Archive for blogging
Is Your Blog Naked?
Posted by: | CommentsIs Your Blog Naked?
By Alice Coaxum
Is your blog naked? Do you have good intentions of filling your blog with lots of content that will appeal to a specific audience? Do you have great ideas for your blog, but never seem to get around to implementing them.
Keep this is mind:
NO ONE visits an empty blog, at least not more than once. Search engines don’t favor thin, empty websites. At one point I used to really neglect my blogs but I realized that it doesn’t work, the whole point of having a blog is to convey my message to others. How can I convey any type of message or information if my blog is nothing but a blank screen?
You can purchase a domain and web hosting and have all kinds of good intentions, but if you have no content on your blog, who is going to visit? Who is going to learn your message and what you’re all about? Nobody.
Blogging involves work. You have to put the time into it to achieve the results you want. Some blogging methods take less time than others. It’s up to use which method you choose to employ.
Make time to work on your blog. Set a timer, put it on your schedule. Do whatever works for you, but buckle down and make it happen! Your blog isn’t going to fill itself and if it does do to some type of scraper then this article is probably not for you. There isn’t an easy out to building a good reputation online. Anything worth doing for your business will take some time.
There are several ways to get content for your blog.
1. Write it yourself.
2. Hire a ghostwriter.
3. Use free reprint articles.
4. Use high quality PLR that can be edited or used as is, like the content I have available at ShopForPLR.Com and PLRContentGalore.Com
Use one or more of these methods to whip your blog into shape. Share your passion, opinion, message, business, knowledge or expertise with the world.
Is It Really Possible To Make Money With A Blog?
Posted by: | CommentsWhat is blogging?
Blogging started out as just a creative outlet for people bring their personal diaries or journals online to share with the world. It was a great way to keep up with what is going on with your friends and family or to learn someone’s opinion on a topic that you’re interested in.
Blogging has since widened out into online outlets of knowledge, entertainment and information on various subjects that are shared by experts and newbies alike in an attempt to rake in a little revenue. Many people use them to make money online.
You can combine your love of expressing your opinion and making money. Blogs are a good way to earn money from home without having to put out a whole bunch of cash upfront. Web hosting is usually less than $10 bucks per month and a domain can be had for less than $20, much less if you use a coupon code at places like Godaddy.
Search engines love blogs because unlike websites, blog are usually updated quite frequently. Millions search for, visit and read blogs every single day for help entertainment and celebrity based content or knowledgeable information from an accurate source. If people really like your blog, they’ll follow it in a reader and visit often. Some will even link their blog to yours which increase your readers.
The more traffic your blog receives, the better the chance that you will earn from whatever it is that you are promoting on your blog because there will be more eyes on your advertisements and content. If the advertisements are relevant to the content, there is a much better chance for you to earn.
Using Adbrite, AdSense or other advertising networks are one of the most popular ways to generate extra income from your blog.
When you strategically placing the ads on you blog and they are relevant to the content it can be very enticing to your visitors and so they may click on them. Each click you get helps you to earn a bit more of the profits that the advertising network brings in. While a couple of clicks might earn just a little, a major flow of traffic which may cause more clicks can earn you a substantial amount of cash.
Another way some people choose to make money with their blogs is by selling advertisement space. People who need advertising will pay to place one of their banners on your blog if there is a good chance that your blog will bring in some traffic for them.
There are several ways that you can make money with the ad space on your blog. You might choose just to sell ads at a flat rate fee for the week or month, earn a commission based on the number of click the advertisement ends up getting, or make you can even make a deal with the advertiser which will allow you to get a certain percentage of all of the sales that are a direct result of advertising displayed on your blog, sort of like a person does when promoting an affiliate product.
You have to choose the monetizing method that works best for you. The easiest would be a flat rate fee for a specific amount of time. You can also promote affiliate products with banners or links or review products on your blog for profit or free product. Some people use a combination of monetizing methods on their blog.
If your blog is a really popular one, then there’s a better a chance that advertiser’s will need to compete to get their banner or text ads placed in your blog which means that your advertising space would be worth more so they will pay more if they want their ads displayed on your blog.
