Whether it’s a website or a blog, it needs to project credibility. If the blog doesn’t meet the highest standards of credibility, there is no way in the world that it’s going to attract a loyal readership.  So improving the reputation of your blog must be a high priority task for you.

Credibility can be built, but it can't be bought!

Here are three tips that will go a long way in improving blog credibility:

Only post Relevant Content

It is only if your blog has relevant content that it can strike a chord amongst users. The reason why visitors want to go through your blog is because you have promised them specific information and if they don’t find that information on your blog, they are not going to come back to it again.  For e.g. if your blog is about iPhone applications and their development and you start offering information about Android or Symbian development, it’s not something that the readers are going to like very much. Another facet of relevant content is that it should be fresh. Readers want the latest information and are not looking for content that is old and whose expiry date is long past.

Answer your Comments

If you think that you can improve the credibility of your blog purely by publishing fresh content, then you have another thing coming. Once you have posted on your blog, it’s important that you answer the comments that you attract for a particular post. The fact that readers have taken time out to post a comment means they have read your blog post with interest and decided to air their views about what was written. Their comments might be appreciative or can even be critical of the ideas or thoughts that have been expressed in your post. As a blogger you need to show your acknowledgment for their appreciation and in most case a short and sweet ‘thank you’ will do.

But when it comes to criticism, you can defend what you said in the blog post and clarify any doubts that the reader has expressed through the comment. This tells blog visitors that you know what you are talking about and are saying something not just for the heck of it, but with conviction. It’s a simple equation really – If you are convinced about what you are saying, you stand a better chance of convincing your readers.

Don’t Keep Projecting Yourself as the Best

Confidence is always good, and you can project that confidence through the content of your blog posts. But, if your blog keeps saying that you are the best at regular intervals, be it through the tag lines used, its content or the images used, instead of looking like an expert, you will come out looking obnoxious. The fact that you are the best shouldn’t be told to the readers of your blog, it must be something your readers should be able to gauge naturally, over the course of time.  The use of visuals, call to actions etc. must be commensurate with the purpose of the blog and not be put in place to tell visitors that there is nobody better than you.

It’s important to note that these are not the only tips that will ensure credibility for your blog. As you go along, you will learn of new ways to improve the credibility of your blog. The important thing is to do the simple things right.

3 Great Ways to Improve the Credibility of Your Blog is a post from: Blog Godown

The two faces of blogging

The “Active” and the “Passive” has a lot of impact on the daily lives of bloggers. An “Active” blogger takes initiative, strives to be productive and does the hard work. The “Passive” counterpart is a big time procrastinator, shirks from menial tasks and tries to find shortcuts, even if they may not be the right things to do.

Classifying yourself as a pure “Active” or “Passive” blogger can be a bit strong. But, there are shades of both, one shade is bigger than the other one (more like a two face you see in the image (evil smile)). One can identify this by analyzing the behavour of “Active” and “Passive” bloggers. Let us take some examples which will help you understand the scenario better:

General Blogging:

The “Active”: An Ideal version of this type of blogger is a task master. A productive guy who does not stop with writing just the article. There’s a lot more it. He tweaks and optimizes and then markets it. Next, he analyzes his posts according to statistics. It is not the quality of article that matters to him, but the actual learning curve which will eventually lead to the path of becoming a problogger one day,

The “Passive”: The type of blogger that most of us experience in one stage or the other. We sometimes call it writer’s block just to avoid embarrassment but we are actually lazing around, dozing off . The Passive sounds fun but it is the path to disaster valley. The Passive guy is only interested in the results and hence, he tries to focus just on writing and super quick methods to make money online – the kind of methods which are sold by many crooks. Eventually, they are either cheated by some crook or they start using black hat methods.

Commenting:

The “Passive”: The “Good Post” and “Thanks for sharing” kind of comments are not adding value to the discussion. They were supposed to be of value years ago, when blogging had just started. Everyone was new to the concept, so short and supportive comments like these were always welcome. But, nowadays, this is a passive way of commenting. Most of these comments are spam, but even the real ones are of no use. Good Post does not reflect your opinions and ideas. It is an indicator that you are too lazy to write a thoughtful comment.

The “Active”: The Active commenter is every blogger’s favorite. The one who treats comments as a forum to discuss. He adds value to the forum by giving his insight and topping it up with his opinions. It can be a critique, or a strong reaction. But, whatever it is, it adds a spark to the commenting forum and adds to the reputation of the commenter.

Social Media

The “Passive”: The shameless self plug or sharing like a robot are signs of this guy. The Passive tries his best to automate each and every bit but fails because he is easily ignored by the people in his network (The people in your network are not dumb!).

The “Active”: He is the content curator who shares useful stuff which may or may not be related to his work. He understands the “social” in social media and makes it a point to be a part of conversations and discuss on big and small issues.

I would not ask which side you have been on, because i am pretty sure its been both. But, I would ask you, what do you consider “Active” and “Passive” in terms of blogging?

Active and Passive Side of Blogging is a post from: Blog Godown

This is a guest article by Kevin Moor. You too can be part of this great knowledge sharing community. Take a look at our guest blogging guidelines.

Blogging is a very popular activity; many folks that you know have a blog, and many of those folks will have more than one blog. Blogs are a great way to express yourself or share your knowledge and expertise, so it makes sense that you would want one too.

As you get started, you probably have done a little bit of research on blogging. It is important to know what to do with your blog, but it is equally vital to know what you shouldn’t do. The following tips are only 10 of the things that you should not do with your new blog.

Don't do this!

1.) DON’T overdo your layout. For your blog, simple is probably better. If you do a more elaborate layout with lots of logos you may end up making your blog too busy and hard to read. It could also end up making your blog look a bit unprofessional.

2.) DON’T create a big header. A big header with a logo is sure tempting to create as it can make you site look sharp. It will also make your blog hard to read. Big,slick headers can push the text down. If your visitors can’t see any actual text or content when they first visit your blog, they are more likely to simply surf away from your site before reading any of your posts.

3.) DON’T put too many ads on your blog. You want ads because you want to make money off of your blog; monetizing your blog with ads is one of the prime ways that the average blogger earns money for all of their hard work. You may like ads, but your readers definitely don’t. If you have too many obvious ads on you blog, you will turn your readers off and they may not end up coming back for more.

4.) DON’T disable comments. Turning comments off can be tempting for new bloggers. If you allow comments, you leave yourself and your posts open for critique and may put yourself at risk for someone saying something negative about your work. If you turn off comments, you won’t know all of the awesome things people are saying about your site either. Also, blogging is a type of social media, and this means that you are cutting off the conversation if you disable comments.

5.) DON’T forget to post. If you want a successful blog with lots of visitors, you need to post often. Some say that once or twice a week is often enough, and others say that once a day isn’t enough. However often you intend to post, you need to remember to do it. If you stop posting, viewers will stop checking back to see if there is new content.

6.) DON’T ignore social sites. Social media is a great way to get more eyes on your blog. Share your content via these sites, and be sure to open up accounts on the most popular sites for your blog.

7.) DON’T have a general blog. General blogs can be fun, but niche specific blogs can attract more readers. If you want a widely read, successful or profitable blog you should have it be on a particular topic.

8.) DON’T have music or video autoplay on your blog. You may think that these features make it easy to find the media, but all it actually does is make viewers want to click away from your blog as soon as they can. Visitors who may be checking your site at work or at class or another time when they aren’t supposed to will not appreciate this.

9.) DON’T use blackhat techniques to get people to your blog. If you don’t know what these are, don’t worry; you probably are safe. Otherwise, please know that these spammy, slightly underhanded methods will turn off your readers and may get you banned from search results.

10.) DON’T forget to read other blogs. By reading other blogs, you will get a lot of benefits, including learning about what does and does not work when blogging. You should also leave honest, pertinent comments on these blogs, as this will surely lead to even more hits for your own site.

10 Things You Shouldn’t Do With Your New Blog is a post from: Blog Godown

Blogging is certainly not as easy as many people think it is. Blogging is actually a business and involves a lot more than just writing good content. Getting a nice design, moderating comments and promoting blogs are only just a bit of the whole blogging business. Running blogs as a professional does take up a lot of time especially if the blogger works a full-time job and can only attend to his/her blog at night or on the weekends.

Always running out of time!

Managing time is an essential skill that a blogger needs to learn. Even if you are a full-time blogger, you still need to manage your time properly. The tough question is always there – how to maximize the time, make sure that we get the most out of each hour and finally come out productive by the time we log off at the end of the day?

Let’s take a look at some time management tips that could be useful for bloggers:

• List down and maintain your ideas in idea file

  An idea for your next post suddenly pops out when you are waiting for the train to arrive – what do you do? Do you keep it in your head? I suggest writing down the ideas.

  Brainstorming activities take a lot of time. Save time and list down any ideas you have in your head so that later on, you only need to focus on the writing part. Create a “box” called an “idea file” and put all the new post ideas in it. When it is time for you to start writing, open the “idea file” and go!

