Barbara Walters Price

Useful and Easy SEO Tool for Wordpress Blogs

You, dear reader, likely know that SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. We work hard to produce useful content for our target market(s), so we want that content to be found via an internet search. Yet search algorithms are always changing. That's why there are firms dedicated to nothing else but helping us with SEO.

However, if your firm is like most, you are not big enough to warrant these services. What do you do? You try your hardest to include tags as well as keywords in your content in an appropriate way. 

Yet, there is a tool to help. The Wordpress SEO Plugin by Yoast allows you to quickly optimize your content for search. There is a great summary of the tool at Blogging Your Passon. Per BYP:

Once you install this plugin, there will be a new feature added just below your content box inside WordPress. This is what allows you to quickly optimize your content.

For example, Let’s say I have chosen the keyword phrase “how to become a mechanic.” If someone uses that phrase to search in Google, then I want to be on the first page and get traffic. The phrase is actual used over 1,300+ times each month.

After I write or paste my content in WordPress, I scroll down to the WordPress SEO feature. It asks for my focus keyword, so I put in “how to become a mechanic.” Now the plugin will tell me either yes or no if my blog post is optimized for the search engines. You can then make some simple changes that the plugin suggests, and then hit publish. See the picture below for a better view.

There are many advanced features as well; however, most of us won't take advantage of them. Here is the list of features for the plugin:

1. Post titles and meta descriptions
2. Robots Meta configuration
3. Canonical
4. Breadcrumbs
5. Permalink clean up
6. XML Sitemaps
7. RSS enhancements
8. Edit your robots.txt and .htaccess
9. Clean up head section

Told ya ... most of these we won't touch, yet the functionality described above is worth it. If you have a Wordpress blog, check out this tool.

Eva Lang is blogging at AccountingWeb

Eva Lang, aka BV Girl, is now blogging at AccountingWeb.com.  For all things business valuation, make certain you visit her blog and visit often.

For those few of you out there who don't know Eva, she has been blogging on business valuation topics since 2002. A member of the AICPA Business Valuation Hall of Fame, Eva discusses hot topics, practice management concerns, and technology issues that affect business valuation and litigation support practices. Her book, "The Best Websites for Financial Professionals," established her reputation as a scout for cool internet sites and search tools to help the CPA. Eva's day job is managing the Financial Consulting group, the largest organization of business valuation firms in North America.

Where did I put my keys to this thing?

I'm back.  Hopefully somebody missed me.  I missed you, dear readers.  I was away not because I'm a slacker (although I felt like slacking many times) or because I had run out of things to say (this is a blog which, unfortunately, by it's very nature tends toward vapid discourse so why should that stop me?). 

I was away because I was too busy to be here which I know is a mortal sin in the blogosphere, however, please forgive me because I was working on the printed word in another form - I was bringing a printed book to life (that's it over there to your left designed in-house by our very talented Matt Washburn).

Now that sounds more interesting (and a bit more dramatic) than it was/is.  And, no, I didn't write the book. Our CEO, Chris Mercer, wrote the book and did it quite well - using his blog (www.merceronvalue.com), by the way, as a drafting tool.

The title of the book is Buy-Sell Agreements: Ticking Time Bombs or Reasonable Resolutions?. 

While that may not sound like a page-turner to some of you, it's a very readable and useful book (350+ pages) and of interest to many more people than an average reader of this blog might think. 

This is a self-published book that we have been working on for over a year.  Several folks here provided review and editing.  When I picked up the manuscript in November thinking that we were almost done, I discovered that it still needed quite a bit of editing.  We had to get it to market by the end of 2006 and if I didn't stop everything I was doing right before Thanksgiving and work almost exclusively on the book, it wouldn't have happened.  I won't go into all the details here.  I will share those with you in a future post.

I will say, however, that this book was our first experience with print-on-demand.  I'll share the advantages and disadvantages of this technology in a day or so.

In the meantime, if you want to purchase the book, it's only $79 - a steal!

Blogging Best Practices: Should you (ever) reuse content?

Recently, I was speaking to a group of CPA firm marketing directors about blogging.  During the Q&A, someone asked "Should you ever reuse content?"   My answer was "welllll ... it depends." 

If you bring back an old post because the information is still relevant and useful to your audience, that's okay.  I've done it as have many others.  Just note that it's a reintroduction of a past post.

