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Shape Up The Content For Your Ezine

We are down to the home stretch. You've got your Ezine laid out, you have gotten some good content for it and now you want to put the whole thing together in a nice neat little package with a pretty bow so that your readers will have an experience that they can honestly say was worth the zero cents they paid to subscribe. So just what does shaping up the content for your Ezine involve and how do you go about doing it?

Most of what you are going to have to do involves fitting pieces together and modifying things so that they look just right. You will be spending a lot of time doing this with the various articles that you get, either from the freelance writers you hired or the sites you downloaded the content from. Why?

Ever hear the phrase "Beggars can't be choosers?" Well, when you're downloading free content off of web sites, you're not going to have a lot of control over the format of this content. It may be in simple Ariel 10 pt. font or heaven knows what. If you have an Ezine where you are going for a certain look, this can be a bit of a problem. For example, let's say you're putting together an Ezine on "Chinese Food" and you want to have an oriental look to the Ezine itself. It is doubtful the articles you download are going to be in fonts that support this look. You're going to have to reformat them with your own fonts. You may even have to download fonts from the Internet if you're going for a certain look that isn't part of the default font set in your word processing program.

Another part of the formatting, aside from the font itself, is how the article is laid out. When you download it or have it sent to you, it may not be 90 characters per line, or whatever line spacing you are looking for. For that matter, it may not be formatted at all. You may need to get a hold of a text formatter, which you can get for free just about anywhere on the Internet. This will reformat your text to however many characters per line you want. This is critical for sending out emails as some email programs will just display your paragraphs as one long string, making it very hard for your subscribers to read. If they can't read your Ezine easily they will most likely unsubscribe. You certainly won't make the sales you're counting on.

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Another thing you're going to have to do, especially if you're putting together an Ezine with photos or graphics, is format the graphics around the word content so that it flows. You don't want your layout to be willy-nilly. If you need ideas for how an Ezine with photos should look, go take a peak at a few. Again, there is nothing wrong with getting inspiration from others. If you have doubts in your own ability, get a graphic artist to do it for you or at least look at your work.

If you're putting together a fancy Ezine with multiple sections, like a real magazine, make sure you have a table of contents inside the front cover. After a while, when you have developed a real following, you are going to have subscribers who will consistently look for certain features. By having a table of contents, you make it easy for them to find what they are looking for. They'll love you for it.

Finally, you want to be consistent. Once you have got a format, stick to it. Develop a routine for putting your Ezine together. Make a checklist of all the things you have to do each time you send out your Ezine, whether it be weekly, monthly or whatever.

After a while, when you have done this enough times, it will become second nature to you and the time you spend each day will become less and less and you'll have more time for actually running your business.

Related: Blogging Software - Photoblog Hosting

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PMCezine" Internet Marketing Bulletins... Weekly up-to-date powerful marketing tips, strategies, and secrets to grow your online business. You don't want to miss this ezine... Receive 6 FREE gifts when you subscribe at our site! Yes! "Please Send My Gifts"

Copyright 2006 – Ken Mathie. Editor PMCezine... You are free to reproduce this article as long as no changes are made, the author's name is retained and the link to our site URL remains active.

8 Ways to Use a Blog to Develop Content for Your Book

1. Participate in the blogosphere: Read and comment on other blogs in your field. This is a prime way to build readership of your weblog . It is also a way of getting fresh content for both your weblog and for your book.

To check out other blogs in your niche: use www.blogsearch.google.com, www.technorati.com, or www.google.com.

This is also a good way to get ideas. What are other people in your field writing about? What are the major challenges of the people in your field? If you have competitors, check them out. They may be a great help in inspiring you for content ideas, different slants and perspectives. The old song, “Anything you can do, I can do better,” comes to mind.

2. Ask readers to comment on your weblog . In fact, each time you post something, ask them a question. Then spell it out to them on how to post a comment because your readers will probably need to be educated or at least encouraged to comment. (“Click on the comment link in the footer of this post, and leave your responses.”)

Sometimes readers will need assurances of privacy, in which case, you can ask them to email you their questions or comments in private. Others are not worried about privacy because after all, a weblog isn’t meant to be private. However, readers can be shy about commenting, and need encouragement.

