The Conclusion

Hello, my friends. For the final time, I welcome you to our discussion on amateur blogging. Throughout this discussion, I’ve given you tips, tricks, and techniques from my store of knowledge, as well as others’ research and posts. I’ve walked you through selecting and setting up your blog, to writing your first posts, to analyzing your traffic patterns, to monetizing your blog. Where does it end? Well, in actuality, it doesn’t end. Blogging is a never-ending quest for knowledge. The longer you blog, the more you will learn about what makes a good blog, and what brings in money. Once again, I’ll use one of my favourite phrases: Make no bones about it, I have no wish to be an amateur blogger, forever. I got started in blogging because I enjoyed it. Way back in the late 1990’s, I started keeping an online journal. I had webspace through my internet service provider (ISP), and kept a website through them. I used to update my journal by uploading a static HTML page for each and every entry. In May of 2000, I found LiveJournal, and began to use their service. To this day, I still keep a personal journal at LiveJournal. In fact, I’m fairly active in the support and maintenance of LiveJournal (general support, and the user documentation maintenance). Somewhere in 2002, I discovered Moveable Type, and started my first blog. That didn’t last too long, as I found MT to be a little hinky, and a little unwiedly. To be honest, it probably was. MT was in its infancy, then. Since that time, it’s come a very long way.

In October of 2004, I decided to learn PHP. What better way to teach myself PHP than by building my own blogging system. This self-built platform lasted for over a year, and I still use it on some other sites. In fact, I actually released it - in modified format - to another webmaster who wished to use it for her family’s website. Unfortunately, however, time became my enemy and I never was able to truly excel at PHP. Coming to the conclusion that it would take me longer than I was willing to spend to integrate an XML-RPC server into my blog (for the use of offline blogging clients), I started shopping around as to what was availible. I ended up downloading and installing WordPress fairly quickly, and to this day it is my blogging platform of choice. This entire article series is primarily written around WordPress, as it is the most well-supported and extensible system I’ve seen. With the advent of WordPress 2.0, there is even more functionality availible to those blogging with this wonderful system.

All of this glowing commentary about WordPress aside, blogging is less what software you use, and more what you make it do. Then again, it’s less about the back end, and more about the content. If you remember that good content overrules anything (except an absolutely horrific layout), then you’re set. You can use the original, mundane, nothing, WordPress layout, have excellent content, and become one of the best blogs in the blogosphere.

Throughout all of our conversations, the thing I have most wanted you to pick up on is this: So long as you enjoy what you are doing, write well, and write often, you’re going to be a-okay. The other (and more important) thing you should also have picked up on is that it’s about doing it because you love it. Even if you’re making money, if you stop enjoying the blog, shut it down, find something else to blog about. Even professional bloggers (even Darren Rowse - one of the most successfull bloggers in the world) will tell you that if you don’t enjoy blogging, don’t enjoy what you’re blogging about, don’t do it.

So Where do We Go From Here?

You’re on your own, now, grasshopper. I’ve taught you most I can. Go forth, multiply, and permeate the blogosphere with your own brand of unique commentary and ideas. This is it, this is the time I turn you loose. The time I drop the leash. The time I open the kennel door (sorry, thinking of my girlfriend and her canines has me making dog analogies).

This, however, is not the penultimate end. If you have questions, if you have comments, please feel free to ask them. I am here, not only to impart this information to you, but to help you in any way I possibally can. If you’ve got a question or concern, drop me a comment, or use the contact page.

Again, this isn’t the bitter end. I’ll write more entries, in the future, that will be tacked on to the end of this series. I simply haven’t thought of the ideas for them, yet. This is where you come in. What would you like me to write about? My experiences in traffic building? My experiences with Google Adsense? How I chose this layout? The plugins used here, and why? Or perhaps general suggestions for things I find worthy of being blogged? If you’ve got something you’d like me to write about - or maybe you’d even like for me to review your blog - just let me know. Drop a comment, or contact me.

This isn’t the end, my friends. Just the end of this conversation. I hope you’ve enjoyed discussing amateur blogging with me. I’ve enjoyed having you.

Stay tuned! You never know what will come up, next!

Placement of Ad Units

The placement of your ad units is absolutely crucial in monetizing your blog. First and foremost, you must figure out how to place your units without overriding the blog, itsself. Your ad units should call some attention to themselves, yet they should also attempt to flow within the page. Secondly, you should attempt to maximize the visuality of the units. In other words, place them where people will most often be looking. In this particular case, you should place most of your ad units, whenever possible, above the fold. That is, in the portion of the page that displays without any scrolling. Sometimes, with a large header/header graphic, this simply isn’t possible. That’s fine, but you need to put some of your ads (I suggest Google/YPN) as high up on the page as possible.

Where’s the Best Placement?

Where is the best placement? Everyone has a differing opinion. In my case, I find high up on the page, and in the sidebar as the best areas. My top performing ads are the Google header unit, and the Google links unit - both at the top of the page. Here’s a list of every unit I have, and where it’s located:

• Google Half Banner - Header unit at the top of each content area, on every page except individual entries. On main page and archive pages, another half banner between the 4th and 5th entries.
• Google Link Unit - In the black area directly under the header, on every page
• Google Vertical Banner - In the comments section of each entry, directly to the right of comments.
• Google Wide Skyscraper - On the right-hand sidebar, up top.
• Google Medium Rectangle - On individual entry pages, inline with the content.
• BlogAds - Temporarily on hold, but eventually on the left-hand sidebar.
• Comission Junction Display Unit - Directly under the “Rent My Blog” in the Partner’s section, right-hand sidebar
• Adgenta Ads - Within individual entries that are relatively long, and are not appropriate for an individual product focus.
• Chitika Ads - Within individual entries that are relatively long, and are focused toward a single product, or product type
• Amazon Affiliate, and some CJ affiliate - Within individual entries

Does this seem excessive? Some twelve types of ads on this blog? The thing is, at any given moment, you’ll probably only be seeing a maximum of three ad units. Because of their placement on the page, and within the site, the units are designed to mazimize placement and mimize overall impact.

Additionally, all of my Google ads will roll over to Chitika (excepting the link unit) instead of displaying PSAs.

There really is no absolute BEST placement. The top placement areas, in my experience and research, are:

• Directly above the content
• In the header
• On the left-hand side, at the top
• On the right-hand side, at the top
• Between the first and second entries
• Beside/within the comments
• At the bottom, directly above the footer

Of course, there are many more placement areas. The trick is to assign each and every ad unit you use its own unique channel ID, and track their hits by channel. Then, experiment with placement. Virtually every major blog out there periodically changes its ads/ad placement, until it gets high performance.

When is it too Much?

Some people say that even one ad unit is too much. Personally, I disagree. I don’t find it too much until the ads start heavily encroaching on the meat and taters of the blog, itsself. In other words, so long as your ads don’t override your content, detract from the content, or make it difficult to read the content, you’re probably fine. Of course, a blog that is primarily made up of ads (more ads than content), probably has too many ads.

When is it not Enough?

This is a very hard question to answer. Honestly, I don’t think you can ever have too few ad units. The trick is finding a nice balance between your ads and your content. If you are making a little bit of money, but think you can make more and aren’t sure how to change your existing ads, perhaps it’s not a matter of changing ad units and more a matter of adding a unit. Experiment, young grasshopper. Experiment.

Colorizing

Colorizing is the art of picking colors for your ad units. There’s a lot written on Google as far as ads that stand out, blend in, etc… It’s not an exact science. While there are really only three schools of thought on this subject, there’s a lot to learn and a lot of experimentation to be done. Personally, I’ve used each of the three I’ll discuss below, and found each to by differing effectiveness.

Blending In

Blending in is the art of making your ads seamlessly blend in to your website. Some people are so good at this, that you don’t even realize the links are ads. In my case, my links unit in the top, black portion, is designed to blend in. Many people have contacted me simply to say that they thought the ad links were actually a part of my site. All of my ad systems are designed to blend in as much as possible, except for the google unit in the comments. That’s designed to stand out (as a trial). The Google unit at the top of the content is designed with the site colors and link colors, to appear more as a part of my site than as an ad unit. The Chitika ad units, while offering less customization than others, are still designed to appear as a part of the site. The links appear in my link colors, and the text is designed to match my text (although “black” is easy to match). The text-based (affiliate) ads/links are specifically designed to blend in. In fact, the only ones that do not blend in are the Adgenta ads, and the Google ad in the comments section. (Adgenta simply fails to work properly with color settings. The Adgenta crew is working on this issue.)

Standing Out

Standing out is the art of making your ads pop, at least somewhat. A good example of this is the Google ad unit in my comments section. While the ad unit comes somewhat close to matching some of my colorings, the unit itsself is primarily of a contrasting color scheme. I set this ad unit up to test colorization that stands out. I must say, it hasn’t worked quite as well as the units that blend in. While I still get some hits from the unit, the performance percentage is nowhere near the remainder of the Google units. I’ll be changing the colorization of this unit to match the rest, soon.

WHOA! MY EYES!

This section discusses the art of making your ads pop so much they make your eyes bleed. Some people I know online swear by this method. Personally, it annoys the hell out of me, most of the time. Short of a <blink> tag, I’ve seen some ads where it wouldn’t be possible to make them more annoying and stand-out-ish. If all else fails in your colorization, go hog-wild and make your ads look absolutely insane. Maybe you’ll be surprised!

Picking Keywords

I discussed picking keywords for your articles, briefly, in a previous conversation. This time, however, we’re discussing picking keywords for your ad units. In the case of Chitika, Adgenta, and other keyword-targetted systems, you need to pick a good string of keywords that are representative of your site. In my case, I attempt to pick keywords that people who come here would be interested in. These result in advertisements for everything from magazines to iPods to video game consoles to lamps to car care kits. I attempt to rotate my keywords every so often, and over the Christmas season, I picked keywords that were more targetted to jewelry and gift ideas. These did… well, not too well. I’ve had a lot of trouble picking good keywords for Chitika, because my site is so diverse (and they simply don’t have much related to “blogging” in their catalog, heh). The trick? Rotate your keywords, use channels, and keep rotating until you find things that work. I suggest having at least four or five keywords in your Chitika keyword list (per unit). When picking for Adgenta, you should simply pick a single keyword that has to do with your article.

