The Evolution of Affiliate Marketing

by Nicole Munoz

Affiliate marketing is still a viable business model with low start up costs and the potential for high return. But, affiliate marketers have had to change their tactics as the competition has increased. In light of the regulations by the FTC, has this industry changed for the better?

What is Affiliate Marketing?

In the simplest terms, affiliate marketing is advertising done by others to promote a company’s products. It’s ingenious really. Amazon was one of the first to institute this model. Instead of a company spending big bucks to advertise their products, they allow others to help out with it for a share of the profits.

The advantages include:

Wider circle of influence owing to the number of affiliates
Lower advertising costs
Several people focusing on advertising instead of one
Opens the market to a larger and more diverse audience
Increased sales

Affiliate marketing is a partnership that pays off for everyone involved.

Affiliate Marketing in the Past

Affiliate marketing has always been about promoting a product or service but the methods have changed over the years. For one, there are fewer banner ads. Remember when they were all the rage? The flashy ads scrolling across the top of the webpage caught a reader’s eye. They clicked to see what all the hype was about. Banner ads were all about getting the click for higher affiliate payouts.

Unfortunately, that led to a lot of gratuitous advertising on the part of marketers. The sale was the main drive and it resulted in concentration on enticing people to click instead of focusing on the product itself. Reviews were clearly aimed at showing the product in the best light possible even if there were negative issues. When given freebies, review writers felt compelled to shy away from detracting statements about the product.

As a result, people felt “had” with these biased reviews and advertisements. They bought the products but didn’t get what they were promised in the way of a great product or at least the product that was advertised. Not all affiliates have operated like that. Many have seen the wisdom of adding value to their affiliate marketing methods to:

Build their brand
Build their reputation
Gain a faithful following
Build their list

Competition has raised the Standard

For “black hat marketers” this means that tactics used to beat the system and make a quick sale are no longer making the profits they once were. Changes to Google search engine algorithms have weeded out those who provide lackluster content or recycled content on their affiliate sites. Keyword stuffing is a definite no-no as well as using PLR content “as is” to populate your sites.

To compete on search engine pages and not get dinged by the likes of Google, affiliate marketers are providing SEO rich content that informs instead of “sells” a product to their readers. Making money is still important (it is a business after all), but marketers are exchanging their products for value. Engaging the reader reaches them on a different level. When a person can emotionally identify with a product, you are more likely to make a sale.

Tools in the affiliate’s arsenal now look like:

Videos
Podcasts
Social media interaction and social bookmarking
Webinars
Personal recommendations for products

Websites are user-friendly and contain a host of information and ways for the affiliate to interact with their audience instead of just telling them what to buy.

The FTC and the Future of Affiliate Marketing

Many affiliates are talking about the guidelines set down by the FTC. It is not as gloomy a forecast for the affiliate marketing industry as many are leading you to believe. These guidelines are there to provide internet users with what you would want for yourself – honesty and truth in advertising.

Learn more here: http://business.ftc.gov/

The guidelines advocate disclosure. We’ve seen how people react to public figures and non-discloser of their links with certain companies and products. Many television commercials with spokespersons also include a disclaimer at the bottom letting you know that they are paid for their services. If that makes a difference to you, then it will also make a difference to your website visitors and your promotion of affiliate products.

Compliance is not a hardship if you are already adding value to your affiliate marketing methods. According to the guidelines, endorsements must be “truthful and not misleading.” Use the product before you promote it. Personal testimonials mean that the information you are providing comes from your experience with the product. Consumers can tell when you have an in-depth knowledge as opposed to just glossing over the product’s highlights than anyone could write.

Mention the pros and cons of the product. Allow readers to make an informed decision based on all the facts and not just those that paint the product in a positive light. Otherwise, you are making the decision for them and that is misleading.

Provide a disclaimer. Let your readers know that you are an affiliate who uses the products and services that you are promoting.

Many of these guidelines have been around for a while but have been updated to reflect the advent of social media. Here as well, advertising claims need to be based on personal experience and reveal all sides of the product.

So, how has affiliate marketing changed? It has evolved for the better for both customer and the affiliate marketer who strives to build a brand that supports value and honest products.

Get the best out of Google+ Circles!

by Nicole Munoz

Circles is one of the things that really sets Google+ apart from other social networks. In Facebook for example, your friends are your friends – It doesn’t matter if that person’s the janitor you sometimes talk to or your best friend from childhood.

