Google Finally Rewards Quality Content Marketing - Writers Everywhere Must Celebrate!

If you're in business for yourself, then you have continually been inundated with how important it is for you to have a business website, a blog, marketing videos, key words in every single post, (and the list goes on and on) in order to improve your chances of having some of your key phrases get picked up by Google so that you can get some decent exposure in the internet world.

Randy Kirk, a Google marketing professional, just wrote this article on how Google has decided to finally become more intentional in not allowing spam to dominate the search results.  Many professionals just like you and me, have often become so frustrated after spending hours on the computer writing marketing specific content, in order to drive potential clients to our sites, only to find that our information (no matter how closely we have stuck to the "Google marketing rules") is frequently passed up.  It has been even more discouraging to find that other less professional and valuable information has topped the search engine results.

Kirk writes, "Great content writ large and long by folks who actually know enough about the subject to write something useful and spelled correctly, get to go to the head of the line.  It had to happen.  By the end of 2011, content had degraded to the point that 6th graders in various foreign lands whose third language was English seemed to be the big winners at getting ranked."

He goes in depth to describe the specific changes that Google is now implementing to acknowledge and elevate quality marketing content.

• No More Content Spam
• Unique, Well Written, Relevant, Content Is and Was Always Right
• Great Marketing Content Is Worth the Money
• Characteristics of Good to Great Content for Marketing Online

This is a great read, and I think you will find most helpful the last section, which describes specific characteristics related to creating great content.

Would like to hear your thoughts on what you found most relevant to your current business situation, as it relates to content marketing.  

Imprinted Safety LED Light for Pets (and Their Owners, Too)!

How many of you dog lovers out there would use a safety light to protect your pet?

They are the apple of our eye, the one who greets us with the most excitement after a long day, the best cuddle buddy in the entire world, the one who comforts us when we are down, who rests along aside us when we’re sick, the one who takes us on long strolls both day and night, the one who is perfectly happy just to be near us.

We know just how much you love and care for your beloved pet. You would say he's more than a pet - he's part of your family and you would bend over backward to make sure he feels loved and protected.

We understand that your little buddy enjoys those night strolls more than anything - it's his last chance to stretch his legs and breathe in fresh air before turning in for the night. But just how safe are both of you when drivers pass by on a path or street that is not so well lit?

How do you make yourself noticeable?

As you already know, wearing reflective gear and carrying your cell phone for emergencies are important safety steps to take for night walks.  At BikeNSafetyPromos, we have created the Electronic Panic Alarm that screams out like a fire alarm when you pull the chord.  No sprays or weapons - just the simple pull of a chord to alert those around that you are in danger.

Additionally, we want your dog to have his own safety gear!  So, we recommend using the Bug-Eyez LED Safety Lights you can attach to his collar, so that you can see him at all times, even when he’s checking out some bushes up ahead. You can even attach one to your keychain, to help you clearly see the mess you must clean up in the dark!  

What better way to help promote safety for animal lovers and their favorite furry friends? BikeNSafetyPromos is ready to partner with you!

{Book #3}: Required Reading: How I Raised Myself from Failure to Success

What Entrepreneurial Book Has Most Influenced Your Business Outlook & Approach?

We are making our way down a list of tried and true inspirational books for any person in business for themselves. An entrepreneur not only possesses unique qualities and talents which spur them on to pursue the impossible; an entrepreneur actually gains momentum by facing such challenges and adversity, because of their inbuilt desire to pursue dreams and make them reality.  

To recap, the first two books recommended in this must-read list are The World Is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman and Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill.  

{Book #3}: How I Raised Myself From Failure to Success in Selling by Frank Bettger

Written back in 1949, this is considered a classic motivational book on selling. Bettger faced many disappointments and failures in his business pursuits, but he points out three very basic, but simple and true, foundational principles: You can't collect commission until you close the deal; You can't close the deal until you set up the face-to-face meeting; You can't set up the face-to-face meeting until you make the call - yes, the dreaded call that all salespeople must make but absolutely avoid at all costs. What keeps us from consistently practicing these three actions? Fear. Bettger addresses ways to overcome such fears and move forward in confidence.

He not only gives practical ways to win over skeptical or resistant clients, but he also presents a strong work ethic, encouraging business people to gain success, not merely by serving themselves and their own personal agendas, but by truly listening to the needs and desires of others. Because of his own personal experiences with business failures and then success, it is a must-read for anyone who needs encouragement and renewed enthusiasm in their sales approach.

What is your go-to principle or practice to pick yourself up after you've experienced failure?

Spread Your Business Name All Around Town On An Imprinted Blinking Safety Light!

