Xeal Online Publicity

There's one surprisingly simple secret to getting the most out of search engine optimization. It will make it easier, it will make it more effective, and it won't make your SEO company cringe in fear.

Want to know what it is?

Start SEO before you ever build your site.

It really is that simple. And here's why:

1) Your site will have a focus from the get-go.

With SEO, you're creating a site with the user in mind (with "user" here being both search engines and customers). That means you need to be thinking about that user with every decision you make, from coding and design to layout and copy. An unfocused website will not bring nearly the same kind of sales or conversions as a website that is targeted for a specific keyword and a specific group of people.

If you wait till the end of your web project to incorporate SEO, you'll have to start over from scratch in many areas.

2) You'll write your content right the first time.

I can't count how many times we've gotten a new client, taken a look at their site, and let out a collective groan. There are no keywords; it's all meaningless "happy talk"; it focuses completely on the company and not at all on the customer. That isn't good for rankings or, more importantly, for sales.

For good search engine rankings and better conversions, your site needs engaging, keyword-rich content that focuses on the benefits your product or service provides. Keyword research before you ever build your site helps you target both your content and your audience.

3) Your website design will have search engines in mind.

Believe it or not, SEO isn't just about what you see on the site. It's also about the code behind it. If a website has sloppy code or is entirely flash-based, search engines won't be able to read it. Needless to say, this negatively affects your rankings and traffic.

Redoing the code on your site after it's already been up for awhile is a huge hassle. A website designed with SEO in mind has clean code, simple navigation, and keyword-optimized tags, among other things. You know how much trouble it is to design and build a website once. Who wants to have to redo the whole thing for SEO?

To get the most out of SEO, you need to do it first.

That's not to say it is impossible to optimize your site after it's built. But SEO isn't something that can be tacked on at the last minute for instant results. It's a long-term strategy that will increase your results over time. It's often months before SEO truly starts to have an effect. However, with proper optimization and patience, that effect can build immense results for your business.

About the Author
Michelle Pierce is the assistant editorial director for Xeal. To find out more about SEO and Internet marketing, contact Xeal today at 1-866-XEALWEB.

Once upon a time, there was a young woman who wanted nothing more than to write novels. She read everything she could about writing novels. She went to college to learn more about the art of writing.

Then, she graduated and discovered an important truth. In the real world, novel writing seldom produces two paychecks a month. And so, she searched and searched for the perfect job.

In her search, she stumbled across a marketing company that needed a writer.

"Why, that's perfect!" she thought.

The young woman took the job. She sat down on her first day to write her very first words, only to realize one tiny detail she had overlooked.

Writing sales copy was nothing like writing a novel, and she had no idea how to do it.

Oops.

Scary, but true

That young woman was me.

Once it hit me that I had absolutely no idea how to write to sell, I went in to heavy research mode. I read everything I could get my hands on about writing sales copy. I read websites, blogs, books, magazines, the copy on credit card offers and magazine subscription renewal letters, you name it.

Because of that, I've picked up a lot of knowledge over the past two years. Some of it works, some of it doesn't. Here are the five most important lessons I've learned about writing copy that sells.

1) What's in it for them?

When you're writing about your new product, you probably think first to focus on its features. People have to know what your product is in order to want to buy it, right?

The lesson I learned the hard way: People don't care what your product is. They want to know what your product does. More specifically, they want to know what your product does for them.

When you're writing, don't focus on features. Focus on benefits. What are a few ways that your product will help your customers save time? How can they use it for profit? What are some ways they might use it that you haven't considered?

Make your sales copy all about them.

2) Give them a reason why.

According to blogger Brian Clark, the two most important words in writing persuasively are "you" and "because." We've already covered "you," so it's time for "because."

The lesson I learned the hard way: When you want somebody to take an action, give them a reason why.

"Because this will save you money."
"Because this will give you more time with your family."
"Because it will earn you the respect and admiration of your co-workers."

"Because" is a powerful psychological trigger. You're providing justification for the action that you want them to take. Don't just imply it. Flat-out say it, because using "because" will make your writing that much stronger.

3) Always have a call to action.

You write this lovely, eloquent, emotionally moving copy that will bring your readers to tears, only to get to the end and…do nothing with it. No email link, no phone number, no "buy now," NOTHING.

The lesson I learned the hard way: Always, always, always include a call to action. If your copy has done its job, you've persuaded people to take an action. Give them a chance to take that action.

