Written on July 29th, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia28 zone.at 09:07 am by Darren Rowse
Earning Fortunes - One Click at a Time
MSNBC has a ‘nice’ (I call it nice because it’s a fairly shallow, but warm and fuzzy one) article on Publishers making money from contextual advertising and gives some examples of a variety of sites making decent money, one click at a time. I’m always amazed by the diversity of sites out there that make money. This article covers site ranging from services that help scientists and researches find public documents, to one that reviews the best seats on planes, to one that offers free layouts of MySpace users to one that is a directory of podcasts. What a bizarre and wonderful collection of sites making good money from contextual ads.
Written on July 29th, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia28 zone.at 04:07 am by Brian Clark
You Don’t Need a Product of Your Own to Have a Successful Product Blog
As we wrap up this short series of posts on product blogging, let’s take a look at a strategy for those who may not have a product of their own to sell. We’ve looked at selling information and niche e-commerce, and you can obviously use those strategies with products that you sell on behalf of others.
Two Ways to Work on Commission
Selling for others online basically boils down to two options:
- Affiliate programs are a logical choice. They’re easy to find and join via various affiliate program directories, and tracking and payment systems are already in place. However, you have competition. The key to successful affiliate product blogs is to add independent value, as we’ll discuss below.
- Joint ventures or representation agreements are another option, and can be hugely profitable if structured and executed properly. In this case, you find a product that is not currently being marketed online, and strike a deal with the owner that allows you to sell the item on a negotiated commission basis. You’ll also need to be familiar with affiliate program software, as you’ll likely be advising the seller on how to set up a way to track your sales.
Add Value and Build Credibility
With the crack down on the “Google Cash” method of sending searchers directly to affiliate merchant sites via pay-per-click, plus the most recent AdWords landing page shake-up, the situation is clear — the pressure is on to actually add value, rather than simply drive traffic. Plus, as the Internet itself makes consumers more savvy then ever, some of the older affiliate marketing techniques have become less effective.
- Adding value means offering something to the potential buyer beyond a link to the merchant site. This could be free bonuses you deliver with a purchase, or even a rebate that comes from your commission. But it need not be anything like that. Creating content that caters to the lifestyle surrounding the product, or that shows how a product solves a problem, is a value-add strategy that is perfectly suited for blogs.
- Creating “review” sites monetized by affiliate links is a strategy that goes way back, but it may not work very well going forward. Savvy consumers can sniff out your profit motive, and discount your review and go looking elsewhere. Blogs like Engadget and Darren’s own digital camera review blog forego hard selling of the product and rely mostly on advertising instead. You’ll want to be transparent about wanting to sell the product if that’s your model, and by no means be ashamed of it.
Learn the Product, and Don’t be Afraid to SELL It!
It’s impossible to truly add value and maintain credibility without really understanding what you’re selling. In-house copywriters live and breathe the details of the company products, and the first thing freelance copywriters do when starting a new assignment is become exhaustively familiar with everything they can get their hands on about the item to be sold.
Once you really understand a product, and believe in it, selling becomes much easier. Your enthusiasm is genuine, and people can pick up on that in your writing. Combine your knowledge and that excitement with good copywriting, and you’re on your way.
If you’re interested in learning more about copywriting for product blogs, affiliate marketing and joint ventures, I’ll be digging in deeper over at my place.
Otherwise, thanks to Darren for letting me guest post during his paternity leave — his biggest adventure is only just beginning. :)
Written on July 29th, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia28 zone.at 04:07 am by Darren Rowse
If I had to Start My Blog Again - Final Reader Submissions
This week’s group writing project is now officially closed with 80 submissions (see the complete list here). Thanks to all who participated.
Now the ‘judging’ of submissions begins. Head to the full list from this week and do a little surfing of what people have written. While there is no official ‘winner’ or ‘judging’ I encourage you to find a few that you resonate with most and link up to them on your own blog to acknowledge the good blogging of others.
Here are the final 12 submissions. Once again there is some insightful posts in this lot!
