Those of you who follow me on Twitter will know that as this post goes live I’ll be heading to the airport to head to warmer parts of Australia for a couple of weeks break. The bags are packed, the house sitter has the key, the tickets are bought and most importantly….. the blog is scheduled to keep proving you with great content.

Everytime I go away for a break I’m confronted with the choice of either letting the blog sit idle for a couple of weeks or to work hard for the week or two before going to make sure that content keeps flowing. I’ve never really been able to bring myself to let things stand idle – so this week I’ve worked hard at getting enough posts up and ready to go (across ProBlogger and dPS I have 60 posts scheduled – it was a big job!).

The vast majority of them are guest posts. While a few of you may be disappointed that you’ll not be hearing from me for a week or two – I actually think it’s a massive opportunity for the ProBlogger community to hear from some fresh voices on some topics that I would never have come up with myself.

Here’s a screen grab of the upcoming schedule (including a few that already have gone up). Some of them are a little cryptic as I wrote them more for my own benefit and didn’t intend to share this – but hopefully it gives a little insight into how I prepare for a break – I did this for dPS also.

I hope you enjoy the next couple of weeks of content here on ProBlogger – having read all the posts I’m sure you will!

Blog World and New Media Expo is a fantastic event for bloggers held every October in Las Vegas.

This year there will be a full day of ProBlogger training in a ‘ProBlogger Track’ on the Thursday. Yesterday the full details of that track’s sessions were released on the BWE site.

The four sessions through the day are based around 4 Pillars of ProBlogging that Chris Garret and I have been working on for a future resource here at ProBlogger. In our view these 4 pillars are all crucial foundations in building profitable blogs – it’s not just about one or two of them, all come together and make a blog a more powerful thing.

The day in vegas is also very similar in content to what we recently put on in the sold out ProBlogger Training day here in Melbourne.

Here are the four pillars and session times:

Creating Killer Content: 9.45-1045am (Presented by Chris Garrett)

Chris Garrett walks attendees through principles of creating compelling content that will draw readers into a blog and get them excited about passing it onto their network./b>

Finding Readers for Your Blog: 11am-12pm (Presented by Darren Rowse)

What’s the point of great content if nobody is reading it? Darren Rowse has jam packed his session full of teaching and tips on ensuring that your blog is read… by more than your Mom!

Building Community On Your Blog: 1.30-2.30pm (Presented by Darren Rowse)

A blog REALLY comes alive when it has community. In this session Darren Rowse teaches the secrets of moving ‘visitors’ into ‘readers’ and ‘readers’ into ‘members’ who feel a sense of belonging to your blog and who begin to take ownership of it to help you take it to the next level.

Making Money from Your Blog: 2.45-3.45pm (Presented by Darren, Chris and Yaro Starak)

In this final session of the ProBlogger stream Darren Rowse, Yaro Starak and Chris Garrett will present strategies for making blogs profitable through a variety of approaches. It will include time for Q&A from participants.

If you’re interested in these sessions – make sure you mark them on your schedule so you don’t forget they’re on. I’m sure Chris and I can come up with some prizes for people who come along and participate well so we’ll make it a fun day.

Keep in mind that this ProBlogger track is on the Thursday and is available to all BWE attendees with a ticket for that day. There will be other sessions going on in other rooms that you can also attend (although we’ve designed this track so that it’s best if you get the full lot).

Other Sessions

I’ll also be participating in a number of other panels and sessions including:

• A Keynote with Brian Clark and Sonia Simone (both of Copyblogger and ThirdTribe) on Saturday morning.
• A Monetization panel with Shoemoney, John Chow and Anita Campbell on Friday.

Come along to BWE

I get excited about Blog World Expo every year. The sessions/teaching are great (I just looked over the schedule and there’s some great stuff going on) but better still is the opportunity to meet other bloggers (big and small). The opportunities for collaboration, networking and some fun times are certainly there.

This was taken at a ProBlogger dinner we held last year at BWE – one of the most fun nights I had all year. Photo by Lisa Morosky.

I’ve found people to be very approachable and while there are thousands of others there it’s not as overwhelming as some of the bigger conferences like SXSW.

Speakers are very accessible – here’s Tim Ferris (4 hour work week), Mike Shinoda (Linkin Park) and I after one of the sessions in 2008. Image by Shashi Bellamkonda.

I also love how BWE brings together such a diverse group of people from all kinds of interesting backgrounds.

