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Les 6 stratégies de marketing gagnant à adopter en 2022

Les 6 stratégies de marketing gagnant à adopter en 2022

1. Développer et promouvoir un site Web bien conçu et optimisé pour le référencement pour présenter votre activité d’hébergement Web.

2. Créer une présence sur les réseaux sociaux pour promouvoir votre activité et encourager l’engagement des utilisateurs.

3. Utiliser des outils de marketing numérique tels que le référencement payant, les annonces Facebook, les publicités Google AdWords et les campagnes d’e-mail pour promouvoir votre activité d’hébergement Web.

4. Organiser des événements et des webinaires pour promouvoir votre activité et générer des leads qualifiés.

5. Établir des partenariats avec des entreprises et des organisations liées à votre secteur pour promouvoir mutuellement vos activités et bénéficier des avantages de chaque partenaire.

6. Utiliser des outils de suivi de marketing pour mesurer et analyser les performances de votre campagne et ajuster vos stratégies en conséquence.

AfricaPresse

Where Can I get traffic for my website?

Where Can I get traffic for my website?

There are many ways to increase traffic to your website, including:

  1. Search engine optimization (SEO): By optimizing your website for search engines, you can improve its visibility in search engine results pages (SERPs), which can help drive more organic traffic to your site.
  2. Paid advertising: You can use paid advertising platforms like Google AdWords to drive targeted traffic to your website.
  3. Social media marketing: By promoting your website on social media, you can reach a wider audience and drive more traffic to your site.
  4. Content marketing: By creating and sharing high-quality, valuable content on your website and on other websites, you can attract more traffic and build a loyal following.
  5. Email marketing: By collecting email addresses from visitors to your website and sending regular newsletters or promotional emails, you can keep your audience engaged and drive more traffic to your site.
  6. Influencer marketing: By partnering with influencers who have a large following on social media, you can reach a wider audience and drive more traffic to your website.

By Africa Presse

What is the GDPR and what is our path to GDPR compliance?

What is the GDPR and what is our path to GDPR compliance?

We manage so many of our daily activities online that the web has inevitably turned into a giant pool of personal data, which is exposed to a variety of risks, as was the recent case with Facebook.

Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which goes live on May 25th, is aimed at addressing all security risks by enforcing a strict data protection regulation across the EU and beyond.

Learn more about the main principles of the GDPR, how it is meant to protect data privacy and how it will affect our relationship with you and your customers.

What is the GDPR all about?

The GDPR regulation is the most impactful piece of data privacy legislation in the new century.

Coming on the heels of the recent Facebook scandal, which revealed that the data of millions of Facebook users had been misused for the sake of third-party campaigns, the GDPR regulation is designed to regain order in how personal data is handled and stored online.

Despite being an EU regulation, the GDPR practically affects any company that processes the personal information of EU citizens.

That said, it applies to whether or not that company is based in the EU.

For instance, if a US-based company provides goods or services to EU citizens, it automatically falls within the scope of the regulation.

Personal data and individual rights

Approved on April 14, 2016, the new set of rules treats personal data protection as “a fundamental right” of all EU citizens and consumers.

Regarding online services, personal data could include anything from an individual’s name to a physical location or an IP address.

The law also covers browser cookies that can track the web activity of EU individuals.

In an effort to give consumers a bit of power in the so-called “big data” world, the new regulation also gives EU individuals more rights to their information.

All EU individuals will have the explicit right to know whether, where and for what purpose their personal data is being processed.

The GDPR empowers EU individuals to have their personal data erased or not processed further.

They can also object to having their data processed for direct marketing purposes and choose to transfer it away to another provider.

Data protection responsibilities under the GDPR

The GDPR sets out the rights of EU individuals and the respective obligations of data processing companies and organizations in a total of 99 articles.

The main business takeaway is that each company will have to justify the collection of personal data and to follow very strict rules in the process.

The regulation makes a clear differentiation between companies that direct the collection of data (data controllers) and those that actually process it (data processors).

Both controllers and processors will be delegated data protection responsibilities that will make them equally pursuant to GDPR compliance audits.

The GDPR requires companies to revise and update their privacy policies and to make them clearer and more transparent to EU users.

They will need to clearly specify what personal information is collected, for what purposes it is used and what legal basis each purpose is backed up by.

Apart from justifying their data processing activities, however, companies will also need to take specific technical and organizational measures to ensure the highest level of in-house data protection.

Planned GDPR compliance measures on our platform

As a service provider operating on the European market, we are GDPR-bound by default.

Here is a list of the measures that will come into effect on the 24th of May in order to ensure GDPR compliance across our platform.

1. Privacy policy updates

The privacy policy has to mirror each given company’s approach to become GDPR-compliant.

We’ve published a revised version of the Privacy Policy for clients and a brand new Privacy Policy for resellers, which clearly specify our legal grounds for personal data processing, as well as all associated individual rights and data protection responsibilities.

2. Reseller agreement updates

We’ve also updated the Reseller Agreement that governs our relationship with you. You can review it here.

If you are using our Reseller API or are a member of the cPanel Reseller Program, you can take a look at the brand new Data Processing Agreement. It’s our new legal framework, which details how we will process your clients’ data.

3. WHOIS updates

The current public WHOIS system, which is aimed at providing free access to a domain owner’s personal information, is incompatible with the GDPR’s principles.

For that reason, registries and registrars have taken steps to hide the WHOIS details pertaining to the domains they are managing by default.

As an ICANN-accredited registrar and ‘data controller’ for .COM and .NET, we’ve taken measures to hide the WHOIS contact data for all .COM and .NET domains on our platform, in a GDPR-compliant manner.

Registrants who want their personal data to be displayed online, will be able to opt-in to having it exposed in the public WHOIS database via an explicit consent option.