You may also encourage them to respond by telling them that you would like to use their replies in your book, but will only do so with their permission.

3. Survey your readers, do a mini-study on their preferences, their experiences, etc. The Internet is the fastest way to acquire some statistics of readers’ preferences. Far from being a scientifically validated study that would pass muster in universities with academicians, an informal survey can give you ideas and material to write about. It can also confirm that you are addressing the concerns of your readers.

4. Run a contest for the best idea, funniest experience, most influential or heart-grabbing situation. If you want to use these readers’ responses for content in your book, you should tell them. Many people jump at the chance to be included in a book. Others may prefer to participate anonymously. You can give them both options.

Here’s an example of how one writer asked his readers for input:

Do You Have A Broken WIndows Story?
Michael Levine's new book, Broken WIndows, Broken Business is being released later this month. Many people feel this is going to be a mega best-seller.

We have set up a web site, where you can rant about broken windows in your everyday experience... Check it out at BrokenWindows.com.

People love to share their experiences, and they love to rant, or rave. Just ask.

5. Ask your readers to attend a teleseminar based on the needs, challenges, concepts and ideas of your weblog readers. This is a great way to go deeper into the problems and solutions you are writing about. You can record the sessions, transcribe the dialogue, convert the teleseminar to audio and PDF files. These can be sold, or given away as marketing materials for your book.

6. Use your weblog site meter stats to examine what are the most popular articles posted. This information will guide you to expand on the topics and subtopics that capture the interests of readers.

7. Consistently reconnect with your passion, and ignite and inspire others with similar interests. After you’ve been blogging for awhile, you will probably develop good blogging habits:

a. Write something on your weblog daily, or at least 2-3 times a week.
b. Read other blogs 2-3 times a week. Be sure to use the My Yahoo or other RSS feed buttons to subscribe to your favorite blogs, or sign up to get email updates through a FeedBlitz service on each weblog .
c. Write with your readers in mind. And if you’re not sure where their interests lie, ask them. If they’ve found your weblog , and have subscribed, chances are you share a lot in common.
d. If you ever fall into weblog -block, reconnect with your core purpose for the weblog (remember, the one you wrote out before starting your weblog ?). When this happens there is usually a reason, although it may not be clear to you at the time. This will pass. You can help it along by asking questions – of your readers, yourself, your closest allies.

8. Podcasting – Create audio files easily by scheduling teleclasses and recording them. Some people like to get their information auditorily and at their convenience by downloading mp3 files to their iPods.

Use a free teleconferencing bridge line like http://www.freeconference.com to host a call. Record your call, upload the audio file and then post to your weblog or podcast using a service like www.audioblog.com.

As an added benefit, you can get these calls transcribed; then convert the word doc to a PDF file which you can either give away, or sell, in exchange for people’s email address; www.CastingWords.com is a fast, affordable transcription service.

A SEO Choice for Content Management System (CMS)

There are three main ‘tiers’ to search engine optimization: the internal, the external, and the all-too-important web site content itself. While the internal and external factors have everything to do with server issues and link popularity plus, the content portion of a web site is a large piece of the SEO pie. To add to the mix, all too often this important content needs to be placed into the hands of end users within the company, and therefore they must opt for a system to keep their web site up to date. This article addresses this content management system dilemma from an SEO point of view.

I was originally contacted by a community college that needed a solution that would allow their different departments to update their web site via web-based methods. More importantly, it must be SIMPLE TO USE as most of these updaters or “users” had very little knowledge of computers. Many had little or no experience with Microsoft Word, so simplicity was a MUST.

The second dilemma was a little harder. Knowing that I was an SEO specialist, they needed me to either design or find a Content Management System that would allow their site to be SEO compliant. It was important that their current and potential students be able to find their site using search engines, both quickly and easily.

Prior to the start of this project, they had someone in-house do a little bit of research. The Savvy software was recommended as a solution to the end user problem, but they needed me to review the software for search engine compliancy. I took one afternoon and spent some time on the phone with the company, asking detailed questions about the software and how it’s built.

