Miscellaneous Blog Tips : @ProBlogger

Written on 12/11/2011 at 12:07 am by Guest Blogger

How to Establish Influence from Scratch

Filed Under: Blog Promotion, Miscellaneous Blog Tips 23 Comments

This guest post is by Jonathan Goodman of the Personal Trainer Development Center.

I’m a nobody. Scratch that; I was a nobody. I work as a personal trainer in Toronto; I had no connections, knew nothing about blogging, and hadn’t written anything since University.

What I did have was an idea and, with the right know-how, an idea is powerful enough to break through all barriers.

I’m not the first person on the Internet to talk about fitness. On the contrary, I’m about the 1 000 000^th. My idea, though, was to be different and I decided to cover topics that nobody else was covering.

You see, every fitness guru on the planet gives suggestions pertaining to exercise prescription, while nobody was effectively teaching trainers how to actually train. After all, isn’t learning how to effective teach more important than a fancy new version of the squat?

That was my idea: “I’m going to be the one to bring non-exercise prescription advice to personal trainers.”

I launched the Personal Trainer Development Center (PTDC) in April of 2011 and it has become a main resource for personal trainers passionate about getting better. It already brings in a nice monthly passive income and will provide a great forum for me to sell my book in April of 2012.

The question I get asked constantly is how I made friends with some of the best fitness pros in the World and consistently get them to take part in my site without being able to pay them. These are folks who charge $200-500 to write elsewhere and give me their article for free. To take it one step further, I know bloggers who put out brilliant information weekly. Too bad their mothers are the only ones reading their blogs.

The answer doesn’t lie in SEO and doesn’t lie in buying links. Those things matter but come later on. The first step in building a house is a strong foundation. That foundation hinges on both the relationships you’re able to build and your creative problem solving ability.

This article is the first time I’ve ever written about why I carefully hand-picked the people to be involved in my site and how the power of my idea has grown to both a money-making enterprise and a beacon of change in a badly controlled industry. Apply these principles to your own industry and watch your influence grow.

Do your research

If you write it, they won’t come. Content is only king if people read your content and care who you are.

The first step is getting a thorough understanding of who the movers and shakers are in the informational sector of your industry. I took a full year to study the fitness internet informational world. Before launching my site I had research done into who the influencers were and who were the people behind the scenes acting as puppeteers.

I opened a new email account and subscribed to everybody’s newsletter in addition to adding as many blogs as possible in my reader. From there, I made notes not only on content but on who was linking to whom. I was then able to ascertain which bloggers had relationships with whom and who seemed to be competing.

What I quickly realized is that in the fitness world there were a number of distinct “camps.” Each of these camps had their head guru behind the scenes and top infopreneurs putting out resources. Peel away the layers and I found all of the soldiers spreading information.

There is good news and bad news here. The bad news is that you’re too late. I can promise that these camps and levels already exist in your industry. The good news is that there aren’t many bloggers who have figured this out yet and you have a great opportunity to become acquainted with these camps.

Look at it this way: the systems of spreading information are already set up for you. That’s the hard part. So how do you break into these camps?

Create a committee of coaches

Anybody can contribute to the PTDC but I have a special section for “coaches” where I highlight their profiles and link back to them. These coaches are my advisory committee. I don’t ask for much from them but keep them on an email list. Camaraderie has evolved where the coaches are now proud to be part of the team and many have built relationships with each other.

If you want to build a community, I recommend having an advisory committee and introducing them. One of the biggest benefits you can give to new potential contributors is the ability to network with your existing following.

Start strategically small

At this point, your site should be built. Don’t blast it off to the heads of the aforementioned camps. You will be ignored. During your research, though, you took careful notes of the foot soldiers right? Here’s where they come in handy.

These foot soldiers are trusted within their chosen camp and will act as your person on the inside. Here’s how I did it.

I noticed that many of the gurus offer internships. One by one these interns become household fitness names. It was obvious to me that the gurus weren’t only teaching them fitness, they were also teaching them the internet marketing game.

In identifying the foot soldiers, I made special note of the folks who had done top tier internships and had small websites popping up or were starting to be quoted on the major blogs. These were my targets. I made sure to Like their Facebook updates and comment where warranted. I also commented on their blogs. After some back and forth among the comments I sent them a private message asking if they would like to be involved in my site as coaches.

I had a warm opening, as we had had some contact previously, and getting them on as coaches allowed me access to their networks (which, conveniently, consisted of the camps I was desperately trying to break into).

Identifying the foot soldiers in your industry is a great way of gaining entry into the trusted gurus camps. These people are just as hungry as you are and will jump at the opportunity to network and be part of something bigger than them.

Republish your coaches’ old content

Now that I had a small but well-connected gang of coaches, it was time to approach the influencers. Armed with my vision and some early success because of good content, I wrote them a message. Out of the ten I contacted, I had a 90% response rate, and out of those 90%, every one agreed to come on board.

It was right then that I knew the PTDC was going to make it big. So how did I get their participation without being able to pay them?

I realized that all of these top fitness pros had been writing for years. As a result both of their longevity in combination with poorly built sites, I realized that their old material was getting little to no traffic.

I went through their archives before speaking to them and mentioned a couple of key articles that I had figured they forgot about. I discussed how these articles would be a great addition to the site and were needed to help the industry. They supported my powerful idea.

