No Spec Work - Rewarding Creativity Properly

It is important to realize that your choice of a niche can have a significant influence on the success or failure of your new blog.

Deciding on a theme can be a daunting task. What exactly are you going to write about? Your niche needs to be a popular topic that many people are interested in.

If you are going to blog about yourself, then you better have a very interesting life, or you will have difficulty keeping your readers coming back for more. You should choose a topic that will make it comparatively easy to grow your readership and build a strong following.

Since many bloggers write about their favorite subjects, it’s not a bad idea to start brainstorming by writing down a list of your hobbies, interests, and any areas of professional expertise. Now try to determine a niche you can target within one of those areas.

Should you blog about automobiles in general, or the latest sports cars? If you choose too narrow a theme then you may struggle to come up with regular, fresh content. And if you choose a topic that’s too general your readers may be confused by a jumble of seemingly unrelated posts.

You might consider niches within the following general topic areas which have proven to be popular for blogging:

• Automobiles
• Computers & Information Technology
• Digital Cameras
• Gadgets
• Music
• News
• Photography
• Politics
• Shopping

If you plan to use Pay-Per-Click advertising to get traffic to your blog, then remember also that the hottest topics might have the highest pay-per-click fees.

You can sometimes get great niche ideas by browsing at Blog directories and sites like Google Blog Search: http://blogsearch.google.com

Since it is so time-consuming trying to com up with the ‘perfect’ niche idea, many bloggers and webmasters have turned to specialized niche discovery tools. I particularly recommend Online Gold Finder and NicheTopics.

With Online Gold Finder you can uncover profitable, undiscovered online markets with just a couple of clicks. Read more about Online Gold Finder at: http://www.moneyforblogging.com/goldfinder.htm

NicheTopics is quite handy in a different way. You get to use some great research that’s already been completed by an expert. It is a ready-to-use report on 109 unique, untapped niches. Read more about NicheTopics: http://www.moneyforblogging.com/nichetopics.htm

The tools above are not free but consider for a moment. If you are planning - or would even like - to make some money from your blog, then it will be worthwhile to start off with a well-researched niche.

If a particular tool uncovers a good niche that pays an additional $5 a day, it will pay for itself inside the first month!

Don’t forget, it will be very difficult to change the theme and niche of your blog later. So invest some time wisely during your planning stage.

You will be off to a strong start in building a successful blog.

Mike Seddon is a writer, entrepreneur, and webmaster. He is the author of the popular e-book, ‘How to Build a Money Making Blog’, available from www.MoneyForBlogging.com

11 Ways to Promote Your Blog

1. Ping weblogs.com and other search engines. When you ping a blog, you are telling the search engine that you have updated your blog content and that your listing should be refreshed. Weblogs.com is a blog update notification service that many individuals and services use to track blog changes. Pinging your blogs to the search engines is the fastest way to get the search engine robots to visit your blog. Also, many people browse these sites to find something new.

2. Submit your blog address to blog search sites and directories. You can submit your blog’s url to websites such as Technorati, Daypop, Blogdex and Popdex. For a complete list of websites where you can submit your url, go to http://www.guidetorss.com

3. If you have some cash you can promote your blog using pay per click search engines such as Yahoo Search and Google Adwords.

4. Set your blog to display RSS feeds and submit your blog’s RSS feed to the major RSS feed directories online. A good place to start is http://www.guidetorss.com which provides a list of the top RSS directories.

5. Put your blog URL in your email signature. If you’re a regular at any online discussion forum, you can also add your url to your signature line at the bottom of each message you post.

6. Install a blogroll. A blogroll is a collection of links to other weblogs. Services such as Technorati spider your links to tell who’s linking to you and who you’re linking to. If you show up on someone’s Technorati link list for their site they’re likely to visit your site to see what you said, increasing your exposure. Blog owners can also visit your site to check it out if you show up on their referral logs.

7. Be an active commenter. Try to leave comments on the blogs that you regularly visit. Most comment systems also provide a way for you to leave a link back to your blog which begs a visit at the very least.

