Posts Tagged ‘Google’

The Who, What, Why, When, and How of Blogging

Sunday, April 25th, 2010

Some time ago I read an article about the tremendous growth that blogging was experiencing and it really caught my attention. I feel like I have a lot to talk about and a blog seemed like a perfect venue to write some of the things I wanted to share. I took the plunge and created my own blog and I am very glad that I did. Maybe you are considering blogging as well. Here are some answers to the common questions about blogging.

Who Should Blog?

I think that everybody has something to say. If you have something to say then you should have a blog. You might be asking, “What would I write about” Good question. Here are some answers. What are your hobbies? What are you passionate about? What do you consider yourself an expert in? What do you find yourself talking about? Are you interested in politics? Can’t get enough news talk radio or TV? Love football, basketball, baseball, hockey, NASCAR? Fascinated by celebrities? Love to cook? Love to travel? Raising kids? Watching movies? Reading books? You can start a blog about anything that you are interested in. Write good articles and people will come and read them. Most blogs also allow their readers to post comments on the articles, which has the added impact of building a nice online community.

What is a blog?

A blog (short for web log) is like an online journal. There is a lot of free software available that makes running and maintaining a blog very easy. A blog takes the articles you write (called posts) and organizes them by date and category so that people who visit your blog can easily find, read and enjoy them.

Why a blog?

A blog is not only a great way to talk about your ideas; there are also some very real possibilities of making money. There are programs like Google Adsense, Affiliate Programs, Click Banks, and opportunities to sell articles that you write. A blog is also a lot simpler and quicker to set up than a traditional web site.

When should I start?

There is no time like the present! If you are interested in blogging then I want to encourage you to go for it. There are plenty of available options when it comes to getting started. There are places where you can get a free blog site. There are places to get hosted blog sites. If you are planning on trying to make money from your blog than you should probably consider going with a web-hosting company where you pay a small monthly fee. With some of the free sites there are restrictions about the way you monetize (make money) from your site.

How do I get started?

The Internet is filled with information to help you learn all that you need to get your blog off the ground. Do a little research and then take your own plunge. I am sure you will be glad that you did.

How to Blog about Your Travels

Wednesday, September 23rd, 2009

Ever wondered where travel bloggers get their money to sustain their travels?

They get the money from writing about and taking pictures of their travels. Basically, they get rich from traveling the world and enjoying their lives. They just document it so that others can read about and enjoy the adventure.

Travel bloggers have taken advantage of some of the most lucrative and easiest business models today, getting rich via Internet blogging.

You have to have at least basic Internet skills, decent writing skills, and a bit of marketing flair. Although, let me stress that all of these can be learned as you go along with your blogging. And the further you blog, the better you become and the more traffic your site will get.

Let me give you an idea on how to blog about your travels and get rich while doing it.

1.    Own a Blogsite

Not the free ones like, Blogger, Myspace, etc. Buy a domain. It’s just about 15 bucks. Chump change of an investment to get started raking millions.

All you need to do after that is to install a wordpress theme, put some content and there you go. Money machine!

2.    Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and getting traffic

If you’re not sure what SEO means, don’t worry. You can get help with this by researching it on the Internet. Basically, you just make your site easy to find around the World Wide Web.

Link building, social bookmarking, joining social media networks, and enhancing page ranking… these are some of the process of making your site more accessible. It is one of the most important steps so you will gain an audience and eventually a stream of income.

3.    Implement PPC advertising in your site

To get started, put some pay per click advertising on your site. You earn money when readers click on the ad. The more traffic you have the more chances that someone will click the ad. It is free and can be used immediately. You can use Adsense from Google.

Pay per click won’t make you rich but it will help bring in a steady stream of passive income.

4.    Be an affiliate marketer

Once you have a steady stream of traffic. What you have to do is advertise an affiliate product. When your reader buys the product you earn a commission for every sale that was referred from your site. You do this by promoting the product just be sure that it relates to your blog posts and content. Marketing a totally irrelevant product is silly and might turn off your audience.

