Thursday
The Setting Up And Promoting A New Blog
 I have been spending quite a bit of my blogging time trying to set up a new blog 67 Not Out. As its about coincidences and synchronicity it's not one of the 'easy' niches to promote.I've set up blogs previously on things like celebrities and money making and have got them moving pretty quickly using the right SEO and also picking popular subjects that people actually want to read. I usually set myself a target of 1500 visits for the first month of a new blog. I must admit though that I'm not on target as yet for 67 Not Out. It's something I want to persist with though as coincidences, and there meaning, is something that interests me. With this new blog I've found a few things that work traffic wise and some that don't. One good source of traffic has been blogcatalog whereas a similar site FuelMyBlog has been a waste of time as far as I'm concerned. Blogcatalog is bursting with activity whereas FuelMyBlog has a directory of many defunct blogs and very little action on their forum. Blogcatalog's forum is almost too good as, if you start a discussion, it can quickly get knocked off the front page unless you give it some attention yourself. I would add though that to be successful on blogcatalog you have to be pro active. It's not good just listing your blog, going away and forgetting it. It's necessary to make friends, leave comments, join in the forum and so on. Unfortunately that means allowing time for such activities. It's a good place to find other blogs to visit and leave comments. I usually say in the comments I leave that I 'arrived via blogcatalog'. This way most bloggers return the visit. She Told Me has also produced a few visits for me and with the site you can also make a little money - if you are lucky! You simply list your blogs/posts and get any AdSense clicks from the page credited to your own AdSense account. It won't make a fortune but, as they say, every little helps. As for blog directories most are a waste of space as regard referring visits. You might just get a handful if you are lucky. I've submitted 67 Not Out to most of the main directories but have had no referrals at all. What they are useful for is links to your blog, which helps with the search engine rankings. Most directories have PR's in excess of 4. I've managed to get a few blogs linking to 67 Not Out so that also helps with visitors. What I'm waiting for is to crack Google and get some good positions for a few keywords / phrases. This will come in it's own good time. As I said in the previous post it's persistence that will win the day. Good luck, Mike. 10 Coincidence or Synchronicity Examples: Message from the dead, dreaming winners, questions answered, unexpected meetings etc. etc. Labels: 67 Not Out, blogcatalog, Blogs, fuelmyblog, She Told Me |
Sunday
Four Secrets Of Making Money With Blogs
 Okay, what are the secrets to making money with blogs? There's a lot of rubbish written on this but here the 4 essentials.(1) Persistence So many get enthused at the start of a New Year and decide to make their fortune by blogging. "It's easy," they think, having read a lot of the hype. The reality is, however, that most new bloggers soon give up when the cash doesn't appear as it is supposed to. Yes, there will always be exceptions but generally it takes a lot of persistence to make good full time money from a blog. Think perhaps years rather than overnight. Even big six figure bloggers such as Darren Rowse didn't crack the big time straight away. He made a lot of money in November 2009 but after he had stated this fact he went on to say: This might sound like another scammy ‘make money fast online’ story - but it’s not. While the money did come in fast in November, it was on the back of over 3 years hard work and gradual growth on that blog.Take another example. Rhys Wynne for example, for whom I have a lot of respect. He recently wrote: Maintaining a blog is hard work, promoting a blog is hard work. However it can be rewarding. Blogging hasn’t bought me – after 7 years – a full time sustainable income yet. However, in the past 7 years I have gained the following from blogging:-So, unless you are a 'special one', it may well take a while to build up your blog to reach a good income level. You have to keep on going. (2) Flexibility I maintain that you have to be flexible in blogging and with any money making venture. If something isn't working it's no good flogging a dead horse. You have to make some changes. If you keep on doing the same things, you'll get the same results. So be prepared to try different styles or make improvements if things aren't performing as you would wish - but keep in mind that blogging is long term. (3) Promotion You can write the most interesting and perfect copy but, if no one visits or reads your blog, you won't make any money. Full stop. People won't just arrive at a blog post, you have to learn the business. Read about Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and do something every day to promote your blog. You'll find lots of ways to do this if you start looking. When I started blogging I set myself a target of getting my blog's URL listed somewhere different every day. At the time I didn't fully realise all of the benefits of doing this. It simply made sense to me that if I had the blog listed in lots of places, hopefully I might just get lots of visitors in return. It didn't actually work out exactly like this but the blog traffic increased gradually week by week. The benefit I eventually saw was that all of the links often got my posts in good positions on Google. Now this does bring visitors. (4) Traffic The biggest secret of blogging is traffic. If you have lots of traffic you'll make money. "Yes, but isn't Content King?," people ask. I think it's more of a Lord or a Duke personally. Good content will keep people re-visiting the blog and they may well become subscribers. But I feel that all visitors are of equal value. Some visitors will make you some money but lots of visitors will make you lots of visitors. This is regardless of where they came from. Blogging is partly a numbers game. Summary For me therefore the Four Secrets Of Making Money With Blogs are: Persistence, Flexibility, Promotion and Traffic. There are lots of other things that will help achieve success and that's why I previously mentioned how it is necessary to learn the business. The answers are out there. Good luck, Mike 67 Not Out: A new blog of coincidence, synchronicity and other stuff. Labels: making money |