Written on December 19th, 2005 at 02:12 pm by David Shawver city of Stanton
Adsense Gift Arrives
My AdSense Christmas Present just arrived. It came in a spotted box that said ‘from your friends at Google’. Inside the box was (as reported previously):
- carrying case with embossed google logo. zipper closure
- wireless mini mouse, with scroll wheel
- usb charger for mouse with retractable cord
- usb 4 port hub
- usb gooseneck led light
- 128mb usb flash drive with wrist strap
- headset with retractable cord. has two plugs (one for mic and one for earbud) so it is for a computer, not a mobile phone.
I’ve included pictures of it all below the fold for those interested.
Thanks for another great year to the team at AdSense.
Written on December 19th, 2005 at 11:12 am by David Shawver city of Stanton
Bloglines Scheduled Outages
If you rely heavily upon Bloglines for your Blogging then you might like to schedule a lighter day today as they are having significant upgrades as they move to a new data center and are predicting outages.
It’s a pity they were not able to schedule this for a weekend when traffic is so much lighter.
Read more about the Bloglines scheduled outages here.
Written on December 19th, 2005 at 11:12 am by David Shawver city of Stanton
Product Placement for Consumer-Oriented Blogs
Today’s post in the b5media 12 Days of Christmas series is another post by Hsien-Hsien Lei. She previously posted about ethics for science and health bloggers but this time she’s showing her diversity of blogging interests by writing about Product Placement on Consumer Blogs.
Hi. I’m Hsien-Hsien Lei and I write not only Genetics and Health but also Play Library. The approaches to these two blogs are dramatically different. For Genetics and Health, I present science/health news and analysis with no specific intention of selling anything (aside from the occasional book). For Play Library, it’s a constant show-and-tell of toys, book and things for children.
Almost all of the affiliate links I use on Play Library are from the Amazon Associates Program. It’s the most straightforward and comprehensive products catalog online. Amazon also makes it incredibly easy to create product links. Initially, I inserted the pre-fab ad buttons and banners into every post. They were ugly, but functional, and I did get the occasional sale.
When Arieanna Foley’s Cooking Gadgets blog went live, though, I knew I had a lot to learn. She was making sales left and right without a single ad button or banner in sight. Learning from Arieanna‚s successful example requires a little more work and these are the steps I now take for Play Library posts featuring products:
1. Check Amazon.com for the specific product to be featured and find the image I want.
2. Right click and copy image location (I hotlink directly to Amazon because I would have had to anyway if I were using the affiliate buttons).
3. Go to Amazon Associates and pull up the specific affiliate code.
4. Copy the product link which includes my associate ID.
5. Make the product image clickable and include the link wherever appropriate in the post.
Using these steps, Play Library is sleeker and more friendly. My sales haven’t gone through the roof (yet), but I have seen an increase in product sales via Amazon. When one month has passed since the start of the experiment, I’ll be able to compare Google ad revenues as well.
Hope this works for you too! If subtle product placement works on TV and in the movies, you can bet it will work on blogs too.
Written on December 18th, 2005 at 01:12 pm by David Shawver city of Stanton
Overcoming Intimidation Over English Skills in Blogging
The next tip in the b5media’s 12 Days of Christmas is from Gayla McCord - one of b5’s celebrity bloggers at Celebamour. She’s got 7 blogs (last time I counted) is a stay at home/work at home mom (twin 12 year old boys) and writes also at Single-Again. Her topic is something I’ve actually helped a few bloggers with myself - the fear of blogging when your English skills are lacking. Here’s what Gayla has to say:
The one tip I’d like to submit and hope that many will listen is to forget those fears. I’ve found that so many people are intimidated by their lack of ‘proper English’ skills and let that stand in their way. Rather than allowing it to be a hindrance, they could even turn it into a niche. I’ve seen a few blogs that play on those faults rather than allow them to detour them from fulfilling a dream of writing.
Regardless of a persons education level, I believe everyone has an opinion that’s valuable or a story to share that others would be interested in. It doesn’t take the fame behind those on Pajamas Media to mean their views are valuable.
