Design, Science and Technology

As a freelance copywriter, I’ve put together a nice portfolio of major corporate clients, ranging from Bay State Gas to Pizzeria Uno. And I found most of them in a rather unusual way.

I didn’t use SEO or pay-per-click. I didn’t go to networking events and shake hands with half the Rotary Club. And I didn’t take out billboards by the highway that said AWESOME COPYWRITER FOR HIRE.

I got most of these lucrative gigs in a way that wouldn’t cross many people’s minds — a way that’s unconventional and highly effective.

I sent them a sales letter.

Not the kind that’s an HTML page, but a good, old-fashioned paper letter in an envelope with an honest-to-goodness stamp.

If you’ve been around the SEO world for any amount of time, then you are probably pretty familiar with the basics of SEO. You know to do good keyword research and you have to do on-page optimization.

Sometimes, though, that on-page optimization can go to a deeper level than just making sure your meta tags are filled out… and you can go to that deeper level without having to be a veteran SEO.

Here’s how:

Tactic #1: Search for synonyms using Google

The use of synonyms in creating an SEO plan for your blog or website is pretty common. Finding those synonyms is not always easy or done properly.

I think the best way to search for these terms is to use Google. The reason is you get to see not only the synonyms but how they are ranking in competitors pages....

After creating content -- whether it's a blog post, an ebook, a webinar, or a video -- it's important to promote that content through social media channels.

And when you do promote that content in social media, you cross your fingers that it generates a ton of shares, tweets, and interaction. For the sake of Twitter, if you follow a few simple best practices, more people are likely to retweet and spread the distribution of your content, giving it a much broader reach and a better opportunity to get found by a new audience of prospective customers beyond your direct followers. Marketers should know how to retweet the right way, but it's also critical for them to learn how to get others to retweet their content, too.

11 Tips for Getting People to Retweet Your Content...

As a business owner, do I really have time to blog? I’m a business owner too, and I realize that we are already pressed to our limits for time. We are responsible for everything, including finding new business, working with our existing customers, interfacing with suppliers, running our books, and infinitely more.

Attempting to convince a business owner that we should add yet another task can understandably seem like a herculean endeavor. For anything that is going to take more time, the rewards must be tangible and immediate. As many of us cannot clearly identify what the rewards are that can be reaped by blogging, it is not placed high on the list of priorities. It should be...