Each of the gurus agreed to come on the team. I then sent them a list of the articles I wanted to republish and got the okay for each one. Not only did I get a bank of articles to use for the coming months, so content wouldn’t run dry, I also had given these folks a great forum to attract more readers without any work.

Once two or three top pros were on board, they started referring me other “friends” who might be interested. Now I also had the advantage of offering new coaches a powerful new network.

While doing your research, make sure to go through the archives of the gurus you found. Keep a file on your computer of their old articles that support your idea. It is a great way to stimulate initial traffic to your site.

Creatively solve problems

This process was not always rosey, and there were a lot of problems in building up the PTDC that had to be dealt with. One I want to cover here is how I approached the top coaches.

As a new blogger, your only currency is links, and sending out cold calls or messages to top writers won’t get you any response. After a failed attempt I went a different route and started a weekly blog entitled Online Personal Trainer Blog Posts of the Week.

It wasn’t much extra work since I was already reading these blogs anyway. All I changed was to make a file and when I liked a post I kept the link and included it in the article.

Here’s the catch. I knew which influential bloggers I wanted to approach next and the Posts of the Week blog was my way of making sure they noticed me before I sent them a message. I linked to their blog and tagged them on Facebook in addition to mentioning them on Twitter. They would almost always interact back.

Adding their post to the list was my way of saying, “Hey! I noticed you do good work. Come look at my site and the great info we provide.” Nobody is every surprised when I send them a message an more as they have all already seen the site.

You will also have problems building up and here is my recommendation to you: figure out who on the internet can help you solve your problem. Don’t approach them immediately. Instead, creatively find a way to make them notice you.

Summing it up

Follow Metcalfe’s Law. Whether you are a new blogger or an existing blogger trying to increase your influence, remember that you are only as valuable as the number of nodes on your network. Figure out who is already effectively doing what you want to do and find a way into their good books.

Armed with your powerful idea and with the help of your advisory board your reach will explode. Remember: content is only king if there are people to read it.

Jonathan Goodman is a personal trainer and blogger. His powerful idea led him to create the Personal Trainer Development Center and maintain a personal site.

Written on 12/9/2011 at 6:09 am by Guest Blogger

How to Get the Best Return on Your Blog

This guest post is by Laura Booz of Blogger Behave.

I started blogging because I caught a glimpse of its potential to give something back to me.

Can you relate? Sure, that “something” is sometimes money. But, as we all know, there’s got to be more driving us to the keyboard, or we’ll lose our enthusiasm. Blogging requires a ton of work, and if it doesn’t offer a sweet return, we get stressed out, our writing grows thin, and our impact weakens.

Though a nice deposit in the old bank account feels terrific, money can’t motivate us to love our work or grow in our craft. We humans need something more than money to be truly excellent, and truly happy. I don’t want to divert you from your financial efforts or goals; I just want to point you towards the thing that will keep you motivated long after the money is invested, gifted, or spent.

I want to remind you of the far greater reward that could actually increase your likelihood for making money: personal growth.

Think about the last time you shook off a bad habit or muscled your way into greater maturity: it rocked, didn’t it? Unlike money, the pay-off of personal growth is a permanent, deeply felt reward that will keep our affection over the long-haul.

At the end of this article, I’ll ask for your input about ways in which we bloggers can grow in our personal lives and in our craft. But for now, sit back and consider my top three ways to ensure that I’m getting the best possible reward from my blog.

1. Write a blog vision statement

In our home, we have a Family Vision Statement that helps each member—from the biggest to the littlest—join together in achieving the same daily goals. That’s what inspired my Blog Vision Statements, which help me to define what my blog looks like, where it’s heading, and the type of content I will keep.

My vision statement is a brief description of what my blog is all about. It helps me stay focused and not compromise for every passing whim and tempting online offer. I use it to evaluate what I write about, the amount of time I take to write it, and the ambitions I have for my public platform. It’s the permission I need to say, “yes” to beneficial opportunities and “no” to everything else.

Here’s how it works: my newest blog, TheHomeschoolBaby.com exists to “equip homeschooling families with wisdom, practical application, and personal encouragement for their children from birth to five-years old”.

So if I’m suddenly over-dosing on giveaways or product reviews, I’ll know I’m working outside of my vision statement and possibly jeopardizing the value of my blog. The hope is that I like my vision statement so much, I think long and hard before breaking it.

2. Keep an online budget

“Time is money,” isn’t it? We need to be very discerning about the amount of time we are investing in our blogs: does it cross the line into costing us more than it’s worth? For example, as a “mommy blogger” I must be vigilant about my time online. Though adding one more affiliate link might put twelve bucks in my PayPal account, taking the extra fifteen minutes away from my children is not worth it to me.

I evaluate the hours in my day and all of the things that are worth my attention. If I only have one hour available for blogging, so be it. My blog will be a one-hour-a-day blog. It might not pay off the mortgage or catch the eye of thousands of readers, but it’ll be as top-notch as I can make it within that time frame. I’ll divide that hour up into portions so that I can write posts, respond to comments, solicit guest posts, and work on other projects. When the online stopwatch buzzes, my time is up.

