10 most useful WordPress Plugins for better blogging

Here are the 10 most useful WordPress Plugins I am using on my websites and blogs.

AWeber Forms Optin Cat or Contact Form 7

Two plugins to integrate with email autoresponder software, create forms to collect names and emails from your blog.  If you are a small business offering a service or products then this is a great way to build a list of subscribers, clients or customers who you can follow up with and send communications about new products and services.

WordPress Editorial Calendar

I found out about this plugin from a master blogger while in Costa Rica attending a marketing training event. It’s a calendar tool that allows you to upload a number of posts and schedule them over the month or week so that your posts get published on a consistent basis. If you want to use Wordress to create a professional blog the best way forward is to have one or two set days when new content is released. I’ve researched some of the top bloggers and social media influencers and they state the days of the week when new content will be published. That way your subscribers know what to expect from you and your website.

WP Legal

All websites should have a “Legal Disclaimer” whether your site is selling ecommerce, affiliate marketing or just an info blog hobby because what you write is available online. If your blog is personal you could add something like “This is my personal blog and the views expressed are my own”  If you gather data you should have a “Privacy Policy” and in the UK there are laws about keeping data and “Data Protection Principles” will tell you more.

Yoast SEO

This plugin helps you to get your SEO and readability optimised. When you know how to write and optimise the content and images you will have a much better chance of ranking your posts to be seen.

Shareaholic

I love this plugin, when you publish new content you can share the post to your own social media pages, like Twitter, Facebook or Google plus.  Your readers can also easily share the post to their friends. Also useful to create PDF’s of posts if you are in business and want to give a report to your customers or create some sort of lead magnet that you can promote to drive traffic back to your website.

Pixel Caffeine

Now this little “Pixel helper” tool is for anyone who wants to really cash in on their marketing budgets with Facebook promotions. It helps you to install a piece of code on your website from your Facebook ads manager. Then when you promote a sponsored ad with Facebook you can actually retarget your website visitors on Facebook.

Google analytics By ShareThis

The best way to add a Google Analytics tracking code to your website without modifying any files. You can check GA to see how many visitors your website has and also see where your visitors are in the world. Another useful analytic is how your visitors found your blog. GA will tell you the keywords that were searched and also the platform that the visitors arrived from. If you have shared out your posts or page links to social media you will see which platforms are bringing in the most visitors.

WP Paypal shopping cart

Do you have a digital product? An ebook or reports that could be sold from your blog, this is the plugin that will help you with setting up your Paypal checkout.

Youtube Embed plus

Do you have a YouTube channel? If you create videos you can use this plugin to embed and share video content on your blog.  The videos you share also don’t have to be your own.

W3 Total cache

Improve the load speed of your pages and posts. Optimise your SEO. Your visitors don’t want to wait for images and pages to load. If your site is slow you will lose visitors.

WordPress Image Sizes

thumbnail – 150×150
Starting out learning WordPress and wanting to create you very first blog, read 10 most useful WordPress Plugins and get my special offer “free blog install” when you sign up to the recommended hosting… Click the image for more information on hosting.

medium – 300×300

medium_large – 768×9999

Other images sizes for information

large – 1024×1024

post-thumbnail – 630×315

featured-post – 285×200

list-image – 182×125

small-image – 78×55

shareaholic-thumbnail – 300×0

You can find more useful marketing tips with my done-for-you service.

How to get better results from Cold Emails.

Cold emailing is not as awkward as cold calling, but it still can be a frightening thing to do. A well-written cold email could be the key you need to get into contact with employers, celebrities, speakers, and just about anyone else you want to contact. You might be trying to reach out to one particular person you want to partner with or you might be trying to sell your product to two dozen people you met at a conference. Either way, cold emails are a fast and simple way of communication.

Unfortunately, it is often very difficult to find a way to get somebody to notice your email amongst dozens of other messages. Most people have countless spam emails in their inbox that they never read and they might disregard your email in the same way. Here are some tips you can use to make cold emails work for you:

Keep it Short and Sweet

 Busy people don’t have a lot of time and they’re not going to stick around to read an essay when they have 200 other messages to read. Make your headline direct and to the point. Avoid the fluff in your message and stick to the bare bones. You should be passionate, but avoid gloating too much over your love for the recipient’s work. The emails should be easy to read and respond to without the recipient having to dig up extra facts or ponder about what you were saying.