One of my more surreal moments last year was sharing the stage with people like CNN’s Don Lemon, music producer/rapper Jermaine Dupri, journalist Hugh Hewitt, and Ford’s Scott Monty. Image by Ken Yeung.

Lastly – if you book your tickets before 16 September there are some good discounts on tickets still available. Get all the details on the Blog World and New Media Expo Site and I hope to see you in Vegas!

Update: we’ve just launched the new version of this resource and the price is now $29.97. Congrats if you got it at the launch price. To those who missed out – the resource is still value – you get 100 pages of teaching and resources to help you optimize your posts for readers and search engines.

Almost two weeks ago we launched the brand new ProBlogger eBook – the Copywriting Scorecard for Bloggers.

Written by SEO specialist copywriter Glenn Murray it’s an eBook designed to help bloggers get their posts optimized for readers and search engines so that their posts reach their potential (you can read all about it here in more detail).

The feedback from those who have bought it has been incredibly positive with lots of great reviews hitting the web.

We are about to Triple the Price!

We launched this new eBook at the special introductory price of $9.97 and intended to put the price up to $14.97 this week. However – as often happens with launches like this – we’ve changed that plan.

The price is still going up on at midnight on 1 September (EST US time) but it is actually going up to $29.97 USD!

Yes – we’re tripling the price and we’re doing it for two reasons:

1. we were told time and time again by those who have bought the eBook that $9.97 was a steal and that $14.97 was too cheap too.
2. we decided to update the eBook significantly. One of the pieces of feedback that we got about version 1 was that it would be more useful with a working example that illustrated how to use the Scorecard. As a result – Glenn has spent time over the last 2 weeks adding a lot of new content to the eBook.

What’s in the Update?

The update is pretty significant – it adds a lot to the original version (it’s now over 100 pages) including:

• NEW — A 33-page worked example, where we score one of my own posts and discuss our reasoning.
• NEW — Electronic scorecard that automatically totals your score. You just select Yes or No.
• NEW — Single page printable scorecard, containing all the the recommendations, but scaled to print on a single page.
• NEW — Recommendation on using sentence case or title case for headings.
• NEW — Expanded discussion of SEO copy.
• NEW — Improved navigation, with bookmarks displaying to the left of the PDF, so no need to scroll back and forth between Recommendations and Scorecard.

Who gets the update?

In short – everyone will get the new version.

As of 1 September at midnight – anyone buying the eBook at $29.97 will get version 2 of it automatically. We’ll also be sending it to anyone who bought version 1 before that time.

So if you’ve already bought it – you’ll get an email sent to you (your paypal email address) with download details of version 2.

If you’ve not yet bought it – but want to get it before the price rises – you can buy version 1 today and you’ll also get an email with download details of version 2 when it is released.

Again – everyone will get the new version – it’s just a matter of how much you pay for it. If you buy before midnight on 1 September you’ll secure it for $9.97 – if you wait until after that time, you’ll pay $29.97. The choice is yours.

More Updates and Bonuses?

Will there be more updates? At this point Glenn and I are pretty happy with how the eBook looks and works and are not planning too many more updates to it. However we are putting together some extra bonuses and resources for those who buy it.

We’re hesitant to announce them right now as they’re partly based upon reader feedback but we already offer those who buy the Scorecard a newsletter which we’ll be using to send send some extra content/tips out with. We’re also looking at running a Q&A podcast session for those who’ve bought the eBook.

So yes – there will be a few bonuses for those who have bought the Copyrighting Scorecard for Bloggers.

Grab Your Copy Today

So if you’ve been umming and aaahing about whether to grab the Scorecard – it’s time to make a decision and lock it in at the intro price.

We’ll not be returning to the price of $9.97 again as it is only becoming more valuable as we add content to it.

Grab your copy today.

It’s been a few days since I launched the latest ProBlogger eBook – Copywriting Scorecard for Bloggers. Since that time we’ve seen over 1000 purchases of the book and have had some fantastic feedback.

Here are of the first reviews so you can hear what others are saying about it.