In Google+, you can create circles and put different people in different circles. You can then choose to share things only to certain people and not to others. For example, you might share only professional updates with your work contacts, while sharing photos of a night out with your friend circle.

The people in your circles won’t know what circles you put them in. It gives you a whole lot of control over your data, without any potentially embarrassing situations.

Here’s how to use Google+’s circles feature.

Step 1: Click Circles

To access your circles settings, hover your mouse over “Home” in the left navigation.

Then click on “People”.

You’ll see a screen of the people who are already in your circles.

Step 2: See Potential Friends

Click on “Have you in circles” to see who added you to their circles. You can think of these as your “friend requests.”

Step 3: Drag and Drop Into Circles

To add someone to a circle, just drag and drop them into the circles along the bottom.

Step 4: Create a New Circle

To create a new circle, click or drag and drop into the “+” circle. If you hover your mouse over it, you will see this:

The create circle box will pop up. Choose a name for your new circle, then either add people to the circle or create an empty circle.

Step 5: Adding by Search

If you want to add someone who hasn’t already added you, do a search for them along the left bar, right under “People”.

Click on the name to go to their profile page. Then click “Add to circles” to add them to a circle.

Step 6: Circle Specific Stream

Want to only see photos and updates from your friends? Or want to see what your family is up to? Google+ makes it easy to see only updates from the people you want to see updates from.

On the top bar navigation of your home screen, just click one of the circles whose streams you want to see. Google+ will update and only display updates from people in those circles.

Step 7: Circle-Specific Posts

To post an update to only certain circles, click on the “Share what’s new” box and start writing a post. A box with who can view your post will pop up.

To remove a circle, click the small “x” in the top right corner. To add a circle that can see your post, click “Add more people.”

You now learned how to see who’s in your circle, who’s added you to their circles, how to add people to your own circles, how to create a new circle, how to add people who didn’t add you to a circle using search, how to sort your stream by circles and how to post to only specific circles.

Google+’s circles features really makes it easy to use social networking without “leaking” updates you don’t leaked to the wrong people. It allows you to connect with the different people in your life in different ways.

Get Started With Google+

by Nicole Munoz

How to Set Up Your Account

Once you’re signed up on Google+, how do you actually setup your account? In this guide, you’ll learn how to add information to your profile, how to choose who can see what, how to set your notification preferences and how to link up other social networks to your Google+ account.

Step 1: Accessing Your Settings

To get to your settings page, click on the “Settings” dropdown button in the top right.

Click on “Account”

Click on “Google+”

Step 2: Add a Phone Number

Adding a phone number allows Google to send you a text whenever you get a notification. To add a phone number, type in your mobile number, then click “Send Verification Code.”

You’ll need to get the code from your phone and enter it into Google+ before you can receive notifications.

Step 3: Choosing Your Notifications

When do you want to receive an email or text from Google+? Use the checkboxes to select when you do and don’t want to get notifications.

Step 4: Set Your Image Preferences

Choose whether or not you want geographical location information to be tagged onto your photos. Most modern cameras, including the iPhone and Android cameras now tag geographical information onto photos.

If you check the “Show photo geo location information” box, Google+ will automatically add the geo location tag to your photos.

Your other choice is who gets to automatically have their photos approved. Approved photos show up on your profile. Use the blue drop-down box and the “Add more people” button to choose who can post photos of you and have them approved automatically. You can also choose to upload photos at full size from your mobile or desktop, autoenhance and autoawesome.

Step 5: Access the Profile Edit Page

To edit your profile, click on “Profile and privacy.”

Then click on your profile.

Click on “About.”

Step 6: Editing Your Personal Information

Fill out your story, things you’re proud of, occupation, employment, education and places lived information.

Then fill out your contact information, relationship status, gender and alternate names.

Step 7: Safeguarding Your Personal Information

Google+ makes it very easy to choose who can see what personal information. When you click on a field to enter your information, below it is a privacy setting button.

Just click on the button to choose exactly who can see the information you type in.

Step 8: Add Other Social Networks

If you want to add other social networks to your Google+ profile, go to the “Links” box in your “About” page, and add your social networks URLs to your Google+ profile.

You’ll immediately see a list of accounts that Google+ thinks belongs to you, based on Google+ searching the various social networks.

