Tips to Write Blog Posts

How to Write Posts that Get Noticed and Keep Readers Interested

One of the most important keys to blogging success is providing exceptional content. Follow these five tips to make sure your blog posts not only get read but make people want to come back for more.

1. Choose the Appropriate Tone for Your Blog

Every blog has a target audience it's written for. Before you start writing blog posts, determine who your primary and secondary audiences will be. Who will want to read your blog and why? Are they seeking professional information and discussions or fun and laughter? Identify not only your goals for your blog but also your audience's expectations for it. Then decide what tone would be most appropriate for your blog, and write in that tone and style consistently.


2. Be Honest

Blogs that are written in an honest voice and truly show who the writer is are often the most popular. Remember, a critical component to a blog's success is the community that develops around it. Represent yourself and your content honestly and openly and reader loyalty will undoubtedly grow.

3. Don't Just List Links

Blogging is time-consuming, and sometimes it can be very tempting to just list links to other online content for your readers to follow. Don't fall into that trap. Readers don't want to have to follow a breadcrumb trail to find something interesting to read. In fact, they might find they like where you lead them more than they like your blog. Instead, give readers a reason to stay on your blog by providing links with your own synopsis and point of view about the content of those links. Remember, a link without context is a simple way to lose readers rather than retain them.



4. Provide Attribution

Don't risk being accused of violating copyrights, plagiarism or stealing content from another blog or website. If you found information on another blog or website that you want to discuss on your blog make sure you provide a link back to the original source.

5. Write in Short Paragraphs

The visual appeal of your blog's content can be just as important as the content itself. Write your blog posts in short paragraphs (no more than 2-3 sentences is a safe rule) to provide visual relief from a text heavy web page. Most readers will skim a blog post or web page before committing to read it in its entirety. Text heavy web pages and blog posts can be overwhelming to readers while pages with a lot of white space are easier to skim and more likely to keep readers on the page (or to encourage them to link deeper into the site).

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Tips to Choosing a Blog Topic

Tips to Choosing a Blog Topic

Building a successful blog is a commitment in time and effort. Follow these five tips to choose a topic to write about on your blog that will put you on the path to reaching your blogging goals.

1. Choose a Topic You're Passionate About

A successful blog is updated frequently (often several times a day). If your blog has a chance at success, you need to keep your content fresh, which means you need to consistenly update your blog. Make sure you choose a topic for your blog that you feel strongly about and truly enjoy. Otherwise, writing about it will feel stale very quickly. You need to be able to stay motivated about your blog's topic for a long time.


2. Choose a Topic You Like to Discuss with Other People

Successful blogs require two-way conversation between you (the blogger) and your audience (your readers). As readers leave comments on your blog or email you to discuss your posts in further detail, you need to be responsive and receptive to them. Your blog's long-term success will depend on the sense of community you can create around it.

3. Choose a Topic You Don't Mind Debating with Other People

The blogoshpere is made up of people from all walks of life with varying opinions. As your blog grows, more and more people will find it, and some of those people may not agree with everything you write. Successful bloggers enoy discussing their blogs' topics from all angles and appreciate a healthy debate.

4. Choose a Topic You're Not Overly Sensitive About

As your blog grows and more people find it, many are apt to not just disagree with you, but actually disagree so strongly with you that they may attack you personally. You need to have a thick skin to deflect personal attacks and strongly opposing opinions.

5. Choose a Topic You Enjoy Researching

The blogosphere is constantly changing and one of the most unique aspects of blogs is their ability to provide fresh, meaningful content and discussions about a wide variety of topics. In order for your blog to be successful, you need to enjoy reading about your blog's topic and keeping up with news and current events related to it thereby enabling you to keep your blog's content interesting and relevant to readers.

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Tips to Choosing a Blog Topic

Tips to Choosing a Blog Topic

Building a successful blog is a commitment in time and effort. Follow these five tips to choose a topic to write about on your blog that will put you on the path to reaching your blogging goals.