Writing for Keywords

Writing for Keywords? Yep. That’s the art of writing articles around specific keywords, to trigger Google, YPN, and other contextually targetted systems to display certain ads. Usually people do this to display high-dollar keywords. While I can’t divulge specific high-dollar keywords (rather, while I won’t), there are a lot of places that write specifically for keywords. In fact, there are people that make their money by writing keyword-rich articles for people. The trick is to look around the ‘net, use the tools availible, and listen to what others are saying (or read what they’re typing), and find out the higher-dollar keywords. Then, you do a little bit of research on them, and write an article about them. I’ll give you one keyword - and only one - to start. Mesothelioma. A while ago (a year or two), this keyword was generating nearly $100 per click to adsense users. While I’m positive that cpc (cost per click) has changed, I have no idea how much.

There is one thing to watch out for, though. If you write about a specific topic/genre the majority of the time, and all of a sudden come out with an article on something that is a high-dollar keyword, and not in that genre, the ad companies may consider that to be against the terms of service. Be careful.

So What’s Next?

Wow, we’re almost through! This time, we discussed setting up your ad units in both placement and color, as well as selecting keywords. Next time will be the conclusion article to this series, and an open call for questions and future article suggestions. Stay tuned!
Technorati Tags: Ad Placement, Adsense, YPN, Blogads, Ad Colors, Monetization Share This ]]> http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/02/20/amateur-blogging-series-making-the-money-work/feed/ http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/02/17/amateur-blogging-series-how-to-monetize/ http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/02/17/amateur-blogging-series-how-to-monetize/#comments Fri, 17 Feb 2006 12:27:50 +0000 Fyre http://www.fyreplace.com/?p=328 Welcome back!! Last time, I gave you a teaser on monetizing, and told you why you might want to. I also included some specific rules of thumb for any program. This time, we’ll discuss specific programs, and I’ll spend time explaining what I use. Before we get started, I need to tell you that a majority of links in this post are affiliate links. That means that if you sign up for the ad/affiliate programs, I will make a little bit of money. What you earn will not change, it’s just a way of the individual companies rewarding people for bringing in new business. Think of it as a customer loyalty type thing. Okay, let’s get started.

Google Adsense and Yahoo Publisher Network (YPN)

Google Adsense and Yahoo’s YPN are essentially the same. They are both contextually driven text and image-based ad systems. Essentially, this means that they display ads based on the content of your blog/entries. The ads change, depending on the content of your site. On a blog, you’ll usually find most of the main page ads related to blogging. On the individual entry page, you’ll find the ads more tailored to the topic(s) of the post.

Okay, for the remainder of this section, I’ll be discussing Google’s Adsense, as that’s what I use. Yahoo’s YPN is essentially the same, so most of this will translate.

If you’re not familiar with Google’s Adsense, then look at the top of any page on this site. The ad unit directly above the main content, as well as the links in the black portion, are Google Adsense ads. Google offers ad units in a variety of formats, from full leaderboards (720×240) to small blocks (120×120), to small one-line link units. Google pays out on a per-click basis. Every time someone clicks one of your ads, you earn a bit of money in your account. This can be anywhere form around twenty cents, to over twenty dollars, depending on the ad and the keywords associated with that ad. Google’s terms of service prohibit me from revealing what I’m making per click, but suffice it to say that the amounts ad up. Google will mail you a check every time your account balance reaches $100. At the end of every month that your balance is at least $100, Google will send you a check for the money you earned that month. If your balance is not $100 at the end of the month, your money carries forward.

Google’s adsense (and, to a slightly lesser degree, Yahoo’s YPN) offer advertisements targetted to your readers. The programs do so by spidering the content of your website (much like any search engine), and displaying ads based on the words contained in your text. The analysis algorhytms are not public knowledge, but I can say through my own experience and what others have written, Google appears to be better targetted then Yahoo. Both services display “Public Service” advertisements when there are no ads relevant to your content. In other words, if the keywords on a page do not trigger any advertisements, then the services display generic ads (usually for non-profit and other charity organizations) in their place. These Public Service Ads (or PSA’s) do not pay anything per click; however, both programs allow you to get around the display of said ads. Google has a simple script that simply hides the ad unit, instead of displaying the ads. The beauty of this feature is that you can replace the public service ads with another ad system, simply by pointing the ad unit to your other system’s code. On this site, I display Chitika ads in place of Google PSA’s. You have the option of displaying pretty much any other ad system, provided you do not violate any terms of service.

Contextually targetted ad systems are great, and effective, ways to earn money through your website. By simply installing the code in the appropriate place, you’ve put an highly targetted ad on your site that will be appropriate to your content. Although, if your site deals with adult situations - particularly pornography and sex - you will usually not be able to use Google and Yahoo’s services, as both services do not allow “adult” advertisements.

Chitika E-MiniMalls

Chitika is a relative newcomer to the online advertising industry. They’ve come up with a unique method of advertising, as well. Chitika is a primarily keyword driven product display system. Once you sign up with Chitika, you can choose from many ad unit sizes to display. Once you choose your size, you choose your keywords. Using the chosen keywords, Chitika rotates products throughout your site. Rather than a strictly text-based, or image-based ad, Chitika uses a tabbed interface to showcase individual products. Chitika’s ad units primarily display product information and description on the main tab, and include a “best deals” tab that shows the prices at up to three different online stores. Clicking the links will take you directly to the product page on your chosen store. Chitika also includes a search box (which can optionally be disabled) that allows customers to search for products in their vast catalog without ever leaving your site. Think of Chitika as your very own minituare online store.

While Chitika has recently lowered their payout, and instituted stricter auditing of “fradulent” clicks, the system still seems to pay higher per click than Google, Yahoo, or competing systems. Additionally, Chitika is one of the most customizable systems, allowing you to use either keyword-based ad units (making it compatible with Google and Yahoo), or contextual-based ads. Chitika also allows disabling of any tab, and color customization. Chitika also pays out at a low threshold. If you choose to get paid via your paypal account, you will get paid out at the end of every month where your Chitika balance exceeds $10. Yes, ten dollars. If you elect to receive a check, I believe the payment threshold is $50. Again, if your balance does not meet the payment criteria, it will carry over to the next month. Chitika is considered by many to be a viable option, especially on highly targetted blogs, as it is very compatible with Google and other contextually-targetted systems. Although Chitika is not a die-hard performer on loosely targetted blogs (such as this one), careful ad placement and keyword choices can lead to substantial earnings.

Adbrite and Blogads

Adbrite and Blogads are a unique perspective in the world of online advertising. In their models, you list your site information and pick an amount to charge for ad space. Then, advertisers come to the website listings, and choose to purchase ads on your website. The systems utilize the same concept for obtaining advertisements, although each system is a great deal different from the other. Adbrite concentrates on single (and dual) line text ads, where Blogads concentrates on a full advertisement, including an image. Both are designed, primarily, for the sidebar of a website.

Adbrite, a text-based service, provides additional options that Blogads does not. First, Adbrite is open to anyone. Secondly, if you are not using Google/Yahoo (or any other contextual service), and do not have any paying advertisers, you can display contextually targetted ads through adbrite, and earn money per click. Those per-click ads will dissappear when someone purchases ad space on your website. I’m not certain of Adbrite’s payout requirements, but I believe they pay on a Net-30 (that is, 30 days after the end of the month, you’ll receive your check/payment (much like Google, Yahoo, Chitika, etc)). While several websites run adbrite, I have not seen a lot written about them in the blogosphere. This does not neccisarily mean anything negative. Then again, it doesn’t neccisarily mean anything positive, either.

Blogads is a combination graphics and text ad service. A great way to see an example of blog ads is to visit any Metroblogging website (such as The Houston Metroblog) and check the sidebar. Ads traditionally display with an image and a short blurb of text describing/promoting the service. Blogads is availible by invitation only, however. You must find a sponsor to invite you to the system (unfortunately, although I am a blogads member, I am not elligible, yet, to be a sponsor). You can submit your e-mail to Blogads who promise to e-mail you when a sponsor becomes availible in your blog’s genre. Blogads offers one and two week options, as well as one month and bid-per-click. Additionally, they offer an “intermission” style ad, where visitors to your site will click a link on your page, be taken to an ad page, and then re-directed to the link they clicked after so many seconds (fifteen, I believe). This is a unique ad unit, and traditionally sells for a reasonable amount. Visitors are shown these “intermission” ads a maximum of once every 24 hours (once a day).

Affiliate Programs / Amazon Affiliate

Affiliate programs are normally pay-per-sale programs, where you are promoting a specific product or service on your website. The links to amazon.com, my shop, and the links advertising web hosting in my right-hand sidebar, are examples of affiliate systems. Amazon is the leading affiliate system online, although websites like Comission Junction are making a name for themselves, as well.

Amazon Affiliates is a program designed to showcase products availible on Amazon.com. While you can create an affiliate link to any page on Amazon.com, in reality the easiest method is to use amazon links to showcase individual products. Nearly every book link I display on this website is a link to Amazon.com and the affiliate system. Amazon works by paying you a percentage on every purchase made through your affiliate links. The percentage increases based on the amount of money you earn each quarter. Amazon provides many methods for creating links, and there are many outside plugins and websites that do the same for you. Additionally, you can create your own links using your given affiliate ID. Amazon pays out quarterly (that’s four times per year), and will either cut you a check, or give you Amazon credit.