Does it matter what your blog is about?
Not really and I will tell you why. People have such varied interests that there is any one type of thing that you should blog about. Make use of the search engines and keyword tools. Punch in keywords that would lead to the type of blog that you’re considering running. Are there many results? If so, you’re topic is a winner and honestly if you’re passionate about something that might not have a high count, who is to say it won’t at a later time.
Blog about what you know, what you love, what you’re interested in, what you review, what you want to share or how you feel. There are so many topics that you could choose to hone in on. Put yourself out there and earn some money by sharing your thoughts, knowledge, interest or your day to day life.
Blogging Is Not for Everyone In Business…Or Is It?
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Blogging Is Not for Everyone In Business…Or Is It?
By: Alice Coaxum
Have you ever thought that blogging is just not for you? You wouldn’t be alone in this train of thought if you have, but you’d be mistaken. Never trying your hand at blogging, you would be passing up a tremendous opportunity to spread valuable information to your readers, the same readers who would be interested in the kind of products or services that you’re offering.
I can certainly understand why some are reluctant to get involved with blogging regularly or at all. For some, writing ranks as high on their list of fun things to do as getting a root canal. Some cringe at the very thought of writing. But even if writing blog posts isn’t your cup of tea, there is no need for you to pass up on using this ultra powerful online tool. A blog can be one of your greatest assets.
Don’t allow yourself to feel like it’s going to take up all of your time or that it won’t be worth the effort. It doesn’t even matter if you aren’t naturally good at writing. Many times we can hype ourselves up about the supposed bad points of a certain task so that we give up before we ever try.
Alternative ways to get content:
Keep in mind that for those who are pressed for time or for those who love writing as much as falling down the stairs or stepping on a rusty nail, there are other ways to get good content for you blog. If you dislike all of the researching and narrowing down of facts and points a topic that it takes to create a good article, don’t have to get your hands dirty so to speak.
You can always outsource. This just means that you’ll find someone else who will give you the content that you need for your blog. There are several ways that you can accomplish this.
You can hunt for good writers on different freelance writing websites and on writer forums too. If hiring a ghostwriter is just to big for your budget right now, you will probably want to consider purchasing high quality private label rights content, also known as PLR, to use on your blog.
If you go the PLR route, all you have to do to personalize your PLR articles is to read it and add your own touch to it, by adding your opinion, adding facts, statistics, quotes or editing them as you see fit by removing or switching around the content. You can easily take PLR articles and make them as unique as they’d be if you’d written them yourself. Or you could just copy and paste directly to your blog, the choice is yours. I suggest personalizing because it makes the content unique to you. You can put a spin on it that someone else might not ever think of.
If you are friends with another blogger and you like the way the write, you could ask them to do a guest post on your blog where you’ll display their name as the author as well as a link back to their own blog. While you may lose some of your traffic to their blog, it can be a quick and pain-free way to get content.
When push comes to shove and you have no content you can go to an article directory and grab a free reprint article. You’ll get great content written by an expert author, depending on who the author is and it will cost you nothing. However you may not change a single word and part of your blog traffic will go to whatever links the author is promoting in their bio box, which you also have to display unchanged.
Maintaining a blog is great for a beginning business owners as well as for business owners who are more established. A blog is an important tool that can get you REAL RESULTS.
I want to write my own posts:
If you are having trouble writing your own posts and it’s something that you really want to do there is an easy way that you can do this. Try picking out four or five main points about the topic that you’d like to cover. You could open up a text document, Word or whatever you prefer to use, to create an outline and your rough draft . Research each main point.
Underneath of each main point, you would write a paragraph of about four or five sentences that brings out details about and explains each main point. Combine these main points together in one blog post. If you have more than five main points that you really want to highlight, you could create a series of blog posts.
For example, if you are writing a blog post about trying to lose weight, some of your main points might be:
- How obesity hurts the body.
- Why it’s important to eat healthy.
- Why many dieters fail.
- What to do when you feel like giving up.
- Why it’s best if you can include a fitness plan in your weight loss journey.