1. Choose a Topic You're Passionate About


A successful blog is updated frequently (often several times a day). If your blog has a chance at success, you need to keep your content fresh, which means you need to consistenly update your blog. Make sure you choose a topic for your blog that you feel strongly about and truly enjoy. Otherwise, writing about it will feel stale very quickly. You need to be able to stay motivated about your blog's topic for a long time.


2. Choose a Topic You Like to Discuss with Other People


Successful blogs require two-way conversation between you (the blogger) and your audience (your readers). As readers leave comments on your blog or email you to discuss your posts in further detail, you need to be responsive and receptive to them. Your blog's long-term success will depend on the sense of community you can create around it.


3. Choose a Topic You Don't Mind Debating with Other People


The blogoshpere is made up of people from all walks of life with varying opinions. As your blog grows, more and more people will find it, and some of those people may not agree with everything you write. Successful bloggers enoy discussing their blogs' topics from all angles and appreciate a healthy debate.


4. Choose a Topic You're Not Overly Sensitive About


As your blog grows and more people find it, many are apt to not just disagree with you, but actually disagree so strongly with you that they may attack you personally. You need to have a thick skin to deflect personal attacks and strongly opposing opinions.


5. Choose a Topic You Enjoy Researching



The blogosphere is constantly changing and one of the most unique aspects of blogs is their ability to provide fresh, meaningful content and discussions about a wide variety of topics. In order for your blog to be successful, you need to enjoy reading about your blog's topic and keeping up with news and current events related to it thereby enabling you to keep your blog's content interesting and relevant to readers.

Read More

Give Your Blog a Boost in the New Year or Anytime with These Blog Resolutions

Give Your Blog a Boost in the New Year or Anytime with These Blog Resolutions

While the beginning of a new year is a great time to give your blog a boost, the resolutions listed in this article can actually be used anytime. Whenever you feel like it's time to take your blog to the next level by increasing traffic, creating a better reader experience, or any other improvement you want to make, take a look at this list for inspiration. These aren't necessarily quick fixes but rather actual resolutions - changes in behavior - that can help your blog in the long term.

1. Increase Posting Frequency

If you only post once a week, bump that up to 3 times. If you post everyday, try to post twice a day at least three times per week. Every additional blog post provides new content for existing readers to view and new entry points for search engines to help new visitors find your blog. Follow the link to learn all about blog posting frequency.

2. Respond to More Comments

Comments are what makes blogs interactive, social and different from static websites. If you only occasionally respond to comments left on your blog posts, try to respond to at least half of the comments you get. If you already respond to most of the comments left on your blog, try to respond to every comment left on your blog. You can follow the links to read more about blog comments and blog conversations and communities through comments.

3. Clean Up Your Blogroll

A blogroll is a great way to connect with other bloggers, but it's useless (and possibly annoying) to your readers if the links aren't helpful or don't work. Take some time to periodically test the links in your blogroll throughout the year to ensure they deliver value to your readers and actually work. You can follow the link to learn more about blogrolls

4. Clean Up Your Sidebar

If your sidebar is cluttered with too many ads, useless links, and images and information that isn't useful to your readers, you need to delete the unhelpful excess. Take some time throughout the year to check the contents of your sidebar ensuring it's fully optimized to provide value to your readers as well as the results you want. You can follow the link to learn about 15 popular sidebar items.

5. Learn Something New

If you want to grow your blog's audience, a great way to do that is to introduce something new to your blog. For example, if you haven't learned how to create a podcast or vlog before, learn how and add it to your blog. You can follow the links to learn how to create a vlog and how to create a podcast.

6. Try Something New

If you don't have time to learn something new, you can still try something new on your blog. Blog contests, guest bloggers, polls, and blog carnivals are just a few suggestions of new things you can try on your blog at anytime. Follow the links to learn more about blog contests, guest blogging, polls, and blog carnivals.

