INTERVIEW WITH DEEPAK MORRIS

TOPIC: Internet marketing of oneself and ones work on the internet. Dec. 17, 2006

Deepak Morris, brings to the Green Room his wealth of knowledge and experience that can help every playwright put his/her play on a global platform. Deepak happens to be a computer and internet enthusiast and will be happy to share his experiences and expertise in marketing a play worldwide. He has written over a dozen textbooks on managerial subjects in addition to the numerous plays, monologues and short scenes that have been staged by various groups across the world.

Deepak: We’ll be discussing how I got in on the SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) groove with the experience of my first play, "Business Is War" then I'll go on to modern SEO techniques and give you some links for further reading if people are interested

Edd: Tell us what about marketing ourselves and our work. How do you suggest we start?

Deepak: The absolute must-have is a website. That's the first step (presuming you have a product, of course), The next step is optimising the website so that it reaches the first page in Search Engine rankings. It all started in 2001 with my search for a comedy to perform. I was looking for something easy to do, for a cast of 7, 2 males and 5 females. I used a Search Engine and found that in most cases, the permutations and combinations of search words I used brought up the same few sites on the first page. One was a site (now defunct) where playwrights could post their plays (or just extracts), tag them with keywords and place an email address to enable producers to contact the playwrights. The other was Stageplays.com. So, when "Business Is War" was written and performed, it suddenly occurred to me that there was a worldwide stage where it could be performed, should anyone be looking for a play like it. So I placed it on that site, tagged it with words like "comedy", "funny", "easy to stage", etc. And I joined the Stageplays forum. Within months, BIW was picked up by students of a school in Canada and I knew that the strategy was working. The first thing I learned was that I must think like a searcher, not a provider

Ohdear: Do you suggest that we have a large body of work before we attempt to have a web presence?

Deepak: No. BIW was the only play I had written when I placed it on the site. Why waste time? It doesn't matter if you have only 1 item to offer.

Edd: When you talk about tag lines do you mean at the top of the HTML in you website?

Deepak: Those are part of tags. They are called meta tags and are the first thing search engine "bots" read when they reach your site.

Edd: I have all those tags at the top of each play but I never got any business from it. How can I get my website on the top of a Google search other than using tags?

Deepak: Good question, Edd. Because of the number of website out there, search engines have now begun ranking web pages (not just sites, each page on the site) according to relevance to the keywords.  Therefore, the aim of the internet marketer must now be to convince search engines that their pages are important. Search engines use various parameters to determine the relevance and importance of web pages. Some of these are: Freshness of content, other sites that link to the page in question, the "business" of each linking site, etc. Freshness of content means that one must constantly update the important pages on ones website. That's why search engines love blogs, which are usually updated more often than websites. Getting other sites to link to your pages takes several strategies. One is to ask friends to link to you.  Another is to join a link exchange program, where you host someone else's link in exchange for having your link on their website. But it's important to make sure the two websites linking to each other are relevant to each other (are in related "businesses")

Edd: there are lots of free websites. Do you have any particular one you recommend?

Deepak: I use freewebs.com and I like if for its ease of use and great templates. Google Pages also offers free webs but I haven't had a chance to evaluate it yet. If Google Pages follow the Google philosophy, it'll probably be good to go with Google Pages because you'll then get tons of free space.

Ohdear: Is it good to piggy back on a well known site like stageplays.com rather than have to optimise your own site? Or is it better to use a blog for optimising?

Deepak: Why not both? Do a link exchange with Stageplays AND optimise your website. In my opinion, just piggybacking is not enough

Edd: Do you all know that everything written in this forum makes it way to Google within a couple days?

Deepak: Yes Edd, that's because Stageplays has a very high ranking with Google.

Edd: Thus the reason for the tags and connections with other websites?

Deepak: That's right. If Stageplays has a link to your website on its pages, your website goes up in Google's ranking

Edd: Are there any websites that do not require knowing HTML?

Deepak: Freewebs.com requires no knowledge of html. Google Pages also claims that no knowledge of html is necessary. In fact, I think most free sites now do not need knowledge of html.
Ohdear: Are news letters a good idea because the force new content?

Deepak: Not in increasing site rankings, unless you post the newsletter on your website as well. Newsletters are valuable in another form of internet marketing, called permission marketing or network marketing. For a playwright, they won't work unless a whole lot of theatres and producers are subscribers and that's difficult to achieve.

