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Written on 3/25/2005 at 7:03 am by

Introduce Yourself

Filed Under: Pro Blogging News

I thought it might be fun while I’m away for you to talk amongst yourselves for a bit. Why? Well I know many of you reasonably well because we chat on IM or have emailed – but I think a lot of you would quite like one another and could learn quite a bit from each other as fellow bloggers trying to earn an income from your blogging. I know enough to realise that I don’t have a monopoly on Pro Blogging truth – I’d like to see us learn from each other and the only way to do this is to put yourself out there an introduce yourself.

So I’m going to leave a number of questions designed to help you introduce yourself which I invite you to do one of two three things with. You can either:

  1. Ignore this post and go have an Easter Break like I am
  2. Answer these questions on your own blog and leave a link in comments below to your answers
  3. Answer these questions here in comments below so that we can have them all in the one place

Here are some questions (feel free to ask and answer more if you’d like – and to ignore some of these question if you’d rather not go there):

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Written on 3/25/2005 at 3:12 am by

Writing Blog Content – Keep it Simple

Filed Under: Writing Content

The average person only comprehends 60% of what they read. How much do you comprehend?.

To ensure your reader ‘gets’ what you’re saying you need to make it clear by using some of the following techniques.

- Use simple language. Avoid technical jargon.

- Don’t introduce too many ideas in one post. You can always add another post later.

- Start your entry with your main point in the first paragraph. Better still, incorporate it in your title. (This can also bring more traffic through search engine referrals)

- Find creative ways to reinforce your main point throughout your post.

- Use visual aids like bold, CAPITALS, italics, underlining, teletext and to emphasize points. Don’t go overboard as you run the risk of frustrating your reader. Also consider changing font size, color and style to draw your readers eyes to your main points.

- Utilize headings, lists and borders to break down the your post into more manageable chunks.

Keep your postings simple and you have more chance of communicating your main message effectively. Share your tips below.

Written on 3/24/2005 at 10:02 pm by

ProBlogger Easter Break Vacation

Filed Under: ProBlogger Site News

Well its Easter (or it will be tomorrow) and at this time of year a group of friends that I am close with always go away for the long weekend for a time of great food, fantastic wine, to take in some our wonderful state’s coastline and a whole heap of fun and shenanigans. I’ve been looking forward to this for weeks but going away for more than a day or two always leaves me asking the question – ‘what do I do with the blog?’ Its probably too short a time for a guest blogger, but four days is a long time for my more addicted readers not to get a ProBlogging fix (yes you know who I’m talking about).

So I’ve decided to write a few posts which I’ll post before I leave and which will appear at pre determined times throughout the next few days – thanks to the magic of WordPress. I hope you find them helpful – feel free to add to them as you’d like in comments. Otherwise I’ll see you in a few days when I hope I’m feeling nice and refreshed.

Written on 3/24/2005 at 1:51 pm by

Google Search Box Ads

Filed Under: Adsense

One of my wonderful readers, Danger, just emailed this question – ‘I was just looking through my adsense reports and it occurred to me that I’m not using the google search box on my site to serve ads. I’m debating whether to employ it and I kinda wonder if a lot of us beginners aren’t asking the same question. Any chance you could do a post about the performance difference between your regular ads and search box ads?’

I will be a little careful in answering this – as I’m not completely sure what Google allows me to say about it in their changed rules. But I can make some general statements without going into specifics of CTR, impressions and earnings.

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Written on 3/24/2005 at 12:55 am by

Adsense Earnings Poll Update

Filed Under: Adsense

The Poll we’re asking in the sidebar this week asks how much bloggers earned from Adsense last month. At the time of writing this 295 readers have voted (thanks everyone!) I’m going to let it run until the end of March at which point I’ll give you a full tally and nice little graph.

It is pretty obvious that a distinct pattern is emerging – over half of ProBlogger reading bloggers earn less than $3 per day from Adsense. A further 14% don’t use the system at all.

These are the sorts of results that I was expecting – the anecdotal evidence I had been collecting through conversations with bloggers over the past months made it clear that very few bloggers using Adsense were making more than a few dollars per day from it. However these results also show that a few bloggers are actually making significant money from their blogging (9% over $1,000 per month and 2% over $10,000).

Its my goal to bring some change to these figures – I’d like to see more ProBlogger readers getting their monthly earnings into triple and quadruple figures in the coming months.

Update: In addition to the numbers you’ve already indicated that you earn – I’d also be interested if readers would give some indication in comments below (anonymously if you’d like) at the percentage rises or falls that you’ve seen in your monthly earnings over the past few months.

I’ll be writing a post in the next few days that will draw on this information and I’ll share a few more of my own earnings figures – but in the mean time am interested in hearing how your earnings from Adsense have changed over the past few months if you’re willing to share.

Written on 3/23/2005 at 3:30 pm by

Random Blog Tip – Contact Options

Filed Under: Miscellaneous Blog Tips

Related to my previous post about About pages I’d also like to make mention of another personal preference that I have – the inclusion of the ability for readers to contact you privately.

There are many ways of doing this – but I’m surprised by just how many blogs give no option for getting in touch with their author, editor or owner. Some may argue that having the ability to make comments is a way of letting your readers get in touch with you – however I don’t find this to be an appropriate way of communication on some topics as it does not ensure privacy for your readers.

I can think of a number of times over the past week where I’ve wanted to make contact with a blogger only to be confronted with the choice of the whole world being able to read my message or to refrain from making any contact at all. In the end I refrained from interacting with the blogger concerned and am unlikely to go back to the blog.

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Written on 3/23/2005 at 12:53 pm by

Ambush Podcasting – Screen Your Skype Calls

Filed Under: Pro Blogging News

Watch out Jeremy Wright is Ambushing Business Bloggers.

You might like to screen your Skype calls or you might get asked questions like ‘How do you justify your Existence’.

His Ambushees included:

Nice format actually – which could be adapted quite nicely to different Business Blogging topics.

Written on 3/23/2005 at 12:05 pm by

Wikis and Wikipedia

Filed Under: Pro Blogging News

There is a good article over at Wired on Wikis and in particular – Wikipedia. I’m a regular Wikipedia user and often wondered how it got going – now I know.

thanks to Rachel for the tip

Written on 3/23/2005 at 11:37 am by

Meeting Cameron Reilly

Filed Under: Pro Blogging News

This morning I spent a couple of hours with Blogger and Podcaster Cameron Reilly.

Meeting face to face with other bloggers is always an interesting experience but to do it with a podcaster added a new slightly surreal element.

Not only have I been reading what he writes daily for months now – I’ve also been listening to him for quite some time, I was quite familiar with not only his ideas but also his voice – weird.

Anyway – once I got of over that (it took all of four seconds and a gulp of coffee) I had a really enjoyable time. Conversation topics were diverse and productive. We talked about potential Podcasts and the idea of a Melbourne Blogger’s Meet Up which I’ll get to work on after Easter.

What I appreciated most about our time was connecting with someone who has a similar desire to see the new mediums that we work in become something that is not just about making a quick dollar – but has the potential to be about making a difference in the world we live in. I’ve long believed that Podcasting and Blogging can be change agents and life giving mediums. It was great to find someone else with a similar vision for medium – not just interested in building a business or a career – but interested in using the opportunities and developing tools before him to play a part in creating a better world.

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