If they can’t overcome that fear, I recommend creating their entries in a word processing program so they can do spell and grammar check. It may not be 100% full proof, but at least it will ease the intimidating factors enough to open doors for possibility and to never be afraid to ask for help!
I’m helping a girl now who has struggled with her writing skills and let them keep her from writing and blogging. We’ve finally gotten her to the point where she’s ready to take the chance and she’s off to a flying start.
Darren here again - I thought I’d kick off the comments on this one here by saying I think Gayla is onto something that should be talked about more. I am often approached by new or potential bloggers who are very very nervous about their English skills but who wish to write in English. Sometimes their concerns come out of the fact that English is their 2nd language and other times they’ve just struggled with it through the years (like I struggle with arithmetic).
While I have written here from time to time about making your blog as professional as possible and working on issues of spelling and grammar I would advise someone who struggles in this area to not let it stop them. In fact I know of a couple of different bloggers that I’ve encouraged to blog to help them improve their language skills.
While from time to time they do get a hard time about it I think the exercise of blogging in and of itself both gives them new skills and practice in their language but also gives them confidence to have a voice in ways they may never have discovered in other mediums.
I also think the rest of us who sometimes get picky about grammar sometimes need to loosen up a bit and rather than getting too condemning need to remind ourselves that others come at blogging from different backgrounds and perspectives. Anyway - thats just my two cents worth - nice post Gayla - sorry for hijacking it, didn’t mean to write this much but you triggered something.
Written on December 17th, 2005 at 01:12 pm by David Shawver city of Stanton
7 Characteristics of the Entrepreneurial Life
I was out last night and got talking to a mate of a mate (Ben) who in the past year had just started a small business. I love chatting to people in the start up phase of companies as there is often a kindred entrepreneurial spirit that is shared through the conversation.
The conversation was quite fascinating as we shared our stories and experiences of the first year or two.
Ben’s business couldn’t be more different than mine. He sells products in an industrial setting. He’d had previous experience in the industry and most of the challenges he’s face have revolved around getting good products, supply chains, getting payments from customers, warehousing etc. He needed significant capital to get up and running and has considerable ongoing overheads that need to be covered from month to month. The potential returns on his investment of time and capital are quite large and his prospects are good - however there are real risks and some big players in his field who could make life difficult for him.
My Business on the other hand had a very different story in terms of my challenges. They revolved more around issues of technology, relationships, profile, publicity, managing incoming money from a variety of currencies, avoiding burnout, recruiting others etc. My own overheads were considerably lower than Ben’s with the major ‘expense’ being my own time. Again the potential return on this investment of time is significant and I feel the prospects are good but in many ways the progress has been a lot slower for Ben (although I suspect he’s about to hit a growth spurt where as I’ve just had one).
It was interesting to compare the differences between our experiences. There were numerous times when we both shook our heads and said words to the effect of ‘if only it was like that for me’ and there were other times where we laughed at how easy we had certain things that the other didn’t have.
Perhaps even more interesting to me than our differences were the similarities.
One would think that being in such different industries that there wouldn’t be a whole lot of these - but in fact there were actually many. Some of the similarities in our entrepreneurial journeys so far included:
- Emotional Roller Coaster - We both spoke of times of elation, lots of fear and uncertainty and times of real disappointment and even depression.
- Loneliness - Being a solo entrepreneur is something I enjoy so much. I’m an introvert and need time alone to energize myself - but there have been real periods of feeling isolated and alone. Interacting with people online helps with this - but there is no substitute for a real chat.
- Freedom/Flexibility - Working for yourself brings with it some wonderful positives including the freedom not to have to answer to anyone and the ability to set your own course (and work hours). While there are many responsibilities that you feel squarely upon your own shoulders the freedom and ability to change course quickly is a great thing after working in environments that are very established.
- Logistical Challenges - The administrative tasks that any small business in start up faces are almost enough to kill the passion and excitement at times. Setting up companies, a financial structure, working out tax etc are all something we both went through periods of struggle around.
