AMVA - Amanda Moore Virtual Assistant

Welcome to the June 15, 2008 edition of the Virtual Assistant/Home Business Blog Carnival. We received a ton of entries this week, unfortunately several were unable to be included for various reasons. But, we still have a great carnival for you this week so hopefully you enjoy!

Steve Oliphant presents Free Backlinks! Woo Hoo! posted at Steve Oliphant’s Musings.

Patrick Schwerdtfeger presents How I use Twitter and Utterz posted at Tactical Execution, saying, “This post describes how you can use free micro-blogging platforms like Twitter and Utterz to build a following and push value to your audience, all without leaving home.”

Webmaster_1 presents Avoiding Make Money From Home Scams posted at The Entrepreneurs Online Magazine, saying, “Tips on how to avoid money making schemes”

Diego Norte presents Internet Business 101 posted at Internet Business 101.

Jose DeJesus MD presents Business Startup - Testing Your Idea and Yourself posted at Physician Entrepreneur.

Steve Faber presents The Steps to Starting an Internet Business posted at Home Based Business Success.

Laurie presents Law Practice and Life Balance posted at Halo Secretarial Services.

Fiona Lohrenz presents Why Your Day Care Needs A Website posted at Child Care Only.

Social D presents Social Marketing Traffic Experiment Updated Results Video posted at Social Networking Bookmark Domination.

Jose DeJesus MD presents Business Document Resource posted at Physician Entrepreneur.

Janet Barclay presents Keeping Track of All Those Blogs posted at From the Desk of Janet Barclay.

Tammi Metzler presents My journey from full-time employee to full-time entrepreneur posted at Writeassociate’s Weblog.

Jennifer Naughton presents Day One Of A New Life posted at Jennifer Naughton — Virtual Assistant.

Mary Havlicek presents I’ve Got Spirit, How ‘Bout You? posted at Hours by Design.

Raymond presents Internet Service Is More Important To Me Than Phone or Cable TV posted at Money Blue Book.

Amanda Moore presents 10-Second Must-do SEO for Bloggers posted at AMVA - Amanda Moore Virtual Assistant.

SJ Yee presents On Becoming A Full-Time Blogger/Internet Marketer posted at Personal Development for the Book Smart.

Mark Riffey presents Who has time for marketing? posted at Business is Personal.

Jimmy Sansi presents A Big List For Improving Article Marketing posted at The Kaizen Business.

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of Virtual Assistant/Home Business Blog Carnival using our carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

Welcome to the June 1, 2008 edition of Virtual Assistant/Home Business Blog Carnival.

Terry Dean presents Quality Website Traffic posted at Integrity Business Blog by Terry Dean.

Webmaster_1 presents 5 Reasons Why Blogging Is Beneficial posted at The Entrepreneurs Online Magazine, saying, “An article on why blogging is beneficial to any internet business”

Jose DeJesus MD presents Defending Yourself Against Time Thieves posted at Physician Entrepreneur, saying, “Here are some ways to become more effective by avoiding things that steal or waste your time.”

Colleen M. Johnson presents Web Database Management Tools posted at cmjoffice.com Blog, saying, “Discover some information on web-based database options.”

John W. Furst presents Aweber – A Marketing Lesson And Smart Pricing posted at E-Biz Booster Blog, saying, “Are you freaking out? One of the popular Email Marketing Tools provider — AWeber — has new features and new prices. What’s in it for you?”

Jimson Lee presents Free or Cheap Help Desk Support Software posted at CRM Help Desk Software.com, saying, “A quick review of the 2 best free Open Source Help Desk Support Ticket software for your business.”

Cindy King presents How To Use Online Translation Tools posted at Cindy King, saying, “I think free online translation tools are great… for certain tasks. Never use them to write any sales content or sales materials. And think twice about relying on them for any other translations.”

John Crickett presents How To Start A Blogging Business posted at Business Opportunities And Ideas, saying, “A guide to starting a blogging business”

Terry Dean presents From a Sale to An Experience posted at Integrity Business Blog by Terry Dean.

Craig Andrews presents Small Steps for a lot of Traffic Generation posted at Craig S. Andrews.com.

Laurie presents Lawyers and Technological Change posted at Halo Secretarial Services.

