All Entries Tagged With: "blog writing"

How To Ruin Good Blogging Advice

I found a great article about blogging online. I agreed with every word. Up until the last paragraph. It really was a beautiful article. Clear, sound advice. Then, the author made one huge mistake. I mean, HUGE. Here’s the article minus the mistake:

Blogging For Small Business – How to Build Your Reputation

By Barry Deen

Blogs have taken the internet by storm. More and more people are setting up blogs, and in the most part they die off within their first year, before they pick up any momentum. Most people set up blogs to build their reputation, sell products and get traffic to sell ads.

Although blogs have been around for a while, many small businesses are still not taking advantage of all the benefits a small business blog can provide to your bottom line.

* Creates awareness about your service / product

Many businesses have great, innovative products – especially in the technology sector. A major problem small businesses run into is getting the word out about their product on a small marketing budget. Creating a blog will create awareness about your product and ultimately drive sales.

* Builds your reputation as a subject matter expert

If you are an expert in your field, it is very beneficial to write about what you do and how you do it. The quality of your content is key. It may seem counter-intuitive to give away your “secrets” – however most people will find your articles because they are not the experts and are looking to learn.

* Strengthens your Search Engine Optimization strategy

The better quality articles you write, the more likely it is that other people will link to your articles. Link popularity is one of the most important aspects of SEO. Additionally, with correct code structure, you can create an internal cross linking strategy that will drive your PageRank higher.

This is all great advice. I don’t disagree with a single word. A blog is perhaps the most powerful marketing tool any small business owner can employ. If you can write then it’s a great free tool. If you can’t write and you need to hire a ghostwriter then it’s a low-cost tool that you can work to your advantage.

But the writer of this great article then went on to give some very poor advice. What was that? Here it is in all its pristine glory:

These are some of the benefits of blogging for small business. Setting up a blog is very cheap, often times free (www.blogspot.com or www.wordpress.com) and all you have to risk is your time.

Folks, I would not set up a business blog on a free host. You lose all control of your content that way. I have seen people set up 10 blogs at WordPress.com and lose it all overnight because one person made a spam report. It doesn’t matter if you think it’s spam. If WordPress or Blogger executives think it is spam then they can, and will, take it down. You lose it all.

Instead, spend $10 to buy a domain name that you have control over. Set up a WordPress blog on your domain name and write to it every day. That is the best SEO you will ever have and it will only cost you $10 plus the cost of hosting, which is usually no more than $60 per year.

The above article was written by:

Barry Deen is President & CEO of Web Strategy Canada and one of the top affiliate marketing specialists in Canada. For information on how to make money online, checkout http://www.makemillionsathome.ca For information on Barry Deen and his company, Web Strategy Canada, visit http://www.web-strategy.ca

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Barry_Deen

To learn more about business blogging contact a qualified blog consultant today.

25 Ways To Make Your Blog Better

Shri Nagesh has put together a good list of ways to make your blog stand out from the crowd. The problem with blogger networks like the one that he promotes is that it takes time. If you have time to learn how to blog and you want to write your own business blog then these are great points, but if you don’t have time, what then? Read the note at the end of the article.

25 Unique Ways to Make Your Blog Stand-out

By Shri Nagesh

Amiability: Make your readers feel welcome to your blog. Don’t spook your visitor with cluttered text ads, banner ads, affiliate links, popups etc. This leaves limited space for the actual posts.

Unique décor: Choose a unique style for your website. This will leave a lasting impression on the visitors. It gives out a professional look. Imagine a white page with black letters or a web page which looks like a cluttered html lab. There are thousands of themes available, pick the right one that suits your niche, customize it to serve your purpose.

Easy To Navigate: Blogs are known for their bad navigation. Limited place or tabs are available to fit the vast amount of information you amass on the blog. You have to provide links to readers so they can easily browse around your space. You will want to include an about page, contact details, archives among other links.

Revive Latent Posts: Despite the number of advantages of blogs, there is one disadvantage I detest. Blog posts are filed in chronological order and slowly get buried in the archives. Your most important latent articles would need some revival.

Transparency: Don’t make false promises. One of the key objectives of any brand is to build consumer trust in its values. So rather than a humbug sales copy that exaggerates or spins the truth, why not just tell the truth in the first place?

Offer something free: Many people just love the word FREE. Your visitors have so much of choice. If you want to keep them, you need to show them how good your products are. This will attract people to your site. Offer them a small free gift for signing up to your email. This is not just to attract people but also as a courtesy for the newsletter sign up.

Don’t spam: Keep strict privacy policy and adhere to it. My vocab falls short to stress enough on this point.

Choose the things you offer to people: You need to pay close attention to what you are offering your visitors. Don’t just offer because it gets you more commission. Try it out yourself if possible, or browse around for reviews. Mention to people what reviews you went through and how you support them or controvert them.

Genuine: Be yourself. Don’t sell yourself as someone else or boast that you are something which you are not. False pretensions don’t help build credibility.

Attention to detail: Don’t rush. Take time on each thing and draw attention to detail. This will bring out the best in you. As a child I always wanted to finish my work as quickly as possible and end up messing things. I learned to slowed down a little and now I feel things are under my control.

Stay in touch: Once you build a subscriber/ customer email database, you’ll need to use that list to stay in touch with them at pre-mentioned intervals (week, fortnight, month or once in a quarter) by sending e-newsletters, special offer emails, special discounts, free products etc. This will help them remember you among your competitors. Over doing this by flooding subscriber inbox will not only lead to higher unsubscriber rate.

ROI (Return On Investment): Don’t expect to become rich overnight. Trying to monetize your blog too early can hamper its growth.

Taste: If you have what they are looking for, and instead of just reading about it, if they can savor a little, they are obvious to come for more.