If you see any accounts that do indeed belong to you, just click the “+” button to link the account.

Click “Save” and the account will be linked to Google+.

Now click on “Manage connected accounts”.

And there, you can add your social networks, simply by typing your username, or by entering your profile URL.

Congratulations! You’ve just setup your Google+ account. You’ve learned how to add a phone number, how to set notifications, how to setup your profile, how to adjust your privacy settings and how to link other social networks.

Top 10 Google+ Mistakes

by Nicole Munoz

Google+ is one of the world’s largest social networks. At 170 million active users, Google+ is behind Facebook but still ahead of LinkedIn’s 150 million users. Don’t be fooled by its lower user count however: Google+ is still a power house.

Unlike Facebook, which just about everyone is on, Google+ tends to be populated by first adopters, influencers, networkers and serious professionals. While Google+ might not be the best place to get a hundred likes for the latest funny photo, it’s an absolutely fantastic place to build your brand and market your business.

Google+ also has one big advantage over other social networks: Google +1s have a big impact on search results. Google +1s don’t affect rankings globally, but do affect rankings powerfully on a user-specific basis.

That means that if you write an article about blogging and a user +1s that article, they’re much more likely to see your content ranked in the future. All your content about PPC, about social networking, about video marketing and everything else will get a huge boost because they +1ed a piece of content by you. This alone makes Google+ worth investing in.

All that said, Google+ is often misunderstood. People often don’t know understand how to use this powerful platform and as a result make mistakes. Here are ten of the most common mistakes people make and how you can avoid them.

Mistake #1: A Corporate Sounding Tagline

On a Google Plus page, your tagline is really the only space you have to sell curious browsers on taking a closer look. The tagline is short, but it gives you a chance to “hook” people.

Don’t squander your tagline on a corporate sounding sound bite. Don’t use it on a cute sounding slogan. Your tagline should be something that directly hints at a benefit. It should promise a benefit and get people hooked in.

Spend some time perfecting your tagline. It’s a vital part of your page’s first impression.

Mistake #2: Not Fully Utilizing Links

One of the truly great things about Google+ is that it allows you a ton of leeway on your links. You can put almost as many links as you want. You can link from both your own “about” page as well as your brand pages.

Link to all the different resources you can. Link to all the credibility boosters you have on the web. Link to your personal site, your company website, your LinkedIn, your Facebook page and any other resources that can help boost your credibility and allow people to get to know you.

Mistake #3: Not Regularly Posting Content

Google+ revolves around content more than just about any other social network. On Facebook, it’s common for people to share all kinds of things, from photos to quotes to personal updates. On Twitter, even more so.

Google+ however revolves almost solely around content. People on Google+ expect to receive high quality content from the people in their circles, especially if it’s from someone they know in a business context.

Google+ allows you to post entire articles in an update. This makes it easy for people following you to digest your content all within the social network, without having to leave and go to an outside site.

Publish content regularly on Google+ – It’s the best way to build a relationship with your audience.

Mistake #4: Not Encouraging +1s

Getting more +1s works wonders for your business. It can make your content rank higher in Google+. It builds social proof when others see that people like your content. It helps your future content rank for that specific user.

Getting +1s isn’t something that happens on its own. A lot of people who like content will never +1 it. People are often more used to “liking” Facebook content than +1ing Google+ content.

How do you remedy this? By asking people to +1 your content. By incentivizing people to +1 your content. Make it an active mission of yours to get people to +1 your content.

Mistake #5: Poor Use of Photos

Google+ is the most powerful social network in terms of photos in the main stream. On Facebook, only thumbnails of photos can be shared. To view a larger photo, people have to click on the photo to go to the photo album.

On Twitter, it’s even worse. All photos are shrunk down into a short URL and only the URL is posted. There is no preview for the photo.

On Google+ however, you can view the whole photo right in the stream. Large photos are shrunk down to fit the stream; but even the preview is quite large.

Make sure you utilize photos in your Google+ stream. A picture can tell a thousand words.

Mistake #6: Not Enabling Direct Connect

Direct Connect is a feature that makes it easy for people to find your brand page. All they need to do is type in the “+” sign followed by your brand name in Google. For example, to find McDonalds, you’d just type in “+McDonalds.”

