Learn how you can improve your white paper copywriting skills — and grow your freelance business — by attending the first ever White Paper Success Summit.

Michael Stelzner sees a need . . . and fills it

A few months ago, my colleague Michael Stelzner (*the* go-to guy who knows anything and everything about white papers)  taught hundreds of freelance copywriters how to market their services at his online copywriting summit. 

According to Mike, lots of people wanted to know how they, too, could make thousands of dollars writing white papers.  (Michael says he didn’t hide the fact that he makes $7500 per paper and usually runs four projects each month.)

Because of the response, Michael had planned on offering a white paper event for freelancers in the spring of 2009. But the economy caused him to rethink things.  Nobody could have imagined how many businesses would end up suffering from the recent economic fallout.

“It became immediately apparent to me that waiting until the spring to offer a white paper event for freelance writers would be too late,” says Michael. “Let me explain why.”

“You see, back in 2002, just after the last major stock market crash, white papers took off as super-powerful marketing tools for businesses.  Why? Because businesses needed resources that would help them sell under the radar to customers who were frankly resistant to spending any money.”

According to Mike, smart businesses were achieving amazing success with white papers.  So much so that literally overnight, thousands of white papers were being produced to generate leads and help businesses stand out.

Today we are at the front end of the very same pattern that occurred in 2002, but the need is even bigger! 

Why Michael worked non-stop all through the holiday madness 

To meet this need, Michael put together the best panel ever on creating marketing white papers. He’s calling his brainstorm the White Paper Success Summit 2009 and his goal is to empower freelance writers to create white papers that help businesses achieve success. 

Michael is a great guy and really knows his stuff — I know, because I interviewed him for the definitive MarketingSherpa reports on white papers, read his book, Writing White Papers, and have been a guest on his hugely popular teleclass series. 

And, because this is a recession and you need to watch your bucks, Michael has made this White Paper Summit *very attractive* for freelancers.

First, you’ll save huge dollars by not having to pay for airline tickets, hotel costs, or other expenses because the entire White Paper Success Summit is being held online.

Second, if you register now, you’ll save 40% off the regular admission price.

You have nothing to lose and everything to gain. Register for the White Paper Success Summit today!

If you’re a B2B marketer and want to learn more about social media and its applications — or you’re a B2B marketer successfully using social media and want to share with others — please join my new LinkedIn Group, B2B Social Media.

My goal is to make this a group where we can share advice and tips and learn more about how B2B companies can use social media tools such as Twitter, YouTube, video, forums, etc. to promote products and services, build relationships, and yes, even achieve real ROI.

If you have ideas on how we can make this a fun and interactive group, please feel free to share them with me!

HubSpot Marketing posted five excellent blogging resolutions — from which I’m heavily borrowing (with their permission)!

Herewith, my blogging resolutions for 2009 (which is going to be an excellent year!):

1. Post more regularly — I make resolutions all year long to post more regularly. Some weeks I post two or three times. But other times, when I get really busy and overwhelmed, I don’t post at all. My first resolution is to add my blog to my daily work schedule and then post at least two times a week every week.

2. Link to other bloggers — I read a ton of blog posts, newsletters, and reports. I even print out this information and plaster sticky notes on it to remind me to write blog posts. But alas, by the time I get around to writing, the blog post, newsletter or report is months old. I resolve to do a better job of linking to other bloggers by writing about their interesting or insightful information within a week of it being posted online.

3. Learn how to better optimize this blog — I downloaded and activated the WordPress SEO plugin, but I never use it. I resolve to learn how to optimize this blog and then report my findings.

4. Link to my other content — I publish an e-newsletter each month, write articles for other online publications, and often get interviewed by other bloggers, but I don’t always publish links to this content. I resolve to do a better job of promoting other bloggers and online venues and their efforts to reach out to me.

5. Use more pictures — I heartily agree with those experts who say blog posts should have pictures. I do try to include them when possible, but will often forego adding pictures when pressed for time. I resolve to make my blog posts more graphically appealing by adding pictures, logos, YouTube videos, etc. whenever possible.

That is my list. What do you think I should do more of? What should I do less of?

In his December 19, Winning the Web blog post, “How to Be a Top 100 Online Marketer in 2009 — 8 Lessons in Personal Branding,” Gyutae Park lays out eight tips on how to become a top Internet marketer by building your personal brand.

To illustrate his points, Park links to a number of successful bloggers and marketers, many of whom have great stories and advice.

One marketer in particular caught my eye: Neil Patel, #32 of the top 100 online marketers for 2008. Neil is “just 23 years old and yet has managed to start multiple online businesses and make millions of dollars,” according to Park. (He’s also been quoted in the WSJ and works with big companies, such as AOL and GM.)

I clicked over to Patel’s post, “Why I am sexy, and you are not.” In it Patel lists eight reasons why he’s become successful at such a young age.

Neil has some great tips, but if you’re of a certain age or personality type, some of them may not sit well with you — which is why I used Neil’s tips as a jumping off point. To wit:

1. Location — Although Neil cites living 30 minutes from Los Angeles as one factor of his success, you don’t have to live near a big city to build a thriving business or your personal brand.

Thanks to the Internet, you can now work wherever your heart desires. (I know, because I live close to two farms and can hear cows mooooo-ing in the mornings when I walk the dogs.)

What you do need, however, is connections and thanks to blogging, Twitter, LinkedIn, and email (and myriad other tools), you can make connections with people all over the world.

You can also meet people face-to-face at industry conferences and seminars, local networking meetings, and lunches.

These people will then write about you in their blog posts, feature you in their newsletters, ask you to speak at their businesses, conferences or seminars, quote you in their published books, and more importantly, hire you.

Over time, your fame spreads and your business grows – even if you have cows instead of skyscrapers in your backyard.

“Content is king!” is a common phrase. It used to mean that content drove targeted traffic and leads/sales.

Now it means developing what Jill Whalen, of High Rankings, terms, “madlib spam pages where you simply substitute keyword phrases from one page into another.”

In her latest High Rankings Advisor e-newsletter, Jill talks about setting realistic SEO expectations. It’s very difficult now to rank well for keyword phrases — even those that aren’t that competitive in terms of search traffic. 

In addition to hundreds of thousands of sites now jockeying for position, Google continues to make changes to the search experience on a regular basis.

(For example, if you’re logged into your Google account, you can move search listings up and down on the page! And, Google will show you results based on your own search history while also serving up results based on your IP address.)

As Jill points out, this doesn’t mean SEO is dead, but it certainly does mean that you need to set SEO goals based on your **business strategy** — not on being “number 1″ for a keyword.

A good SEO strategy includes specific SEO tactics, such as using the right keywords that drive qualified (or targeted) traffic AND creating content that helps drive conversions — from getting people to sign up for your e-newsletter or downloading a white paper to viewing an online demo or actually buying a product.

(It also includes all sorts of other things, such as social media and viral marketing, public relations, and integrating traditional offline tactics.)

Unethical SEO companies will tell you that they can make your site #1 for dozens of keywords (I know, because I’ve had plenty of people call me who have shelled out thousands of dollars with little return after working with these companies).

The SEO/marketing firms you can trust, however, are those that will tell you the truth — that SEO, like marketing, is a long-term strategy that requires consistent and strategic application.