Becoming An Authority On The Intetnet

BY CHUKWUEMEKA FRED AGBATA JNR.
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Chukwuemeka Fred Agbata Jnr.
Every other week, I get to speak to various groups and one question I hear often is how can I build a brand on the Internet or to put it succinctly, how do I differentiate my brand online?

My answer is always centred on marketing. The fact is that life is all about marketing, whether it is a father and daughter relationship or a boss and an employee relationship; each party is busy trying to sell one idea or value to the other. If you understand this basic content, then you are well on your way to becoming an authority on the Internet.

There is a rather close link between becoming an authority and Internet marketing. This is why I will refer to it a number of times in this piece because that is one point I will like you to grasp.

Internet marketing is the provision and promotion of products and services online. Many business owners, particularly those that run small businesses, may genuinely find Internet marketing a rather daunting and tiresome task because of the lack of knowledge on how to go about it.

In order to succeed with Internet marketing, businesses need to devout quality time to it. Sometimes, the more enterprising business owners do take a sluggish start at internet marketing, only to steer back into traditional marketing after a while.

It cannot be denied that Internet marketing plays a vital role in the success of businesses worldwide today and Nigeria is not an exception. To help you make a success of internet marketing, there are certain things that you need to know and do.

Since Google apparently occupies the top spot when it comes to the Internet, I will primarily focus on what it demands from the website owner regarding what an individual or business can do to promote its brand and authority online.

It will, however, be a serious error of judgment to totally neglect other search engines, especially Yahoo and Bing, as these two smaller giants also drive a considerable amount of routine search traffic in their own right.

1. Content marketing

Would you like to become an authority online? Then think content at all times. Now here comes my favourite example. Imagine the internet without content i.e. text, images, audio and videos; how boring do you think the internet would be?

Content is undoubtedly the overall reigning monarch on the Internet and this includes social media channels as well. Google has effectively tied content to authorship which is a cool way to become an authority.

Furthermore, it has also become crucial to ensure that this content is yours and that it is unique. Copying another author’s articles or having it published across a multitude of sites could spell disaster for your own search results.

Focusing on these guidelines could put you on the way to achieving a sound internet strategy for your business. Businesses should, thus, be forward-looking in adopting internet marketing and not remain behind just because the use of internet marketing in our clime is not yet at an advanced. Learn what you need to learn about it and move ahead to integrate it into your business marketing plan and ultimately implement your strategies.

2. Authorship

I talked about authorship briefly above and I want you to understand that it is schemed to form a crucial link in the search engine algorithm criteria for those who will like to become authorities through Google’s search engine.

Google has hundreds of algorithm signals that determine how a particular content should be ranked on the search engine. In a recent statement, a prominent senior executive of Google firmly asserted that those in possession of verified authorship by the company are the ones who will be given top search result ranks.

Verified authorship is not a difficult feat to attain once you can connect your Google+ profile to your website and blog. Google authorship then automatically links your Google+ profile to the content you publish online.

Google Author Rank is also a possible algorithm signal that may impact the search engine ranking of content verified as yours. To cut the long story short, this is simply a good strategy in building your online authority.

3. Building of links

Many will argue that link building is not as effective as it used to be in the past. Previously, it was an SEO expert practice to encourage generation of maximum links. There was less regard for where these links were generated from.

Today, however, Google, for instance, sees things differently, and will not even momentarily hesitate to have you removed from its search results if there are too many “unnatural” links pointing to your website.

Now, you need good quality links that relate directly to your own site. One thing you must also avoid is broken links which is why the tool mentioned in the tool of the week section is quite necessary.

4. Social media

I decided to talk about social media last because it has become over flogged albeit still very important for anyone looking to build an online brand. Social media platforms have since graduated from the erstwhile restriction for use as a social contact medium into full blown use in the business world.

It has now become ever more pertinent to be able to show your presence on various prominent social media channels to promote your products or business as well as brand and events. These social media channel include Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Google+, Pinterest and others.

These sites provide you with fresh and easy means of interaction with your current as well as potential customers. It is, however, more than a simple matter of profile creation and occasional sending out of updates. There are distinct principles behind the social media science that inculcate attraction and retention of the attention of your audience.

Because of the last point above, a lot of business owners that patronise the social media are frustrated as they hardly see any difference for the better after patronising all these social media channels without anything to show for it at the end.

Many business owners still need to learn or be taught the secrets of how to use the various social media channels to achieve business success in their internet marketing drive as there are a lot to learn in this regard.

These are some of the strategies that I have personally applied and keep applying towards strengthening my online authority and I believe that they might be of help if you are willing to give it all it takes.