It will be featured in the My Domains section of the Reseller Control Panel and the Domain Manager section of the Web Hosting Control Panel. (as a ‘Whois data disclosure consent’ option in the Edit Whois area).

Until this option becomes available online, you can ask for your registrant details to be disclosed online by opening a ticket.

4. Order form updates

Minor updates have been added to the order form to ensure that customers could consent to specific activities such as having their data stored outside the European Economic Area (EEA).

5. Reseller hosting platform updates

ResellersPanel’s reseller hosting model is not fully compatible with the GDPR’s data privacy standards.

Following a consultation with data protection advisers and learning from our industry’s best practices, we’ve had to initiate a few important, GDPR-compliant updates to our reseller hosting platform.

Those updates include:

  • A revision of the List Clients section of the Reseller Control Panel, after which you will see the following per-client information: Username, Type of Service, Date of Purchase and Expiration Date;
  • A revision of the client’s Control Panel when accessed from the Reseller Control Panel via the “Login as reseller” button, after which you will only see information that does not directly or indirectly identify the given client as far as their personality is concerned. Here is a quick list of the new changes:
    • the following sections are no longer accessible – Change Contact Details, Change Password, Recurring, Invoices, Social Media Accounts, Feedback, Webmail, ID Protection, Wallet;
    • the names of all mailboxes in the account will be hidden, with the option to change the password – disabled.
    • in the File Manager section, the following options are no longer available – View, Edit, Download;
    • in the MySQL and PgSQL Databases sections, the option to change the password is disabled;
    • in the Registered Domains section, the option to edit the WHOIS for a domain is disabled;
    • in the Remote Backups section, the “Available Accounts” list is removed;

In other words, in accordance with the GDPR regulation principles, which come into force on May 25th, you will be able to recognize your customers by the very details of the service they’ve purchased rather than by their personality.

For now, we don’t plan to stop our partners from manually creating accounts for their customers using both the public order form and the Reseller Control Panel.

If you are signing up your customers yourself, make sure that you familiarize them with the Privacy Policy and with the special, explicit-consent opt-in box for entering into a contract that will be featured on the order form starting from May 24th.

In any case, once the data has been processed by us, it will be hidden from you, since we’ll take full responsibility of its processing (as explained earlier).

5. In-house technical and organizational measures

As mentioned earlier, the GDPR will enforce a set of data protection policies on interested companies and organizations to comply with.

They will all require a substantial investment of resources in technical and organizational data protection measures for ensuring the utmost GDPR compliance level.

We’ve done our best to create an efficient action plan that will help us implement all the newly required measures right on time.

Among them is the very method in which we communicate with the data centers that we are partnering with to ensure that they provide the necessary data protection levels.

Comment protéger sa boite mail des spams ?

Comment protéger sa boite mail des spams ?

Les spams sont des messages indésirables et non-sollicités. Si cet article est consacré aux spams reçus dans les boîtes de messagerie, le spam s’attaque à toutes les formes de communications électroniques comme les forums, les wikis, les réseaux sociaux, les sites internet ou même les moteurs de recherche.

Origine du mot Spam

Les messages indésirables seraient nommés spam depuis 1999. Selon une enquête très sérieuse de la BBC, le mot aurait pour origine un sketch des Monthy Python. Les humoristes britanniques avaient parodié une publicité où le nom de la marque de charcuterie Spam (Une nourriture assez lourde) était répété sans cesse par un groupe de vikings dans un restaurant. Un newsgroup dédié aux Monthy Python aurait vu apparaître en 1999 un fil de discussion rendant hommage à cette scène et composé uniquement de messages contenant le mot spam. Ce trait d’humour se serait répandu de newsgroup en newgroup et le mot spam serait ainsi entré dans le dictionnaire de l’internet !

Le premier Spam de l’histoire

Gary Thuerk est considéré comme le premier spammeur de l’histoire. Bien avant l’apparition du mot spam, le 3 mai 1978, cet employé de DEC a envoyé aux 600 utilisateurs d’ARPAnet, l’ancêtre d’internet, un même message les invitant à se rendre à une démonstration de son entreprise.
Ce message a été très peu apprécié des utilisateurs du réseau et a même été condamné par l’administration américaine, déjà en charge du réseau. Cette pratique avait été jugée non conforme au règlement d’utilisation.

90 % des emails sont des spams !

De nombreuses études ont été publiées ces dix dernières années sur les spams et plus particulièrement sur ceux à destination des messageries électroniques. Le m3aawg, un organisme dédié à la lutte contre le spam, a annoncé en 2010 qu’un peu plus de 80% des messages électroniques étaient indésirables et non-sollicités. L’ENISA, l’European Network and information Security Agency, avait annoncé quelques mois plus tôt que 95% des courriers électroniques étaient des spams! Des études plus récentes estiment qu’au moins 90% des emails envoyés sont des spams.

Plusieurs genres de Spams

La très grande majorité des spams contiennent de la publicité. Ces messages invitent leurs destinataires à visiter un site internet où ils devront sortir leur carte bancaire pour acheter le meilleur et le plus beau produit de la planète, et souvent à un prix battant toute concurrence.

Si les spams publicitaires sont chronophages et envahissants, ils ne sont pas dangereux. Les messages des catégories suivantes le sont.

Tout d’abord, des escrocs peuvent utiliser les spams pour extorquer de l’argent à des personnes peu averties. Les arnaques les plus fréquentes sont la promesse de la remise d’un cadeau en échange d’une somme d’argent ou la proposition d’un travail à domicile contre également une contre-partie financière, destinée généralement à de prétendus frais de dossier.