Sometimes the sacrifices sting and I wish I had more time to accomplish all of my online dreams, but I’m confident that I will not regret my choices in the long run. To tell you the truth, I’ve found that when I keep healthy parameters on my blogging time, I have much more to offer—even if I only have twenty minutes to think smart and type fast.

3. Write tough yet reasonable expectations

My second-grade teacher was so demanding that I saved almost all of my work from that year in a big trunk. I was so proud of my accomplishments! She had high expectations, and we children were delighted to meet them.

I think about her when it comes to blogging. Thanks to Miss C, I know now to keep my blog in line by asserting some high standards for it. For example, I expect my blog to improve my writing skills, develop my voice, and make me a more honest person. I expect it to help me think twice about my opinions, and five times about my facts. I expect that the feedback from my family, friends, and enemies makes me confess, buck up, or move on.

I expect my blog to influence, help, and encourage other people whom I’d never be able to influence otherwise. I expect it to stretch me out of my comfort zone, increase my compassion for other people, and spur me on into other worthwhile projects.

Over time, I’ve received every item on my list. Gaining so many personally enriching treasures keeps me positive about blogging. It also keeps me in control of my blog, and not the other way around. If I didn’t benefit from my blog on a regular basis, I sure hope I’d stop blogging.

If you find that the motivation to make money just isn’t enough for you, consider writing a vision statement, an online budget, and a list of expectations for your blog. Once you have these in place, you’ll find yourself looking for ways to grow in those areas. You’ll reach out for advice, insights, and opportunities that will help you to grow as a person, not just a blogger-with-a-bank-account. You’ll love the sweet return.

Now it’s your turn to be the wind beneath the wings of bloggers like me. How can we grow in our personal lives and in our craft so that we get the most out of our blogs?

Laura Booz is the author of the new eBook Blogger Behave: Make your blog benefit your life so you can love both!. She writes at http://www.10millionmiles.com about homesteading, homeschooling, faith, and other things that fascinate her along the way.

Written on 12/7/2011 at 6:04 am by Guest Blogger

The Simple Power of Asking

Filed Under: Miscellaneous Blog Tips 44 Comments

This guest post is by Sanjeev Mohindra of Makewebworld.

What is asking? It is a simple act of putting together a query in order to obtain the answer. Whether you get an answer or not depends on how a question has been framed and asked.

Image used with permission

Asking has an awesome power, yet it is one of the most unused methods of advancement.

When you enter the blogging world, there are lots of things which you might want to know. You can get them by just asking. Still, most people avoid doing that: they try to get all the answers by themselves.

Asking in practice

When I started my new blog, I started to look for guest post opportunities and my first guest post What you can take from your Blog’s Worst Day got published on ProBlogger.

I created a draft and send it for consideration. I waited for the next 15 days to get a response to my email, but one came.

I could have assumed this was a rejection but rather than leaving it, I decided to ask about it. I sent a note to ask if the post was still under consideration … and I was amazed to see the response.

“So sorry for my late reply, and thanks very much for following up with me, because I thought I’d responded to your email already! I enjoyed this piece and will be happy to include it on the site.”

Now I want you to take a moment and think: what you would have done in this situation? If you’d have asked in the same manner as I did, you know the power of asking.

If you think logically, you’ll know that posts can be overlooked at ProBlogger, where they might be receiving hundreds of emails daily. It might not be the same on a fledgling blog where there are hardly any emails.

The power of asking

Asking is a sign of courage and a sign that you are ready to learn. Every question demands a response, so it generates active communication.

All you have to do is ask. And ask is what people in best-practices cultures do—all the time.—Winning – The Answers, by Jack and Suzy Welch

Winning – The Answers, is really a great book. It focuses on global business practices, but who doesn’t consider blogging as a business? Jack and Suzy Welch have mentioned one more important point in the book: if you are asking your direct competitors, you are most probably not going to get the answer.

This is true in blogging world, too. If you are looking for the best practices, look at the blogs other than those in your niche, check what is working for them and ask if it can work for your blog.

If you think that it can work for your blog, then go ahead and ask how they are using the technique. Arund 99% time you will get an answer—they will be happy to show you how they have created their blogs.

You can do the same within your niche, but be prepared for lower response rates. Still, you will find some nice people who are ready to welcome a new blogger into the niche.

Ask for topics

What do your readers want? It’s always a mystery! What could be a better way than asking them directly?

Bloggers do run many polls on our blogs as a means to engage the readers. How about running a poll for your next topic? Ask what they want to read. You may end up writing on each topic mentioned in the poll, but a poll can help you give priority to certain topics.

It also does one more thing: it engages your readers for the future posts so they will be tempted to come back and check what you wrote about the topic they suggested.

Ask for friends

Darren mentioned in 31DBBB that you need to find a blogging buddy, but what if you don’t have anybody close to you who can be your buddy?

Asking can help you find a friend or buddy. You can try asking some bloggers in your niche if they want to connect with you: just ask them. You might be surprised to see the responses. No, you might not get many responses, but you do not need many buddies.

You need to make sure that your question is clear enough to convey the message properly. Below are a few things to keep in mind when you ask for a blog buddy:

Use open-ended questions to encourage conversations.
It should not be about me—it should be about them and what they will get.
Try to avoid trivial questions.
Try to avoid Yes/No type question, as they don’t generate an opportunity for conversation.
Give the person enough time to get an answer.