I found that this company had done their SEO homework prior to building this software. They did a remarkable job handling the often overlooked, yet extremely important SEO compliancy issues. They addressed many issues that most CMS’s do not.

Savvy is software you can install on your own web server or host.

Owning the software allows you to choose your own web host – one that is not listed on a spam list. If your site is hosted on a computer that also hosts known spammers, your web site is often also penalized for spam since it resolves near the same IP address of the spammer. With the ability to install the software on the host of your choice, you have the option to choose a “clean” server. In addition, if you are required to use the host of the software, your domain name is being pointed, or redirected to your site. However, if the redirect is not programmed a particular way, it can be considered a type of spam for which Google penalizes. Make sure you have control over your software and your web host server.

Page names are SEO compatible.

Search engines frown upon urls such as www.reneescomputerhelp.com/page.asp?ID=23451fjdlks34565. Savvy creates pages with names like this: www.reneescomputerhelp.com/seo/index.cfm which is completely search engine friendly and avoids complicated parameters that search engines tend to avoid or deny spidering altogether.

Templates can be built with SEO in mind, so that every page created using these templates is search engine friendly.

By strategic use of CSS or tables (if one must), the layout of the template code can become search engine optimized – meaning any page created with this “SEO Template” is also search engine compliant. For example:

One of Google’s 106+ algorithmic variables is the analyzation of the first 200 words of the body. Many times web developers unwittingly design the site so that other things, like navigation for instance, precedes the body copy, and therefore it is considered by Google to be the first 200 words of the content. If this occurs over several pages within the web site, it begins to look to Google like every page is the same since the first 200 words of every page are the same.

Savvy gives the webmaster power to design “SEO Templates.” The next step is to teach the end user to adequately write the content to be search engine optimized. During Savvy end user training, I usually include a 30 minute session on the requirements needed for their content to be ‘likable’ by the Google mathematical algorithm. There are several simple steps that an end user can usually follow without complication of any sort. It’s also made easier in that the WYSIWYG editor in Savvy compliments the need for these steps by utilizing well-thought-out editing tools.

Savvy’s editing tools make it easy to teach end users not only to update their pages, but how to make them search engine compliant, and in some cases, even search engine optimized.

Headings, bold type, alternative text for images and more, all play an important role in search engine compliancy. With Savvy’s editing tools in the WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) editor, a 30 minute session on search engine optimization can teach the end user how to appropriately apply these features within their text to make their pages at least search engine compliant and at other times optimized. Remember, compliant means that search engines will ‘eat’ it, but ‘optimized’ mean it’s the search engine’s ‘favorite food.’

Savvy gives you power over your meta data.

The most important meta tag in a web page is its Title tag. When creating a new page, Savvy gives you the opportunity to write not only the Title tag, but the Description and Keywords as well. The User Manager in Savvy controls the rights given to end users as to whether they are allowed to edit the meta data or not. It would be best that only those trained in SEO write the meta data. Remember one thing though: Content on your page is KING and always will be, but the next most important is the page’s Title Tag. Most other CMS’s assign page titles for you and leave you with no control over this important SEO issue.

Savvy’s navigational features render text links.

“Anchor text” is an important factor in search engine optimization. Anchor text, the text used in a link to a particular page, is not only relevant from external links, but also from within your site. Structuring your site so that your key phrases are used in anchor texts to point to your most important landing pages is one of the keys of good SEO navigation. Savvy’s navigation, using CSS (cascading style sheets) to control the look and feel, renders text links that are easily spidered by search engines and gives the end user power to control the anchor text and therefore, the overall structure of the site for search engine optimization.

After careful review of Savvy, I determined that it was an excellent solution to resolve the need for a content management system as well as the need for SEO compliancy / optimization. I’ve used Savvy now for several web clients and all clients can be found on Google easily by typing a portion of their company name. You may even find the specific pages for a department if you type the company name and its department. Too often a web site can’t be found for even its company name, but Savvy has set up their CMS to win in the area of SEO; even if you’re looking to optimize your site for keywords and phrases other than your company name. Savvy allows for well-developed sites that Google can spider and give their searchers the relevant results they need from you. Savvy makes both the client and Google happy.

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