Well, Avery M. has taken me up on my offer and has bloggrolled me for $5.00. They asked me to donate to the Red Cross, so I have gone ahead and done so. That was very nice of them, don’t you think?
Here is the winner’s blog: Shii’s Rocky Middle Path
Stay tuned..I may make this a regular Friday Feature. Perhaps I should call it the Friday $5.00? 
Linked with thanks to: Point Five
Darren at problogger has asked for volunteers to participate in group writing project titled Habits of Highly Effective Bloggers. So, here’s my a snapshot of my daily blogging routine.
First off, even though I’ve been working online since around 1995, I am very much a latecomer to blogging. I guess there has been so much hype surrounding it that I ignored it. The other factor that kept me away and still makes me nervous to this day is that something doesn’t seem quite right about the massive amount of blogs that are out there, and the large number of new blogs that are started every day.
I will say that my primary reason for blogging is to hopefully make a living from it. I’m trying to combine this with my passions/interests so the journey will be a fun one. Even though my gut keeps reminding me of the dot com bomb, I think it is worth the risk spending a large chunk of my time and efforts with blogging. Hopefully my gut will be wrong and I’ll make a large fortune. Anyway, now with my habits.
Because I’m a night owl, I usually wake up around 11am or noon. After waking, I turn on my computer and fix myself breakfast. The first thing I do is check my email, then check my latest stats to see if there is traffic coming in from any new sources. I love using Sitemeter for my stats - it is very simple, free and effective enough. I check the stats on all of my blogs and if I’m lucky will notice a huge burst in traffic. I had this luck with one of my blogs as I was mentioned in a very popular German vidcast of some sort that brought a few thousand extra visitors in one day.
Next I check to see how my ad revenue is doing and if any fine tuning may be necessary for my blog. I’m way obsessed in this area, but am trying to check less often.
I will then read an affirmation I typed out. I read this statement in the morning and right before I go to bed. It is kind of an experiment. If you have ever read the book Think and Grow Rich, you will probably know what I’m talking about. Anyway, I read the affirmation which is a financial goal of what I want to make with blogging, the time limit in which I should obtain it and what I should give in return (lots of quality blogging) for the moola.
Next I will moderate any comments if necessary, answer email and start planning my blogging day out. I keep an ongoing list of blogging goals and update them daily. I have a handful of blogs I have started, but only 2-3 are getting the most attention right now. I’m starting to think it might be best to focus on one blog until it gets to an optimum level of performance. Who knows…I’m learning as I go. Anyway, I go through my goal list and update if necessary and try to make a list of what I think I can get done today. Then, I simply do it.
I will likely stay up till 4 or 5 in the morning before I’m satisfied I’ve put in a good effort for the day. The goal list helps keep me on track and with it hopefully I’ve done some marketing, research, writing, brainstorming, maintenance and perhaps have had a bite to eat sometime in there.
I’m trying to read more blogs and see what everyone else is up to. I obsess over some blogs…like this one and this one. Why can such crazy blogs build such a huge following? Who knows? Whatever works, works, right?
Anyway, for now that’s about it with my blogging habits. The best advice I’ve ever heard on the subject of writing and writer’s block is “writers write”. So, perhaps the best advice on blogging could be… “bloggers blog”.
A web site design is one of the most important features cheap web hosting as it serves as an attraction ground for the end user. So the website design must be well looked for in its making in accordance with the target audience. Most of the ppc advertising done uses a website design. The businessmen using their wireless internet click on the affiliate resources as while searching for related products. This clicking pays the website host a pay per click.
If you would like a quick and easy way to submit your latest entry in your blog, social bookmarking sites are a good place to start. Many of these sites will show your site on their home page as soon as you submit it. It’s up to everyone else that uses each of these sites whether your site stays there or gets buried.
Don’t bother submitting your latest blog article if you plan on spamming. You’ll do nothing but irritate everyone and they will quickly flame you and nuke your story. They may even show up on your doorstep. Well…let’s hope not. Anyway, you know the drill - provide high quality content and if it’s good enough you may find yourself getting bombarded with traffic. What’s good enough? Well, perhaps check the section of each of these sites to see what is popular.
You will need to register for each of these sites before you can submit anything. And without further ado….here is a list of 55 social bookmarking sites I have compiled. If I missed any, feel free to leave a comment and let me know.
