Today I’m playing golf with a friend who is a member at Mimosa Hills Country Club. This place is near the mountains about an hour from Charlotte so it will be nice to get a little break from the heat and humidity, even if it is only a few degrees. The course was built by a famous old architect, Donald Ross, in 1929. There aren’t a lot of Ross courses remaining which haven’t been redesigned so today will be a treat.
I hope everyone has a great Saturday!
We’ve all gotten those random friendship requests on Facebook. They seem to be harmless, you look at the profile and wonder if this might be the beginning of something good, a new friendship, a new partnership, maybe a little bit of both.
But how do you know the person behind that profile is…
Source: Not A Grouch
I didn’t intend on posting again today but one of my favorite authors posted something to her IG that sparked something I had to share. As you see above, this author is Bernice McFadden and this is her sharing the rejection letters she received for her novel Sugar. I have this book as well as her novels This Bitter Earth, Glorious and I’d like to get my hands on Nowhere is a Place and The Book of Harlan but I digress. Needless to say, the writing is on point. Long story short, you all know that Sugar has gone on to do very well despite the 75 (yes, seventy-five…let that settle) rejection letters. For Indie Authors, we may not be looking for publishers, but we have rejection letters too. I want to encourage you not to give up when you get one:
Negative Reviews – One of our…
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I love my neighborhood early in the morning. The birds are chirping and the animals are getting things done before the heat hits in the afternoon. The moon is still out and the humidity is low. Oh, and did I mention we are leaving for the beach tomorrow night?! I think it’s going to be a good day!
Yesterday Jennifer emailed me and asked how I promote my website outside of organic methods. For those who might be unfamiliar, organic refers to traffic to your site that doesn’t cost money. The organic tactics I use involve Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and good SEO practices.
Jennifer was interested to know if I pay to gain exposure for my page. And the answer is yes. I use 4 basic methods to drive traffic from the web to Dream Big: Google search, banner ads, Stumbleupon ads and Facebook ads. This is a new strategy I implemented a few months back after doing extensive research and developing an organized advertising strategy.
I am utilizing the promote your page option in Facebook ads where I am encouraging people to like my Facebook page. So far I average 40-50 new followers each month and the strategy for getting new followers is to target people who live in and around the Charlotte area who also show interest in multiple sclerosis, self-improvement, personal development, blogs, inspirational quotes, National MS Society, etc. The targeting is important and no other platform allows for more specific targeting than does Facebook. How you might ask? Great question.
My company is a partner of Facebook as we do a ton of advertising with them each month. When the general public describes Facebook they do so in terms of social media. But inside the walls of Facebook they think of themselves in terms of data curation; a fancy way of saying they collect data. They know what kind of car you drive, where you like to eat, what you like to eat, where your kids go to school, what roads you travel, where you vacation, what web pages you visit most often, where you shop, etc. The amount of information Facebook collects is insane. Facebook’s success comes by leveraging that data to advertisers through laser-like targeting.
What this type of targeting allows is for me to advertise to those who might engage with my page more actively; we call this high conversion. So instead of simply targeting anyone with a pulse, I am able to only target those specific types of people who will most likely be interested in my type of Facebook page and who will enjoy reading my posts.
Then getting to those followers requires another step. I’m not sure that most people are aware but Facebook limits your organic reach on business/fan pages to approximately 2% of your total followers. For instance, if you have 1000 followers on your business/fan page and you generate a post, only 20 people are going to see that post. In order to reach the remainder you must use the Boost button and pay FB. Amazingly enough this is how they make FB profitable.
Google search has also been a productive tool. You may not realize this, but Google does not view themselves as a search engine. What??!! That’s right, Google views themselves as a referral business. They index pages based on specific search criteria to put relevant results in front of potential customers, readers, researchers, etc. (With that said they still only index about 35 trillion webpages or 4% of the pages on the internet!) Ultimately Google wants you to visit a business, have a great experience and then return to Google for another referral opportunity. In short, Google helps websites and businesses generate leads. And the primary way they help is to use paid Google search.