Once you've made your case, encourage your readers to take the next step, whether it's to make a purchase or to contact you for more information. Make sure you have a nice, obvious "click here" link to make it even easier for them.

4) Snappy headlines are a must.

You know what they say about first impressions? In the case of sales writing, your headline is the first impression you make on your reader.

The lesson I learned the hard way: If it's not written well, your headline will be the only impression you make on your reader. Because your headline is the single most important thing you will write, it will take a few revisions to get it absolutely perfect.

The good news is that you don't have to craft a clever headline from scratch. People have been writing successful sales headlines for decades, and they've found a number of formulas that work. If you're stuck, look here and try one of these.

5) Know your audience.

The number one most important rule of copywriting is to know your audience. And I don't mean just know that they're women between 25 and 50 who operate their own businesses. Know their hopes, dreams, fears, problems and secret desires. Know their priorities.

The lesson I learned the hard way: You must be able to empathize with your audience. When you know them well enough to empathize with them, you can mirror their thoughts, answer their objections, and make them trust and like you. Why? Because people buy from people they like.

Read the magazines they read. Hang out on the forums where they hang out. Survey customers and find out what they like. If you can empathize with your audience, then you've mastered the most important tool in your sales writing arsenal.

And one bonus tip, just for fun:

6) Grammar, spelling, and punctuation still matter.

Ever heard the joke about the panda that walks into the bar? He sits down, has a meal, pulls out a gun, shoots at the bartender, and then walks right back out. The bartender wonders what in the Sam Hill just happened, and pulls out an encyclopedia. The entry under panda says, "Eats, shoots, and leaves."

You don't have to make the AP Stylebook your Bible (in fact, it's probably better if you don't), but don't throw the whole "guide to grammar and punctuation" out the window. Spelling, punctuation, and grammar exist to clarify what we write. Use them properly to get your point across in a clear, professional way.

If those areas aren't your strong suit, get somebody else to look over your writing and invest in a dictionary. Trust me; it'll be worth it in the long run.

Looking for help getting the copy on your site to sizzle, spark, and sell? Call 1-866-XEAL-WEB and get the ball rolling.

About the Author
Michelle Pierce currently provides copywriting and PR services for Xeal Precision Marketing. You can email her at michelle at xeal dot com with any questions or comments.

There's no greater competition on the Internet than the fight to get to the top of the search engines. An entire industry has sprung up around search engine optimization and search engine marketing. Some companies make outrageous, tempting, but too-good-to-be-true promises about getting you to the top of Google, Yahoo, and other search engines.

Like any other business, SEO has its real gems and its terrible scams. Before you search for an SEO company for your site, here are a few SEO "tricks" that could get your site penalized, or worse, blacklisted for good.

1) Keyword stuffing is not the path to success.

Search engines are always looking for keywords, so the more you have on the page, the better, right? If you just repeat two or three keyword phrases 50 times on your home page, surely you'll rank higher than everybody else!

Well, no. Keyword stuffing is a big no-no in the world of SEO. It doesn't matter if you color the keywords the same as the background or put them into meta tags (both methods discussed below). Shoving keywords on your site – especially irrelevant keywords – merely for the sake of rankings will get you into big trouble with the search engines.

The recommended keyword density for sites is about 4 percent to 8 percent. So, if you've got 500 words on your home page, at the most only 40 of those should be keywords.

Search engine optimization is the art of strategically placing keywords in your content without making it look like you're putting plenty of keywords in your content. You want search engines to see what your site is all about, but you don't want to detract from the user experience. Keyword stuffing does exactly that, and will hurt you in the long run.

2) Hide your passwords, not your keywords.

Some websites hide keywords or links by making the text the same color as the background, or through other coding means (meta tags or putting text behind images, for two examples). The logic here is that users can't see them, so it doesn't detract from the user experience, but the search engines will read them, so it still boosts your rankings.

This is not the case. Search engines will actually penalize or even ban your site if you have text that is the same color as the background on your website. It's just another way of trying to "beat the system," and search engines don't like that.

3) Meta-tags are so 1990s.

A brief history of meta tags: Long, long ago in 1996, when there was no Google and search engines were not nearly as sophisticated as they are today, meta tags were a handy indicator that told search engines what your page was about. The meta description tag and meta keywords tag were only visible to the search engine spiders, not by somebody viewing your page through a browser.