Ask

Asking is really easy and handy tool. The only thing to remember is that you need to ask with the intent of learning and improvement, not just for sake of it. People can feel your intent in your questions. So keep asking, and keep learning.

What was the last thing you asked for to help develop your blog? What happened when you asked? Share your experiences in the comments.

Sanjeev currently writes at Make Web World and offers his latest eBook “5 steps to WordPress Blog” for free, you can get the eBook by subscribing here or can connect with him at Google Plus.

Written on 12/5/2011 at 6:00 am by Guest Blogger

How to Create Another Day a Week Just for Blogging

Filed Under: Miscellaneous Blog Tips 35 Comments

This guest post is by Udi Tirosh of DIYPhotography.

When you start blogging it seems that there is never enough time—especially if you aren’t blogging full time, and you’re doing it from home. You get phone calls that need to be picked up; the service guy for the dishwasher shows up; you must read that important mail. It is not uncommon for an entire day to go by only to find out you didn’t complete any of the tasks you set for yourself.

The magic flask…

What if I told you there was a magic flask you can drink from which will freeze time for you? Every surrounding noise will stop: no calls, no incoming urgent mails, no dishes to wash or laundry to do. It will be just you and the computer. Everyone else will be frozen in time, allowing you to do your work. If you need something from someone, you just call their name and they will wake up for the exact amount of time you need them for an answer. I will grant you one flask a week.

Imagine: a whole day just for you and your work each wee. How would you use it? Would you outline your next blog series? Finally finish that long post that’s waiting in the queue? Brainstorm a subject for your next month of posts? How would you make this time useful?

Finding the extra day

Of course there is no such thing as a magic flask, but getting a day a week for your important work is actually not that hard.

All you have to do is spot the time of day when you are most prolific and productive. For some it is the afternoon, for some it is early morning. For me, it is the period after lunch.

Now decide that you are going to dedicate this time to blogging—think of it as a one-hour meeting with yourself. Actually, don’t just decide it, put it into your calendar. With a reminder. For every day of the week.

This will gain you six hours of uninterrupted work. During that time, don’t answer phones (disconnect or turn them off, if you need to), don’t surf the web (use blocking software if your willpower isn’t strong enough), and dedicate yourself to the blog.

Since this is your best time of day and since you will be uninterrupted, your potential for using this hour for something productive is high.

But it takes commitment. It means that you must use the time for work. And it means that you cannot set this appointment aside. You must stick with it every day. After a while, you’re likely to find that you need to expand that meeting. Go ahead and do that. And after a longer while, you may find that you don’t need this meeting at all.

Now, this is up to you. I’m offering the flask only for the next ten minutes. Use those ten minutes to schedule your daily appointment.

Udi Tirosh runs DIYPhotography, a place for photography lovers, and makes awesome photography products.

Written on 12/2/2011 at 6:02 am by Darren Rowse

Listen to Your “Inner Crazy Voice”

Filed Under: Miscellaneous Blog Tips 30 Comments

Sometimes I hear voices … they suggest I do crazy things … and sometimes they end up being the best things I’ve done!

Speaking of 'Crazy Ideas'

Okay, that’s one of the strangest first lines of a post that I’ve written but it struck me today as I was looking back over the past few years that some of the most successful things that I’ve done have often started out as a “crazy idea.”

Perhaps it is just my personality type, but I’m a prolific idea generator. Barely a day goes by when I don’t have at least one idea for a new product, blog post, or even new blog. Sometimes the ideas are simply extensions on what I’ve done previously, but occasionally I get a really crazy idea—something that is either really big, or something that makes me laugh and shake my head.

For a long time I would simply push aside the crazy ideas, but I’m learning to at least give them a second thought these days, because the ones I’ve acted upon do have a history of working.

Let me give you some examples of “crazy ideas” that I’ve had that have worked out well, or which I’m currently working on building up:

Bestselling ebook: One “crazy idea” that I’ve written about recently was 31 Days to Build a Better Blog. The original idea came on 30 July 2005, when I decided that I’d write a 31 day series of blog posts here on ProBlogger, each day containing homework for readers. It was crazy because I’d never done a series that long before, I’d not really given readers “homework” to do before, and because I decided to start it the following day with no promotion or planning. The idea paid off—it eventually evolved into my bestselling ebook.
Successful conference: Another “crazy idea” was to hold my first ProBlogger training day. I started pondering what would happen if I held a training day for bloggers in Melbourne. Again it was something I decided to do on the spur of the moment. The period from my having the idea to running the training day itself was a matter of weeks. I’d had no experience in planning conferences, had no venue, and didn’t know how much to charge or even what we’d do on the day. Again, the idea paid off—we’ve now held two training days and there’s significant demand for more (we’re planning some exciting events for 2012).
ProBlogger “Tour down under”: One more “crazy idea” that looks like becoming a reality dawned on me on the way home from a conference in one of Australia’s northern states (Queensland). The state has some of the most beautiful beaches and natural wonders that you’ll ever see and, on the spur of the moment, I tweeted out that I wanted to run a competition to get bloggers form overseas to come do a tour with me of some of our country’s most beautiful regions. Among the tweet replies that came in from hundreds of bloggers wanting to come on the tour were a couple of replies from Aussie Tourism boards. Those conversations continue today—watch this space to see if this was another crazy idea that might pay off!
ProBlogger clothing range: Lastly, a fourth “crazy idea” that I’ve had for a couple of years now, and which looks like it might come to be, is the long-awaited “Blogger Work Ware” range of clothes. Again, this started as a crazy tweet saying I wanted to develop a range of “work clothes” for bloggers: PJs, bathrobes, and so on—after all, we’re known for blogging in our PJs are we not? The number of people who responded that they’d buy a bathrobe or PJs was overwhelming. I’m now looking at it more seriously (watch this space).