7. Try a New Promotion Method

If you want to grow your blog, then you have to take time to promote it. If you haven't been submitting your blog to social bookmarking sites, participating in social networking, using Twitter or another microblogging tool, commenting on other blogs, or participating in forums related to your blog, then you should start! Follow the links to learn more about social bookmarking, social networking, Twitter, increasing blog traffic and free blog promotion

8. Network More

Networking is one of the keys to blog success. As you meet more bloggers, communicate with other people in the blogosphere, and become better known online, your blog will grow. Take some time to use the social networking and microblogging tools available to you to grow your blog indirectly. To learn more about social networking and microblogging, follow the links for more information about Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, Twitter, Plurk and Jaiku.

9. Enhance Your Blog's Appearance

The visual appearance of your blog can have a big impact on whether or not visitors stay once they find it or return later. Take some time to evaluate your blog's appearance, and add enhancements or revisions to make your blog look better than ever. You can follow the links to learn where to find free Wordpress themes, where to find free Blogger templates and where to find free photos to use on your blog

10. Upgrade Your Blog's Functionality

There are a number of ways you can upgrade your bog’s functionality. If you're currently using Blogger.com or Type Pad, you might want to consider moving to Word press. If you're using the free version of Wordpress.com, you can switch to Wordpress.org and gain a significant amount of additional functionality. If you already use Wordpress.org, you can add plug-ins to give your blog a boost. Follow the links to read a blogging software comparison to help you understand the difference between the various blogging platforms available. You can also follow the links to read more about blogging with Wordpress, Blogger.com, Typepad, Wordpress.com vs. Wordpress.org, types of blog hosts and how to choose a blog host.

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How I Make Money from Blogs

How I Make Money from Blogs

It’s been a fair while since I talked specifically about my blogging earnings. I decided a year or so ago that I wasn’t going to put specific dollar figures to my income any more in public - however as I get a lot of questions from readers asking for updates I thought I’d share where my blogging income has been coming from lately.
All I will say in terms of dollar figures is that I am still well and truly earning over six figures per year from the following income streams.
The following is a ranking of my top 9 income streams for the fourth Quarter of 2006. It is a summary of the income from my own personal blogs - ie income from b5media (where I am an employee as well as a shareholder) is not included - either is income from Six Figure Blogging (which continues to sell at a reasonable rate) or any speaking or consulting work that I do (very little these days anyway).
I’ve also included a little information on how I use each of these income streams and which products that they offer work best for me which I hope is helpful for others looking to monetize their blogs or websites. Note - Some of the following links are affiliate links.



1.Chitika
While they don’t work on every blog (for example I don’t use them here at ProBlogger) and there is a traffic minimum to be accepted by them Chitika continue to be my highest earner. They offer a variety of ad units and income streams - the top three for me are eMiniMalls, Related Product Units and Shoplincs. They continue to work best on product related sites. Place RPU units at the end of posts (they give a good option for people to click on when they finish reading and experiment with linking directly to products in your shoplinc
from product reviews (of the same products) on your blogs. I’ve written plenty of Chitika Optimization tips.


2. AdSense
When I survey bloggers about the methods that they use to make money from their blogs Google’s AdSense is always the number one response. It is a quick and easy way for bloggers of all sizes to display ads that are relevant to their content.
AdSense is a ‘contextual’ advertising program where publishers simply add a piece of code to their blogs that helps Google analyze what your page is about so they can serve ads on that topic. This increases the chances of your readers clicking the ad which increases the chances that you’ll earn something from them.
AdSense also provide a variety of other income streams to bloggers including a site search tool (you make money by people searching your site) and referral tools (where you can make money by recommending Google products).
AdSense is how I earn around 35% of my income as a full time blogger and I would thoroughly recommend it as a way of monetizing a blog - especially for those just starting out.