You would then expound on those points, which in turn give your reader something of value if they were trying to lose weight. You could create one informative blog post with these five points or even turn each of these points into separate blog posts by creating outlines with four or five main points that break down and teach about each of these points.
You might even add something personal from your own dieting struggles like, “I used to have a tough time making healthy choices until I decided that my health was worth fighting for.” You could then share a little bit of your journey and some of the things that helped you.
If your business promotes fitness, weight loss or health products it would be appropriate to add a link within the post because you’d be providing quality to your readers and those who enjoy the post would probably be interesting in learning more about or purchasing products or services like the ones you are promoting.
Blogging can also help you to build your list if you display an optin box, somewhere easily visible. So in a nutshell, blogging can be great for your business, helping your to expand your readers, list and customer base.
Blogging Tips:
Don’t put too much into one post, unless your teaching your audience something and it all flows well in one post, stretch it out over several posts so you don’t give them to much to chew on at once. While there are some who love long posts, many just don’t have the attention span or time for it.
You may be serving your readers a 5 course gourmet meal when what they are really looking for is something quick that they can gobble. It really depends on the type of readers that you are trying to attract so this is a hard rule but merely a suggestion as I write long and short posts for my own blog depending on what points I’m trying to get across.
Your post should be informative, entertaining and to the point and not just go on and on just for the sake of having a high word count.
Blogging isn’t for those who just want to add a bunch of affiliate links in every post without giving quality content to your readers. If your blog isn’t helpful or entertaining those links will probably go ignored and you’d be better off using pay per click ads or some other type of advertising method. Your readers need to have a reason to follow your blog. What’s in it for them? What do you bring to the table, that they need?
What you want to do when you first get started blogging or even if you’ve been blogging for a bit is to share your posts with others . Tweet, Like, Pin your posts on social media websites and ask your readers to do the same.
If you’re thinking of starting a self hosted blog, get started today at Wahms Online Hosting where you can get affordable web hosting and easily add WordPress, the preferred blogging platform, to your website.
To your success,
Alice Coaxum
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Blog Regularly To Keep Your Audience Captivated.
Posted by: | CommentsBlog Regularly To Keep Your Audience Captivated.
By: Alice Coaxum
Blogs used to be just a way for people to express their thoughts, feelings and knowledge with the whole world. Blogs were used solely as a tool for communicating. Today that is still the case, as there are many interesting blogs that you can subscribe to and read that still offer all kinds of information and opinions without asking anything of you in return or promoting anything to you.
These are the blogs that you see without any type of advertisements, links or optin boxes, which I don’t recommend, because there is nothing wrong with monetizing good content.
There are so many blogs available on the internet, devoted to all kinds of topics like weight loss, how to be a better writer, frugal living, green living, moms with children, family life and the list goes on and on. While some blog writers may have affiliate links and banners on their blog to help offset the cost of their blog or to earn money in general, some really do blog just for the pure enjoyment of it.
However, these days, it’s perfectly acceptable and now even expected that blogs will be used for business purposes. Businesses use blogs to help keep you up to date with what is going on with their company, let you know about about the latest and hottest deals and sale and also to promote their products. Blogs are a free or low cost marketing tool that can really help your business to reach a wider audience. With a self hosted blog you have total control of what goes on your blog.
If you don’t have a blog of your own yet, you should put it on your to do list —> to get one A.S.A.P. If you happen to have a blog, but really aren’t using it to its full potential, you should take the time to revamp your blog by adding new interesting niche appropriate posts.
Starting a new blog is like purchasing a home that is built from the ground up, with no prior owners. You decide how many rooms your home will have, what color the rooms will be and what type of furniture you will place in each room.
It’s the same principal with a blog. You decide how many pages, the decor of the blog and what you will write about on specific pages and posts of your blog.
A blog is truly your home on the internet. You want to make it appealing and inviting, just like a real home so other will want to visit often. Just as you wouldn’t neglect your home, letting everything get dusty, broken and outdated, you would want to keep your blog in tip top condition by: making sure that your blog looks neat, testing the links to be sure they really work and updating your information as technology changes when applicable.