- Would I Care if I Made $0.00? by Adnan
- Mistakes I’ve Made Wit my Blog in the First 30 Days by Igor
- Haiku by Tillerman
- Jump on the couch: What I would have done differently with my blog by Sarakastic
- Je ne regrette rien - Ha, I wish! by Katy
- What would I do if I was starting over again by Peter
- Blogging - Does Currency of Information matter? by Dorai
- Re-Wind, Re-Do, Re-Start by Bald Man
- Starting All Over Again by L.P. Rieger
- Brand Your Blog From Day 1 by Eric
- Again…Again by Andy
- Discovering More Time by Steve
Thanks to all who have participated in this week’s project. There will be a new one in the week after next (I’ve got a fun topic in mind that all bloggers should be able to participate in). I’m also considering offering a prize or two to those who participate in the next round to add to the benefits of participating.
Written on July 29th, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia28 zone.at 12:07 am by Darren Rowse
Blog Readers are Selfish
Perhaps my post on remembering that blog readers are people was a touch too ‘warm and fuzzy’ - so I thought I’d balance it with another characteristic of blog readers that it’s well worth keeping in mind as you blog…. that being that….
Blog Readers are selfish!
Ok - that might be a little harshly put…. blog readers have many characteristics and motivations for reading blogs, but from my experience of both reading and writing blogs - there is at least an element of truth to the idea that most blog readers have some selfish element to their motivation (and I put myself into that also).
Most of us live pretty full lives with plenty of opportunities when it comes to deciding how to spend our time. I often lament that I wish there were more hours in a day because I never seem to have time to do everything I want to do.
As a result of this when I find a new book, website, TV show, newspaper article…. blog …. etc - I tend to ask myself a question of some sort to work out whether it’s something I want to spend time doing. When it comes down to it - the question boils down to:
‘What’s in it for Me?’
Of course I might not say it in those words - I might ask:
- ‘does this interest me?’ or….
- ‘will this help me become a better person?’ or….
- ‘is this fun/entertaining/relaxing?’ etc
but ultimately I’m asking ‘what’s in it for me?‘
I have a theory that this little question is one that most of us ask throughout our days as we decide what to invest time into.
That’s not to say we don’t do things that are not ’selfish’ - but it’s definitely a filtering question that many of your blog’s readers will be asking in one form or another.
Take Home Advice
So knowing this information, and knowing that people make up their minds very quickly whether to stay on a website or not (most seem to stay on blogs for just seconds), it’s important to give your potential reader a reason to stay and explore your blog.
Tell them ‘what’s in it for them’ - and tell them loudly, quickly and clearly.
Don’t hide the answer to that question away on an about page, or at the bottom of an in depth article on the benefits of your blog.
One of the best ways to do this is to work hard and nailing down the key benefit of reading your blog into a single sentence or phrase so that you can incorporate it into your page title and header - you might even like to reinforce this with a picture or some other visual element (like a logo) that communicates simply and clearly what the blog is about.
Make it clear how readers will benefit from interacting with your blog but whatever you do - deliver upon your claim. It’s all very well to tell them what they’ll get by sticking around - but if they don’t see the benefits you claim they’ll be gone before you know it.
Also take this same principle and put it into the micro nature of blogging - the writing of individual posts. Your title and first sentences are essential in the writing and reading of a post so keep your potential’s ’selfishness’ in mind as you form them also.
Written on July 28th, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia28 zone.at 11:07 pm by Darren Rowse
Chitika Release WordPress Plugin v2.0
Chitika have announced a new version of their WordPress plugin that works with WP2. The improvements include:
- The plugin configuration is now done through the Wordpress options tab. No need to edit the files.
- To put a eMiniMall right into your blog post, there is now a little button on the editor to help you add and customize the eMiniMal l for that particular post
- This plugin is backward compatible with Wordpress 1.5. So you can use it with Wordpress 1.5 as well.
Written on July 28th, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia28 zone.at 04:07 pm by Darren Rowse
Ana Marie Cox Talks Blogging
David Pogue from the NYT has a good interview with Ana Marie Cox, blogger from the massively successful Wonkette. She’s also recently been hired to become Washington editor of Time.com as a result of her blogging.
In it he asks her about how she got into blogging (Nick Denton discovered her in a grocery store) as well as exploring what it’s like to be a paid blogger with a contract.