You won’t see any search results. Instead, you’ll be taken directly to the McDonalds brand page. This is true of both searching on Google.com, as well as through Google search bars in Chrome, Firefox and other browsers.

If you’re not enabling Direct Connect, you’re going to miss out on traffic from your highest quality users. It’s hardcore social media users (influencers) who’re most likely to use the Direct Connect feature. Make sure it’s enabled to make sure you don’t lose your most powerful followers.

Mistake #7: Not Verifying Your Page

Verifying your page with Google+ prevents anyone else from taking your brand’s name. Nobody else will be able to get a “verified” page under the same name.

Also, if you’re using Direct Connect, verifying your page will ensure that your page is the one that pops up when people type in “+” and your brand name.

Verifying your page does take a bit of effort. First, you have to post a bit of HTML code from Google+ on your website. You may also be asked to provide proof in the form of a credit card statement or utility bill.

Mistake #8: Not Segmenting Using Circles

One of Google+’s most powerful features is circles. Circles allows you to separate the different groups of people in your life, as well as the different people who follow you professionally, into different groups.

For example, you might separate your newcomers from your buyers from your “super elite” crowd. You might also have a separate circle for contributors to your business and your inner circle.

You’ll be able to post tailored content just to each of those groups. You’ll be able to make sure that everything you post is on-message for the people who’ll see them.

Mistake #9: Reposting Too Much

Google+ is all about building your personal brand. It’s about posting original content. It’s about impressing people with your content. It’s not about constantly reposting what other people are saying.

On Facebook and Twitter, sharing and retweeting is very common. On Google+, it’s less so, especially for businesses and brands. That’s not to say never to share, but the ratio should be much lower.

On Facebook, a good 20% to 30% of your content might be shares from other people. On Google+, less than 10% of your content should be shares. Focus on high quality original content, not resharing what other people posted.

Mistake #10: Overlooking Hangouts

People often underestimate just how powerful hangouts are. Hangouts allows you to connect with your friends using audio and video conferencing, completely for free. What’s incredible is how seamless the video and audio is. It’s easy to use, it’s fast and it just plain works.

Most other kinds of software on the market that can do this kind of video conferencing cost a boatload of money. Even Skype video conferencing isn’t as smooth and easy to use as Google hangouts.

You can use hangouts for classes, for impromptu gatherings for presentations or group meetings. Don’t overlook hangouts just because it’s free – It’s a robust and powerful piece of conferencing software.

These are some of the most common Google+ mistakes people make. Google+ isn’t Facebook, but it’s still one of the most influential social networks around. Develop a strong Google+ strategy and it’ll pay off in customers, in brand, in credibility and influence.

On Page Search Engine Optimization for Blog Posts

by Nicole Munoz

On page search engine optimization is an extremely important part of the overall search engine optimization formula. Some people say it’s half the equation. In reality, it’s more like an entry ticket to compete.

Having your on-page SEO done well isn’t necessarily going to help you topple the #1 position for your keyword. However, if you don’t have your pages well optimized, chances are you won’t rank at all.

Consider it an all-important prerequisite to getting your website ranked on the front page. If you don’t have your on page SEO done properly, chances are you won’t rank at all.

The primary reason you want to do on page SEO is so that Google can accurately tell what your page is about. A poorly optimized page will seem like it’s about everything. A well optimized page on the other hand will tell Google exactly what the page is about, so Google can give you strong rankings for that keyword.

Here’s how to optimize your page for search engines. For the purposes of demonstration, we’ll be using the “All in One SEO” plugin for WordPress for a number of these steps.

Step 1: The Title Tag

The title tag is the most important tag in all of your SEO efforts. It’s what Google places the most weight on when they’re trying to determine what your site is about.

Your title should have as much of your keyword towards the front of the tag as possible.

Different pages on your site should have different title tags. Do not have the same title tag throughout your entire website. If you do, you waste each individual page’s potential to rank for unique keywords.

For example, below is a setup for how your WordPress pages and posts might look like. You can configure your system to by default put post’s title first, then the blog’s name second, rather than the other way around.

Step 2: Meta Description

Your meta description tag doesn’t actually help you rank higher. Instead, what it does is tell Google what to display beneath your search listing. This can help you get a lot more clicks from Google by writing the “right thing” to hook your audience in.