Establish Yourself

 If you met the person before, make sure to indicate that. If they don’t know who you are, you must establish your credibility. Tell them what you do or what organization you are from. You can show them sample of your work, if relevant, but avoid piling on too much detail. A quick and easy way to establish yourself without taking up too much space is by linking to your website or LinkedIn profile. These links will explain everything you need to so that you can save time and space.

Remember that there are certain elements of your personality that you want to shine through: your professionalism, your confidence, and your passion. It’s much easier to decide how to display these things when you are behind a computer screen rather than when you are meeting with someone in real life. Avoid generic messages and let your personality show.

Make it Personal

 You should know something about the person you are reaching out to. Personalize the message so that it meets their needs and expectations. People are far less willing to respond to what looks like a mass email sent to a dozen other people. Take the time to begin the email with the person’s name rather than “to whom it may concern.” If you are sending out a mass email, you can use certain software to automatically add the recipient’s name to the message.

See if you two have anything in common and use that to your leverage. Perhaps you picked them to speak at your conference because of their vast knowledge on biology. Maybe you reached out to them because you both graduated from San Francisco University.

You should also take into account who exactly this person is and why you decided to reach out to them. Let the person understand why you are reaching out to them and not anybody else and how they can benefit from it. Quite obviously, people are far more inclined to perform a favor if they can benefit from it in some sort of way.

Proofread

 Once you click “Send,” the message is gone forever so any mistakes you make will be loud and clear. Sure, you can always send another email with corrections, but that seems unprofessional. Proofreading doesn’t take that long and it always pays to double-check the details. Make sure that your letter to TechCrunch doesn’t say that you are writing to The Verge and make sure that any dates are accurate. You don’t want to send yesterday’s copy-pasted letter if it still has yesterday’s date on it.

Follow Up

 It’s true that the vast majority of cold emails will never receive a response, but it’s always good to follow up if you haven’t heard back from them in a week or so. In fact, the recipient might have just forgotten to get around to answering your email because it got lost in their inbox. Make sure that you mention the first email you sent them so that you don’t come across as a complete stranger.

Want more tuition on Email Marketing Sign up to this FREE Training

 

Conclusion

 Getting someone to read a cold email is always a challenge. Most people are natural adverse to opening up anything strange or unfamiliar. However, cold emails can become your business’s top way of reaching out to new clients, customers, and partners. If you want to find out more about how to utilize this, check out my done-for-you system.

Six Top Types Of Subject Lines to get you started.

Here are my six top types of subject lines to help you get started with email marketing.
The type of subject line is a very important part of your email marketing campaigns. You have to realise that your customers probably get a deluge of marketing mails into their inbox. Savvy marketers will use these types of subject lines to get a response. If you think about it most people will just scan the subject lines before making the decision to open your message. You have just a second or two to get inside the head of your prospect or customer.

1. Personal subject lines

Are you coming?

You’ve changed?

NAME – Surprise inside

NAME, check out these hand-picked tools

Crazy invitation, I am going to buy you lunch…

Seriously, who does this?

Quick favour?

? your detailed results…

Thanks for helping us.

2. Retargeting subject lines

I’m deleting your account

The price dropped …

we are not gonna give up on you!

How can you afford xyzzy

3. Pain point subject lines

Stop wasting money on  xyz…

“Your xyzzy issues, solved”

“Wanted: Digital Entrepreneur Superstars…

How to survive your next xyz

job lay off, big medical bill, financial crises

Stop wasting time on mindless work

Learn a new skill with only 20 minutes a day

Start a business without breaking the bank

4. Greed subject lines

Get priority access

25% off your favourites

Turn your mobile into a cash generator

5. Humour subject line

Text message: “loraine we need help the bathroom has been stolen”  (True Story)

“We like being used”

Look what you did, you little jerk…

6. Fear of missing out subject lines

Urgent, breaking, important, alert,

eg. Uh-oh, Your xyzzy is expiring

[URGENT] You’ve got just ONE DAY to watch this…

Your 7-figure plunges bye-bye at midnight…

[WEEKEND ONLY] Get this NOW before its gone…

You can find more useful marketing tips with my done-for-you service.