I’ve been so busy with other stuff lately that I haven’t been checking some of my feeds and other blogs I usually visit. When I went to see what Chris Pirillo was up to I noticed he has switched to WordPress. I’ve only messed around with Blogger and Typepad but have a pretty good feeling WordPress is the way to go these days. Per his suggestion, I’m going to try installing the “World’s Best WordPress” plugin and see what all the fuss is about. It will be very interesting to watch how he continues to pimp his blog.
The web hosting services are increasing as the number of pay per click ppc options are multiplying. The cheap web hosting is an option for dealers who can’t afford the costs behind search engine marketing. Thus website hosting through channels is selected though it does not promise effective search engine marketing. With the coming of wireless internet search engines are being accessed all over the world in businesses and jobs increasing the workload of search engines.
Well this has been a bit of a crazy day - in a good way. Besides buying a winning $50 scratch ticket, I was mentioned on a German news site which brought in a nice chunk of traffic to one of my blogs…probably 4,000 or so extra visitors. I love days like that… I wish it would happen every day.
I am finding the deeper I get into blogging the more humbled I am becoming. It’s pretty tough finding a good idea that can attract visitors, keep them coming back, earn you money and be exciting at the same time. It’s not impossible, just tougher than first anticipated. I think one of my biggest hangups is after going through the first dot.com bomb I’m always expecting another internet implosion and this creates a certain anxiety. Do I really want to invest all of my efforts into something that could cave in with little or no warning? Well, I guess that’s part of the risk I have to take.
Another hangup I have is the massive amount of blogs that are already out there. It does seem quite saturated - but the good thing is there are a lot of blogs that come and go. This blog could be one of them! Hopefully not though. There is only so much time though and only so many blogs one person can run. My gut feeling tells me to stick with one blog and do that one well and start another one only when that one has built up a lot of momentum. But, I’ve got several good blog ideas and am having problems figuring out which ones to focus on. Yes…I’m probably spreading myself too thin.
I think most of all I need some type of structure. A schedule of some sort. Anyone out there have any suggestions for how to run multiple blogs? How many do you run… and how do you do it?
Since I started this site a little over a week ago, I think I’ve changed my mind on what will be in this blog. I don’t want to repeat a lot of content that is already out there, so I’m thinking it would be more fun and perhaps more interesting to use this blog to document my progress to (hopefully) become a six figure blogger. Hopefully you can then use this information to increase your blog traffic and income.
Last month around this time I officially decided to once and for all give this blogging stuff a try. I’m very happy with my results so far…I’d love to disclose what I’ve made, but am too paranoid to do so. Let’s just say that I could break the four figure mark in my first month. The biggest reason for such a good first month is from Michael Cheney’s Adsense Videos. I highly recommend you buy his package now. It’s well worth the money.
Today I’m going to start the 31 Days to Building a Better Blog series. It looks pretty fun and promising. I thought I read on his site that one guy doubled his traffic after the end of the 31 days. I’ve got a handful of blogs to use this with, so I’ll let you know how it goes. Well, time’s a wasting… time to blog!
Well, after taking some time away from the computer, Internet and blogging I came back to find very little traffic to this blog. But, that’s ok. I put in a lot of time last week and needed the break. It took me about a day to wind down and actually be able to relax…and once I was able to relax I found myself craving to blog…but unfortunately didn’t have Wi-Fi in the woods.
I’m starting to think it might be good to treat blogging like a good exercise routine. When you lift weights, you need to give your muscles a day off so your muscles can recover and rebuild. Perhaps it would be best to create some kind of blogging exercise schedule? Perhaps alternate blog Monday, Wednesday and Friday…and market my blogs Tuesday and Thursday? Hmm…I’ll have to think about this one a bit.
I did do a write an article before my camping trip that I scheduled to have posted on Saturday. It was cool to come back and see this article on my blog that was automatically posted at the time I requested before I left. If you think you can’t blog every day, then perhaps spend one or two days and write all of your posts for the week - then have blog software post when you desire.
I did find there are quite a few good advertising bargains on blogads. I found several blogs where you can advertise for as little as $10 for a week! I bought one of those $10 ads and am testing it right now. You should select a specific category to see these $10 bargain ad spots.
Well, I hope in the next day or two to come up with another article that might create some buzz. This week I’m going to take a closer look at what the market wants…then try to tailor an article to fit that market. Stay tuned…
Well it may be time for some insane marketing tactics. I’m not sure if it has something to do with Friday and the time of the year, but today’s traffic seems to have dipped a bit with a few of my web sites. Maybe today is graduation day for a lot of people? Hmm…not sure.