The most popular form of advertising on blogs is AdSense (according to a few studies that I’ve seen) and for me it’s a reliable earner that brings in a significant level of income (just under what Chitika pulls in each month). While I use referrals and their search product on some of my sites I find that normal ad units are producing the best income for me - particularly rectangle (250 x 300 pixels) ones placed close to content with a blended design. For tips on optimizing AdSense on your blog .



3. Text Link Ads

Perhaps the biggest mover for me over the last 12 months in terms of my earnings has come from TLA. While they have a ceiling in what they earn per site they are another good solid earner for me - particularly now that they’ve added feedvertising (RSS ads) which out performs any other type of RSS ad that I’ve tried. I’m hearing from many bloggers that TLA is their biggest earner now. It works best on sites that have been around for a while - you don’t need big traffic to be accepted - but having a page rank and some search engine presence helps.



4. Amazon Associates

The forth Quarter of each year tends to be a good one for me when it comes to commissions from Amazon. The last quarter is a time that people are in a buying mood in the lead up to Christmas - smart placement (deep linking inside posts) can bring great conversions. The key is picking relevant products to promote. Read more tips on affiliate programs for blogs for a few other tips on optimizing Amazon.


5. Private Ad Deals
I don’t do a lot of private ad deals (it’s something I should focus upon more but there are only so many hours in the day) but when they come in they can be significant (if you have decent traffic). I’ve just signed two deals on my digital photography blog with Apple and Adobe for the next couple of months so I suspect this one will leap up next quarter.


6. Miscellaneous Affiliate Programs
My blogs have a variety of smaller affiliate programs running from them. I try to find quality products that relate to my topics that I can genuinely recommend - often via reviews. Some of the better converting products that I’ve recommended this last quarter included - Digital Photography Secrets (a camera technique series), Pro Photo Secrets (a photoshop product) and SEO Book(Aaron’s legendary resource).


7. ProBlogger Job Boards
Not spectacular earnings but growing. I see this more as a service to readers than an income stream at this point - however it does pay for itself and bring in a few hundred dollars each month.


8.Performancing’s Partners Network
The now defunct ad network did bring in a few hundred dollars last quarter. I was sad to see this close as it offered an interesting alternative.


9. BlogAds
I don’t use them much these days but they do bring in a little each month. I noticed BlogAds decrease in performance for me around the time they went to the new version. I’m not sure if it’s my problem or theirs but apart from one blog I rarely see any sales these days.
How Much Do I Spend?
A question that I’m regularly asked when I do such posts is ‘how much do you spend’ to earn what you earn?
The answer is ‘very little’.
I do experiment occasionally with using AdWords to promote my blogs - but don’t have the time or patience to get into it heavily (the biggest month I’ve had with AdWords ever is $100 - just over $3 a day). Other than that I don’t do any paidpromotional activities and my costs are really just hosting related and the normal ISP and office costs.

Read More

How I Make Money from Blogs

It’s been a fair while since I talked specifically about my blogging earnings. I decided a year or so ago that I wasn’t going to put specific dollar figures to my income any more in public - however as I get a lot of questions from readers asking for updates I thought I’d share where my blogging income has been coming from lately.

All I will say in terms of dollar figures is that I am still well and truly earning over six figures per year from the following income streams.

The following is a ranking of my top 9 income streams for the fourth Quarter of 2006. It is a summary of the income from my own personal blogs - ie income from b5media (where I am an employee as well as a shareholder) is not included - either is income from Six Figure Blogging (which continues to sell at a reasonable rate) or any speaking or consulting work that I do (very little these days anyway).

I’ve also included a little information on how I use each of these income streams and which products that they offer work best for me which I hope is helpful for others looking to monetize their blogs or websites. Note - Some of the following links are affiliate links.

