What is Your Tagline? Part I

Have you ever watched an ad on TV and wondered out loud, "Now what on earth are they advertising?" I have. Many times. Usually by the end of the advert I begin to hazard a guess. Sometimes I'm right. Sometimes I'm totally wrong.

The movie clip that is clearly advertising some sort of drink ends up promoting a make of cellphone. Or the gripping little video showing a cute toddler and a rescue dog is really trying to get me to buy a bar of chocolate. Their taglines are not clear, if they are even present.

Until 2010, I had never even heard of a tagline. Then I attended a continuing workshop at the Florida Christian Writers Conference. The workshop leader was Laura Christianson of the Blogging Bistro. She led us through a series of exercises in an attempt to establish a "tagline" for our writing.

"A tagline is a slogan that succinctly, memorably, and descriptively sums up a company or product." (Thanks to Wisegeek.com for this definition.) So as a writer, I needed a slogan that would sum up my writing.

Hmm. Not so easy.

I learned a lot about myself during Laura's series of workshops, but I left without a tagline. It wasn't Laura's fault. My problem was that I seemed to have several genres.

• I write to encourage writers. 
• I write inspirational material. 
• I write devotional material.
• And as a cancer survivor I write to encourage those in the valley of cancer.

I had two websites. Two blogs. Two Twitter accounts. Two genres. Several newsletters.

And no tagline.

Some weeks after the conference, I realised what had been looking me in the face all the way through those exercises. I live to encourage and inspire others who are struggling in some way. Even as a youngster at school, I inevitably befriended the kid that had no other friends. I didn't write in a variety of genres at all. I wrote articles to inspire and encourage.

I searched for a definition of a tagline for writers and came across this one on a forum, which I have slightly modified: A tagline is a concise statement of your Unique Selling Proposition (USP). It is a short slogan that tells what you do, what benefit you offer, and what makes you different, all at the same time."

And so I looked at

• what I did (I wrote. I encouraged. I inspired.) 
• what benefit I had to offer. (I encouraged and inspired people.) 
• what made me different. (I am a writer, a cancer survivor, and a Christian who wants to encourage.)

And at last, I had a tagline. The Write to Inspire and Encourage.

How has this helped me? I now have one newsletter: The Write to Inspire. Although I still have two websites they have a common goal. ShirleyCorder.com is to inspire and encourage writers, while RiseAndSoar.com is to inspire and encourage those in the cancer valley. The tag is not perfect, and I'm sure it will develop as the years go by. But at least it tells people who I am.

Some taglines are more catchy than others. Even Coke, surely one of the experts in the field of catchy slogans, changes theirs often. Remember "Coke is It!"? That dates back to 1981. "Things go better with Coca Cola" goes back even further—to 1963! Every year or two, the manufacturers of this drink come up with a new tagline. But I have to say this for them. I always understand what they're advertising.

OVER TO YOU: Do you have a tagline? 

• If you do, please share it here. 
• And if you don't?  Maybe work through those three points above and see if you can come up with one. Share it and if you like invite comments and suggestions. 
• Next month, same time (April 20) same place we'll look at some taglines that work really well, and see what we can learn from them. Maybe we can all improve our current tags.

SHIRLEY CORDER lives on the coast in South Africa with her husband, Rob. Her book, Strength Renewed: Meditations for your Journey through Breast Cancer contains 90 meditations based on her sojourn in the cancer valley.

Please visit Shirley through ShirleyCorder.com, where she inspires and encourages writers, or at  RiseAndSoar.com, where she inspires and encourages those in the cancer valley. You can also meet with her on Twitter or FaceBook. 

Blog Posting, Keywords, Anchor Text, Tags, and Website Statistics Part 2

In Part 1 of  Blog Posting, Keywords, Anchor Text, Tags, and Website Statistics we talked about Keywords and their importance on driving traffic. Today, in Part 2, we discuss Anchor Text and Tags.

Anchor Text

Another interesting fact in regard to the statistics’ referring sites is that the KCWM site itself is listed as a source. This is accomplished by creating anchor text within the post content and/or at the bottom of the post as “Additional Reading” or other worded lead-in.  The anchor text (article titles) under this section leads the reader to another page/post within your site.

According to Wikipedia, “anchor text is weighted (ranked) highly in the search engine algorithms, because the linked text is usually relevant to the landing page.”

Is there a difference between an anchor text leading to another post and simply putting the url itself? YES.

Anchor text allows search engines to easily find and index your content and they value this strategy; the url address doesn’t have the same ‘word power.’ Wikipedia says, “The objective of search engines is to provide highly relevant search results; this is where anchor text helps.” This is part of SEO.

Tags

Next on my ‘to do’ list when posting an article on my site is to put relevant tags.

In the article “Using Categories and Tags Effectively on Your Blog” on
ProBlogger.net, it explains that tags should be thought of “as the colorful little page markers you might use to flick back to your favorite pages in a book. The tags don’t describe the book as a whole, instead they describe individual sections of the book.”

Two important factors to consider:

•    Tags complement categories. If you use Wordpress you’ll be able to and should use categories. Blogger does not offer this feature, so it’s even more important to use tags.

•    Tags should be focused and use the same ones for each specific topic. This means if you are writing about book marketing, use the same specific tags: book marketing, book promotion, etc.

 Don’t switch them up. Be consistent because it is this consistency that search engines will use to index your site and establish you as an authority on that keyword. This means a higher ranking in the search engines.


Promote your Blog Posts

If you want to enhance your visibility, you need to SHARE each article/post. Wordpress and Blogger both have plugins or gadgets to provide easy ‘sharing’  to Facebook, GooglePlus, Twitter, StumbleUpon, Digg, and Linkedin. Make use of the ‘sharing’ feature.

Then of course there are your other social networks, your groups. Don’t forget to post a message in your groups letting them know you have a new post up.

Use these three blog posting elements for each of your posts and your traffic/views are sure to increase.

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MORE ON ONLINE MARKETING

Widen Your Reach Know Your Audience
Small Business Marketing – Know What Consumers Buy

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Karen Cioffi
Award-Winning Author, Freelance/Ghostwriter
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