Passive Marketing

Blog

  • One Extremely Overlooked Way To Find Guest Blogging Targets

    One Extremely Overlooked Way To Find Guest Blogging Targets

    As one of my bigger sites continue to grow month after month (even without working on it!), I have finally gotten enough time in my schedule to sit down and focus on some quality outreach. I will not bore you with ranting and raving about why guest blogging is great, or why you should be doing it. You have probably heard this from every other internet marketing blog on the internet over the past few years.

    Instead, I want to focus on a technique I have just started using that people seem to forget about and not use. This technique has gotten me a 53% response rate and I have already landed a few links without much work at all which is what I am all about here at Passive Marketing.

    What You Will Need

    The Basic Concept

    target

    There are a ton of ways to utilize tools you have in search of blogs that accept guest posts. One of my absolute favorites has been twitter. All you would need to do is search for your niche + guest post, used Twitter advance search to limit the search date range, and you were presented with tons of targets!

    The one glaring issue here is that if you have such easy access to sites that are accepting guest posts, so do your competitors. On top of this, coming up with this list of outreach targets took TIME, and a lot of it. There has to be a better way right?

    Well, there is! The entire method for this to work, is to accept guest posts yourself.

    Hear me out for a second here. Let’s step back to around 4 months ago where I found myself with a growing site in a lucrative niche, but paying for mass amounts of content each day was getting costly. “Why am I paying for all this writing”, I thought. Maybe I should be leveraging other people to get fresh content up on my site.

    I immediately set up a “write for us” page on my site, and ran some paid ads on Twitter as I outline in my starting a blog guide here to my page asking if they would like to write for me. I managed to snag a few writers and everything was right in the world.

    The real magic hit me months later. I had structured my “write for us” page in such a way that:

    1. The page was getting traffic organically by using the right keywords
    2. I asked potential guest posters to contact me via a web form and give 5 examples of previously published posts

    Just like that, I had people contacting me to guest post on my site. Even if I did not want to accept their guest post at that moment, they were doing the hard work for me! These people were literally handing me some of the best outreach targets that I would have never found via twitter!

    If you have 5 people contacting you a day to guest post, and each one is giving you 5 previous guest posts they have done, these add up quickly and before you know it, you will need to hire someone to outreach for you while you work on other things.

    If you would like to get other quick tips like this one, make sure to hop on my email list below.

    Enter Your Name and Email Below and Click

    One Quick Note

    Before we get into how to structure your “Write for Us” page, you need to understand the search modifiers that people typically use to search for guest posting opportunities. Luckily for you (and me), Brian Dean from Backlinko has done the majority of the work for us. For ease of writing this, I will paste the search modifiers below.

    • Your Keyword “guest post”
    • Your Keyword “write for us”
    • Your Keyword “guest article”
    • Your Keyword “guest post opportunities”
    • Your Keyword “this is a guest post by”
    • Your Keyword “contributing writer”
    • Your Keyword “want to write for”
    • Your Keyword “submit blog post”
    • Your Keyword “contribute to our site”
    • Your Keyword “guest column”
    • Your Keyword “submit content”
    • Your Keyword “submit your content”
    • Your Keyword “submit post”
    • Your Keyword “This post was written by”
    • Your Keyword “guest post courtesy of ”
    • Your Keyword “guest posting guidelines”
    • Your Keyword “suggest a post”
    • Your Keyword “submit an article”
    • Your Keyword “contributor guidelines”
    • Your Keyword “contributing writer”
    • Your Keyword “submit news”
    • Your Keyword “become a guest blogger”
    • Your Keyword “guest blogger”
    • Your Keyword “guest posts wanted”
    • Your Keyword “looking for guest posts”
    • Your Keyword “guest posts wanted”
    • Your Keyword “guest poster wanted”
    • Your Keyword “accepting guest posts”
    • Your Keyword “writers wanted”
    • Your Keyword “articles wanted”
    • Your Keyword “become an author”
    • Your Keyword “become guest writer”
    • Your Keyword “become a contributor”
    • Your Keyword “submit guest post”
    • Your Keyword “submit an article”
    • Your Keyword “submit article”
    • Your Keyword “guest author”
    • Your Keyword “send a tip”
    • Your Keyword inurl: “guest blogger”
    • Your Keyword inurl: “guest post”
    • allintitle: Your Keyword + guest post

