Black Blogs and Blog Building Tools

If you are looking to generate more traffic for your blog here are a few great sites to look into and join:

Technorati
Blog Catalog
Feed Burner
Black Women Bloggers
Black Blogs : Search Urban Directory
Black Blogs: Black Refer Directory

Originally featured on Black Business Women Connect
http://bwomen.blackgirlclick.com/

$7.95 - Black PR Post Opportunity

Want more clicks? Get a Black Buzz PR Plug...

Quite a few of my readers have asked me to help them generate more online traffic to their websites and from time to time I try to feature various Black Businessess on my websites and blogs. This being the holiday season, everyone is online right now so it is a great time for online businesses to take advantage of innovative ways to be seen.

For the next 3 days I am offering a website plug opportunity for those who are interested in tapping into my growing network. For $7.95 I will post your site summary, article, press release, or product promotion on the following pages:

1. Black Business Women Connect
2. Black Online Entrepreneurs
3. Sistas Making Money [Blog] + 1 Bulletin Post
4. 1 Free Text Only Submission to the Search Urban Directory

This offer expires 12/1/07 so take advantage of it while there is time. This is a great opportunity for those looking to connect with Black Professionals who might be interested in their services AND adding your links to relevant pages is a great way to help improve your search engine optimization. The RSS Feeds for these sites search engine friendly and are featured on various yahoo groups and social groups like: Black Business Women Connect [the group] and Networking Black Women Who Work at Home [yahoo newsgoup].

Essentially I am offering you the opportunity to have your submission posted on multiple pages, to increase your online exposure.

How does the Black Buzz PR Plug Work?

1. Send your submission/website info to: lhenry@msoyonline.com
   Subject = Black Buzz PR Submission
2. Submit your site to the Seasrch Urban Directory

If your submission is approved it will be posted online and you will recieve a paypal invoice. All submissions will be screened, and not all will be accepted. I will only approve content that is relevant to African American online viewers and that does NOT include profanity, violence, or pornography. I also am NOT accepting submissions that include large images or consist of more than 1, small, tasteful relevant image.

Take advantage of this and take care!
lh.

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Urban Dynamics Black Business Web Tools
http://www.msoyonline.com/ud

Urban Gift Guide

Make your Christmas a Mahogany Christmas with the Urban Gift Guide.This site features the best quality Black Gifts from Black Celebrity fragrances to Black Movies and Magazines. Let the Urban Gift Guide help you find the perfect gift for all your loved ones.

Black Freebies on Black Friday

Here are a few choice Black Freebie offers in honor of Black Friday.

1. Carol's Daughter - Share the Love Sweepstakes
   Enter to Win Mary J Blige Cds, Carol's Daughter Gift Baskets, Rocawear T Shirts and more.


2. Free Lip Gloss from Queen Latifah's Cover Girl Collection


3. Essence Magazines Get Even Contest
   Win Free Cosmetics for Your Skin


4. 75% Off Black Business Marketing Guide


5. Mahogany Momma's Fabulous Fall Sale: eMagazine for Black Moms


6. Aretha Franklin CD Contest


7. Visit Giveaway of the Day.com


8. Free College Cds, Scholarships and Application Waivers for Black Students


9. Get Free Black Clipart for Your website of myspace page!


10. Join the Black Freebies Email List: It's Free!

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African American Christmas
Holiday Movies, Books, and Gift Ideas
Urban Gift Guide

75% off Black Business Online Marketing Guide

Build Your Black Business Online
by LaShanda Henry
75% off Coupon in Honor of Black Friday!

"Build Your Black Business Online" is an eBook for Black Entrepreneurs interested in expanding their business online. This guide features information about how to market, network, advertise, promote your business online and more.

Coupon Code: 5683H27E
Expires: 12/5/07

View more info Buy Book Now

Build Your Black Business Online featured on Urban Dynamics Black Business Web Tools

Get more discounts with this coupon code! View other Business, Family, or Educational eBooks that you can purchase using this Coupon Code.

Urban Banner Design - Only $15

Graphics Design Available
468x60 pixel Banner Design - $20
120x90 pixel Banner Design - $15
Other Sizes - request pricing information

Email for Details:
lhenry@msoyonline.com

Graphic Examples

Do you already have a banner that you want to promote? Looking for Low Cost Banner Advertising? Review multiple shades of you add packages starting at $19.95, online advertising opportunities designed with African American websites in mind. http://www.msoyonline.com

Do you read my Black Business Blog?

I'll be posting quite a bit of Business related posts this month, so I won't be able to cross post them here and on my other favorite spaces. If you want to stay up to date with my Business Blog posts subscribe to the Black Business Women Blog: http://bwomen.blackgirlclick.com.
lh.

Making Friends on Myspace

It's no secret that all the hopeful entrepreneurs have flocked to myspace looking for a new audience, new customers, big networks and lots of money. Everyone logs on and sets up a profile, believing that if they build it the friends will come and THEN most sadly realize that that they don't have as many friends as they want and that they quite seem to understand how a site so simple to setup is so difficult to promote on.