However, if you reuse posts because you either don't have the time or the energy or the proper respect for your audience, then it's a very bad idea.  I removed a blog from my RSS because I began to see the same posts again and again.  This blogger is very respected in his field but by recycling old posts, it felt like the blog was just a cynical marketing device rather than an attempt to create a dialogue with readers.  The best blogs create that dialogue, that community, and the most avid readers.  As such, they are a very effective marketing tool.   By cynically recycling posts, you are diminishing the marketing effectiveness of your blog.

My answer, I think, rang a little hollow because of the touchy-feely nature of it.  In order to give them something to hold on to, I gave the example of an old pastor of mine.  As he neared retirement, he started telling the same old stories in his sermons.  You could tell he was phoning it in.  Not good for pastors and not good for bloggers.

So, the moral of the story - don't phone it in.  If you are considering starting a blog for you or your firm, know that it is a commitment of time and, as a rule, the content should be fresh.  It is okay to repeat a post once and a while but only if you note that it is a repost and only if it is information that your audience needs.

Blog Roll updated - finally

It's been too long in coming but I've finally updated my Blog Roll.  If I had known it would be this easy, I would have done it months and months ago.

Notable additions:

• Michelle Golden's Golden Practices (this is a daily read for me)
• Dianna Huff's B2B MarCom Writer Blog (fould via Michelle and really enjoy)
• Escape from Cubicle Nation (a little off topic yet it's a fun read with good ideas)
• Build a Better Blog (we're working with these ladies on Mercer on Value and they're goooood)

A few others added were added as well and all are certainly worth a visit.

Now, I've got to do something about those categories ....

CPAs: In case you missed it

Michelle Golden gently nudges CPAs to join the blogosphere.  Check out her list of CPA blogs.  One entry on her list is Eva Lang, who I'm honored to call a good friend.  Check our her post on the same subject.  One of my first posts was about the absence of CPAs blogging.  Apparently, not much has changed since then.

Passing Along the Indie Virus

My friend and talented blog consultant, Paul Chaney of the Radiant Marketing Group, just infected this blog with a great virus - the Indie Virus!  Now that I've caught it, I intend to pass it on.   

What's the Indie Virus? Don't worry, if you get it, it won't crash your blog or make you sick.   It's an experiment-turned-blog-phenomenon originated by Chris Pearson of Pearsonified.   The experiment, henceforth referred to as "The Indie Virus," has two goals:

• To bring exposure to lesser known blogs (especially those outside of Technorati's Top 100)
• To explore the metrics behind a viral linking campaign launched by the "little guys" (less popular blogs).

So, according to my friend, Paul, if you are infected, you basically find lesser known blogs and link to them using as the anchor text in the link, The Indie Virus.  Now I pass the virus along ... the Indie Virus ... to my friend, Tom O'Neill, of the Buy Out Blog (a great read, by the way). 

The Indie Virus: Catch it, spread it, and grow your traffic virally by spreading it to others.

New Marketing Blog for CPAs

Patrick McEvoy has begun a new blog - CPA Marketing Best Practices.  Other than some structural issues (the RSS feed, blogroll, etc. seems to have fallen to the bottom of the right column), it looks like it might have some interesting content.  Take a look.

The Coach is in the Game

The Coach is in the game ... the Blog Coach, that is.   Paul Chaney is the Blog Coach.  The mission of his blog is in the sub-title: Training to help you become an expert blogger.

As George Halas once said, "What makes a good coach? Complete dedication."  Paul is completely dedicated to and passionate about the power of blogs and helping you to harness that power.

As Paul notes on his blog: "WE KNOW BLOGS and we know how to help your business use them to communicate directly with customers, constituents and stakeholders to create strong personal, lasting relationships. Not only that, we know blogs can help your business set itself apart from the competition and make you the recognized expert in your field."

In the spirit of full disclosure, Paul served as our blog consultant when my firm, Mercer Capital, was developing Mercer on Value, Chris Mercer's CEO blog.  Paul did a fantastic job for us and he is still one of our trusted advisers. 

If you have a blog or are thinking of creating one, visit the Blog Coach as well as Radiant Marketing Group, Paul's consulting business site.

RSS: a Tool in Your Marketing Plan

Kevin O'Keefe's blog, Real Lawyers Have Blogs, has a great post re the inclusion of RSS in our business models.  Kevin's blog focuses on law firms yet the information contained here is applicable for any professional service firm. 

Legal marketers, it's time to incorporate RSS in marketing strategy

If you don't understand RSS or its potential, you are already behind the curve.  It should be part of your firm and personal marketing arsenal.