Happy Hour with AC's SEO Expert

Tomorrow evening, Associated Content will be hosting another "Happy Hour" discussion in the Forum, this time with our Director of Analytics & SEO, AC Miguel.

When: Wednesday, 8/26, 5pm EDT
Where: In the "General Discussions" section of the AC Forum

Miguel is AC's in-house SEO expert, and he'll be sharing some of his tips for creating highly-discoverable, search-friendly content for the Web. He'll also be responding to questions from the community.

If there are any particular topics you'd like for him to address tomorrow, leave a comment on this post. See you tomorrow in the Forum!

Town Hall This Wednesday on Using SEO to Make Your Content More Discoverable

This Wednesday, May 6th, at 8:00 pm EST, Associated Content is hosting a Town Hall.

Hosted by our in-house SEO expert Miguel, this Town Hall will review ways to use SEO to make your AC content more discoverable. He'll cover topics like keyword density, title writing and effective search tags.

Basic Search Engine Optimization is an essential part of publishing for the Web, and it's simple once you've gotten the basics down. Sign up to attend here.

If you are unfamiliar with SEO and would like to do a little background reading before Wednesday evening, visit this article by Mutha.

Firsthand Testimony from an AC Newbie

This is the 2nd installment in our weekly series of guest bloggers here on the AC blog.
Today's guest is Radell, who joined AC on March 2, 2009.

Thank you to AC Laura for her gracious invitation to me, a mere Newbie, to write as a guest on AC’s Blog, and thank you to all the AC writers (a.k.a. Sources) who take the time to read this post, or were instrumental in helping me learn the ropes. I owe you all!

I hail from a print media writing background (newspapers and magazines), so I’m not totally new to writing for pay, but the online writing term “SEO” through me for a loop, initially. However, that was nothing compared to the difficulty I had once I learned the term’s meaning and set about actually trying to do it!

For those of you still in the dark, SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization; but don’t ask me to explain that process in this short write-up, I can’t do it. I’m just not qualified. Fortunately for you I know someone who is, and she wrote two AC articles about it this month: Momie Tullottes.

Visit Momie’s articles, entitled “Tips on Writing for AC and the Web Part I: SEO Tips” and “Tips on Writing for AC and the Web Part 2,” for everything you need to know as a newbie.

If you don’t master SEO, or don’t even want to try, then you will knock yourself out of one of the big reasons to write for AC in the first place, and that is Performance Payments. What writer doesn’t want to kick back one day and rake in the dough for articles they wrote a year or so earlier (that’s what is driving Heidi Hutchinson, a new AC Source who is already an established writer elsewhere)?

From what I’ve been reading in the AC Forum’s General Discussion section, some more seasoned AC Sources are raking in page view checks over $500 a month (Pam Gaulin is a good example). Make the effort to learn SEO and you’ll start receiving those payments fairly soon after joining.

To get a more in-depth idea of all the learning curves I have experienced as a Newbie – and tips I have learned along the way – read my Newbie articles (there are 4) on my profile page.

I would be remiss if I didn’t close this post with a nod to some of the AC Sources I have met who went out of their way to make me feel welcome: Tamara Waters, AC Category Editor for Home Improvement, the “Gardening Guru” to me, has gone above and beyond on my behalf. Thanks Tamara! Do yourself a big favor and read her articles. Momie Tullottes, winner of this month’s “AC’s Best” in the Parenting Category, is willing to lend a hand when asked and, of course, the two sisters who have been amazing from from practically day one, Coral Levang and Soldierz Soul. These two are a wealth of encouragement for a Newbie, so visit their profiles, too!

Take the Unofficial Associated Content Challenge

CP Amy Browne gets AC.
A Clout 10, Top 1,000 CP with 1.2 million pageviews under her belt, she's fed up with rumors that Associated Content is a scam, and has taken action.
Amy just issued the Unofficial AC Challenge to prove that articles on Associated Content can and will earn page views if you take a few simple steps to make them do so. All of the successful CPs on AC have worked hard to earn their PVs and ANYONE can do it if they put in some effort.
This challenge is still unofficial but I wanted to be sure that blog readers saw it in case they'd like to participate.

Ease the Pain of the Current Financial Crisis

Things are bad. Probably even worse than I can wrap my head around since nothing but bad news has been coming from Wall Street this week. The economy is in a slump, gas prices are high, the job market is shrinking...the list goes on.

But not everything is terrible! Things are still moving right along at Associated Content. Our CPs are working hard to supplement their incomes on AC. By answering calls for content and frequently submitting new video, text, and audio recordings, our busiest CPs are easing the strain on their bank accounts. If you're looking to up your earning, now is the time to join the ranks of our especially savvy CPs by taking extra steps to ensure that your content is optimized for search (SEO) so that your articles gather a lot of page views. Promote your content! Put links to your AC profile on your Facebook, Squidoo, Myspace, Twitter and other social network sites.

We have lots of lessons on how to optimize your earning potential in the Tutorials section of the Forum. If you have specific questions please post them in there, your fellow CPs are full of great advice and are always happy to help out. Hang tough through the bad news this week and keep working hard.