Comission Junction is another method of affiliate programs. While it’s a bit confusing at first, if you stick with it and go through their online tutorials, you’ll rapidly come to understand how it works. CJ is an affliate marketplace. In other words, they have a directory of various companies and advertisers, and the programs they have availible. From $85 per signup with Vonage, to $.20 cents per lead with a european cellular company, there are literally thousands of different programs availible with CJ. The programs differ, although the most popular is a certain amount (or percentage) per sale. Some programs pay per lead (in other words, they pay for each person that fills out their information for a salesperson to contact them), and some pay per click (although these are relatively rare). The trick with CJ is this: any time you write an article on something (say, voice over IP, or internet telephone companies), you search through CJ for corresponding programs. Then, in your article, you include your affiliate links. While I haven’t yet institutued that on this website, I plan to in the future. Currently, my only CJ ads display directly underneath the “Rent My Blog” system on the right hand sidebar. The ad changes each time the page is refreshed, and some of the ads are weighted to appear more often than others (and I control the weighting). It’s a very full-fledged system that I highly reccommend everyone at least checking out. Remember, it’s a bit confusing at first, if you need any help with it, feel free to contact me.

Adgenta (Qumana)

Adgenta is a newcomer to the ad spectrum. Adgenta focuses on text-based, keyword-driven ad units that are designed for placement within a blog entry. Adgenta is put out by the people who make the Qumana Blog Editor. In fact, Qumana is designed to interface completely with Adgenta, and can automatically place the ad code into your entry for you. I use Adgenta sparingly on this website, but in the instances where I discuss a specific product, or genre of product, I often look for Adgenta ads, if there is no corresponding affiliate ad availible. Adgenta is a reasonable method of earning some spare cash here and there.

Others

There are literally hundreds of other ways to monetize your blog, I merely touched on the biggest and most popular. There are tons more contextually and keyword driven systems on the Internet. There are also some places that will provide you with a banner, and pay you for clicks through it. Keep your eyes open, and check out the ad units on every website you come across. When you’re beginning monetization of your blog, turn off your ad blockers (but not the pop-up blocker, heh), and check out the ads. You’d be flat-out surprised what’s availible out there.

So What’s Next?

First off, let me warn you that all of the above ad systems I discussed (excepting amazon, and some CJ systems) require Javascript to be enabled. Those surfing your website without Javascript simply won’t see your ads. Unfortunately, there’s not much you can do about that except for finding systems that do not require Javascript.

This time, we discussed the differeng ad systems availible on the Internet. Next time, we’ll dive in to customizing your ad systems to make the most out of your monetization. Stay tuned!
Technorati Tags: Google, Adsense, Yahoo, YPN, Chitika, Adbrite, Blogads, Comission Junction, Adgenta, Amazon Affiliate, Monetization, Advertising, Blog Monetization Share This ]]> http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/02/17/amateur-blogging-series-how-to-monetize/feed/ http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/02/15/amateur-blogging-series-why-monetize/ http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/02/15/amateur-blogging-series-why-monetize/#comments Wed, 15 Feb 2006 12:25:59 +0000 Fyre http://www.fyreplace.com/?p=327 Welcome back! Last time, we talked about knowing what people are reading, keeping them coming back, and promoting your blog within your blog. This time, we’ll spend a brief period of time explaining what monetizing is, and why you might want to do it. Let’s get started.

Mon - uh - tie - zing?

Monetizing. If you’re scratching your head, wondering what that means, then let me help you out. Monetizing is making money from your blog. Essentially, it’s what you do to make money from your blog. Putting ads, affiliate links, etc… on your blog. From Google’s Adsense, to Commision Junction’s affiliate programs, monetizing is an effective way to make a few extra bucks. Just remember, like getting traffic when you first started, it takes time to make money from your blog. As an amateur blogger, you will probably never make money hand over fist; but hey, a little bit of extra cash occasionally, never hurt.

Why the hell do I want ads on my blog?!

Advertisements. Some people don’t mind ‘em, occasionally someone loves ‘em, and some people downright hate them. Make no bones about it, you will lose a visitor or two if you put ads on your blog. If you don’t overdo the ads, then you won’t alienate the majority of people. The trick is to have some decent, low-key ads across your site, without overdoing it.

So, why. Simple. Money. Come on, folks. That’s the long and short of it. Money. Ads bring you money. End of story.

Key things to remember, though… Learn about any ad program you join. Read the terms of service and make CERTAIN you don’t violate them, and above all else, do NOT click on your own ads. Ever.

So What’s Next?

I know this article was short. Think of it as a teaser. Next time, we’ll discuss specific ad and affiliate programs. You’ll get a good idea of what’s availible out there. I’ll even spend some time telling you precisely what I use, and how I use it. Stay tuned!!
Technorati Tags: Monetizing, making money blogging Share This ]]> http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/02/15/amateur-blogging-series-why-monetize/feed/ http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/02/11/amateur-blogging-series-drawing-in-traffic-iii-search-engines/ http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/02/11/amateur-blogging-series-drawing-in-traffic-iii-search-engines/#comments Sun, 12 Feb 2006 04:21:07 +0000 Fyre http://www.fyreplace.com/?p=325 Welcome back! Last time, we talked about specific methods for bringing traffic into your blog (including getting dugg and slashdotted). This time, we’ll discuss getting traffic from search engines. Let’s get started.

Search engines are the easiest method for drawing in traffic. Eventually, you’ll get picked up by search engines, even if you don’t submit to them. It’s a good idea, though, to submit early.

Submitting to Engines

Every major search engine out there has a way for you to submit your website to it. First are foremost, you should list in the one major directory, and the three major search engines. Those are dmoz.org, Google, Yahoo, and MSN.

DMOZ

Dmoz is considered the definitive directory of links. In fact, each time that Google, Yahoo, and MSN begin a new run of the Internet (about once every six to ten weeks), they query dmoz for new sites added since their last run. Getting listed in dmoz is a sure-fire way to eventually get in the major search engines. Once you go to dmoz, spend some time reading the information on how to get listed. Dmoz is pretty strict on the requirements for listing, and it is entirely category based. You have to make certain you get the right category (or categories). Spend time exploring, before you list.

Google

Google is considered the Big Engine, right now (although Yahoo is rapidly making a name for itsself, again). Listing with Google will help to bring in traffic in (sometimes) amazing amounts. Now keep in mind that there are a few little peculiarities with Google.

PAGERANK:
Google bases where your site gets listed in results on your Page Rank. PR (Page Rank) is calculated by a mind-boggling algorythm, that few people actually understand. Essntially it has to do with relevance to searches, number of inbound and outbound links (more is not neccisarily better), and the PR of the sites linking to you. The higher your page rank, the closer to the top you’ll show in searches. Even a relatively low page rank of four (which is what this site ranks) will often result in first page, and sometimes in first page, first result. Remember, when you first start, you’ll have no page rank. Page ranks are updated seemingly regularly - about once every six weeks, to three months.

THE GOOGLE SANDBOX:
When websites - particularly blogs - are newly picked up by google, they will often be placed in what has been termed the google sandbox. This is, essentially, a no-mans land where Google keeps track of your site, but doesn’t list it in the results. This is to keep splogs (spam blogs) and spammy sites from showing up in the search returns, so that relevant content will show, instead. Don’t worry, you’ll eventually be out of the google sandbox and (often, seemingly overnight) your traffic will suddenly increase. It normally takes from three to six months to get out of the sandbox, but some sites manage it sooner. The google sandbox is not fully understood, yet, and Google has been rather silent about it, so I can’t tell you much other than submit your site, and hang in there.

YAHOO
Yahoo was the big search engine back in the 1990’s - when the ‘net was young. Now-a-days, its been surpassed by Google, but a ton of people still use it (millions of people, actually. Perhaps, billions). About a third of my search traffic comes from yahoo (half from google, a third from yahoo, and a third from the rest). Definately submit your site to Yahoo.

MSN
MSN is Microsoft’s search engine. Anyone using MSN internet access, MSN Web-TV, or Internet Explorer (default), will usually be using the MSN search engine. I’ve yet to find the submit link to MSN (I was picked up by it, automatically), but I’ve been assured it exists. Submit. heh.

RSS Engines/Directories

With the advent of RSS and syndicated feeds, there are a rapidly growing number of RSS-based search engines on the Internet. It’s highly suggested that once you get an RSS feed up and going (and every decent blogging system should provide you with a feed, automatically. Certain softwares offer more customization of your feeds than others), you submit it to these engines. Look around the ‘net (I’ll eventually get around to making a post of links to these) for them, or check ping services like pingomatic and Pingoat.

Keep in mind that you should also be submitting your blog URL to search directories, as well as the RSS feed. Submitting your blog URL to blog directories can be a decent way to obtain visitors. While I haven’t had many visitors from directories, I can guarentee that they help increase your page rank with Google, and therefore increase your search engine traffic.

SEO - Search Engine Optimization

Seach Engine Optimization is something you should not ignore. Optimizing your blog for search engine indexing is one of the most important things you can do to increase your traffic. First and foremost, let me state that I am not an SEO wizard. I know a little bit, but not a lot. The tips I’ll give you in this section are ones I’ve garnered from reading things online. Secondly, you need to read. Find some good SEO blogs, and read them. Find some tutorials on SEO from reputable sites, and read them. Remember, just because a site appears high in the search engine results does not mean it is reputable. Disreputable webmasters are probably the best at SEO, but the worst and giving good information.

Keywords, Keywords, Keywords

Keywords are of paramount importance in SEO. Every article you write should begin with a keyword rich title and first paragraph. While the best title from an SEO point of view may be something like “Search Engines, Blogging, Optimization, SEO” it doesn’t make for a very good article title. A better way of using a keyword rich title would be, “Search Engines and SEO from a Blogging Perspective.” The trick is to get your keywords out there, on the front page, in a human readable format. If you use technorati tags (which I’ll discuss in the next section), you already know how to do keywords. Your technorati tags are keywords, and usually the keywords you should highlight in your title and first paragraph.

Write your first paragraph (and/or all paragraphs that appear on the front page) to both draw in your readers, and to make search engines sit up and notice keywords. What makes a keyword? What is your article about? The main things your article covers are your keywords. For instance, if you write an article about a visit to the Houston Zoo, where you particularly liked the zebras and pandas, your keywords would be: Zebras, Pandas, Houston Zoo. If you write an article about self sealing stem bolts, and where to purchase them, your keywords would be: Self Sealing Stem Bolts, Stem Bolts, Purchasing Stem Bolts, (and possibally) Stem Bolts Online.