- Relational Challenges - I can’t think of a business that wouldn’t have some sort of relational challenge. Whether it be with staff, partners, suppliers, co-workers, customers, family/housemates or competitors - relationships need to be managed. Business would be a breeze without the people!
- Scalability - Starting a solo business that grows brings the inevitable challenge of how to sustain the growth in a life giving way. This brings up many challenges from those of a financial matter, to staffing, to time management. My mind goes to some of the stories and lessons in The E-Myth (aff link) which address some of this.
- Workaholism - Talk to most start up owners and you see a glazed look in their eyes that is the direct result of the combination of lack of sleep, too many hours in front of a screen and the inability to get your mind off the job. I often talk about the hard work aspect of my business in a way that makes it seem like a drag (and sometimes it is) but mixed in with this is also the addictive nature of starting up something that you actually love. There’s a book been doing the rounds in the past few months here in Australia (and probably elsewhere) called ‘Work is Better than Sex’ which talks about this. While ‘work’ is sometimes talked about in negative terms I find I’m coming across an increasing number of people who actually get great pleasure from their work. Balance is needed but work isn’t all bad (or am I deluding myself).
I’m sure there would have been many more similarities that Ben and I would have discovered had the conversation continued. I enjoyed it thoroughly and thought it might be an interesting one to continue here. Feel free to share your own experiences an insights in comments.
Written on December 17th, 2005 at 08:12 am by David Shawver city of Stanton
Making Money Because of Your Blog as Opposed to Making Money Directly From Your Blog
This afternoon I had a call from a guy and the topic got onto how he wants to make money from blogging (as it seems to quite a bit these days). He was all excited by the potential but was a little muddled with his thinking about how to do it and asked my advice.
One of the questions I sent him away to ponder was this:
‘Do you want to make money directly from your blog or because of your blog?’
Here at enternetusers I talk 99% of the time about how to make money directly from your blog using advertising and affiliate programs - but while this is legitimate and the way I make the majority of my income it is really only half the picture when it comes to making money through blogging.
While there are many bloggers experimenting with this ‘money directly from a blog’ strategy there are also many other bloggers who make a decent living BECAUSE of their blog in indirect ways. They often don’t have a paid advertisement or affiliate program in sight but still are really pro bloggers. How can this be so?
There are many ways to indirectly make money because of a blog. Instead of selling other people’s products or ad space most of these ways are through the blogger selling themselves. Here are a few ways of making money because of your blog that come to mind. It’s no an exhaustive list so feel free to add your own:
- Consulting - If there were three of me I’d dedicate one of the me’s to do consulting work. After a year of blogging here at enternetusers on the topic of blogging for money I have people come to me every day asking for advice. Some are willing to pay good money for it too! Unfortunately I don’t really have the time and so only take on consulting work if it’s on a larger scale or a very interesting opportunity. There are a growing number of bloggers in many different fields that offer consulting having built up a profile and perceived expertise through their blogs.
- Recruitment - In a similar way, I’ve heard of a few bloggers over the last year or so who have landed jobs in non blogging fields after their prospective employers found and liked their blogs. Write on a topic well enough and eventually others in your industry will find your blog and in the process hear about you. You never know what opportunities might come out of this.
- Business Blogging - Some businesses actually employ people to blog for them either as their main role or part of their role. As a result in effect they are being paid to blog.
- Books - I’ve had a number of offers from publishers in the last year to write books on a variety of topics after they have found my blogs. Once again it’s about being seen as an expert in your field - if you can achieve this you will find publishers are more receptive to having an idea pitched to them and at times will even seek you out. This is becoming more and more common with publishers as they are seeing not only some great writers but that many of them already have large amounts of content on their blogs ready to be pulled together into a book!
- Offline Writing Gigs - Manolo from Shooeblogs recently landed a writing gig in the Washington Post Express after he was discovered via his wonderful blog. Offline writing gigs can be in the shape of newspapers, magazines, trade publications etc.
