The vast majority of the world has heard of YouTube; it is at the top of the pile when it comes to sharing videos and disseminating content on a worldwide scale. Although it has a massive reach – figures show that there are over 12 billion videos watched on this site every month in the US alone – it is concerning that internet marketers have been slow to take up the opportunity to create a buzz and generate traffic using this site. Sure, there are many traffic generation techniques out there, but YouTube seems to be the last area of the internet that is really open for anyone to make a massive impact.

The thing about YouTube is that, more than any other site, it is the quality of the content that is king – the results of each search are displayed with reference to how popular they are and how relevant they are. Sure, there is the chance to do some SEO on the videos that you upload, but essentially your video lives and dies on the premise that it has to engage the viewer. This means that if you have the time and the skills, you can create the new killer video that goes viral – it isn’t only those who have the SEO knowledge that get to the top of the tree.

So creating the perfect video is obviously the first – and most – important part of your YouTube marketing strategy, as the law of averages says that the more people viewing your video, the more people will click on the link supplied below it. You must be careful, however, to make sure that the video does not confuse – after all, if the viewer does not know what they are watching, then the chances are they won’t understand why they should in fact click the link displayed. Therefore you should have a call to action. It doesn’t have to be blatant and scream “click this link now!”, but at the same time it should be in there somewhere, even just as a subtle logo at the end. Entertain them, then tell them where they can find more content that is relevant to what they have just watched…

So you have your entertaining video and you have the necessary call to action – surely that can’t be it? Well, unfortunately it is not. There is some tweaking that needs doing in order to get your video seen by many. You will need to advertise it on appropriate websites and also make sure that you use the appropriate keywords in the video title and description. This doesn’t equate to a serious amount of SEO though as, providing you have chosen a reasonably uncompetitive niche, the competition to get to the top is not as fierce as Google’s rankings. If you want to research keywords then YouTube has its own keyword research tool, which is extremely intuitive and will help you immeasurably. Even if you have never researched keywords before, take a quick look online and you will understand the concept within a few minutes.

Now that you have promoted your video and ensured that the video is both entertaining and has a call to action, you have done almost all you can. Over the coming weeks and months you can continue creating links to the video on other sites to increase its popularity, but other than that you should sit back and let the YouTube Gods do their work for you!

Author Bio

Jamie Wright is the founder of www.topimnews.com and has been working in the internet marketing business for a number of years. His site specializes in delivering all of the latest internet marketing news, as well as hints, tips and strategies on many of the key elements of the internet marketing world.

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Bad web content is a website’s worst nightmare. Your content is the very first impression you make on your readers. Making a good impression through your content, however, is about a lot more than writing a few paragraphs and slapping it on a webpage.

Internet readers are a flighty crowd: you’ve only got about three seconds to grab your reader’s attention before they’ll leave your site. Is your web content failing to grab your readers? Here are eight ways your content could be failing you.

1.) It’s Too Long

Internet readers have short attention spans, so make your point and make it swiftly. Ask yourself: What am I trying to say? What are the main concepts I want my readers to get from this piece? Draft an outline based on these key ideas. Having an outline will help prevent unnecessary tangents or excessively wordy explanations.

 Once you’ve written your content, go over it twice more. Cut out any unnecessary words or sentences. The cleaner your writing, the easier your content will be to read.

2.) It Doesn’t Have Enough White Space

Successful SEO copywriting is about writing clean, clear content that’s easy to skim. Make your content easy on the eyes by breaking up your ideas with subheadings, line breaks, and well-spaced line height. Nothing will scare away a web visitor faster than lengthy walls of text.

3.) It Doesn’t Have Pictures

Humans are visual creatures. Give your readers some engaging pictures to accompany your content. Think of Mary Poppins and her spoon-full-of-sugar-trick: pictures and white space are the sugar to help make your content (or “medicine”) more appealing.

4.) It Contains Weak Writing

Search your content for the following weak writing pitfalls:

• Passive voice (Saying “Good writing is loved by readers” instead of the active “Readers love good writing”)
• Weak verbs
• Run-on sentences
• Excessive adjectives (“We provide unique, engaging, well-written, professional content”)

For further reading, try Purdue’s Online Writing Lab (OWL) or Grammar Girl.

5.) It’s Too Vague

“We provide the best content writing services on the web,” isn’t the same as “We provide SEO copywriting services for several Forbes 500 companies.” Similarly, “We provide SEO copywriting services for top companies like General Electric and Whole Foods Market” conveys more about your company than the previous two examples. Aim to make your content as specific and focused as possible.

