Capital Hosting

Chances are good you’re not going to go on a diet with the goal of learning new marketing lessons, but you might be surprised by how much dieting really can teach you about what you’re doing right—and wrong—to advertise your business using search marketing.

How so? Read on for five important lessons that will help you no matter what business you’re in.

Be consistent. You can’t lose weight on a diet that you’re only following half the time, and you won’t grow your business if you only engage in search marketing every once in a while. The key to success in both cases is to stay as steady and consistent as possible in your approach.

Remember, the goal isn’t a single big push that gives you amazing—but temporary—results. You want to achieve sustainable growth or, in the case of dieting, loss. Your goal should be consistency.

Don’t be afraid to cheat. Cheating means both deciding to go ahead and have that slice of cheesecake and only blogging twice one week instead of three times. Some people get so discouraged when they can’t follow the rules they’ve set out for themselves, they give up entirely after one mistake. Instead of a slice of cheesecake, they cry while gorging themselves on the rest of it; and missing one blog means they might as well stop writing altogether.

Don’t make this mistake. It’s OK to cheat, you just have to force yourself to get back in the saddle. In fact, in some ways, cheating is rather healthy because it keeps you from burning yourself out. If you find yourself cheating too much, though, maybe it means the way you’re going about things isn’t right for you.

Do what works for you. Some people swear by PPC, while others believe you have to grow your site by blogging regularly and incorporating SEO. In the same vein, calorie counting may work wonders for many dieters, but not work at all for others. There is no specific law of marketing or weight loss other than you have to do what works for you and your business. In other words, don’t feel like you’re doing something wrong just because you’re not following someone else’s amazing plan; if you’re finding success, that’s all that matters.

Get a little help from your friends. Everyone’s heard of using the buddy system in weight loss programs. Maybe that means someone who joins a particular diet plan with you or encourages you to go to the gym. Whatever the case, because of their support you are able to be more successful. In terms of search marketing, this means getting backlinks from other sites to increase your search rank through things like guest blogging. As an extra bonus, doing this also helps you to gain credibility as an expert in your specific field.

Big changes won’t — and shouldn’t — happen overnight. Remember, this is about sustainable improvement. Dropping several pounds in a week is a good way to land you in the emergency room, and something that gives you a huge bump in visitors isn’t likely to last. Chances are good they’ll disappear after the initial wave, leaving you right where you were. Your goal should be to find techniques that allow you to experience small but consistent changes over a long period of time so you can not only reach your goals, but maintain them once you get there.

If you’re one of those people who has a hard time believing that change is really happening if you can’t see it, there’s no reason why you can’t let yourself check in on a fairly regular basis so that you can watch the pounds slide off and your visitor numbers grow. Just make sure you’re not doing it so much that you lose heart because the changes aren’t happening as fast as you would like.

---

Josh Weiss-Roessler is a contributor to Weight Loss Triumph, a site where you can save 25 percent on ediets. Get more information here. He enjoys covering the topics of search engine marketing as well as health and fitness. Together with his wife Juliana Weiss-Roessler, he runs the Los Angeles-based company Weiss-Roessler Writing, which offers search engine optimization, content marketing and other copywriting services.