Commuter Cyclist Stays Safe In A "Most Ridiculous" Way: Bicycle Safety LED Blinking Lights

Sponsored by the League of American Bicyclists, May is National Bike Month and May 13-17 is officially Bike To Work Week.  Bicycling provides many positive benefits, including:

• Pure enjoyment of being outdoors
• Good exercise
• Save money on gas, wear and tear on the car
• Emotional sanity from not having to sit in traffic
• Cleaner environment

So why aren’t more people jumping on their bikes every morning? Fear of being hit by a careless or ruthless driver is probably the number one factor.  Many bicycle safety programs like “Share the Road” and “Bikes Belong” have done tremendous work to bring more awareness for cyclists’ rights to bike in a safe environment.  Cities across the U.S. are taking measures to both widen bike lanes, develop legislation protection for cyclists, put up barriers between motorists and cyclists, and much more.  

Commuter cyclists’ have continued to ride to and from work, in spite of the safety challenges.  In Massachusetts, Amanda King of Somerville commutes to and from work three times a week in the summer, 32 miles roundtrip.  She describes her method for making sure motorists always see her:

“When I first started biking, I thought, how can I possibly bike on the road — I’m going to get killed,” she said. “Now, I’m not as worried about it, but that doesn’t mean I’m not very wise to the dangers.”

When it comes to safety, King rides her bike wearing a helmet and fluorescent-colored vest. She mounts blinking lights on her helmet and the front and back of her bike. She “signals like a lunatic” to drivers, never runs red lights and stays as far to the right as possible, she said.

“I wear the most ridiculous outfit,” King said. “You couldn’t find more flashing lights.”

She understands that making herself noticeable in a “most ridiculous” way is her key to safety on the streets.  BikeNSafetyPromos distributes only the best bike safety promotional items!

{Book #2}: Required Reading fo Entrepreneurs Everywhere

What Is Your Favorite Entrepreneur Book & Why?

Entrepreneurs everywhere have been given a book to help jumpstart their business.  Which book tops your list and why?  

In this series of posts, we will continue to explore some of our favorites (though not in any particular order), and give a brief description of the content.  {Book #1} demonstrates the historical role of globalization and its continued impact on how we do business today.

Book Two: Think And Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill
Written back in the 1930's, this book has been a classic and bestselling business book for decades.  People today still gain the same insight and motivation to know what they want to pursue, and how to practically go after their desire for success.  Inspired by Andrew Carnegie, Hill looked at the lives of 500 extraordinary men who had found material success, and utilized over 20 years of research to ultimately present the 13 Steps, which have been proven to lead to great wealth, including:

1. Desire
2. Faith
3. Autosuggestion
4. Specialized Knowledge
5. Imagination
6. Organized Planning
7. Decision
8. Persistence
9. Power of the Master Mind
10. The Mystery of Sex Transmutation
11. The Subconscious Mind
12. The Brain
13. The Sixth Sense

Millions of people have greatly benefited from the timeless strategies presented in this book.  Some have even said that when you read it, substitute the names of the successful people he wrote about for people we have seen achieve great success in our time, such as Steve Jobs or Bill Gates.

What book motivates you toward success on a daily basis? 

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{Life-Saving} Bicycle Safety Lights

Is A Cyclist Responsible For An Accident If Unwilling To Use Safety Lights?

What kind of unsafe behavior have you seen cyclists demonstrate?  

The majority of reports regarding collisions between cyclists and motorists seem to point accusingly at motorists for not sharing the road, driving at excessive speeds, and not double checking to make sure there are no cyclists before quickly turning on street corners. What we hear very little about is negligent cyclist behavior, or certain cyclists' unwillingness to take necessary precautions to ensure their own safety. While we are quick to make generalizations about all motorists being unsafe because of our own experience or hearing of someone else's life threatening encounter with a motorist, we rarely give the other side a second glance and see what they might be doing to cause preventable accidents. Namely, Unsafe Cyclists.

Just recently, another vigil was held in memory of a cyclist who was killed in a motorist related accident.  The Boston Globe recently printed a letter, written not only to express the sadness over the loss of another cyclist, but the writer aimed to identify factors he has personally observed which contribute to such accidents.

THE TIME has come for a fresh point of departure in a heightened dialogue on bicycle safety. To my mind, the emphasis should shift from creating bike lanes or wearing helmets to bicycle users’ habits and attitudes.

I reside in Cambridge, work at a university, live near campus, and bike every day. Most important, I am at an age where I don’t want to have my fate determined by the irresponsible actions of others.

Day and night, I witness countless incidents of careless, self-absorbed behavior by bicyclists. Two factors stand out: speed and lack of lights.

On a recent night, a female student whizzed by me on a narrow path with no lights to alert me to her approach. I intoned, “Where are your lights?” Her smug response: “It doesn’t matter.”

Well, it does matter. The next time might find her in the path of a turning vehicle, or find me in the way of a speeding bike.