Anyway, I had a crazy idea when I woke up this morning. Do you remember the forehead ad guy from a year or so ago who raked in $37,375 to put an ad on his forehead for a month? Well, tons of people have done the same with the attempt to get money - but as far as I know, nobody has done it for a link on the homepage of a high traffic site. My gut feeling tells me that someone out there would do it. Imagine getting a homepage link on digg, TechCrunch or Fark in exchange for a forehead ad?
Well, it’s just an idea. If anyone wants to borrow my idea, you’re welcome to it. I’d be very curious to see if it works. Who knows, maybe I’ll give this one a shot.
Well, it has been one week since I started this blog, completely “from scratch” and I have brought in 1,027 visitors with an average of 133 visits per day. As for page views, this blog brought in 1,944 total with an average of 246 per day. Not bad, I guess? For the latest stats on this site, click here.
I have definitely learned a lot in this first week and have also changed my opinion on some things since I started. Since one of the main reasons to get a lot of traffic is to make money and one of the most popular sources of revenue is Google Adsense, I take back what I said earlier about using traffic exchanges and anything that resembles that. Darren from problogger first clued me in on this. I wondered though if StumbleUpon would fall into this category. I emailed Google and they could not say anything about any specific company. They repeated the phrase “We recommend that you exercise caution when using traffic exchange programs”.
So, whether you can use StumbleUpon is a mystery. I’d say it is better to play it safe and don’t bother…for now, it’s not worth the risk. Which is too bad, because you can get some really good traffic for a fairly reasonable cost…and it is very well targeted.
If you’re not using Adsense or any other advertising network and don’t have to worry about being banned then perhaps traffic exchanges are for you.
Overall, I think this article and this article brought in the most traffic. I was mentioned in a few other blogs and forum posts, creating a mini snowball effect. Probably the quickest and easiest way to get good traffic is to write high quality posts that others will want to blog and talk about. Leverage the power of sites like digg, and if you’re lucky - one front page story could bring you bucketloads of traffic.
Other than this I think optimizing your blog is the next important thing. I’m still not getting very much (if any) traffic from Google, but my site is listed. Perhaps I have need to optimize a few more things?
I’m definitely running low on steam and have gone kind of overboard lately. I’ve got at least 5 blogs that I’ve started, and ideas for a few more I’d like to start. I know it’s insane and not the direction I should go in…but I guess I temporarily have “blog fever”. If I get my head together, I’ll focus on two or three blogs at most. Really, I should just focus on one - but I don’t see that happening yet.
I wonder what is best - to have one blog (using one domain) covering many different topics…or have several very specific blogs each with their own domain? I’m taking the latter route, so I guess I’ll wait and see what happens.
[tags]blog,blogs,blogging,Blogging+Tips,weblogs,blog-tips[/tags]
Ok, I’ve had enough with the default masthead that comes with the WordPress, so I finally made something a little more eye pleasing. It’s not the best in the world, but not as embarassing as the default look. Well, I didn’t plan on doing this, but perhaps I should make this a quick tutorial in case anyone else out there would like to know how to do this.
Step 1:
To get started, first right click and save your default masthead to your desktop. It should be a blue masthead that looks something like this:
Step 2:
Using Photoshop or other image editing software, select the white border on the outside of the blue and then COPY the selection.
Step 3:
Hopefully you have already found a good background for your masthead. If not find one and open it up. Now simply pasted your selected area to this background picture. Add text or other graphics if desired:
Step 4:
What I do from this point is crop in the white area and then paste this on top of the original blue masthead image. By default, your masthead is probably stored in a location on your server at:
/wp-content/themes/default/images/kubrickheader.jpg
To make things easy, safe your new masthead as kubrickheader.jpg and upload over the old one. Save the old one if you like as a backup.
Now, your new masthead should show up on your blog. But, you probably notice your blog title overlapping your masthead making things look screwy. You will also want your masthead clickable so readers can use it to easily navigate to your home page. To do this you will need to go into your blog admin and click on “Presentation”, then click “Theme Editor”. On the right click the link that says “Header”.
It should say at the top: “Editing header.php”. Select and copy everything and save this as a backup on your computer in case you make a mistake. The section you will need to edit is near the bottom of the header.php file.
At this point I will send you to a more detailed explanation of how to edit the code. Click here to continue…
Now, what does this have to do with increasing traffic to your blog? Well, nothing directly. It has more to do with making your blog pleasing to your visitors…so they will keep coming back.
[tags]blog,blogs,blogging,Blogging+Tips,wordpress,weblogs,blog-tips[/tags]
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