The key to being a successful blogger is staying consistent with promoting your blog on a regular basis and not allowing your blog get stale or tired. You have to keep sharing fresh and insightful information to captivate your readers and keep them looking forward to the next post. Give them something of value every time they read a new blog post of yours.
There are many blogs that I enjoy reading and not all of them are marketing related, however I must feel that I am getting some type of value or enjoyment out of the post or I’m clicking the X and moving on faster than you can say “new blog post.” I view my time as valuable and so I’m not going to waste it on reading things that I don’t enjoy or that are of no value to me.
While you are in charge of when you will post and how often you shouldn’t allow your blog to sit dormant for too long as your regular visitors may get disappointed due to the lack of content and stop visiting. Try posting at least once or twice a week. Some may say that you should post daily but that just might not be the right schedule for you, blog as your schedule permits. It’s your blog, so do it your way. Just be consistent!
There isn’t an exact quota for blog posts per week as that really varies from person to person, but they should be meaningful, and not just filler crap content, posting for the sake of posting. Each post should have a purpose and the reader should be called to some type of action, whether that action is:
- For the reader to learn more about what your speaking of.
- For the reader to purchase something.
- For the reader to join your emailing list.
Your blog posts should motivate the reader to feel more inclined to read your next post. You want your reader to feel that they have received something of value by reading your post.
There are so many blog available online, so why should the reader take time out of their day to read yours?
You can also use your blog to build a responsive list by adding an optin box in a visible spot, preferably above the fold, since many won’t take the time to scroll down very far unless they are actually reading a post or thoroughly checking your blog out.
You can further monetize your blog and earn a little extra cash by:
- Promoting your own product that are relevant to the post or creating a separate post to your blog if it is relevant to niche that your blog is in. You wouldn’t want to advertise a social media marketing product on a blog devoted to the care of fish. Your product must be relevant to your audience.
- Placing Adbrite, AdSense or some other advertising network banner and text ads in the sidebars of your blog. These type of ads can work well when the advertisements are relevant to your niche.
- Promoting relevant affiliate products within your posts. Promote quality products that would interest someone who is interested in reading that particular blog post. Example: One who is interest in reading a blog devoted to cooking tips would probably be interested in buying various cookbooks. Keep it relevant.
Your blog is the perfect way to boost your brand and reputation by letting others get to know you through your thoughts, opinions and knowledge . You can create a blog that reflects your YOUnique personality and still showcases your products and opportunities in a tasteful way that builds your public image in a positive way.
Blogging Tips
To make your blog successful you will need to:
- Create a blog that’s easy to read and navigate. Nothing will turn a potential reader off faster than not being able to navigate your site easily. Make sure that your colors and fonts are easy on the eyes.
- Make sure that each post is well written. Put your spell check to good use to avoid unnecessary spelling errors. If you are using PLR, fully read the article first and add your spin on it, giving the content your voice. Speak up when you don’t agree, share facts, stats, quotes and images. Straight copy and paste isn’t your only option with PLR! You can use it as a starting point, tweaking and editing the content to make unique and reflective of your voice.
- Offer something of value to the reader. Readers don’t want fluff or crap. This will keep your readers coming back for more.
- Keep your blog fresh. Readers will not come back to see the same old posts if you never have anything new to offer. Give them a reason to visit your blog and share it with others. That was a problem that I used to have with blogging. I was too sporadic and now I strive to make sure that I post at least once per week. I want my readers to know that I’m here and willing to share my thoughts, feelings and knowledge with them and I can show that by staying consistent with my postings.
- Invite people to interact on your blog by allowing your readers to comment and share their own thoughts with you. Respect your readers rights to tastefully disagree with you on different topics. Agree to disagree when conflicting opinions are shared.
Blogging may be a little time consuming, but will be worth it in the long run as you begin to compile lots of interesting posts that draw your readers in again and again.
If you are ready to start your own WordPress blog, swing on over to my web hosting site, Wahms Online Hosting, where you can get your website cPanel hosted at an affordable price. 3 options available + easily install WordPress through the easy script installer included with each package. http://wahmsonlinehosting.com
Already own a domain? Great, bring it over! Purchase of a domain isn’t required to make use of my web hosting.