They also dig into the ‘ingredients of a successful blog’ in which Ana talks about how she sees a move from blogs run by individuals to blogs being run by groups of people as being a shift that is happening and will continue to happen in the successful blog ranks.
Written on July 28th, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia28 zone.at 09:07 am by Darren Rowse
Dave Sifry on Making Your Blog Popular
Dave Sifry gives a few basic tips in next month’s Wired on how to get more traffic to your blog.
It’s pretty basic stuff but has a few good points (his headings are in bold - my thoughts after each with links to where you can read more on each):
- React quickly - IF your blog is news related or talking about current events or any other time specific topic this is key. I operate in a few product related niches and know if I can have a post out within hours of a product announcement that I stand a good chance of being linked to by other sites and being first to be indexed by Search Engines and other indexing sites. It also helps you get credibility and loyal readers who want to know the latest news and get Scoops.
- Make your posts easy to read - I had dinner with a reader last night and one of the things he told me that he likes about my blogging is that he finds it accessible. He said it was like sitting in a cafe with a coffee and chatting with me. I’m not saying that my style of writing is how everyone should write - but it’s always been my goal to write in an accessible style and I think it’s paid off. So write in a style that’s easy to read but also a form that is digestible (which includes thinking about things like scannable content, using lists etc)
- Link, link, link! - Dave’s right in what he says about this being somewhat counter intuitive. Many bloggers guard their outbound links and only do it when they have to in the hope that it’ll keep people on their blogs. While there are some circumstances where outbound links will be less appropriate than others - in general I think linking to others is a worthwhile way of participating in the wider conversation - which has the flow on benefit of traffic. Read more on the times when outbound links are and are not appropriate.
- Optimize for search engines - While you never want to lose site of the fact that you’re writing for humans, it’s also worth noting that most people find content online at one time or another via search engines. As a result to ignore basic SEO principles you’re limiting the potential to be found by those Actively searching for it.
- Post, post, post! - There’s no need to go overboard and post just for the sake of it - but keep your posting level up to the highest rate that you can sustain without sacrificing on quality. The key is establishing regular frequency and keeping momentum going on your blog. Read more on whether Posting Frequency Matters.
Dave’s pointers are fairly entry level and are tips that most bloggers have heard before - but the reality is that it’s often the basics things that work best.
Also check out my post with 19 strategies for finding readers for your blog.
Written on July 28th, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia28 zone.at 03:07 am by Darren Rowse
103bees Search Term Analytics - Review
103bees is a free tool for analyzing inbound search engine traffic. As with most tools of this nature you use it by adding a small piece of javascript code to your template and it then goes to work analyzing what SE the traffic is from, what keywords they come to your blog after searching, what landing pages they hit on your blog etc. You get 7 days of analysis for free and can upgrade to get 30 days (still for free).
The basic information that it gives you includes:
- Comparative analysis of how much traffic is coming to your site from SE’s vs referral/bookmarks/type ins
- Latest Search Terms - the most recent phrases that people came searching for
- Top Landing Pages - the most popular landing pages on your blog and how many visitors they’ve had in the last 7 days
- Top Search Terms - a list of terms that people used to come to your blog searching for with how many visitors used them
- Top Key Words - a list of single words and how many people used them (you can also get this presented as a tag view)
- Search Engines - a list of which search engines sent the traffic and how many people used them (also what percentage of all SE traffic they made up)
The above are the first level of stats that you get. Then you can go deeper from within these pages and can do cool things like go to a page that analyses a keyword or phrase and shows you how much traffic came from different SE’s for that term (useful for comparing how different SE’s rank you for different terms). There’s also a deeper page that graphs how many hits different landing pages got over time and another to analyze what search terms people used when arriving at a certain landing page.
The analysis you get from 103bees is not completely unique - I’ve got all of it already from different stats packages BUT I do like a few things about it that make it worth considering:
- Analysis is done in real time - the stats come into your analysis area very quickly, something some other stats packages don’t give you
- Multiple Domains - you can track multiple domains (they are called ‘projects’) in the one package - very handy for us multi-bloggers
- Usefulness of Analysis - as I say you can get all this information from other stats packages but the analysis is presented in a way that makes it reasonably useful (ie when it refers to pages in your blog you’re given links to go look at what they are referring to.