Don’t overuse your keywords. Good keyword density is important, but a title like “Self sealing stem bolts, purchasing stem bolts online, how to make a good purchase of stem bolts, and where to find your stem bolts” is annoying. A much better title, with good keyword density, would be “Self sealing stem bolts, and making the best stem bolt purchase, online.” Convey your topic in your title, without making peoples’ heads roll.

Links, Links, Links

Linking to reputable sites could possibally help in page rank. While it’s more important to have incoming links, some independant (and amateur) research has shown that outbound links to reputable sites may help increase your page rank, somewhat. There’s no guarentee on this, and I’ve never found a specific report on this, but the various bits and pieces I’ve read have seemed plausible. Remember, though, a site with a billion links may be detremental to your page rank. Link density is important, but it’s more important NOT to overdo external links. If you wish to have a ton of links, then you may wish to tag some as “nofollow.” The “nofollow” relative is a directive to search engines not to follow the link, and thusly to ignore it as a link. A nofollow link would look like this: <a href=”http://www.website.com” rel=”nofollow”>website.com</a>. Link, but don’t overdo it.

Javascript, Flash, Graphics, and other happy things

Javascript, Flash, Graphics, and other various things can make a site look very spiffy. I use Javascript on my archives page, and in a few other places on the site. Some websites use flash, and a LOT of graphics. This makes your site look great to visitors, but search engines look at it and sratch their head. Search engine bots/crawlers, simply do not understand javascript, flash, or images. So how do you get around this? Simple.

Javascript: When using Javascript, make certain you add a <noscript> attribute. For instance, if you visit my archives page with javascript, you get a spiffy interface. If you visit without javascript, you get a listing of categories and months. If you link ANYTHING with javascript, have the same thing linked normally in a noscript element. Same for text. That way, searh engines will understand what you have on your site.

Flash: Flash has an attribute similar to the noscript discussed above. Although I’m not certain what that attribute is, a quick search should merit you the answer. Any time you do a flash object, have explanatory text (and links) avalible, non-flash. This will ensure that the flash-based data is still indexed by search engines.

Graphics: Graphics are the big killers. Although search engines will pick up the existance of an image tag, they have no way of knowing what that image represents unless you tell them. For instance, my RSS feed links on the right-hand sidebar are images. The search engine merely sees that as a link without text. Search engines see links like that, thusly: <a href=”http://www.link.com”>[IMG]</a>. Doesn’t give any information, huh? If you use an image to represent something, that representation is lost to the search engine. Don’t despair, though. There is a way around this.

Welcome to the ALT tag. When showing an image, you should use the ALT reference. This is a way to attach text to an image. The text will be displayed when the image is not. In other words, people who are browsing with images turned off (and some do), as well as search engines, will see the ALT text. How do you use it? Like this: <image src=”http://www.site.com/image.jpg” alt=”This text describes the image” /> Use the alt tag in every image. Whether you use one word, or an entire sentence, you’ve gotten the job done.

Other Spiffness: Other things like sound files, movies, etc… detract from SEO as well. Use them sparingly, and use alternate methods alongside them, whenever they exist. These little things will definately help.

Above, I’ve given you three techniques for SEO. There are literally hundreds more out there. Search, read, and learn.

Technorati Tags

This section is a little out of place, and I should have included it earlier in my technorati commentary. However, it is something you should pay particular attention to.

Technorati indexes information by tags. Whenever you make a blog post, take your keywords, and add them as technorati tags at the bottom of the post. How do you make a technorati tag? You use a technorati tag link. First thing to remember, is that technorati does not interpret spaces. Instead, you should use the + symbol instead of a space. For instance, if your keyword is “stem bolts,” it becomes “stem+bolts”.

Now, how to link to technorati tags. Thus: <a href=”http://www.technorati.com/tag/stem+bolts” rel=”tag”>stem bolts</a>. Normally (as you see on my site), I preface my tags with the words: “Technorati tags:”. Normally, I try to put them in a smaller font, as well, so they don’t detract form the post, itsself.

If you haven’t registered and claimed your blog with technorati, for gods sake, go do it.

So What’s Next?

This time we discussed search engines, directories, SEO, and technorati. Next time, we’ll discuss keeping traffic coming into your blog, and especially keeping repeat visitors. Stay tuned!!
Technorati Tags: DMOZ, Google, MSN, Yahoo, Technorati, SEO, Search Engines, Search Engine Submission, Amateur Blogging Share This ]]> http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/02/11/amateur-blogging-series-drawing-in-traffic-iii-search-engines/feed/ http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/01/17/amateur-blogging-series-drawing-in-traffic-ii/ http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/01/17/amateur-blogging-series-drawing-in-traffic-ii/#comments Tue, 17 Jan 2006 09:44:01 +0000 Fyre http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/01/17/amateur-blogging-series-drawing-in-traffic-ii/ Welcome back! Last time, we discussed the generalities of bringing in traffic, and how to tailor your blog to the audience you desire. This time, we’ll dive into some specific methods of bringing in traffic.

Before we begin, I need to tell you that each of the methods I’ll discuss have their good and bad points. I also need to point out (and listen, here, this is important), no method is sure-fire. Especially for a new blog, traffic will be very light. It takes time to bring in steady traffic. It takes even longer to bring in regular readers. Even after a year, only about 24% of my readers are repeat visitors (based off of weekly stats). Don’t get discouraged, just know that it takes time. If you’re just starting a blog, you’re getting in on the explosion of the blogosphere, and the web 2.0 hype that includes blogs. As more and more people discover and turn to blogs for information, your readership will rise. You may be at my level in only six months, perhaps even less. It’s just the timing, sometimes. Okay, with that out of the way, Let’s get started.

Methods to Draw in Traffic

As I mentioned, before, there are several viable methods of drawing in traffic. Before we start, though, let me ask you a question. Do you have at least ten or twenty good, solid posts written and on your blog? No? Then go write them. You need a good base before you start really promoting your blog. Promoting with only an entry or two may work for LiveJournal or Xanga, but it doesn’t float so well in the blogosphere. Ready? Good. Here we go…

Surf-for-Click

Surf-for-click sites are popping up all around the internet. One of the biggest is Blog Explosion. If you want more, go to Google and search for “surf for click”.

Surfing for click is precisely what it sounds like. You register your blog on a surfing site, and then you surf other members’ blogs. For ever blog you surf, you get a certain amount of credits. Each credit guarentees someone surfing to your blog. You’ll usually get a 2:1 ratio, for every two blogs you surf, one person will surf your blog. These are valid methods to pump up your hit stats. Unfortunately, most surf-for-click sites only require you to view a blog for around thirty seconds before you’re able to move to the next blog. This doesn’t seem like such a bit deal until you realize that most of the people surfing are doing so only to bring in traffic to their own blogs, and will only be staying on your blog for around thirty seconds, before moving on. Heck, when I surfed for clicks, most of the time I didn’t even give each blog more than a passing glance. I just knew that for every hour I spent surfing, I’d have sixty people surfing my blog. Of course my traffic went up, quickly, but noone stayed around for very long, and didn’t really pay attention to the articles. If you go with surf-for-click, you need to grab people’s attention right off the bat.

BlogExplosion

BlogExplosion offers many more methods of drawing in traffic, aside from just surfing for clicks. They offer a concept called the Blog Rocket, which is a rolling list of 25 blogs (when someone adds their blog to bottom of the list, the top blog srolls off the list). People routinely look at this list to find new and interesting blogs. Some people open every one (in hopes of finding “mystery credits,” usually), but most often people are only going to the ones where the description interests them.

BlogExplosion also offers a Battle of the Blogs, where you can bet credits against another blog. You win 75% of the total credits bet (if you bet ten, and they bet ten, you get a total of fifteen credits (75% of 20) if you win). I guarentee that people will spend at least a couple of minutes on your blog when they’re voting. BlogExplosion also has member-frequented forums, where you can include your blog in your signature. They also offer “Knowledge,” which is a place where you can ask (and answer) questions. There’s a knowledge area specifically for “blog help” and “rate my blog” style requests. That’s often a good way to draw in people. If you answer knowledge questions - and participate in the community - you’ll often get visitors. It’s a slow trickle, but it works.

BlogExplosion also has the “Rent My Blog” addition. Essentially, you bid credits to “rent” others blogs for a one-week period of time. If the person you’re renting from is any kind of a blogger at all, they’ll promote your blog in an entry when you rent. You’d be surprised at the traffic this can generate. My renters average around sixty clicks per week when they rent from me. That’s not too shabby, especially if you consider you can rent from multiple blogs at one time, and the sixty if just from my blog. Now, keep in mind that not every blog will generate that amount of traffic, but if you check stats, you can find the best generators out there.

Commenting

A well-placed comment on someone else’s blog can be a great traffic generator. My favorite way of using this tactic is to find a blog that mentions a subject I’ve blogged about in the past. Then, I’ll make a comment about their entry, and include a link to my own (something like “Oh, yes, I completely agree. In fact, I blogged about that (link:before). I think that…..”). Even if you’re never blogged about the topic before, almost every blog out there will link your name (on your comment) to your blog. In fact, the only one I’ve found that does not routinely do this is Performancing. Just remember to make sure your comments are applicable to the subject at hand. An off-subject comment - especially when you include a link - is usually considered spam, and is often deleted, or you’ll be blocked from commenting.

Forums

Do you participate in discussion forums at all? Well, then, why not add your blog (with a link) to your signature. That way, on every post you make, your blog link shows up. If you make relevant posts, you’ll often find people dropping by to give you a look. I’ve had some pretty decent success with forums. Don’t forget, in the “introduce yourself” areas, it’s more than okay to mention that you’re a blogger, the topics you blog on, and include your link. Don’t forget about the “introduce your blog” areas, as well.

Pingback and Trackback

You would be amazed at the amount of traffic a trackback can gain you. The top referrer to my blog is still a single trackback I made, ages ago. What’s even more amazing is that this referrer has beat out every search engine, etc… in terms of total referrals. Whenever you write a post that is based off of, inspired by, quotes, or is in regard to another’s blog post, make sure to include a trackback (and, perhaps, a link to them in your post).