  To record the ideas and store the details, I recommend Evernote. Evernote helps to maintain the idea list and the retrieving process is easy. If you don’t fancy Evernote as much, find other method that suits you. The list of ideas doesn’t even have to be maintained electronically; some people write their ideas in notebook or keep them in their smart phones. Whichever method are you using, the idea is to maintain the idea list to save your time.

• Build a routine and stick to it

  When we work for others, time is managed for us. We have certain expectations to be met – arrive at the given time, log on to the system, be productive, take a break, come back and be productive again. If you think this only applies when you work for others, think about it again. It is just as effective if we apply this to our own day when we become our own bosses. The only difference is that this time, we manage our own time, instead of having our schedule and tasks dictated by others.

  Schedule your blogging time, make it a routine and stick to it. Having a routine helps you to stay organized. If you don’t have a structured schedule, it is very easy for you to come up with excuses such as “no time” every time you messed up your progress. For instance, you might want to have a fixed brainstorming session every Monday and write articles every Friday. This helps you to focus on other tasks on the other days; you could spend those days working on marketing, generating traffic, etc.

• Focused Batches

  Focused Batches is a tactic to manage time effectively when running a blog. We all suffer from information overload and it can be a major interruption at work. Writing articles in one sitting and then publishing them in queue every day during the week is an example of focused batch work. It leaves the rest of your week open to other tasks such as developing products, for instance.

  You might want to consider breaking the weekly tasks into focused batches. Structure your schedule by allocating one or two hours just to focus on that single task, take a break and start with different single task in the next hour. You also can switch it to days instead hours but the gist is to have a single task to be focused at a go.

• Airplane mode

  Airplane mode is a feature on most smart phones that will turn off all connectivity once you activate it. You can’t call, text or surf the web. It is a “Do Not Disturb” hanging on the phone “door”. Apply the airplane mode to the times when you are doing important works on your blog.

  It literally means removing all potential distractions such as turning off Twitter, email notifications and going off Facebook. Carrying out your work at a fixed place such as in an office with a door might help you to get full, uninterrupted attention as well. It indicates you are in working mode and activating “airplane mode” makes you actually stay there with your work.

Everyone needs time management skills, regardless of whether you are a blogger, office worker or a homemaker. The tips above and some self-discipline helps to keep a blogger efficient and effective in running his/her blog, even if the blogging hours are limited.

Time Management Tips for Bloggers is a post from: Blog Godown

If you are serious about developing your blog as a business there are times that you will have to consider outsourcing some aspect of your blog. Indeed managing a blog when you have 100 visitors is a lot different when compared to 10000 visitors. This is why it might be important that you learn how to outsource some aspects of your blog. In this article I will be speaking about 4 interesting aspect of your blog that you can outsource

Design

The first thing that you might consider outsourcing is the design part of your site. Indeed things such as blog templates and logo design can all be outsourced without having too much impact on your blog. The key here is to make sure that you give enough information to your designers to make sure that they understand what you are looking for. There are plenty of freelancers online that will be ready to work for you at a really affordable price.

SEO

Another thing that can easily be outsourced is the SEO. Indeed things like social bookmarking or link building can beoutsourced quite easily and will allow you to save time for some more productive aspect of your blog. Again you will want to make sure that you choose a qualified person or firm to handle this as you will not want them to make use obscure techniques. Using such techniques can penalize your site and may cause your site to disappear from search engines ranking page altogether.

Blog Management

Updating blog software, hosting management and databases management can be a time consuming task especially as the number of visitors keeps on increasing. This is another aspect of your blog that you should be able to outsource quite easily if you want to save some time. It might be a good idea to leave this blog management aspect to the same company that designs your blog in the first place.

Content Creation

This is an aspect of your blog that can be quite tricky if you are careful. Indeed the success of your blog will depend on the quality of the content that you post on your site. Your post will normally be a reflection of your own personality and it can be quite difficult for another person to replicate this. This is one feature of your blog that you may have problem outsourcing as it may take some time for you to find the most appropriate freelancer.
Alternatively you might want to outsource only some categories of your blog while you continue to write on the core topics of your blog.

Outsourcing Your Blog: A Guide is a post from: Blog Godown

Faster website improves user experience and hence directly affects the bounce rate as well as the returning traffic. If you are targeting global audience, you should know that they are using different types of internet connections – some are fast and some are slow. Those with high internet speeds don’t care much about the site load time because almost every websites loads in a matter of seconds. However, those with slower internet connection, each byte downloaded is precious. Therefore, the goal should be to reduce the site load time by tweaking and optimizing the website.

Google Also Recommends Faster Websites

As you might know, google has included site speed as a part of their search algorithm. This was done by google for the same reason – website usability. They also believe that a good website should be fast loading in nature. Therefore, they have provided tools to check site speed such as google analytics and some other firefox plugins. This helps you find the bottlenecks such as SQL Queries, DNS Lookups etc.

Plugin Performance

Similar to the tools provided by google, godaddy has launched a wordpress P3 Plugin Profiler. This ingenious tool generates  ”creates a profile of your WordPress site’s plugins’ performance by measuring their impact on your site’s load time”. In layman terms, it finds the speed bottlenecks.

It generates virtual traffic for the website and measures the performance of each plugin and stores them in the results file. You just have to click on “Start scan” and it will do all the work automatically by loading multiple pages of the website.

It displays a pie chart of the average total time taken by each plugin. Here is what my website’s test results looked like:

As you can see, you can easily visualize which plugins are consuming more time and hence, you can act on it by:

1. Removing the plugin

2. Replacing it by another plugin which consumes less time.

3. Using a code snippet which has the same functionality as that of the plugin.

It’s a pretty cool plugin and has a lot of advanced features such as detail stats and timeline. You should give it a try!

Site Performance: Determining the Blocking Factor is a post from: Blog Godown

When the holidays descend upon us in full force, as bloggers we’re faced with a constant demand to stay on our toes and give our readers the holiday information, spirit and content that they’re seeking.  However, for every way that holiday blogging can become more difficult than normal, it also offers the opportunity to improve and grow our blog.  Readers are now, more than ever, passionate about making the internet an integral part of their holidays in every way from planning and organizing to shopping and avoiding the crowds.  No matter what your blog topic is, the holidays provide you with the opportunity to stretch and grow your reader borders.

Be in the Holiday Spirit..

Reach out with Holiday Spirit

In order to really reach readers during the holiday season, you’re going to need to bring a little holiday into your blog.  For whatever reason, when December hits, we become a culture obsessed with everything gone holiday.  We expect everything we see and everything we read to have a little holiday sparkle, and if it doesn’t, then we generally don’t want much to do with it!  So whether you do a little site redesign, you include some holiday themed content or even just place a unique holiday countdown tool in the corner of your blog, you’d be amazed how many people will be drawn to your blog or stay with your blog to see how you incorporate the holiday theme.  If you can come up with something extra innovative, you’ll have an even bigger opportunity for your blog to garner new readers as the word spreads and you have an opportunity to see something go viral.

Take Advantage of Some Bragging Opportunity

Holidays allow for a personal touch in the blog world like almost nothing else.  We expect people to open up and become almost like family during this time of year and we appreciate it when they do. You can take advantage of this by doing a few personal pieces on what your blog/business has accomplished over the year.  This allows you to put the post out there as more of a personal reflection piece than a bragging piece that would have the potential to put people off.  Share your highs (and even your lows if you can show how you overcame them) as you conclude your year, encouraging your reader with how far you’ve come and how far you expect to go in the next year.

Lure Readers in With Holiday Specials

If at all possible, take advantage of the blogging gift phenomenon and offer your readers holiday specials.  Whether you can provide special discounts; buy one, get this; or even freebies, you’ll be amazed at the spike your readership will get.  And, remember, getting people to the site is more than half the battle.  Once there, then it’s just up to you to keep them there with stellar content!

Point the Way to Other Specials

Even if you yourself don’t have anything to “offer” per se, as in your blog is not a business with product or discounts to offer, you are by no means out of luck.  When this is the case, all you have to do is do some research.  Compile lists of where all the best deals are.  Find every site listing free shipping and put together a guide by category.  Find the gift guides that you think your readers would love most.  If they can come to you for a concise list that will show them all the best deals and freebies that will save them having to put in all that research time, you’ll gain very affectionate, thankful, loyal readers.

Festive & Helpful

In the end, it mainly comes down to these two aspects: being festive and helpful.  Decorate the blog; provide fun, festive holiday themed content (you can tailor any content to be at least a little holiday-like) and try to put something like a countdown or a “25 posts of ________,” etc. that will keep your readers coming back for more every day.  And finally, do your best to offer them something tangible or direct them to where they can get something tangible!

Making the Most of Holiday Blogging is a post from: Blog Godown

A guest article by Elena Vakhromova. You too can be part of this great knowledge sharing community. Take a look at our guest blogging guidelines.