- Online Writing Gigs - A number of enternetusers readers have recently told me that they have been approached to write for a variety of online sites as a result of being discovered from their blogs. These positions have been paid quite well.
- Selling e-resources - this is close to the idea of making money directly from your blog but is a little different because instead of advertising someone else’s product you’re selling your own. E-products could include e-books, teleseminars etc. Once again the success of these products is often directly tied to the profile of the blogger (or to their sales network/affiliate program).
- Launch a Product - This is similar to selling an e-resource but is perhaps a little different in that the product could also be a service of some kind. I’m aware of a number of start up companies that have started blogs that they will later launch paid services from. The blog becomes the launching pad for something much larger through building profile and creating interests.
- Partnerships - One of the cool things about building a name for yourself in an area of expertise is that people often start pitching you ideas for you to partner them in.
- Speaking Opportunities - I was asked to speak this week at a blogging conference late next year as a result of the organizers of this conference reading enternetusers. This is a bit rare for me as I’m stuck on the opposite side of the world from most of the relevant conferences I dok now of quite a few bloggers who are regularly speaking in a paid capacity at conferences in a variety of industries.
As I said above - this is by no means a complete list. Feel free to add your own suggestions.
As I’ve written this list I’ve been struck by how that in each case opportunity comes out of some sort of a perceived expertise and profile. The book deal, job, writing opportunity, speaking gig, consulting work or selling of a product only really come about if people think you have something worthwhile to say or offer.
Building this type of profile doesn’t just happen overnight. Making money because of your blog is a long term proposition and will probably happen increasingly overtime as a blog and it’s blogger mature and become more well known.
Where as with making money directly from a blog we often talk about skills like SEO and ad placement the skills to making because of a blog probably revolve around:
- providing useful content that shows an understanding of a niche.
- networking within a niche and knowing and interacting with key players
- using a blog not only to report and rehash news but to also show initiative in proposing solutions and taking topics onto new ground
These can be important in running a successful ad blog also, but are especially important for building profile.
Lastly it’s worth nothing that it is possible to go with both approaches and make money both because of and directly from a blog. In a sense that is what I’m finding with enternetusers at present. Ad revenues are a little higher these days and affiliate programs do reasonably well - but in more recent times it’s the indirect opportunities that have come out of this blog that have probably taken enternetusers to a higher earning capacity.
My hunch is that for many bloggers the short term gains often come from the direct earnings (advertising etc) but that the indirect opportunities come in the longer term and it’ these that often have the larger earnings potential.
I’ll finish with one example that I’m unable to give details of. I was told this past week of a blogger who had been blogging about a particular product category (a technical product) for a couple of years. He had become very well known in his industry and had made reasonably good money from AdSense and other ads. A month ago he was approached by one of the manufacturers in this industry and was asked to come on as an ongoing consultant. The fee they offered him per hour was double his daily AdSense earnings. This week he was asked to write a book about his niche. After two years of building profile things have certainly gone into a higher gear and the direct earnings are starting to look quite small.
Interested to hear what you think on the topic.
‘Do you want to make money directly from your blog or because of your blog?’
Written on December 17th, 2005 at 08:12 am by David Shawver city of Stanton
Mini-Interview with Anil Dash regarding TypePad ‘issues’
I’ve just chatted to Anil Dash from Six Apart and he tells me:
“we know we’re not meeting people expectations, but we will make it right”
and also:
“this happened while we were adding redundancy to the storage system which is kind of like lightning striking.”
I was struck by Anil’s sincere desire to make TypePad and openness about how they’d failed their users here. From what he said to me in addition to these quotes I’d feel pretty confident that any TypePad blog I was running would be back to normal pretty soon. There are never guarantees in these things but I’d advise TypePad users not to dispair.
Every online service has their bad day, bloglines was down last night when I went to bed, del.icio.us was offline a few days back, feedster seemed to have problems yesterday for a bit. None of this makes TypePad being down ok - it definately sucks - but this seems to be a temporary thing from what I can gather from my quick chat with Anil.
update - there is an update at the Typepad blog which indicates that data is safe and there are no indications that anything has been lost. They expect things to be up again with bloggers able to log in this afternoon (Pacific time) but that for a day or two blogs might look like they were a couple of days ago. There are some instructions on how to get your blog republished and assurances that things should be ok in the next day or two. Hopefully this will mean Typepad bloggers are back up and running shortly.