For example, if you had a page about Acme widgets, then your description might have said "Everything you ever wanted to know about Acme widgets." Your meta keywords might have included "Acme widgets," "history of Acme widgets," and "building Acme widgets."

However, people got greedy and started stuffing the meta tags with keywords, repeating phrases like "building Acme widgets" over and over in an effort to boost their search engine rankings. Search engines now use more sophisticated algorithms and meta tags are all but extinct.

If anybody tries to tell you that meta keyword tags are a magical solution that will shoot you to the top of the rankings, they either don't know what they're talking about, or they're trying to scam you. Leave behind the era of spinning gifs and blinking text and bring your website into the 21st century.

4) Avoid duplicate pages and duplicate content at all costs.

We had a marketing client recently who had three websites with identical home pages with identical title tags and identical content. Guess what Google did to his site? If you picked "flagged him for a duplicate content penalty and quit listing the site in search results," you would be correct.

Duplicate pages and duplicate content negatively affect your search engine rankings, and also detract from the user experience. If you visited a site and saw the same article on three pages, even if the major keywords were changed ("constructing Acme widgets" instead of "building Acme widgets"), wouldn't you feel cheated?

Unique and useful content on all of your pages will make both search engines and your visitors happy.

5) Don't harvest from link farms.

It's not just keywords that are considered with search engine rankings. Incoming links are also important. If other sites think yours is worth linking to, then search engines will give it more weight as well.

Link farms horribly twist this concept to be about the quantity of links rather than the quality. Link farms are groups of sites that all link to one another, regardless of how relevant those links are, in an effort to boost traffic and rankings.

Link farms can grow to encompass hundreds of thousands of links, but they're shallow, meaningless, and unprofessional, and search engines HATE them. When it comes to links, link to sites that are relevant to your users, and see if those sites will link to you. A hundred relevant inbound links will help you much more than 10,000 from a link farm.

Remember the user experience

Search engines are here to serve the users and deliver them good content that's relevant to what they're looking for. Search engine optimization is simply doing your best to ensure that your quality content is catching users' eyes and search engines' spiders. Keyword stuffing, hidden links and keywords, meta tags, link farms and duplicate content will drive both users and spiders away.

A good SEO company will know this, and they won't promise you some "magical" solution that will shoot you to the top of the rankings in three hours. They'll give you good, keyword-rich content that will work together with your website to increase your rankings organically. Where bad SEO will get your site banned and blacklisted, good SEO will make your website better than you ever thought possible.

About the Authors
Jessica Cox and Michelle Pierce are graduates of the University of Oklahoma’s College of Journalism with a background in Internet marketing and writing for the Web. They currently provide PR services at Xeal Precision Marketing. You can email them at jessica at xeal dot com or michelle at xeal dot com with any questions or comments.

Congratulations to Evolve for landing an article in the April 2008 issue of Industrial Heating!

We created this piece for Evolve as a part of our Power Package. The article allows them to showcase their expertise and help educate industrial clients.

Industrial Heating, the Largest and Most Preferred Industry Publication, has been applying the latest advances in thermal technology to practical use since 1931. With over 23,030 BPA audited circulation comprised of mostly thermal processing engineers, Industrial Heating's technical articles cover heat treatments, brazing, sintering, melting, process control, instrumentation, refractories, burners, heating elements, and other thermal processes typically in excess of 1000°F.

Evolve provides advanced learning management software for industrial and business clients. They have recently branched into the health care industry with complete HIPAA training options.

The best prevention is avoidance. If you've got a steady stream of ideas to draw from, writer's block will never be a problem. The trick is to understand the ebb and flow of creativity. Harness the ideas when they are flowing freely, then stock up for dry seasons.

Because dry seasons will come. Ten new clients dropping into your lap, a new speaking engagement, upcoming seminars, and dozens of other wonderful opportunities can drain your time and energy. When the well of ideas runs dry, the blog is usually the first to feel the effects of the creative drought.

Even if you're in the middle of the desert, ideas may be flowing beneath your feet. Here are some ideas to help you draw water from the rocks.

News

Weigh in on trends, events, and people in the public spotlight. When the world is watching, you may be able to show up on the radar as well. Relate it to the topic of your blog and add value with your unique perspective.

It is important to take a new angle on the news. You do not want to blend into the thousands of other voices in the media whirlwind. If someone failed, point out ways they could have turned it into a success. If the story illustrates a point you've been making, draw out the analogy. If a new idea is taking your area by storm, sound out about it.