    write for us pageFormatting The “Write For Us” Page

    The first thing you need to do to ensure that this works, is find out which one of the modifiers people are searching for in your niche. Simple head over to the Google Keyword Planner and enter in the phrases above. Rank them by how many searches a month they get, and save the top 5 to 10. We will use this while building out our page. When you are writing the text that I outline below, make sure to include these these top 5 or 10 terms somewhere within the paragraphs. Make it look natural and do not stuff them in there so it reads poorly.

    Now lets take a look at a sample page that you could put up on your site to get the same results that I was able to get.

    Example Page

    Title: Use the most searched modifier in the niche for your title. For sake or argument, lets assume it is “write for us”

    Intro: This is where you are going to signal to Google that your page is relevant to guest posts in your niche. Keep it short and sweet, but make sure to add in a few keywords in a sentence or two. If you were running a financial blog about stocks, you could say something along the lines of: “If you are an expert stock trader, or a beginner who has purchased a few mutual funds in the past and has some experiences they would like to share with a large audience, we want to hear from you!”

    Heading 1 What We Are Looking For: You can use this heading first, or another variation. I do not want to waste peoples time, and right off the bat, I want to give them an idea of what the site is looking for so they know if their background is inline with what the site posts about.

    Paragraph: Here again, I like to use this space to reinforce what the site is about so far, and that we are looking for people excited in the topic. To go along with the financial blog example from above, you could simply state: “Website.com was launched in 2008 to share our experiences and expertise in the financial and securities trade with a wide audience. We are looking for experts of enthusiasts to write about:” See what we did there, we added a few more LSI keywords to the page that will give your page relevant to other guest blogging keywords so people will find your page from the SERPs.

    Bullet points: Since we left off the last paragraph about what types of articles we are looking for, we need to expand that.

    • Keyword 1: LSI Keyword 1, LSI Keyword 2, LSI Keyword 3
    • Keyword 2: LSI Keyword 1, LSI Keyword 2, LSI Keyword 3
    • Keyword 3: LSI Keyword 1, LSI Keyword 2, LSI Keyword 3
    • Keyword 4: LSI Keyword 1, LSI Keyword 2, LSI Keyword 3
    • Keyword 5: LSI Keyword 1, LSI Keyword 2, LSI Keyword 3

    This section is where you can pack in a bunch of topics you are interested in, but also topics that you want to guest post on other peoples websites. This works because someone will see that you are looking for Stock tips guest posts, and end up providing you examples in an email (we will get to that later), of where they have guest posted their own stock tips.

    Heading 2 Why Write For Website.com?: This is the section where I show off the amount of visitors the site gets, explain how and where you will link (even if you do not want to accept guest posts, you need to make people think that you do), and that they will build brand awareness. Show off the positives of guest posting. You should already know what these are!

    Rules: Since I originally put up this post to actually get people to guest post on my site, I wanted to make sure that I was getting quality content. I laid out in this section that I was not looking for commercial content, that I wanted original content, that links needed to provide value to readers, and that I wanted articles that went into depth and did not want readers to be left thinking “What about X..?”.

    Remember, a good page on why people should guest post for you can actually bring in some simply amazing content. The best part? It will be FREE!

    Heading 3 FAQs: Even after reading everything else you have written, you need to answer some common questions that you may run across. Here are a few ideas!

    • Will the guest poster be paid?
    • What should the guest poster write about (direct them above and take this paragraph to possibly enter some other keywords you are looking for).
    • Can the guest poster post their article on their own site after it is published on yours (Absolutely not! That being said, encourage them to share on social media and drive traffic!).
    • How often can/should the guest poster write. This is my absolute favorite section. I was interested in guest posters bringing in fresh content monthly for me, not just a one and done deal. You can use this section to explain that you are looking for weekly, biweekly, or monthly guest posts if you want. Like I keep mentioning, this entire method involves around FINDING guest posting targets, but you can actually pick up some great content and long term free writers. It really can add up.

