. Garrett made the point that to generate good traffic on your blog you have to leave comments on other blogs. First to leave a comment was Laura who said the “me-first attitude doesn't help”.

She said: “I agree with Chris that networking first is important because a community is more valuable. I would love to grow my blog, but a me-first attitude doesn't help. We can learn from one another and help each other out.”

Hayden said that by starting a blog on his site iStylista.com his traffic doubled within two months which subsequently led to twice the income from sales of their products. It just goes to show that the power of blogging cannot be underestimated.

Hayden suggests the key thing to remember is to find keywords and phrases which are “diamonds in the rough.” By this I can only assume he means that bloggers should target niche keywords.

He said ”I wholly believe that a corporate blog that reviews and talks about things related to the industry that your are in, rather than what the CEO's dog ate for breakfast, can take your traffic to new heights in months.”

Yhadz Critic said blogging has brought their site a different kind of return - credibility. “I used to blog for personal reasons because I wanted to write, but then again I realized some people do like to read about what I have to say, so why not monetize. It's not a lot of money, true, but eventually the blog becomes a testament to your credibility so it's really quite cool,” said Critic.

Being published does suggest credibility, especially if your business is being published in a major newspaper. Our case study, In Good Company Workplaces, based in New York, discussed how to get great news coverage with some tips from co-founder Adelaide Fives.

A large part of In Good Company's success was their perseverance over a long period of time, and Dave Winters suggested success could have been achieved more quickly if they'd hired a PR firm.

“A good PR will know a journalist's current interest areas and quickly assess how they match what's newsworthy about your business. They'll also guide you in how to handle a press, radio or TV interview effectively. They'll know the interviewer's style and will have prepared you with ways to brush off negativity in polite ways which make the interviewer quickly switch to the main event - your key message.” Spoken like a true pro.

But as one commenter warned, “hiring a PR firm doesn't eliminate the actual work involved with getting coverage.”

Jim added: “As the very first point in the article pointed out, the real key is determining what is interesting about your business. That's often very hard work.”

Some of you seemed a bit annoyed with In Good Company Workspaces. Tonya said, “As a PR pro I regard this as a fluke and a stroke of luck that they got coverage and that's how most stories are.”

Tony said it was “misleading” to say perseverance pays off.

In our final article on the Mark Nunney SEO expert series we looked at what people should be doing when hiring an SEO consultant and what you should expect.

It was clear that a lot of you were frustrated by the number of bogus SEO companies out there, and boy did you let us know about it.

Denise gave a typical example of how disappointing some unscrupulous SEOs can be.

“I tried a SEO co. that bragged about how good they were. Out of 22 million sites they were #1 but the work they did on my site was less than acceptable. I know SEO and have optimized my own sites. I already had good rankings but I wasn't in the top five on some of my keywords so I thought I would give this co. a try...For $300 they threw a few links on my site (that were some of their existing clients, I'm sure). They did no research, I had to tell them what to do. Then for an additional $100 a month they would throw a few more links on my site. Yippie, they were fired before the $100 charge was due.”

Andrew Jensen left a comment saying that SEO companies offering “outdated or even questionable services” would hurt their own reputation in the long term.

He said: “The quick profit potential of SEO lures too many ad agencies, web designers and entrepreneurs down the quick and easy trail, only to hurt their own clients and make legitimate SEO an even harder sell down the road.”

It seems that a few of you are already feeling SEO is a “hard sell”, as Andrew put it. Victoria Ipri admitted she hates telling companies that she's an SEO professional. “Half think I'm going to rip them off and the other half don't have a clue what I am suggesting they do to improve their sites.”

She puts this down to SEO “still being in its infancy”.

I'm glad to say that some of you added to Mark Nunney's sound advice with your own. Chris TT suggested the following:

“If an agency doesn't mention keyword/keyphrase research, walk.

“If they say, “You pick the words, walk.

“If all they talk about is links, walk.”

Straight to the point. Thanks Chris.