If you have a niche blog, you can also talk about little-known news that hasn't made big waves yet. There is always a demand for interesting stories the rest of the media is missing.

To learn more about getting publicity from news, read this post about Online Press Release Mistakes and How to Avoid Them.

Respectfully disagree

Controversy, when kept at a professional level, can be a great spur for conversation. You can generate comments and page views with trackbacks to the original post that inspired your commentary as well.

This must be handled with extreme care. With any controversy, you take on the threat of negative comments towards you or your company. Tread lightly and courteously when testing these waters. If not, you risk offending a very vocal community leader with an established audience.

Agree...with a new twist

A less turbulent option for interacting with other blog communities is adding your unique spin to an existing idea. This carries the same benefits of traffic and comments via trackbacks. Choose blogs with an established audience, if possible, or smaller blogs closely related to your own.

Since you are effectively sailing in the slipstream of another blog, this should be used sparingly. Commenting on posts from other blogs is a very effective technique. However, you can lose your credibility as a thought leader if you're always riding edge of someone else's wave.

Highlight useful links

Since ancient times, farmers have diverted water from existing rivers to help nourish their crops. For years, the Web has generated a steady stream of incredible resources. Mentioning any one of these resources can keep your blog going and deliver helpful content to your readers.

Spin old ideas into new articles

Re-visit old articles you've written and look at the subjects you touched on. One or more of those sub-topics might have enough information to become its own article. For example, if you talked about the top 5 things to do to improve your golf swing, you could create an article focusing on one of those 5 things. Or if you wrote an article on choosing the perfect putter, you might be able to do a similar article on choosing the perfect driver as well.

If you're short on ideas to begin with, check out this post on 20 Surefire Ways to Beat Writer's Block.

Any or all of these techniques can help you survive a creative dry spell. Once the creativity starts to kick in, keep tabs on the ideas when they're flowing. Creativity comes in bursts, and it pays to ride the waves when they come.

Not only will you be able to keep your blog rolling along till the next big rain, you might have the chance to build community as well through commentary and links. Who knows? You might help someone else break out of their creative slump too.

On the Internet, you are what you publish. Article marketing is a great way to get your company's name out there by offering tips, tutorials and commentary on the state of your industry. You might be considering putting the articles on a company blog, into databases, or using them to populate your newsletter.

However, none of that will make any difference if you don't know the first steps in actually writing an article. You may think there's nothing to it, but the Internet is flooded with meandering, pointless, poorly composed drivel.

The stakes are higher for business articles than for your average blog. People will make judgments about your company based on what they read. If your articles sound unprofessional and poorly written, you might be surprised at how fast it can drive people away.

If you want to get the most into your article content, here are a few tips to give you an edge over 90 percent of the articles out there.

Consider your audience

Who are you trying to reach with these articles? Your tone and topic depend on what your audience wants to know, and what voice will reach them. A piece comparing the pros and cons of leading prescription drugs for depression might capture the attention of patients, but the CEO of a pharmaceutical company will be more interested material related to strategic planning and industry trends.

Focus, focus, focus

It's surprisingly easy to get off-topic while writing articles. Don't make your article too broad. Find a specific focus and stick with it. This will keep your pieces short and sweet, and it'll keep you from rambling on about everything even remotely connected with your chosen topic. Plus, by splitting up ideas, you'll have more articles to write and won't be scrambling for content. An outline with subheads is also helpful to keep you on target, and it'll let readers know exactly what to expect from your article.

Do your research

Research can mean the difference between a decent article and a must-read. You don't have to spend four hours a day in a library, but fifteen minutes of searching online can give you a good idea of what other people are saying about your chosen topic. This can help you decide what to talk about, or put a new angle on the piece if too many people are handling the subject in the same way. Plus, you might be able to find studies and statistics that back up your assertions.

Watch your language

Repeat this mantra to yourself as you write: It's an article, not a sales pitch. Using sales language in an informative article is a quick way to make sure nobody publishes your pieces. Even if you're trying to get into article databases, this is a surefire way to get rejected. Yes, you know your product is the best thing on the market. But this is not the time or the place for product placement. Articles should build credibility and prestige. If you just want an advertisement, spend the money on a banner ad.