Le spam peut également être utilisé par les escrocs pour pratiquer le phishing, ou hameçonnage en français. Des messages semblant être envoyés par une banque ou un organisme de confiance demandent à l’utilisateur de se rendre sur un site internet factice où il doit saisir des informations personnelles comme par exemple un numéro de carte de crédit. Une fois les précieuses données récupérées l’escroc peut facilement voler l’identité ou l’argent de sa victime.

Le Spam est illégal

Quelque soit la finalité d’un spam, ce type de message est illégal. Une directive de l’Union Européenne, datée du 12 juillet 2002, interdit, dans le cadre de la protection de la vie privée dans le secteur des communications électroniques, l’envoi de messages commerciaux sans le consentement du destinataire.

La France, s’est appuyée sur cette directive européenne pour promulguer le 21 juin 2004 une loi pour la confiance dans l’économie numérique. Cette loi interdit purement et simplement l’envoi de spams.

Lutter contre le Spam

Ne pas mettre son adresse email sur la place publique

La première mesure à prendre quand on ne veut pas être envahi par les spams est de communiquer son adresse email uniquement à des personnes, des organismes ou des sites internet de confiance.

Une très mauvaise habitude est par exemple d’utiliser son adresse email comme signature sur un forum ou un site internet. Si l’adresse email doit impérativement être rendue public, comme par exemple sur un site professionnel, il est fortement conseillé de ne pas écrire son adresse email en claire. L’email peut être “cachée” dans une image ou être écrite de manière cryptée.

Cette protection n’est pas une fantaisie. Les spammeurs utilisent en effet des robots pour collecter en masse les adresses emails divulguées aux quatre coins de la toile.

Une autre bonne habitude à prendre est de ne pas saisir son adresse email dans le premier formulaire venu.
Une autre bonne habitude est d’utiliser plusieurs adresses email, dont certaines jetables pour les formulaires qu’on ne juge pas importants.

Trier ses messages

La majorité des spams peuvent être identifiés sans avoir à consulter leur contenu. Si vous relevez vos emails via un webmail, l’excellente habitude à prendre est de directement transférer les messages indésirables dans le dossier “spams”. Vous évitez ainsi d’ouvrir un message pouvant contenir un lien vers un site de hameçonnage et vous participez également à la détection des spams pour l’ensemble des utilisateurs. Les services de messagerie analysent en effet les messages marqués comme étant des spams. Cette base de données permet de mettre en place des filtres automatiques. Cette prévention est généralement rendue possible grâce au filtrage bayésien, un système fondé sur l’apprentissage.

Ne pas suivre les liens ou télécharger les pièces jointes d’un message suspect

Si vous avez ouvert un spam par erreur, la seule action à effectuer est de le transférer dans le dossier des spams ou dans la corbeille. Il faut impérativement ne pas suivre l’éventuel lien présent dans le message ou télécharger et ouvrir une éventuelle pièce jointe.

Le suivi du lien peut en effet permettre au spammeur de récupérer des informations personnelles. La pièce jointe peut quant à elle contenir un virus ou un cheval de troie dont l’objectif peut aller de l’installation d’un logiciel fantôme au vol de données.

Sécuriser sa boîte email avec l’installation d’un logiciel anti-spam

Les services de messagerie disposent de logiciels permettant d’assurer le filtrage des messages transmis aux utilisateurs. Si ces logiciels permettent d’éliminer de nombreux spams, les services de messagerie ne peuvent pas se permettre d’éliminer tous les messages “suspects” : leur mission est de transmettre aux utilisateurs leurs emails.

La majorité des services de messagerie ont adopté la politique suivante: ils transmettent les messages suspects aux utilisateurs mais les placent dans un dossier dédié aux spams. L’utilisateur peut ainsi sortir de ce dossier les messages de son choix.

Les utilisateurs recevant leur courrier électronique dans un logiciel de messagerie ont en charge d’installer un logiciel ou un filtre anti-spam. Ces derniers utilisent deux grandes méthodes pour détecter les spams : le filtrage d’enveloppe, où les en-têtes des messages sont inspectés afin de détecter d’éventuelles incohérences et le filtrage de contenu, où le contenu du message est analysé à la recherche d’éventuels motifs indiquant clairement qu’il s’agit d’un spam.

Maintenir ses logiciels à jour

La mise à jour d’un logiciel ou plus généralement d’un système informatique permet de bénéficier de nouvelles fonctionnalités mais aussi de la correction de bugs et de failles de sécurité. Un logiciel anti-spams doit, comme un logiciel anti-virus, être maintenu à jour par les utilisateurs afin de bénéficier des derniers filtres et protections. Il est également conseillé de s’assurer de la mise à jour automatique de la base de données des spams connus.

Conclusion

Le spam existe malheureusement depuis les premiers échanges électroniques. Si la majorité des messages indésirables sont de la publicité, certains peuvent s’avérer particulièrement dangereux et entraîner le destinataire dans un processus long et difficile pour obtenir réparation après une escroquerie.

Trois habitudes simples permettent à l’utilisateur de se protéger du spam et d’éventuels fraudes et arnaques : la transmission de l’adresse email doit être réservée à des personnes ou des organismes de confiance, la boîte de messagerie doit être sécurisée avec des logiciels anti-spam et anti-virus, et enfin les spams doivent être le plus rapidement possible supprimés ou déplacés au moins vers un dossier dédié ou la corbeille.

The Four Types of Bloggers You Need to Work With

The Four Types of Bloggers You Need to Work With

When you run a blog, you’re essentially running a self-made magazine. There are a lot of unspoken rules. Between formatting, how many pictures per post, subject matter, the keywords you should use, and more. If you’re looking for consistent blog readers, you’ll need to keep a high level of content.