Commission rates are usually high. Mostly, more than half of it will go to your earnings. Affiliate marketing is very profitable indeed.

5.    Create and sell your own product

If you have that entrepreneurial spirit, things can get interesting and even more profitable. It is your own product you will sell. You get all the money not just the cut from sales.

The tricky part is deciding what kind of product you are going to create and sell. For starters, you can write a book, create a video, or engineer an offbeat invention. Be creative.

If You Have A Website, Then You Need To Be Blogging Too

Sunday, September 13th, 2009

If you conduct any business online or maintain a website to compliment your offline business, then blogging is quickly becoming a mandatory part of your future. And if you are not currently blogging, chances are after realizing the potential of these traffic-enhancing goldmines, you soon will be!

Blogs, derived from the words “web log” were originally thought of as simply online diaries a place for people to record their thoughts and inspirations. At first, no one took blogging very seriously and these collections of online thoughts were simply passed off by many as hobbies or creative outlets and nothing more.

But then Google came along and started to recognize the unique and original content that these trite little sites presented and the rules of the game suddenly changed. After all, unique content is what makes the Google world go round, and what better way to command the attention of Google than by creating a dynamic environment with content that is solely your own.

At this stage, a whole new SEO world emerged and in the process, brought with it traffic opportunities like never before. People began blogging on more than what they had for dinner last night. They started to blog about new products, exciting travel adventures and all things related to online commerce.

The evolution quickly continued and today, with RSS feeds, sites like pingoat and many other content clearinghouses, blogging is big business and not to be overlooked by hungry entrepreneurs looking to establish a web presence.

What currently makes blogging so attractive is the sheer speed with which blogs and blog posts are able to get indexed in the search engines. It is a simple matter of static versus dynamic and the search engines love the dynamic.

Let’s take two different scenarios to see how traditional websites and blogs differ in their index-ability:

Scenario One:

One person creates a website to advertise gardening products and services. Each page of the site contains the traditional information about the company; it’s founders, the services they offer and the products they sell. Maybe, at best, the site has articles and content that is updated with some small frequency that are relevant to the avid gardener. When visitors arrive at the site, they have the option of signing up for the company newsletter and receiving valuable tips and new offerings.

In this scenario, the Webmaster or business owner will need to tend to many SEO related tasks in order to get and maintain high search engine ranking for a tight list of selected keywords related to the gardening niche. Not only will this activity require great skill, it will also involve many hours to achieve the intended results.

Scenario Two:

The same business owner as above also creates a blog to supplement their company website. Now, instead of focusing on simply one set of tightly selected keywords, the blog itself remains a broad overview of the gardening niche, while each individual post reflects a drilled down topic within that same niche.

So when the business owner writes a blog post about the benefits of “organic vegetable gardening in backyard containers,” this individual post becomes a keyword rich, targeted wonder and when indexed by the search engines has a far greater opportunity to bringing highly targeted traffic to the blog based upon that single post.

Through time, the blog expands with many similar posts that are targeted to sub niches within the broader gardening niche and can even be categorized from inside the blog structure itself. What has now been created in Google’s eyes is an extremely dynamic, naturally evolving site that is content rich and niche specific.

When properly constructed and promoted, each time the business owner posts to the blog, that individual post can get indexed in anywhere from two to twenty four hours on average. This opportunity is far greater than any options available at the static website.

Additionally, when the business owner endeavors to have a visitor signup for a newsletter, further segmenting can occur and subscriber lists can be refined and targeted. And because the blog is the front-end showcase to the original website, each blog post has the opportunity to link back to specific and relevant products at the main site.

When properly structured, blogs are the biggest SEO asset to a website that currently exists. The wise business owner will recognize these benefits and when implemented, will enjoy many opportunities that do not currently exist with traditional websites alone.