blog-promotion Archives - Page 53 of 78

Bloggy Question 33: You’ve Changed, Man — DON’T Look at Yourself

December 10, 2006 by Liz

Where’s the Guy We Loved?

For those who come looking for a short, thoughtful read, a blogging life discussion, or a way to gradually ease back into the week. I offer this bloggy life hypothetical question. . . .

You and a friend started blogging 8 months go. You’re in different businesses, but you have similar goals — to establish yourselves, to see what you’ve got, and to watch where it takes you.

The ride has been fun and almost a tale from a famous book — The Tortoise and the Hare. He’s been the hare. He collect links hand over fist during the first 6 months — almost 100 in the first month. You were the tortoise. You collected a respectable link count at a slower, more natural pace.

At your six month blog-anniversary, your friend began to lose links at the same rate he had collected them. At first he tried to act as if it didn’t matter, but he started posting more and more in month seven. In month eight, he began a campaign of self-promtion. He’s been outright asking for links at the end of every post.

His writing has changed. Some people have mentioned that fact to you.

You are still gaining links at a natural pace. He’s beginning to mention that to you.

How do you respond?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Being Smart by Accident: Why Living Your Brand as a Writer Is Everything

December 5, 2006 by Liz

Every Choice IS the Story

In 6+1 Traits — Word Choice, I make the point that we cannot talk without talking about ourselves. The words that we choose to express what we mean also reveal things about who we are and our world view.

The same is true about every choice we make. What we bring to each choice is our experience as a person and a writer. Therefore, each choice we make reflects who we are in a most telling way. Our writing and how we present it says more than we sometimes imagine. That’s why we need to internalize what we stand for, what we value and offer as an entire story. In other words, as a writer, a business person, someone people read . . .

It’s crucial to live our brand to communicate clearly.

I had this brought home to me by a reader, TS, this week. Choices I unconsciously made affected how he saw, not just this blog, but blogging in general. I’ve included an excerpt from his email that tells the story. . . .
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Bloggy Question 32: Blogger Alert! Where Is She? What Should You Do?

December 3, 2006 by Liz

She Was Just Here . . .

For those who come looking for a short, thoughtful read, a blogging life discussion, or a way to gradually ease back into the week. I offer this bloggy life hypothetical question. . . .

You’ve been friends with a blogger for almost a year. You’ve shared a comment or email daily for so long you can’t remember. You met once, when she was in your city. It was a fabulous dinner. You’ve got the pictures. You’ve talked on Skype several times and on your cell phones too.

A few weeks ago, she started a new job and moved to a new city.

Her emails have been erratic. Most have been jubilant, filled with hope for the transition, telling how much she likes her new job, the new city, the people at the new company. Those emails were filled with plans for buying furniture and meeting people. One even mentioned a guy she’s been dating. He sounded a little possessive, but cool.

Then three weeks ago, you got a long email that told a different, darker story. Your friend said that nothing is turning out as she thought it would. She called herself a miserable failure at business, at love, and at life. She mentioned that she’s missed three days of work again this week.

Now, you haven’t heard from your friend since that email. Nothing new has been posted at her blog. She doesn’t answer her cell phone. No one online seems to know where she is.

How do you respond?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Sunday Link Love: 15 Great Finds on Promotion, Working at Home and Productivity

December 3, 2006 by Liz

Can’t Have You Sitting Home with Left-Overs

I’ve collected 15 more links for you to read or add to your tool kit over the weekend — more help and treasures.

Have a great Sunday!. 🙂

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Don’t Design for Comments: Design to Give Readers an Experience

December 3, 2006 by Liz

The Right Thought, Not Far Enough

I talked about design and comments in a post Friday. My theory, based on my experience and continuous conversations with readers, was that design has an impact on whether we leave a comment in response to what we read. I was on the right track, but my thinking was just short of where it should have taken me. I should have gone deeper. I also should have left more room for other folks to add their experiences. Details in such conversations are the the nuggets and the takeaways.

We Break Stuff Said It Better

This morning I read an article from We Break Stuff on design.

What We Break Stuff says is crucial and brilliant.

IÃ¢â¬â¢m not talking about large type, gradient and rounded-corner design, but the understand user needs, develop meaningful experiences design. IÃ¢â¬â¢m talking about the art of tailoring products to the necessities of the user, creating emotional connections and building compelling solutions.

Emotional Connection — I felt that thought, I recognized it when I read it. We Break Stuff had nailed it.

Let’s take a look at how they propose we give readers a complete and compelling experience.
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Blog Promotion: How to Write for People and Search Engine Spiders

November 28, 2006 by Liz

Blog Promotion by Writing Well for the Web

Writing online serves two audiences — people and search engine spiders — those little crawly bots that move from link to link indexing information that ranks my pages. People are my readers. People are also the users who search for information. Spiders locate the content for search engines to index and serve up when people go searching for information. Keeping those facts in mind helps me handle the balance between the people and the coded arachnids that search out quality, relevant content to serve them.

The best blog promotion is to write well for the web. I keep my focus on people and give a nod to spiders by following these basics.

Write for People

I write for people. I use my own voice. I write with the way people read as my guide.

I read over my work as a reader would. When I read what I’ve written listen as a person would hear the message.

I look for words, phrases, errors, and overly-long sentences that would get between readers and my message. I also have a proofreader check things behind me. If you find something, she’s not been here yet.

After the work is “people-ready,” I go over it another time for my secondary audience Ã¢â¬â- those search engine spiders. I make sure the spiders donÃ¢â¬â¢t trip and have plenty to eat.

Feed Spiders

Spiders like to eat keywords. I make sure they find some in titles and subheads and key sentences. I don’t mind a bit of repetition.

I avoid the word “here” as link anchor text. Spiders place more value on outgoing links when the anchor text shows how they are relevant.

I add related articles. Spiders like to know how my pages relate to each other, and they like to have those pages to serve up when someone is searching for a related idea.

I link out or trackback to quality blogs.

These last crumbs to feed spiders didn’t really change the content. So I give the piece a final read, fix what I find, and hit that publish button.

Readers are happy because they get my best writing. Spiders are happy because people get my best writing — that means the people will use their search engine again.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Where’s the Guy We Loved?

Every Choice IS the Story

She Was Just Here . . .

Can’t Have You Sitting Home with Left-Overs

Blog Promotion and Traffic

Working at Home

Productivity

The Right Thought, Not Far Enough

We Break Stuff Said It Better

Blog Promotion by Writing Well for the Web

Write for People

Feed Spiders