One of the best ways to maintain quality content is by guest bloggers. But, who do you pick to blog for you? First, you need to make sure the guest blogger adds value to your blog. They need to be a part of your niche community, or they need to have something of value to share.

One big misconception about blogging is that a guest blogger and a thought leader are the same thing. They’re not. A guest blogger can be anyone with an unusual perspective or a tip they’d like to offer to your readers. Maybe they have a blog that gets a lot of readers, and they want to expand their audience.

A thought leader is a proven guru in their field of study. A thought leader provokes insight or explains processes that are deeper than what you could offer. A thought leader needs to have credential that vaults them above the crowd.

These four bloggers are sure to add value and substance to your blog:

Technical experts

Maybe you run a blog dedicated to Nintendo and old school gaming culture. Why not hook up with someone who knows the in’s and out’s of the hardware? A total pro who can help readers understand why games work a certain way or offer a solution to a machine that’s stopped working. Maybe this blogger can teach your readers tips and tricks to clean their Sega Genesis or keeping their Turbografx 16 in working order when parts are scarce.

Everyone loves How To’s or a niche-related pro-tip. Expert advice is an easy win and always gets a lot of readers. If you play your KEYwords correctly, a blog that offers evergreen content will always rank because the value never diminishes.

Essayists

In years past, newspapers and magazines swore off the long form, kicking it down to two or three pieces per issue. Now that everything is digital, writers have complete freedom to go as long as they like. If in your adventures of gaming, you stumble upon a blogger who can offer a deep cut into gaming history, readers love learning about their niche. If you can mix up the usual content with a few longer pieces, the effect can satisfy many readers tastes because of the options.

As long as the essay adds value and the writing is solid, adding long form could be an excellent way to separate your brand from the pack.

Celebrities

There’s famous and then famous to particular groups of people. Sure, would getting a piece written by Brad Pitt get you some readers? You bet it would. But, let’s be realistic, if you run a blog dedicated to a niche community, it’s best to find the people who stand out, and everyone knows them.

By tapping that celebrity culture, it brings an instant gratification that your blog is cool. No one with a following will just blog anywhere, or so it’s perceived. If you can land a popular gamer or someone who’s well known in the industry, people will view your blog in a much different light. Despite actually not having any significant bearing on your content’s quality, this move works best for gaining awareness with a whole different set of people who didn’t know your blog existed.

Thought leaders

We touched on them earlier, but thought leaders are a crucial score for the success of any blog that deals with a particular community. A thought leader, like a celebrity, lends a different level of credibility to anyone’s blog. Because they’re considered an expert in their field than just famous, the degree of respect is different.

Negotiating terms with a thought leader can be lengthy, but most of the time, having their name attached to your blog is a worthy pursuit. If you want to have a more professional, critically-minded tonality to your blog, working with thought leaders is an awesome way to access knowledge and get content people are excited about.

If you put in the work and mix these personality types in with your content, there’s a great chance you’ll see unique visitors to your blog each week. Just remember to keep the quality high and the reader’s value in mind.

If you’ve got any blogging pro tips, we’d love to hear them. Shoot us a Tweet or leave a comment.

Machielle Thomas, 
What You Need to Know About SSL Certificates

What You Need to Know About SSL Certificates

When was the last time you purchased something online? If you can’t remember, how about someone you know? Odds are the answer is one of the following: today, yesterday, or the day before yesterday. Now let’s hold onto those answers, we’ll need them later.

Online marketplaces, purchases, and transactions are a part of our everyday routine. In addition to that, we live in an age which allows anyone with a little time on their hands to set up shop and participate in online business. When you sign up for a hosting account, it’s usually for a personal hobby, such as blogging, or blogging, or blogging. Or it’s because you have a great product/service and you want to share it. Now whether you’re brand new to hosting or a veteran of the web, you know there are many terms to learn. We’ll help you hone in on one of the most important ones to your business, an SSL Certificate. But first, let’s review some factors that influence online transactions.

Why should I get one?

There are several factors that go into making an online purchase, such as price, quantity, and quality. Those values are usually associated with the product itself, right? Getting someone to trust in a product is one thing, but how can you get visitors to trust in your website? The answer is your SSL certificate. Having one allows you to process credit card and other personal info safely and securely. It allows you to become PCI compliant, which is also a must for online business.

What is an SSL Certificate?

To summarize, an SSL certificate on the front end is the badge that let’s all of your visitors or potential customers know that the information they submit via your site is safe. Security is important, privacy is important, trust is important! That’s the beauty of an SSL certificate. It lets your site’s visitors know those things are important to you too. Without one, you will not succeed in getting your products and services to the people that want them. The symbol that appears when your site has an SSL takes care of half of the battle for you.

How does it work?

We know that on the front end, an SSL certificate is represented by a badge; a symbol that your site is the place to be. But how does it work exactly? The main function of an SSL certificate is to encrypt the information that’s submitted via your website in a way that only the actual recipient of the data can utilize it. In short, no one, except for the person or persons who are supposed to receive it, can read it. Sorry identity thieves and hackers, not on our watch.

When should I get one?

Technically, you can start a blog or a website and not need one right away. In fact, you can even have a website and run purchases exclusively through PayPal without an SSL certificate. While that’s convenient and PayPal is becoming a popular means for transactions, when you’re considering using credit card information for online purchases, PCI compliance requires that you have an SSL certificate. In the long run, we’d recommend that any business gets set up with an SSL cert. If not, you’re telling potential customers that if they’d like to submit credit card information they will need to go somewhere else.

How can I get one?

At Bluehost, we want your online journey to be successful. Getting an SSL with a third party can be a little bit of a hassle, so if you need one and want to ensure a seamless process, we can get you set up. We provide different certificates for different needs and  can help you make sure you get the one that’s the right fit.