Janet Barclay presents Business Lessons Are Everywhere posted at From the Desk of Janet Barclay.

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of the Virtual Assistant/Home Business Blog Carnival using our carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

by Nicholas Nanton

If you’re looking to grow your business, then a BLOG is a great tool to add to your tool chest. In this article we will discuss BLOG basics and how you can use them in your business.

1. What’s a BLOG?

What’s a BLOG you ask? Well, let me tell you. According to Wikipedia.com:

A blog (short for web log) is a user-generated website where entries are made in journal style and displayed in a reverse chronological order [newest entries are at the top].

So, its really just an online journal or diary that is written by anyone who wants to tell the world what’s on their mind. (Side note: When I say “the world” I really mean it, so be careful what you write.)

Ok, so how can this help you grow your business? Great question. To understand the answer you have to know just a bit about how search engines work.

2. BLOGs and Search Engines

Search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN and all the others use what they call “spiders.” Spiders are software programs that “crawl” the internet looking for new content, and rank it based on its contents and its relevance to a certain topic. This is all done by some very complex math, but the important thing you need to know is that if you write often and/or discuss topics that are getting searched online a lot (i.e. topics in the news), the search engines will consider your site “relevant” and if you include “key words” (popular search terms) in your content, that you know your potential customers are searching for, there is a much better chance that they will actually be able to find you.

So to recap, my 3 Principles of BLOGging for Search Engines are:

1)Write Often

2)Write Relevant

3)Write Using Key Words

3. What makes a good BLOG?

This is a rhetorical question. The only thing that really matters is the opinion of the audience you are trying to reach. So here are a few tips that will help you stay on track.

1. Know who you are writing for - If your audience is 13 year olds, writing about retiring next year probably isn’t going to get you a lot of return visitors

2. Keep it short and to the point - 100-300 words is all most people will have the time to read, so keep your articles short and to the point. Over time this will build a great deal of credibility with your readers.

3. Write actionable content - “How To” and “Top 10″ lists are great. It gives your readers action steps they can take to use your content in their everyday lives. Think about ways to use these to point out how you are different from your competitors.

4. Don’t be afraid to tell some of your secrets - People love to hear about how to make something happen, then they love to pay someone else to do it. Let’s be honest, even though you just told me how I can edit my html code on my website to make it stick out like neon lights in a search engine, that doesn’t mean I want to do it myself. Just give me a way to contact you to hire you. After all, you just showed me that you are the expert.

5. Allow Comments - Consider allowing people to post comments about your BLOG. In fact, you should be the first one to post a comment after each blog, pose a question or comment to simply getting a discussion started. If visitors are interacting and writing comments about your BLOG, they are actually adding relevant content that the search engines are going to like.

Well, there you have it, BLOG basics.

JW Dicks & Nick Nanton, founders of TheBusinessGrowthLawyers.com, publish the Business Growth ezine monthly covering topics that every business, start-up to international powerhouse, needs to know. If you’re ready to take your business to the next level, get more FREE info now at www.TheBusinessGrowthLawyers.com
Article Source: Keyword Articles

By: Juhani Tontti

They look so simple, that I often ask, what special they have and how they have become so successful in the tough internet home business market? It seems that the simpler and the more user friendly the site is, the better chances it has to create big sales.

Very clearly one big success factor is that the fine tuning work should concentrate to take away all the unnecessary elements and non-selling links.

1 - Winning Element: Attention Grabbing Title.

The title is absolutely the most important element of the site. It should contain the promise and to describe the content of the site. The job of the title is to persuade the visitor to continue and to find the things that are useful for him.

The headline should be written well and it should stand out from the rest of the copy. It also should be the first element, which catches the visitor attention in seconds, because if it does not do that, the visitor continues the surfing.

2 - Winning Element: Well Written Copy.

The Internet is the information highway, so the role of the copy is very important, this is the world of the words. The copy should draw the readers attention immediately to the benefits your offer give to him.

The style is important and the target is to build up the trust from the first contact. The copy should make the reader enthusiastic about the benefits but it should not use hype style over promises, because they will destroy the trust.

3 - Winning Element: Easy Site Navigation.

This is the technical must, because nothing drives the visitors away faster than the bad navigation. The site structure should be clear and logical, so that the visitor knows all the time, where he is and to where he could go from here.

