The anticipation of a new post everyday can be intoxicating. Many times the anticipation is better than the article itself because it is something new to teach and amuse us. But that doesn’t mean it will help you become a better blogger right now.
It turns out there is actually a better way to learn about blogging than hanging on the edge waiting for the article addressing the topic you are struggling with. It is the miracle called archives. I know the word brings to mind the Hollywood image of an office building basement where old useless files are stored; they only seem to come in handy when trying to solve some strange mystery… Click to continue...
After reading of the comments from my most recent post about a blogging schedule and Leo Babauta’s article about How to Deliver the Highest Impact with Each Post, I really started thinking about ways to really capture both of these ideas together.
If you’re posting killer articles day after day, but not seeing significant growth the problem might not be your content. Your problem might be where you are publishing your article.… Click to continue...
Hyperlinks are they foundation that the internet was built upon. Links are the juice that blogs live on as well. Inbound links are the highest sign of respect another blogger can send you because they truly believe your content is worth reading.
Linking to someone requires trust. If you’re sending your readers to another person’s site, your credibility as a source of valuable information is on the line. Maybe that is why it is so rare that bloggers link out unsolicited.
The more blogs I read, big and small, I’ve noticed that very few blogs regularly use outbound links, and I’m not sure why. There are 2 main reasons I can think of, but both neither make sense when you really consider it.… Click to continue...
Posting schedule is a topic that is often debated among bloggers. It’s not always easy to post on a schedule, especially when family and offline work calls, so lets talk about why you should consider posting schedule and what frequency you should post.
Before we get too far, we should also remember that a posting schedule does not mean you have to post 5 times a week. Posting one time per week on the same day is still a schedule.
Should You Have A Posting Schedule?
One of the main arguments for not having a posting schedule is genuinely inspired posts. Being on a strict schedule can force you to publish posts that aren’t… Click to continue...
Many of us have an academic background where you can never write too much. If it’s not 5 paragraphs with an intro, three supporting argument paragraphs, and a conclusion, then it’s formatted wrong (this of course is the minimum. More fluff/garage is required the higher the class).
Blogging is different. Most of us don’t have time to read 3-5 pages of essay when there are 25 other blogs begging to be read, so why do we bother writing that much? At first, a post might not seem like enough, but trust me, it is.
Brevity is what Chris Brogan preaches with conviction. Seth
The two biggest ways to get new traffic to your site are SEO and word of mouth (social media). Which traffic is better is debatable. I’ve read many sources that say search engine traffic converts better because the visitor was already searching for something specific whereas social media is usually not as targeted.
Regardless, search engines will likely send you the most long term traffic and definitely the most passive traffic of any source. I had to take a 6 week break from blogging, but I still continued to receive search engine traffic.
We’ve all read the standard SEO tips before. Get backlinks, using h(x) tags, keyword density without overstuffing… Click to continue...
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you probably already know that social media has exploded over the last couple of years. The rate of growth seems exponential, and the user demographics for social media has expanded from internet geeks and bored students to just about every type of user you can think of.
In fact, my mother-in-law is so hooked on Facebook that if she doesn’t get her daily dose of it, she starts having major withdrawal symptoms including (but not limited to): moodiness, shaking, tremors, nausea, cold sweet, seizures, bleeding from the eyes, ears, and nose, and occasional death.
For a blogger, social… Click to continue...
Branding is one of the most important aspects of creating a successful product. Brand identity often revolves around simple visual cues. There are several types of visual cues that can be used for branding.
One simple way to brand is color. When you UPS did a major campaign a while back “what can brown do for you?”
Another is style. Site Sketch 101 might be about how to blog, but it is the hand sketched style and appearance that give it such a distinct branded look. Nick is an awesome example of how to brand.… Click to continue...
Today is my first day ranked as an Alexa top 100,000 site. When I started blogging, I didn’t really know much about what all the rankings meant, but I knew that I wanted to get my Alexa Rank in the top 100,000 because that was their cutoff for caring about your site.
I have read several articles about how Alexa ranking was useless, but never took it to heart. While I don’t hold Alexa in the same high esteem as I did when I first started, I still believe Alexa ranking provides great information about the type of traffic you have… Click to continue...
Links have always been one of the most critical aspects of the internet. Being able to link multiple related pages together provides a tremendous value to readers.
Back in the pre-Web 2.0 days, a lot of links were written with “click here” as the anchor text (and a lot of people still link like this). While that makes writing the link easy for the author, it is boring and not descriptive. Furthermore, search engines use the text the link is anchored to in order to determine what value the link has. I’m shocked at the number of people I see not using optimized anchored links. Appropriately anchored text is an awesome SEO tool.
Use Anchored Links To Improve Your… Click to continue...