Of course I’ve had my fair share of crazy ideas that I’ve not done anything with, or which have failed. But in each of the cases I’ve mentioned here, the ideas came out of the blue and, for some reason, just wouldn’t go away.

In each case, the reaction I had straight after having the idea was to either laugh or gasp. In most cases, the reaction was the same when I told those around me. I’m learning that the laugh and gasp reactions are good. They tell you that you’ve thought of something a little out of the box—something that will, at the very least, get noticed.

The other thing I did each time was to share my crazy idea with others. In some cases, it was with another couple of people who I trusted, and some cases the “test” was to share it more widely (on Twitter in the last two cases) to see if the idea had any resonance beyond my imagination.

What has been your most crazy idea that has paid off?

Written on 11/30/2011 at 6:07 am by Guest Blogger

Charles Darwin’s 12 Rules of Blogging Survival

Filed Under: Miscellaneous Blog Tips 64 Comments

This guest post is by Tom Treanor of the Business Blogging Telesummit.

Blog readers have a myriad of reading options for almost every topic you can think of. In fact, within your niche, potential customers may be enjoying blog posts written by your competitors while they ignore your blog like the plague.

So what do you do about this dire situation? Do you hire ghost writers to create more content? Do you promote your content more via social media? Do you get better at SEO so you can attract more search traffic?

Well. These may work to a degree. You may see some minor bumps with more Tweeting, Facebooking and catching more long tail keywords in Google. But, it’s a long and slow process if you’re using these brute-force tactics.

There has to be a better way. And there is.

Like Darwin’s finches, which evolved different beak sizes over the generations to better suit their differing environmental conditions and to survive, your blog has to become better suited for your audience’s needs over time. You need to develop more “evolved” blogging strategies that are more effective at differentiating your blog and attracting and keeping the readers that you target.

You don’t want your blog to end up on the wrong end of Natural Selection, do you?

Here are 12 ways for your blog to survive and thrive.

1. Be the best teacher in your niche

Explain the things that most people in your niche assume don’t need to be explained. Answer all of your potential customers’ frequently asked questions in writing, with pictures and (or) in video. Do detailed tutorials on fundamental as well as on in-demand advanced topics.

Keep the quality high and listen closely to your audience when you pick topics and develop the content. When competitors start sending customers to your site to understand a complex topic, then you’ll know you’ve won!

2. Be more personal than the others

Getting personal can lead to a deeper connection with your audience and pay dividends in terms of allegiance to your blog and brand.

Many business bloggers put up a barrier between their personal lives and what they share on their blog. Including aspects of your personal life is one way to differentiate yourself from your “plain vanilla” competitors.

3. Be funnier than the others

People love to laugh. Using humor well is hard, but can separate your blog from the pack. if you can successfully pull off inoffensive humor (depending on your industry), you’ll bring a lot of readers back again and again. You’ll also likely increase the amount of social media shares that your blog gets.

4. Say what everyone else thinks

It’s uncomfortable to do. Saying what everyone else thinks is really hard. If you can be the “voice of reason” without upsetting everyone around you, you can gather a tribe of people who say “Yes!” to every post.

5. Be the expert on a specific sub-niche

Don’t focus on widgets: focus only on the custom-designed, high-end widgets from Alaska.

If you can focus on a specific, but important sub-niche within your industry and become the authoritative source, you can develop a big advantage against your competitors in that area. Once successful, you can extend from this beachhead into the broader widget market.

6. Have a bigger vision

Tie your blog to a bigger goal. What far-reaching vision can you use to inspire people to join you in your mission? Can you align your company and blog with a bigger movement that is out there? Can you create your own far-reaching vision that aligns with your passions as well as with your company goals?

7. Be more extreme than the others

Go much further than the other blogs in terms of topics, challenges, transparency or risks. It doesn’t have to be dangerous, just extremely different. You’ll get noticed.

8. Be more creative than the rest

If everyone’s writing articles, why don’t you mix in video? How about being the first infographic producer in your industry?

Try new topics, writing styles, media or blog post structures. Think of other ideas that will provide value while separating your from the rest. Give yourself permission to try something unique.

9. Cross-pollinate better than the others

Do you only work with other real estate-related blogs or influencers? How about looking at the lending, architecture, finance and relocation industries?

Spread your tentacles where your competitors never dreamed of going by guest posting, blog commenting or connecting with other bloggers in those industries. If the target audience is the same, you can gain some great benefits from this kind of cross-pollination.

10. Be the best curator of meaningful content

Find the best information that others have written and posted online—the best articles, charts, tables, infographics, videos, or pictures. Collect it in a logical, easy-to-use navigational structure on your blog.