Written on December 17th, 2005 at 06:12 am by David Shawver city of Stanton
TypePad Blogs Unavailable - Deploying Backups
I’ve woken up this morning to four emails and three people on IM all telling me their frustrations with TypePad which has been down for at least the last 7 or so hours (possibly longer). Over at Six Apart’s website is the following message:
‘During routine maintenance of our network and storage systems last night, we experienced an issue with our primary disk system where data from published blogs are stored. We are currently running diagnostics on the device, and working to restore your data as soon as possible. Verifying data can be a slow process and will take time.In the meantime we are currently deploying backup copies of your weblogs from approximately 2 days ago. This is what will be displayed for your blog. The TypePad application is currently unavailable, which means that users will not be able to log in, and visitors to weblogs will not be able to post comments. We are working to bring TypePad back online as soon as possible.
We appreciate your patience as we work through these issues. We will be posting updates to status.sixapart.com throughout the day, and will post to Everything TypePad with major news.’
If you’re a TypePad user you can get the latest updates here. I really hope that they are able to restore your blogs quickly - I know how frustrating it is not to be able to post anything and to fear losing posts. It sounds like there might be a loss of a day or two’s posting which would be a real loss for TypePad users - but I guess in the scheme of things it seems that they’ve at least been wise enough to back up recently enough. All the best everyone.
Written on December 17th, 2005 at 06:12 am by David Shawver city of Stanton
Tips for Writing Hardworking Posts - Part 2
Here’s part 2 of Tips for Writing Hardworking Posts by b5 blogger John Evans.
I’m John Evans and I write Windows Vista and Microsoft Weblog for b5media. My personal blog is SYNTAGMA.
In Part 1, I looked at how a blogger’s “backlist” could be made to work harder by interlinking posts within a blog archive.
Here I’d like to give some thought to why certain posts become “hardworking” in the first place, and how this quality can be replicated in new posts.
I used the case of a post I did on Blogsmith, Weblogs Inc’s in-house blogging tool, a post that generated a continual stream of search traffic months after it was written. I believe this became a hardworking, much-searched post because it contained unique information.
Remember, I’d actually asked Jason for this info, so all other posts written on it referred back to mine. The post also ranked highly for the keyword “Blogsmith” which apparently interested a lot more people than I’d imagined.
Another “unique” post which generated lots of traffic for months, was one on the mysterious Google browser. Rumours had been going round for ages that they were working on this at the Googleplex. But you know how secretive those guys are … no hard news leaked.
Then one day, my stats (good old SiteMeter) showed a visitor who used a browser called Google 4.0. I wrote a kind of fantasy post about a mythical monster landing on Syntagma’s shores. From that moment until I closed down the Blogspot site, there was constant search traffic to the post. Again, it was unique information, not just commentary on another blogger’s post. So uniqueness makes for hardworking entries. And interlinking within the archive makes them more hardworking still.
What other qualities create hardworking posts? If we look at the way we read our newspapers, we might get a few clues.
Generally, we turn to the hard news first, especially in our interest groups. So it might be the sports section. We’ll skim down looking for our team by name and digest the facts. The same with politics and general news. We’ll look for hard facts and create an image in our minds of the shape of the day.
Then we’ll turn to the op-ed pages and search out our favourite columns, usually written by a big-name journalist. We will, at this stage, be seeking a pre-digested version of the news, with special insights from somebody in the know.
Thus, we want hard facts first, then additional commentary to make sense of them from a trusted source. These are the basic elements of a hardworking post.
1. Hard facts.
2. Unique information, wherever possible. You’ll need to seek this out or it won’t be unique.
3. Your take on the facts. This is your op-ed moment, when you add value to the baseline information you’ve assembled for the post. If readers begin to trust your opinions, they’ll come back for more.