1. Clare at Women in Business writes

“The eBook shifted my perspective on the purpose and value of each blog post. Sure you can have your call to actions at the end of the blog post – but does the content you’ve written support and encourage your visitor to take that action?” Read the full review

2. Ali Hale writes

“While reading, though, I was struck by how useful this book would be for many newer writers in the blogosphere. I see basic grammatical mistakes every day, and I also see posts which are fundamentally sound but poorly structured or formatted. It’s so easy to lose attention online, and this ebook would be invaluable to bloggers who are struggling to build an audience.” Read the full review

3. Kristi from Kikolani writes

“In addition to the checklist, the beginning of the ebook gives you 10 questions to ask about your blog as a whole, as well as 11 questions to ask before writing each post. If you refer to these answers as you write each blog post, your writing will not only improve, but you should also see better reader engagement with your posts as well.” Read the full review

4. Paul from Blogging Teacher Writes

“When you find a weakness in your writing all you need to do is look up that section in the ebook, learn how to improve that part of your writing, and put it into practice. In no time it will become second nature and you’ll be writing high quality blog posts with complete ease.” Read the full review

5. Jennifer from Gurls Asylum

The Copywriting Score Card for Bloggers is a great product for all writers, especially those writing for the web. It shows many blog copywriting secrets in a way that is easily understood. The topics are actionable and often have a nice tip to help you use the topic better.” Read the full Review.

6. Stanford from Pushing Social

Check out this cool video review of the Scorecard – Stanford gives some thoughtful and considered analysis.

Updates and Price Increases

The feedback has overwhelmingly been a positive so far – however we’ve also had a couple of good suggestions on how to make it better. Glenn and I are already talking about how we can update it (any update will be given to those who already have it for free) to make it even more useful and anticipate having a significant update by the time the price goes up on 1 September (again, if you buy it now you’ll get the update free).

Keep in mind that the current price of $9.97 USD is an introductory offer. We’re putting the price up on 1 September. We’ve previously said that the price will go up to $14.97 USD but the feedback we’re getting is that it is worth more and with the updates we’ll most certainly put it up beyond that mark.

So to secure it at the introductory discount grab your own copy of Copywriting Scorecard for Bloggers now.

You’re about to hit Publish on your next blog post – but is it up to scratch?

• Is it compelling?
• Is it easy to read?
• Is it grammatically correct?
• Is it optimised for search engines?

Wouldn’t it be great to have an editor by your side to look over your next blog post before you hit Publish, to make sure it’s really ready?

Today I’m excited to announce a brand new ProBlogger resource – The Copywriting Scorecard for Bloggers. It’s a system to help you get your posts ready to publish and well optimized for readers… and Google.

I’ve been working on this for months with another Great Aussie blogger and experienced Copywriter – Glenn Murray from Divine Write and am excited not only because it’s comprehensive and will help many bloggers – but also because for the next two weeks it is only $9.97 USD!

Why the Copywriting Scorecard is Important

As bloggers we know how important content is to the success of our blogs and we all know how those little things can make a big difference to the impact of that content.

We know the theory – but if you’re anything like me there are days where you hit Publish on posts that could be better.

The Copywriting Scorecard for Bloggers is a downloadable eBook providing a list of recommendations to follow, as well as pitfalls to avoid, as you write that next blog post. It’s a checklist of things that are common in most great copywriting and mistakes that are commonly found in ineffective copy.

All up, there are 63 things to consider, all comprehensively explained and divided into these four easy to read sections:

1. Writing — How to write engaging compelling posts.
2. Scannability — How to ensure your posts are easy to scan read.
3. Search engine optimization (SEO) — How to write posts that Google will like.
4. Grammar — How to avoid errors that undermine your credibility.

Then, once you’ve read the recommendations, simply print out a scorecard, check how many recommendations you’ve incorporated into your post, then add up your score for a total out of 100. The higher your score, the more effective your post is likely to be (I scored 85/100 on this post).

Using the Scorecard you’ll quickly identify things you can improve to help your post reach its full potential – all before hitting Publish

In addition to the printable Scorecard – you’ll also get plenty of teaching explaining each element as well as 2 additional chapters of teaching – one looking at principles to consider before you start writing and another on writing your posts.

What Others Say about the Copywriting Scorecard for Bloggers

We made this ebook available to a small group of friends and readers – here’s what some of them have had to say.

Brian Clark – Editor of CopyBlogger

“I’ve built a multimillion dollar business not only by teaching the intersection of blogging and copywriting, but by using it. The Copywriting Scorecard for Bloggers provides clear guidance on how to put this powerful combination to work for you, too.”

Leo Babauta – Editor of ZenHabits.

“This little guide contains a goldmine of blogging insights. It’s years of expert wisdom distilled for beginners. Blogging is an art form, but this brings some order and science where none existed before.”

James Chartrand – Owner of Men With Pens

“The ProBlogger Scorecard reveals some best-practice techniques I use every day at my blog – and even some I wished Darren and Glenn would’ve kept a secret! It gives a clear checklist to bloggers who are serious about becoming my competition, and it provides a ton of practical info to freelancers ready to build a business through blogging.”