8. If you plan to have anything printed up, put your blog’s web address on it. You can print your blog URL on business cards, stickers, leaflets, etc.

9. Take advantage of blog software features that help to promote your Blog. For example, if you’re using Blogger, you can do this by turning on: “Email This Post”, “Post Pages” “Site feed” and the Blogger Navbar. These features will help attract new visitors to your blog.

10. Exchange Links with other Bloggers or blog owners. This is another effective strategy for generating targeted traffic to your blog for free. It involves contacting other blog owners for a possible link exchange partnership. All you have to do is locate blogs that are related to yours and contact the webmaster to swap links.

11. Write articles or free reports for other webmasters to publish and put your blog url in the byline. The ‘byline’ is the short paragraph that goes at the bottom of each article and describes who the author is and what they do. If you write good content, your articles will be published by other webmasters and many readers who like your article will go on to visit your blog. You can submit articles for free at: http://www.going-platinum.co.uk/

Copyright © 2005. Chileshe Mwape writes for Debt Consolidation Loans UK: http://www.best-debt-consolidation-loan.co.uk/ and http://www.secured-homeowner-loan.co.uk/. Visit these sites to consolidate debts and apply for a loan online. This article may be reprinted as long as all the above links are active and clickable.

For the past two years, one of the best SEO inclusion tactics was the use of blogs. Blogs have become a base standard in SEO marketing, but as times change, so does the efficacy of any tactic.

With that said what worked two years ago certainly isn’t the same thing that’s working now. The worst part is that uninformed marketers are still teaching the old methods of SEO marketing with blogs to the masses.

In this article, you will be enlightened to the newest form of SEO marketing with blogs.

Let’s begin by eliminating a huge fallacy.

The blog and ping is a process by which you post a snippet of information from your site to a blog (mainly blogger.com) with a URL to your site included, and then notify Yahoo that a post exists on this blog. The idea is that your blog will be spidered quickly by both Google (due to blogger.com) and Yahoo.

You only need to blog and ping a maximum of 10 pages from your site. The entire purpose for doing this is to attract search engines to your site and let them spider the rest of your site on their own. You can equate this process to renting links. You simply rent one link to your site in order to get the spiders to visit your site.

Unfortunately money hungry marketers came along, didn’t understand the concept, and then took it upon themselves to teach people that every page on your site required blogging and pinging. To top it off, these same uninformed marketers began teaching their followers that three pages should be processed every 15 minutes.

The blog and ping isn’t as effective as it was a year ago because of these numbskulls.

With that said, it was time for the process to evolve. Its efficacy was diminished due to misuse and misguided education.

So where has it evolved to?

It’s evolved into an organic blog that grows of its own. This blogging system receives its data from remote sources and posts on a consistent, yet infrequent basis. It pulls usable and visitor friendly data from a variety of sources, while still hosting the links you want found by the search engines. This blog informs over 50 blog directories every time an automated post is made, making it extremely valuable to the search engine algorithms.

How is this accomplished?

First, you need Wordpress (http://wordpress.org) and RSS to Blog (http://www.stealthtrafficsecrets.com/rsstoblog.html). Once you’ve downloaded both of these, make sure you install them.

Once installed, configure Wordpress per the instructions found here: http://www.stealthtrafficsecrets.com/wordpress-tricks/.

Second, create a list of links from your site which will be used in this new hybrid blog and ping tactic. One of the bonuses for RSS to Blog is a tool that does this automatically for you.

Third, add these harvested links to the RSS to Blog system and hit save. Set your cron to post out as often as you like and you’re done.

That’s it in a nutshell.

There are a couple of additional points I need to make,

First, when using RSS to Blog you also have the ability to add additional data from other sources in order to make your Wordpress blog readable by the masses.

Second, the Wordpress tricks book gives you the knowledge to make your blog more search engine friendly as well as providing a list of blog directories that are automatically notified every time you make an entry.

With this tactic revealed, it’s my intention for you to enjoy the quick search engine inclusion that comes as a result of implementation.