Why do people guest-blog? For self- or product promotion, for traffic, money or just for interest’s sake. Indeed, guest blogging has become a marketing goldmine and all self-respecting online business owners tend to create a discourse around their product or service in blogosphere. Not all of them have the ability to write excellent posts which make the readers beg for more. Still any writing skills aren’t inherent or intuitive. Instead, good writing is a learned skill and it may be easily developed through practice.

If you’re preparing to plunge into guest-posting, you will need not only a knack for writing but a bunch of good tools to aid you in daily chores. Here is a roundup of handy web and PC-based applications which I find indispensable for everyone aiming at comfortable and effective guest-posting.

Evernote

Those who get tired of MS Word and OpenOffice, will definitely love this free note-taking app. Evernote is an ideal solution for drafting a guest post. Its main asset is being perfectly cross-platform: notes are easily accessible from a PC, Mac, iPhone, iPad, Android phone and from the Web. Beside text notes, Evernote can keep whole web pages or excerpts, images, HTML code, PDFs, music, business cards, etc. Everything added to Evernote is automatically synchronized and made searchable. Evernote is also remarkable for its auto-saving, absence of cumbersome editing tools and ability to email notes.

FastStone Capture

Flickr

NoDoFollow

Bufferapp

WordWeb

It’s needless to say how grammar and spelling are important for a guest blogger, especially for a non-native speaker. Here WordWeb comes to the aid. This is a free powerful dictionary and thesaurus program that provides the definition, synonyms, antonyms of any given word without requiring you to go online. It has about 150,000 words in its database and allows you to look up a word in online reference sites. The app is also notable for its hot key support: you simply use a hot key combo when the cursor is pointed over any word, and WordWeb will pop up onscreen with all pertinent information. The Pro version ($19.50) includes more word definitions, advanced Web search options and other features.

Freemake Video Converter

Guest posts may get better coverage due to multimedia addons. If you’d like to put a video into a post, you can’t do without Freemake Video Converter. This is a free Windows-based software that lets turn any offline video into web-compatible format (Flash FVL or SWF) or easily upload it to YouTube. You can also cut unnecessary video parts, choose a custom video resolution and even create video out of photos and music.

7 Must Have Tools for Guest Bloggers is a post from: Blog Godown

Here are the most obvious LinkedIn benefits for bloggers.

1. Brand yourself

LinkedIn profile is an excellent way to build personal brand and promote yourself as a blogging expert. A complete, well-planned, and linked profile is a powerful way to show off your professional achievements and expertise. Your LinkedIn profile sums up your professional experience, career history, education, skills and interests. It gives you an opportunity to demonstrate what you can do for others (your target audience). LinkedIn profile is an important part of your public image and credibility. Promote it on your blog and in your email signature by adding link View my profile on LinkedIn.

2. Promote your blog

LinkedIn gives you an opportunity to add customized links to your blogs or websites. You can add up to three personal links in your profile. But, you can also use LinkedIn applications like WordPress and Blog Link to promote your blog feed on your LinkedIn profile. This is an awesome way to give you profile visitors the sneak preview of your blog content.

3. Increase blog Traffic

It is a well known fact that as bloggers we use social networks to promote our blog content and increase traffic to our blogs. When it comes to LinkedIn, you can share links with your connections only, groups you belong to, or publicly, with everyone who visits your profile. But, use this opportunity wisely and don’t bombard your connections and groups with links. That may have counter effect. You certainly don’t want to brand yourself as a spammer.

4. Build your network

LinkedIn enables you to quickly grow your network and connect with others. You can easily search through your email contacts and see who already has a LinkedIn profile, find your ex-coworkers, school  and college friends. LinkedIn also uses the system of connections to recommend users whom you may already know. LinkedIn logic is simple: The more connections you have, the more your network will grow. By adding connections you are increasing findability of your LinkedIn profile.

5. Build reputation and authority

There are authorities and leading experts in every field. If you want to position yourself as a blogging expert or blogging consultant, then you have to build your reputation in that field. LinkedIn can help you in this pursuit a lot. You can build your reputation and authority on LinkedIn through LinkedIn Groups and Linkedin Answers. LinkedIn answers and LinkedIn groups enable you to easily demonstrate your expertise in your field. By answering other users’ questions, you demonstrate your knowledge and prove that you can help others. As an active and helpful member of the groups you joined, you can increase your visibility and recognizability.
Another powerful way to position yourself as an expert is to get recommendations. Recommendations are personal endorsements and proofs that you deliver what you promise.

6) Find ideas for blog posts

LinkedIn questions and group discussions are absolutely amazing tools for generating blog post ideas. They provide an insight into what people want to know and need to learn. You may want to subscribe to new questions in your area of expertise. For example, if you are blogging about technology, it would be wise to subscribe to new questions in this category.

This is by no means a comprehensive list of LinkedIn benefits for bloggers. But these six are certainly good enough reasons to visit the site and click the button Join Now.

Six LinkedIn Benefits for Bloggers is a post from: Blog Godown

Black Friday is one such time when you get the best deals online as well as offline. As my audience basically belongs to the category of bloggers, I make it a point to let them know the best offers available to them, so that they save a lot of money.

Here are some of the best deals available for grabs this Black Friday and Cyber Monday:

1. Hostgator (50% off)

I am a hostgator customer and I am happy with their hosting as well as the live support they provide. If you are looking for a good hosting option, then hostgator should be your first choice (P.S. This Blog is also hosted by Hostgator).

Offer: 50% OFF on ALL hosting services. This includes shared hosting, reseller hosting, VPS hosting, Dedicated servers and Windows hosting! This does not include domain names.

This promotion will bring hostgator’s hosting packages as low as:

Shared hosting: As low as $4.95 Now only: $2.48/month (pre-paid)

Reseller Hosting: As low as $24.95 Now Only: $12.48/month (pre-paid)

VPS Hosting: As low as $19.95 Now Only: $9.98/month (First Month)

Dedicated Servers: As low as $174 Now Only $87/month (First Month)

Offer Validity: The Offer starts from 12:00 PM  Friday, November 25^th, 2011 Central Standard Time (GMT -6) and is valid for one day. Also, it is valid on client’s first invoice, so it is advisable that you take orders for more than a month to avail the maximum benefit.

Grab 50% off by clicking on this link

2. Godaddy (5$ for a .COM domain)

Offer: Godaddy is Offering .COM domains for 5$ for an year (Usually the price is around 10$ for an year).

Offer Validity: This offer is valid for the order of upto 5 domains. The offer is not valid for Renewals or Transfer. The Offer will run through 11/28 or until all 10K domains are gone, whichever comes first!

Get a .COM for just 5$

3. StudioPress Theme (25% off on Everything)

Offer: The Amazing Genesis Framework is up for grabs. I have always wanted a theme that has flexibility and, the genesis framework makes this happen with ease. Everything at Studiopress is at 25% off – the genesis framework as well as the child themes.

How To Avail Offer: Use the coupon code: THANKS

Offer Validity: This deal ends promptly at 5:00 pm Pacific time on Monday, November 28, 2011.

Grab 25% off on Studiopress

4. MaxBlogPress Bundle (70% on the Bundle)

Offer:  The MaxBlogPress Bundle consists of 4  5-Star Products available at 70% off.  475$ worth products are available at 137$. A saving of 388$ (isn’t that huge!). You might have used MaxBlogPress’ free plugin and you must be aware of the quality it offers.

Offer Validity: The Deal starts on 24th November Midnight EST and is valid for 1 day.

Grab This Super Duper Offer Fast

5. DreamHost (50% on 1 year hosting)

Offer:  Dreamhost is a reliable web hosting and you could get an year’s hosting at half the price. This Offer is open only for the readers of this website. So Grab it fast!

How To Avail Offer: Use the Coupon Code:  BLACKFRIDAY2012

Offer Validity: Valid till 1st December

Get DreamHost Hosting at 50% Off

7. MOJO Themes (CyberMonday Super Saver Bundle)

8. Income Blogging Guide (40% off)

8. ThesisAwesome Blog Skin (50% off)

Offer: ThesisAwesome is a beautiful Thesis blog skin by my friend Hesham which improves the look and feel of your thesis website. He is offering 50% off on his thesis blog skin for the occasion of Black Friday.

How To Avail Offer: Use the coupon code: 266E 

Offer Validity: This code is valid till Monday midnight, November 28,2011.

Get 50% off on ThesisAwesome Blog Skin

9. OBOX Themes (25% off)

Offer: OBOX is a collection of classy and elegant themes which are available at affordable prices. On this black friday, you can get them at 25% off.

How To Avail Offer: Use the Coupon Code: BLACKFRIDAY2012

Offer Validity: The Offer is Valid till 30th November 2012.