You might be interested to read Six Subject Line Tips to get your emails opened.

 

Six Subject Line Tips To Get Your Emails Opened

 Get your emails seen and opened.

Massive email marketing campaigns are a great way to get more eyes on your newsletter or website since. You can reach thousands of people at once. However, your campaign won’t be successful if nobody opens your message. MY six subject line tips will help you to get your  emails seen and opened. According to Madison Logic, over 122 billion emails are sent an hour, so knowing how to stand out from the crowd is important.

Your email’s subject line is arguably the most important part of the message since it’s the part readers will see first and make a split-second decision whether opening the message is worth their time. Headlines that aren’t interesting will quickly be marked as read or deleted. In fact, copywriter coach Chris Marlow claims that studies have proven that headlines are responsible for 50-75% of an ad’s success.

Knowing just how much of your campaign’s success rests on the headline alone, it’s important that you really take the time to examine how effective your headlines are. Here are a few great tips to craft better headlines:

Personalize your subject line.

A study by MailChimp examined about 24 billion emails and found that subject lines with the recipient’s first and/or last name were opened more often than those without. The most effective emails had both the first and last name.  However, those which only used the last name were strangely more effective than emails that only used the first name.

The power of first name personalization varied based on industries. Personalized emails sent to those in the government were opened 92% more often than usual while there was 45% difference for the creative services/agency industry. There were positive effects in all sorts of industries such as software, art, retail, and entertainment, but proved to be ineffective in the legal industry with a -31% open rate.

Create a sense of urgency.

A headline that compels the user to read right away will surely be opened. Such a headline tells the reader that there is some important information within the email that needs to be read right away and can’t be put off until later.

The aforementioned MailChimp study found that the following words results in a higher open rate:

• Urgent: 79%
• Breaking: 68%
• Important: 55%
• Alert: 31%

Note that Adestra similarly found that “alert” lead to a 61.8% increase in open rates.

Try giving a deadline with phrases like “today only” or “last chance”. Make sure that they know they must act now.

Make them feel special. 

Adding a first and last name to a subject line makes the email feel more personal. Adding phrases that make the email sound like it’s exclusively for the reader. Headlines such as “An exclusive offer just for you,” or “For your eyes only”.  Try this “A message for our dear customers only”. This makes the reader feel that this message is just for them or their group of people.

Keep it short and simple.

Your subject line should ideally be 6-10 words. Keep it under 50 characters.  Provide a description of what the reader can expect in the message. People are receiving an a ton of emails and won’t want to waste any time on something that doesn’t immediately meet their needs. Subject lines that are too vague or too detailed won’t be opened very often.

Short headlines are important considering that 40% of emails are opened on mobiles, so longer headlines will get cut off. You can shorten your headline by using contractions and not spelling out numbers. (i.e. “don’t” instead of “do not” and “45” instead of “forty-five”)

Capitalize each word.

MailChimp found that capitalizing each word in the subject line lead to a 7% increase in open rate. However, only capitalizing at least one word lead to a -1% open rate. These numbers are small, but they shouldn’t be overlooked. If you have a very large mailing list, the small percentage points can translate to hundreds or thousands of consumers.

Use an A/B test.

You will likely reach a situation where you have multiple headlines you would like to use, but can’t decide which one is best. You should A/B test them by sending them to segments of your mailing list. Collect some data and then send out the winning headline to the rest of your list.

Make sure to keep as many factors as consistent as possible. For example. When you send Headline A at 2:00 AM and Headline B at 9:00 AM, you should see a difference in open rates.

Using the right subject line hacks can exponentially improve your marketing success. You should use Aweber, Constant Contact, or another email marketing service to send out your emails, track statistics, and watch your numbers grow. You can find more useful marketing tips with my done-for-you service.