Before you even ask, by the way, there is a slight difference between pingbacks and trackbacks. Trackbacks were introduced by Six Apart, the makers of Moveable Type. They are the “industry standard” when it comes to such things. Pingbacks were designed by WordPress, and use the XML-RPC system. They’re essentially the same thing, but pingbacks work only with Wordpress blogs. (They’re pretty much interchangeable. Every major blogging platform supports trackbacks. Wordpress supports both.)

Link Exchanges and Directories

Link Exchanges are exactly what they sound like. You, and another blog, exchange links. Often-times this is done through an automated system that displays a certain number of random links. For every link you display, your link gets displayed once. Other methods include the ages-old asking other bloggers to link to you. Darren Rowse over at Problogger has written a good commentary on asking for link exchanges. The most important thing to remember is to be cordial, and do not be demanding. Also, try to only ask once. I had one individual ask me to link his blog in every comment he left, and he e-mailed me a couple of times, asking me to link to him. Even though he linked to me, he severely hurt his chances of my linking back to him. Don’t be offended if people don’t want to link to you. Most bloggers are very picky about the blogs they link to. I know I am. Also, if you promise to link to someone, do it. It’s okay to remove links, occasionally. If a blog goes defunct, doesn’t update for a long while, or you no longer wish to associate with it, then by all means remove it. If you’re just shortening your list and want to remove by date, then I say leave the link exchange up there at least three months before removing it.

Directories. Directories are just that. Simply put, they’re a massive listing of blog links, organized by subject. Submit to each directory, sit around, and wait. It may take a while to get your listing approved.

Link exchanges are important for search engines, I should point that out. Often times, your ranking in a search engine will be influenced by the number of links coming into your blog. The jury is still out (and the debate is fierce) as to whether or not directories help or hurt your ranking. Overall, if the directory takes care not to list splogs (spam blogs), then you should be fine listing in it.

del.icio.us, Bloglines, et al

Del.icio.us and Bloglines, and other social bookmarking and blogmarking sites are great ways to bring in traffic. I firmly support having a “del.icio.us this” link on each and every entry you publish. Get a plugin for your blog (or write it into your template), and list it on the individual entry page, at the bottom of the entry (before the comments). I’ve got a few links on each of my posts, and they’ve come in handy. I’m rather surprised, usually, by the number of links from del.icio.us (and others) I find on some of my entries.

Even if you just del.icio.us your own entries, you’re still getting them listed, and people will find them. Sites like Reddit, Digg, and Slashdot are also viable weapons in the traffic war. Feel free to list your own entries, there. Yes, some consider it spam, but if the entries are interesting and relevant to current topics, you’ll usually get promoted a bit, and people will come and read. Sure, you’ll get flamed in comments, but hey, some people consider just breathing, spam.

Getting Dugg and Dotted

I’m listing these in their own major heading for one reason. Getting on the front page of Digg and Slashdot can make or break a server… literally.

First off, how do you get dugg/dotted? Well, the easiest method is to get someone (a friend, perhaps) to list your post on digg, or to write a short article on slashdot, including a relevant link to you. It’s an artform, really, on getting to the front page at Slashdot, and it rarely happens. The trick is to think of the sites like a PR (Press Release) type of thing. Digg is primarily direct links, where the userbase at large votes to promote (or “diggs”) a post. Slashdot is article-based, and usually includes inline links in a blurb about the article. If you’re submitting, yourself, you’ll do better at digg. As for how to get slashdotted, search on Technorati or for “How to get slashdotted”. There’s a wealth of information.

Surviving the Digg and Dot Effect

Getting dugg, or dotted - especially on the front page of either site - will lead to a massive influx of traffic in a short period of time. Remember when I said that it could make or break a server? I was being serious. You can go from a few hundred hits a week, to over 10,000 in one day, with a slashdot front-pager. Digg traffic is a bit less than that, but still substantial (5,000 - 8,000 a day). The traffic influx rarely lasts beyond a day or two, though.

Surviving the Massive Initial Influx

There’s a well-defined trick to this. Make sure that your website is designed to load quickly and easily. On a broadband connection, your site should load within a second (two seconds with a lot of images). When your blog starts getting that massive amount of traffic, your bandwith will be sucked quickly. I’m lucky in that I have an exhorbinate amount of bandwith per month. Most people, are not. If you find out that you’ve gotten slashdotted, or dugg, to the front page, then go in and disable all but the absolutely required images. I usually leave the rss subscription chicklets, but I disable other images that run from my server. If you have a link to a photo gallery from your blog, you might want to remove it, temporarily, to prevent a lot of people from clicking through to it and sapping bandwith. Digg and Slashdot are the reason that so few blogs use a lot of locally-hosted graphics (and the reason I use so few graphics, period). If your server starts to balk, and starts to slow down, you can try disabling some of the more database intensive things, such as link/blogrolls, etc. If you go down, well, you go down. Wait for your webhost to send you the standard complaining e-mail, apologize, and get your site back up. These triage measures may have to remain in place for a couple of days. Usually no more than five, though, and most often only a couple.

Surviving the Post-Influx Let Down

Oh my gosh! You got several thousand hits in one day! For nearly a week, your traffic was outrageously high. Now you’re looking at your stats, and you’re back to the same-old, same-old traffic. What happened?! Well, the dotters came, and left. That’s what. Often times, they’re coming, looking, and leaving. Don’t worry, though. Some of them will be back, and some of them may even blog about your entry in their own blogs. That will, over time, bring in more steady traffic. Don’t despair, and remember, the slashdot and digg effects were only temporary to begin with. Your traffic will probably rise, overall, as a result of your getting dugg/dotted, but it will take time.

So What’s Next?

In this conversation, we discussed specific methods from bringing in traffic, including getting dugg and slashdotted (and how to survive it). Next time, we’ll talk about drawing in traffic from search engines, and a little bit about SEO (Search Engine Optimization). Stay tuned, and see you soon!

Who do You Want to Read Your Blog?

The obvious answer is, everyone. Unfortunately, not everyone will be interested in your blog. Sit down and thing for a bit about the groups of people who would be most interested in your blog. Those will be the ones you want to target. While pro bloggers automatically have groups of people, by niche, you don’t. You need to spend some time make sure your website is out there, and gets well known. It’ll take time - sometimes a long time - to draw in traffic. I started writing in this blog a year ago, and I’m just now getting to - what I consider - a good level of traffic. It’s important to keep apprised of what people are reading, too. We’ll talk more about these things, later.

The first thing to realize is that every blogger - professional or not - is competing against every other blogger to draw in traffic. While the advent of syndicated feeds (RSS and ATOM), and feed aggregators (feed readers) make it easier to read a substantial number of blogs, there is still a finite limit to what one person can comfortably read in a reasonable amount of time. I, myself, am nearing fifty feeds in my feed reader, and there are always new ones to add. Eventually, people have to start giving up feeds to add new ones. The trick is to make sure that you hold your reader, once you draw them in. We’ll discuss keeping readers in a later installment; this time, we’re concerned with how to get them to your blog.

Although that last paragraph seems redundant, and out of place, it is information that bore repetition. Just trying to get you in the right mindset.

Now, I started this section by titling it, “Who do You Want to Read Your Blog.” It’s time to think long and hard about that question. Do you want only business people? Do you want only teenagers? Do you want only other bloggers, or politicos, or who? Once you have an idea, you know how to tailor your blog to draw in that traffic.

Wait! Tailor your blog? No, I’m not saying niche it, and I’m not saying write only for those people. Tailoring your blog goes much further than what you write. Your layout, color themes, and extras are what makes your blog attractive to a certain subset. An unusual theme and flashy colors may appeal to the younger set, but business folk may see it as overkill and too busy. A clean, white-space filled, “sterile” theme may make the business and older set sit up and bark, but the younger crowd would probably pass you buy. It’s best to give a long thought to the types of people you want to draw in, and tailor your blog to the best match of all of them. If you decide you want to draw in “everyone” (and trust me, eventually your blog will find a “people niche” all its own, so everyone will eventually turn into specific groups), then I feel a semi-bright, well layed out, easy to navigate blog is your best bet. I offer my own up as an example, but even here I’ve had complaints (people think there’s too much “tan” coloring involved - or at least that’s the most often generated comment).

The trick is to make it so the people surfing in find thing easily, and don’t immediately click away because of your layout, color choices, or offerings. That way, when people drop by, they’ll at least be convinced to stay and read what got them there in the first place.

How do You Get Traffic?

I’ll go much more in depth in this category in the next installment. For now, I’ll just give you a good list of ways to draw in traffic:

• Surf-for-Click
• Methods from BlogExplosion
• Commenting on other blogs
• Pingback and Trackback
• Link Exchanges
• del.icio.us, bloglines, and other “bookmarking” services
• Digg and Slashdot
• Search Engines

Seems like a lot, yeah? Well, it is. There’s a veritable plethora (my girlfriend would tell you I overuse that term. That and “metric a–load”) of ways to bring in traffic. The trick is getting them to work for you. Go give some thought to the type of people you want to read, work on your layout, and keep writing some of those initial articles (Once you get about ten or twenty, start with your regular posting schedule (remember that?), and future-date or draft your extras. If you don’t have ten or twenty (more is better) posts on your blog, yet, then get to writing. You don’t want to try to bring in traffic if you don’t have a good base of post).

So What’s Next?

This time, we discussed the generalities of drawing in traffic, including tailoring your layout to the people you want to read. Yes, I know it was very general, it was intended to be. Layouts and themes are very personal things, and you should ultimately decide on specifics for yourself. Next time, we’ll dive into the specifics of bringing in traffic. See you soon!

What is Blogger’s Block

Blogger’s block is just like writer’s block. It’s the state you occasionally get into when you just can’t find anything to blog about, or the words just won’t come. We all go through it, and if not overcome within a decent amount of time, it can kill your site, as people flee when you stop posting. Now, I’m not going to talk about every different way to battle blogger’s block, as there’s just too many. Darren Rowse (gee, how many links do I give this guy, heh) over at problogger.net has written a great series of articles on battling bloggers block. He’s even condensed them into one single page. Give it a read… after our discussion.