Get 25% on all themes

10. WpWebHost (50% Off on VPS Upgrade)

Offer: If you are running out of bandwidth and want to reduce the website loading time, you can think of upgrading to the VPS plan by WpWebHost. They are offering 50% discount on the VPS Upgrade.

How To Avail Offer: Use the following code to avail the offer: VPS50

Upgrade to VPS Plan for half the rate!!

There are many more deals to come. So, stay tuned because this post will be updated soon!

Also, If you want a discount on a particular product you want to purchase. Just let us know and we will try to get a discount for you

Black Friday and Cyber Monday Super Deals for Bloggers is a post from: Blog Godown

Blogging arena has emerged as the sweet segment for the budding webmasters and those considering becoming rich quickly. However, over concentration and reliance on blogging can work against the established networks over a period of time. The webmasters often tend to align themselves more to changing SEO dynamics rather than writing quality content for the end users and as an aftermath traffic numbers dwindle and eventually the earnings. The blogging ecosystem is changing at rapid pace and is no more a standalone entity in itself. A well chalked out SEO and SMM hold the key.

Finding the right monetization strategy for you!

Research The Keywords Before Putting Thoughts Together

It is essentially imperative for webmasters to focus on a set of keywords for a stint only rather than sticking with them for a life time. The popular tools such as Google Trends should be leveraged by bloggers to know the current topics of interest and then concentrate on those. For instance, some iPhone niche bloggers are still focusing iPhone 5 keyword phrases rather than iPhone 4S and are hence are experiencing decreasing traffic trends.

Another strategy to counter the fad trends is by buying domain names with the high value keywords and stacking those with the blog posts. However, not everyone has the budget to buy too many sites and set them up from scratch with quality content. The strategy is highly recommended for webmasters who intend to develop a rich blogsites portfolio.

Try Non-Adsense Monetization To Boost Earnings

More often than not the bloggers tend to rely 100% on Adsense based earnings even if they crack higher rankings. There comes a saturation point in the earnings potential and unless non-Adsense route too is leveraged by the users the earnings will eventually normalize.

Technorati Media ads and Clickbank are fastest non-Adsense affiliate networks that have been yielding substantial earnings. The video ad networks such as Vdopia have penetrated the market with a boom too. You should try marshalling your resources around these potential monetizing possibilities in order to stay competitive in the blog niche.

Change & Innovation Are The Buzz Words

Even more than the content the look and feel of the blog should be appealing to the users. Have you ever wondered if the design of the site is intimidating and user friendly? Perhaps the good starting point will be to benchmark the design with the best competitors. The surfers tend to prefer blogsites which load up faster, have meaningful content and are not spammy.

There is no harm in re-engineering the site from scratch even if you have substantial traffic but are witnessing regular churn. Only by changing ad layouts, blog’s design and categorization you can know the things to concentrate upon. As a best practice you should ideally take a leaf from the book one by one rather than radically changing the design, layout and content in one go. And as pointed out by Tom pointers – Try fast and Fail fast, you should recognize what is going on wrong and how it can be corrected with apt steps in the next iteration.

Blogging Can Make You Riches To Rags Too – Be Cautious! is a post from: Blog Godown

With all of the latest Google Webmaster Guideline Updates and Changes, it’s no wonder that the blogosphere is scattering to make improvements to their content and site structure. Of course, they own more than 65% of the search market, so abiding by what they say may be a good idea. Likewise, it’s been proven that search giants like Bing and Yahoo have mimicked the way Google has done things for years. Yet, their version of “best practice” blogging and content development is consistent of common sense, mostly.

When you’re trying to reach a specific crowd, I’ve learned that there are few really helpful techniques. First and foremost, you should always present some form of contact information, whether it be via twitter or a simple e-mail address. Users like to verify that what they’re reading is coming from an actual person. Similarly, they like to know that this person has a bit of an “expertise” in what they’re writing about. Bounce rates aren’t only the after effects of a poorly designed site; they’re certainly dependant on authorship. If you aren’t represented as an authority on anything, nor have you really made a name for yourself in that particular niche, you’re probably not on the right path to successful blogging.

Become Known as an Expert

And as I mentioned before, Twitter can be greatly useful to demonstrate authority and authorship. At the same time, it can be a great tool for spreading the word about your writings. The same can be applied for Facebook – I recommend updating statuses and sending out media regularly to your followers. Google + claims it has over 25 million users currently, which means it’s certainly worth exploring as well. Using http://www.clintonglobalinitiative.org (Clinton Global Initiative) as a great example, you can clearly see they’ve done some tremendous work garner visitors and asking for help via Facebook. Brainchild of President Clinton and Doug Band, the CGI continues to flourish and provide unique and relevant content to its audience – Those interested in providing foreign aid.

Last but not least, you want to not only reach the right crowd, but also deliver something of substance. Don’t tell your readers the same thing that everybody else is saying, and certainly don’t post the same thing twice. It’s important to avoid paraphrasing, repetition and keyword stuffing for the pure sake of increasing traffic. If you’re content is noteworthy, people will find it. Accompany it with images and videos to solidify return rates and represent your blog as a real authority on the matter.

So again, if you’re an authority on something, and are helping to spread the word about this important matter, you’re golden. But remember, people won’t always trust you and your information if you’re not making your contact details available to them.

Substance, Authorship and Social Media is a post from: Blog Godown

There are many challenges of freelancing that can derail you on the road to success. From client management, to coping with distractions while working from home and even mundane tasks such as invoicing. There are many aspects of freelancing that are all designed to test the skills and patience of a freelancer, and thus only those who are perfect for this lifestyle should embark on a freelancing career. However, one of the most difficult aspects of freelancing is to effectively build your own marketing splash in order to promote your services and acquire clients. In short, you need to hit the ground running when starting out as a freelancer and only you will be raving about your skills and services and the best way to do this is to enter the blogosphere. So how can blogging get your talents out there to be seen by potential clients?

Entering the blogosphere

By entering the blogosphere you can make a name for yourself and more importantly your services by learning from fellow freelancers in your field and sharing your knowledge and experience with others in your position. Entering the world of freelancing can be extremely daunting and the demand of fighting to land projects in order to survive means that any tips and tricks that you can share with other freelancers will be greatly appreciated. Moreover, if you’re a young freelancer that is perhaps just starting out on the path, then of course without the years of experience behind you, the best way to learn from the practical experiences of others is to follow the main blogs from leaders in the field. However, interacting with the blogosphere means more than just reading blogs and writing the odd blog comment. Create your own blog in order to forge your own style/brand, and start connecting with other bloggers in order to collaborate on articles.

Using your blog to find new contacts

By using your blog as a platform to communicate and interact with other freelancers you will find yourself coming onto a first name basis with many of them. By offering guest article spots to fellow freelancers in your field then you are enabling their services and brand to reach your readers. This “you scratch my back I’ll scratch yours” approach to blogging is vital in order to build up a strong list of blogging partners that are happy to recommend your blog to other contacts. These new contacts will bring you more traffic and thus more readers who you can impress with your know-how. However, this sharing of knowledge will not land you with hundreds of contacts right away. Of course, you will need to expand your networking to other platforms such as twitter and LinkedIn in order to keep the flow of the conversation between you and your blogging contacts constant.

Landing new clients and projects

One thing that can’t be underestimated is that really effective blogging can take up a lot of your time. So you need to be realistic about what you want your blog to be. If you want it to be a lexicon style fountain of knowledge, with a constant publication of tutorials then this may leave little precious time for the work that will pay your bills – completing projects. However, using a blog to kill two birds with one stone is the way to go. Any completed work can be showcased on your blog (as long as the details are not private) in order to create a diverse portfolio for yourself. Moreover, investing the time into making a professional blog that is liked and shared around the freelance blogosphere is vital to impressing potential clients and landing new projects. Plus, your blog content does not always need to be heavily researched and in-depth, simply including posts which reflect on your experiences as a freelancer will bring unique content to your readers and show a more human side to potential customers, giving them an indication of you before they decide on contacting you for a project.

Boosting your freelance profile through blogging is a post from: Blog Godown

Google Chrome extensions have continued to increase in popularity since the arrival of the browser, and now offer tools that can help people with just about anything they are doing on the Internet. With such a large number of extensions now being offered, Chrome does a good job of categorizing them and presenting them in a manner that will allow you to find what you are looking for when searching through all these new extensions.

If you check out the section of the extensions page for bloggers, you’ll see that there are hundreds being offered that can help you with many of the everyday tasks that you may encounter while working on your blog.

Here are ten very useful and easy-to-use Chrome extensions that every serious blogger needs to check out.

1. Diigo

If you are looking for a tool that will help you in the process of researching for your blogs, then you need to look no further than Diigo. This extension allows you to bookmark interest articles, highlight things on websites, post reminders to yourself on them, pool all your findings, and even share them if need be.

It is an all-in-one tool for getting your research done in an orderly manner.