The menu should be the same on every page and clearly accessible and also easy to understand. The terms should be clear, despite of the fact that you may want to use internet home business key phrases.

4 - Winning Element: Call To Action.

After the copy has presented the main benefits it is the time to call the reader into action. Yes to tell him directly what to do and not to leave him guessing, how should I go on? Action is everything and we have to call the reader to do that.

One good way is to lower the bar, i.e. to offer a cheap or free trial opportunity for some weeks, before the reader will buy the product. The efficiency is the better, the more often you call the reader into action.

5 - Winning Element: Images.

One picture tells more than thousand words. You should include photos of every product you sell, because they make the products more real, than the copy alone.

If you have lots of products for sale, you can use thumbnails that link to larger images. This speed up the page loadings.

6 - Winning Element: Opt in Form.

Most of the internet home business visitors needs at least five contacts before they will buy. However if they are interested about what you offer, it is important to get their name and email address through an opt in form on the visible place of the site.

In this process you have to give them a gift, an email course, a free e-book or something like that, which again will sell your offer later on. Now you can send them messages during a long period of time, which clearly makes the process more productive.

7 - Winning Element: About Us Section.

The idea of every internet home business site is to build trust over a long period of time. This requires that you tell enough about yourself and give your contact information for further questions. An effective way is to use a picture about yourself and some information in the form of a story and underline your expertise as a marketer in this area.

This shows people that there is a real people behind the business.

8 - Winning Element: Site Freshness.

People and search engines love unique, fresh information. That is why you should update the content very often and change those parts that do not work anymore and add some elements which show right away that something new is available. It is useful to look the competing sites in your internet home business niche, because they are a great source of new ideas. Another idea is to make sure your site can stand out from the crowd.

The marketing is very important but the key is still the quality of your internet home business site. It makes the people to come back and it is the real place, where they can reach you and your offers.

~~~~~

Author Resource:-> Juhani Tontti, B.Sc., Marketing. Finetune Your Site And It Will Work For You Day And Night Automatically. Find More Information From My Internet Business- Site.

Article From Niche Article Directory

Welcome to the 2nd issue of the Virtual Assistant/Home Business Blog Carnival. Last week was a rousing success and this week is even better. There are 16 great posts below which I’m sure you’ll enjoy. Please feel free to spread the word!

• Terry Dean of Integrity Business Blog provides of list of 21 Free Software Resources.

• Cindy King provides a book review of Letting Go Of The Words - Writing Web Content That Works By Janice Redish.

• Kathleen Gage of Street Smarts Marketing & Promotions wonders Internet marketing is all about luck….or is it?.

• Anya of Gavin Ingham presents The Sales Apprentice 2008: Sales training & business development tips from the hit TV show, part VIII.

• Stefan Töpfer of THE SMALL BUSINESS BLOG presents Small Business Lists – Start-Up on a Shoestring.

• Timothy Yordy of I’m Not A Rat talks about the Perseverance of the Enslaved.

• Liz at Nitro Marketing Blog asks Are Higher Gas Prices Driving People to Cheat on Their Partners?

• Colleen Johnson of CMJ Office presents Ten tips for blog writing.

• Heather Johnson gives 6 Steps to Keep Employee Complaints from Escalating.

• Janet Barclay presents Highlights from the 3rd Annual Online International Virtual Assistants Convention.

• Cindy King talks about Buying Logos For International Websites.

• Keiron of Full Time Blogger wonders A Virtual Assistant - Do I need one?. (See my response to his challenge here. Make sure you read the comments on both.)

• Amanda Moore (me) gives 4 Tips on Responding to RFPs.

• Edith of Edith Yeung.Com talks about Happy Hour Marketing

• Shari Sultana of Modern Marketing Support tells you to Hire a VA: Build More Time, Freedom and Money into Your Business.

• Monique Terrell of Virtually Speaking gives you 15 Tips to making the Transition from Employee to Business Owner.

If you would like to participate in future VA/HB Blog Carnivals, please feel free to submit your article using the following link: http://blogcarnival.com/bc/submit_4185.html. If your submission is not received in time for the current week’s carnival it will automatically be included in the next one - so submit whenever you would like.