Bloggers: Winning Like Charlie Sheen

When you are struggling along with a low PR and cannot figure out how to compete with the big boys, the deck seems stacked against you. You may not be able to match a competitors budget or have the man hours to go on a massive one-man link campaign, but you can compete. The key rests in your content. Thanks to the love Google shows new content, like Charlie Sheen, you can be Winning!!

The key is in knowing how to pick your battles. Posting any old content and hoping for the best just because it is new is not the answer. The key lies within walking a submissions tightrope that provides relevant content to your site in a timely enough manner that you get indexed ahead of your competitors and steal a little bit of their thunder. Focus on winning just one day at a time – and here is how.

For our example, let’s say you own a sports memorabilia store in Atlanta, Georgia. You have a site with a PR3, and the three stores you are competing with in the metro area are each PR6. You have similar inventories, but you offer better deals to your customers. The problem however is that you have too few customers because your site is buried behind the competition. How do we fix this?

In this specific example, the first step is adding a feed to your site bringing scores and updates from the sports world. Give your visitors more than just sales copy, keep them connected with what they loved real time. You can choose to go with a feed that limit’s the information being streamed to local teams if you prefer. The point is that you have regular relevant updates coming in.

If you haven’t already, start a blog. Don’t limit the scope of your blog to things like upcoming sales or changes in store hours, use it to engage visitors. This is where you can scoop your competition. Use your blog to recap recent games with your own unique commentary. When an athlete dies, eulogize them in your blog (linking back to an item of theirs for sale on your site of course), host a countdown to a milestone record like Derek Jeter’s march to 3,000 hits, or flat out rip into the local coach/manager for a boneheaded tactic that cost his team a game.

Consider running a contest that draws people to your site. Consider something along the lines of a ticket giveaway. Get your hands on a pair of  the “it” ticket of the season and perhaps allow each person that “likes” your site on Facebook, links to you from their blog or site, or otherwise promotes you gets entered in the ticket drawing. This often works because tickets are expensive, tentonbud, people love contests, and they can enter for free – it just takes a click. Before long, word of your contest has spread and you are getting more visitors than you ever had before – and likely making some extra sales along the way.

It all comes back to you keeping your site and blog updated and relevant. When your competition is only promoting sales and upcoming shows, you are matching them in that and providing something extra. When you cover recent relevant events as they happen, you increase your chance of building up to being indexed on the Google news feed. Innumerable good things happen if you provide new quality content – you just have to do it.

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