Professional blog

How To Build Traffic To Your Blog

2011-06-02T02:38:00.000-07:00

With the growing interest in blogging as a means of online promotion and branding, a lot of marketers are starting blogs to promote their opinions, products, books and services.

But a blog is like a website. “Write and they will come” isn’t exactly a magic formula to bring in traffic by the boatload.

If you need to promote your website in order to build traffic to it, you need to promote your blog as well.

Here are some ways you can become a well-read and influential blogger.

1. Write Posts That People Will Want To Read

This should be common sense, but many marketers tend to forget that their readers are real people and that you need to use the principles of online copywriting to make your headlines and copy interesting to your readers.

If you write posts that people enjoy reading, they will reward you by returning to your blog regularly.

Make your posts conversational, pithy and topical. Keep them short and stick to one topic per post.

Write often and regularly so that both readers and search engines visit your blog more often.

2. Optimize Your Posts for Search Engines

I cover this topic in detail in my article on “Search Engine Optimization For Blogs” http://www.blog-maniac.com/blog-seo.htm

But here are the most important rules to follow to get your posts listed for keywords of your choice.

* Make sure your blog URL contains the primary keyword you want to optimize for

* Use your primary keywords in the title of your post

* Use your secondary keywords in the body of your post

* Use your keywords in the anchor text of links in the body of your posts

3. Submit Your Blog and RSS Feed To Directories

If you publish a blog you should submit your blog and RSS feed to big directories like Yahoo and Dmoz, as well as the numerous blog directories and search engines.

Here is the best list I’ve found of places to submit your feed or blog, compiled by Luigi Canali De Rossi, who writes under the pseudonym Robin Good.

Best Blog Directory And RSS Submission Sites http://www.masternewmedia.org/rss/top55/

Another list of sites to submit your Blog. http://www.rss-specifications.com/rss-submission.htm

4. Ping The Blog Services

There are a number of services designed specifically for tracking and connecting blogs. By sending a small ping to each service you let them know you’ve updated your blog so they can come check you out.

Bookmark the Ping-O-Matic ping results page so you can visit it and quickly ping a number of services with a single click.

http://pingomatic.com

5. Build Links To Your Blog

I recommend the methods here as the best ways to get links pointing to your blog

* Link to your blog from each page on your main website

* Trackback to other blogs in your posts

* Post legitimate comments on other blogs with related topics

* Offer to exchange links with other similarly themed blogs and websites

6. Edit Your Blog Posts Into Articles

One of the best methods for promoting your website is to write articles and submit them to article directories.

The suggestion for extending this to edit your blog posts into articles and submit them to directories came from the coach at “Explode Blog Traffic” who also has other noteworthy suggestions at his blog here.http://bloghit.blogspot.com/2004/11/how-to-explode-blog-traffic.html

You’ll find an extensive list of article directories here http://ebizwhiz-publishing.com/write-articles/submit-articles.htm

7. Create Buzz About Your Blog

Creating a buzz about your blog posts and topic in the local and online media will give your marketing a viral component.

* Create a controversy around your blog or it’s topic.

* Distribute bumper stickers or other merchandise with your blog’s URL and tagline.

* Write a press release about something newsworthy and tie it in with your blog topic.

8. Capture Subscribers By Email

It may seem strange for a blogger to send out updates by email, but email is still the #1 choice of most people who want to receive news and information.

Using a free service like Bloglet to manage your subscriptions is easy and it allows your subscribers to manage all their subscriptions from one interface. http://www.bloglet.com

However, if you want more control over your list and don’t mind mailing out the updates yourself, you can use an autoresponder system to capture and follow-up with subscribers.

RSS responder is a new script that allows you to keep in touch and follow-up with your subscribers without the hassle of email. http://ebizwhiz-publishing.com/rssresponder.htm

These tips should give you a good start to building your blog traffic.

Priya Shah is a partner in the search engine marketing firm, SEO & More http://www.seoandmore.comRequest the whitepaper Boost Your Search Engine Visibility With Blogs And RSShttp://www.seoandmore.com/blogs-rss/

Do You Want To Become A Professional Blogger?

2011-06-01T03:25:00.000-07:00

Back in 2004 when I started blogging there really wasn’t anything such as a professional blogger. Those who were making money as a blogger weren’t talking about it… yet.
Over the next two years the idea of blogging for money, possibly even as a career, became a reality. Blog networks started up paying bloggers a salary, thanks to programs like Google Adsense generating income became easier for the average Internet user, and eventually blogging went mainstream.
Today thousands of bloggers make money and while the number of those who do it as their main job is small in comparison to the number of blogs in existence, for those who realize the lifestyle of a professional blogger, life is good.
I never intended to make money as a blogger when I started. It was an experiment aimed solely at gaining more traffic from search engines. Little did I know that my blog would eventually become my business and just a few short years later I’d sell off all my other businesses just to pursue blogging.
Today my blog has helped pay for my house, my car, an 8 month trip around the world and I’ve just purchased a plush two bedroom apartment in my favorite suburb, where I will be moving to next month just before my 30th birthday (pictures coming soon!).
Needless to say, I am extremely blessed by what blogging has done for my life, and part of my mission as a blogger is to help other people realize similar benefits and freedoms thanks to blogging. Here are some of the resources I offer that can help you follow in my footsteps…

28 Ways to Make Money with Your Website

2011-05-28T01:28:00.000-07:00

Direct Methods
1. PPC Advertising Networks

Google AdSense is the most popular option under this category, but there are also others. Basically you need to sign up with the network and paste some code snippets on your website. The network will then serve contextual ads (either text or images) relevant to your website, and you will earn a certain amount of money for every click.

The profitability of PPC advertising depends on the general traffic levels of the website and, most importantly, on the click-through rate (CTR) and cost per click (CPC). The CTR depends on the design of the website. Ads placed abode the fold or blended with content, for instance, tend to get higher CTRs. The CPC, on the other hand, depends on the nice of the website. Mortgages, financial products and college education are examples of profitable niches (clicks worth a couple of dollars are not rare), while tech-related topics tend to receive a smaller CPC (sometimes as low as a couple of cents per click).

The source of the traffic can also affect the overall CTR rate. Organic traffic (the one that comes from search engines) tends to perform well because these visitors were already looking for something, and they tend to click on ads more often. Social media traffic, on the other hand, presents terribly low CTRs because these visitors are tech-savvy and they just ignore ads.

List of popular CPC advertising networks:

Google Adsense
Yahoo! Publisher Network (YPN)
BidVertiser
Chitika
Clicksor
2. CPM Advertising Networks

CPM advertising networks behave pretty much as PPC networks, except that you get paid according to the number of impressions (i.e., page views) that the ads displayed on your site will generate. CPM stands for Cost per Mille, and it refers to the cost for 1,000 impressions.

A blog that generates 100,000 page views monthly displaying an advertising banner with a $1 CPM, therefore, will earn $100 monthly.

CPM rates vary with the network, the position of the ad and the format. The better the network, the higher the CPM rate (because they have access to more advertisers). The closer you put the ad to the top of the page, the higher the CPM. The bigger the format (in terms of pixels), the higher the CPM.

You can get as low as $0,10 and as high as $10 per 1,000 impressions (more in some special cases). CPM advertising tends to work well on websites with a high page views per visitor ratio (e.g., online forums, magazines and so on).

List of popular CPM advertising networks:

Casale Media
Burst Media
Value Click
Advertising.com
Tribal Fusion
Right Media
3. Direct Banner Advertising

Selling your own advertising space is one of the most lucrative monetization methods. First and foremost because it enables you to cut out the middleman commissions and to determine your own rates. The most popular banner formats on the web are the 728×90 leaderboard, the 120×600 skyscraper, the 300×250 rectangle and the 125×125 button.

The downside of direct banner advertising is that you need to have a big audience to get qualified advertisers, and you will need to spend time managing the sales process, the banners and the payments.

Related links:

How to Find Advertisers for Your Website
Finding Advertisers for Your Blog
Direct Advertising Sales for Beginners
Openads Ad Server
OIO Publisher Ad Platform
4. Text Link Ads

After Google declared that sites selling text links without the nofollow tag would be penalized, this monetization method became less popular.

Many website owners are still using text links to monetize their sites, though, some using the nofollow tag and some not.

The advantage of this method is that it is not intrusive. One can sell text links directly through his website or use specialized networks like Text-Link-Ads and Text-Link-Brokers to automate the process.

Text link marketplaces and networks:

DigitalPoint Link Sales Forum
Text-Link-Ads
Text-Link-Brokers
TNX
LinkWorth
5. Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is a very popular practice on the Internet. Under this system you have a merchant that is willing to let other people (the affiliates) sell directly or indirectly its products and services, in exchange for a commission. Sometimes this type of advertising is also called CPA (cost per action) or CPL (cost per lead) based.

Affiliates can send potential customers to the merchant using several tools, from banners to text links and product reviews.

In order to find suitable affiliate programs you can turn to individual companies and publishers like Dreamhost and SEOBook, or join affiliate marketplaces and networks.

List of popular affiliate marketplaces and networks:

Commission Junction
ClickBank
Azoogle Ads
Link Share
6. Monetization Widgets

The latest trend on the web are widgets that let you monetize your website. Examples include Widgetbucks and SmartLinks. Some of these services operate under a PPC scheme, others behave like text link ads, others yet leverage affiliate links.