I have two possible solutions. The first is to form core coalitions of safe bikers, who would address other bikers one to one or at the group level.

The second is more complex, but deserves thorough examination: to reverse bike lanes so that both bikers and motorists can see what’s in front of them. 

This is as basic as the oft-heard advice to walk against traffic on a dark road.

Douglas Shafner

Cambridge

There are two sides to the issue of bike safety: those motorists who are unwilling to share the road and those cyclists who are unwilling to use proper safety measures.  While it would be unfair to make generalizations on either side, the fact remains that so many deaths and accidents can be prevented by taking minimal safety measures: helmets, lights, learning and utilizing hand signals, reflective gear, and reading up on how to prevent the various accidents between cyclists and motorists, as described in a previous post.

What preventative safety measures have you been most surprised about that have saved a cyclist’s life?

BikeNSafetyPromos is committed to making and distributing the highest quality of bike safety promotional items.  Where can we start helping YOU promote bike safety?

Required Reading For Entrepreneurs Everywhere

What Book Has Been the Most Influential In Building Your Business?

We all started somewhere. Something inspired us to choose the business we are in today.  Maybe it was an internship or maybe it was a part-time job we picked up during college which actually made us realize our true passion.  From that passion, we begin to hunger for knowledge and guidance on how to best pursue the direction we’d like to go.  

Over the next several weeks, we'll be exploring several classic, must-have, business books and what has made them invaluable to entrepreneurs over the years.

Book One: The World Is Flat

The is the book which every entrepreneur should have a copy, entitled, “The World Is Flat” by Thomas L. Friedman.   This book describes the impact of globalization, with historical examples leading all the way up to the way we currently do business in America.  Friedman refers to the world being flat in terms of leveling the playing field for anyone interested in entrepreneurism.  Online information is so easily accessed, giving limitless business opportunities, from the local American housewife wanting to run her own business to an employee in India being paid for an outsourced job.

What Are You Willing To Do To Land the BIG Account?

Practical Business Steps For Achieving More

What is at the top of your “essential t0-do list” before attempting to land that "must-have" account?  

Randy Kirk at Help For Small Business blogs about a handful of key steps you must boldly take if you are going to land that account.  

Step One.  Jump in with both feet and make that call to the client, despite the level of fear or dread you may be feeling.  “Every sales professional who is interested in earning a substantial living salivates at the idea of landing the ‘big account.’ For most of those same salesfolks, however, the idea of making that call is about as appealing as eating crushed glass.” Put your fear aside - what have you got to lose?

Step Two.  Be prepared ahead of time by having all the necessary information to best meet the needs of this client.  Be professional in your approach and be sure to listen to what the customer's expressed needs before rattling off all your ideas of what you think is important to the client.  By carefully listening to your client's challenges, you can then present the use of your product in ways they hadn’t considered before.  

Step Three.  Be sure that your company is able to meet the demands of this client.  Are your suppliers reliable so that you will be able to deliver when you promise?  Are the demands made by the client realistic for your company or will it cost you more in the long run?

Step Four.  Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.  In other words, be sure that you are not solely relying on this client’s business.  You must have a strong customer base to depend on, so that this client will not break you should the business deal fall through for any number of reasons.

Please share what difficult challenges or tasks you have been willing to take on in order to attain your goals.

Baby Steps For Setting & Reaching Big Business Goals

What are some areas you’ve found success in 

by taking 

baby steps?

We often set enormous goals for ourselves, with good intentions of increasing productivity, health, business, and organization.  But what often happens is, while the goals are made for our own benefit, it feels too large to ever achieve them, so we drop the ball and give up.  

So why not start with the small, short-term, attainable goals?  After all, the smaller goals are what we use as stepping stones to lead us to the big defining goals of life.  Everyone has different long-term desires, whether for more financial freedom, growing our business by a certain percentage, becoming debt free, or even just ending positive on the financial books each month.  

But what is the desire that ultimately drives you to strive for your goals?  What is it that you think about the most?  You must make the decision to think about what you’re striving for and why.  The biggest challenge (and best kept secret) in attaining a goal is keeping your eye on it.  We are energized by the possibilities of actually achieving certain goals we’ve set out for ourselves, but we immediately get overwhelmed with the day-to-day challenges of life, which drain us of every other desire except to just make it through another day, week, or month, and then we realize it’s been another year.  And it can be so discouraging to acknowledge that once again, we’re in the same boat we were in last year.

“[Have] you ever tried to tackle a really big job? One of those jobs where the goal looks overwhelming like losing 100 pounds or writing a Book? How about making 1000 cold calls! Surely that would be a great goal to set. There is a big secret to getting these kinds of things done, and with low anxiety.”  Check out this article for not only making, but actually reaching, such business goals realistically.  

The next question then becomes, what will you do differently this year to reach those goals?