Defeating Blogger’s Block

Defeating blogger’s block is not that hard. You just have to make some changes to the way you handle things. Most often, a good change of scenery will make the difference. If not, some web surfing will. If not, take a day or so off from blogging, and do other things without even touching the computer. Of course, that idea notebook I mentioned last time (and will mention again in a bit) will help, too. So, let’s get down to brass tacks (if you prefer, you can get down to Brass Monkey, but you’ll either wind up drunk, or dancing crazily, and I don’t want to see that).

A Change of Scenery

A simple change of scenery can often be the most effectual method of battling blogger’s block. This series assumes you have a laptop, or portable computing device of some sort. If all you have is a palm pilot (or pocket PC), consider getting a keyboard for it. If that doesn’t help, heck, keep a notebook with you and write long-hand. If not, well, a few of the places I talk about will have computers you can use.

Cyber Cafes

Your local cyber cafe is a great place to blog, especially if you blog about tech and/or gaming. What is a cyber cafe? A cyber cafe is a coffee-shop style establishment that provides computers for its customers. Most of the time, they are geared towards gaming. Sometimes, they’re geared towards simply giving you a place to sit and type. Whichever, it’s a change of scenery, and still a computing environment.

A sub-set of the cyber cafe is the WiFi Cafe. A coffee shop, restaurant, or bar that provides wireless internet access. Some places (like Starbucks) charge ($7.99 a day! yeesh!). Some places do not. I prefer the ones that don’t, as I’m on the fast track to being the first Fortune 500 professional loafer. heh. Sitting around at a place with wireless access, you can observe others, talk to friends, or just get the creative juices flowing in a new envrionment.

Libraries

Your local library will often have computers availible for its patrons. Most of the time, you have to use them in one hour increments, but during the time you’re not at the computer, you can explore the library, read some great fiction books, read some great non-fiction books, or research that factoid that’s been bugging you (how long was the longest sleep on record, after all). Explore the local library, you’ll be pleasently surprised what it can offer. If you don’t want to (or can’t) blog online from the library, take a floppy disc with with you, and write in the word processor, and save your entries to disk. Alternatively, take your laptop/pocket PC/pocket rocket (okay, this one might get you in trouble) with you, and save entries to the hard disk to blog later.

Coffee Shops and Restaurants

For some reason, I write much better at my local Denny’s (a 24 hour diner-style restaurant). The majority of this series has been written at my local Denny’s. My novel-in-progress, and short-story series have almost entirely been written at Denny’s. Your local coffee shop/restaurant can be a great place to meet new people, discuss new and interesting things, and write new and interesting things. Maybe it’s the muzak, maybe the places I go just have good feng shui, but I find writing away from home very conductive. Besides, if you find you can’t write, you can relax with a book and a cup of coffee (or tea, or cola, or a plate of pancakes, or a basket of fries).

Friends Houses

Got a friend? Do they have a house? Go over and hang out. Chances are, you’ll empty your mind, have some fun, and be able to sit back down at the computer, later, and write like the wind. Alternatively, spend a little time with your laptop, surfing the ‘net with a friend. I hang with friends about once a week, and it works well for blog fodder. Just keep your laptop, or notebook, handy.

Bars

Bars have long been a great place to listen to conversations, discuss things in the news, and generally get the jucies flowing. Had a great conversation at a bar? Blog about it. Overhear a fight about something trivial? Blog it. Watch an awesome game of darts? Blog about it as if you were the announcer. Bars will almost always find you something worthy of blogging. Just be careful on the drinking, huh?

Offline Blogging

A lot of times you’ll want to write a post, and you won’t be able to get online at the time. That’s fine. Have a good text editor handy. Not a word processor, those often use hidden characters that break your blog and RSS feed validation when copied and pasted. Use something like Notepad++, or even the Windows Notepad program. I like Notepad++, because it has a tabbed interface, so I can keep mutliple documents/posts in the same window. Write things out in the text file, save it, and late copy/paste it into your blog. I have a folder called “blog entries” on the desktop of my laptop. Bingo, bango, bongo, there we go.

The Idea Notebook

I’ve talked about having an idea notebook several times in this, and previous, posts. Keeping an notebook with you, and writing down ideas, thoughts, interesting tidbits of information, and post ideas can be a great way of keeping blog fodder around. I go through my notebooks every now and then. Sometimes I only get an idea for a quick LiveJournal entry. Sometimes, I write an entire long post on a blog. Keep one with you.

Types of Notebooks

There’s a veritable plethora of notebook types out there. 43 folders continually talks up moleskine notebooks. A lot of people keep blank, hardcover books with them. Some use a standard multi-subject notebook. Personally, I use a 6″x9″ green-tint gregg ruled notepad (gregg ruled is a standard lines page, with another line down the center). I keep this notebook with me, everywhere I go, with a pen clipped in the wires up top. I write down everything. Find the one you like best, and dang-it, keep it with you.

How to Use Your Notebook

Write in it. Seriously. Keep the notebook with you, and write down passing thoughts, tidbits of information, summarize conversations, and especially ideas that pop in your mind. Don’t think to yourself, “oh, I’ll remember that, later,” because you won’t. Write. It. Down!!!

Some of you have multiple blogs. I have a LiveJournal, this blog, and I write for the Houston Metroblog. Since I normally only put quick little tidbits in LiveJournal, I don’t worry about using it, elsewhere. It’s simple to do it in your favourite notebook. You can either carry multiple notebooks, but c’mon, who wants to carry a bunch of notepads around. If you have more than two blogs, I suggest getting a three subject, or five subject notebook, and making each “subject” for a different blog. If you only have two blogs, then start ideas for one from the front, and only use the front of each page. For the other blog, start from the back, and only use the back of each page. I do this in my gregg ruled notepad, and it works great. I just flip open a cover and start looking through the pages for blog fodder. Keep the notebook with you, and write things down. Keep it with you as you go from room to room in your house. It should be your constant companion.

So, What’s Next?

In this conversation we discussed battling bloggers block. If these tips don’t help you, there are tons more ideas over at problogger.net on battling bloggers block. Next time, get started in our discussion on bringing in traffic to your blog. Stay tuned!

Finding Things to Write About

The Internet is a huge place. There are billions of websites, online. Everywhere you look, there’s blog fodder. Yep, it’s buzz-word time. “Blog fodder” is, essentially, stuff that you consider blog-worthy.

“But, Eric, with billions of sites, where do I find the good stuff?”
So glad you asked. I’ll be touching on several places to find things to write about. I’ll be a little heavy on tech stuff, because that’s what I know. I’ll also be a little heavy on other blogs, since they are wealths of information. Just remember, if you’re re-blogging something (blogging about something you saw on another blog), you need to try to bring something new. Even if that “something new” is as simple as your opinion on the subject.

Google Searches

In reality, this will work with any search engine. Personally, I prefer Google, because of its personalized search feature. If you have a Google Account (if you’ve got gmail, you already do. If not, Google accounts are free, but don’t - neccisarily - include gmail), you can sign up for the personalized search feature. This nifty little feature keeps track of your search terms, and, some say, the results you click on. That way if you search a lot for wifi information, and suddenly do a search for camping, you may find a link about wireless internet while camping crop up in your top results. Results are still ranked according to Google page rank, but Google also takes into account the previous searches you’ve made. You can opt out of this service at any time (you have to specifically activate it, to start using it, though).

So finding things on Google? Search about things you’re interested in. Remember to look past the first page or two of results. Sometimes the neatest stuff may wind up buried on page five, or twelve, or even one-hundred. Searching, and exploring, are great ways to find new blog fodder. Spend some time exploring the new Web 2.0 based search engines, that search multiple engines and return details in one page, or that do nifty things with your search. I’d like to find a search engine that searches on my overall term, and then extrapolates each individual word and searches on it, combining the most relevant results (preferably in a sexy, AJAXified layout).

del.icio.us

Del.icio.us, and other “social bookmarking” websites are great places to find blog fodder. Start looking around del.icio.us. Spend time exploring your own tags (if you have any), and finding the links from people with similar interests. This is another way to find some of the neatest stuff. Sometimes it’s just a link you want to share, other times you’ll find a great new service that you’re dying to review. Del.icio.us (and, again, other sites of that type) are vast repositories of interesting things, online.

Digg and ‘Dot

Digg and Slashdot are great places to find new and interesting things. From politics to tech, these sites have it. Slashdot, of course, is more tech-oriented. Another good site along these lines is Kuro5hin. Reddit is a lot like Digg, in that people vote on topics to move them up to the front page. Through judicious use of tags, categories, and rankings, you can find some interesting stuff. Don’t forget to del.icio.us-ly bookmark things you find interesting.

Other Blogs

This section was originally entitled “Feeds,” but I realize that not everyone reads RSS feeds. Personally, I read around thirty or so feeds, but some prefer to go direct to the blogs. However you slice it, other blogs give you great things to blog about. Don’t forget to search blogs for your favourite keywords, or look through their archives. Spend time surfing on your favourite blogs, you’ll likely find something you want to write about. Just be careful about overblogging and restatement.

Overblogging is just like it sounds. Going overboard on things that have already been “blogged to death.” After all, who wants to read another post about how Google Base is trying to be the next Craigslist. If you re-blog something that has already been posted about, elsewhere, make sure you bring something new to the mix. Even if you’re just voicing your opinion on the matter, so long as it’s a little different from what else is out there, you’re fine. This doesn’t always apply to newer information, though. Sometimes it’s okay to link to someone else’s blog, to let your readers know that there’s a new topic on something. Although, again, be careful of restatement.

Restatement, essentially, is when you do nothing more than restate exactly what another blogger has said, in your own words. If you do this, for the love of all that is bloggy, link to the original post, and/or consider using the original blogger’s own words in blockquotes. Again, don’t go through and overly restate things, unless you’re bringing a little something new to the tale.

Technorati

If you’re wondering where to find other blogs on specific topics, or find out what other bloggers are saying, Technorati is your source. You can search Technorati and find the latest posts on virtually any topic. If you search on multiple terms - like a person’s name, for example - be sure to seperate the words with a + sign. For instance, to search on my name, you’d use eric+scalf. Technorati is, indeed, one of the best resources in the blogging world.