Their main differentiator, however, is the fact that they work as web widgets, making it easier for the user to plug and play the service on its website.

List of companies that provide monetization widgets:

WidgetBucks
ScratchBack
SmartLinks
7. Sponsored Reviews

PayPerPost pioneered this model, with much controversy on the beginning (related to the fact that they did not require disclosure on paid posts). Soon other companies followed, most notably Sponsored Reviews and ReviewMe, refining the process and expanding the paid blogging model.

Joining one of these sponsored reviews marketplaces will give you the opportunity to write sponsored posts on a wide range of topics. Not all bloggers are willing to get paid to write about a specific product or website (because it might compromise the editorial credibility), but the ones who do are making good money out of it.

If your blog has a big audience you could also offer sponsored reviews directly, cutting off the commissions of the middleman.

List of sponsored reviews and paid blogging networks:

PayPerPost
Sponsored Reviews
ReviewMe
BlogVertise
Smorty
8. RSS Feed Ads

With the quick adoption of the RSS technology by millions of Internet users, website owners are starting to find ways to monetize this new content distribution channel.

Feedburber already has its own publisher network, and you can sign-up to start displaying CPM based advertising on your feed footer. Bidvertiser recently introduced a RSS feed ad option as well, with a PPC scheme.

Finally, some blogs are also opting to sell banners or sponsored messages on their feed directly. John Chow and Marketing Pilgrim are two examples.

Related links:

Feedburner
BidVertiser
Pheedo
9. Sponsors for Single Columns or Events

If you website has specific columns or events (e.g., a weekly podcast, an interview series, a monthly survey, a special project) you could find companies to sponsor them individually.

This method increases the monetization options for website owner, while giving advertisers the possibility to target a more specific audience and with a reduced commitment.

Mashable illustrates the case well. They have several advertising options on the site, including the possibility to sponsor specific columns and articles, including the “Daily Poll” and the “Web 2.0 Invites.”

Problogger also runs group writing projects occasionally, and before proceeding he publicly announce the project asking for sponsors.

10.Premium Content

Some websites and blogs give away part of their content for free, and charge for access to the premium content and exclusive tools.

SEOMoz is a good example. They have a very popular blog that gives advice and information on wide range of SEO related topics. On top of that visitors can decide to become premium members. It costs $48 monthly and it grants them access to guides, tools and other exclusive material.

11. Private Forums

While the Internet is populated with free forums, there is also the possibility to create a private one where members need to pay a single or recurring fee to join.

SEO Blackhat charges $100 monthly from its members, and they have thousands of them. Obviously in order to charge such a price for a forum membership you need to provide real value for the members (e.g., secret techniques, tools, and so on).

Performancing also launched a private forum recently, focused on the networking aspect. It is called The Hive, and the monthly cost is $10.

These are just two examples. There are many possibilities to create a private and profitable forum, you just need to find an appealing angle that will make it worth for the members.

List of popular forum software:

vBulletin
Simple Machines Forum
phpBB
Vanilla
12. Job Boards

All the popular blogs are trying to leverage job boards to make some extra income. Guy Kawasaki, ReadWriteWeb, Problogger… you name it.

Needless to say that in order to create an active and profitable job board you need first to have a blog focused on a specific niche, and a decent amount traffic.

The advantage of this method is that it is passive. Once you have the structure in place, the job listings will come naturally, and you can charge anywhere from $10 up to $100 for each.

List of popular job board software:

JobThread
Web Scribe Job Board
SimplyHired Job-o-matic
Jobbex
13. Marketplaces

Sitepoint is the online marketplace by excellence. Some websites and blogs, however, are trying to replicate that model on a smaller scale.

Depending on your niche, a market place that allows your visitors to buy, sell and trade products could work well. Over the time you could start charging a small fee for new product listings.

The problem with this method is that there are no standard software on the web, so you would need to hire a coder to get a marketplace integrated into your website.

You can see an example of a marketplaces being used on EasyWordpress and on Mashable.

14. Paid Surveys and Polls

There are services that will pay you money to run a small survey or poll on your website. The most popular one is called Vizu Answers.

Basically you need to sign up with them, and select the kind of polls that you want to run your site. Most of these services operate under a CPM model.

15. Selling or Renting Internal Pages

Million Dollar Wiki made this concept popular, but it was being used on the web for a long time around (check Pagerank10.co.uk for instance).

These websites sell for a single fee or rent for a recurring fee internal pages on their domain. Usually they have either high Pagerak or high traffic, so that people purchasing a page will be able to benefit in some way.

Implementing this method on a small blog would be difficult, but the concept is interesting and could be explored further.

16. Highlighted Posts from Sponsors

Techmeme probably pioneered this idea, but somehow it has not spread to other websites. The tech news aggregator displays editorial posts on the left column, and on the sidebar they have a section titled “Techmeme Sponsor Posts.”

On that section posts from the blog of the advertisers get highlighted, sending qualified traffic their way. Considering that the monthly cost for one spot is $5000 and that they have around 6 sponsors at any given time, it must be working well.

17. Donations

Placing a “Donate” link or button on a website can be an efficient way to earn money, especially if your blog is on a niche where readers learn and gain value from your content.

Personal development and productivity blogs, for instance, tend to perform well with donation based systems (one good example being Steve Pavlina).

A small variation of this method appeared sometime ago with the Buy Me a Beer plugin. This WordPress plugin enables you to insert a customized message at the bottom of each article, asking the readers to chip in for a beer or coffee.

18. In-text Adverting

In-text adverting networks like Kontera and Vibrant Media will place sponsored links inside your text. These links come with a double underline to differentiate them from normal links, and once the user rolls the mouse over the link the advertising will pop. Should the user click on it the site owner will make some money.

Some people make good money with this method, but others refrain from using it due to its intrusiveness. It is also interesting to note that very few mainstream websites have experimented with in-text advertising.

19. Pop-ups and Pop-unders

Pop-ups are a common yet annoying form of advertising on the Internet. If you are just trying to make a much money as possible from your website, you could experiment with them.

If you are trying to grow the traffic and generate loyal visitors, however, you probably should stay away from them. Just consider the hundreds of pop-up blockers out there: there is a reason why they are so popular.

Ad networks that use pop-ups:

Tribal Fusion
PayPopup
PopupAd
Adversal
20. Audio Ads

Also called PPP (Pay Per Play), this advertising method was introduce by Net Audio Ads. the concept is pretty simple: play a small audio advertising (usually 5 seconds) every time a visitor enters into your website. The user should not be able to stop it, creating a 100% conversion rate based on unique visitors.

The company is still rolling tests, but some users are reporting to get from a $4 to a $6 CPM. Regardless of the pay rate, though, this is a very intrusive form of advertising, so think twice before using it.

21. Selling the Website

Selling your website could be your last resource, but it has the potential to generate a big sum of money in a short period of time.

Market places on online forums like DigitalPoint and Sitepoint are always active with website buyers and sellers. Keep in mind that they most used parameter to determine the value of a website is the monthly revenue that it generates, multiplied by a certain number (the multiplier can be anything from 5 to 30, depending on the expectations of the seller, on the quality of the site, on the niche and other factors).

Some people also make money trading and flipping websites. They either create them from scratch or buy existing ones, and after some revamping they sell them for a profit.

Related links:

How To Buy A Website And Flip It For Profit
How To Sell A Website – How Much Is Your Website Worth?
Where to sell a website? How to go about selling it?
Indirect Methods
22. Selling an Ebook

Perhaps one of the oldest money making strategies on the web, using a website to promote a related ebook is a very efficient way to generate revenue.

You could either structure the website around the book itself, like SEOBook.com, or launch the ebook based on the success of the website, like FreelanceSwitch did we the book How to be a Rockstar Freelancer.

Related links:

Writing an ebook for your blog
How to sell ebooks
Processing payments for your ebook
How to sell digital products online
List of ebook selling software
23. Selling a Hardcover Book

Many authors and journalists leverage their blogs or websites to sell copies of hardcover books. Examples include Guy Kawasaki, Seth Godin and Malcolm Gladwell.

While most of these people were already renowned authors before they created their website, one could also follow the other way around. Lorelle VanFossen did exactly that with her Blogging Tips book. First she built her authority on the subject via her blog, and afterwards she published the book.

List of self publishing and publishing services:

Lulu
Self Publishing
iUniverse
WordClay
24. Selling Templates or WordPress Themes

As more and more people decide to get an online presence, website templates and WordPress themes become hotter and hotter.

On this segment you have mainstream websites like TemplateMonster, as well as individual designers who decide to promote and sell their work independently.

Brian Gardner and Unique Blog Designs are two examples of websites that make money with the sales of premium and custom WordPress themes.

25. Offering Consulting and Related Services

Depending on your niche, you could make money by offering consulting and related services. If you are also the author of your blog, the articles and information that you will share will build your profile and possibly certify your expertise on that niche, making it easier to gain customers.

Chris Garrett used a similar strategy. First he created a highly influential blog on the blogging and new media niche, and afterwards he started offering consulting services to clients with related problems and needs.