    Heading 4: Get Started!: This is the end of your “Write for us” page. Now you need to provide a way for people to contact you EASILY. I cannot stress this enough. If you have a form where they need to fill a captcha or just an email where they should send the info, you might be passed over.

    Grab a nice contact form for your site. I prefer to use Contact Form 7. Set that up and add the shortcut to the bottom of your post and hit post. Below are the lines that I set up within that plugin.

    • Full Name
    • Email
    • What Subject Would You Like To Write About
    • Include Author Profile Text Below
    • Enter in 5 Published Writing Samples Below (Boom! Free outreach targets straight to your email)
    • Send Button

    Wrapping It Up

    There you have it. If you have done this correctly and used the correct search modifiers sprinkled throughout your post and included keywords that are related to your sites niche, your page accepting guest bloggers should begin to rank and you will slowly start to see that people contact you. You can either accept the good writers for 100% free content, or you can be a bit more devious and take advantage of the 5 guest posts that they did in the past that they just emailed you by doing your own outreach.

    If you try this out, let me know how it is working in your niche down in the comments below!

  • 5 Reasons Social Media May Hinder Your Marketing Efforts And What To Do About Them

    5 Reasons Social Media May Hinder Your Marketing Efforts And What To Do About Them

    You might want to sit down, because what I’m about to tell you could be shocking.

    Ready?

    I don’t use Facebook.

    not on facebook

    That’s not all––I don’t use Twitter, either. Or Instagram. Or Snapchat.

    In fact, I only use two social media networks: LinkedIn and Reddit. It’s especially strange since I’m a content marketer, and there’s a lot of overlap between content marketing and social media marketing. At first, it sounds like it could hinder me, but it’s one of my professional secrets. Selectively using social media networks (SMNs) improves my productivity, enhances my knowledge, and generates more leads for me.

    I know how counter cultural this idea is, but if you’re willing to pull the plug on SMNs, you and your business will be better for it. In this article, I’ll tell you why most SMNs are useless and how selective SMN usage is one of the best things you can do for your work.

    The SMN Lie

    SMNs are addictive by nature. You know you’ve had days when you tweet 70 times. Maybe you even check Facebook first thing in the morning.

    And even from a business standpoint, SMNs can be just as addictive. Many business owners and marketers focus a large chunk of their efforts on SMNs. That’s because SMNs are hugely popular, so on the surface, they seem like a good place to market. After all, everyone’s on SMNs, and you need to go to where your customers are, right?

    The problem here is that SMNs don’t provide a significant ROI. There are 4 main problems that SMNs present for marketers:

    1) Poor conversion rates.

    User interaction seems to be at its highest on social media, but many of those users are dead leads. People often like Facebook pages even though they don’t plan on buying a single thing. SMN activity has become such a second nature to people that it’s nearly a brainless activity, which makes for users who don’t convert.

    I will admit that SMNs can be a good source of traffic and leads, but it requires a sizable investment to give a positive ROI. Even if you automate your activity, SMNs still suck time and money from you that you could be using elsewhere. While SMNs can be effective, there are much more powerful marketing channels you can use to get a bigger return, more user engagement, and increased conversions.

    2) A personal environment.

    Since people use SMNs to chronicle their life and talk to friends, they aren’t in a buying mood when they’re logged on. Of course, there are some exceptions (perhaps Pinterest), but in most cases, SMNs are personal. That means people will be mainly focusing on posting status updates and sharing tweets. Many people will scroll past a news feed ad without a second thought.

    3) A colossal audience.

    This doesn’t sound like a negative at first, since more people equal more potential customers. That’s true, but with such a wide and varied audience, SMNs can easily overwhelm marketers. It can be difficult to find a niche audience in an endless sea of users. And even if you find your niche, you still have problem #4…

    4) Lots of noise.

    Unless you’re in a niche vacuum, you’ll be going up against others who have been in your niche for a long time. And if your niche has a lot of competitors, it could be nearly impossible to make yourself seen. All your competitors are running Facebook ads, too. At that point, it almost becomes a game of luck.

    5) Time suck.