- Fresh Design - I like it. It’s clean, fast loading and useful.
- Depth of Analysis - once you go beyond some of the first level of pages to the secondary pages there is some very useful information. For example being able to analyse what different search terms were used to for people to get to a single landing page on your blog is very useful information.
- Breadth of Statistics - 7 (or 30 if you upgrade) days analysis for free isn’t heaps but it’s more than what packages like sitemeter give you (they only give you the last 100 visits)
Why would you use it?
The beauty of knowing what people are searching for when they come to your blog is that you have your finger on the pulse of what type of information people are looking for (which can give you hints as to what to write more about) and you know how the different SE’s are ranking you for certain terms which helps you work out how your SEO is going.
Once you start analyzing how people arrive at your blog in this way it’s interesting and useful to find out how many people arrive using terms you’d never considered before. Knowing this data can sometimes just be ‘fun’ (you get all kinds of quirky keywords coming up) but also useful as you might find that the SE’s see you as an authority on something on the periphery of your niche that you could write more about.
It’s also very very useful for analyzing not only your overall blog’s performance but single pages on your blog and how they’re going in SE’s. For example:
If I wanted to analyze the performance of my page How Bloggers Make Money from Blogs (one of the better performing pages here at enternetusers) I could gather the following information:
- How much traffic it’s had in the last 7 days (I could see this graphed and raw stats)
- How this compares to other pages on my blog
- A list of specific search terms that people come to the page looking for (ranked) - for example ‘make money online’ drove traffic to that page
- I could then see what other pages on the blog those search terms have produced traffic for - for example ‘make money online’ also sent traffic to my home page
- I could see which SE’s are sending the traffic to that page (ranking and also percentages given)
- I could see how the page ranks for each search term ranks on the different SE’s sending traffic - for example ‘make money online’ on Google
- This enables me to optimize the page more for the SE’s by trying different onsite SEO techniques to see if I can rank it higher or not
What I’d like to see added
Some of the features are slightly hidden away and are not accessible enough. For instance one of the things I love to check is how high I rank for a search term by clicking through to the SE that the visitor came from to see whether I’m #1 or #10 for that term (for example - 103bees told me that I got visited by someone searching on Yahoo! for “Colin Ferrell Sex Video” (go figure!). When I go to Yahoo’s page for that search I find I’m #10). 103bees does give a ‘ranking’ link which takes you to these pages but you have to click on two or three links to get to it.
Perhaps the only other suggestions I could make would be for them to add a feature that tells you what number your page ranks at in the SE so you don’t have to click through (not sure if this is possible but it’d be nice) and also a few more percentages (for example on the ‘top landing pages’ results it’d be nice to see what % of SE hits have gone to your top page in addition to the numbers - this is a handy stat to know on a blog that get a lot of SE traffic. This would also be handy on ‘Top search terms’ and ‘top keywords’ results).
All in all - 103bees is a great little program. I’m not a big fan of adding to many javascript tracking codes to a page but I think this is a worthwhile one to investigate if you’re looking for analysis of your inbound SE traffic.
Update: Marcus over at Performancing has a great review of 103bees also.
Written on July 28th, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia28 zone.at 12:07 am by Darren Rowse
Your Blog’s Readers are People Too
Breaking News!!! Your blog’s readers are people.
Have you ever lost sight of that fact?
If you have - you’re not alone. I suspect that most of us as bloggers forget it from time to time.
In the busyness of life, in pressure we put on ourselves to post regularly, in the desire to make a blog profitable or to build it’s traffic - it’s easy to forget that while we enter our thoughts and ideas into a plastic box of wires and electrical currents that those who interact with our words are flesh and blood - just like us.
It’s worth reminding ourselves of the humanity on the other side of our blogs for a number of reasons.
1. People deserve respect
One of the side effects of allowing those who read your blog to become just another statistic is that there is a temptation to treat them as such - without respect, honor or dignity. It’s easy to do online where there is little chance of face to face interaction (it is easy to treat someone badly when you’ll never meet them), where there is no body language to give visual cues on how other people are feeling and where controversy and conflict tends to escalate quickly. However despite all this people have a right to be treated with respect regardless of race, religion or any other distinguishing factor (unless they support the Collingwood football club - sorry about the Melbourne ‘humor’).