2. Ly

This extension is used to shorten your URLs so that they are compact and easy to share. If you have been blogging and shortening URLs for some time, then you know about http://bit.ly – this extension just makes it easier to use by allowing you to access the service without actually having to go to the site.

3. WordPress Stats

There are a lot of bloggers out there who use WordPress as a platform and are addicted to checking their stats and constantly looking at the number of visitors that they are getting each day. This extension allows you to get all of the stats that you are interested in without having to log in to your WordPress dashboard.

4. The Ultimate Free Stock Photo Search

Bloggers who commonly use stock photos in their posts will love this tool. This extension allows you to easily search over half a billion free stock photos from over 200 galleries.

5. Lazarus: Form Recovery

Losing your blog after working on it for hours is every blogger’s worst nightmare. This tool auto-saves everything you type and can easily recover your work if your computer crashes or the electricity goes out.

6. SEO SERP

Bloggers are always looking at their Google ratings and how their sites are doing in terms of keywords. This tool allows you to check all of this information simply and keep track of the progress that your blog is making.

7. Quick Markup

This tool enables you to capture any webpage of interest and then use it for brainstorming purposes. Capture the image and then jot your notes down, create mind mapping illustrations, and then save the pictures in high-quality for future reference.

8. Rapportive

This extension will help you network with other bloggers and participate easily with a community of people who share similar interests. It links with your Gmail account and gives you all necessary information on other bloggers that you are interested in building a relationship with.

9. Missing e

This is a very useful extension for Tumblr bloggers that makes it easier to navigate, post, and interact in this platform.

10. Incredible StartPage

A productivity tool for bloggers that will put everything you need on your start page in a great looking and easy-to-navigate frame. It gives you easy access to all of the webpages that you need to work and is easily customized and personalized for your personal needs.

10 Useful Google Chrome Extensions for Bloggers is a post from: Blog Godown

Whatever business you happen to be in, your reputation is one of your greatest assets. Building brand awareness is every bit as important (if people haven’t heard of you in the first place, there’s no reputation to manage) but once they have, the way people perceive your brand is crucial to your success.

The Internet has undoubtedly opened up a whole host of marketing opportunities, allowing businesses both large and small to reach out to new markets and audiences that would otherwise have been inaccessible without a large expenditure of time and resources.

It also provides a platform for conversation that spans both geographical and linguistic divides. This makes it even more important to monitor and manage your reputation across as many languages as possible.

Follow the conversation with Google Alerts

It’s difficult to manage your reputation if you don’t know who’s talking about you and where and when they’re doing so. Your own websites and social media profiles are certainly areas where you might expect to receive feedback, but Google Alerts will allow you to track other mentions of your brand or business by emailing updates whenever your chosen keyword shows in Google’s search results. You can also choose different language settings, allowing you to track mentions of your keyword across different languages. There are also online services such as Boardtracker, which specializes in scanning Internet forums and message boards for your mentions of your keyword (such as your brand name).

Make use of social media

Social media sites offer an ideal platform for direct communication with your customer base, and for monitoring the online conversation about your brand. You can make announcements, answer questions, collect feedback and respond to criticisms, all on free-to-use sites. The major players such as Facebook and Twitter have multinational followings but don’t forget that in some areas local competitors have a greater market share. In China, for example, Qzone and Renren are the most popular platforms while Orkut rules the roost in Brazil – you’ll need to tailor your social media strategy to the particularities of the popular social networks in each of your target foreign markets.

Consider your translation

Of course, if you’re disseminating content on foreign social networks, you’ll need to have your content translated. There are a number of machine translation systems available, such as Yahoo! Babel Fish and Google Translate. You can copy and paste any chunk of text for a quick ‘dictionary-style’ translation. This is fine for getting an idea of what people are saying about you, but for your own posts, responses and website content, a native-speaking translator will yield far better results.

Even the best machine translation can be prone to contextual errors and will often not deal well with things such as slang, colloquialisms and abbreviations. Using a native translator will prevent your copy from looking stilted and amateurish, adding local knowledge and a more human face to your online presence. When it comes to building and preserving your online reputation the easiest thing you can do is to make sure that your copy is sophisticated and well-written across all your target languages!

Encourage reviews

Many people will actively seek out online reviews before deciding on a particular product or service. You can increase the frequency of reviews you receive by offering incentives such as vouchers or a prize draw for participants, but these should apply equally to all reviews, whether positive or negative. Reviews should be seen to be both fair and unbiased.

Google Maps is a good platform for reviews of services in many localities and languages, and sites like Amazon also offer the chance to get multilingual reviews if you use them as sales platforms.

If you do get a bad review, you may wish to respond if there’s a facility to do so. Always do so calmly and politely, even if you consider the criticisms to be unfair. Present your argument, correct any factual errors and detail how you will improve your service in future regarding any valid points.

Again, this can all be done with machine translation, but a native-speaking translator will make your copy look better, which is after all what managing your online reputation is all about.

How to Manage Online Reputation Across Multiple Languages is a post from: Blog Godown

Are you spending every waking moment planning for your blog? Do you spend hours and hours searching other high ranked blogs related to your niche, reading blog after blog to find inspiration and ideas, checking traffic of your blog or sometimes just starring at your laptop’s blank screen and finally going to bed exhausted?

If the answer to the above mentioned question is yes, then you are over indulging in your blog. If, despite all of your efforts, you fail to be inspired and are not generating any new ideas for your blog then you’re suffering from blogger’s burnout.

Getting Frustrated is not the solution!

Questions to ask yourself

If you are not quite convinced yet that you are suffering from writer’s block or blogger’s burnout then ask yourself the following questions.

Ask yourself if all of your practices helped you achieve something remarkable?

If it helped you make any improvements to your blog?

If your answer is no then here’s the first sign that you just might be a victim of the notorious condition called blogger’s burnout. If you have any doubts then look around at the condition your room is in. Are there coffee stains on your table, energy drinks cans, chocolate wrappers or pile of cups? If yes, then there is no denying the fact that you, indeed, are undergoing a blogger’s burnout.

Dealing with Blogger’s Burnout

If you are in a state of denial about your condition then you can seriously aggravate it and take your “blogging burnout” to a point where you will be unable to post something new for your readers.

It’s a normal condition and happens with a lot of other bloggers too who have been blogging for a long time without having anything else to do. But rather than fretting too much about it, you can simply use the following tips to deal with it.

Make a schedule

There are certain rules of doing things. Blogging is like working from home for which you need to work by a strict schedule. Dedicate a few hours to your blog while taking out time for other things as well. You should not overwork or burden yourself too much just because it’s your blog you are working on. Take short breaks even within day and after some interval.

Create a proper working ambiance

Open up your windows and curtains, let light flood your room. Continuously working in a darkened room can affect your eyesight. Besides, working in little or no light can also cause stress which snubs the generation of idea.

Spare some time for yourself

It is not advisable to work continuously. You need to take out the time to allow yourself to live life. Go out for a walk, a jog or a swim. Make your limbs move and take in ample oxygen into your lungs. Meet your friends, plan some lunch or go out for coffee even. Not only will it be refreshing for you but you’d also feel much better.

Find inspiration

There is no specific time duration within which you can brew up an “exceptional idea” to work with. Go easy on yourself, relax and you will definitely come up with something new, something brilliant for your blog.

If for example, you come up with more than one idea then it is not necessary for you to start working on both of them. Note it down and schedule for some other time. Keep a notepad with you at all times to write down your ideas for later.

Learn to relax

You have got a blog like everyone else has, then what were you doing so exceptional to get it going? Once you are relaxed, prioritize your activities to allocate time to each one of them.

Once you will be back, even you write one post, make sure to optimize it for SEO, do some promotion and see the results. Instead of a big leap, take small steps towards your destination. All of these things will help you to get rid of your stress but also re-energize you. You’d see the affect of it all on your blog in the form of better response.

Telltale signs of Blogger’s Burnout and how to deal with it is a post from: Blog Godown

An interesting article that reflects on how Google + can change the rules of the game of SEO. There is no doubt that Google is the world’s most powerful machine in the field of business based on public relations.

In recent times, and after placing in brand new algorithm that seeks to banish the poor quality of the fabric, it has been much talked about Page Rank, a classification system of trademarks that saw the light back in 2001 and has caused many headaches who are focused on pursuing actions to increase it.

Closely linked with the PR we the paper representing the links  … if we extrapolate that the strengths that underlie social interaction, it seems to have less and less weight … yes, the links like the Page Rank are are useful for any business if they are not supported under the fundamental premise of quality that is only possible with good social interaction. Likewise, the PR and ranking of brands, it makes no sense if it is obtained through the actions and the quality of those marks in the fabric … what else makes up the reputation?

Now Google is here to stay + the new commitment by the congregation’s social search engine, which sees the light surrounded the debate, a debate that lights the fuse on the quality and manages to go one step further in the exhibition, connectivity and interaction , as central to the growth in Internet.