Interesting Factoid…
Seeing is believing! Google is the primary method of browsing the internet for most people (64% market share). Do you know the #1 search site for millennials? If you guessed YouTube you would be correct!
Google search ad copy
I am also using banner ads which display on websites which allow for AdChoices delivery. AdChoices is the program Google uses to sell advertising on a variety of websites including all the WordPress blogs. I am targeting other big websites whose readers might also enjoy and engage on my page.
Banner ad 728×90
And then there is Stumbleupon which drives views but isn’t something I focus a lot of energy. My weekly budget is minimal ($10-$20) and I don’t always run ads on this platform. What I do like about Stumble is it has huge upside in that a post can go mini-viral driving huge views in a short period of time. I’ve had posts get as much as 5,000 views in an afternoon! The downside is these views have low conversion meaning not a lot of people follow my page and become engaged readers. And for this reason I don’t use Stumble that much.
Stumble ad set
Jennifer was also curious as to why I do all this advertising; which I view as a great inquiry. The truth is that most blogs are followed by other bloggers and this is a great thing. My mission, however, is to reach all types of people and I don’t want to be limited just to those who use WordPress.org or .com. So for me to reach non-bloggers my website must be present in the places they live in the digital world. Thus I advertise.
I know this is a lot to digest, but I thought it might be interesting to see behind the curtain of what I do on a daily basis. There’s a little more to getting a lot of followers than just sitting back and waiting for growth to happen!
My motto: you can spend your whole life waiting or you can get busy doing.
Do you have a marketing strategy for your page? If so, I’d love to read about. Be sure to drop me a line in the comments or shoot me an email! Have a great week folks!
Any time I scan Facebook I can’t help but think of a quote from Steven Furtick. But first here’s what makes me think of the quote.
I see so many smiling faces. Pictures of parties. Posing. Smiling. Family pics. More smiling. More posing. Everyone is doing it. Vacations. Exotic locations. Amusement parks.
Furtick said, “The reason we struggle with insecurity is we compare our behind-the-scenes with everyone else’s highlight reel.” Boy, what a powerful statement and so true about modern day society.
I am curious to see the psychological effect social media has on kids over the next 20 years. Constantly seeing everyone else’s highlight reel compared to your behind-the-scenes. The impact could be devastating.
Good Monday morning, friends! It’s so good to be among the living, and that means that you’re still in the fight of your lives. You already know the enemy’s MO — to kill, steal, and destroy. Here’s how we counter his strategy and fight:
10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.11 Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.13 Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.14 Stand firm then, with the belt…
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My friend Nathan is getting married today and we are off to celebrate with him and his new bride, Heather. The reception is at a neat place on the water on Lake Wylie and we are excited to be included in their special day! How do we look??
Hi guys,
If you want one of 100 free downloads of Havana Heat, now’s the time to grab it. My giveaway has just been shared on Facebook, by Coffee Time And Romance on their fan page! They may disappear quick.
Blurb:
Havana Heat is book one of the Romance Set in Paradises series of modern,steamy, suspenseful and romantic stories, set in exotic locations around the world. In Havana Heat readers are transported to the paradise of Cuba’s capital Havana, following the romance and heat build between Spaniard Detective Sebastian Garcia, and London born and bred wedding planner Melinda Jones. Melinda’s path crosses with the handsome and charming Detective at Casa De Amour Hotel as a guest at her client’s exotic location wedding. Both characters are in search of a slice of paradise, away from their own troubled love life back home. Once their paths cross the romance and sizzle begins.
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If you currently do not utilize the free social media services I would encourage you to rethink your strategy. It’s not only a great way to connect, but search engines give your page more credibility-SEO. So here are mine, just click on the link in red and it will take you straight off to my pages:
