« Previous | Next »
Marketing Wikipedia
Published on 23/07/08
by nordend
How to Use Wikipedia Entries for Lead Gen - 6 Steps to 18% Higher Conversion Rate.
found at marketingsherpa.com Jul 23, 2008
An interesting article since most marketeer seems to prefer using article marketing than Wikipedia, find below guidelines how to market your site on www.wikipedia.com .
Enjoy, David Norden
SUMMARY: Wikipedia’s heavy traffic makes it a tempting lead-generation channel for B-to-B marketers. But you need to follow some strict user guidelines, so that you’re not seen as a spammer when you use Wikipedia to generate leads.Read how a technology marketer sent more qualified traffic back to his own site. His Wikipedia referrals convert 18% more than other traffic.
CHALLENGE
Like most marketers at startup companies, Scott Niesen, Director, Marketing, Attensa, doesn’t have a huge team or a sizeable budget to build a brand and generate leads. To reach potential customers for his company’s RSS technology products, he must focus on ensuring that Attensa has a presence wherever prospects use the Web.
Niesen adopted SEO principals, and he saw social media and Web 2.0 technologies as a good fit for his marketing efforts. “We’re all about RSS and channeling information from blogs, wikis, forums, and other kinds of channels into feed-enabled portals,” says Niesen. “It’s not a big leap for us to go, ‘Oh, social computing, that makes a lot of sense.’”
http://www.marketingsherpa.com/cs/attensa/study.html
One target was Wikipedia. Its massive traffic volume and influence in search engine results is undeniable. The site also tends to attract a tech-savvy audience that researches RSS and other Web 2.0 technologies. Niesen wondered whether establishing a strong presence for his company with relevant Wikipedia entries could help drive traffic to their website.
CAMPAIGN
Niesen and his team bolstered Attensa’s presence within Wikipedia by creating new pages and augmenting existing ones, always using the site’s strict submission guidelines. Simply creating a page for your company and using language that could be considered promotional could get your article flagged as spam and quickly removed.
Here are the six steps they took to develop Wikipedia entries:
-> Step #1. Audit Wikipedia to find potential voids to fill
The team examined Wikipedia’s content to determine what already had been written related to Attensa, its competitors, and RSS technologies. They also looked for information gaps they could fill with new entries.
They searched Wikipedia manually and used a free tool that allows you to enter a keyword to display pages that receive the highest volume of user traffic. The process identified gaps they could fill, such as:
o Attensa-specific page
o Web Feed Server page (generic term for Attensa’s primary product)
They also found existing entries to which they could add information, such as:
o List of RSS aggregators
o Main RSS entry
Their goal, however, was not to create or augment Wikipedia content primarily in a self-serving way. They had to add value by expanding the information available on RSS technology.
-> Step #2. Create new pages to fill voids
Following Wikipedia’s guidelines, Niesen and his team first decided that no Attensa employees would write articles. Instead, they handed over the task to members of their external marketing agency who were experienced Wikipedia users and registered editors. (NOTE: Other agencies who have created articles on behalf of clients have reported that their entries were deleted as a violation of Wikipedia’s conflict-of-interest policy.)
Next, the team employed several tactics to make sure that new entries complied with Wikipedia standards:
- Researched Wikipedia’s guidelines for content creation and editing, including standards for writing style, formatting, editing, adding links, etc.
- Crafted practice articles in the Wikipedia Sandbox – a section of the site that allows members to post draft articles, experiment with formatting, tone, and linking strategies, and receive feedback from the community.
- Contacted site editors by email to state their intentions and ask questions before posting new articles.
- Wrote articles according to Wikipedia’s neutral point-of-view standards, which discourage users from putting spin or bias in articles.
This sentence, for instance, is similar to something that would appear in company marketing materials:
o “Attensa develops RSS technology to get the right information to the right people at the right time.”
For Wikipedia, the team wrote instead:
o “Attensa develops enterprise RSS technology for XML syndication throughout an organization.”
“It’s really taking out all the slick marketing hype,” says Niesen.
-> Step #3. Supplement existing pages
To add value to existing pages on RSS, the team used the following tactics:
- Added Attensa to a list of RSS aggregators
- Included information about RSS technology that could be referenced from a company information source, such as an Attensa Web page or white paper.