6.) It Doesn’t Have an Engaging Headline

Your headline is the most important part of your content. If your headline doesn’t pull your reader in, your content won’t be read. “How to Take Good Pictures” isn’t nearly as engaging as “14 Photography Secrets From Professional Photographers.” Write a list of headlines and choose the one that you’d be most likely to read.

7.) It Uses a Too-Small Font

A recent Problogger post revealed that the optimum size for web content font is 16 pixels. Don’t strain your readers’ eyes by using smaller fonts. Similarly, black text on a white background makes for the easiest reading display– lose the dark backgrounds or creative font colors.

8.) It’s Boring

If your content isn’t engaging, you might as well throw away the other seven tips on this list. Strive to make your content something that you’d want to read. Get interested in your content. If you don’t find your subject matter fascinating, your readers won’t, either.

About The Author

Nicki Porter is an active writer for CopyPress, a content development company. Nicki is a published poet, fledgling foodie, and admitted alliteration addict currently living in the greater Boston area. Raised barefoot in Pennsylvania farm country, Nicki’s been writing ever since she could hold a pen long enough to scribble down stories in her Pocahontas journal (complete with lopsided stick figure illustrations). Though her artistic talent never evolved much beyond those stick figures, she’d like to think her writing ability has—at the very least, she’s using bigger words now.

Internet marketing has become a grandiose mindset of an all-encompassing marketing strategy to somehow pull together different marketing branches to successfully spread a company’s reach on the internet. With so many businesses using the ‘traditional’ internet channels such as social media, search engine optimization and PPC advertising sometimes a unique approach is needed to grow a modern brand.

I am not saying that the aforementioned strategies are ineffective, but they are certainly not groundbreaking strategies by any stretch of the imagination. Even mom and pop shops have a Facebook page or Twitter profile. To stick out from the pack one must think outside of the box and search for less commonly used alternatives. Below are some of our  favorites:

SlideShare

SlideShare is an online resource for viewing and sharing slide shows such as PowerPoint presentations. The site has a very simple interface which is very easy to upload and share presentations. It can also be a great way to spread your expertise on your industry on the internet. Many local brands using SlideShare have tens of thousands of views.

Being a highly trafficked and ranked site, uploading a slide show on SlideShare could be a great way to reach users that you may not otherwise reach strictly from your website. When uploading, make sure to fully optimize the presentations with your keywords and brand name to maximize findability.

YouTube

Although YouTube has been around for a while, it is not often used by small businesses and bloggers. YouTube has an extremely large audience of viewers looking for informational videos on any possible subject.

Many online businesses have seen huge growth by creating a web channel and regularly uploading videos to YouTube which inform viewers about different aspects of their industry. This creates strong brand recognition and user base which often times translates to sales on your website.

Blog Networks

Blog networks like BizSugar or BlogEngage are great ways to share your articles with other bloggers in the blogging community. The exponentially increases the potential of a post to go viral because many of the users on the site are niche leaders in their respective industries and if they share your post many of their readers are most likely going to do so as well.

The networks are very easy to use. All you have to do is create a profile and then begin to upload your blog posts on to the site. Other users can then read and vote on your posts. Put time into informative, well written posts and you will be rewarded by these communities.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn may not be the right channel for every business but it is certainly a great tool for B2B businesses. You can create a pretty in depth profile with information about your company, articles and links to employee’s pages. This help’s potential customers to identify with your company with faces rather than just a corporate name. LinkedIn can also be a valuable recruiting tool to search for prospective candidates.

Newsletters

Newsletters are great way to stay in touch with past customers or potential customers that are interested in your company. Set up a regular send routine so that those receiving the newsletter know when to expect it. This is a great way to keep your brand name on the tip of customer’s tongues.

Management of newsletters can be simple as well. MailChimp offers free options to easily manage the newsletter and email lists as well as providing you with great reporting tools to see who opened your email, you didn’t and who unsubscribed.

There are many ways to engage customers and to remain relevant with them on the internet. As a general rule, to catch more fish it is better to have more nets in the proverbial customer pond. Each one of these tactics provides you with another net.

About The Author

Corey Rab is the co-founder of Orlando SEO company SEOhatch. Along with internet marketing consulting he also writes about technology and investing on Technorati and many other sites.