Six Figure Income : Affiliate Marketing

 Is It Possible To Pocket A Six Figure Income
With Affiliate Marketing

“Generally those marketers  who own websites and don’t create products or sell services of their own, find it difficult to earn big money through the internet.”

How many times have you heard this?

It is possible to sell space for advertising. You would need to be generating significant amount of traffic to your site. You can’t expect to sell the advertising space if you don’t attract high traffic.
To become a six-figure income earner, affiliates need to learn what to promote, and then how to promote it.  The secret is in what you offer on the front end of the website or funnel.  In traditional affiliate marketing, the commissions earned on the products are usually low.  The disadvantage is that a product creator usually has affiliates promoting these low-ticket products and the higher ticket items are reserved to be sold out to the email lists that are created.

A home-based business

Most marketers prefer to start earning money from home on a part-time basis, while still working another job or business.  However, there are pros and cons here, working from home is fine but the reality is many online entrepreneurs will not earn huge commissions.

One reason for this is that the marketer will treat the new business like a hobby while working part-time. Individuals are not fully committed to focusing on starting the business the correct way.  I’ve listened to many success stories and I can tell you there are a lot of people who tried and tried and failed before they became successful.  The difference is, that they did not give up.  They worked on growing themselves first. Successful marketers get educated, and then find mentors to support them.

Generally, affiliate marketers are selling other people’s goods and services for a commission which normally ranges between 5 to 25 per cent of the product price. The secret is to have a product that fits your target group. Then you drive traffic to the offer and collect names and emails. Results come from converting the traffic to sales.

You should also ensure that your adverts do not look like conventional advertisements. This is because many people do not take their time to pay attention to the banners that are scattered all over. When they do visit your site they are wanting information on what you provide.  A good strategy is to have something that you can offer FREE this way you can build a good list of potential customers.

When you are researching for products as an affiliate you need to look at some of the Affiliate Platforms that sell the goods and services that are related to your niche.
See my earlier post on TOP ten affiliate programs
These websites have affiliate programs with offers that you can promote on your own website, you will find information on how you can sign up to join them.

Six Figure Income: Affiliate Marketing

The smart affiliate marketer promotes companies that pay out commissions on all of its products through the whole sales funnel. Even smarter they sign up to a company that helps them to build a team of marketers.  A company that teaches them how to get sales in the first 30 days.  A company that pays up to 50% and up to 100% commissions on front-end sales and 50% commissions through back-end sales. There are big rewards for top earners.

Don’t Miss Out Watch The Free Web Class Through My Special Invite

Top 10 Affiliate Programmes

The Top 10 Affiliate Programmes to Monetise your Blog

Want to know how to monetise your blog or your niche website?  Consider adding some offers from the Top 10 Affiliate Programmes as promotional adverts in your niche.

I’ve researched what I consider are the top 10 affiliate programs.  The programs are not ranked in any order by the way.  I can not recommend any of them personally. I will leave that to the Affiliate Marketing masters out there.

Starting Here

1  Amazon Associates  –  https://affiliate-program.amazon.co.uk/

Amazon is probably one of the most  well know on-line retail stores. by becoming an affiliate or associate you can monetize your web site and promote products sold on the Amazon Store and be earning up to 10% in referrals.

Our friends over at Authority Hacker said this:

Did you know Amazon associates is one of the biggest affiliate marketing programs in the world?!

That’s exactly why we did a deep dive into the Amazon associates for a recent blog post. It covers everything you could imagine, from getting started to dealing with a dreaded suspension.

We work with Amazon Associates every day so like to think we know our stuff, and I hope you’ll agree too!

Check out the Authority Hacker post here

2  Apple iTunes – http://www.apple.com/uk/itunes/affiliates/

Another widely accepted on-line & mobile store – the affiliate program requires approval but once approved you can link to music, apps and books via iTunes, the App store, iBooks and the Mac App store.
If you are thinking of joining this program I strongly advise reading through the FAQ’s on the website.

http://www.apple.com/itunes/affiliates/resources/documentation/faq_en.html

Some of the lesser known programs

3  Affiliate Future – http://www.affiliatefuture.co.uk/default.asp?id=1

Free to become an affiliate – no set up fees.
You subscribe to Merchants and allow their advertising on your website. To earn revenue from your sites your visitors need to click through on ads. This generates visits, leads or sales for the Merchants.