Copyright 2005 Keith Baxter

This article has been authored by Keith Baxter, the editor and publisher of the fast selling video newsletter at http://www.StealthTrafficSecrets.com. If you wish to learn how to drive massive amounts of traffic to your website, then subscribe to the site now… it’s only $7.00 per month!

I was sitting in my local Internet Cafe yesterday, I like to get away from my ‘home office’ from time to time and it’s a great place to go for a cup of Espresso and to meet interesting people. The rather attractive lady sitting next to me was typing away furiously and, when she had finished, I asked her what she was writing - I’m interested in learning how other people use the Internet… some people call that being nosey!

It turns out she was a ‘Blogger’ and she was updating her web site through a web browser. She was really interested in vegetarian cookery and she was adding a new restaurant review to her blog.

If you spend any time at all online these days you simply can’t avoid reading something about blogs, they are becoming increasingly more popular; and they are a great way of building an online presence without the need for any technical knowledge. A blog is an abbreviation of the term ‘web log’ which is a relatively simple content management system.

Quite a few years ago, web surfers began collecting information and interesting links that they encountered during their online travels. As time passed they started to create logs of the information that they collected and they soon started to develop their own web logs. These web logs enabled them to update the information and links as often as they wished.

Blogs are more permanent than posts to an online forum or to a discussion list, they are much more dynamic than the traditional style home pages. They are also more personal than standard journaling, and definitely more public than diaries. A blog is often a mixture of what is happening in a person’s life and what is happening on the Web, a kind of hybrid diary site. So, there are as many unique types of blogs as there are people.

There are a few common characteristics of a blog, but there may be slight variations within the classification. Some blogs provide succinct descriptions of links within the chosen theme of the blog. Some others contain commentary and links to the news of the day. A few are endless stream of blurts about the writer’s day. Others are - political blogs, intellectual blogs, some are hilarious and some topic driven. They are all - Weblogs.

As mentioned earlier, blogs are posts that are short, informal and sometimes deeply personal no matter what the topic of discussion is. They can be characterized by their conversational tone.

If a person has a web presence but is disappointed with static homepage - if an elegant treatment of posts on a global platform is what they want, then ‘blogging’ provides an ideal platform. They may also consider blogging if they are seeking feedback from their chosen audience.

Weblogs are definitely the mavericks of the online world. Two of their greatest strengths are their ability to filter and disseminate information to a widely dispersed audience, and their position outside the mainstream of mass media.

There are many different options available to the new and seasoned blogger alike. Some blog scripts are available for you to install on your own domain and these require at least a basic understanding of FTP and HTML. There are many hosted blog services available some free and some paid. If you are serious about blogging then I would strongly recommend that you use the best system that you can afford and that meets your needs.

I personally have used the ‘Moveable Type’ stand-alone script and although quite complex to install, I found it very easy to use. My recommended choice of hosted blogging service would have to be the Blog4Cash.com system that includes a wide variety of high quality features and has a built in two tier affiliate scheme that enables you to generate a recurring income from all your referrals!

John Taylor - © November 2004.

About The Author

John is a prolific writer and is the author of several books including ‘Testing & Tracking’ (http://www.Test-and-track.com). John’s http://www.MarketersBlog.com weblog provides insightful comments on all aspects of online marketing and is well worth a visit! For information on ‘How To Get Paid To Blog’ click here now to visit… http://www.Blog4Cash.com

This article may be reprinted online, within ezines and newsletters on the condition that this resource box remains intact.

A blog is a type of website. It allows the website owner to easily write messages that get posted to the site automatically, often in a journal or diary-like style. A particularly appealing thing about blogs is that your readers can comment back to your posts fairly easily, and a continuous stream of fresh conversations result. (This is a good thing.)

Here are three reasons to consider getting a blog:

1.To Replace Your Ezine

If you currently publish an ezine, you may wish to consider replacing it with a regularly published blog. This means using your blog to publish journal entries, and then when it comes time to communicate with your subscriber list, you excerpt some items from your blog, and send those out as your ezine.