Wikipedia

Wikipedia is one of the end-all, be-all sites for user-centric information. The world’s first user-editted “encyclopedia,” Wikipedia brings a lot of great information to the forefront. The “history” entries are especially interesting. I could literally spend days surfing nothing but Wikipedia, and about once a month, I spend a weekend doing just that. Sometimes I find great blog fodder. Most of the time, it’s a bunch of “I didn’t realize that,” type of things; but occasionally, I come up with a lot of “what if” style ideas, and wind up describing an alternate universe if something changed, or didn’t happen. While I haven’t quite started doing that, here, yet, I am fairly well known for it on one service I frequent.

I challenge you to go surf Wikipedia, one day, for a full day. Then, report back here on the thing that caused you to have the biggest “wow,” or “I didn’t know that,” reaction. Write an “entry” about it, in my comments section. The best one will be used on the site as a “guest blogger” portion. Who knows, you might even be invited to help me start a new blog, or be a regular guest blogger.

The Real World

The Real World can be a great place to find new blog fodder, and I’m not talking about a craptastical reality tv show. Carry a little notebook with you (I use a 6″x9″ Gregg Ruled notepad), and write down interesting things you hear, or things that occur to you. Sometimes listening to the people around you will result in a post, or even a series. This entire series spawned out of a conversation I overheard at Denny’s, one night. A guy and his girlfriend were discussing blogging. The girl stated that she had considered it, but had no clue where to begin, and weren’t blogs all about making money, anyway? Boom! The Amateur Blogging Series was born.

Of course, we can’t forget the TV and radio news. We can’t forget conversations with friends. We can’t forget opening our eyes and looking at what’s around us. The Real World provides the best blog fodder, of all.

Citing and Quoting

It’s important to remember to give credit where credit is due. Any time you draw information from another source - especially from another blog - it’s important to cite the source. You can go as simple as placing an “(original source)” link at the end of a paragraph, or as involved as saying “This post was inspired by ________.” However you cite is up to you, but remember to do so.

Something else to keep in mind. <blockquote> is your friend. Anytime you quote something directly from a page, another blog, or even one of your own posts, enclose it in blockquote tags. This lets people know that it’s a quote, and not your own words (or, that it’s something you said, before). I suggest doing a cite like “In his entry on such and such, so-and-so said: <blockquote>blah blah</blockquote>”. This will get the cite done in a professional manner, and get the information out there. Remember, taking info from another’s blog and not giving a link back is considered very bad form in the blogosphere. Even if you’re attack someone’s post, link to them.

So What’s Next?

This time, we talked about finding things to blog about, and properly citing/quoting those things. Next time, we’ll discuss how to battle Blogger’s Block. Also, I’ve given you eight great resources for finding blog fodder, above. Now it’s time for you to go explore the vastness that is the web, and tell me what are some of your favourite sites for finding new blogging ideas.

Types of Posts

There are many, many types of posts. In fact, Darren Rowse, at problogger.net has identified 20 specific types. We won’t touch on all of them, but I highly suggest you familiarize yourself with them all. I’ll touch on some of my favourites.

Reviews

Everyone knows what a review is. Whether you’re reviewing a book, a tool, a product, a movie, or even another blog, a review is a great way to bring in visitors. In fact, you’ll often find people linking to your review from their blogs, especially if you’re one of the first to review, or present a unique viewpoint. Don’t know how to write a review? It’s simple:

• What you’re reviewing.
• A little about it (factual information).
• Your opinions on it/experience with it.
• Your suggestions (pro/con) to others.

It’s just that simple. Write a few, you’ll get the feel.

Op-Ed (Opinion/Editorial)

Op-Ed pieces make up a good majority of the blogosphere. Keep in mind this isn’t a rant. A rant would be going all out, and not caring what others think. In an op-ed piece, you want to address an issue, present the background of that issue, and then address your feelings, opinions, or concerns regarding the issue. Op-ed pieces are most often found in the political world, but I’ve written a few on other matters (and so have millions of other people). If you find a post in a blog that expresses an opinion (often in a “letter to the editor” style), that you don’t think is a full-on rant, then it’s most likely an op-ed piece. Here’s a bonus thought… Ask your readers to e-mail you their “letters to the editor,” regarding your articles.

Affiliate-geared

If you’re trying to make some money off your blog, then I highly suggest the occasional affiliate piece. Simply put, you pick a product, describe it, talk about it a bit, and include a link to an affiliate program that has that item (I use Amazon.com often for this). Whether or not people click is irrelevant. The fact that you’re presenting information on a product is the point. Often you’ll find these pieces reading a lot like a review (and if you haven’t included an affiliate link in your product reviews, what’s wrong with you, heh). Make no bones about it, though, these pieces have to be well-written, and present more about the product, than your opinions on the product (although your opinions are important. They’re often what get people to click/buy).

Link posts

I touched on these in the last session. We’ll talk about them, briefly, again. It’s just a good idea to include the occasional link post. Whether it’s several links that you’ve added that day to del.icio.us, a link to someone else’s blog, or a single link to some random site you’ve encountered, link posts can bring in readers for miles. Especially if you consistently find the obscure and unusual things (grade-A scrounger? If you’re the Klinger of the internet, you should be making link posts).

Dissection posts

The premise behind a dissection post is simple. Take someone else’s post, and dissect it (through judicious use of blockquotes). Take it piece by piece and explain your feelings behind it. Sometimes you’ll agree, and sometime’s you’ll disagree with what you’re dissecting. Heck, sometimes the disagreements can bring in a lot more visitors. The point is, you’ll be linking back to the post you’re dissecting (and hopefully trackbacking to it, as well), and this can bring in readers. Besides, people love to read what you have to say on others’ posts.

Trivia/Knowledge

Know some unusual, obscure, or preposterous bits of trivia? Have a bit of knowledge to impart? Then by all means, tell the world about it. A lot of times, these posts will be short and sweet, telling people about some little fact, and linking them to the information on it. Sometimes you’ll tell them about a factoid and then expand upon it. Often times, I take truly obscure trivia, and then what-if it to death, often creating my own pandimensional, alternate universe based around the what-ifs. Why? I enjoy it. After all, half of blogging is narcicism (you want the readers/attention), and half is for your own personal enjoyment. (If you’re blogging for cash, then the third half is for income.)

Rants

Sometimes a post calls for a good, old-fashioned rant. If you’ve seen something that gets your schwartz in a twist, then dang-it, rant about it on your blog. You’ll usually wind up with comments for miles. People will be agreeing, disagreeing, calling you names, threatening to trap you in a closet, all sorts of things. In short, you’re getting your feelings out, planting your opinions on the ‘net, and generally getting things off your chest. Salut!

Inflamatory

It’s easy to go inflamatory. Inflamatory is when you’re fishing for the massive comments by trying to piss people off. These types of posts are especially easy to combine with rants, or dissections. The goal of an inflamatory post is to get others’ to twist their schwartz, and, thereby, comment. Just remember, you want to try to keep from being slanderous/libellous when you go inflamatory. It’s okay to tell CNN to get its head out of its ass. It’s NOT okay to say that CNN is in bed with the religious right in an attmept to get everyone in America to slaughter the proleteriats.

Articles

Sometimes you can’t think of anything to post, so you post an article by someone else. Sometimes you choose a topic and write an informative article on it. Articles are structured posts, designed to impart knowledge and infromation, with as little opinion as possible. Often you’ll see others re-posting your articles, so be sure to include information at the bottom about your site, and whether or not you allow re-posts.

How-to

Remember those knowledge posts, above? Well, this is a sub-set of them. Take a topic/thing/idea/dohickey, and tell people how to do it. Got trapped in the closet, one day? Tell people how you got out. Encountered some random error on your computer, and fixed it? Tell people how to fix it. How-to posts are among the most-often bookmarked, slashdotted, and digg’ed posts on the ‘net.

Combination

A lot of posts will combine more than one method in a single post. This is fine, and - in fact - is even encouraged. Make an inflamatory rant about a specific product, and link to it via an affiliate program. Alternatively, write an article on how to link to an affiliate program. You could even write a series of articles on how to be an amateur blogger, and include some of your opinions on the matter (just remember, go light on the opinions in articles). Oh, wait, I’m doing that right now. Well, no matter, there’s always room for more on the ‘net. We’re the Jello of the next millenium.

Remember, there’s several more types of posts. This is just a place to start. Read, reasearch, learn!

Length of Your Posts

So you’ve decided to write, you just don’t know how long to make your posts. Simple, a post should be as long as it needs to be. Now, sometimes you’ll have a topic that you could go on and on for pages. My general suggestion is that if a post takes up more than two and a half “pages” (screens) on your blog, you should consider making it two posts, and expanding on it. As for too short, or too long? BAH! Link posts are notoriously short, articles are about midline, and rants can go on for miles of screen real estate.

The trick is not how long to make your post, but how much of it to show on your front page. If your blogging system has an “excerpt” or “short/full post” or “more” feature, I’d suggest using it on the longer posts. In general, the front page needs to have enough to get the basic information across. In other words, include enough to tell what the post is about, and draw the reader in. Then, to conserve real estate on the front page, you can include a “Read more” link. See my blog for examples. On my longer posts, I usually only place the first couple of paragraphs on the front page. The point is to draw the reader in, in the first few lines. The rest is all in real estate.

So What’s Next?

In this conversation, we talked about what types of posts you can make. Next time, we’ll discuss where to find things to post about - so-called “blog fodder,” as well as properly citing within your posts. See you soon!

Those First Posts

Oh Boy! You’ve got your blog set up, you’ve picked an awesome template, you’ve got some great plug-ins installed, you’ve decided on your topics, and you’re hyped and primed to post. You sit down, open your post editor, and don’t have a clue where to begin. Welcome to your first case of bloggers block. We’ll discuss how to battle bloggers block another time. Right now, I’ll just give you some starting places. As The Sound of Music said, “Let’s start at the very beginning, a very good place to start.”