1.Chitika

While they don’t work on every blog (for example I don’t use them here at ProBlogger) and there is a traffic minimum to be accepted by them Chitika continue to be my highest earner. They offer a variety of ad units and income streams - the top three for me are eMiniMalls, Related Product Units and Shoplincs. They continue to work best on product related sites. Place RPU units at the end of posts (they give a good option for people to click on when they finish reading and experiment with linking directly to products in your shoplinc

from product reviews (of the same products) on your blogs. I’ve written plenty of Chitika Optimization tips.

2. AdSense

When I survey bloggers about the methods that they use to make money from their blogs Google’s AdSense is always the number one response. It is a quick and easy way for bloggers of all sizes to display ads that are relevant to their content.

AdSense is a ‘contextual’ advertising program where publishers simply add a piece of code to their blogs that helps Google analyze what your page is about so they can serve ads on that topic. This increases the chances of your readers clicking the ad which increases the chances that you’ll earn something from them.

AdSense also provide a variety of other income streams to bloggers including a site search tool (you make money by people searching your site) and referral tools (where you can make money by recommending Google products).

AdSense is how I earn around 35% of my income as a full time blogger and I would thoroughly recommend it as a way of monetizing a blog - especially for those just starting out.

The most popular form of advertising on blogs is AdSense (according to a few studies that I’ve seen) and for me it’s a reliable earner that brings in a significant level of income (just under what Chitika pulls in each month). While I use referrals and their search product on some of my sites I find that normal ad units are producing the best income for me - particularly rectangle (250 x 300 pixels) ones placed close to content with a blended design. For tips on optimizing AdSense on your blog.

3. Text Link Ads

Perhaps the biggest mover for me over the last 12 months in terms of my earnings has come from TLA. While they have a ceiling in what they earn per site they are another good solid earner for me - particularly now that they’ve added feedvertising (RSS ads) which out performs any other type of RSS ad that I’ve tried. I’m hearing from many bloggers that TLA is their biggest earner now. It works best on sites that have been around for a while - you don’t need big traffic to be accepted - but having a page rank and some search engine presence helps.

4. Amazon Associates

The forth Quarter of each year tends to be a good one for me when it comes to commissions from Amazon. The last quarter is a time that people are in a buying mood in the lead up to Christmas - smart placement (deep linking inside posts) can bring great conversions. The key is picking relevant products to promote. Read more tips on affiliate programs for blogs for a few other tips on optimizing Amazon.

5. Private Ad Deals

I don’t do a lot of private ad deals (it’s something I should focus upon more but there are only so many hours in the day) but when they come in they can be significant (if you have decent traffic). I’ve just signed two deals on my digital photography blog with Apple and Adobe for the next couple of months so I suspect this one will leap up next quarter.

6. Miscellaneous Affiliate Programs

My blogs have a variety of smaller affiliate programs running from them. I try to find quality products that relate to my topics that I can genuinely recommend - often via reviews. Some of the better converting products that I’ve recommended this last quarter included - Digital Photography Secrets (a camera technique series), Pro Photo Secrets (a photoshop product) and SEO Book (Aaron’s legendary resource).

7. ProBlogger Job Boards

Not spectacular earnings but growing. I see this more as a service to readers than an income stream at this point - however it does pay for itself and bring in a few hundred dollars each month.

8.Performancing’s Partners Network

The now defunct ad network did bring in a few hundred dollars last quarter. I was sad to see this close as it offered an interesting alternative.

9. BlogAds

I don’t use them much these days but they do bring in a little each month. I noticed BlogAds decrease in performance for me around the time they went to the new version. I’m not sure if it’s my problem or theirs but apart from one blog I rarely see any sales these days.

How Much Do I Spend?

A question that I’m regularly asked when I do such posts is ‘how much do you spend’ to earn what you earn?

The answer is ‘very little’.

I do experiment occasionally with using AdWords to promote my blogs - but don’t have the time or patience to get into it heavily (the biggest month I’ve had with AdWords ever is $100 - just over $3 a day). Other than that I don’t do any paid

promotional activities and my costs are really just hosting related and the normal ISP and office costs.

Read More