This saves you from creating special articles only for your ezine. In many cases it becomes easier for you to write in blog format (short and sweet) so you save time. Readers enjoy the practical, “reporter-like” nature of blogs instead of ezines, and gradually come to feel that they are in conversation with you on a daily basis. You become part of their everyday circle of friends and associates, which leads to you becoming their natural resource on the topic of your expertise.

2. To Create a Quick and Dirty Learning Environment or e-Campus

For those of you who offer TeleClasses or other programs that want to have a web page of learning resources, links, class notes and audio, etc., a blog can be a great way to bring together an e-Campus.

If you offer a workshop, coaching/consulting, or even a software solution, and you want to instantly add value to your clients, create a “client/student resource page” using a blog. This becomes an environment that the students can play in, study more, and soak up your materials. Your clients continue to benefit from your expertise even though you’re not physically there; they do it at their pace, and at little cost to you.

Once again, because blogging makes it easy for you to continually update your website without mucking around with FrontPage or DreamWeaver, you will save time and energy publishing to the Internet.

3.) Just For Fun, And To Be Cool

Let’s face it, a large part of the reason you’re wondering about blogs is because it sounds cool, right? And new stuff is fun. So why not try it just because? Sometimes it’s enough to try something because it stretches you, keeps you limber and awake to possibilities. There’s nothing wrong with playing, UNLESS you fool yourself into thinking your business is improving, or you’re somehow paying the mortgage while you play.

Rest easy, there’s no pressure to get a blog. Not getting one won’t negatively impact your bottom line. So although the technology can be entrancing, stay focused… what are you selling to who? How is it going? That said, do stay curious about new technology. Part of your chosen profession as an online biz owner means modeling for others by staying abreast of new things.

With that in mind, see some fun blogs at the blog search
engine: http://www.blogsearchengine.com/

Andrea J. Lee coaches entrepreneurs and online business owners. As Thomas J.Leonard’s General Manager, she helped build and manage the largest network and trainer of personal and business coaches in the world. Now the CEO of Andrea J. Lee Group of Companies, she writes, speaks and consults on Marketing, Internet and Business systems. For more helpful tips, visit www.39lessons.com

One of the reasons successful business blogging is working for small business is because of many of its direct and in-direct effects. In this series of articles, I’ll be talking about some of these effects and how they occur, including increases in traffic, better search engine results, and the enhancement of online company brands.

One of the other side-effects of successful blogging can be, and often is, an increase in sales. This occurs for a myriad of reasons, four of which I’ve listed below.

First, as you begin to consistently give your prospects information they can use, they return for updates on a regular basis. As they begin to see you as an authority on your topic matter, in their minds it seems less of a risk to buy from you as they begin to trust you more, and rightfully so.

The logic is that if you know enough to be able to blog effectively about your subject, then you’re knowledgeable in your field - which means that your product likely addresses a solution they’d be interested in purchasing.

Second, it illustrates that there is a human, approachable presence at your site. By blogging, you’re showing that someone is in fact “at home”, and that your web property is presently being maintained and updated, giving a prospective buyer more security as they weigh their options and approach a buying decision.

Third, the conversations that occur through blogging build a bridge of trust and loyalty. It’s human nature to tend towards the familiar, and to trust it. When you blog frequently, your return visitors see you as the familiar.

Once they become buyers, this trust can elevate to loyalty. They’ll begin to come to you repeatedly for information and when given the choice, will want to buy from you, the known, rather from someone else they don’t know.

Fourth, if you take care to configure your blog in a way that takes advantage of its inherent search engine friendly architecture, your blog can help your site show up for searches for more terms, bringing you both readers who are generally interested in your topic matter, and those who are looking for a solution and are ready to buy.

Many blog systems have some of the necessary tools that can help you optimize your blog for better search engine placement by manually configuring settings in the template or modifying the code to make it more compatible. But if you’re not a techie, or are a busy professional, you’ll want to find a system that incorporates all the most needed tools for you already.