    We all know that people find themselves sucked into their SMNs, and it’s just as easy (if not easier) for marketers to do that. You can spend forever fine-tuning your ad campaign, researching your demographic, looking up competitors’ strategies––the list goes on.

    Despite all of those problems, I do think SMNs can benefit marketers. The trick is to selectively use certain SMNs to achieve a specific aim. Thankfully, narrowing your focus and setting those defined goals is a fairly painless process.

    The Selective SMN Process

    Finding relevant SMNs and approaching them with a fixed goal is perhaps the best social media marketing strategy you can use. It not only saves you time and money, but also gives you a much better ROI. It also exposes your product or service to people who will find the most value in it.

    There are 3 important questions to ask yourself in this process:

    1) Where is your audience?

    You need to answer this question specifically and narrowly. It’s not enough to find your demographic on every site and then call it a day.

    Instead, find communities that are based around your niche. Then analyze the SMN that has the greatest activity within that niche community. That’s going to be your focus SMN.

    2) What is the best method of outreach for your focus SMN?

    If your focus SMN is Twitter, this could mean using specific hashtags to drive engagement. If it’s LinkedIn, this could mean publishing posts on LinkedIn Pulse to expose your product or service to thousands of new eyes. This will take some experimentation, but once you’ve found something that works, I recommend sticking with it.

    3) How much time should I spend on this SMN?

    Defeat time suck by blocking out a certain amount of time (say 10 minutes a day) to concentrating on your SMN. If you interact and post with targeted, distinct goals, you won’t have to automate anything, and you won’t waste time.

    By answering those questions, you’ll essentially create a SMN strategy. Write it down, and keep it somewhere nearby until you’ve internalized it.

    The power of this strategy comes from focussing on only one SMN. Once you have that down, you can move on to another SMN, but only if it’s also directly relevant. This is why I only concentrate on two SMNs.

    If you want to have accounts on other SMNs, that’s fine––but either automate them or outsource the work. You need to spend time on your focus SMN. Focussing on the others will give you a poor ROI. There are countless programs to help you manage your SMNs, like Buffer and Swift Social.

    You’ll find that concentrating on one SMN will enhance your productivity, improve your ROI, and give you more downtime. I also recommend not using SMNs for personal use (see problem #5 above). Eliminate the excess and keep only the essentials so you don’t waste a single second or penny.

    –––––––

    Ian Chandler is a content marketer, brand storyteller, and writer based in Ohio. ​He is the author of The No B.S. Guide to Freelance Writing and editor of Nukeblogger. You can read more about content marketing ​​at IanChandlerWriting.com.

  • How to get FREE products from Amazon to review on your blog

    How to get FREE products from Amazon to review on your blog

    Like a lot of people, I do the majority of all my shopping on Amazon. Not only do I sell products on Amazon, am an affiliate for Amazon, as well as have them create and ship my T shirts like I showed you in my last post, but they are the main retail outlet for all my purchases.

    So the other day, I realized that I was out of something for one of my main hobbies. The first thing I do is head over, and start browsing products and adding products to my shopping cart. Pretty standard stuff right?

    Well, once I get ready to check out, I noticed that my cart was over $100. I certainly have the money to pay for my purchase, but every time I spend ANY money, I have a nagging feeling that I could be turning a great ROI if I put it back into my business. This feeling got me thinking about something I saw on Reddit recently which you can read here: https://www.reddit.com/r/juststart/comments/42z2ek/leveraging_your_authority_site_to_get_products_to/.

    It just so happens I have a site in this niche I was looking to buy products for. I also sell products on Amazon with FBA (I am still working on a massive guide for everyone!), so I know all the little tricks that sellers use to get ranked and sell more products. One thing that sellers need to do to keep their account in good standing on Amazon is reply to all buyer messages within 24 hours. Not doing so will result in a strike against you. If you get enough of these strikes, Amazon will take a look at your account and you could possibly be banned. You also should know that when you first launch a product on Amazon, getting good reviews is a MUST since this is what people are looking for when shopping. If you can find someone to leave a great review on Amazon, as well as write up a review on a site that gets traffic, this is a bonus. Typically new sellers will use any number of review groups or services out there (and these only get you reviews on Amazon.com). Do you see where we are going here?