Make sure you link to and give credit to your sources and only summarize (or take small portions of) the articles you link to. Content curation is a way to share great information that is already available and to become seen as a key source of great information.

11. Be the news source for your industry

Focus on being the source of timely news and analysis for your industry. To be able to keep up with the news cycle, this often means a combination of curated content mixed with some original content or analysis.

Niche or industry news blogs can do very well because they get lots of shares, links, SEO benefits and subscribers. Just have a plan for getting regular, high-quality updates onto your site.

12. Work harder than the rest

Sometimes all the right things are in place but you don’t have the results yet. Working hard can pay off, but pace yourself and don’t burn out! Grab more virtual land than the competitors to create a barrier to entry for “lazier” niche-mates.

Come up with your own unique variation

Just like nature’s many variations (which we never could have predicted), come up with your own unique way to differentiate your blog. The blogs that thrive in a given niche will be the ones who evolve in ways that allow them to meet the needs of their audience better than the competitors’ blogs.

Avoid finding yourself on the wrong side of Natural Selection by using one of the strategies above, combining a couple or by developing your own differentiated strategy.

Tom Treanor is the founder of the Business Blogging Telesummit, designed to help SMBs succeed with their blogging and social media efforts. Visit his blog at RightMixMarketing.com.

Written on 11/26/2011 at 12:09 am by Guest Blogger

When No One Knows Where You Are. Or Needs To.

Filed Under: Miscellaneous Blog Tips 23 Comments

This guest post is by Greg McFarlane of Control Your Cash.

As you’re reading this, it’s 80º Fahrenheit and sunny with a light breeze. Not necessarily where you are, but somewhere.

That somewhere is where I’ve chosen to blog for a living. Most of the time, that means Las Vegas. Right now, this being November, it’s Maui. In other years it’s been Mexico or South Africa. I’m untethered from any particular location, and able to give value to my clients while neither shivering nor wearing layers. It’s a lifestyle that I’ve merely adopted, but that Jon Morrow seems to have perfected. Also, it’s a lot less expensive than you might think.

What motivates you? Yes, money, health, family, friendship, I get it. Those are all the universal answers. But what motivates you in particular? Spend a few seconds thinking of an answer, then keep reading.

For me, money and self-determination are motivating factors 1 and 1A. Following right on their heels is the avoidance of cold weather in all its dreary, cloudy, soul-crushing forms. I would gladly starve my children if doing so meant I’d get to live somewhere warm, and if I had children. I might hate winter more than I hate terrorism.

If the idea of blogging on your own terms (and closer to the Equator) resonates with you, understand that the demands on your time will increase. (That’s not a typo. I did mean “increase”, not “decrease.”)

What you need

In this post-industrial society, blogging has few physical demands. In addition to blogging, I run an advertising business. I write radio and TV commercials. You and I happen to be living in 2011, which means that all we need to be productive in certain fields of endeavor are a laptop, a power source, a word processor, and an Internet connection. Oh, and discipline.

If you can’t motivate yourself harder than any employer can motivate you, do yourself a favor and return to your 9-to-5 world before thinking about the remote blogging lifestyle any further. The distractions abound when you determine not only your own schedule, but your own workplace.

The problem with many people who aspire to blogging remotely but who can’t actually make it happen is that they forget one crucial component—“setting your own hours” really does mean setting your own hours. Not, “I’ll blog today, maybe Monday, depending on whether the mood strikes me and whether the fish are biting.” Rather, it’s “From 6:00 to 11:00 tonight, I’m going to apply myself as diligently as a new hire on his first day. I’m going to pretend a boss is watching me on camera. This is my probationary period.”

Remote blogging is a tradeoff, like anything else in life. There’s freedom, but with the concomitant temptation to slack off. With respect to the latter, you’re at a disadvantage to people who work in conventional office settings. Discipline is easy for them, because it’s forced upon them. They can’t take a five-hour lunch break when there are coworkers in the adjacent cubicles. They probably can’t put their feet up and watch TV when the mood strikes them. It’s doubtful they can work pantslessly, either.

Taking the plunge

As a practical matter, researching before you pack up and go remote is critical. One of my favorite working spots is the village of Playa Naranjo (Orange Beach) on the Gulf of Nicoya in Costa Rica.

It’s bucolic, and it’s relaxing, but it’s miles removed from the metropolitan first-world bandwidth that many of us take for granted. Customer support is provided during inconsistent hours, and in a language I understand only the fundamentals of. That means that I have to allot slightly more time to my projects, and upload them in batches. It also means that if I want to travel any deeper into the jungle to look at toucans, I’d better do so on non-working days. But it can be done. It can all be done.

Don’t assume that ease of communication is correlated with human development, either. The fastest Internet connection I’ve ever enjoyed was on a free Wi-Fi network in Ulan Bator, Mongolia. (The Mongolians never had obsolete legacy equipment to dig up and work around, so they started with state-of-the-art.) Months later, my failed attempts to log on to a trusted Canadian network from a hotel a mere five miles over the U.S. border were met with lamentations and the gnashing of (my) teeth. And they charged $15 a day for the privilege.