Keywords are still important

The major difference in writing for print and writing for the Internet is that you have to worry about keywords online. Make sure that keywords are in the text and title, but don't just shotgun them in there. That makes your writing choppy and unnatural. The copy should still flow naturally. Yes, it takes some time to do this correctly, but it's a lot better than the alternative.

The biggest mistake you can make with writing your articles is to assume that people will care just because they're your articles. By writing an informative, focused piece, you'll go a long way to getting published and establishing yourself as a good writer and an expert in your field. Let your writing speak for the quality of your organization, and people will be more inclined to turn to your company for a solution to their problems.

Getting your creative juices flowing

After several months of steady blogging and regular newsletters, you may be running short on ideas. When work picks up and you're running from one project to the next, your readers usually take a backseat. Besides, when your creativity is already stretched to the limit, conjuring up ideas can seem like an impossible task.

Unfortunately, your readers may have already moved on by the time you're ready to start writing again. With new blogs and newsletters popping up daily in every industry, your competition could be taking advantage of your dry spell.

Rather than letting your blog or newsletter go for weeks or even months without updating, spark your inspiration with these simple tips:

Get to know your audience

For any publication to succeed (and yes, your blog or newsletter is a publication), it needs to deliver content readers actually care about. In order to do this, you need to come up with a reader profile. Hopefully you did this when you first started your blog or newsletter. If not, this is a great time to re-focus and help get the creative juices flowing again.

Think about your readers. What age group do they fall into? What are their interests? Are they working in a specific industry? If so, are they managers, CEOs, financial officers?

Create a clear picture in your mind of your top readers. Imagine a person to represent each of your top 3 audience groups and write as though you are speaking to these people.

Need a bit more help? Read this post for more tips on Defining Your Audience.

Creating must-read content

Once you define your reader base, you need to focus on topics they want to read about. Ask yourself the following questions:

What problems are your readers or clients having? What issues do they care about? What trends can you comment on? Have your clients or readers asked questions or left comments that might make good article topics?

Stay current on the latest news

News items provide endless possibilities for content. Bookmark a few good news sources with interesting stories and look through them when you're brainstorming topics for your blog. Weigh in on interesting stories, industry trends, and new techniques from your unique perspective. Also, by covering the latest trends, your blog or newsletter can gain a reputation for cutting-edge content.

Read what they're reading

Browsing magazines, blogs, and other newsletters that your readers already love will give you an idea of what they are interested in. Consider spin-off stories related to topics you find in these publications.

Added bonus for blogs: If you write a spin-off story, you can comment on their blog and mention your article. Do this tactfully, and invite them to comment on your story as well.

Added bonus for magazines: If your content is truly high quality, consider pitching your story to the magazine as a column or special feature. Take a look at their writer's guidelines and mention the article when you write to the appropriate editor. List a few points you cover in your piece and any credentials you have as a writer or expert in your field.

Branch out

Your existing material could turn out to be a gold mine for new article ideas. Look at old topics you've written about. Would any of the sub-points make good articles by themselves? You can expand previous articles into a series to cover things with greater depth, or cover an old article from a new angle.

This will also help maintain a tight focus for your blog or newsletter. However, take care that you don't simply say the same thing over and over. Each article needs to have a unique focus and provide useful information for new and old readers alike.

Keep a topics list handy

A little brainstorming on a regular basis can go a long way towards maintaining a fresh stream of content. You may see a news story or read an article that would be perfect material for a blog or newsletter article.

If you don't have a single place to store these ideas, you'll be back in the same spot again when inspiration runs dry. Keeping a "Topics" document in your newsletter file lets you jot things down as they come to mind, and prevents ideas from being lost.

If you're running low on ideas, check out Chris Brogan has a list of 100 blog topics.
See if any of the topics spark something for you.

The world is full of useful ideas for your blog or newsletter. "I don't have anything to write about" shouldn't be an excuse any longer. Keep your blog or newsletter updated consistently, and you'll keep a loyal reader base that could very well turn into customers someday.

Perhaps you've been thinking about getting into article marketing. It can't be that hard, can it? You just need to write up a few articles about your industry and distribute them to the masses, and the masses will come running to your website because they revere you as an expert now, right?

Ahem. If that image is in your head, get it out right now. Article marketing is a very beneficial practice, to be sure, but it's not something you can just jump into without doing any research first.

Hey! Is anybody out there?

One fatal flaw many articles have is lack of a clear audience; that is, people who are going to be interested in what you're saying. "An audience?" you might be saying. "Well, that's easy. My customers are my audience."