2. People have needs
I believe that this is an aspect of our readers that is especially important to keep in mind as we blog. People (all of us) have a variety of different needs in our lives. Some of them are felt needs and some of them are unfelt ones. The people who come to read your blog will often do so with a felt need. They might be searching for information or an answer to a question, they might seek education, they could be looking for company or even entertainment. Keep the needs of your readers in mind and seek to fulfill them and you’ll not only help out another person - but the flow on effects will improve your own position as a blogger (as the reader becomes a regular and loyal reader, as they spread the world about your blog etc). Many bloggers seem to forget the needs of their readers and blog in a ‘know-it-all’ fashion that is likely to alienate rather than draw people in.
3. People are relational
One of the ‘needs’ that people have is to connect with others. Some of us have a greater need for this than others - but we all like to feel a part of something bigger than ourselves and most of us respond well to knowing that others have gone our of their way for us. Blogs naturally tap into this in the way that they link to one another, the way that they have comment sections (generally) and in the tone that they are often written in. Of course this doesn’t stop some bloggers ignoring their readers altogether.
4. People are emotional beings
One of my favorite books of last year was Lovemarks: The Future Beyond Brands - a book that explored a variety of aspects of marketing and branding. One of the numerous helpful ideas in the book was that people have emotions and respond well when these emotions are engaged. Inject emotion into your blogging and you’ll find that people relate and connect with it. I find that one particularly useful emotion injector is ’story’. Tell your story (and that of others) and people will connect.
5. People have hopes and dreams
Similarly - all people have some level of hope or some type of dream for the future. When you tap into this as a blogger you’re connecting with something quite powerful in others. People like to be inspired and motivated to reach their potential - to become better people (in different aspects of their lives) - blog from this place and you’ll find they respond. Keep in mind that when you start blogging about issues of the heart like hopes and dreams that you’re treading on fairly personal ground - so you need to be able to deliver what you’re writing about and not abuse the privilege (it comes back to #1 - respect).
I’m sure there are other aspects of the ‘humanness’ of people that we could tap into in our blogging but these seem to me like a good starting point for me as I get back into blogging after a couple of weeks off.
Written on July 27th, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia28 zone.at 09:07 pm by Darren Rowse
If I had to Start My Blog Again - Reader Submissions Part 3
I had an email today from two different newbie bloggers who wanted me to pass their thanks onto contributors of the current Group Writing Project where bloggers of all levels of experience are sharing how they’d do things differently if they had to start their blogs again.
Here’s a quote from one of the email I had today:
‘I am loving your Group Writing Project, it’s exactly what I need right now as I’m just starting my blog. The timing is perfect and I feel like I have 50 experience bloggers steering me through my launch phase and helping me not to make the same mistakes others have made. I’m loving it and cannot wait to see tomorrow’s entries!’
Well here’s today’s submissions - hopefully they are just as helpful as the last 2 rounds (there’s 68 submissions now including the ones below).
- 3 Things I would Change as a Weblog Starter by Conn
- Wordpress and Typepad and Blogger, oh my! by Kelly
- 12 Things I would do if I had to start my Blog again by JohnTP
- Don’t Let Your Boss See Your Posting Times by Todd
- Darren Rowse’s Group Blogging Project by Melissa
- If I had to Start a Blog Again by Laurie
- Poor Old Michael Finnigan, Begin Again by Thatedeguy
- How I Screwed Up My Blog by James
- Blog Reconstruction Dreams of Time by Paul
- One Small Step for Blogkind by Jersey Girl
- Kill Fifty Birds with One Stone by Curt
- Learning from Experience in Blogging by Brem
- Do Over by Chris
- Digg me Out of This Mess by Darnell
- If I had to Start My Blog Again by Angusman
- How Palm Discovery may have been if I started out today by May
- But Don’t Look Back in Anger by Jan
There’s still time to join this week’s project. Simply follow the instructions here - but make sure you get your submission before the deadline at the end of Thursday!
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