Building a reputation online is important. If you've already established your place within a certain niche online, you're well ahead of the curve. If you're just getting started, you'll want to build out a blog platform that you can direct people to so they can read more about you, and what interests you.

Since we're focusing on what you should be doing while you build your Guide, publishing content on your blog relating to your Guide is an important first step in building an audience for your Guide once it launches.

At this stage, you should be writing and producing high quality content related to your work and Guide subject, without actually blogging about the Guide itself. At this stage of the Guide creation process, it's important to have people equate your name and brand with the Guide you're about to launch. Blogging about everything and anything related to your Guide is a great way to solidify yourself as an expert in a particular field.

Remember, keep your promotional efforts to a minimum. No one likes to feel like they're being marketed to continuously. The best marketers are great at marketing their products to people without over promoting their work. If your readers already feel like you provide them with quality content, there's a high likelihood that they'll purchase your Guide once it's released. As a result, when you do eventually feature promotions on your blog, they will be viewed in a much more favorable light than if you continuously promote yourself to them relentlessly.

It's important to follow the 70:20:10 rule for promoting content online. 70 precent of all content should be valuable, relevant information for your readers; 20 percent of your content should be sharing other people's relevant work; and, the final 10 percent should be self-promotional in nature.

The Tim Ferris Model

We're big fans of the way Tim Ferris does online marketing currently. Take a look at the editorial calendar around promoting The 4-Hour Body . His content, and marketing campaign lasted 3 months before he published his book.

Below is his editorial calendar during that marketing team, bolded is the strictly promotional material on his blog for his latest book:

1. The New Book Unveiled: The 4-Hour Body (Sept. 29)
2. Zen, Tea, and the Art of Life Management (Oct. 5)
3. How to Buy a Round-the-World Plane Ticket (Oct. 8)
4. Have a Good Eye for Ads? Try the 4-Hour Body Experiment (Oct. 13)
5. The Experimental Life: An Introduction to Michel de Montaigne (Oct. 19)
6. How Tim Ferriss Makes Money (and Other Things) (Oct. 28)
7. 20 Things I've Learned from Traveling Around The World for Three Years (Oct. 30)
8. How to Email Virtual Assistants: Proven Templates (Nov. 2)
9. 8 Exotic Destinations You Can Afford (Nov. 4)
10. 4-Hour Body Promo - Half-Naked Girls, Erections, and Stickers (Nov. 17)
11. Clinton's "Reality Distortion Field" Charisma (Nov. 21)
12. How to Become a Model Photographer in Brazil (Nov. 25)
13. Engineering a "Muse": Case Studies of Successful Cash-Flow Businesses (Nov. 28)
14. The 4-Hour Body - Official Movie Trailer (Dec. 1)
15. The 4-Hour Body - Sample Chapter and Full Table of Contents (Dec. 6)
16. The Land Rush: 48 Hours to Claim $4,000,000 in Prizes (Dec. 9)
17. Engineering a "Muse" - Volume 2: Case Studies of Successful Cash-Flow Businesses (Dec. 11)
18. The 4-Hour Body is NOW OUT - Live Q&A Today, New Trailer, Free Books, and Much More (Dec. 14)

Here you can see the great balance between helpful content and promotional pieces.