Each page on your site can have a different meta description. You definitely want to write the meta description for your home page and the popular pages on your site yourself. For the pages on your site that aren’t too popular, Google will just take an excerpt from your website and use that as your meta description.

Step 3: Meta Keywords

Your meta keywords tags tell Google what keywords you think your site is relevant for. It doesn’t bear much weight as far as helping you rank goes, but it can really help Google figure out what your site is about. It takes just a minute to do them and is good SEO practice in general.

Step 4: URL Structure

Generally, you want your URL to contain your keyword as much as possible. You never want to use just your post ID or the date as your URL. You should also avoid cryptic URLs that contain data that no human being can read.

If you want to use just your post title as your URL for example, this is how you’d do it in WordPress’ “Permalinks” settings.

Step 5: Image Alt Tags

Optimizing your alt tags plays a much larger part on SEO than a lot of people think. It won’t single handedly help you rank, but it is an important factor for your on page SEO.

Give the images on your site good alt tags. Make sure the filenames are meaningful and make sure that your alt tags are descriptive. If you have purely navigational images on your site, such as white space or button backgrounds, name them numbers (111.jpg) rather than a text based keyword.

In WordPress, you can change the alt tag of images by going to that image’s preferences.

Step 6: Noindex Non-Content Pages

You should noindex your non-content pages. Your affiliate pages, your category pages, your archives and so on should all be noindexed. This is particularly true if those pages contain duplicate content. On most blogs, category and archive pages are mostly duplicate content so you definitely want to noindex those pages.

Step 7: Internal Linking

Internal linking is one of the most crucial factors you could pay attention to for your SEO.

Make sure you have links going from all your content pages to other pages on your site. Embed these links within your actual content, or within links on the site or bottom of the article.

Things like “You May Like” boxes or “Related Posts” boxes are all good choices.

Step 8: Have a Robots.txt

A robots.txt just tells search engines where to go and where not to go. This is a good way to disallow search engine spiders from going where they’re not supposed to.

This can help you keep the areas you don’t want from ranking out of the search engines. For example, you probably don’t want the paid areas of your site indexed and shown in the Google search engines.

Step 9: Low Ad to Content Ratio

One factor that’s become more prominent since the Google Panda and Panda 2.0 updates is the ad to content ratio on your website. As the name suggests, the idea is to avoid stuffing your site with ads.

Google knows that great websites tend to only have a few ads on their pages. On the other hand, people who focus too much on milking their visitors for as much cash as possible tend to produce lower quality content.

So, therefore, pages with more ads tend to rank lower. Of course, you do need to make money – Just limit your ads to one or two per page, rather than spamming ads all over the place.

Step 10: Regular, Fresh, High Quality Content

Finally, it all comes down to content and content quality. Google is looking to promote websites with high quality content.

Produce fresh content as often as possible. The more fresh content you have, the higher your chances of ranking.

These are the most important on page factors to pay attention to in search engine optimization. Get your on page optimization right before you try and topple your competition.

All-in-One Social Media Checklist

by Nicole Munoz

Though the term “social media” groups social networks like LinkedIn, Google+ and Facebook all in one bucket, in reality they’re all quite different. Each one has a different kind of communication style and each one has different tools you can use to promote your business.

Here’s a list of the various different kinds of activities you can do on each site.

Facebook Activity List

Post a Photo – Whenever you have an in person event, post a photo. If you’re launching a new product, you can also post photos of the product. Photos are inherently more eye catching than text.

Add a Milestone – Your timeline plays a big role in how people view your overall Facebook presence. Use milestones to make important things in your timeline stand out.

Create a Group – Facebook groups are powerful community building tools. You can create a very vibrant community of people who share ideas with one another using a Facebook group.

Create a Page – A Facebook page is a great place to host your brand’s social media presence. It’s the ideal way to relate to social media fans as a brand. Unlike a personal account that has a cap on the number of friends you can have, with a page you have no such cap.

Invite People to Your Page – You can “suggest” a page to your entire network of contacts. If your friends like what you’re up to, there’s a good chance they’ll join your page.

Google+ Activity List

Have a Quality Profile Photo – This is more important than on any other social network, because your profile photo will actually show up in Google searches. People will see the picture you put up actually displayed on the search results page for your name when they Google you.

Check Your Description – Your Google+ profile shows up in search engines as a combination of your tagline, your occupation, your employment information and your introduction, in that order. Make sure you have a stellar tagline and complete job information filled out to maximize your brand impact.