26. Creating an Email List or Newsletter

Email lists and newsletters represent one of the most powerful marketing and money making tools on the Internet. They offer incredible conversion rates, and the possibility to call people to action in a very efficient way.

Creating a big list is a difficult task though, so if you have a popular website you could leverage it to increase the number of subscribers on your list.

Yaro Starak is a famous Internet marketer, and if you visit his blog you will notice that right on top he has a section encouraging visitors to subscribe to his email newsletter. Yaro generates five figures in revenues each month from his email newsletters, proving that this method works.

List of software to manage email newsletters:

AWeber
SendStudio NX
PHP Autoresponder
Constant Contact
27. Mentoring programs

People are willing to pay for someone or something that will teach them and give them knowledge (as opposed to mere information). Education is one of the biggest industries in the world, and the online landscape behaves in a similar way.

Creating a mentoring program related to the niche of your website could be very profitable if you manage to structure and promote it adequately. There is a wide range of media and tools that you can use to deliver the information, from text articles to audio and video lessons.

Brian Clark leveraged the success of Copyblogger to launch a mentoring program teaching people how to build membership and how to sell content online. The program is titled Teaching Sells, and it costs $97 monthly. Sounds expensive, but they have over 1,000 members.

28. Creating a conference around the website

If your website takes off and becomes an authority on its niche, you could create a conference around it. Depending on the size of your audience, the event could attract thousands of people, and you could make money directly from conference passes and sponsors.

Search Engine Land, for instance, created a series of conferences that visit several cities on the United States and on other countries as well. The conferences are called Search Marketing Expo, and the tickets and passes cost thousands of dollars.

10 Fun Widgets For Your Blog

2011-05-23T00:59:00.000-07:00

1. Cyber-pet

Description: What better way to spice up your blog than to have your very own virtual pet hanging out in the sidebar? The Cyber-pet blog widget lets you choose the type of pet you want, name it, and customize it. You can even have a pair of flying scissors as a pet

2. Funny Quotes

Description: 9.3 times out of 11.78, simpler is better. Funny Quotes is a simple blog widget that displays humorous quotes to your visitors. It can also be quite addicting flipping through the quotes, so if you install this widget, you might want to use caution when visiting your blog at work.

3. Etch A Sketch
Description: Here's a real blast from the past. Get your own Etch A Sketch for your blog and let your visitors draw to their hearts content.
4. Magic 8-ball
Description: Who says you can't help your readers out with a little bit of creative problem solving? This 8-ball is not only attractive, but it's also magical, and is able to answer any question posed to it. This is a great blog widget for those that want to put a little nostalgia into their blog.

Get the Widget
5. The Official Dilbert Widget
Description: Turn your sidebar into a comic strip with the Official Dilbert Widget. Everyone's favorite office cartoon will provide a nice distraction for your readers. The only downside: Trying to compete with Dilbert by writing something interesting enough for your visitors to read your stuff instead of just laughing about Dilbert.

Get the Widget
6. Secret Message Scratch Card
Description: What would happen if you pulled a widget out of a box of cereal? You might get something like the secret message scratch card widget where you can write a secret message and your readers can reveal it by scratching around with a penny.

Get the Widget
7. Cool Site of the Day
Description: A neat little blog widget that pulls up a posting of the cool site of the day. This is a great way to introduce your readers to interesting spots around the web.

Get the Widget
8. Roaches
Description: Bring your blog to life with this widget. Unfortunately, the lifeform happens to be a pack of roaches that readers can scare away with their mouse pointer.

Get the Widget
9. YouTube Recently Featured Videos
Description: Nothing says you've made it like your own television station. And, while that might take a while to come true, you can at least have popular YouTube videos on display on your site with this blog widget.

Get the Widget
10. Text Scroller
Description: Caution! You have entered the dangerous land of text-scrolling. One half fun, one half annoying, the text scroller should only be used in emergencies. A great way to celebrate an event on your blog, but avoid keeping it there forever.

100 Blog Topics

2011-05-21T21:04:00.000-07:00

1 How I Use Facebook
2 Ways I Embrace My Audience
3 Should My Town Use Social Media?
4 A Community I Love
5 Technology That Empowers Me
6 How Flickr Did it Right
7 How Best to Comment on a Corporate Blog
8 Ways to Save a Bad Time at a Conference
9 How I Find Blogging Ideas
10 Somebody Has to Say It
11 My Children Will Do it Differently
12 How Schools Could Use Social Media
13 The Best Parts of Marketing
14 Presentation Skills for a New Conversation
15 How I Find Time to Make Media
16 Empower Your Best Customers
17 After the Event- Carrying the Conversation Forward
18 Just Jump Into Podcasting- Heres How
19 My Community and How You Can Engage It
20 Twitter Jaiku Pownce Facebook- And Then What
21 Making a Miniseries
22 If I Were an Advertiser Today
23 My Mother is On Facebook
24 Does a Big Brand Need You
25 Books I Want to Write
26 Serving the Deep Niches- How I Do It
27 How Women Use Social Media
28 A Hard Look at My Media Habits
29 If I Were a Television Producer
30 Social Media Marketing vs Traditional Marketing
31 Elements of a Marketing Campaign
32 Social Media Campaigns are NOT Traditional Campaigns
33 Idea Making and How I Make Something
34 What I Spend Money On
35 Do Rock Stars Need Social Media Strategies
36 How I Use My Website
37 Book Shopping- Buy These Books
38 MTV Changed the World in the 80s- Here is What Comes Next
39 How I Process Blogs and What I Do With All That Info
40 Ten Guilty Pleasures
41 The Internet Application I Havent Seen
42 If I Worked for a Venture Capital Firm
43 My Day Job Versus My Passion
44 The Difference Between Fark and Truemors
45 Fixing Conferences
46 Making Marketplaces for Media Makers
47 When I Feel Frustrated
48 Branding Strategies I Use
49 Your Ideas And My Ideas- How We Play Together
50 Friends I Cant Wait to Meet
51 The Art of Chaos
52 Telling My Boss About Social Media
53 Could I Quit My Day Job
54 When to Cut Back on Web Habits
55 Breaking Down My Favorite Blog
56 Explaining Social Media to Your Chamber of Commerce
57 Non-Internet Equivalents to Internet Tools I Use
58 Considering Media for the Rest of the Globe
59 Twitter is Too Simple- Twitter is Just Right
60 The Future of Podcasting
61 Video Made Simple
62 Facebook Applications I Love
63 You Are Here
64 Blogging Tactics- How to Keep it Fresh
65 I Want to Brag A Minute
66 Who Says What About Your Brand
67 Tools for Blogging
68 Wordpress Plugins I Use And Why
69 Media Topics That Need More Coverage
70 Comments versus Blog Posts
71 How I Drive Traffic to My Site
72 News- Is it Useful and How I Might Fix It
73 Which TV Network Gets Videoblogging and PodCasting
74 Franchising My Media
75 Handling Critics
76 My Audio Tricks
77 Ning Sites I Like and Why
78 Controlling My Brand
79 Sharing and Contributing
80 How Twitter Improved My Blog
81 Email After Twitter
82 Facebook Video Improved My Social Network
83 Letting Go
84 Downtime- What I Do Offline to Recharge
85 How I Went From Very Shy to Less Shy
86 The RIGHT Number to Track for Podcasting
87 PodCamp Has to Change
88 Shaking Things Up
89 Joining A Network- Things to Consider
90 Newspapers and How I Would Change Them
91 Interview With a Veteran
92 The Countries of My Social Media World
93 Giving it Away
94 Consulting Strategies for Social Media Experts
95 Turning Media into a Business Card
96 Podcasting on a Budget
97 For Every Excuse a New Strategy
98 Just When I Think I Am Done
99 Buying Gear- My Shopping Tips for Podcasters
100 When is Free Better- When Not

Using Social Blogging to Grow Your Business

2011-05-21T08:28:00.001-07:00

B using social networking sites, gives much more advertise about your blog and share our post through social networking sites like orkut, facebook, twitter, etc.