Here are the SSL’s we currently offer:

Positive SSL

Comodo’s Positive SSL Certificates are designed for securing intranets, extranets, and websites. These certificates are an ideal and low-cost way of securing your enterprise web server.

Comodo SSL

Comodo SSL certificates provide the strongest protection, greatest flexibility, and can be issued to your website within minutes using our 100% online ordering process.

Positive Wildcard SSL

You can either spend a lot of money and time buying and managing individual SSL Certificates for each subdomain, or you can save hundreds or even thousands of dollars by purchasing just one Wildcard SSL certificate to secure them all.

Comodo Wildcard SSL

Comodo Wildcard SSL secures subdomains such as yourdomain.com, secure.yourdomains.com, and mail.yourdomain.com. One Wildcard SSL certificate saves you money and time by simplifying SSL certificate.

By Eric Ross Anderson

7 Reasons Every Student Should Start a Website

7 Reasons Every Student Should Start a Website

From career boosting to money making, a site of your own comes with the kind of benefits that make a big difference while you’re studying or looking for a job.

1. Think of it as your career ‘game face’

Not only do most recruiters use the web to screen job applicants, more than a third have even knocked back candidates because of their social media activity. According to Andy Sumner at Monster UK, “a Google search will tell a recruiter more than a CV can” — but as scary as that sounds, it’s actually the perfect opportunity to manage your online reputation.

Whatever else you get up to online, a website gives you a professional digital presence to fall back on, as well as a chance of appearing in search results ahead of distracting social stuff. There’s no harm in spreading your personal brand across third-party sites such as LinkedIn too, but starting a website gives you the chance to tell your story in your own way.

2. It’s the ultimate CV

If video content, demos and photos do the best job of showing what you know, a website is what you need. Plus, it’s a lot more discoverable than print or PDF resumes.

An online CV isn’t only a calling card, though: it actively demonstrates you have the skills you say you do(remember the ‘show, don’t tell’ advice about CV writing?). If you’re aiming to get into web design, marketing, publishing— and loads of other professions—a well planned site can sell your enthusiasm for and knowledge of the industry, as well as prove hands-on skills such as coding, picture editing, writing, retail, or flair for SEO.

If your social media already does that, but in lots of different places (Pinterest plus YouTube, or wherever), a website will allow you to keep the highlights in one place — and that means less clicks for employers.

3. You can make money

How to make money from your website is the golden question! Luckily, it’s simple:

Affiliate marketing: Link to partners’ products or services on your site and get a cut of sales from your readers. It’s a neat way to make passive (long-term, low effort) income.

Advertising: Earn cash every time visitors click ads on your site. Google Adsense can automate the process, but if you have the traffic — or the gift of gab — you could make more profit approaching companies directly.

Sponsorship: Allowing retailers to post content on your site (for a fee), or being sent freebies in exchange for a product or service review.

Members’ content: Set up a paid subscribers’ area, or sell downloads of premium content (ebooks, PDFs, insider tips, tutorials, and even audio guides).

Sell products or services: You can sell things you’ve made or can do, too.

There are plenty of other ways to monetize a website but if the ones above sound familiar, it’s because they’re the business backbone of tons of sites you visit everyday. From news and education portals to entertainment, dating, and gaming hubs. And—like them—if you enjoy making content as much as cash, it’s perfectly possible to turn your web work into a whole career.

4. The freedom to do what you love

Got something to shout about? Whatever you care about, you can write, blog or brainstorm it any way you like, including:

Raising money or awareness for a cause.

How-to guides for something you’re an expert in or enjoy doing.

An online journal and/or advice to help others in similar situations.

The freedom to do your own thing is a pretty potent reward but once you’ve got a bank of content, you can always go the monetization route (above). You can also sell your content outright as print or digital books or for use on other websites. It’s great to have the option!

5. A sense of professionalism

It doesn’t matter if you’re applying for jobs or running a business: your own domain name, an email address to match, and some good content looks much more professional. Whether you’re selling products, services, or your career skills, a website demonstrates that you believe in what you’re doing, and are prepared to put in the time and effort.

6. Hands-on experience

Whether you use a website to make money or get your CV seen, there’s nothing like rolling up your sleeves and getting started to see how things work.

Getting and keeping content online is the perfect opportunity to practice problem solving and research skills. You can also perfect your persistence, idea generation, curiosity (how did they do that? And how can I do it?), and network with other influencers. It just so happens, these are all valuable transferable skills as well.

7. It’s ridiculously easy

Luckily, it’s not rocket science! You can start a website — from choosing your domain name and hosting to publishing your first post — in a lunch break or less. Building and buffing your content and brand does take time, of course, but the fewer the hurdles to get to that point, the better.

A website is a bit like a Swiss Army Knife: it’s good for more than one thing. The beauty of it is, you don’t need to be technically minded to be digital. Starting or maintaining a site doesn’t have to take any more time than your average social media fix — and that means bite-size effort, but big-time rewards!

By Ruth Bushi

Why Your Company Needs a Defined Brand and Website

Why Your Company Needs a Defined Brand and Website

Have you ever landed on a website and immediately felt confused? Did the copy and design fail to inform you who the company was, what they sold, or why you should buy from them? Or, on the other end of the spectrum, was the website cluttered with contradicting information, sporadic design elements, and unnecessary functions?

This terrible user experience is the result of a poor branding strategy or a lack of a brand in the first place.

As defined by Entrepreneur, branding is _“the marketing practice of creating a name, symbol or design that identifies and differentiates a product from other products.”_Having a strong brand and corresponding strategy can position your business or personal career competitively in your market or industry. Without it, your company and website become another piece of noise on the Internet.