The remote blogging lifestyle—and it is a lifestyle, more than it is an occupation—isn’t something you want to dabble in and then maybe reconsider. Yes, it requires you to make sure you’ll have the right tools at your disposal and readily accessible, but there’s more. Like finding and pricing a place to stay. And pricing your existing place on the rental market to see if the numbers can pencil out in your favor. They probably can, but it’s better to determine so before you make the commitment.

If you can somehow engineer the remote problogger lifestyle for yourself—and it took me plenty of trial-and-error before getting it right—most of your clients, coworkers and vendors will be disdainful. Fortunately, you won’t be able to hear them over the surf and the ukulele music.

Greg McFarlane is an advertising copywriter who lives in Las Vegas. He recently wrote Control Your Cash: Making Money Make Sense, a financial primer for people in their 20s and 30s who know nothing about money. You can buy the book here (physical) or here (Kindle) and reach Greg at greg@ControlYourCash.com.

Written on 11/24/2011 at 6:08 am by Darren Rowse

Define Successful Blogging for You

Filed Under: Miscellaneous Blog Tips 42 Comments

At the recent ProBlogger training day in Melbourne, surprise guest Tim Ferris said something that resonated with many attendees (if the number of tweets it got was anything to go by). His message was simple: define what success means to you.

Many bloggers that I meet start out with a goal of having a successful blog, but have little idea what that actually means.

Image copyright GIS - Fotolia.com

They want “opportunities to open up,” they desire “influence,” they want “lots of readers,” they want to be seen as “authorities”…

None of this is bad—but it’s also quite vague and I wonder if it could be a contributing factor to wishy-washy results.

Good things do sometimes just happen to people, but more often than not, the people who achieve most with their blogs have in mind some goals that they’re looking to achieve.

My story of defining success

When I started blogging in 2002, I didn’t have any idea that blogging would last beyond a few weeks (I had a history of not sticking at things) and as a result, I had few goals. However, over the coming couple of years I began to see the potential of blogging to be more than just a hobby, and to even become a way of earning an income.

The problem was that my dreams remained very vague. While I hoped one day my income would grow, I never got specific with what I was aiming for and as a result, I never really gave it the effort that I should have.

It was only when I sat down with V (my wife) one day and we set a specific goal that things began to really take off. The goal was to be working full-time as a blogger within six months (note that I’d already been blogging for some time—the full story is here).

For the first time, I had a definition of what success was for me. I wanted to be a full-time blogger. I also had a timeframe in mind—six months to achieve my goal.

Suddenly I started to take my blog more seriously, treating it as a business and doing the things I always knew I needed to do (but had always put off).
Suddenly I had a concrete target to aim for—and motivation like I’d not had before.
Suddenly I had consequences to face if I didn’t meet my target (I decided I’d have to go get a “real job” if I didn’t succeed).
Suddenly I had something with which to filter the opportunities that came my way. when invited to do something, I was able to ask, “Will this take me closer to my goal, or is it a distraction?”

Defining what success meant for me drove me to action and sped up my blog’s growth. A few months later I needed to come up with a new definition of “success,” as I’d already achieved the full-time goal.

Define success… and then…

Recently I came across an old Moleskine notebook from the period after I’d defined success for the first time (2004). In it, I’d dedicated a number of pages to goal-setting and planning how I’d act on those goals.

5-year plan: The way I did it at the time was to set a five-year plan. I had a full page of notes of things that I had wanted to achieve by 2009.

In it, I had some pretty lofty goals. i wanted to have written a book, I wanted to have started another photography blog, I wanted to be doing public speaking regularly, and more. Much of what I wrote back then I’ve actually achieved (some of it was way off track), but at the time I couldn’t have been further away from much of what I was dreaming of.
1-year plan: With that five-year plan or dream in place, I then created a 1-year plan. At the top of that page I’d written “what do I need to do this year to take me closer to my goals for 2009?”

That page then contained my goals for 2005. They were smaller goals, and each of them was a stepping stone to the big dream.
1-month plan: The next pages broke down my 2005 plan into monthly action items—things I’d need to do to achieve my one-year plan.

The key was to start with the goal (a definition of success) and then break it down into achievable steps.

This may all sound highly organized, but these plans were all hand-written and took up a total of five pages in a small notebook. I’d probably put it together in a few hours, yet these decisions gave me a powerful plan to move towards my definition of success.

What is your definition of success?

Your definition of success is likely to be a little different from mine. We all blog with different motivations and goals, and that’s totally fine. The key is to have something to aim for.

So what does success look like for you?

Written on 11/24/2011 at 12:08 am by Guest Blogger

“Brushing it Off” Vs. “Brushing It Off”

Filed Under: Miscellaneous Blog Tips 14 Comments

This guest post is by Nick Thacker of Life Hacks for Living Well.

Are you “brushing off” the work you need to complete? Or are you able to “brush it off” when it’s finished, ready to launch into the world?

I’ve had experience brushing off the things that needed to be done—and I’m sure you have, too—but I’ve also had the satisfying feeling of being able to put down my tools and say, finally, “I’m done.”

I’m referring to that point you eventually reach, after many long hours and sleepless nights, where there’s no more you can you can possibly do to improve your project, no more tweaking or adding or altering—it is done, as perfect as it can be.

But this “feeling,” this goal I invariably set for myself prior to embarking on any project, is sometimes fleeting, lofty, and quite unreachable.

