My dad is a song writer, he has been one since I was a kid. That was his hobby and that is what gave him enjoyment. This post is for him, but anyone trying to get out there on the internet could use these ideas. Now I’m not a SEO (Search Engine Optimization) expert, but I am out there online and I have conversations with people all the time on how to get more popular online. These are mostly my observations on how someone like my dad could get started.
The Internet is an information Black Hole. It sucks up everything that is out there, and just like a dog who is hungry, it will come back to you to see if you will feed it again. So the more you populate your information out there the more the search engines will be interested in you. Content is KING on the internet. If you have it, then you will have an easier time getting results. Many people on the internet produce a ton of crap information. And yes, the internet rules apply for that content as well. Ask yourself why you see so many crappy links on a search mixed in with the good ones. Having quality information is the key, people recognize quality and you will see results faster than putting out sub-standard information.
To feed the Internet, it takes a lot of work. Just because you put something out there online doesn’t mean you will get views immediately. You have to work to get people to know who you are. In a lot of ways it is kind of like a multi-level-marketing scheme. The work you do in the beginning builds on itself. So in the beginning you have to build that base, and once you get going it builds on itself (even when it gets popular you still have to maintain it). Don’t get me wrong I’m calling the Internet a MLM or anything. I’m just saying you have to do a lot more work in the beginning then you do when your content is established.
Create a Domain – Build your brand:
Going back to my father, he is a songwriter so his content is quality (because of the time and energy he spent creating the songs). So my suggestions for him to get started is to create a blog. Now in my opinion I would create a domain name for yourself as this is the beginning of branding yourself online. The reason for this is if you get a free service you will have a web address name like www.wordpress.com/1234567/accountname/post?id=123. Now that could work, but I think this is a lot easier to remember with something like this: www.<yourdomainname>.com – it is easy and if you come up with something unique and catchy that is even better. Just remember you are going to be putting in a lot of work into this site in the beginning. It will be easier in the long run if you create the domain name now. Not only will you be creating something that is easy to remember for people, but you will be building your brand name right from the beginning. The search engines also like longevity (crap vs quality), so the longer you are out there creating good content the better your results will be.
To make it easy I’m going to suggest using GoDaddy.com (I’m not a huge fan of that company but it is easy and they have the services I’m referencing). You can create a WordPress account with your own domain there. If you aren’t familiar with WordPress don’t worry. I’m suggesting this because right now it is the gold standard for creating blogs. It is very easy to use, it is very easy to customize (themes) and there are a ton of plugins. There doesn’t need to be another post on all these features (with a quick search online you will find plenty of posts regarding this blog engine), if you spend a little time with this program you will see how easy it is to create and customize your blog.
Building your brand and relationships:
Before you write any content, I would come up with a list of other sites that have content like yours. For my father and his interests, I would look for sites that other song writers hang out and share. The more the better, but make sure they are fairly popular sites. If they are less popular sites than your return on investment will be lower. Spend some time researching these sites. Create an account and visit them regularly. Many of these sites where you can share information have profile sections. Fill in your information and put your new domain name information in there. Again, spend sometime becoming a user of those sites. The most important part of becoming a user is to find a way to either create a signature or have your profile have a link back to your site.
So once you become a member of these sites, interact with people. If it is a question and answer type of site, then answer questions. If you have questions ask them. The more you get your name out there the better. People will interact with you and you will start forming relationships in those communities. I know for my father the term relationship will be be an odd word to use. Online relationships are very new, but they are also very real. You never know the reach someone might have online. You could run into someone with a 1 million followers on Twitter, they could tweet something about you and your stuff is available to 1 million people! There is huge upside to interacting with other people. I will offer this 1 opinion. Just like with your content, meaningful relationships mean more in my opinion than just idle chit chat. Take that for what it’s worth, it’s my opinion and that is what I strive for when I make online & personal relationships.
Use your content:
My father has 30+ years of songs in his library. That is a lot of content. Writing a blog post about each and every song would be easy. The hard part was creating and recording his songs. My suggestion to him was to make a simple post about the song. All it would have to include is the songs name, what it’s about, and why he wrote it. For him, he could probably write 1 post everyday for the next 3 years going through his library of songs. I know he won’t because his passion is writing and recording music, but he could as he has THAT MUCH CONTENT.
For everyone else, you have to create content. You could write about anything, you never know what some people would find interesting. Be yourself and be passionate in your content. It is going to take some time but don’t be discouraged. It takes 10,000 hours to become an expert in something. Your first posts will be ridiculous, learn from each one and get better in your craft. Many people know my philosophy follows the tortoise and the hare story. Slow and steady always wins. Keep at it and you will find success eventually.
Twitter, YouTube & Facebook:
Just like with other sites that you become members of, you should spend some time on these social media sites. Learn how they work, figure out what the best way is to get your information out there to people that might share your interests.
There are new mediums that are insanely popular! Twitter is one of those mediums. After you get your blog, you should create a twitter account and somehow you should incorporate your domain name (as your user name). Doing this helps build your brand. In fact my strategy is to try to use the same user name in all mediums. Every time you create a post you need to put your post on Twitter . Remember to use the Twitter Hash Tag (#), and to append the hash tag to your post. For my father, he may find that #songwriter or #music. Watch how other people use Twitter, you will understand what I am saying. If you don’t understand something, do a quick search online. Many people have the same questions as you do. Of course you can always leave a comment below and I’ll try my best to answer your questions.
YouTube is another very popular medium. This is probably the next upcoming medium. It allows for video. I know people that write blog posts and also do a daily vlog (video-log). Doing vlog is hard to do as you have to edit it. Unless you do each video in one take, editing your video takes more time. But there is nothing more powerful than video. It is a lot easier to watch something for 10 minutes than it is to read something for 20 minutes. I know some people will disagree, but watching video is more mindless than reading. Video is a great medium for a music writer, this is something is would absolutely suggest for my father. Again, like Twitter, create an account and start figuring out YouTube. Post your video up there and put it on your blog and on Twitter. You need to give your users of your content options to see your content. So duplication is key.
Finally with Facebook, how can you deny a medium that has 300+ million users. Let’s face it, that is a gold mine of users. Yes, Facebook is more personal than other mediums, however, my suggestion is to create Facebook page. This way, a normal user who may be interested in song writing could find my fathers Facebook Song Writers page and he could “Like” a song that my father posted. That “Like”, would then go on that users Wall, where all of his friends would see it. Maybe one of his friends clicks the link that brings him to my fathers Facebook page and the process starts all over. You could be very surprised how many users Facebook could bring to your content. This is probably the most advanced concept outside of creating a domain name and hosting your blog. Take some time in doing research in Facebook. Figure out how it can work for you.
There are many plugins that will post to Twitter and Facebook automatically from your blog engine (WordPress). It will take you time, to get everything just right. But these steps should get you well on your way to becoming part of the Internet community. If you have questions about anything I wrote here, please feel free to leave a comment below and I’ll do my best to answer it for you!
Good luck and I’ll see you online!
Posted by Jeff V. on February 9th, 2012 :: Filed under
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on the same Hard Disk Drive. Through my searching online I found that there was a way to shrink my volume. No this isn’t some sort of diet (I wish), but there is a tool built into Windows 7 that allows you to take part of your unused Hard Drive and make it an unused space which then allowed me to install Windows 8 on that portion of the disk.