Considering that consistent presentation of a brand increases revenue by 23% on average, it is vital for your business to have a defined brand. And, with 54% of shoppers turning to a brand’s website for product information, customer service, and personalized shopping, a brand website is more important than ever.

The Importance of a Brand

Reviewing the Entrepreneur definition of branding once again, the goal of a brand is to differentiate your organization, product/services, and identity from that of the competition. While effectively positioning your business in the market is the main goal and benefit of branding, it also offers several other advantages:

A Brand is an Experience

While developing this entity for your business, you, in turn, create a customer experience. Everything from your logo to the interactivity of your website is part of the total brand experience. The way your customer support team answers messages, the content published to your company’s social media profiles, the manner in which customers are onboarded for products and services – it all revolves around your brand.

Your brand has the power to construct a one-of-a-kind experience for your customers. This experience is extended through various online channels, in-person interactions with employees, and other instances. When your brand is unorganized or not defined, this customer experience is disorienting and undesirable.

Branding Leads to Recognition

If given a test of the world’s top brands, the majority of us would pass with flying colors. From McDonald’s to the Walt Disney Company to Sony, we can identify the leading brands in seconds. Having a consistent and established brand strategy works to improve customer recognition of your brand. On average, it takes approximately 5 to 7 brand impressions before someone remembers you. Therefore, those first few impressions need to be strong—not scattered!

Plus, as stated by Reuters, 82% of investors believe that brand strength and name recognition are becoming more important in guiding them in their investment decisions.

Customers Trust Brands

Did you know 48% of consumers expect brands to know them and aid in finding new products or services that fit their needs? This is derived from a level of brand trust. After beginning to recognize and interact with your brand, customers will begin to trust your company for their specific needs.

And, 64% of consumers say that shared values are the main reason that they have a trusted relationship with a brand. If your brand is discombobulated online, how will you be able to demonstrate the value of your company/product/services and earn the trust of your target audience?

You Need a Brand Strategy

After establishing your brand, you must devise a brand strategy. A brand strategy identifies the goals for your brand as well as how to best accomplish them using the various components of your brand including language, the logo, and trademarks (also known as a brand standards guide.) While much of your brand strategy will focus on how to appropriately utilize the brand across marketing and company efforts, Hubspot also identifies 7 components all brand strategies must contain:

  1. Purpose: Define your company’s vision.
  2. Consistency: Ensure a seamless representation of your brand.
  3. Emotion: What is the tone of voice for your brand? How should your brand convey emotion?
  4. Flexibility: Identify how and when to pivot, if necessary.
  5. Employee Involvement: Describe how employees can best represent and promote the brand.
  6. Loyalty: Discuss how to recognize and appreciate your loyal customers.
  7. Competitive Awareness: Analyze your competitors and determine how to differentiate your brand.

With a solidified brand strategy, you can move forward with developing and launching a website that represents your brand in a positive, accurate, and consistent manner.

What Every Brand Website Needs

Remember, the goal of your website is to inform customers and entice them to trust your brand. In turn, they’ll convert into paying customers over time. However, an unorganized, chaotic website design won’t do the trick. You don’t want customers to access your website only to be confused!

In fact, if customers cannot find what they want on your website or homepage, 79% will exit your site and search for another website to complete their task. Considering 81% of customers complete extensive research online before making a purchase, your website needs to have the following components.

A Clear Message

Armed with a defined brand and thorough brand strategy, your marketing team will know how to communicate your brand message via the company website. The website copy should be:

  • Clear
  • Concise
  • Informational
  • Entertaining
  • Captivating
  • Aligned with Your Brand Strategy!

Remember, your brand message must demonstrate your company’s values and why customers should trust and purchase from your business.

A Consistent Design

As outlined in your strategy, your website must contain consistent branding and design elements throughout. After reading this article, take time to explore the Wise Host Website. As you navigate to different pages and products throughout our site, you’ll notice everything from the website copy to the illustrations, layout, and photos are persistently aligned with our brand.

It’d be odd if we had an orange page with an entirely different layout all of a sudden, right? Since color increases brand recognition by 80%, our website is fully in accordance with our brand standards which state a specific shade of blue must be used.

Crucial Company Information

When users land on your website, they want information ASAP. Or, they want to know where on your website they can find that information.

For instance, if you own a restaurant, your website visitors should be able to easily find your menu and your hours of operation. If not placed on your homepage, the website navigation should clearly display these page links/buttons.

Information users commonly look for includes:

  • Products and Services
  • Prices
  • Hours of Operation
  • Product Information
  • Company History
  • Employee Bios
  • Store Location and Directions

Forgetting to include such vital information can leave potential customers with a negative impression of your brand. Be sure to place the important details where visitors can find them.

Launch Your Brand Website

After meticulously developing and defining your brand and strategy, you can share it with the world by creating a WordPress website. Remember, your website is a reflection of your brand—not an extension—make sure it follows your strategy to a ‘T’!

Over to you! Why do you think having a defined brand and website is key for businesses?

Influencer Marketing: Is It the Right Tactic for Your Blog?

Influencer Marketing: Is It the Right Tactic for Your Blog?

By Machielle Thomas, Content Manager

In an ever-changing digital marketing world, bloggers and brands alike are looking for the next big way to generate revenue and website traffic. In 2017 (and for the foreseeable future), that tactic is influencer marketing. As reported by a 2016 TapInfluence study with Nielsen Catalina Solutions, influencer marketing content delivers 11 times higher return on investment (ROI) than traditional digital marketing methods.

With such a drastic ROI, it’s no wonder bloggers are jumping on the influencer marketing train, and from both angles, too. Bloggers are transforming their website and marketing efforts to position themselves as influencers, while also targeting and working with other influencers to promote and distribute content.