An increase in sales is just one of the reasons blogs are working for business online, from the small business to larger corporations. With Google embracing blogs with the Google Reader and Blog search, and Yahoo including blogs as sources in the Yahoo News section, business blogging is no longer seen as a theoretical test for increased exposure. They are an essential component to your online marketing strategy.

Tinu Abayomi-Paul is the co-owner of Leveraged Promotion, which provides many solutions for companies who prefer to out-source their online promotion needs. You can read more about Business Blogs and Your Market Strategy in the Business Blog Promotion and News section at http://blog.leveragedpromotion.com

As public relations find blogs useful in communicating effectively to specific audience, PR is now giving a second thought of actually using blogs as a tool for their campaigns.

In the article, New Media, Blogs, and Public Relations, it shows some of the main concerns of most public relations and media groups. This includes how to connect with bloggers and how to use blogs effectively. This specific concern may already sound outdated, but the underlying issues behind them are very important in the decisions of communication specialists to use blogs as part of their communication tool.

The thought of the so-called “long tail” concept originally coined by Chris Anderson, wherein there are actually few weblogs who have many readers and millions of weblogs who have few readers on their site. Between these two, however, what most PR thought effective is the weblogs who have few readers. I slightly agree with this observation that with few readers on a site, the exchange of ideas and opinions are more focused and significant. It is true in a sense. However, most read blogs too could create the same healthy discussion room.

As for my own observation, it is not a matter of how little and exclusive a blog is in order to gain a significant exchange of opinions between the blogger and its readers. There are high-traffic sites gain participatory readers. I think what makes them good blogs, where there is actual communication, is that they blog boldly. They wrap their thoughts in a brief and unique way. These elements trigger visitors’ attention, which make them participate in the blogger’s monologue.

However, the continuing pull of attention by good bloggers makes blogs for most PR hard to handle when it comes to looking at specific audiences. With most readers participating to almost any blog that catches their attention, it is hard to really target real interested audience.

Another concern the article pointed is that there is no actual correlation between the number of links to a site and the persistent attention of readers in the site. For example, the article says,

For instance, it’s customary for bloggers to maintain “blogrolls” - lists of other blogs they’ve read and find interesting, or blogs by people they know - in the margins of their sites. However it doesn’t necessarily follow that a blogger actually reads all the blogs on his blogroll on a regular basis.

This point is true as much as it is also true that the stats on the number of hits and links are not determinants of audience attention. Thus, the problem of actually looking for real influential sites is very hard to do.

As discussed before on metric tools available on the net like traffic web stats, PR can now measure its effectiveness. Yet, presented with these concerns, I think that PR should not rely on web stats alone. There is still the need to look for other ways to make their campaigns not only effective, but also more accurate.

http://onlinepr.gbwatch.com gives updates on the ins and outs of public relations and marketing within the Internet. It helps various companies of all sizes to become competitive entrepreneurs, and to focus on building good publicity, promotion and higher sales. It aims to teach businessmen to be witty, confident, and strategic in whichever industry they hope to build their dreams upon.

Attracting traffic to a blog or a web site is challenging enough. So from the very beginning, when you start to see visitors coming to read your blog, be sure that they feel comfortable to stick around. And there are a number of ways you can help them to do just that.

Here are seven vital ingredients for building a successful blog with a loyal following.

1. Publish Regularly.

As your readers become familiar with the frequency of your posts, it will influence their visiting behavior. If your readers know that you post fresh content every day, they will probably come every day to read it. If they know you post on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, that’s when they will come.

2. Stay on Topic.

Stick to your niche. If your blog doesn’t have a niche, give it one. Readers like blog’s that are focused on a particular theme or topic. If you have no theme and just post about anything, then readers are less likely to become passionate about your blog and will probably move on to somewhere else.

3. Use Meaningful Titles in Posts.

This not only announces clearly what the post is about, but it will help people navigate your blog and also influence your ranking with search engines.