    Well, knowing this information, all I did was start contacting sellers on Amazon. It was about 4am so I thought I would shoot out a few emails and see what happened. I sent out 31 emails that night. I woke up to 31 responses in my inbox, which is a 100% reply rate! Of those 31 replies, I got a couple people who offered me free product, a few others who had questions, and then another few sellers who were not running any promotions. Excellent news, I now have free product for my hobby, more content to write for my blog, and best of all, I did not spend a dime. Here is how to do it!

    As always, if you want more awesome information like this, hop onto my email list and I will keep you all updated.

    Enter Your Name and Email Below and Click

    Step by Step Guide for Finding Newly Released Products

    • The first thing you need to do is head over to Amazon.com and enter your niche into the search bar and see what comes up. For this example, I am going to use the Kitchen Knives niche.

    kitchen knives

    • From here, we want to head over to the left hand side of the page and scroll down. You will see a section called “New Arrivals”. Click on either the last 30 days or the last 90 days. These are going to be brand new products that sellers have posted to Amazon and will need reviews to start selling organically.

    new arrivals

    • After you click on the new arrivals, you should see a page that is filled with products and many of them will have a few or no reviews at all. You want to be looking for brand names that you have never heard of. Why? Well, if you have not heard of a brand name, this is usually a signal that these are private label brands that people are trying to get off the ground.

    sharp knife

    • Take a look at this image above. You can see that the brand is “WeLoveCooking”. The knife looks nice, and it only has 8 reviews and was just launched. This is a great candidate for this method.
    • We want to look and read the actual reviews that it has. There are a few things we need to note here. First, if a seller is giving something away for free or any type of discount for more than 50%, then Amazon will NOT give that review a “verified purchase” tag to the reviews. The second thing you need to know is that if you get something for a discount or for free, reviews MUST include a disclosure that says they got the item at a discount in exchange for an honest and unbiased review.
    • Now that you know these two things, read the reviews on the page and you can quickly find that not a single review has the verified purchased tag and that each person has been given the item to review at a discount. This is a signal that the seller is giving out free or discounted products. Being a seller myself, if you have a site in my niche, I would be absolutely estatic to give away something to you if you will write a review on Amazon and drive traffic to the page from your site!

    amazon reviews

    • It looks like we have found our target product, now we need to go back to the main product page. You need to find the account that is fulfilling the product. Note that this is typically not the brand name because you are only allowed 1 seller account. This means that you will have 1 account, and then be selling different brands under that 1 account. For this example, it turns out that the brand name IS the same as the sellers name. Click on the name after “Sold by” right after the in stock message here:

    sold by

    • After you have clicked that, you will be on their storefront page. This is where you can see the feedback that the account has gotten and all the products that the account is selling. As you can see from the lifetime of this account at the time of writing this, they only have a single feedback (feedback is different than reviews on Amazon!). You can also see that they are a new seller and are just getting started. This is the perfect scenario for asking for a review copy!
    • Click on the button in the right hand corner labeled “Ask a Question”.

    storefront

    • All you need to do from here is write a message. This is an extremely rough draft of what I sent that late night when I came up with this idea. If you can create a better message, this should be even more successful. However, this worked just fine for me, and free products are being shipped to my house as I type this.

    amazon question

    Wrapping It Up

    And there you have it! Enjoy pretty much a 100% response rate and hopefully you can snag some free products in your niche! The reason this works so incredibly well is that Amazon makes it essential that they respond to you.

    Please please PLEASE make sure you hold up your end of the deal and as soon as you get the product, test it out, write a review on Amazon, and then write a review for your website. Nothing is more of a headache than giving something away to someone for free (and taking a loss on that sale!), just to be screwed over and ignored when you ask them to review your product. As a new seller myself, this is making me slightly insane with how ungrateful people can be.

    After you write your reviews, feel free to offload the product on sites such as Craigslist. I would caution you to stay away from reselling the product on Ebay or Amazon because this just creates more competition for a new brand that just did you a solid.

    Best of luck and keep hustling!