Website Traffic Series Part 3: Leave Comments on Other Blogs
April 10, 2008
The concept: Blogs are conversations. Most of them, in fact, allow any user to post a comment at the end of every article. Usually you just need to write down your name and email (kept private) and publish your comment.
Most blogging platforms also allow you to insert your website URL, which will then be used to hyperlink your name to your website.
Read more
Engadget Has Been Redesigned
April 10, 2008
The new design is more minimalistic, with a simple header featuring navigation links, a big column for the content, and a sidebar with ads and links to featured articles.
I like minimalistic concepts, but the opinions regarding this new design are divide. If you check the comments (over 130 of them) you will see that many people did not like it. Some were even calling April Fools….
Read more
Zemanta Firefox Plugin Can Read Your Mind!
April 10, 2008
Zemanta was only just launched on 26 March this year and is already making waves. The Plugin supports the following platforms:
- WordPress Dot com
- Blogger
- Self hosted WordPress (upwards of version 2.0)
- Typepad
The Best Sources of Content for WordPress Users
April 9, 2008
WordPress is the most popular blogging platform, and I know many Daily Blog Tips readers use WordPress to power their own blogs. As a WordPress user, I enjoy reading about the platform and staying up-to-date with news from the WordPress community. The great thing about WordPress is the endless possibilities that it allows, and by reading from other users and designers there is plenty of information available on just about any topic you can think of.
If you’re looking for technical documentation or support, the codex and forums are usually the first place to look. However, I would like to share some blogs and websites that provide a good amount of WP-related content that I think you will appreciate. Whether you are a theme designer/developer or a blogger who is looking to get more out of WordPress, visit some of these sites and see for yourself.
Weblog Tools Collection (added by Daniel)
Read more
Have AdSense Sliding/Scrolling Text Ads Changed Your eCPM?
April 9, 2008
Personal brand pack
April 9, 2008
You probably already have a few accounts dotted around the Internet on social networking sites like MySpace, YouTube, Facebook etc and have reached the point where you’re thinking about building your own website, your own dotcom, somewhere to present yourself, your business, your thoughts… your BRAND.
Brand-Forge.com’s Personal Brand package is designed for people with some knowledge of how websites work (HTML, PHP, FTP, Flash etc) but are not interested in the technical jiggery-pokery behind managing your own webserver and other time-consuming and unrewarding activities. For those who have no interest in getting down and dirty with a bit of simple code customization and plugin configuration, don’t worry, Brand-Forge.com offers a fully managed service from as little as $10 (£5) per hour.
Now, for the first time you can order, at the click of a button, a complete suite of tools to help you realize your dream and begin the process of building your own online brand.
The personal brand package includes: Read more
Sphere: Related ContentAre You On A Shared Host?
April 9, 2008
For starters, did you know that being on a shared host could get your Adsense account banned? Yes, it’s true. A friend of mine shared his hosting account with a spammer and got shut down by Google. No remorse. They simply don’t care.
How would you feel if that happened to you? What if the main portion of your income relied on Adsense. This is a heavy pill to swallow and certainly not what I would want to happen to me either.
Read more
On Being a Healthy Blogger
April 8, 2008
- For starters I think people in all occupations can get stressed and suffer from ill health. I’ve had friends pass away from and survive heart attacks who work in numerous fields - including blogging. I’m a little skeptical that blogging is any more stressful than other professions - yes it can be a pressure cooker of a job - but I wonder if it’s more about the person, the way they deal with pressure, the choices that they make and the boundaries that they put around themselves etc than the occupation itself.
- Having said that - I’ve had my own little health scare of late with diagnosis of high blood pressure which my doctor thinks could partly be a stress related thing and perhaps related to work. It’s too early to tell and tests go on but it’s becoming clear that I need to make a few more changes in my life in addition to my own increased attempts to eat healthy and exercise more (something I’ve done since late last year). Tomorrow I’m wearing a blood pressure monitor for 24 hours - I’ll be interested to see if it rises or falls when I’m blogging!
- I can see how bloggers might suffer from the impact of a lack of exercise and poor diet. Blogging can be highly addictive and the temptation to blog through meal breaks, skip opportunities to exercise and to eat poorly is no doubt there for most of us. I know until late last year my exercise routines all went completely out the window and I began to put on weight.
- Lack of sleep is another common thing that many of us as bloggers fall into the trap of. I know of quite a few others who suffer from insomnia as a result of blogging right up until bed time and then not being able to ’switch off’.
- Another health related aspect of blogging is that I’ve come across a large number of bloggers lately who suffer from the effects of sitting on poor chairs all day every day. I know for the first few years of my own blogging ‘career’ that I had this problem from sitting on a kitchen chair and then a poor office chair all day. More recently with an investment in a ergonomic chair my back’s been a lot better.
Further Reading:
Let me leave you with three posts on ‘healthy blogging’ - all from Lea Woodward. Read more5 Reasons You Should Not be Blogging
April 8, 2008
- You absolutely hate writing - There’s no cure for this, and if you really loathe the thought of typing you should not be blogging. True, you can choose other type of media for example create a video blog or focus more on doing podcasts, but you’ll still need to write summaries and perhaps the occasional text post.
- You rather go out and play - If you don’t like looking at the computer for more than an hour, you can’t really blog. Yes again, you can be outdoor more often if you’re doing a video blog but you still need to edit the video, upload it and blog about it. Generally speaking, a blogger has to spend at least 2-3 hours a day looking at the computer screen.
- You don’t like to explore / learn - There is a lot of information on the Internet, to the point where there’s usually too much new things happening that you need to read, understand and eventually blog about. If you don’t adapt to well to learning new information, you end up with nothing to say on your blog.
- You choose the wrong topic - Spinning the same post in different angles can only get you so far. Although you can learn how to come out with creative topic to write about, usually if you find yourself running dry too fast, it has something to do choosing the wrong topic in the first place, a topic that you’re not really passionate about.
- You’re pretending to be another blogger - If have to develop your own blogging identity and style as soon as possible. You cannot constantly try to mimic what other bloggers are doing and trying to beat them at providing the exact same information, especially if your niche market already has several large, established blog.
You’ve Read ProBlogger the Blog - Now Buy the Book
April 8, 2008
I’m excited to announce today one of the worst kept secrets in my life - over the last year (longer actually) I’ve been writing a book with Chris Garrett. Today we’re Pre-Launching it as we’re just weeks from the book becoming available for purchase. The book is published by Wiley and is titled:
ProBlogger Book — Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income
I’ll speak more over the coming weeks about the writing process - but today we just wanted to let you know about the upcoming launch, to point you to a site we’ve put together for the book and to invite you to sign up for a newsletter that will give you access to a sample chapter as well as a series of weekly blogging tips for a whole year.