As a result of the skyrocketing popularity and success of influencer marketing, you may be wondering: Should I become an influencer? Is influencer marketing the right tactic for my blog?

The answer is a resounding it depends. For some industries, blogs, and brands, you’d be crazy not to take advantage of influencer marketing. However, for others, influencer marketing would be a waste of precious marketing funds.

What is Influencer Marketing?

Defined by TapInfluence, influencer marketing is a type of marketing that focuses on using key leaders to drive your brand’s message to the larger market. Rather than send promotional content directly to consumers with traditional digital marketing tactics, such as email marketing and display ads, influencer marketing relies on outside individuals known as influencers to deliver a message.

Influencers are individuals with moderate to large fan followings on top social media and content marketing platforms including Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, and YouTube. In addition, many of these influencers operate and maintain a blog.

When a brand decides to use influencer marketing as part of their promotional strategy, they must target, connect with, and properly compensate influencers. Often, influencers will create sponsored content featuring the brand and product/service to share on their respective social media channels and blog.

Why Do Brands Use Influencer Marketing?

In an age where anyone can become an advertiser, we are more skeptical than ever about our online activity and purchases. It has been reported that 96% of people believe the advertising industry does not act with integrity, with 69% of these people attributing their mistrust to the advertisers’ desire to sell more effectively.

With this in mind, we look to our friends and trusted sources for recommendations and advice, as well as for guidance on purchases. In fact, 71% of consumers are more likely to make a purchase based on a social media reference.

When brands partner with online influencers, they are looking to prove to customers why they are a trusted company and product or service. With 49% of people saying they rely on recommendations from influencers when making purchase decisions, it’s easy to see why companies hop on the influencer marketing bandwagon.

On top of online sales, brands use influencer marketing to:

  • Drive social media engagement on their brand channels
  • Gain quality backlinks for their online content
  • Generate consistent website traffic
  • Foster a connection with targeted audiences
  • Improve awareness of a brand or specific campaign

While influencer marketing can be beneficial for both parties involved, you need to determine if it is the right course of action for you and your blog before jumping in head first.

How to Determine if Influencer Marketing is Right for Your Blog

First, let’s approach the question from the standpoint of becoming an influencer.

To become an influencer, you must regularly create quality content on your blog and on social media. On top of developing and distributing content, you need to regularly interact with your audience and generate a loyal following of fans. This is not a small feat.

Plus, you must determine if you have a competitive edge in your particular market or niche. What makes you stand out as a blogger or influencer? Can you carve a place for yourself as an influencer? If so, have at it! Work to position yourself in the market and begin partnering with brands as an influencer.

On the other hand, if you are not ready to become an influencer, you can partner with relevant influencers to improve awareness of your brand and blog. However, while a 2015 Forrester report claims 73% of marketers say they have an allocated budget for influencer marketing, it’s not the best tactic for every blog.

To determine if influencer marketing is the right path for your blog, complete the following steps.

1. Ask “Why?”

You shouldn’t invest in influencer marketing because everyone else is. You need to identify why influencer marketing will be an advantageous marketing strategy to accomplish your objectives.

Are you looking to have influencers share and link to your blog content for search marketing purposes? Are you looking to drive more targeted customers to your blog? Perhaps you’re looking to grow your social media following and share your content with a larger audience. All of these goals can be accomplished by collaborating with influencers in your particular market or industry.

2. Set Goals

As with all online marketing tactics, you must set objectives for your influencer marketing strategy. Goals can include:

  • Increasing your social media following by X% over a specific period of time
  • Improving the amount of website traffic from a specific online source
  • Raising the number of brand/blog mentions online
  • Adding more quality backlinks to your blog link portfolio

Without outlining your goals, you will spend money on influencer efforts without being able to quantify the results. This may lead to short-term gains but not long-term outcomes.

3. Ask if Influencer Marketing Makes Sense for Your Industry

Also, before giving the “go ahead” on influencer marketing, you need to identify if the right influencers for your industry exist. Some industries, such as the lifestyle products and travel industries, are overwhelmed with influencers. These blogs and brands have thousands of influencers to vet and choose from. On the other hand, manufacturing businesses and the pharmaceutical industry will have a harder time finding the right influencers to partner with.

You must also determine if influencer marketing truly makes sense for your industry. Do customers rely on the opinions of influencers before purchasing your products or services? For commodities, certain B2B markets, and other industries such as manufacturing, this may not be the case.

Take the time to research your industry and identify influencers that would partner well with your marketing objectives.

Tools to Help You Win at Influencer Marketing

Should you decide that influencer marketing is the way to go, use these tools as part of your strategy:

Followerwonk by Moz

Followerwonk is a free tool from Moz which allows users to search for Twitter influencers based on a number of filters including topics, followers, and social authority.

UTM Parameters

UTM Parameters are tiny bits of code added to the end of a website URL to help marketers track results. Use these parameters when working with influencers to identify how much traffic their content drives to your website or blog content.

BuzzSumo

BuzzSumo is an in-depth content marketing tool which allows you to research topics, influencers, and so much more. This robust tool helps marketers find ideal influencers based on keywords, hashtags, and social media metrics.

SEOquake

If using influencer marketing for SEO and link building purposes, you’ll want to know more about the influencer’s website. SEOquake is a browser add-on that delivers robust information about websites with a few simple clicks.

CrowdFire

CrowdFire enables users to identify people to follow based on interests, industries, and more. In addition, this tool is great for influencers who need to manage their personal social media following and unfollow irrelevant or dormant accounts.

BuzzStream

As one of the leading blogger outreach tools, BuzzStream is an essential asset for influencer marketing strategies. With BuzzStream, brands can analyze influencers, reach out for opportunities, and manage relationships in one place.