The electronic marketplace is flooded with content, to the extent that the price of it as a raw commodity is next to zero. However, your content will rise in value when it attains a permalink which is indexed by the search engines. Now your post is not just a transient bit of fluff blowing away in the wind. It becomes a stable part of the Internet conversation, accessible by anyone over time, and a store of value for the blogger or blog owner.
The Weblogs Inc blog network was sold for a reported $25 million to AOL, plus a package of benefits which included the previous owner keeping his job, and possibly a swatch of stock options too.
So, don’t be fooled by the apparent flimsiness of blog posts. The two I’ve used to illustrate my points here were very flimsy indeed. But they contained unique information, hard facts, plus a little op-ed added value. It doesn’t take much to make a hardworking post … and then make it work harder still.
This post belongs to the 12 Days of Christmas Series.
Written on December 16th, 2005 at 02:12 pm by David Shawver city of Stanton
Niche Blogging Benefits
It’s Day 8 in the b5media 12(ish) days of Christmas Series and the next contribution is from By Tammy Powley from the Jewelry and Beading. She’s going to talk Niche Blogging. Feel free to add your own reflections and experiences on niche blogging in comments below.
Right now, I maintain three weblogs: Jewelry and Beading at b5media.com; Jewelry Making at About.com; and The Jewelry Weblog at Creative Weglogging. Notice a trend? While each blog has a different flavor, they all focus on one topic - jewelry.
After many years working as a defense industry technical writer, I always wanted to become a freelance writer. Jewelry was the way I accomplished this. It was my “niche,” my forte, and the way I managed to eventually write for the Internet, get published in magazines, and write and consult on a number of books. I was lucky that I happened to stumble onto my niche, and by focusing on one topic, I have found a good deal of success as a freelance writer and now Internet weblogger.
Niche blogging is a great way to promote your writing/blogging career and can even be fun, especially if you pick a topic that you’re already passionate about. If you’ve been struggling with your blog identity, moving from one topic to another but never really sure of where you’re headed, then consider the benefits of niche blogging.
- You become an expert. When you concentrate on one topic, you eventually become an expert. Your knowledge grows and so does your reputation. This can lead to more writing work and recognition. As an example, I was recently interviewed by another freelance writer for an article she was working on for Art Jewelry magazine. I’m not getting paid in cash for this, but it will pay in promotion for me because she agreed to include the URL of my writing site (www.tammypowley.com), which has links to all my other blogs and web sites.
- You can cross promote yourself. For example, use blog rolls to include links to your related sites. I do my best to keep each weblog I write filled with new content. However, if I have a new article or e-course on my About.com Jewelry Making site, I make sure to blog about it at one point or another on my Jewelry and Beading blog at b5media.com. I also blog about my latest hardcopy publications such as magazine articles or books I have pending. Keep your content fresh and new for all your blogging, but there’s no reason you can’t mention some of the same topical information.
- You build an audience. By positioning yourself as an expert and cross promoting your on line and off writing, you build an audience. Readers of one blog turn into readers of your web site who turn into readers of your books. As you build an audience of readers, you build your reputation in your chosen topic field. I’ve received numerous publication opportunities from the fact that someone found my blog or web site. They liked what they saw and emailed me about possible writing projects. Also, when I query about new writing jobs, once I mention a URL or two of mine, those “in the know” often already know me and have read much of my on line work already.
Niche weblogging, of course, first requires a niche. Pick something you are already knowledgeable about and extremely interested in because it is what you will focus the majority of your blogging efforts around. You don’t want to get burned out in just a matter of months. Many of us have interests, hobbies, or a vocation that may be the perfect niche topic for a weblogging career. More than likely, you already have a niche; you just haven’t purposely concentrated on it in order to reap the full benefits of niche blogging.
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And we just found out about get paid to. When your phone rings or you receive an email or receive a text message then you get paid. Could it be that my groom’s fantasies might actually be wilder than the site of me perfectly coiffed, bustled, and veiled?
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