The Welcome Post

Yes, that’s right. The very first post in your blog should be a welcome post. Why? Until you get around to writing a colophon (or “about”) page, you can link to your welcome post as an about. So what do you write in your welcome post? Well, I usually start by welcome readers to my blog. I give a little bit of background on who I am, and why I’ve opened the blog, and I talk a little about the topic(s) I’ll be blogging on. In short, answer the the important questions a first-time reader might ask:

• WHO are you?
• WHAT is this blog about?
• WHY should I read this blog? (this is a good time to tell more about your experience, expertise, or like of your topics)
• HOW often will you post?

Answer those questions, and you’ll have your welcome post down pat. Err, I highly suggest doing a little more than just listing the questions and answering them, though. You want people to understand that you’re a decent blogger, and can write reasonably decent entries.

The Focus of your Initial Posts

So, now you have to populate your blog with posts. Most people recommend having at least ten solid posts before announcing your blog, and at least twenty posts before heavily promoting it. At the beginning, it’s more than okay to blog more often. Most people start out writing two or three posts a day, and eventually taper off to the posting schedule they’ve decided on (we’ll cover this, next).

So, the big question, what do you write about? In the first several posts, I suggest writing at least once on each of the topics of your blog. If you’ve decided to blog on food, wine, religion, politics, and giraffes, then you should write at least one good, solid post on each. A solid post, by the way, is a post that consists almost entirely of original content, of reasonable length. Not too long, not too short.

“So, why should I cover every topic at the start?” You might be asking. Simple, it’s so people will get an idea of what to expect. If you have a good base of posts, people will have a general idea of what to expect from you, and your spiffy new blog. Let people know what to expect, and they’ll probably come back for more.

How Often Should I Post?

It’s completely up to you to decide on a blogging schedule. Every blogger has to decide how often, at minimum, they want to post. Before you worry if it’s enough, here’s a good guideline. Most bloggers try to post at least five times a week (usually one a day, monday through friday). Personally, I try to post at least one full post once a day Monday through Friday, and a smaller post (link post, or several asides) on weekends. It’s also perfectly okay to post more often. Oh, yes, if you just don’t think you can hack five times a week, then try for three. Even if you only update once a week, you’ll be fine if it’s a good, quality post. One of my favourite blogs updates only once per week, and it’s a links post. I enjoy it, though, because I often find new and interesting things through it. (In case you’re wondering, the blog is “Simplicity,” and the series is “Links for a Sunday Morning.”)

Deciding on a Schedule (and sticking with it)

I touched on deciding on a schedule above. A touch is all that’s really neccesary. Decide on your schedule, and cement it in your mind. If you use GTD, a calendar, or any other tasking system, try making yourself an entry on the specific days, reminding yourself to post. Err, make sure you let yourself know in the morning (and maybe a reminder at the end of the day, just in case you haven’t, yet).

Now that you have your schedule, you need to stick with it. Like I said, before, it’s okay to miss a day here and there, and it’s more than okay to post more often. You just need to remember to stick with your main schedule and at least fulfill it. Of course, there may be times you simply can’t. Perhaps you’re sick, and just don’t feel like blogging for a few days, or a week. Perhaps you’re going on vacation to Nepal, or on a pilgramage to Mecca, and there’s no readily availible Internet connection. What to do?!

What to do if You Can’t Blog

ACK! OH NOES! You’re sick/out of town/trapped in the closet!! What do you do?! Well, if you pre-plan for these events, you’ll be fine! First and foremost, you should pre-blog. If you’ve already fulfilled your posting quota for the day, and want to write more, consider saving your post as a draft. If your post isn’t time-dependant, then it can really be presented at any time, right? For instance, I’m future-blogging all of the posts in this series. I’ve only posted three, so far, and I’m currently writing the sixth post, several days before I plan to actually let it loose on the ‘net. I have them all saved as drafts on my computer (I prefer to keep them there, as opposed to in my blog software, but I could have just as easily slapped it into my blogging software as a draft). Whenever I’m ready to post the next one, I slap it into the posting system, and away it goes, off to ravage the poor, pure internet. If you know you’re going to be out of town, or unable to blog (or simply want a few days off), then write enough drafts beforehand to fulfill your posting quota.

Once you have those posts written, you can future-date them. Most blogging systems (well, most blogging softwares) will allow you to date a post in the future, and it won’t appear on your blog until that time. That way you’ve fulfilled your quota, and you’re set. Of course, sometimes you’re in a position where you get caught unaware (sick, that stupid closet, etc). At that point it helps to have a guest blogger.

So how do you get a guest blogger? Well, start looking at the people who comment on your blog. If there’s one whose comments you admire and truly appreciate, or there’s someone you think would write a good series of posts, try e-mailing them and asking if they would like to guest blog. If you’re uncomfortable with random people from the ‘net posting on your blog (err, you do have comments enabled, right?) then try asking your significant other (girlfriend, boyfriend, wife, husband, gay lover, mistress, dominatrix, girl-who-swears-she’s-eighteen, etc…) to make a few posts for you. Most of the time, you’ll have someone you trust to post. They don’t have to post on your specific topics, and they don’t have to be as eloquent or as good at writing as you. They don’t even have to post humongous posts. So long as they can slap a few thoughts on some subject or other together, they’re fine. Check with your blogging system and see if you can add an extra author account. I know some MoveableType installations can do this (although you have to pay for the ability), and I know for a fact Wordpress can do it. My girlfriend is currently a guest blogger on this blog, although she has yet to write a post (she says she just doesn’t know what to say). If you can’t add a new author to the system, then simply have them write up some posts in draft form, e-mail them to you, and you can future-date them.

Okay, you don’t want a guest blogger. What now? Simple. Link posts. You can create a link post simply by going through your favorites/bookmarks and slapping a few random links together. You can sign up for auto-posting from del.icio.us. Of course, with most automated link postings, only the links you add that day will be posted. This can be a drawback if you don’t feel like surfing and bookmarking links. My suggestion is to just randomly go through your bookmarks (ignoring the porn, heh), and slap a few into a post. Failing links, you can have a few articles, from different article sites on the ‘net, squirreled away. Future date those, and you’re golden.

Above all else, you can (and need to) simply explain that you won’t be blogging for a while. If you’re going on vacation, or are sick, just let your reader’s know. Yes, you may lose readers if you don’t update for a few days, but most will stick around if they know you’re coming back. Avoid saying things like “this blog is on hiatus,” though. People will think you’re gone for a long time. You’d be surprised how understanding your readers can be, when you explain things to them.

So What’s Next?

In this discussion we talked about your initial posts, setting a blogging schedule, and what to do if you can’t blog for a while (remember, draft things in advance). Next time, we’ll talk about what types of posts you can make, and then length of your posts. Stay tuned!

What is a Niche?

A niche is almost like a keyword for a blog. In essence, it’s the one specific thing your blog is about. Niches can either be broad (”Computing Blog”), or narrow (”Graphic Design Software Blog”). The niche defines your blog. Just about every pro blogger out there has a defined niche for each of their blogs. Therein presents the problem for amateur bloggers.

Niches vs. Generalities

Pro Bloggers have Niches. There’s a Digital Camera Blog, an Adsense Blog, a How to Make Money Blogging Blog, and there’s probably even an Graphic Design Software Blog (actually, there are several Digital Camera, Adsense, and How-to Blog blogs). Every pro blogger out there spends time exploring and defining the niche for their blog. We, however, are not pro bloggers.

Amateur Blogger have Generalities. A generality is precisely what it sounds like. Whereas a niche is one specific topic, a generality is a broad spectrum. In amateur blogging, most of the time a blogger picks a handful of generalities. In my case, my generalities are technology, blogging, politics, and items I find interesting (I’ll take “things only I know” for $1,000, Alex!). Essentially, I’m not limiting my blog to a specific topic.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying your blog can’t have a niche. Some amateur bloggers have niches, but most of the time your average amateur niche bloggers will wind up going pro, as they realize they’re making some money on their niche. Alternatively, a lot of amateur niche bloggers will drop their blogs after a while, when they find that staying inside their niche is limiting, and they really want to just blog.

Just Blogging is a very good thing. You’re not limited to a single topic, you’re not trying to constrain your commentary, you don’t find yourself continually looking at things and going “does this fit in with my blog?” It’s a lot more liberating to specify a few generalities, rather than defining a niche. Keep in mind that even if you specify generalities, you are free to go outside of those generalities every so often. On niche blogs, going outside of your niche can, often, hurt your overall readership and income stream. On generality blogs, going outside of your generalities will usually draw in a few extra readers, and might open up more opportunity for promotion.

Now you’ll notice, I’ve said nothing about personal blogs. Personal blogs reflect the blog author’s life, and often include personal information along the lines of “last weekend I went out with Tara and Jenn and saw some movies and blah blah blah.” No problem with that, but it’s not what we’re discussing. In an amateur blog, you’ll often see things like “Last weekend, I went to see Madagascar with some friends. Here’s what I thought of the movie…” In other words, you’ll get more attention to the opinions and feeling of the blogger in an amateur blog, than you will in a personal blog. Yes, before you even comment on it, there is often a very fine line between personal blogging and amateur blogging. Just like there can be a fine line between an amateur blog and a professional blog (especially when it comes to monetization).

Choosing Your Topics

First off, if you want to choose a niche, I suggest visiting problogger.net and reading what Darren has to say on the topic of choosing niches. Alternatively search Technorati for articles on choosing a niche. In short, go with what you know, what you feel you can write about for an extended period of time, and be narrow (but not too narrow).

Okay, now, choosing your generalities. It’s pretty simple, actually. Ask yourself the following questions:

• What do I know?
• What am I learning?
• What do I want to share?
• What can I write well about?
• What would I want to read?

Once you answer those questions, you’ll probably have at least three or four things that jump out at you. If they all fit together well, don’t worry about narrowing them down. If they don’t fit together at all, you could consider narrowing them down, creating two blogs, or just going with them as-is. You’d be surprised at the mish-mash of topics I’ve found on some blogs, blogs that generate thousands of dedicated readers.

The most important thing to remember when choosing your topics is to make sure it’s something you can write about, and would pro