First off you need to realize that myspace is full of people just like you, and we are all trying to network our way to the top so in order to get noticed on myspace you have got to stand out. Before I get to the nuts and bolts of how to stand out on myspace and gain more friends, let me first tell you why I think this whole process is important.

As a Black Entrepreneur with limited start up money I've been trying to map Low Budget Marketing down to a science because quite frankly I am more interested in making money than spending what little I have. That being said, Myspace is one of those social networks that - if used properly, can help increase your web visibility without you having to spend a dime. Nice idea right. Of course most people understand this concept, they just don't get how it translates into putting up a profile and adding a bunch of friends you've never met.

Ok, so let me explain that part from a personal perspective. My flagship myspace page, Sistas Making Money has almost 3,000 friends, which is an impressive size friend list to some and practically minuscule to others. Either way, it is a community that I built filled with businesses, entrepreneurs, and women who are interested in my products, articles and services. Every time I create a blog post, add a new friend or post a bulletin, I am connecting to thousands of potential viewers and customers in a matters of clicks and minutes. Creating this page has allowed me to not only share my work with others, but find out about some very interesting Black Businesses and entrepreneurs, many of which I would not have discovered on my own, or even through Google.

So in a nutshell that is why I created my page, and how I use myspace to share and network with others. Let me now tell you how I did it so that you can work on building your myspace friend list and making the most of your profile.

After researching myspace marketing (I'm a research fanatic, you should be too), I realized that I was going to have to develop a myspace marketing strategy if I wanted to be seen, so I did the following:

1. Tried to Pick a Name that was Catchy and Relevant to what I wanted to promote. My focus was Black Business Women so I decided to go with Sistas Making Money, because every body wants to make money so the chances of people clicking on my profile to see what it was about what high.
2. You also want to make sure you set an eye catching profile image. Folks love the Sistas Making Money logo, it stands out. In a sea of myspace profiles, you want to up your chances of being noticed in a crowd.
3. Two things I personally avoid in my design are embedding music, if I am not a musician and using background images that make it hard to read my profile text. Sometimes too much flash makes viewers run fast. I personally like adding friends with cool but simple layouts, clear links to their website, great product photos, and interesting blogs.
4. My most important criteria for adding friends is whether or not they meet my target audience. I don't believe in adding every person that sends you a friend request just to up your numbers because at the end of the day when I am sending out blog posts and bulletins I want to know that my list is largely comprised of people who are interested in what I have to say, rather than myspace fantatics looking to up their friend count. Don't get me wrong, I make it a point to add a few random friends every now and again, but 90% of my Sistas Making Money friend circle is comprised of Professional, Innovative Black Women entrepreneurs. I like it that way, and keeping it that way also helps the friends in my circle easily navigate my friend list and find interesting people to add to their circle.
5. Which brings me to my BIG point about making new friends on myspace. For at least the first month that I created Sistas Making Money I spent at least three hours a week looking for friends and manually adding them to my list. This amounted to only a few hundred friends but the end result was a list that quickly started to build itself. Once you pass the 500 mark by manually adding friends and accepting friend requests as they come in, you will start to find that more people are requesting your friendship which means less work for you.
6. Again, I want to emphasize that I tried to make friends with folks most relevant to my business and pro Black Women Initiatives. But I didn't try to exclusively link to big profile sites because chances are you won't initially be in their top friend list on their profile page, which means unless you are constantly adding comments to their page (a good way to promote yourself but lots of manual work), you won't get seen on big profile pages so they won't really help build your visibility. In addition to a few high profile pages, mix it up with folks with medium size friend lists, your closest of close friends, and friends with no friend circle at all. It really helps to be in the top listing of a persons profile, because chances are when someone comes to their page to either comment or to find new friends, they are going to click on the pages of the first friends they see.
7. As I mentioned above commenting is also alot of work, but its a great way to show your friends some love and promote yourself at the same time.
8. Don't forget to review my Sistas Making Money friendship circle, and add a few of my friends and ME to your list.

Related Posts:
- Sista-To-Sista: How Online Networking Works
- Black Business and Myspace Marketing

lh.

Black Business Women Online
http://bwomen.blackgirlclick.com

SEO and Search Urban: Black Directory

When it comes to SEO, one of the most common techniques for optimizing your site for search engines, is getting your site listed on other websites that:

• Have Related Web Content
• Generate Strong Web Traffic
• Reach your target Audience
• Have High Goolge Page Rank (a Page Rank of 4 or Higher
• Provide Relevant Banner Exchanges or Ad Packages

The Search Urban Directory was created to do all these things and more, with the primary goal of promoting Black Websites while providing African American online viewers with access to the best, quality Black pages online and highlighting new, websites and information that is relevant to the Black Community at Large. From Black News and Commentary to Websites for Black Women and support for Black Business, Search Urban aims to spread the word about all that is Hot, Positive, Quality, Educational, Entertaining, and Innovative as far as Black Online Content.

The best part of the Search Urban Directory is that it is featured on several sites, so that site submitters get the most exposure possible. Search Urban Sites include:

• Multiple Shades of You Online
• Black Girl Click
• Black Moms Club
  

Review the directory or submit your black website today. Search Urban Directory:
http://www.msoyonline.com/msoyonline_black_search_directory.php