Specialize: specialize in a micro-niche in your area. If you are running a blog on pets, find a micro-niche you are passionate about. Centralize on a that smaller topic. Ex: Pets > Dogs > Great Danes. Master that area.

Frequency of posts: Writing posts at regular intervals will keep your readers informed about your posting habits. If you can’t post for some reason, let your readers know about it.

Be Pragmatic: When you are writing a post, think about its practical utility to the readers. The more your posts are written with a mindset to help, the more readers will be attracted to your blog.

Fast: Quicken your speed than competition. You should be able to finish a project in a week which your competition would take to finish in a fortnight.

Conversing Tone in Writing: Blogs should not sound like website. They should have the personal touch and blog posts should be written in conversational tone.

Interact With Readers: You should also take the advantage of comment facility with blogs to interact with your readers.

Hand pick your affiliate programs: Before recommending products to your readers, a blogger must have tried and reviewed the product. If that is not possible, you should have a strong reason why & how your readers are going to benefit from the product.

Reflect Your Personality: Quote: “Imitation is suicide”. Come to think of it, Imitating another blogger won’t serve any purpose. Your blog’s uniquity comes with you and your writing. It should reflect your personality.

Primary Goal Of Your Blog: A focused blog is well admired by readers especially those who subscribve for rss feed. They will know what to expect from your blog. Choose a micro-niche and post continuously about it. Pretty soon, your blog will gain prominence.

Balancing quality & quantity of posts: I see that many bloggers set a goal about number of posts per month. It is great to set such goal, IF you have enough content. Your content should be relevant to your blogs niche and should be of quality.

Organic Posts: Try to write posts about topics that haven’t been covered before. Or at least try to add more value to the topics already covered. There is no point in writing the same points which have been covered by hundreds of other blogs.

Catchy Phrases: This point has been stressed upon by every professional blogger. The title should be catchy to attract readers. You could also include an interesting piece of your post to display as excerpt. You will find this under advanced options, if you are running your blog on wordpress.

Keep your blog fresh: Provide fresh interesting content to your readers at regular (stipulated, if possible) intervals.

You need to provide a reason why your visitors should visit your blog among millions of blogs. Do you have a strong reason?

Shri is an online business consultant for small & medium businesses since 2004. Shri blogs about amiable cross-blog networking to help boost bloggers at SmartAdvise.info and created a community for Budding Bloggers at Budding Bloggers Network.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Shri_Nagesh

Most of these points are ways that our bloggers use to make every blog we write outstanding. If you don’t have time to write your own blog and you want a business blog that stands out then join the growing list of customers that rely on Blog Content Provider for expertly written blog content.

Increasing Traffic By Linking To Past Posts

One overlooked aspect of blogging by many new bloggers is promoting previous posts. You can actually drive traffic to your previous posts by linking to them from current posts. It’s called cross linking.

Don’t go crazy with it though. One or two cross links per post is enough and you don’t want to do it in every post. Just every once in awhile. When you find yourself blogging on a topic you’ve covered before you might allude to that previous post with a link back to it for reference. Your new blog readers will go back to look at that other post and older blog readers who have forgotten the older post will check it out again.

Just a useful tip if you’re writing your own blog.

How To Use Your Blog to Get Writing Jobs

By Angela Booth

If you enjoy writing, blogging is great fun. You can even turn your love of blogging into a great career. Blogging is a great “work from home” opportunity – you work the hours you please, you work from home, and you’re your own boss.

Blog jobs are springing up everywhere like mushrooms after rain. In this article, you’ll discover five easy tips which will help you to land all the blog jobs you want.

Here are the tips.

1. Focus on your own blog first – build your name and reputation

Your own blog is not only your “portfolio” showing your blogging skills and expertise, it’s also a way to get known. Please don’t just aim to be a generic blogger or writer. In blogging, you need to build your name and reputation. Once people know who you are, you can charge the rates you want.

Don’t forget to let people know you’re available for blog jobs on your blog. Create a “Hire me” page.

2. Use the blog job boards with caution – the best jobs aren’t advertised

Once your blog’s established, check out the blog job boards. However, use them with caution. Check out job posters on Google. If you can’t find anything on them – be very wary.

3. Write guest posts – for free – on other blogs to get known

Writing for free – to get known – is the key to being paid well to blog. Remember, you need to get away from the generic “blogger” tag as soon as possible. Spread your name and writing skills around. You’re laying the foundations of a great career.

4. ASK! Propose a blog to sites which don’t have one

Here’s a big tip. When you see a site which doesn’t have a blog, but which would benefit from one, propose a blog. Your proposal can be just a short note to the site’s contact email address, or it can be a full-blown business proposal.

I suggest a message of a couple of hundred words for your proposals – you’ll be amazed at the results you can get. One blogger is now happily blogging for a large corporation, both publicly, and privately, for the company’s internal blogs. He’s making three times his previous salary.

5. Use the free classifieds sites to spread your name

The benefit of the free classifieds site is that they’re free, and that they spread your name far and wide – remember, the more you get known, the more blog jobs you’ll get, and the more you’ll be paid.

Enjoy blogging: you can turn it into a fantastic career when you know how to get blog jobs.

Discover how to make money online by blogging with Angela Booth’s Sell Your Writing Online NOW at http://sellwritingnow.com/Home/training.html Not only will you discover how to blog, you’ll get complete training in how the Web works, so you can take advantage of the unlimited opportunities.

For free weekly writing information sent to your Inbox, subscribe to Angela’s Fab Freelance Writing Ezine at http://fabfreelancewriting.com/ezine/fab-freelance-writing-ezine.html and receive “Write And Sell Your Writing: The Power-Write Report” immediately.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Angela_Booth

If you’re looking for a way to earn some extra cash and you like to write, put in your application for a blog writing job to Blog Content Provider.