True though that may be, all of your customers do not fall into the same demographic. You'll need to target your articles differently depending on if you want to talk to men or women, teenagers or parents, businesses or individuals. And you need to find your audience before you ever start writing your articles.

Correctly targeting your pieces can make the difference between publication and the slush pile. Here are a few tips for finding your audience.

Who do you want to read your articles?

If you say "everybody," then you might as well just quit now. Yes, everybody wants to be read by the whole world, but the whole world isn't going to be interested in what you have to say. By saying "everybody," you're dooming yourself to failure before you even start writing.

Targeting the entire world will make your piece so generic that nobody will give it the time of day. By targeting a certain audience, you ensure people will immediately identify with your piece, and you'll make it that much easier to pitch to editors.

Who is your audience for your product and services? (Hopefully you figured that out before you even started business.) Those are the people most likely to be interested in your industry, but you have to be specific with your audience. The more targeted a piece is, the better chance you have of getting published.

You can see our recent success stories specifically targeted individual publications:
Online Publicity Success Stories

What is important to them?

Your audience is more than just age and career brackets. New parents, parents of elementary school-aged kids and parents of teenagers may all be parents, but new parents would be more interested in breastfeeding than parents of teenagers. By recognizing what would be important to them, you'll be able to get a good angle on your article.

If your product or service reaches across different demographics, then you have to figure out how to apply it to each of them. Your product might be perfect for stay-at-home mothers, churches and fundraising groups, but you'll need different language and different distribution to speak to each of them. What's important to one won't be important to another, which will render your article ineffective.

See what others have to say

Believe it or not, you're not the first person who's thought about writing an article targeted to goat ranchers in their early 20s. Find other publications with the same target demographic, and read them to get an idea of writing style, other article topics and even possible distribution outlets. You'd be surprised how many niche publications are out there.

For more information about article marketing basics, check out this post on Senserely Yourshttp://www.senserely.com/jomark3-30-facts-for-the-article-marketing-newbie.php

Taking the time to find your audience and target your piece will pay off massive dividends. It's easier to write a piece that's targeted, and it's especially easier to market a piece that's targeted to a specific audience. Don't shoot yourself in the foot by neglecting this vital step.

If you've considered pitching to bloggers but haven't been sure about how to go about it, you should read this great post by Paul Stamatiou.

It's a well-written, in-depth how-to list discussing what you should and shouldn't do when trying to get your press release to bloggers. This isn't just theory either: he gives beautiful examples to back up his points. Any PR professional interested in a digital audience should take a look at this gold mine of information.

As the web expands, digital media and digital audiences have grown more niche and personalized. This is especially true of blogs.

Queries should always be narrowly targeted. But successful blog pitches take their message to a whole new level of personalization. I would even go so far as to say MORE research is required for a successful blog query than your average pitch letter.

But the results are definitely worth it. We've seen direct conversions from blog traffic -- no surprise, since the audiences you can reach are highly targeted.

Blogs have leaped to a prestigious position of influence in the digital world. Don't make the mistake of treating them the same way you would any other contact on your press list.

Thanks again Paul! Excellent resource.

At Xeal we're always excited when our efforts pay off in the form of great publicity and exposure for our clients.

We recently worked with Evolve eLearning, a training solutions provider, to create articles related to Industrial Training.

One of our pieces was originally featured on Manufacting.net, a website that caters to manufacturing executives. Now we've secured two more publications for them in the upcoming September/October issues of Process Cleaning Magazine and Time-Compression Technologies.

Process Cleaning Magazine is the central resource for manufacturing professionals responsible for cleaning during the manufacturing process, maintenance and repair operations. This magazine aims to deliver informational articles, industry news, product features, case studies, profiles, and the best practices all around for the cleaning industry.

Time-Compression Technologies is a magazine for design and manufacturing professionals specifically seeking to adopt rapid product development and rapid manufacturing technologies. TCT focuses on being a source of technical information on the technology that reduces the product development process.

Manufacturing.net caters to manufacturing executives. It's updated daily with regulations, industrial trends, plant openings and closings, supply chain updates, distribution and trade issues, prices, employment, finance, economic forecasts, world events and more.

Evolve e-Learning provides e-Learning solutions for customers. Their learning management systems help organizations to maximize employee potential and performance while reducing the administrative costs of employee training. Evolve goes to great lengths to provide customers with solutions to their training needs.