Business Blogging - How to Build A Better Blog

You Know You're a Blogger When...

Just for fun, awhile back I posted the open-ended statement in the subject on my Facebook wall. There were many great responses so in case you missed it, here they are...

You know you're a blogger when...

And there's more...

Free Class - How to Build a Website without a Webmaster

Are you frustrated with working with Web people who take too long to build your website?

Interested in life without a webmaster?

Would you like to take back control, and run things yourself?

Join me and Christina Hills as we discuss using WordPress to create your website...

Thursday, March 10 at 3 p.m. Pacific (6 p.m. Eastern)

During this FREE call, you'll discover how Using WordPress You Can:

• Create Your Own Webpages without a Webmaster
• Interact with Your Customers and Prospects on Your Website or Blog
• Sell Your Products and/or Services Online
• Add Search Engine Optimization to Your Website/Blog for more Traffic
• Automatically send out email messages with your blog posts

Visit this link for all the details.

Christina is a masterful teacher and has taught hundreds of non-techie professionals how to easily build their own websites in the Website Creation Workshop

You can build virtually any kind of website you want with WordPress.

Here are some examples of the kinds of websites you can build:

-Coaching/Consulting Websites
-Personal Passion Websites
-General Business Presence Websites
-Ecommerce Store Websites
-Sales Letter Websites
-Squeeze Page Websites
-Membership Websites
-Hybrid Blog + Static Page Websites
- and Straight up Blogging Websites

This program will have lots of visuals for you to follow along during the call.

See ya there...blog on!

Denise Wakeman, The Blog Squad
http://www.websitecreationworkshop.com/denise

P.S. Christina is the acknowledged master at teaching people how to use Wordpress. If you're a do-it-yourselfer or professional who needs to understand how your site is built and managed, then please join us on March 10!

Click here to get details and register.

P.P.S. If you want to get a head start, you can get a free website planning guide from Christina Hills here.

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Why do you blog?

I'm constantly exhorting business owners and service professionals to use a business blog as a marketing tool. Some eagerly jump on board, others are reluctant or downright hostile to the idea.

Of course, if you do make the leap into the blogosphere, you've got to have a plan and more importantly you've got to know why you're blogging. In addition to connecting with amazing people, building a community and sharing my expertise, these are a few of the reasons I blog...
I suspect there are as many reasons to blog as there are bloggers.

Why do you blog? Share your reasons for blogging in the comments.

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Get Free Videos - How to Get the Best Out of Your Blog

TypePad Celebrates its 5th Anniversary

This month marks the 5th anniversary of the TypePad blogging platform, owned by Six Apart. As many readers know, The Blog Squad's blogging odyssey began in September 2004. You can read my account of our story here.

TypePad is sharing blogging success stories on their anniversary page. There are many inspiring tales about how blogging has changed the lives and businesses of many, many people. If you're a TypePad blogger, be sure to submit your story. You never know, you may be featured on TypePad's site!

Twitter-style blog tips contest

Darren Rowse over on Problogger is having another contest.  This one is asks you to write Twitter style blog tips. If you're not familiar with Twitter, basically it's microblogging. All "posts" are limited to 140 characters.

There are two reasons I pass along info about this contest:

1. Enter it. It's a great exercise in concise, useful blog writing. Share a tip you have about blogging. Remember, it can only be 140 characters so you really have to think about what you want to convey.
2. With 77 entries at the time of this post, there are some excellent bite-size blogging tips you can learn from.

Let us know if you enter the contest and feel free to post your blogging tip here as well in the comments section.  The contest closes Monday, 1/14 at noon Australia time.  You'll have to check what time that is for you.

By the way, here's my tip:

Use photos in your blog posts to illustrate your point. Images attract attention and like they say, a picture is worth 1000 words.

TypePad Page Examples

In the course of doing some research for a teleseminar on  new TypePad features for our Blogging and Beyond Mentees, I was looking for some examples of how people are using TypePad pages.

Here are a few I found:

http://ideaseller.typepad.com/idea_sellers/
http://lutheranzephyr.typepad.com/main/
http://www.kirstenfarris.com/2007/06/you_can_build_a.html - This is an example of how Kirsten Farris built a simple 5 page web site with TypePad pages.

Pages are not dated and there is no interactivity like comments and trackbacks.

Ideas for TypePad pages:
Create a multi-page web site
Contact page
Disclaimer page
Info about your business
A sales page
Newsletter sign up page

Related Posts
TypePad Pages: How are you using them?
TypePad Pages as Sales Landing Pages

State of the Blogosphere

Don't miss David Sifry's State of the Blogosphere. Sifry developed Technorati four years ago and has been reporting on the state of the blogosphere every quarter.

Some notable points:

• tracking 57 million blogs
• blogosphere doubles every 236 days or so
• 55% of blogs are active (updated within the last 3 months
• As of October 2006, about 100,000 new weblogs were created each day
• about 1.3 million postings per day
• English and Japanese remain the two most popular languages in the blogosphere
• There is a strong correlation between the aging and post frequency of blogs and their authority and Technorati ranking ("a-list" bloggers tend to post at least twice a day and therefore have more "authority" on Technorati

UPDATE: Just read a post on Tris Hussey's blog, A View from the Isle, that goes into the aspect of Technorati authority. He understands and explains it way better than I can.  The bottom line is post and link frequently.

It's all an experiment

While Robert French blogs and receives concrete benefits, he insists "everything being done these days with social media is still an experiment, " and I agree.  Robert teaches at Auburn University and uses blogs and other social media for several purposes, including to communicate with his students and  help them build online portfolios which help them stand out in the job-search process.

"It's all still so new," he rightfully proclaims. The blog explosion is still very young. Although we have plenty of examples of what works in specific situations, no one has found what works across all implementations. Maybe in 5 years we'll have some concrete data we can draw overall conclusions from.

Many early adopters are passionate and evangelistic, but lose perspective. There is too much "everyone must blog" mentality.

Robert is one of the  'voices of reason' in my latest book.

Blogs are simply tools. They have some great applications and Robert and I both share passion for social media like blogs, but not blind faith!

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Guest Blogger, Ted Demopoulos, blogs at The Ted Rap and is author of What No One Ever Tells You About Blogging and Podcasting.

Bloggers Meet for Lunch

Today I had the pleasure of meeting and having lunch with a couple of fellow bloggers.  We met in Beverly Hills for an Italian lunch.

What a lucky gal I was to dine with two handsome men:  Rohit Bhargava of Influential Interactive Marketing and Ogilvy PR, and John Trosko (also a client) author of the popular blog, OrganizingLA. It was an hour and a half of blog talk.  Unfortunately, I forgot my camera so I could not commemorate the moment with a photo.  Seems that's a weakness of mine...forgetting my camera.

This is what I love about the blogosphere: virtual online colleagues can become real, living  breathing colleagues leading to great meals, great discussions and possible partnerships.  That's not to say that I have a partnership in the works with Ogilvy, but you get the idea.  You never know what can happen when you meet your fellow bloggers in person.

Blogger PR Continued

Thanks to a comment by Scott Monty to our post on what NOT to do when pitching bloggers, we've been alerted to an evolved form of the press release.

The Social Media Press Release by SHIFT Communications definitly turns the traditional press release on its head. You can download a template to follow and see an actual example on PRNewswire.

Want to learn more about pitching bloggers in this evoloving age of social media? Join our teleclass on Wednesday, How to Pitch Bloggers to Create a Publicity Explosion.