Sometimes it’s a matter of scope—the project is too large to possibly accomplish by one person. Other times it’s the lack of direction: we don’t know where to go with our blog—or our business. But still other times it’s just a matter of not understanding clearly our expectations, and the time it takes to complete them.

The right expectations

I was thinking recently about my experience as a Boy Scout during my grade school years. I enjoyed pretty much all of the events, camping trips, and fundraisers we did, but there was one annual event we participated in that was held in much higher esteem than the rest. My father and I, once a school year, would begin that journey every young man so impatiently awaits for the rest of the season—the coveted Pinewood Derby competition.

A “Pinewood Derby” is a small (about 8 inches by 3 inches), four-wheeled vehicle powered by gravity and graphite-rubbed plastic wheel bearings. The cars, two at a time, would be raced down a track made of wood. It sounds simple, but for young American boys everywhere, it was the raison d’etre for joining and paying your dues to the Boy Scouts of America.

Every year, my dad and I would start dreaming about what style and shape to cut, design, and paint my car. We would shoot for the most aerodynamic, stylistic, and awe-inspiring design that would still be allowed in the races (there were, of course, weight and size restrictions!). One year was a “hot dog” design that almost took home the gold, while another year was a failed attempt at a Camaro convertible with a spoiler.

We would start the project most years by planning, blueprinting, and marking the rectangular block of wood with cut marks in pencil (did I mention my dad’s an engineer?). Only after planning, sanding, cutting, and sanding some more could we even begin to think about putting on the cool pewter attachments—engine blocks, headers, and so on. Finally, after letting glue dry, sanding once more, and then waiting a few more days, we would apply the paint to the finished product.

With me as Creative Director and Dad as Chief Technical Officer and Director of Engineering, the product, no matter how poorly it actually performed in the races, would be something prized and rewarding for both of us—it was something we would, literally, “brush off” when we’d finish, take it inside to show Mom, and then put on the trophy shelf after it had served on the racetrack.

One year was different, though. Dad was either out of town during the initial months leading up to the Derby, or I’d just decided I was old enough to get started myself. I had my wood block, access to power tools, and plenty of sandpaper.

Rather than waste time with the planning, creative process, and initial sanding, I decided to jump in get started making my dream car. I’d also decided to start about a week before the competition.

Needless to say, the car was shoddily built. It was sticky to hold, as the paint hadn’t really dried well, the pieces constantly fell off (we had to bring a hot glue gun to the event), and it gave everyone splinters (I said this was part of the car’s built-in defense mechanisms). I had mostly “brushed off” the steps that he’d taught me were necessary. Dad wasn’t overly excited about it, but he knew a lesson was in store for his oldest son.

Sure enough, I realized (though much later in life) what the lesson was: while each stroke of the sandpaper and each slow pull of the paintbrush wouldn’t make a marked difference on the outcome, it was the step-by-step process we went through to ensure every piece of the puzzle was in place that created the final wooden racer.

In short: the whole was much bigger than the sum of its parts.

Embrace the process

That year, I’d skipped out on a lot of the process, and because of that, I couldn’t “brush off” my work and show it off to my friends and fellow scouters.

For my fellow bloggers, here’s the takeaway:

Don’t cheat the system: If you’re trying to start a blog, and you know that blogs need great content, don’t spend money on a ton of ghost-written PLR articles that sound exactly the same.
Don’t cut corners: If there’s a “standard process” that others in your niche have gone through—maybe they spent most of their early years doing nothing but churning out guest posts and commenting on blogs—don’t think there’s a “secret way” to reach the same level with much less work.
Don’t “brush it off”: Don’t brush off the little things. Every comment, every guest post, and every tweet that you send is an ambassador for who you are—what you are—online. I don’t know you from Adam, so if I visit your blog and see posts written at a second-grade reading level with nothing but AdSense everywhere, what do you think that tells me about you? Come on, get it together!

Okay, okay, there’s always the exception that proves the rule.

If, by chance, you do blog for money only—and there’s nothing inherently wrong with that—then you’ll have systems and procedures in place for that as well, and they need to be honored. The same rules apply:

If you find that most money-making blogs are earning their income because of their massive amounts of content, why would you think you could do better only writing three or five posts per week? Spend some money on some well-written posts to fill out your site, and spend your time building your business.
If you run a business of any kind online, don’t cut the corners or “brush it off,” or you’ll most likely give people splinters. There’s a reason Internet marketers spend so much time cultivating and building their email lists. Why would you think you’re special and can just buy a billion email addresses for $50 bucks?

Don’t skimp

Don’t skimp on the details—they’re what are going to set you apart from every other teenaged marketing “guru” out there, and they’re also going to give you more experience in much less time. As so many business experts and professionals have said, “fail often.” Don’t be afraid to fail—just know that it will be a failure that will help you “brush off” a project (in a good way!) in the future.

“Brush off” your project or business now, and you won’t be able to “brush it off” in the future. Don’t “brush off” your project today, and you’ll be able to “brush it off” and show it off tomorrow.

Get it?

Nick Thacker is interested in learning and writing about ways to live better–his website is Life Hacks for Living Well, and is a repository of tips, tricks, and resources to getting what you want out of life, in a better way. You can subscribe to his feed directly by clicking here.