What looks like a reality is that today is social interaction, the core of the growth … Google + comes to establish itself as a meeting point between the information and advertisers (brands) so … the exposure and the model  of business , this is the SEO … could possibly experience changes from the staging of the more social side of the search engine robot ever more human ….

Some modifications carried out in the search engines, the tangible evidence of these changes … is a quality status updates will be used to measure the reputation of the brand, the editor, Web master … in short, Google could form very creative and innovative to establish a comprehensive SEO in which the algorithms applied to the interaction of Google + have a specific gravity of relevance in SEO

Google + Circles

While links are votes for corporate portals, Google + circles is consolidated as people vote, this is a measure of influence, reputation within the network.

+1 Google Button

+1 Button Google is a metrics-based functionality and is more than evident that statistics provides data of great importance, although it does not have an entirely clear penetration and must face a “readjustment” of the social routine to which users are accustomed.

Google + Sparks

We take a step further with this functionality in Google. Through it you can build a relationship – high efficiency, between a user’s vote and their preferences, tastes and interests, set in the profile.
So we take a step in the comprehensive assessment of positioning, brand SEO and personal SEO merge resulting in a ENTAM in which only the permanent and the interaction and the quality, efficiency and gambling will enable us to achieve progress in our market.

Google + Profiles

Definitely, personal data are the basis for the location, the satisfaction of interests and staging of new goods and / or services that respond to needs.

Interpretation of these data, shown in the profile resulting actions designed to achieve a more integral position, a superb and efficient formula that allows us to advance our brand through quality and protection … all prosumers now, we should not forget.

Google + meetings

Chat with video and audio … it is possible that these talks will derive additional information that might eventually be analyzed and transformed into data to achieve a quality social SEO, which finally seems to be where we are headed.

Location … always there

The configuration of the GPS, which is a key element in Google +, allows brands to target their products using traditional and never well weighted, item location …

Another step towards hegemony or a step towards social integration and the staging of a proposal for efficient business and personal SEO, what seems certain is that Google does not want to stay away from social interaction and the mobile is an innovation, a way of life that is here to stay, gaining more followers.

Photos, exposure of who we are? What we do … the social augmented reality allows us to form links through the elements that allow our recognition. Google+ can track not only our data but also allows Google to understand who we are and what we do in the “real world” … and although it seems a definition of science fiction, should be analyzed from the weight that it, has in the geolocation business, and when dependent on brands and a good SEO.

7 Tips that change the Google + SEO is a post from: Blog Godown

Back in the old days when people had diaries and journals where they scribbled secret crushes and backstabbing outbursts, a passion for writing can emerge. For those who love to write, every stroke of a pen on paper is a thread of distress washed from one’s consciousness out through the extremities. Writing is more often a stress reliever; other times, writing brings out creativity you never thought you had in you. From short verses to full-length poems and novels, everyone who made a name for themselves started with scribbles.

Back then, people who were serious in writing had to put a lot of effort in creating an excellent masterpiece and having the work published. These days, writers have it easy; anyone can be a self-published writer. If you have the ideas and the blog where you will post your works, you will gradually gain a number of avid readers the world over. So before you bury the days long gone, here is to the notebook who has faithfully kept every joyous moment and every sorrowful tear.

Paper

As you say goodbye to your old notebook, take a moment to feel its edges and smooth surface. Think back on how much it has served its purpose. No need to be emotional; just flip a few pages to look back on how life has treated you. If you think about it, you will be saving Mother Nature by not using notebooks for journals.

Pen and Ink

Feel the grasp of the pen in your hand and remember how much thought and feeling you poured over the leaves through it. Without a notebook, you will not need any pen either. You will save yourself from costs on pens and ink refills, however small the amount. Just think of the other things you can spend money on and you can easily let go.

Hiding Places

One of the fun things about having a notebook for a diary or journal is the many hiding places you can come up with. Some people let it lie under the bed, in a corner of a room, or in a hidden stack in a cabinet. Some even go to greater measures as under loose wooden flooring or a tin box buried by a special old tree in the backyard. Think of how fun it was to strategize on where to keep something memorable.

Say Bye Bye to Journals - Start Blogging Instead!

As you bid farewell to your trusty journal, it is time you embrace the new way of keeping one. Most diary keepers often write about personal experiences and less on topics that can be shared with the world. Start on a personal or private entry for a softer transition. As you feel the creative juices flow, let your thoughts speak for itself on your very first public post. Here are some of things to welcome as you begin the journey of a self-published writer.

Themes

This is not just about themes per se; this is about the whole design of your blog. With an online journal, you have a lot of options on creating your blog’s design and overall look. Let your personality come out through the designs you choose or create for your page. Blogs show your personality not only through the content, but also the way you choose to present your site.

Readers

Becoming a self-published writer with works on online blogs means that you get to have readers from anywhere. Do not expect to gain readers right from the start, though. It will take time and a little search engine optimization if you intend on having everyone read it. And when they do, they can leave comments on your posts if you like. You can also reply to them, and you get to connect with people.

Income

Now, this is something you most definitely will not get from the old journal (unless you published your works from that). If you did publish and sell some of the work you have written before, that will earn you money. When it comes to online journals, you can also earn on the side. You can choose to host sensible ads on your site to earn a few bucks. This works very well when you have a lot of visitors and readers on your blog—every click on the ads can help you earn.

So there you have it: the things you lose and gain as you face the transition from a personal notebook to a public blog. Of course, you do not have to let go of the old notebook completely. Besides, you can only use your blog with a computer and an internet connection. If you are anywhere without these, you can always depend on your trusty notebook and pen.

Goodbye, Notebook; Hello, Blog! is a post from: Blog Godown

Please laugh at my blog!  Social media success and satire!

Humour or even humor, has always been popular in advertising and marketing because people like to laugh and nowadays they often need a good reason!

I started my ‘Social media satire’ editions during very difficult times back in March 2011, I’m now on edition 24 and the continued popularity is simply amazing!  I’m even looking at publishing a book entitled ‘Social media satire’, all I need is a publisher and a deal!  (I’m on Zite which is nice, but it doesn’t really earn me anything!)

From Social media satire edition 1

The original cartoons were not well sized and the fonts were often a little hard to read, but the incredible popularity encouraged me to improve my design and layout.  I added too many cartoons on the 1st few editions, people don’t have that much time nowadays and I feel that 5 new cartoons every Monday is about the right amount.

A favorite!!

The cartoon above had very small print on the initial publication, but this version is easier to read.  I love this one and still can’t help chuckle to myself when I see it even now.

Teaching people how to use social media and what ‘permission marketing’ is all about can be quite a task, but I’ve found that if you add some humour the job is much easier and people enjoy it much more.  It’s a simple equation but one that seems to work!

Grandma and her problems with technology are a recurring theme and grandma’s an endearing character, I think we all know someone a bit like grandma, whoever and wherever we are in the world.  I am not trying to be cruel to grandma, she’s too sweet for that!

Social media satire is not all laughs. The cartoon above highlights my feelings after my recent discussions with the directors of a major UK supermarket chain.

Here’s the copy,  “I sat for over an hour with the directors of one of the UK’s largest supermarket chains last week and discussed social media, how to address it and how to put a successful campaign together.”

“The directors were amazed at what full social media connectivity can actually do for a brand and I was amazed at how little they really knew about implementing social media.  Sorry guys, but it’s not just a Facebook and Twitter account, updating LinkedIn and maybe, building a blog.  Social media marketing is not some half -hearted, part time idea, or something one consultant can do on his own; not if you’re a huge corporation with lots of different divisions and millions of things happening.”

So, like I say, it’s not all fun and games!!

Here’s something else a little more serious.  A satirical look at the recent riots across the UK and the fact that social media and Blackberry got the blame.

Is social media really to blame?  Social media is a big subject and covers a lot of ground, should we also blame LinkedIn, Quora, Behance and Google+? They’re social media platforms; maybe we should be more specific or perhaps we should also include nujij, virb and xerpi? Social media is social media, right?

That’s enough about riots and who exactly is to blame, I’m sure enough time and money will be spent by experts looking into the cause and effect over the next decade or two.

There you are, a look at social media success and satire and how humour (however you spell it) works very well internationally! I’d be delighted to hear your comments and receive some feedback!

If you would like to know more about any aspects of social media or if you have any questions that you would like us to answer, you can email us or leave a comment on this blog. If you find this information interesting, please give it a Google + CLICK and also share it on Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon, Digg, or whichever social media platform you prefer.  Social media is all about sharing information, so spread the good news!

Please laugh at my blog! Social media success and satire! is a post from: Blog Godown

However, coming up with unique ideas on a continual basis is possible if you approach it in the correct way. Don’t expect to sit down at your desk and for great ideas to come right out of the blue. It takes a little work on your part to come with these ideas. Here are 5 helpful tips to help you get your creative juices flowing:

#1- Create An Inspiration File

Using pictures for inspiration!