Separate People into Circles – One of Google+’s most important features is the ability to separate people into different circles. Take advantage of this feature to group your followers into categories that make sense. Tailor your updates to different groups of people according to their interests.

Encourage Google +1s – Google +1s influence your search rankings more than any other social media vote. It’s more influential than Facebook likes or Twitter retweets. Get as many +1s as you can by actively asking readers and followers to +1 you.

Get Your Account Verified – Once you have 1,000 followers, get your account verified. You’ll get a “Verified” badge on your Google+ page, which helps build credibility.

Twitter Activity List

Setup Your Bio – Setup your bio or tagline to catch people’s attention to moment they land on your Twitter page.

Customize Your Background – Having a strong background can really change the first impression of your Twitter page. A well crafted custom background that matches your brand can really “wow” your audience.

Tweet Often – Twitter has a culture of high frequency posts. Use tools like Seesmic or TweetDeck to schedule your tweets.

Post Your #FFs –Follow Fridays is your chance to recommend people to follow. If you think there’s an expert people in your space should really know about, recommend them on Follow Fridays with the #FF hashtag.

Use @Mentions wisely – When someone says something you’re interested in, @reply them. If someone @mentions you, @mention them back. Build communication loops.

LinkedIn Activity List

Add Keywords to Your LinkedIn Profile – Potential employers and partners will often look for contacts by doing keyword searches. Look at other people in your industry and see what kind of keywords they’re using and make sure you’ve got the same keywords in your profile.

Join and Participate in Groups – Groups are a fantastic place to meet other people who’re in the same field as you. Join groups and be an active participant. Offer advice where you can and network.

Complete Your Work History – The more comprehensive you are with your work experience, the easier you make it for other people to get a sense for who you are. Many employers won’t even consider candidates who don’t have their career information fully filled out.

Get as Many Recommendations as Possible – Comb through your network and look for people who harbor goodwill towards you. Ask them to give you a recommendation.

Actively Seek Out Connections – Look for people who’re one degree of separation away from you whom you want to meet. Don’t be shy about asking people in your network for connections. As long as you make it clear that you’re someone who gives valuable advice, people will generally be more than happy to make a referral for you.

As you can tell, each social network works a bit differently than other networks. Each network has participants interact with one another in slightly different ways. Tailor your daily activity lists to the specific social network you’re working on.

How to Make the Best of Google+ Pages

by Nicole Munoz

Google+ pages allows you to connect with Google+’s millions of users in a professional way. It helps you separate personal posts from business posts. Google+ also offers a number of unique features, such as the ability to segment who sees what on your page. Here’s how to setup and use Google+ Pages.

Google+ Pages offers are few unique features that no other social networks offer. Taking advantage of these features will help you gain more readership, more followers and build more credibility.

Use Your Circles

Separate the different interest groups in your user base and post different messages to them. For example, you might post different messages to prospects, to customers, to suppliers and to the rest of the world.

Take Advantage of the Multimedia Options

Google+ allows you to embed images and videos inside the post itself. This is an extremely rare feature that isn’t available on Facebook or Twitter. Furthermore, all the multimedia you post can be easily accessed in the Photos or Videos tabs.

Post Long Pieces of Content

Unlike other social networks which cut off your content and require you to link you, Google+ Pages allows you to just post it all on your wall. This is great for event announcements, unique content and product promotions.

Actively Promote Your Page to Your Google+ Friends and Circles

While Google+ pages can be a powerful tool for communicating, people simply won’t hear about it unless you talk about it often.

Audience is Sophisticated and Tech Savvy

Though Facebook has huge penetration, the majority of Google+ users are early adopters and people who like to test new technologies. As a result, by and large your followers will be very savvy. Don’t give out basic content; instead use your Google+ Page to promote only the best of what you’ve got.

If you don’t know how to set up Google+ Page for business, here is a quick guide:

Step 1: Getting Started

Start by going to http://www.google.com/+/business/ to get started.

Step 2: Select a Category

Google has five different kinds of pages you can create. Each has a slightly different look and feel. Choose the one that best relates to the kind of page you want to create.

Step 3: Basic Information

Fill out some basic information about your page. Set the name of your page, your website and your privacy settings here.