Typical Merchants: Airlines – Jet2  & Virgin Atlantic, Retailers – Bed Shed, Smart Phone dealers, online gaming.

4  Paid On Results – http://www.paidonresults.com/merchants/

There is a wide range of Merchants from Food, Bedding, Hair styling products, Airlines, Designer clothing and more.
The affiliate payment terms are available from the website. Paid on Results advise that there innovative software can pay out validated sales commissions in three working days.

For the low down on affiliate marketing with Paid on Results we advise reading the Affiliate Page here
http://www.paidonresults.com/affiliate-marketing.html

5  Book Depository – http://affiliates.bookdepository.com/affiliates/

Again this is free to join – the payments are 5% on all orders and pre orders, with a monthly payment.
With this program you don’t need to have a website. You can promote the Book Depository through other methods like the ever popular Social Media networks, forums, blogs and e-mails.

Half way through the Top 10 Affiliate Programmes

6  Aflite.Co.Uk – https://aflite.co.uk/

This program promotes new smaller on-line businesses and developing brands. Merchants types include home furnishings, books, clothing, hotels and holidays, education, business baby clothes and maternity and much more. The affiliate revenues vary depending on the merchant and range from 1.25% on Villa Holidays to 25% on fashion reading and sun glasses, the average is about 10%.
No set up costs- Free Affiliate sign up, check out the information on how this works here

https://aflite.co.uk/affiliates/how-it-works.php

7  Affiliate Window – http://uk.affiliatewindow.com/homepage/publishers/

This program has sections on their web site for Advertisers (Merchants) and Publishers (Affiliates)
The four main sectors of business advertisers are:
Finance & Insurance, Retail & Shopping, Telecoms & services, Travel.
To join this program they request a £5 nominal fee.  The nominal fee is a security check then when approved the money is repaid to your account. For more information on this program go to the “get started” page here.
http://uk.affiliatewindow.com/get-started-2/

Advertisers (Merchants) and Publishers (Affiliates)

8  Trade Doubler – http://www.tradedoubler.com/

With Trade Doubler again their website refers to Advertisers (Merchants) and Publishers (Affiliates)
Publishers have to register it says just four easy steps to becoming an Affiliate.  Read more at the get started page.

http://www.tradedoubler.com/uk-en/publishers/get-started/

Trade Doubler has over 2000 top brand advertisers.  Affiliates will find adverts for almost any niche.

9  Commission Junction – http://uk.cj.com/

Again Commission Junction refers Advertisers (Merchants) and Publishers (Affiliates)

Publishers can receive payments by Cheque or Direct Deposit and CJ pay out in numerous currencies.

Advertisers at CJ.com include 3000+ merchants and some top brand names like Argos, Laura Ashley, Hotel Chocolate and Match.com. With around 35 categories of retail and services to choose from like Health, Food, on-line service, Telecoms, Books, Clothing, Insurance, well you get the picture.

If you are thinking of joining this program I recommend you go to the “Why CJ” page to check the information for yourself.

http://uk.cj.com/why-cj

Number 10 of my Top 10 Affiliate Programmes.

10  Link Share – http://www.linkshare.co.uk/

Just three steps to signing up, with no fee to join.  Payments to affiliates are made by direct deposit or cheque, the program operates in a number of countries.  Merchants in the program or advertisers include some top brand names that reach UK consumers like Accessorise,  Avon, Benefit, Coast and many more.  See their Clients page for more information.

http://www.linkshare.co.uk/clients/

The TOP TEN AFFILIATE PROGRAMMES plenty of advertisers to choose from.  Please feel free to leave your comments or share this post.  I would love to hear from people who have found success in promoting affiliate adverts on their own blogs or niche sites.

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