Will You Invest in Influencer Marketing?

So, is influencer marketing right for your blog after all? Let us know in the comments section below.

Nom de domaine premium : qu’est-ce que c’est ?

Nom de domaine premium : qu’est-ce que c’est ?

La jungle des noms de domaine est de plus en plus dense : des centaines de millions de noms de domaines sont enregistrés (130 millions de noms de domaine rien que pour le .com). On peut être quasiment certain que tout nom commun ou marque connue est déjà déposé en nom de domaine (ou être plus rigoureux a déjà été réservé auprès d’un registrar).

Parmi ces noms de domaine, on distingue les noms de domaine premium très prisés dans les secteurs pertinents et par les speculateurs du second marché. Mais quelle en est la définition exacte ? Et qui en décide ?

Qu’est-ce qu’un Nom de domaine premium ?

On s’accorde pour définir un nom de domaine premium d’un nom de domaine normal par 3 caractéristiques.

Il doit être court, mémorisable facilement et surtout signifier quelque chose.

Les 2 premiers critères sont très complémentaires et permettent d’avoir un grand avantage sur les moteurs de recherche très souvent utilisés comme “barre de recherche” : ils privilégient par défaut les noms de domaines courts (même si l’internaute entre une expression plus longue contenant le mot/nom du site).

1. Un nom de domaine premium doit être court

Ce n’est pas nouveau : plus un nom de domaine est court, mieux c’est ! Ainsi des noms de domaine tels que 360.fr, abc.fr ou encore wi.com valent très chers et sont très recherchés. De par leur petite taille ils revêtent à eux seul deux des principales caractéristiques d’un domaine premium, ils sont courts et mémorisable !

2. Un nom de domaine premium doit être signifiant

Il doit évoquer quelque chose pour l’internaute un peu comme un drapeau, une bannière. En général, on dit qu’un NDD est signifiant quand il reprend un mot ou une expression commune, significative du domaine d’activité dont on parle.
Bien que le nom de domaine ait moins d’importance dans le référencement naturel qu’il y a quelques années, un mot clé utilisé comme nom de domaine est toujours un plus en termes de SEO, notamment quand le site aura un contenu en accord.

3. Un nom de domaine premium doit être mémorisable

Les points 1 et 2 font que normalement, le nom de domaine Premium est aussi mémorisable. Un nom de domaine mémorisable permet dans une certaine mesure de s’affranchir du passage obligé par les moteurs de recherche car les gens chercheront alors le site DIRECTEMENT.
De plus, dans la viralité bouche à oreilles que tout le monde veut, un nom mémorisable est vraiment un avantage.

Enfin, un nom mémorisable est très utile pour passer du papier à l’Internet. Quand vous imprimez des flyers ou des plaquettes, un nom de domaine mémorisable permettra de rebondir sur Internet plus facilement.

Un Nom de domaine premium attire les internautes

Un nom de domaine Premium tel que nous l’avons défini plus haut permet d’attirer beaucoup d’internautes qui en voyant ce nom pensent qu’il s’agit de l’”oracle” ou du leader incontestable du secteur. C’est un peu ce qui s’est passé avec hotels.com pour Expedia ou makeup.com pour L’Oréal.

Les NDD Premium coûtent parfois plus cher

Dans certains cas, et avec les nouvelles extensions, les noms de domaine Premium sont facturés plus chers à l’enregistrement initial.

Ainsi, par exemple, la valeur de romance.online est 100 fois celle de romance.bet à l’enregistrement initial. Les Registres fixent ainsi des prix plus élevés pour certains noms de domaine Premium présentant un fort potentiel commercial pour son acquéreur. Cela permet notamment d’éloigner les domainers dont le seul but est de les revendre à prix d’or sur le second marché. Ainsi, le domaine a beaucoup plus de chance d’être réellement utilisé.

Chaque Registre définit la politique qu’il souhaite à ce niveau tant en termes de nombre de domaines concernés dans leur(s) extensions(s), qu’en termes de tarification. Par exemple, certains Registrent proposent le même prix pour tous les domaines qu’ils considenrent comme premium, alors que d’autres offrent des prix très différents. Parfois aussi, le prix du renouvellement est standard et seul le prix de l’acquisition initiale est supérieur.

Le Registre du .com, par exemple, offre des prix très larges pouvant aller de plusieurs milliers d’euros comme pour toutsurlecine.com, coursdechinois.com ou encore thefrenchbaguette.com, ou des prix plus accessibles comme pour vindivin.com ou toutsurlecine.com. D’autres extensions offrent même certains domaines Premium à moins de 100€.

Par extension, les bureaux d’enregistrement appellent souvent aussi “premium” les domaines issus du second marché : le marché des noms de domaines déjà enregistrés. Le bureau d’enregistrement joue alors un rôle de médiateur : ils mettent à votre disposition ou peuvent négocier pour vous le nom de domaine en question.

Chez certains bureaux d’enregistrement, les NDD Premium sont associés à un pack complet

Certains registrars proposent les noms de domaine Premium avec d’autres services, dans un pack complet. Ainsi, le client a en plus du NDD, un espace email, un espace web, des sous-domaines illimités, la gestion des DNS ainsi qu’un service d’assistance par téléphone et par message. Ceci lui permet donc d’utiliser directement son nom de domaine sur le web.

En conclusion, un nom de domaine Premium est un nom de domaine court, mémorisable et qui a une signification commune dans le domaine où vous ouvrez sur internet. Un tel nom de domaine est bien évidemment intéressant mais il peut coûter plus cher qu’un nom de domaine classique. Il s’agit donc d’avoir une réelle stratégie afin de le rentabiliser et de profiter de son potentiel complet.