Ask Gina Gaudio-Graves’ … About Internet Marketing & Strategic Alliances

Before I get to the lesson, I’ve got to share a short story with you …

About a month ago, I met a young marketer quite by accident.  It was about 4:30 in the morning and my phone rang.  So, I answered it.

Now, you have to understand … I have 2 separate lines.  One is for customes and one is my personal cell.  (It doesn’t matter which one rang, though, because at that time of night,  would personally answer them both.)

Anyway, I picked up the phone with my usual, “Gina Gaudio-Graves, may I help you?” 

“This isn’t ‘the Gina’,” he said, “is it?”  somewhat shocked that I would answer my own phone.  (Well who else would answer it at 4:30 in the morning?)

As it turns out, the caller was simply inquiring about when commissions would be paid from a recent promotion.  After answering his question, I of course had to find out a little more about who it was that would be calling me at that time of day.

I learned that his name was Koorosh Vahabi and that he was just getting started in marketing, but he had already put up a blog.  So I asked where I could find it.

He told me it was at:

www.kooroshvahabi.com

That seemed to make me chuckle, though.  I just had to inquire about WHY he would name his blog something so difficult to spell!

He explained that he used his name because he’s seen so many other marketers use their names for their own blogs, and he figured that was the right thing to do. 

SIDENOTE:  That is NOT what you want to do with your blog.  Only use your name as your URL if you are trying to brand yourself ie. you are a coach, a speaker, an author, etc.  If you are none of these, then use a domain name that is tied to the theme of your blog.

Well, I just couldn’t resist offering “a few” helpful suggestions and before I knew it, I was rattling on and on!

Ok, so here’s where “the Lesson” comes in …

Tonight, I was going through my email.  In it, I found a “Google Alert” for my name and I clicked on the link.

SIDENOTE:  If you’ve never tried Google Alerts, you should!  Google will actually send you an email any time that new content is posted anywhere on the ‘net with your keyword in it.  If you want to watch for information being put up with your name in it, simply put plus signs between your name and select the frequency you want (they let you choose immediate, once per day, or once per week).  For my name, my alert would read: gina+gaudio+graves

Can you quess where that Google alert took me?

If you’re thinking “Koorosh’s Blog”, you’re WRONG!

Actually, it took me to an article on Digg.com.

In case you don’t know what Digg.com is, let me explain it quickly.  Digg is a “social bookmarking” site. 

In other words, users join Digg to share “favorites” with other users. 

When you add a “bookmark” to your account, the description and link to your bookmark appears on the front page of Digg.com and it shows “1 Digg”.

The other social bookmarking sites like Technorati.com, StumbleUpon, and Delicious all work in much the same way.  Each time someone adds the “bookmark” to their own account, that item jumps back to the top of the list.

The next time someone else adds a bookmark to their account, that description and link jumps to the top, just above the prior item.

In this case, the post on Digg.com was a bookmark that Koorosh had added for his blog post about our conversation. 

When I first saw the Digg.com post, there were already “2 Digg’s” for it.  Sure, one was made by Koorosh himself, but 1 was made by someone other than me.

That tells me that there was at least 1 other person who ended up checking out that article.

Using Social Bookmarking sites like Digg.com can do a number of things for your blog:

1.  It can drive traffic directly to your posts.  By bringing more traffic to your blog, it will help you to build your list as well as to make more sales (provided you’ve set things up properly, that is).

2.  It can alert experts to posts you’ve written about THEM!  Have you ever hoped to get a high-powered expert in your niche to notice you?  Have you tried everything other than standing on your head to do this?  Well, you haven’t tried Social Bookmarking yet, have you?!

3.  It can bring valuable one-way links back to your blog.  This will in turn help to improve your search engine rankings, sometimes VERY dramatically.  (Heck, I’ve even tried 2 techniques personally that gave me top 5 rankings in both Google and Yahoo in less than 48 hours!)

Now, let’s look at #2 just a little closer …

Let’s say you write a review about a new product.  In it, you post an affiliate link.  You’d just LOVE to find a way to let the product creator know about your review.  How can you let that person know about your blog?

Easy!  Just “Digg” It!

If you were to add your post to your social bookmarking account, it would alert the expert through a Google Alert, to his or her name being used at a Social Bookmarking account.

Imagine someone getting 2, 3, or maybe even 5 or 10 alerts in a single day about their own name being added to different bookmarking services.  Do you think that person would just HAVE to go and check it out?

Absolutely!

That makes social bookmarking sites a fantastic resource for getting noticed!

On the other hand, what if the expert doesn’t use Google Alerts?  Is there any other way that you can get the person’s attention?

Yep!

Here’s what you can do …

In your blog post, use the person’s name as “anchor text”  with a link directly to their own blog post.  For example, if I wanted Koorosh to notice this post, I would link his name “Koorosh” directly to his post using this link:

http://www.kooroshvahabi.com/blog/?p=10#respond

Do NOT link to just the URL like this:

http://www.kooroshvahabi.com/blog

That isn’t enough to make this work.

When I link directly to his individual post, the next time he logs into his WordPress dashboard, in the right hand column of the main “Dashboard” page, he’ll see MY post listed under “Incoming Links”.

Whether you link to someone’s blog post or you use social bookmarking sites like Digg, you’re sure to get your blog noticed by ANY expert! 

Of course, you’re going to LOVE the extra traffic the bookmarking will bring, so you might as well do both!  Especially since they’re not mutually exclusive!

To Your Abundant Blogging Success!

Gina Gaudio-Graves

P.S.  If you’d like to learn even more about blogging so that you can try these same techniques on your very own blog, pick up your copy of “7 Days To Blogging Profits”  from Eric White at:

http://www.askggg.com/blogprofits