Top Blog Tips of All Time

2011-05-21T08:25:00.000-07:00

Choose a Professional, easy, Profitable & Valuable Niche
Choose a Short Domain name for your Blog
Use WordPress
Post Daily
If you are using a Free Blogging Platform – Buy a Domain and Start Self Hosting
Optimize your blog to Search Engines
Learn about your Competitor Blogs and Improve yourself
Take Blogging as a business and spend more time for it
Chose the Right theme for your Blog
Don’t allow people to Copy your Content – Warn, Punish them
Make Unique and Fresh Posts
Think Different , Do Different – Write what other bloggers missed to write
Avoid too many outbound External Links
Reply to all comments made in your blog
Use ‘All in One SEO Pack’ Plugin if you are using WordPress
Don’t blog with the only aim of Making Money
Spend time tweeting your Posts (you can use Twitterfeed)
Write Pillar Posts
Link to Others blog’s post
Reduce the number of Blogroll Links
Make your Text font attractive and readable
Take care about your WordPress theme design (color blending and all..)
Include a Top Searched Keyword in your Blog Title
Discover something new and post it
Join forums in your Niche and insert your blog in the signature
Make useful comments in others blog. Also try to make the first comment of a post (it can receive you more traffic)
Make Guest Posts in Good Blogs
Make friendship with other Blogs
Start a Post Series (which contain at least 5 posts)
Try to Increase Alexa Rank
Use Affiliate programs and promote it with your blog. It is n extra way to make money
Analyze your stats and understand your mistakes
Try to build maximum number of High quality backlinks
Use Social bookmarking sites to bookmark your posts. Especially Digg & Stumbleupon
Increase Internal linking of your blog using related posts plugin, tags, archives, links in article etc.
Read a lots of e-Books
Use Forums and Blog Discussions sites to seek for blog help
Be Patient
Learn from successful bloggers
You must include 3 important pages in your blog: About, Advertise, Contact
Use Squidoo
Make a new blog after making the first blog a success. Also promote the second blog using 1st blog
Use at least 2 subscription options (twitter & feed)
Improve your Typing Speed for Fast Content Writing
Include Images in Posts
Make a list of Popular posts and Post it or publish it in the sidebar
Use Post excerpt in your homepage other than displaying whole post content
Join Blogging Networks and be active in it (eg: blogcatalog)
Make a Blog Contest
Think twice before taking a big action in your blog
Write posts in your own style – It will be attractive for your readers
Avoid too many widgets
Avoid too many advertisements
Make your WordPress theme look professional and easy to load
Make your theme W3C HTML Validated. Check it here
Check whether your blog is appearing well in every Web Browser
Make an Effective Post Title – Make it SEO Friendly
Add ‘Podcasts’ to your blog
Make a monthly roundup
Avoid Bad Link Neighborhoods
Organize and make a well structured Category list
Participate in Blogging Contests and Projects
Make use of Adsense ‘Section targeting’ for showing content related ads
Try to become the best blog in your Niche.
Avoid Big Niche topics
Allow email subscriptions
Comment on Top Dofollow Blogs
Enable ‘Subscription to comments’
Ask readers to contact you for Help
Ask for Donations
Do experiments with Advertisements till you success
Be active with your readers
Submit your articles to directories
Make small posts as well as Large posts
Write what readers expect from your blog
Don’t copy articles from other blogs
Post interviews and reviews in your blog (eg: Review of Darren Rowse of Problogger.net)
Use Sense of Humor
Insert Meta Tags effectively
Include Keywords in posts
Read as much as Articles regarding Blogging Tips
I recommend you to use Google Analytics
Encourage readers to subscribe to your blog
Submit your Blog to High Page Rank Blog Directories
End your post with a question so that you will receive a lots of comments
Use Trackbacks/Pingbacks
Make a good Permalink
Install latest Wordpres updates
Understand your Mistakes and correct it
Make a lots of ‘Top 10 …’ posts
If you can, start a Discussion Forum with your Blog
Use ‘Head’ Tags like H1, H2 etc.
Delete Spam comments. Learn how to avoid it
Read your post Twice before posting.
Try good methods of Online Money Making
Focus on your Google Page Index and try to increase it.
Avoid using Bad & Irritating advertisements like Pop-ups and Link ads (eg: Kontera)
Submit your blog to Google Webmaster Tools
Help & Guide other Bloggers like me (kidding)
Read this Article Again and Again

The Best 15 SEO Tools for Beginners

2011-05-21T08:23:00.000-07:00

PageRank Checker is a free tool to check Google Page Ranking of any site and its pages easily and instantly. Google PageRank or PR is a measure of any sites popularity based on Google kept-secret algorithm. The PR is an indication of certain authority to your site and how important it is in the eyes of Google. For the uninformed, here’s how Google calculates your PR.

PageRank Search allows you to search Google using any keyword you wish. It will then return, in order of Google relevance, the sites associated with those keywords. Each result displays a graphical bar with the PageRank of that particular site.

Internal Pages PR Checker will check the page rank of all of your site’s inner pages index by Google and it’s useful to use right after the PR update.

Link Popularity Checker is a tool that checks total number of pages in each search engines index that contains a link to your site, including your own website. It is used to measure your site’s online visibility. The popularity of your site is an important factor in your search engine ranking. The more popular your site is, the better it will be ranked on the search engines.

Backlink Anchor Text Analyzer help you determine the backlinks of your site and anchor text (link text) used to link to your site. Link building is all about getting the quality backlinks along with the quantity. The truth is getting a few of the right links, from the right places can be more valuable than getting 100 links from the wrong places.

It’s all about using the right keywords you are trying to optimize as your anchor text (link text) from the right neighborhood.

Reciprocal Link Checker helps you ensure that your link partners are linking back to your site and determines what anchor text is used. Gone are the days when reciprocal links are considered important, the big G is now putting more weight on one-way (the best option) or three-way links (site A ↔ site C, site C ↔ site B and site B ↔ site A)

Keyword Density refers to the measurement in percentage, the number of times a keyword or phrase appears compared to the total number of words in a page which needs to balance correctly. Too low and you will not get the optimum benefit, Too high and your page might get flagged for “keyword spamming”.

This tool parses the most frequently keyword of a website and calculates its percentage share.

Keyword Suggestion Tool will help you with choosing of the right keywords for your website and analyze which keyword combinations are more popular. Choosing the right keywords is critical for a success of your site. Target the wrong keywords and you have lost.

There is pure gold hidden in less competitive keyword combinations and variations.

Link Analysis of External and Internal Links – The link analysis display all internal and external links of a website with the corresponding anchor texts in a summary table. It’s one of the best I have ever used.

SERP Position Checker is the keyword position analysis used to check on which position your domain is ranked for a given keyword and compare the first 100 results by Google, MSN and Yahoo.

Robots.txt Syntax Checker is the simplest tool to check the contents of your site’s robots.txt against the search engines standard, along with providing warnings on the wrong use of syntax.

In case you aren’t in the know, robots.txt file is the key to stopping search engines robots from indexing certain pages of your site which are deemed unnecessary to be included in the search results, yet many people still fail to get the syntax correct.

Copyscape scours the net and finds sites that have copied your content without permission, as well as those that have quoted you. It is designed to protect you against online plagiarism and article theft.

Search Engine Placement Check is a verification tool that checks if your site is in the top three pages of a search engine result for a specific keyword. It’s important to be in the top 3 pages of a search result because most people using search engines don’t go past the 3rd page.

Bad Neighborhood Checker checks link pages and reports if there are links to bad neighborhoods. This tool will scan the links on your site, and on the pages that your site is linking to, and flag possible problem areas. This can greatly ease your SEO efforts.

Website Grader is a free SEO report that measures the marketing effectiveness of your site. It provides a score that incorporates things like website traffic, SEO, social popularity and other technical factors. It also provides some basic advice on how your site can be improved from a marketing perspective. Check out the SEO report for thoushallblog.com.

what is Posterous ?

2011-05-21T08:19:00.000-07:00

Posterous isn’t just a dead simple way to post everything online using email but beyond it’s simplicity, it’s a great SEO tool to automate the boring, manual work of link building.

how you can build links automatically with Posterous!

-Create an account if you’ve done so
-Assign the dofollow social networks for selective auto posting
-Install the posterous bookmarklet
-Choose the site you want to build links to
-For brevity’s sake, copy the first paragraph of your main article,
-Click the bookmarklet
-At the end of the excerpt, (yes, this is important!) change the anchor text of your inbound link.
-Click post and voila, you’re done!

How to Make a Blog Post Scannable

2011-05-21T08:14:00.000-07:00

Bullet Points
Header Tags
Numbered Lists
Pictures
Quotes
Short Paragraphs
Bold Text
Good spacing between lines

5 Blogging Basics steps

2011-05-21T08:11:00.001-07:00

Step 1: The Power of the Title
Step 2: Blog Posts Must Be Reader Friendly
Step 3: Pictures are Worth 1,000 Words
Step 4: Use Video from Time to Time
Step 5: Keep It Simple Stupid

Shortcomings of Duplicate Content

2011-05-21T07:59:00.000-07:00

As internet users, we all more or less go through the same problem of duplication of content. But before going any further let us first get acquainted with the word “duplicate content“.

When content is available word by word on more than one different URL then the content is considered to be duplicate content. The duplicate content is also termed when the same site have several copies of the same content on its different URLs.

Besides the word ‘duplication’ is also sometimes used when the search engines get confused between pages with same description when displaying search results.

Different popular search engines always discouraged the duplicate content because they want to give internet users unique results which will become food for their thoughts while eliminating same content available on different websites from their result pages.

choose a simple name

2011-05-21T07:50:00.000-07:00

well, it is a important subject in blogging, always try to choose a simple name to your blog. choose a simple name and always remember that your blog name indicate what your blog contain. in simple words, when the reader reads our blog name at the moment itself he is understand our blog content. so choose a short, simple topic.

steps to professional blogging:

2011-05-21T01:31:00.000-07:00

Determine what you want to blog about
Register a blog with Blogger
Create a FeedBurner account
Write 1+ blog entries every day
Read other blogs like yours
Register for a del.icio.us account
Leave 1+ comments every day
Register for an AdSense account
Don't give up
Check your stats and refine

Blog traffic

2010-10-26T19:50:00.000-07:00

Blog traffic is measured to see the popularity of blog sites and individual pages or sections within a site.

Blog traffic can be analysed by viewing the traffic statistics found in the blog server log file, an automatically generated list of all the pages served. A hit is generated when any file is served. The page itself is considered a file, but images are also files, thus a page with 5 images could generate 6 hits (the 5 images and the page itself). A page view is generated when a visitor requests any page within the web site – a visitor will always generate at least one page view (the main page) but could generate many more.

List of blogs

2010-10-26T19:48:00.000-07:00

Blog↓ Language↓ Subject↓ Author↓
1000 Awesome Things English Miscellaneous topics Neil
The 9 on Yahoo! English Video blog on web videos Multi-author
A Motley Vision English Criticism of the Mormon Arts, particularly LDS literature and film Multi-author
The Art Life English Blog about the art scene in Sydney, Australia Multi-author
Athletics Nation English Sports blog focusing on the Oakland Athletics baseball team Tyler Bleszinski
Audimated English Music related blog focused on news, resources and information for independent artists. Lucas Sommer
Balkinization English Blog focusing on US civil liberties issues Jack Balkin
The Bear Club English Niche blogging site for teddy bears and their collectors Multi-author
Belle de Jour English Insight into the life of a London call-girl. Brooke Magnanti
Belmont Club English Political and historical blog Richard Fernandez
Bestiario del balón Spanish Colombian football blog Multi-author
Blogcritics English Multiple sections, mostly involving entertainment and science Multi-author
Bloggingheads.tv English Video blog on politics, philosophy, and science Multi-author
The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks English Blog about the misuse of English quotation marks Bethany Keeley
Blogswara English Indian audio-blog intended to showcase amateur musicians Multi-author
Boing Boing English Politics, science fiction, and general interest Multi-author
Brain Blogger English Multidimensional biopsychosocial perspectives Multi-author
The Brussels Journal English, Dutch Conservative blog on Belgian politics Paul Beliën
Cake Wrecks English Photoblog featuring images of cakes that are humorous or strange in appearance Jen Yates
CampusJ English Jewish college news Multi-author
The Catbirdseat English Mp3 blog Ryan Catbird (screen name)
Chinadialogue Chinese, English Blog on the environment, both globally and in China Multi-author
China Law Blog English Blog of news and opinions on Chinese law and business Dan Harris and Steve Dickinson
Climate Audit English Using statistical methods to analyze historical reconstructions of past climates Stephen McIntyre
The Comics Curmudgeon English Critical analysis of newspaper comics Josh Fruhlinger
ConservativeHome English Conservatism from a UK perspective Tim Montgomerie
Consumerist English Blog on consumerism Multi-author
Contempo Magazine English Blog on Hispanic Conservative Tony Magana
Cosmic Variance English Science blog on physics and astrophysics Multi-author
Couric & Co. English Official blog of the “CBS Evening News” The “CBS Evening News” staff
Crash Test Kitchen English Cooking and food video blog Waz and Lenny (screen names)
Crooks and Liars English Liberal video blog Multi-author
Cute Overload English Photos and videos of “cute” animals Multi-author
The Daily Howler English Center-left political blog Bob Somerby
The Daily Nightly English Official blog of “NBC Nightly News” Brian Williams and other NBC News correspondents
Daring Fireball English Macintosh and technology blog John Gruber
Deadspin English Sports blog Multi-author
Defamer Australia English Celebrity gossip Multi-author
Desipundit English Commentary on India’s major blog posts Multi-author
Diabetes Mine English Blog relating to diabetes Amy Tenderich
Dlisted English Celebrity gossip Michael K.
Down By The Hipster English Blog on the New York City nightlife Multi-author
DrugWarrant English Blog used to advocate the termination of the War on Drugs in the United States Peter Guither
Durma Melhor Portuguese Blog on various issues related to sleep Marcos Miguel
EastSouthWestNorth English China focused blog out of Hong Kong Roland Soong
Engadget English, Chinese (simplified Han), Chinese (traditional Han), Japanese, Spanish, Polish, Korean, German Technology blog Multi-author
Faces in Places English Photo blog of faces seen in everyday objects Multi-author
/Film English Movie news and reviews Peter Sciretta
The Fix English Blog written for The Washington Post Chris Cilliza
Fluxblog English MP3 blog Matthew Perpetua
FoodMayhem English Blog about all topics related to food. Multi-author
GamePolitics.com English Blog about the politics of computer and video games Dennis McCauley
Gawker.com English Manhattan news and gossip Multi-author
Geenstijl.nl Dutch General commentary Multi-author
Generación invisible Spanish Blog by professional journalists Multi-author
GigaOM English Blog with opinions on startups, new technologies, broadband, and online games Multi-author
Gizmodo English, French, Dutch. Italian, German, Spanish, Japanese Consumer electronics centered blog Multi-author
Go Fug Yourself English Comedy fashion blog Jessica Morgan and Heather Cocks
Google Blogoscoped English Blog covering the Google search engine Philip Lenssen
Gothamist English Local interest blog about New York, branch sites cover other cities Jake Dobkin and Jen Chung
Groklaw English Blog covering legal news pertinent to a free and open-source software community Multi-author
The Grumpy Old Bookman English Litblog Michael Allen
Gulfsails English Documented the effects of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans Troy Gilbert
Hanzi Smatter English Blog satirizing the misuse of Chinese characters in the west Tian Tang
Holla Back NYC English Photoblog intended to raise awareness of street harassment Multi-author
Hot Air English Center-right political and news blog Multi-author
How the World Sees America English Blog showcasing views on the United States from around the world Amar C. Bakshi
The Huffington Post English Liberal news blog Multi-author
I Can Has Cheezburger? English Blog featuring lolcats and other animals created by the writers Eric Nakagawa and Kari Unebasami
IPKat English Blog dedicated to intellectual property law Multi-author
Idolblog English Blog dedicated to the talent search show NZ Idol Multi-author
India Uncut English blog regarding India Amit Varma
Inhabitat English Blog on sustainable architecture Multi-author
InkTank English Blog on webcomics Barry Smith
Israellycool English Pro-Israel blog Aussie Dave (screen name)
IvyGate English News and gossip from Ivy League schools Multi-author
Joystiq English Video gaming blog Multi-author
J-Walk Blog English List of strange things found on the internet John Walkenbach
Jezebel English Women’s interest blog Multi-author
Jihad Watch English Blog on the ideas behind Islamic jihad Multi-author
Kaboom: A Soldier's War Journal English Military blog detailing a scout platoon leader’s daily life on the Iraqi frontlines LT G. (screen name)
Kissing Suzy Kolber English NFL humor blog Multi-author
Know HR English Human resources and employee related blog Multi-author
Kotaku English Video game blog Multi-author
Language Log English Language blog Mark Liberman
Lebanese Political Journal English Blog commenting on various aspects of Lebanese politics Multi-author
Liberty and Power English A Libertarian political blog Multi-author
Lifehacker.com English Blog covering life hacks Multi-author
Little Green Footballs English Center-left political blog Charles Foster Johnson
Madame Arcati English British gossip blog Multi-author
Marginal Revolution English Economics focused blog Tyler Cowen and Alex Tabarrok
The Marmot's Hole English Blog focusing on Korean politics and society Multi-author
Mashable English, French Social networking news based blog Multi-author
Memepool English Link blog Multi-author
MetaFilter English Link and general interest blog Multi-author
Milblogging.com English Blog index to other military blogs Multi-author
Mind Hacks English Psychology and neuroscience blog Multi-author
Mini-Microsoft English Blog on Microsoft Anonymous
MobuzzTV English, French, Spanish Technology and current event related video blog Multi-author
Momversation English Home and family blog Multi-author
Monsters and Critics English News blog Multi-author
MSDN Blogs English Microsoft blog where employees blog to a public audience Multi-author
Music (For Robots) English MP3 Blog Multi-author
MyDD English Progressive American politics blog Multi-author
Node Magazine English Blog to annotate the novel “Spook Country” Multi-author
The Oil Drum English Blog on energy issues Multi-author
Overheard in New York English Humor blog of conversations heard in New York Multi-author
Overheard in Pittsburgh English Humor blog of conversations heard in Pittsburgh Chris Griswold
The Panda's Thumb English Blog on the creation-evolution controversy Multi-author
Pharyngula English Science blog PZ Myers
Patentlyo English Patent law blog Dennis Crouch
PinoyCentric English Blog on Filipino culture Multi-author
PopText English Mp3 Blog Abigail McDonald
Popjustice English Music blog Peter Robinson
PopSugar English Gossip and celebrity news blog Multi-author
Protein Wisdom English Conservative and Libertarian political blog Jeff Goldstein
QT's Diary English Satirical blog whose writer falsely claimed to be Quentin Tarantino Unknown
Rate Your Students English Parody blog on the behavior of college students Multi-author
ReadWriteWeb English Blog on web technology Richard MacManus
RealClimate English Blog on climatology Multi-author
The Religious Policeman English Blog on Saudi Arabia Alhamedi Alanezi (user nam)
Retecool Dutch Shocklog Multi-author
Rocketboom English Video blog Andrew Baron and Joanne Colan
Sarcastic Gamer English Blog parodying the video game industry Multi-author
The Sartorialist English Fashion blog Scott Schuman
The Scientific Activist English Blog on science, politics, and science policy Nick Anthis
SCOTUSblog English Blog on the Supreme Court of the United States Multi-author
Seeking Alpha English Provides free stock market advice through a blog format Multi-author
the show with zefrank English Comedy and current events video blog Ze Frank
SiliconBeat English Blog on Silicon Valley technological innovation Matt Marshall and Mike Bazeley
Simply Recipes English Cooking recipes Elise Bauer
Skatter Tech English Technology review blog Multi-author
Slugger O'Toole English Irish news blog Mick Fealty
Smashing Magazine English Blog on web design and web development Multi-author
The Sneeze English General interest blog Steve (screen name)
Soul Sides English Mp3 blog Oliver Wang
The Soxaholix English Comic-based blog for discussing the Boston Red Sox Hart Brachen
Squawk Box English Blog for the CNBC show Squawk Box Multi-author
Stuff White People Like English Satirical blog about the interests of upper white class Americans Christian Lander
Sturvs English Nigerian sharing and voting blog Multi-author
Surviving Grady English Boston Red Sox blog Red and Denton (screen names)
TV Newser English American television news ticker blog Multi-author
TechCrunch English, French, Japanese Blog covering Web 2.0 products and companies Multi-author
Terra Nova English Blog related to game studies and virtual worlds Multi-author
TorrentFreak.com English BitTorrent news blog Ernesto (screen name)
TPMCafe English Center-left political blog portal Multi-author
TrueHoop English Blog on basketball, primarily the NBA Henry Abbott
U.S.S. Mariner English Blog on the Seattle Mariners Multi-author
Watts Up With That English Blog on man made global warming Anthony Watts
Valleywag English Gossip and news on Silicon Valley personalities Multi-author
Velvet Underground Hebrew Israeli news blog Dvorit Shargal
The Volokh Conspiracy English Conservative political blog written mainly by law professors Multi-author
Worldchanging English Blog pertaining to sustainability and social innovation Multi-author
Zen Habits English Blog on productivity, GTD, simplifying, living frugal, happiness and related topics. Leo Babauta
Zooillogix English Blog on zoology Andrew and Benny Bleiman

Fashion blog

2010-10-26T19:43:00.000-07:00

A fashion blog can cover many things such as specific items of clothing and accessories, trends in various apparel markets (haute couture, prêt-à-porter, etc.), celebrity fashion choices and street fashion trends. They cover fashion at all levels from the biggest names to the smallest indie designers.

Many fashion blogs could also be categorised as shopping blogs, since "most of the conversation is shopping advice, liberally laced with consumer recommendations". This is very similar to the content of fashion magazines. Some retailers in the fashion industry have even started blogs of their own to promote their products.

Blogs that only occasionally mention fashion are not categorised as fashion blogs, although they may be labeled by the blogger as such

Impact on the fashion industry

Fashion is a multi-billion-dollar industry that has considerable impact on the way ordinary people clothe themselves. As fashion is trend-driven and fashion blogs provide a new way to follow these trends, it is likely they will have a considerable long-term influence on the industry.

These are some of the things fashion journalists have said about fashion blogs and the impact they are having on the industry:

* "These days, to have one finger on the fashion pulse, you need to have the other one on your computer mouse, reading (or writing) the latest blogs."
* "Before a designer’s runway show has even finished, you can bet your bottom dollar that someone in the audience – or better still, backstage – has recorded every silhouette, signature shoe, styling detail and sulking supermodel, then uploaded it onto the internet for style watchers across the globe to Enjoy."

Number of fashion blogs

There is considerable disagreement regarding the number of fashion blogs in existence.

In a February, 2006 Women's Wear Daily article, Corcoran stated:

There is an enormous, and growing, number of fashion and shopping-related blogs: about 2 million, according to Technorati Inc., [...] or slightly less than 10 percent of the 27 million blogs the company tracks. (That number includes blogs in languages that use the Roman alphabet and that contain anything fashion-related, including sites such as Pink Is the New Blog, which focuses on celebrities.)

It is likely that this figure is inflated by a substantial number of personal blogs that mention fashion. These are not considered fashion blogs using the criteria above.

All other estimates of the popularity of fashion blogs are considerably lower. In September 2005, La Ferla stated that "as little as a year ago, the number of [fashion bloggers] could be counted in the dozens. Today there are hundreds."Lara Zamiatin estimated in November 2006 that there are now "several hundred fashion blogs".

Types of fashion blogs

By writer's expertise

Fashion blogs may be written by insiders, outsiders or aspiring insiders.

Insiders are people who work (or have previously worked) in the fashion industry or for the traditional fashion media. In addition, some fashion insiders blog occasionally as guest on larger sites. For example, the fashion designer Nanette Lepore has contributed to Glam.com.

Outsiders are people who know a lot (or at least have strong opinions) about fashion, usually by virtue of being very dedicated consumers of fashion.

Aspiring insiders are people who want to work in the fashion industry or media and believe their blog may provide a ‘back door’ entry into a mainstream fashion writing job. Examples of people who have been employed within the fashion industry on the strength of their blogs include:

* Manolo the Shoe Blogger, who now has a weekly column in the Express a Washington Post Publication
* Heather and Jessica from Go Fug Yourself, who recently covered Fashion Week for New York Magazine

* The Budget Fashionista, Kathryn Finney, wrote a book called "How To Be a Budget Fashionista" that was published by Ballantine Books.

By ownership

Fashion blogs may be owned either by individuals or by companies.

The types of individuals running fashion blogs are listed above.

The types of companies now running fashion blogs include large mainstream media organizations and fashion retailers. Condé Nast Publications is a mainstream media organization with fashion blogs. Fashion retailers with blogs include Bluefly, Queen of Suburbia and Splendora.

By theme

Most successful fashion blogs follow a particular theme or angle. Some narrow their field to one type of fashion item e.g. shoes, handbags or denim. Some specialise in a particular price point: usually either very high-end or very budget conscious. Some cover celebrity fashion exclusively, while others cover street style. Some cover a mix of two or more of these topics. Many show the authors own personal style and asks for the readers opinion.

Early fashion blogs

Fashion blogs first appeared in the blogosphere prior to 2002, and Kathryn Finney, of The Budget Fashionista, was invited to New York Fashion Week as early as September 2003; a short time later, Fashiontribes.com was being seated fourth row at shows like Bill Blass. By 2008 Tina Craig and Kelly Cook of Bag Snob.com were seated second row at shows like Diane von Furstenberg and Oscar de la Renta.

The fashion blogs that attracted media attention in 2002 include two that are still in existence: LookOnline Daily Fashion Report and She She Me.

In 2004, the first accessories blog, Manolo's Shoe Blog, was launched. While it has been stated that Manolo's Shoe Blog was the first fashion blog,Manolo himself disputes this. He says he read a number of fashion blogs in 2003, and these inspired him to start blogging.

Later in 2004, Michelle Madhok introduced SheFinds.com, "an online shopping publication". By 2005, the site earned $300,000 per year, although most of that revenue went towards running expenses and Madhok paid herself just $40,000 per year.

Legal status of mp3 blog

2010-10-26T19:42:00.001-07:00

Many MP3 blogs post copyrighted material as a free download. While this is essentially illegal, record companies often turn a blind eye because of a belief that the blogs constitute free advertising. Bands such as Clap Your Hands Say Yeah and The National have reported increases in sales as a result of attention from MP3 blogs, which often provide links to legal album downloads.

MP3 bloggers commonly post disclaimers stating that all files are intended only for sampling, and often remove posted files within a short period of time.

The economic significance of MP3 blogs is relatively small compared to peer-to-peer networks.

MP3 blog

2010-10-26T19:39:00.000-07:00

An MP3 blog is a type of blog in which the creator makes music files, normally in the MP3 format, available for download. They are also known as "musicblogs" or "audioblogs". MP3 blogs have become increasingly popular since 2003. The music posted ranges from hard-to-find rarities that have not been issued in many years to more contemporary offerings, and selections are often restricted to a particular musical genre or theme. Some MP3 blogs offer music in Advanced Audio Coding (AAC) or Ogg formats.

Aggregators such as The Hype Machine and Elbo.ws track MP3 blog posts and display the most recently updated posts on its front page. The services are meant to provide a snapshot of what's going on in music blogging and make it easier to search through recently posted MP3s. The Hype Machine features a list of the most popular tracks of the last three days, as well as the most blogged bands and most popular searches. In June 2009, the popular songs list was altered so that it is only affected by user accounts that are several days old, after it was discovered that the "hearts scores" for dozens of songs were being artificially inflated by dummy accounts, often created in batches numbering in the hundreds. Elbo.ws has a similar feature listing which Bands, Tracks, and Videos are currently "hot." Music Blog Aggregators have caused a boom in MP3 blog readership and accessibility. Aggregators use RSS technology to collect data from MP3 blogs and link to the individual blog posts instead of directly to the MP3s.

The Hype Machine does not list blogs whose writers or editors are involved in the music public relations industry.

How can I make my blog load faster? ( secret tips and tricks )

2010-10-26T19:34:00.000-07:00

just go to the site "http://www.google.com/support/blogger/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=42394".

Software used for top 20 blogs

2010-10-26T19:32:00.000-07:00

The top blogs as ranked by Technorati use a mixture between third party software such as Wordpress and that developed and maintained primarily by internal engineers, such as the system used by Gizmodo.

Blog Software
1 The Huffington Post Movable Type
2 Gizmodo Gawker bespoke software[1]
3 TechCrunch Wordpress
4 TMZ.com Unknown
5 Engadget Blogsmith
6 Mashable Wordpress
7 The Corner Same CMS as National Review
8 Boing Boing Movable Type
9 Hot Air Wordpress
10 Gawker Gawker bespoke software[2]
11 Think Progress Wordpress
12 The Daily Dish Typepad
13 The Daily Beast
14 Newsbusters Unknown
15 CNN Political Ticker Wordpress
16 Ezra Klein at Washington Post Unknown
17 Breitbart.tv Unknown
18 Big Government Wordpress
19 ReadWriteWeb Movable Type
20 Matthew Yglesias Wordpress
21 /Film Wordpress

Server models

2010-10-26T19:31:00.000-07:00

Many weblog applications can be downloaded and installed on user systems. Some of them are provided under a free-software or open-source licenses, allowing them to be used, modified, and redistributed freely. Others are proprietary software which must be licensed.

Other weblog applications are offered only through their developers' hosts, either free of charge or for a fee. Services are typically limited to hosting of the blog itself, but some services offer the option of using the hosted software to update a blog published elsewhere.

Blog software

2010-10-26T19:27:00.000-07:00

Weblog software (also called blogging software or blogware) is software designed to simplify the creation and maintenance of weblogs. As specialized content management systems, weblog applications support the authoring, editing, and publishing of blog posts and comments, with special functions for image management, web syndication, and moderation of posts and comments.

Consumer generated advertising in blogs

2010-10-26T19:24:00.001-07:00

Consumer generated advertising is a relatively new and controversial development and it has created a new model of marketing communication from businesses to consumers. Among the various forms of advertising on blog, the most controversial are the sponsored posts. These are blog entries or posts and may be in the form of feedbacks, reviews, opinion, videos, etc. and usually containS a link back to the desired site using a keyword/s.

Blogs have led to some disintermediation and a breakdown of the traditional advertising model where companies can skip over the advertising agencies (previously the only interface with the customer) and contact the customers directly themselves. On the other hand, new companies specialised in blog advertising have been established, to take advantage of this new development as well.

However, there are many people who look negatively on this new development. Some believe that any form of commercial activity on blogs will destroy the blogosphere’s credibility.

Legal and social consequences

2010-10-26T19:23:00.001-07:00

Blogging can result in a range of legal liabilities and other unforeseen consequences.
Defamation or liability

Several cases have been brought before the national courts against bloggers concerning issues of defamation or liability. U.S. payouts related to blogging totaled $17.4 million by 2009; in some cases these have been covered by umbrella insurance. The courts have returned with mixed verdicts. Internet Service Providers (ISPs), in general, are immune from liability for information that originates with third parties (U.S. Communications Decency Act and the EU Directive 2000/31/EC).

In Doe v. Cahill, the Delaware Supreme Court held that stringent standards had to be met to unmask the anonymous posts of bloggers and also took the unusual step of dismissing the libel case itself (as unfounded under American libel law) rather than referring it back to the trial court for reconsideration. In a bizarre twist, the Cahills were able to obtain the identity of John Doe, who turned out to be the person they suspected: the town's mayor, Councilman Cahill's political rival. The Cahills amended their original complaint, and the mayor settled the case rather than going to trial.

In January 2007, two prominent Malaysian political bloggers, Jeff Ooi and Ahiruddin Attan, were sued by pro-government newspaper, The New Straits Times Press (Malaysia) Berhad, Kalimullah bin Masheerul Hassan, Hishamuddin bin Aun and Brenden John a/l John Pereira over an alleged defamation. The plaintiff was supported by the Malaysian government. Following the suit, the Malaysian government proposed to "register" all bloggers in Malaysia in order to better control parties against their interest.This is the first such legal case against bloggers in the country.

In the United States, blogger Aaron Wall was sued by Traffic Power for defamation and publication of trade secrets in 2005. According to Wired Magazine, Traffic Power had been "banned from Google for allegedly rigging search engine results." Wall and other "white hat" search engine optimization consultants had exposed Traffic Power in what they claim was an effort to protect the public. The case was watched by many bloggers because it addressed the murky legal question of who is liable for comments posted on blogs. The case was dismissed for lack of personal jurisdiction, and Traffic Power failed to appeal within the allowed time.

In 2009, a controversial and landmark decision by The Hon. Mr Justice Eady refused to grant an order to protect the anonymity of Richard Horton.

In 2009, NDTV issued a legal notice to Indian blogger Chetan Kunte for "abusive free speech" regarding a blog post criticizing their coverage of the Mumbai attacks. The blogger unconditionally withdrew his post, replacing it with legal undertaking and an admission that his post had been "defamatory and untrue" which resulted in several Indian bloggers criticizing NDTV for trying to silence critics.

Meaning of Blog

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A blog (a blend of the term web log) is a type of website or part of a website. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order. Blog can also be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog.

Most blogs are interactive, allowing visitors to leave comments and even message each other via widgets on the blogs and it is this interactivity that distinguishes them from other static websites.

Many blogs provide commentary or news on a particular subject; others function as more personal online diaries. A typical blog combines text, images, and links to other blogs, Web pages, and other media related to its topic. The ability of readers to leave comments in an interactive format is an important part of many blogs. Most blogs are primarily textual, although some focus on art (Art blog), photographs (photoblog), videos (video blogging), music (MP3 blog), and audio (podcasting). Microblogging is another type of blogging, featuring very short posts.

points helps to make a huge income

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Topic Experience

Topic Popularity

Topic Competition

Topic Contents

Choosing a Topic

Topic Interest

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you just love your topic and make the habit of reading , while in reading you get many many good ideas and this reading habit will help you to choose a topic for blogging and this will help you to earn a huge income from the blogging and adsense .

only choose the idea with you have a lot of ideas to express your all feelings towards to the blogging. If you have rich with your idea, normally your though will make a great sense of blogging this will pick you the hights of the life with the huge income by the adsense. Where the adsense have no limitation whether your traffic make you a huge income maker.

love yout topic and earn it

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That would be the best case scenario because it would be easy to write to the blog, because you love what you are talking about and to get paid as well would be an added bonus! Or do you pick a high earning niche that isn’t your passion, and then have to blog day after day about a topic that doesn’t capture your interest? That would be hard work. There is a lot to think about and consider when choosing a blog topic, and the heart should also be considered in that decision. There are no guarantees with blogging and you need to make the best decision for yourself from all the information, as you will be doing the blogging.

Do you find it difficult to choose a blog topic?

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It’s sometimes not as easy as it sounds! It depends on what you want out of the blog or out of your blogging? If you want to blog for the creative expression or the desire to talk about a topic or issue. Then you probably won’t be too bothered about the size or popularity of your chosen niche, how much traffic you can tap into or how much money you can make. You just want to blog about it for the passion and therefore these are not big factors in the decision making process.

It gets more complicated when you want to reach an audience, a certain amount of readers or you want to make an income from your blog. Now it becomes very important to look at your niche and how much traffic you can hope to receive. You will have to look at how saturated the market is, are there a lot of blogs already out there that cover the topic that you want to talk about, and can you stand out from that crowd to make yourself heard, or read! Can you blog for long enough about the topic and is the niche big enough to attract an audience. Are there a lot of authority blogs running in your niche that have huge amounts of readers. If there are and the niche looks crowded then maybe you could try a sub niche for your topic and specialize in that instead. You need to look at all these answers and determine which way you should go, to give yourself the best chance of having a successful blog. At the end of the day that’s what the research is for, to make an educated decision.

How to Choose a Blog Topic

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1

Write down your ideas. Write down any idea that you have that you think would make a good blog. You can search around and check out other blogs that interest you or use a blog directory

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2

When making the decision you will want to choose a topic that you are passionate about. If you don't have passion for the topic then it will be hard for you to keep the topic up.
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3

Choose a topic that you already know a lot about. After all, it isn't going to do you any good if you have to spend lots of time researching posts in order to update your blog.
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4

Once you think you have a good topic sit down and make sure that you can make at least ten, but preferably closer to twenty sub-topics, categories, and or related topics. This will make it easier for you to have something to write about!
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5

Make sure there is plenty to say. You will want to update it at least three times a week for a long time. You will want to make sure there is plenty to say to keep your blog updated.

History of blogging

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While the term "blog" was not coined until the late 1990s, the history of blogging starts with several digital precursors to it. Before "blogging" became popular, digital communities took many forms, including Usenet, commercial online services such as GEnie, BiX and the early CompuServe, e-mail lists[1] and Bulletin Board Systems (BBS). In the 1990s, Internet forum software, such as WebEx, created running conversations with "threads". Threads are topical connections between messages on a metaphorical "corkboard". Some have likened blogging to the Mass-Observation project of the mid-20th century.
1983–1990

Usenet was the primary serial medium included in the original definition of the Internet. It featured the Moderated Newsgroup which allowed all posting in a newsgroup to be under the control of an individual or small group. Most such newsgroups were simply moderated discussion forums, however, in 1983-84, one exception, named mod.ber, was created, named after and managed by an individual: Brian E. Redman. Regularly, Redman and a few associates posted summaries of interesting postings and threads taking place elsewhere on the net.

1994–2001
The modern blog evolved from the online diary, where people would keep a running account of their personal lives. Most such writers called themselves diarists, journalists, or journalers. A few called themselves "escribitionists". The Open Pages webring included members of the online-journal community. Justin Hall, who began eleven years of personal blogging in 1994 while a student at Swarthmore College, is generally recognized as one of the earliest bloggers,[2] as is Jerry Pournelle.[citation needed] Another early blog was Wearable Wireless Webcam, an online shared diary of a person's personal life combining text, video, and pictures transmitted live from a wearable computer and EyeTap device to a web site in 1994. This practice of semi-automated blogging with live video together with text was referred to as sousveillance, and such journals were also used as evidence in legal matters.

Other forms of journals kept online also existed. A notable example was game programmer John Carmack's widely read journal, published via the finger protocol. Some of the very earliest bloggers, like Steve Gibson of sCary's Quakeholio (now Shacknews) and Stephen Heaslip of Blue's News (still running since 1995 with online archives back to July 1996), evolved from the Quake scene and Carmack's .plan updates. Steve Gibson was hired to blog full-time by Ritual Entertainment on February 8, 1997 [3], possibly making him the first hired blogger.

Websites, including both corporate sites and personal homepages, had and still often have "What's New" or "News" sections, often on the index page and sorted by date. One example of a news based "weblog" is the Drudge Report founded by the self-styled maverick reporter Matt Drudge, though apparently Drudge dislikes this classification. Another is the Institute for Public Accuracy which began posting news releases featuring several news-pegged one-paragraph quotes several times a week beginning in 1998. One noteworthy early precursor to a blog was the tongue-in-cheek personal website that was frequently updated by Usenet legend Kibo.

Early weblogs were simply manually updated components of common websites. However, the evolution of tools to facilitate the production and maintenance of web articles posted in reverse chronological order made the publishing process feasible to a much larger, less technical, population. Ultimately, this resulted in the distinct class of online publishing that produces blogs we recognize today. For instance, the use of some sort of browser-based software is now a typical aspect of "blogging". Blogs can be hosted by dedicated blog hosting services, or they can be run using blog software, such as WordPress, Movable Type, Blogger or LiveJournal, or on regular web hosting services.

The term "weblog" was coined by Jorn Barger[4] on 17 December 1997. The short form, "blog," was coined by Peter Merholz, who jokingly broke the word weblog into the phrase we blog in the sidebar of his blog Peterme.com in April or May 1999.[5][6][7] Shortly thereafter, Evan Williams at Pyra Labs used "blog" as both a noun and verb ("to blog," meaning "to edit one's weblog or to post to one's weblog") and devised the term "blogger" in connection with Pyra Labs' Blogger product, leading to the popularization of the terms.[8]

After a slow start, blogging rapidly gained in popularity. Blog usage spread during 1999 and the years following, being further popularized by the near-simultaneous arrival of the first hosted blog tools:

* Open Diary launched in October 1998, soon growing to thousands of online diaries. Open Diary innovated the reader comment, becoming the first blog community where readers could add comments to other writers' blog entries.
* Brad Fitzpatrick, a well known blogger started LiveJournal in March 1999.
* Andrew Smales created Pitas.com in July 1999 as an easier alternative to maintaining a "news page" on a website, followed by Diaryland in September 1999, focusing more on a personal diary community.[9]
* Evan Williams and Meg Hourihan (Pyra Labs) launched blogger.com in August 1999 (purchased by Google in February 2003)

Blogging combined the personal web page with tools to make linking to other pages easier — specifically permalinks, blogrolls and TrackBacks. This, together with weblog search engines enabled bloggers to track the threads that connected them to others with similar interests.
[edit] 2001–2004

Several broadly popular American political blogs emerged in 2001: Ron Gunzburger's Politics1, Taegan Goddard's Political Wire, Glenn Reynolds' Instapundit, Charles Johnson's Little Green Footballs, and Jerome Armstrong's MyDD. Andrew Sullivan's AndrewSullivan.com — now entitled "The Daily Dish" — launched in October 2000 and gained readership during 2001, especially in the wake of the September 11 attacks.[10] (Two earlier popular American political blogs were Bob Somerby's Daily Howler, launched in 1998, and Mickey Kaus' Kausfiles, launched in 1999).

By 2001, blogging was enough of a phenomenon that how-to manuals began to appear, primarily focusing on technique. The importance of the blogging community (and its relationship to larger society) increased rapidly. Established schools of journalism began researching blogging and noting the differences between journalism and blogging.

Also in 2002, many blogs focused on comments by U.S. Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott. Senator Lott, at a party honoring U.S. Senator Strom Thurmond, praised Senator Thurmond by suggesting that the United States would have been better off had Thurmond been elected president. Lott's critics saw these comments as a tacit approval of racial segregation, a policy advocated by Thurmond's 1948 presidential campaign. This view was reinforced by documents and recorded interviews dug up by bloggers. (See Josh Marshall's Talking Points Memo.) Though Lott's comments were made at a public event attended by the media, no major media organizations reported on his controversial comments until after blogs broke the story. Blogging helped to create a political crisis that forced Lott to step down as majority leader.

The impact of this story gave greater credibility to blogs as a medium of news dissemination. Though often seen as partisan gossips, bloggers sometimes lead the way in bringing key information to public light, with mainstream media having to follow their lead. More often, however, news blogs tend to react to material already published by the mainstream media.

Since 2002, blogs have gained increasing notice and coverage for their role in breaking, shaping, and spinning news stories. The Iraq war saw bloggers taking measured and passionate points of view that go beyond the traditional left-right divide of the political spectrum.

Blogging was established by politicians and political candidates to express opinions on war and other issues and cemented blogs' role as a news source. (See Howard Dean and Wesley Clark.) Meanwhile, an increasing number of experts blogged, making blogs a source of in-depth analysis. (See Daniel Drezner and J. Bradford DeLong.)

Blogging was used to draw attention to obscure news sources. For example, bloggers posted links to traffic cameras in Madrid as a huge anti-terrorism demonstration filled the streets in the wake of the March 11 attacks.

Bloggers began to provide nearly-instant commentary on televised events, creating a secondary meaning of the word "blogging": to simultaneously transcribe and editorialize speeches and events shown on television. (For example, "I am blogging Rice's testimony" means "I am posting my reactions to Condoleezza Rice's testimony into my blog as I watch her on television.") Real-time commentary is sometimes referred to as "liveblogging."
[edit] 2004–present

In 2004, the role of blogs became increasingly mainstream, as political consultants, news services and candidates began using them as tools for outreach and opinion forming. Even politicians not actively campaigning, such as the UK's Labour Party's MP Tom Watson, began to blog to bond with constituents.

Minnesota Public Radio broadcast a program by Christopher Lydon and Matt Stoller called "The blogging of the President," which covered a transformation in politics that blogging seemed to presage. The Columbia Journalism Review began regular coverage of blogs and blogging. Anthologies of blog pieces reached print, and blogging personalities began appearing on radio and television. In the summer of 2004, both United States Democratic and Republican Parties' conventions credentialed bloggers, and blogs became a standard part of the publicity arsenal. Mainstream television programs, such as Chris Matthews' Hardball, formed their own blogs. Merriam-Webster's Dictionary declared "blog" as the word of the year in 2004.

In 2004, Global Voices Online, a site which "aggregates, curates, and amplifies the global conversation online – shining light on places and people other media often ignore" surfaced, bringing to light bloggers from around the world. Today, the site has a relationship with Reuters and is responsible for breaking many global news stories.

Blogs were among the driving forces behind the "Rathergate" scandal, to wit: (television journalist) Dan Rather presented documents (on the CBS show 60 Minutes) that conflicted with accepted accounts of President Bush's military service record. Bloggers declared the documents to be forgeries and presented evidence and arguments in support of that view, and CBS apologized for what it said were inadequate reporting techniques (see Little Green Footballs). Many bloggers view this scandal as the advent of blogs' acceptance by the mass media, both as a news source and opinion and as means of applying political pressure.

Some bloggers have moved over to other media. The following bloggers (and others) have appeared on radio and television: Duncan Black (known widely by his pseudonym, Atrios), Glenn Reynolds (Instapundit), Markos Moulitsas Zúniga (Daily Kos), Alex Steffen (Worldchanging) and Ana Marie Cox (Wonkette). In counter-point, Hugh Hewitt exemplifies a mass media personality who has moved in the other direction, adding to his reach in "old media" by being an influential blogger. Music blog publisher Jeff Davidson, Earvolution.com, now produces Sun Studio Sessions airing on PBS stations across the U.S.

Some blogs were an important news source during the December 2004 Tsunami such as Médecins Sans Frontières, which used SMS text messaging to report from affected areas in Sri Lanka and Southern India. Similarly, during Hurricane Katrina in August 2005 and the aftermath a few blogs which were located in New Orleans, including the Interdictor and Gulfsails were able to maintain power and an Internet connection and disseminate information that was not covered by the Main Stream Media.

In the United Kingdom, The Guardian newspaper launched a redesign in September 2005, which included a daily digest of blogs on page 2. Also in June 2006, BBC News launched a weblog for its editors, following other news companies