Edd: Any other questions?

Ohdear: Yes. What if you had schools on your newsletter list rather than producers and you posted it on your site as well, would it help or be a waste of time?

Deepak: If you post the newsletter on your website it'll help in ranking. As for schools being subscribers, that's a tough question. You'll have to be sure the right person in the school is receiving the newsletter and is actually reading it

Edd: Okay, Deepak, what should each of us do when we leave this Green Room session to market our work? Could you summarize the steps to help us to achieve more recognition

Deepak: First, make sure you have a website. Make sure the title tags of your website have keywords that you think people are looking for. Write a "blurb" about each of your plays, each blurb containing more keywords that you think people are typing into search engines in their quest for a play.  Put an extract from your play on your website, either directly on the page or in Word or PDF form. Provide an email link directly below the extract or the link to the extract. If your website software allows it, have the excerpt open in a new window. When visitors shut that window, they're back to the page with the email link. Promote your website by entering into relevant link exchange programs and article marketing. I'll explain article marketing in a moment Article Marketing: Several webmasters are on the look out for content for their websites. They need to keep the content on their websites fresh, so they pick up articles from online article repositories like ezinearticles.com

If you write engaging articles on the art and craft of theatre, or even funny experiences you've had on or off stage, the article is likely to be picked up by a webmaster looking for content for a theatre-related site. Article repositories allow you to have a "Resource Box", a paragraph at the end of the article that contains a link to your website. When the webmaster picks up your article and puts it on his site, you get a brand new link to your website. If your article is sufficiently broad in scope, it will be picked up by several webmasters (say, one with a site on voice, one with a site on performance, one with a funny site, etc.)  All those sites provide relevant link backs to your website. Your rankings go up. If possible, attach a blog to your website (that is, try to get a website that has inbuilt blogging - freewebs has that) so that it's easy for you to keep refreshing the content on your website. Also make changes regularly to your "offer" page, where you're actually selling your work. Add content like where the play was last staged, anecdotes about performances, etc.

Edd: Do you all have websites? If not, what do you plan to do about it in the next couple days? And, Deepak, is there a way we can see our rankings?

Deepak: Yes there is, but I can't recall the site at the moment. No, I can't seem to find it. Perhaps I can post an addendum to the transcript when it's ready in a day or two.

Edd: When you do will you please post it in the forum so we can all use it. Our hour is up. You're all free to stay and chat as long as you like. Deepak, thank you for sharing your time with us. Though there are few here at the moment .. . many, many read the transcript. Again, thank you.

Deepak: My pleasure, Edd, Mary, ohdear and Waynebow

Marys: What a great chat today, Deepak. You have shared so much with us.

Deepak: There's lots more and the game changes very often. If possible, go to sitepro.com and subscribe to their newsletter

Ohdear: Thanks Deepak, I have got much food for thought, I will get my beloved to read this transcript when it is posted. In appreciation of your time both Deepak and our moderator Edd. Ta muchly

Marys: Well, it's fascinating and I want to follow up on it. My name is all over the internet as both an actor and playwright, with no rhyme or reason. I'd like to get it to rhyme, within reason of course.  You have been a tremendous help to us

Deepak: It's more important to have your work all over the internet, coz people rarely search for playwrights by name.

Waynebow: Thank you Deepak-- Lots of good info--Apologies for not contributing-- been back & forth--filling out form for NYC Fringe festival!

Deepak: cool! break a leg, Wayne

marys:  Good reason not to chat - you must have been inspired, Waynebow

Waynebow: It's an extremely lengthy form! :)

Edd: Take care every one and thank you. Don't go cussin' after I'm gone--it'll all show up on the transcript

Marys: Thanks so much Edd!

Marys: This is @##@@!% great

Ohdear: lol

Marys: My husband has been working on a site for me. That's it, I'm gonna wake him up and find out where it is. Deepak, you have been most generous with us today. I can't thank you enough for this. As my mother was fond of saying you're a "good egg.

ADDENDUM.  Some sites to check your website’s ranking from Deepak:

http://www.prchecker.info/check_page_rank.php
http://pr.blogflux.com/
http://www.checkpagerank.com/

Editor's Note:  I would like to thank Scenedreamer for her suggestions on how to make our transcripts more easy to read and thereby more accessable.  Thank you, Scenedreamer.  --Edd