Successful Blog

Mini-Session 11: Turning Business Blogging Around

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Guest Speaker: Chris Cree

Most of us are at least a little bit familiar with how valuable a blog can be for a business.

Improving search engine rankings, raising company visibility and awareness, driving traffic to the main business web site, and building business reputation are among the many benefits that can be seen when a business starts blogging effectively.

Turn About is Fair Play

Tonight, though, let’s turn it around.

Let’s talk about the idea of turning your blogging hobby into a business.

How do you do it?

How can you make the transition from hobby blogger to business blogger?

Placing ads of some kind on your blog is one way to start.

But what else is there?

Here are some ideas to get the conversation rolling:

  • Freelance writing
  • Publish and sell e-Books
  • Become the go-to expert in a narrow niche
  • Consulting
  • Blog set-up and maintenance
  • Blog Design
  • Create plugins & widgets specific to individual businesses

The ways to earn money on the internet are only limited by our creativity and we’ve only begun to scratch the surface with things like AdSense.

Let’s think outside the box and kick some ideas around.

Thank you, Chris!
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Chris Cree helps business fuel growth through blogging at his SuccessCREEations –ME “Liz” Strauss
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Let’s open the Q&A . . .

I’ll go first. Chris, what is the single greatest benefit of business bloggers?

During the Virtual Conference today, you can take $100 off registration to SOBCon 07.

Mini-Session 10: 5 Things I Look for in a Blog

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Guest Speaker: Terry Starbucker

5 Things I Look For In a Blog –

  1. Fine Style – The look and the “feel” of a site on first glance sets the tone for the reading to come; if the presentation is messy, than the writing probably is too.
  2. Good Headline Writing – I like to be “grabbed” by pithy and oftentimes whimsical headlines that pull me into the post
  3. Positivity – Now I couldn’t call myself a “Half-Fuller” if I didn’t prefer a positive take on your subject matter, would I?
  4. Subject Matter Passion – Care about what you are writing about, put that on the page, and I’ll gobble it up
  5. Simplicity and Elegance of Prose – I can’t help it, I paid attention in English class – I love the proper and concise use of the language (including punctuation and spelling.

Thank you, Terry!
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Visit Terry’s blog, Ramblings from a Glass Half Full, to get and keep a positive view on people, life, business, and what things are about. –ME “Liz” Strauss
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Let’s open the Q&A . . .

I’ll go first. Terry, what is the one thing that will get you to keep coming back to a blog??

During the Virtual Conference today, you can take $100 off registration to SOBCon 07.

Mini-Session 9: Branding and Blogging

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Guest Speaker: Mike Wagner

1. Blogging is a free sample of your brand.

2. Your creativity and unique point of view must be evident in your blog.

3. Everyone’s blog contains implicit and sometimes explicit invitations that
become your brand’s promise.

4. Empathy is what makes blogs useful, without it your blog brand is
useless.

5. Blogs are for the “pro-am” spirit of our times; do you have a “pro-am”
brand?

Thank you, Mike!
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Visit Mike’s blog, Own Your Own Brand, to catch a regular update on how to keep your brand on the right path. –ME “Liz” Strauss
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Let’s open the Q&A . . .

I’ll go first. Mike, what is the key to owning your own brand?

During the Virtual Conference today, you can take $100 off registration to SOBCon 07.

Mini-Session 8: Blogging Beyond the Blogosphere

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Guest Speaker: Wendy Piersall

We build our traffic and subscriber base primarily from other bloggers – but in doing so, are we unwittingly excluding non-bloggers from our sites?

We started our blogs to reach others with the value we can add to their lives. But we may not reach our goal if we stay too focused on each other in the world of blogs.

What can we do to ensure the welcome mat is out for all of our site visitors, not just our blogging pals? And how can we add value beyond the Blogosphere?

Thank you, Wendy!
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Wendy blogs for eMoms and eDads on the life of work-at-home parent. You can find Wendy at eMoms at Home. –ME “Liz” Strauss
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Let’s open the Q&A . . .

I’ll go first. Wendy, what can a blogger do to attrack non-blogging readers?

During the Virtual Conference today, you can take $100 off registration to SOBCon 07.

Mini-Session 7: Music and Moods

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Guest Speaker: Ellen Weber, PhD

Ever rolled out of bed like a Mack truck hit you – only to find a particular tune on the car radio suddenly unzipped new colors into your day? Both sleep and music can make or break a workday in ways that might surprise you. More surprising yet is the fact that you can juggle these two to serve you better.

So while music and sleep may shift your moods from calm to calamity you can shift them back, by music you play and by sleep patterns that avoid alarms while in the REM or deeper rapid eye movement stages. What music do you listen to and how do you awaken on an ordinary work day?

Thank you, Ellen!
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Visit Ellen’s Blog, Brain Based Business, where she provides daily tips for business leaders on how our brains affect what we do. –ME “Liz” Strauss
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Let’s open the Q&A . . .

I’ll go first. Ellen, so what music is music to blog by?

 

During the Virtual Conference today, you can take $100 off registration to SOBCon 07.

Mini-Session 6: Blogging Blunders

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Guest Speaker: Chris Garrett

Liz left a comment on my blog about bloggers who talk down to their readers. It got me thinking (as Liz’s comments do). I don’t think it was aimed at me but at the same time don’t want people to think I believe I have all the answers.

I firmly believe we are all learning, and should make every effort to. We all have experiences to share. Experience is gained through doing things wrong as much as getting things right. Sometimes I think we learn more from goofs than successes. I expect we have all made some mistakes that others could avoid.

The biggest blunder I have made quite a few times is switching blog URLs. My sites have broken links through switching domains, changing hosts or changing software platform Whatever the cause the end result was breaking the paths people were using to find me. In the early days it meant broken bookmarks and links. More recently having to start over with zero feed readers. You should always make the effort to keep consistant URLs. If necessary redirect the old to the new.

Another major mistake was at the launch of performancing. I posted too much too fast. Readers couldn’t keep up with it and I burned out. At times I was posting four long posts a day. Our readers would have been just as happy with one day, perhaps more so. Yes when you launch a blog it is important to have a good archive of posts but this was overkill.

My most recent mistake was going off on a self-righteous rant. It’s not my style. I can’t even do it very well. There are very few occasions where I regret posting, even fewer where I go back and change a post once it has gone out to feed, but this one didn’t sit well with me at all so I edited it. My lesson here was to never post angry.

What blogging blunders have you made? Share your “shame” in the comments …

Thank you, Chris!
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Visit Chris’ Blog Chrisg.com where he keeps us all thinking straight on the ideas of new media –Me “Liz” Strauss
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Let’s open the Q&A . . .

I’ll go first, my second week at Successful Blog, I asked a programmer with limited SEO to help me do a simple series on search engines. I had no idea what I was talking about, and didn’t realize that his ways were no longer current. I learned a lot about SEO, negative feedback, keeping cool under fire, and why you should stick to what you know.

Who’s next?

During the Virtual Conference today, you can take $100 off registration to SOBCon 07.