It is common for artists to create an inspiration file as a brainstorming technique, but it can work for writers as well.  To get started, simply take out a few old magazines or books and browse for images, articles or graphics that inspire you. Cut these images out and keep them in a place that is easily accessible.

You can keep these images in a notebook, in an accordion file, on a bulletin board or in a file on your computer if your images are digital. Keep in mind that you will want to regularly update this file to keep it from getting stale.

When you are experience writer’s block, pull out your inspiration file and glance through it. Pick one image or article and study it. You will be amazed at how quickly an idea (or many ideas!) can come from a simple photograph or magazine article.

#2-Get Offline for Awhile

As a writer, you probably spend a large portion of your day at your computer.  And when you are not on your laptop, you are probably busy checking your email on your phone or surfing the Internet on your iPad. But this constant buzz of technological interaction can actually kill your creativity if you don’t take a break once in awhile.

If you are having trouble coming up with an idea, step away from your computer and take a break. Here are some activities that may help get your creative juices flowing:

• Get out of the office —or your house if you work from home—and go for a walk.  If possible, get out of the city and go for a walk in nature. Can’t escape the concrete jungle? Go for a walk in a park or a botanical garden.
• Call up a creative friend or family member or start up a conversation with a co-worker. Bouncing ideas off another person often helps you see something in a new light.
• Go for a drive in a relatively unfamiliar area of town and take note of what you see as you drive. Just don’t get lost and keep your easy on the road as much as possible!
• Take a quick cat nap.
• Grab a nutritious bite to eat; it is incredibly difficult to think clearly if your stomach is growling.  However, this does not give you permission to grab a candy bar from the vending machine. Instead, opt for a piece of fruit or some type of lean protein.

#3- Get it Out On Paper

A writing technique that you probably haven’t tried since elementary school is free writing. Can’t recall what free writing entails? Luckily, it is pretty simply. Take out a clean piece of paper and write down whatever comes to your mind for a set period of time (usually from 1 to 5 minutes). Don’t worry about spelling, topic, or grammar. Just let your mind run wild and your hands go free. Much of what you produce will be unusable, but getting it out of the way will help you focus in on the good ideas.

#4- Do Productive Research

You probably read the word ‘research’ on this strategy and instantly starting rolling your eyes. But don’t be so quick to dismiss this idea. Research can be unproductive, but can also produce some great ideas. It all depends on how you go about it.

Start your research by looking through article directories. Search for articles that are written on similar topics to what you commonly write about.  How can you put a twist on these articles? How can you make them new, different or better?

Take a look through your back log of old articles that you never finished. That article you started six months ago but never finished might be more applicable now.  Have the introductory paragraph written to a half dozen articles? Finish the one that looks the most promising.

Also, take a look at what your competitors/colleagues are writing about. Great ideas often come from taking an interesting piece that someone has already written and adding to it in some way. Additionally, take a look at what is happening in the news.  News items can result in some great opinion pieces.

#5- Create a Work Space That Inspires Creativity

If your work space is cluttered and uninviting, it can be difficult to feel inspired. Turn your working environment into a place where you feel happy and relaxed. Put up pictures of family and friends or places that you hope to visit someday. Put up a piece of art that is bright and colorful and reflects your personality.  Invest in some candles or air fresheners in your favorite scent.  Chamomile, jasmine and lavender are all calming scents and can help you to relax.

You will also want to make sure that your space is clean and well organized. If your desk is covered with stacks of paper and old soda cans, you will likely be too worried about the mess to focus on writing. If your space is an absolute mess, invest a couple of hours in deep-cleaning the space and organizing your papers. And to keep the space looking clean, spend a couple of minutes at the end of every day tidying things up. That way your space will be clean and well-organized when you return in the morning.

5 Tips to Keep Rolling in Post Ideas is a post from: Blog Godown

Have you ever thought about creating a blog (or a website) that is based on your writing, but are unsure of what niche to go in to? If so, there are many different business models to choose from. What you should go into should depend on three things: 1)Your Passion 2)Your writing style. 3)Your Vision. Everything else will fall into place. This article should help explain the different benefits and roads of two different writing styles.

People love to spend money on entertainment. It’s natural. It’s easy.

Just think about it like this: What is easier to do: Is it easier to take out all of your folded clothes from a drawer and throw them on the floor, or is it easier to pick all those clothes back up and fold them and put them back away. Which one
would you rather do?

And that is sort of how the brain approaches informational writing as opposed to entertainment writing. That is of course, unless your brain finds informational writing to be very stimulating – which of course is the scenario for a lot of different people on this planet.

Search Engine Optimization and Content

This last February, there was an algorithm update called the “Panda Update” (It was named after the engineer that designed it) in which the people over at Google really tried to take the first steps to get their algorithm to start being able to “read” the web.

Now when I say “read” the web, all I really mean, is that they want it to be able to determine bad content from good content.

Why do they want their search engine to be able to do this?

Well the answer is simple really. In an SEO world where “Content is King” uploading your website frequently and having a vast sea of content can get you at the top of the rankings of Google. Also, when a website has mountains of content spread out through thousands and thousands of different articles, it is easy for them to rank in the search engines for long tail keywords.

Side Note: Long tail keywords are keyword phrases that are not as popular searches but can be a little bit more specific. Here is a very good explanation of long tail keywords and why they can be so valuable to a website.

These type of websites are referred to, as what is known as, as “content mills.” They load their sites with informative type articles that, although may be true, usually aren’t the best sources of references.

Google battled these types of websites via Panda, by determining website bounce rates, time spent on page, and amount irrelevant advertisements – just to name a few things that they did. There is a whole list of things that Panda did that can be found here.

So where does entertainment and informational writing styles come into play?

There are a couple great ways to be successful on the web. Number 1 equals —-> Dominate the traffic via search engines and number 2 ——-> create a web site that does not depend on the search engines.

There is an endless amount of ways that you can go beyond being successful in both strategies. Let’s take a look at some of the top websites in the world out there and try to gauge on how they are successful:

The entertainment field may mean that your website will probably have to be a little less dependent on the search engines, And a little more dependent on the fact that people will want to manually add your address in the URL bar every single time.

This is naturally because when you are writing for entertainment purposes only, your search engine optimization in terms of keyword density may have to go down a little bit. Whereas when you are writing for informational purposes, your keyword density, and highly optimized usage (in terms of proper placement) will likely be able to maintained over a long period of time.

Conclusion:

Entertainment and informational writing will not only change the type of visitors you get, but it will also change your business plan, and possibly even the way that your readers will reach your website. In the end, starting a website, should depend on what it is you love do to do. If you are strong with an informative style of writing, then that is what you should go with. If it is entertainment writing that you are good at, then that’s exactly what you should do!

Entertainment VS Informational Writing is a post from: Blog Godown

Blogs take time, effort, and a whole lot of content. While having one isn’t a bad thing, they can quickly become detrimental to your brand if started for the wrong reasons. A blog started with the wrong intent is almost guaranteed to fail.

Although blogging is the cornerstone of online activity for many people, there are still companies and businesses that misinterpret their intentions.

 credit: Webtreats

The following are 6 poor reasons for starting a blog.

1. Competition

Do not start a blog simply because your competition has one and you feel intimidated. The reasons for starting a blog should be your own, derived from the progressive behavior and marketing strategy of your own brand. Remember that what works for one company, may not necessarily work for the other.

Do not let your actions become reactions of your competitions’ behavior. Think before you make the commitment to start writing. If you are blogging just because you think you should, there’s a high probability that you won’t dedicate the time needed to make it successful.

2. SEO

Adding a blog to an existing site is a great way to consistently attract a fresh stream of visitors and increase traffic and exposure. With that said, if the main motivation behind wanting to start a blog is to optimize search engine results, then stop while you’re ahead.

While a blog can deliver better search results, it can only do so with quality, optimized content. Ensure that the initial launch of your blog can be executed with the ability to continuously provide this type of content.

3. To encourage feedback

Admittedly, applying what you learn from feedback to help critique products and services of your company is a great reason to create an online presence. On the other hard, not only are there other facets of social media that perform better for this function, but remember that feedback can be both positive and negative. Ensure that your business is prepared to face both before launching a blog.

4. To generate content

Do not start a blog because you think that someone else will be made responsible for generating content. The most crucial aspect of a blog is that it needs an author that understands exactly what your niche subject area is, and have plenty to say about it.

Whether you believe it or not, the passion you have for the subject will be reflected in the writing. In turn, readers will feel the excitement or lack thereof, making it evermore pertinent that you write your own content when launching a blog.

5. Cutting corners

Do not assume that just writing a blog will bring you visitors. It is a terrible decision to start a blog if you are not willing to back it up with any other marketing.

A blog will never take the place of good ol’ fashion marketing strategies like press releases and research groups. It will only ever work as an extraneous entity of your marketing efforts. Do not utilize it for more.