-> Step #4. Strategically link related pages within Wikipedia
Guidelines state that content creators should provide relevant links to other Wikipedia articles. The team adhered to this policy when creating new pages:
- For the new Web Feed Server entry, the team included links to entries for Attensa competitors as well as other Wikipedia articles.
- They added links to relevant RSS-related Wikipedia articles under the page’s “See Also” section.
-> Step #5. Use external links to send traffic to Attensa site
Hotlinks are permitted in certain sections of a Wikipedia article, such as External Links. So, the team added links to relevant Attensa Web pages where possible.
Adding external links wasn’t an SEO ploy: Wikipedia discourages sites from using this section as a link-building tool by requiring all external links to carry a “no follow” tag. That tag instructs search engines to ignore a link when calculating a page’s search engine ranking.
Instead, the team drove qualified traffic and leads from Wikipedia to Attensa’s website. Linking tactics included:
- Using concise, targeted pages relevant to the Wikipedia article in question, rather than just linking to the company’s homepage.
- Adding links to Attensa Web pages, data sheets, and white papers in an article’s “References” section.
- Including links to third-party sites on company-specific pages to demonstrate neutrality.
-> Step #6. Track and convert traffic from Wikipedia
Each page of the Attensa website features a box with four calls to action. The box requires users to provide contact information or answer qualifying questions. That way, the marketing team has a chance to convert visitors who land on any page within the company’s website.
Using Web analytics, the team tracked referring traffic from Wikipedia pages, and recorded how many of those customers converted on one of the following four calls to action:
o Start an RSS Feed Server trial
o Get an RSS Feed Server demo
o Read a free data sheet
o Download free RSS readers
In just a few months, the team’s Wikipedia efforts boosted site traffic with qualified visitors. The numbers:o 4% increase in site traffic
o 4% increase in leads overall
o 65 leads per month on average from Wikipedia
o 18% higher conversion rate for Wikipedia traffic
“When I saw those numbers, I was really surprised,” says Niesen. Especially pleasing were “the level of quality and the way we are tracking these conversions, and the ability to get in front of customers and bring them into the sales cycle.”
Wikipedia is a collaborative, constantly evolving site, so the team’s task now is to monitor company- and industry-related pages. They want to be aware of changes being made, participate in ongoing discussions about those pages, and look for opportunities to add more relevant, useful content to the site.
Their article creation effort is still guided by two of the most important factors to keep in mind when using Wikipedia:
- Understand and live by the site’s guidelines
- Always provide value to the Wikipedia community – not just your own company
Useful links related to this article:
Attensa’s Wikipedia Campaign Creative Samples:
MarketingSherpa Special Report: How to Get Your Company Listed on Wikipedia, Part I
http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article.php?ident=30116
MarketingSherpa Special Report: How to Get Your Company Listed on Wikipedia, Part II: Damage Control
http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article.php?ident=30125
Wikipedia Sandbox:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Sandbox
Wikipedia’s Conflict of Interest policy explained:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:COI
Wikipedia’s Neutral Point of View policy explained:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of
view
Wikipedia article traffic statistics are available here:
http://stats.grok.se/
Anvil Media helped develop Attensa’s Wikipedia strategy:
http://www.anvilmediainc.com/
Attensa
http://www.attensa.com
EXTRA NOTES by David Norden
Opposed views: Seems most of the strategy above fail, once the strategy is spotted, so if you apply these techniques, better is to keep you mouth Shut, and pray your strategy isn’t to obvious. Also since you can’t advertise this strategy online, you can only sell your technique on the phone.
http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=19391
BONUS: If you bought from the above article send a payment proof to david.norden AT telenet.be and claim your Free Secret Bonus .
Are you a NEWBIE ? Check out these FREE Gifts !
Visit also our News Marketing site
Free instant access to our Secret Marketing Links Newsletter
That's it. What Next?
Please leave your comment so we know what you think about this article. Trackback URL: Marketing Wikipedia.
Comments on Marketing Wikipedia
One Response
thekohser
24/07/08
Interesting article. Too bad it led to the complete and utter roll-back of everything that Attensa and Anvil Media had accomplished. All the articles are gone now, and all the sockpuppet accounts blocked.
I can’t believe they didn’t consult MyWikiBiz.com before trying this.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.