Warmly wishing you success,
Alice Coaxum
Creating Your First WordPress Blog Can Seem Scary
Posted by: | CommentsWhen you first think about creating a WordPress blog it can seem like an especially unpleasant task to undertake, especially if you are new to blogging in general.
Contemplating downloading a copy of WordPress from the WordPress.org site and tweaking your way throughout all of the seemingly endless options until it’s all finished and published, just the way you want it, can be a huge turn off if you really don’t know what you are doing.
When I first tried blogging with WordPress I was so intimidated and irritated that I gave up without really trying. It wasn’t until about a year or so later that I finally gave it another chance, learned more about it and fell in love with it.
Starting out there are some technical steps involved in the installation process that can intimidate you. First of all there are appearance issues to think about because you’ll want your blog to reflect how you want it to look. There are many free and paid themes that can help you to achieve the look that you desire.
You will also want to use SEO (search engine optimization) so you can receive a steady flow of targeted traffic as well deciding on a blogging strategy and schedule. Will you blog once a month? Twice a month? What about the topics? Only you can decide this.
Thinking about how much content you’ll need to keep your blog fresh and relevant can be enough to scare you right out of starting and maintaining the type of blog you have always wanted to have.
You can easily have the content you need by either writing the posts yourself. Hiring a ghostwriter or purchasing PLR are also other great ways to get quality content which will keep your blog updated and fresh. You can easily customize your articles to make them unique to you.
But once you are able to move beyond your fears and get your hands on a good set of tutorials, you’ll develop the confidence needed to easily create and maintain a WordPress blog.
You need confidence because if you think that you will fail at something, you are right. The lack of confidence will cause you not to work as hard because you feel it won’t amount to anything anyway.
However when you finally create your first WordPress blog and start receiving steady traffic, you’ll see why many think that WordPress is the most versatile blogging and website platform on the internet. You’ll understand why WordPress is the first choice of many top marketers.
Once you decide to start your blog or website, don’t rush, take your time and make sure you go through all of the steps correctly. This will keep you from winding up frustrated later.
As you become more more accustomed to the WordPress blogging dashboard, you’ll soon be switching, tweaking and changing it up to fit your own preferences without a moments hesitation. It will become like second nature to you, because the more you practice something the easier it becomes.
Before you install WordPress on your domain, you may take a moment to consider why you have decided to choose a blog format website instead a regular static HTML site. Some people have theorized that Google has a deep liking for bloggers because of the social elements they add coupled with regular updates of fresh content.
Others think that a WordPress blog is also much more optimized for the search engine spiders and believe that a static site can at times get stale and outdated.
Creating your own self hosted WordPress blog is an extremely good move for any entrepreneurs who are looking to build a big online presence because your blog is truly like your home on the net.
Many offline businesses are using blogs to create an online web presence because this helps to broaden their audience, connecting them with those they might not ever haveconnected with if it weren’t for the internet.
Any business type can be supported and maintained with the use of a WordPress site or blog, including information product sales, affiliate marketing, tangible item sales and promotions, services, and much more!
WordPress is my platform of choice for selling my PLR content. Instead of running a blog I use it as an online store with an automated shopping cart that handles all of mysales for me. I also use it as a traditional blogging as well as for niche websites.
When you start going throughout the process of creating your own WordPress blog it’s best if you break it down. Try smaller specific tasks instead of overwhelming yourself by trying to do everything in ten minutes.
For instance, if you are self hosting like I do then you’ll need to register a domain and get hosting before you can install your WordPress blog.
As you continue working with your WordPress site, you’ll find that at times you want to switch some or even all of the choices that you have already made. The great thing about these WordPress is you have the ability to quickly and easily switch some or even everything around when you want to or if you need to, tweaking the site to fit your personal needs and preferences.
Don’t expect a huge rush of traffic the day your site goes up and is live. While Google may index you site rather quickly, your consistent quality content and strong SEO strategies are what will draw in your target audience and keep them coming back for more.
To Your Success,
Alice Coaxum