6. Broadcast marketing

Do not make the mistake of thinking that a blog is just a digital form of broadcast marketing that you control. Again, a blog will never take the place of the marketing strategies you already utilize.

If you can’t market your business without a blog, a blog is not going to save it. A blog is a great way to get more out of social networking and expanding your brand’s presence online, but you need a brand first.

While this may seem negative, it is only because blogging is not simple and requires a lot of thought and patience. Take the time to think through and determine whether starting a blog would be the most effective move for your company. If it is, then do some research and best of luck.

6 Poor Reasons For Starting A Blog is a post from: Blog Godown

I’m surprised that I see so few articles about writing a great author bio because it really is one of the most essential aspects of a guest blog post. It might not be the most important thing you do to get your article accepted, but before it’s posted I hope you put in some quality thought ahead of time to benefit as much as possible.  Let’s take a look at a few basic tips and some other broad marketing campaign suggestions to make sure you’re addressing the key components of what goes into your author bio and why you do it.

Short And Sweet

No matter what blog or website you try to get your article submitted on, they are not going to want you to have an extremely detailed author bio explaining your life story.  If the article you’re writing is about facts and you are sharing knowledge with a sense of expertise it does help to back that up with some references, but keep it concise.  50 words should be more than enough to share your name, your experience, your interests and your links.

How To Link

How do you link? Duh! It’s a hyperlink, not rocket science.  Wrong! Creating a link is easy, but how you use that link for marketing purposes is where the skill comes into play.  If you’ve simply determined that the anchor text of your hyperlink should be “computer software” because you have a website that sells software, you’re not getting as much value as possible.  I say this because unless you are a massive computer software company, good luck fighting your way to the top of the search results for that keyword search.  Instead, try focusing on longer, more specific keyword searches such as “macbook pro laptop software.”

It’s Part of the Bigger Picture

The anchor text you use to link back to your website should be part of your larger Internet marketing campaign. Determine the most important and easy to compete keyword searches and have individual “landing pages” within your website that focus on those specific keyword searches. Now that you’re in the blogosphere taking the time to write quality guests posts you can really benefit by linking back to certain pages within your website that are focused on searching better for a few specific keyword searches.

How Many Links Should I Use?

Again, check the author guidelines within each specific page for this question, but a general answer would be 1-3.  If you’re allowed more than one, you might as well take advantage by linking to your different landings pages or to multiple different sites if you have them.  Most blogs just don’t want the author bio to look spammy or trashy, so as long as you’re within the author guidelines and everything looks professional I’d use as many links as you’re allowed.

Bringing it All Together

The main point of this article is to point out that your link building campaign is part of a larger marketing strategy.  If you realize this and put effort into making sure they are working together instead of separate entities, the benefits will be exponential.

Author Bio Essentials to Benefit Your SEO Campaign is a post from: Blog Godown

While on page SEO is important, it’s link building that will move the needle on search engine rankings. Link building, however, is a time and resource intensive activity. So it’s important you maximize the power of your link building efforts. To do so, you need to start with a well-themed website as the foundation of your site architecture.

This is what happens to your link building campaign!

Well Themed Websites Rank Better Naturally

Have you ever wondered why Wikipedia is the #1 competitor for nearly all keywords? Not only is Wikipedia one of the few websites in the world where the HTML / XHTML actually validates, it is informationally well organized, with a masterful internal linking structure that allows a clean indexing path for search engine spiders. Even Wiki pages with hardly any content or backlinks tend to float to the top. This is because search engines tend to award top rankings to websites that seem to be highly relevant to a subject that matches user queries. When you have a well-structured website built around solid themes of meaning, it’s much easier for search engine spiders to categorize and index these web pages in the SERPs.

When it comes to blogging, you get a head start in the theme silo game, because blogs have search engine friendly framework straight out of the box. Blog categories are your prefab theme-defining silos. You can also create sub-categories to further bolster your theme structure. Any pages you create under your blog categories and sub categories naturally reinforce the theme. And the blog internal linking structure is easy for search engine spiders to crawl.

Unfortunately, if you don’t understand the importance of theme siloing, you can undermine the power of your blog architecture without even knowing it. I’ve done this myself, and let me tell you, it’s a PITY to fix down the road. You’ll end up spending time and money on reorganizing your blog and 301 redirecting old pages, will drastically reduce the power of links built to the old pages. And you’ll spend more time and money on building links to pages that have weak, or no supporting silo structure, just to get them to rank.

Learn from my mistakes by following these theme silo best practices for your blog!

Blog Architecture Best Practices

The best place to start with site architecture is before your website or blog is built. Here are some best practices on theme siloing:

1. Figure out what your theme defining keywords and your supporting keywords are. Your theme defining keywords will most likely be 1-2 word key phrases with high search volume. In a blog, your theme defining keywords can be easily to your blog categories. Your theme defining keywords will be discrete topics, so that there will be no overlap between one category and another. For example, if your categories are “Solar Power” and “Wind Power”, then “Home Solar” will be a sub category of “Solar Power”, not its own category.
2. Map your keywords to target landing pages. In a blog, your category and sub-category pages well suited as the landing pages for your theme defining keywords. Tag pages will also work as well. However, you may prefer to have specifically designated money page to serve as the landing page for your theme defining keyword as well. That’s also OK. But having a pre- defined target landing page is critical, because it will serve as the pinnacle of your theme silo’s interlinking structure. There’s nothing worse than trying to rank a website for keywords when you have no appropriate landing page. This is an exercise in frustration and wasted time and money.
3. Map supporting keywords to sub-pages that further reinforce your theme silo. In a blog, these sub-pages are typically the blog posts filed under a specific category. So if you have a blog category called “Home Solar”, then you want to create blog posts related to your supporting keywords, which could be “DIY home solar”, “home solar systems”, etc. The more content you have related to “Home Solar” filed under this category, the easier it is for search engine spiders to understand that silo is related to “Home Solar”.
4. Create an interlinking structure that supports your silo landing page. Using your primary keyword as the link anchor text, create in content links within each blog post filed under a category theme silo and link up to the category landing page. Do not link across silos or you will dilute your theme structure. If you are using a related posts plugins, make sure that the related posts displayed only pull from posts within the same category as well.

The Benefits of a Well Themed Website

When a website is poorly themed, it will not receive the full power of your link building initiatives. So you’ll find yourself spending much more time and money in order to rank your website. I’ve often discovered small nimble, well themed sites outranking big brands in the SERPs, in spite of the big brand’s behemoth marketing budget. This is often because big brands have a more difficult time creating theme silos, as their websites may have been around longer, re-architecture is politically impossible, or technologically complex. As a blogger with a more limited budget, it’s in your best interest to spend less money on link building by having a better organized site.

Build Fewer Links with Better Blog Theme Siloing is a post from: Blog Godown

With more than 150 million blogs in existence, it can be hard to get the word out about one specific blog. Getting users to come to an individual site requires following seven steps to get the links out there on sites that have high traffic regularly.

How to get the word out!

1. Interaction

Interact with users on the blog. Responding to comments and asking for feedback are great ways to get more users interested in what the writer has to say.

2. Filling in as a Guest

Look for ways to be a guest blogger on other websites. When the entry is posted on the site, there will usually be links to a social media profile and bio, which allow for more exposure and access to the main blog. When choosing to follow this step, it is important to carefully read all guidelines and restrictions listed on the host blog, because breaking a rule could result in removal of the post.

3. Getting the Word Out

Comment on other blogs since anyone reading these comments can click on the profile to access another person’s blog. Online services such as commentluv and back linking also provide more access to the blog via comments. Those who are interested in the content of the comment may want to read more, and could thus become a loyal reader.

4. Participate in Contests

The next step is to participate in as many blogging contests as possible. There are many contests available online, and include a chance to become a guest blogger.

5. Then, Host a Contest

A fifth way is to be the host of a blogging contest as visitors can lead to more subscribers. When planning to host a contest, bloggers can gain sponsors, which can lead to advertising opportunities, meaning more income.

6. Linking to Other Sites

Along with this is the sixth step, which is to offer promotional pages. These allow fellow bloggers to be featured, which can lead to links on other individuals’ pages. This is a form of marketing that won’t cost the blogger anything.

7. Be Everywhere

The final way to increase accessibility to a blog is to market within social networking websites. The Facebook home page offers a news feed where a blogger could post frequent links to the topics on the blog as often as desired. It is estimated that Facebook currently has over 500 million users, and many of these individuals are accessing the site multiple times per day through a mobile application. Utilizing website development courses can also help users understand how to maximize the potential growth of the blog through these sites.

Making a blog stand out can result in higher traffic and interest in advertising opportunities for the writer, and interest in the opinions and thoughts of what is being discussed on the blog. Some bloggers start out with few readers, and then end up becoming some of the most highly visited sites on the web. Why not give blogging a try and increase readers with every step?

7 Ways to Market and Get your Blog Out There is a post from: Blog Godown