Clare Lancaster – Editor of Women In Business, Nett Mag Columnist and Forbes listed woman to follow on Twitter.

“What I like most about this book is the practical business approach it takes to blogging. The Copywriting Scorecard for Bloggers focuses on the core activities you need to do well in order to have a profitable blog. That is, knowing what actions will improve your business and crafting your blog posts so that readers perform those actions.

Being able to tap into Glenn’s 8 years of copywriting experience makes the price of this eBook a steal. For those of us who are blogging for passion AND profit, The Copywriting Scorecard is a must read.”

There are more testimonials from others who’ve already read this eBook here.

Grab Your Copy Today

The Copywriting Scorecard for Bloggers is available to download now. As a launch special we’re making it available for two weeks at 33% off – which means instead of $14.97 you can grab it today for just $9.97.

• Get full details on the Scorecard here
• OR… order it directly and get instant access to it as a downloadable PDF here

Note: if you’re interested in promoting the Copywriting Scorecard for Bloggers as an Affiliate check out the details of our program here.

The 25th July is tomorrow and at our place we’ve invited a group of friends over for a Christmas in July dinner (we do it as an annual thing and exchange gifts and do a full Christmas dinner).

On the spur of the moment today I thought it might be fun to extend the ‘festivities’ to ProBlogger and offer you – our wonderful community – a little gift to celebrate the ‘season’.

For the next week I’m offering 25% off the 31 Days to Build a Better Blog eBook/workbook. To get it just use this discount code in the shopping cart.

chrisjuly25

It will give you 25% off the workbook bringing it down to $14.95 (under 50 cents per day over the 31 days) for some great teaching and activities to improve your blog. Each day in the 31 days gives you a little bit of teaching and a practical and tangible activity for you to do that day to improve your blog.

Get full details of what the workbook includes here OR add it straight to your cart where you can apply the above discount code by hitting the button below.

I hope you find the workbook to be useful and join the many thousands of bloggers who’ve worked through it already in improving their blogs.

PS: I’m doing the same 25% discount on our 3 best selling photography eBooks over at Digital Photography School – check them out and use the same discount code here.

Just over a week ago I had the crazy idea to run a training day for bloggers while Chris Garrett was in Melbourne. It was a spur of the moment idea and as a result something that I thought would be quite small, informal and relaxed.

I posted about the idea and asked for expressions of interest and was flooded with enquiries. What I thought would be a 20 person event was starting to look like a 50 person one. In conjunction with the team at SitePoint I started to look at venues of that size but as the expressions of interest continued to come in we realised we needed to think bigger.

We have booked a venue – the Jika International – which will seat 100 comfortably (there is a chance we can upgrade to a larger room) and on Friday opened the doors to start selling tickets (via this page on EventBrite).

As I write this – we have sold 88 seats and there are only 12 8 6 2 available. There is no guarantee we’ll get the larger room so if you’re interested – today’s the day to secure your place.

A few details about the event:

• When: Tuesday 3rd August – 9am-5pm
• Where: Jika International in Fairfield (it’s not a high end venue but has everything we need including wifi, plenty of food, close to public transport, 6km out of the CBD and some crazy carpet).
• Cost: $99 AUD – including lunch and morning and afternoon tea (plus some other bonuses/prizes). We’ve tried to keep it as affordable as we can and think for 6 hours of training this represents value.
• Who: this event is for people with blogs. It’s not at the real beginner end (ie how to start a blog) but will be accessible for those starting out through to more intermediate bloggers who want to take things up a notch. The 88 people signed up already are a fantastic bunch from all around Australia (and New Zealand) (you can see them listed on the ticket sales page). We’ve got people flying in from Perth, Sydney, Adelaide, Brisbane etc and there will be time during the day for networking and interaction.

Sessions/Topics

The sessions in this event will cover a range of topics identified by a survey of attendees including:

• Creating Killer Content
• Finding Readers for Your Blog
• Building Reader Engagement and Community
• Monetizing Blogs

We’ll be mixing up the presentation style with some keynote style presentations, case studies, a panel and some workshop/interactive times for looking at some participants blogs (we won’t be able to do everyone).

I still want the day to be informal, relaxed and fun – but we should be able to cover some good solid teaching over the day too.

Speakers

Speakers will include both Chris and myself but we’re also bringing in some other great Melbourne bloggers to do case studies including Collis Taeed from Envato and Pip Lincolne from Meet me at Mikes. There will also be some of the SitePoint team participating.