Step 4: Share Your Page

Once your page is up and running, Google+ will give you the opportunity to share it with the world. Just enter a brief message and it’ll be posted to your wall.

Step 5: Posting on Your Page

Your page is now up and running. To begin adding content, just click “Post on Your Page.”

There are a few important things to know about posting.

First, if you want to post an image, a video or a web link, just click the corresponding button on the lower right corner. Any photos or videos you post will be added to the “Photos” or “Videos” tabs.

You can customize whether you want the post to be visible to everyone, or just a select group of people by canceling “Public” in the lower left and adding specific circles that you want to post to.

Step 6: Get a Badge

Adding the ability for people to “+1” your page or land on your page from your website can be a big boon for your page. The best way to do this is through adding a badge. Just click “Get the badge” and add the HTML code to your website.

Step 7: Hangouts

One great way to connect with users is through hangouts. These are impromptu (or scheduled) video chat meetings. To use a hangout, just click the hangout button on the right.

Nicole Munoz is the CEO of http://www.StartRankingNow.com. Since 2010 Nicole has helped over 150 clients market their businesses online and has spoken at over 36 live events attended by more than 41,000 people. She has recently published a series of 10 books and DVDs on Amazon called 7 Figure Marketing Blueprint. To discover more about SEO and Content Marketing, sign up for a webinar with Nicole at http://webinars.nicolemunoz.com

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How to Verify Authorship of Your Guest Blog Posts

by Nicole Munoz

One of the challenges Google has had is the ability to verify content as high quality content. Many marketers and SEO agencies spent years spinning content into hundreds and thousands of versions and posting it to multiple websites all with links back to the main website. This helped the websites achieve top rankings in Google because at that time, the algorithm based a high quality website by how many links that site had.

Google has been trying to figure out a way to provide better search results for the end user. Their search engine is their primary product and it is in their best interest to give the best results possible. They then hired a team of Search Quality Raters to manually review the search results and provide data about the results. This was a step in the right direction, but not a long term solution!

When Google launched Google+ it seemed to the world that it was an attempt to compete with the social media powerhouses of Facebook and Twitter. Maybe it was. Today Google+ is much more than that. And those that have delayed jumping in and have been slow to adapt to another social network… now is the time.

Google+ has many benefits but the one I want to talk about today is how to use it to verify authorship of your guest blog posts. Google wants to know what content you have written. They want to know what content they can safely mark as “high quality” and show in the search results.

The path to verify your guest blog posts is quite straightforward. In essence, it is a reciprocal link from your Google+ profile to your guest blog post.

The reason why you would want to verify your content is two-fold. First, Google has stated that they will give preferential treatment to content that is verified. Second, the search listings of verified content have a special bonus. They have a picture of the person who wrote the content. This little picture should increase the click through rate of your listing.

Looking at that listing, what listing are your eyes drawn to? Yep! The one with the picture. In theory, if all other things are equal, the user would click on the listing with the picture, making the click through rate of your organic search listing improve.

So how do we verify authorship of our guest blog posts and get that little picture next to our post?

Step One: Link to your Google+ profile from your guest blog post.

In your author bio you can normally put in 2-3 links to your websites. It is not yet the norm, but will be soon, for sites to request the Google+ link also. Simply put a text link with your name and link it to your Google+ profile with the ?REL=AUTHOR at the end.

Step Two: Link From Your Google+ contributor section to your guest blog post.

You can add as many websites as you need to and you can also change the visibility so they don’t all have to show up on your profile if you don’t want them to.

And that is it!

Google Search Based Keyword Tool

by Nicole Munoz

Googles search based keyword tool is great for finding better paying adsense keywords for a website! You an put in your website url and google will give you a list of keywords and the ppc value of each of them. Check it out here: https://adwords.google.com//ko/KeywordPlanner/Home#

The tool works best with websites associated with your google adsense account. It will still give you results if the website is not associated with your account but the results are more limited.

The tool does however work really well with foreign language sites. Having tested it on a few of my Spanish websites I have found that it provides a pretty good list of suggested words for adsense purposes.

Google Headquarters

by Nicole Munoz

Today, Sunday, we went for a little Sunday drive and ended up at the Google headquarters, close to Silicon valley her in San Jose. We were able to take some pictures and there is one of me standing in front of one of the Google signs. If you have never been to Google headquarters it is huge- they have probably 3-4 blocks of buildings.