4. Interact With Your Readers.

Think of your blog like a conversation. You post. Readers comment. Be active and be positive as you interact and converse with your readers.

5. Highlight Your Best Posts.

Don’t let your best posts get lost in your archives. It’s always a good idea to link to your best posts from a ‘best posts’ category on the main page.

6. Provide Good Navigation to Popular Pages

If you help people find the key pages within your blog, their visit will be a much more enjoyable experience.

7. Avoid Not Posting for Extended Periods.

If someone visits your blog and discovers that the last post was three weeks ago, they will probably be disappointed. If you don’t post, people may give you the benefit of the doubt and come back on a few days to check, but you better believe they will lose interest quickly if you fall out of your regular schedule and stop posting.

There you have it. Seven little tips that will make a big difference to your blog’s readership. It’s not rocket science. It’s just using some common sense when posting and interacting with your readers.

Mike Seddon is a writer, entrepreneur, and webmaster. He is the author of the popular e-book, ‘How to Build a Money Making Blog’, available from www.MoneyForBlogging.com

Internet has lead to revolution in communication technology. With the fast expansion of internet, blogs have become the order of the day. By a click of a mouse, you will find hordes of information dispersed in blogs on variety of subjects from history, literature, arts, science, architecture, real estate and many more. Blogs carry information on almost all subjects under the sun. People are using blogs not only for dissemination of information but also for supplementing their marketing efforts.

Real estate marketing via blogs is fast catching up. This is because of two reasons. Firstly, blogs are easy to use and wide ranges of free services are available on the net for hosting and maintaining your blog. Services like Google’s Blogger.com provides a fast impetus in getting your Blog on different aspects of real estate marketing seen by the prospective customers at a much faster rate.

Real Estate Marketing Blogs: What and How

Creating blogs for real estate business is both a business and adventure. However, you must be clear enough in your perception as to what all you should write while setting up blogs for real estate marketing.

Listed below are some essential tips that might help you creating a successful real estate blog:

1.Follow a stringent naming convention - This is necessary to attract potential customers and clients to your blog. A blog with a title say balloons for fun containing information on real estate will surely mislead the visitor to your blog. While creating a new Blog always make sure to use the term “Real Estate” or “Realtor” in the Blog name as well as the title. IF you are targeting a business niche or a local market, include the name of the market as well in the blog. It works wonders.

2.Effective Presentation Technique- Real Estate marketing via a Blog will generate good amount of traffic to your post, provided your blog is presented in a neat, clear and smarter way. You can place your listings on your Blog along with photos of some commercial or residential real estate properties.

3.Arranging Information on your Blog-Keep your blogs succinct and to the point. Unnecessary and chaotic information will thwart the audience away from your blogs and the very intention of generating good business fails. It is generally recommended keeping a single entry restricted to around a paragraph or two.

4.Relevant information on Real Estate business - Your blog should provide to the point information related to all the issues of the real estate. It can contain free home appraisals, neighborhood information and advice to sellers on how to market their properties, commercial real estate, residential real estate, discount or fee-for-service, besides many more.

By following above-mentioned steps, you can generate good traffic and business for your real estate marketing blog.

This is a sample of the variety of computers articles to be found at: Articles About Computers

Blog, Blog, Blog, — Ping,Ping,Ping. My head is still ringing from all these new and often mis-understood terms, (especially by me). but, I am proud I did finally get my new “Millionaire Wealth Builders Blog” ‘up and running’ … I think! You can check it out and tell me what I ’shouda dun’ and still need to do… See it at: www.millionairewealthbuilders.blogspot.com

I, unlike many internet ‘ego-guru*s’ … will very much appreciate any helpful ‘criticizzm’ you will give me. Please be kind enough to post it, thanks.

Oh, yes I do love the fabulous internet experience, if only I had been born 20 years later, so I could understand the mechanics of it all, like all the younger generation.

See you commin’ down the other side of the info highway, sometime — untill then, have a good blogging time, and ping your blog often.

Regards, David Holt www.fsp-homebusiness.com