Prizes/Giveaways

Attendees will also be in the running for some cool giveaways. The team at Haul have put up an iPad folio or sleeve (like the one I have) for one lucky attendee, we’ll give away some ProBlogger books, 31 Days to Build a Better Blog workbooks, and the team at Flippa are giving all attendees $20 credit at their site. We’re also talking to a couple of other companies about some giveaways/bonuses to add a little spice into the day (if your company would like to talk about that let me know).

If you’re an Aussie blogger (or you can get to Australia on 3rd August) we’d love to have you join us. Reserve your seat today and if you find that all 100 tickets are taken please do add yourself to the waiting list as we’ll do our best to find a way to add a few more seats or shift to a larger room if it is still available.

Reserve your seat here and join the great group of bloggers attending.

Yesterday I challenged readers to write a post that took a 7 link challenge – linking to 7 posts that fit into 7 themes. I thought I’d take it for myself here on ProBlogger.

1. Your first post – the first post I ever wrote on ProBlogger (I’d been posting on other blogs for a couple of years before this) was in September 2004. It was titled – Get to the Point. It was actually a post that I’d written on another blog which I imported onto this one. On the day I published it I imported 40 or so previously written posts into ProBlogger.
2. A post you enjoyed writing the most – 5 Things You Don’t Know about My Dad the ProBlogger. This post was a departure from my normal writing style and as a result I had a lot of fun both writing it and reading the feedback on it.
3. A post which had a great discussion – Does a Bloggers Age Matter? This was a tough one to choose because there have been a lot of great discussions on ProBlogger in the last 5-6 years. I’ve chosen this one because the discussion is not only rich but it is fresh and has only just slowed.
4. A post  on someone else’s blog that you wish you’d written – I’m going to share a link here that is one that I refer to constantly in my blogging. It’s Copyblogger’s Magnetic Headlines series of posts. Most specifically I always head to the headline template posts – they’re useful and I wish I had the smarts to come up with them as I’m sure many people keep coming back to them like I do.
5. A post with a title that you are proud of – 9 things to do to Make Sure Your Next Blog Post is Read by More than Your Mom. It’s a mouthful but it certainly grabbed people’s attention and was something that people retweeted a lot (I find good titles often get that happening).
6. A post that you wish more people had read – How to Craft a Blog Post – 10 Crucial Points to Pause. This was actually an 11 part series and while it did get a reasonable amount of traffic it was something that I was a surprised by in terms of lack of reaction as it was something that I put a lot of work into and something that I think is actually very important. Perhaps it was that it was spread out over too long a period for people to take in – but it’s something I’m still proud of and hope people take the time to engage with (I’m even toying with the idea of expanding it and making it into a downloadable resource).
7. Your most visited post ever – How to Blog: Blog Tips for Beginners. This post just continues to gather traffic and is a series that I wrote a few years back for beginner bloggers that just seemed to hit the spot with readers.

I hope you’ve found this useful and am looking forward to seeing your 7 links.

If you’re a blogger and looking to work with a group of other bloggers to improve your blog – then there are two new groups starting up to work through the 31 Days to Build a Better Blog workbook together in the coming few weeks.

They are both for different types of bloggers and both were started in response to my post a couple of weeks back looking at how one blogger put on a version of 31DBBB for his niche and in doing so raised his profile and helped many bloggers come together for mutual benefit.

In that post I offered any blogger who wanted to try something similar a head start by offering their group 25% off the 31DBBB workbook.

There are a number of groups starting in the coming weeks but two that are launched and gathering steam are:

1. Women Bloggers

SITSgirls – this community of thousands of women bloggers are partnering up with BlogFrog and ProBlogger to put on this event for their network (and anyone who wants to join them). It’s kicking off on 19 July and looking at the hundreds of comments on the announcement post there is going to be a large group going through this together. Learn more and join them here.

2. Movie Bloggers

Anomalous Material is running a 31DBBB for movie bloggers. This one is a little more niche focused but also is gaining momentum with quite a few bloggers from that niche signing up. They’re kicking off on 2 August. Learn more and join them here.

Both of these groups have discount codes (25% off) for anyone who signs up to do it with them.

If you’re not a woman blogger or a movie blogger – there is talk of another couple of groups coming together in different niches but as I mentioned in my previous post – if you’re in a niche and can gather a group of 5 or more bloggers together feel free to contact me and I’ll set you up with a discount code too.