March 2007

Even though it’s not quite 10 posts, I’ve decided to list the seven Great Posts I’ve received so far! These bloggers have taken me up on my offer of a free linkback for a Great Post:

1. Attraction Hacker talks about linkbait and starts to post a linkbait list. (Number 84: Linkbait)
2. Rodney Olsen writes about “How to broaden your blogging horizons.” (Number 70: Summarizing someone else’s post)
3. Semantically Driven writes a post about “How using Google Reader can save you time and give you a kickass, dynamic blogroll.” (Number 66: Generally unknown secrets)
4. E Pluribus Unum writes a post about citizen activism and the war in Iraq. (Number 16: Current events)
5. Paper Bull makes a post about how linkbaiting can benefit the linking blog as well (Number 58: Hypothesis and conclusion)
6. One Hump or Two makes a speedlinking post (Number 20: Make a speedlinking post)
7. Rotten Bananas makes an edgy yet funny post on the definitive guide to being a complete a**hole. (Number 44: Make a funny post)

Some really great stuff there! Please visit, study and do something similar!

As I posted previously, I provide a free linkback so long as you make a Great Post from one of the ones listed on my 101 Great Blogging Ideas list. Complete rules are here.

If you haven’t participated, why not? Here’s your opportunity to motivate yourself to writing a Great Post. There’s 101 ideas on the list so surely everyone must be able to find something on there to write about!

On the other hand, maybe you are just one of those people who like to read about great ideas (like my list of great post ideas) but don’t actually do anything to get involved. If that’s you, I can’t help you until you help yourself.

I went to the Problogger NYC meetup on Thursday and got to talk to a number of interesting bloggers! Here’s a couple of pictures with me and Darren and with me and Aaron Brazell, and of New York City near O’Connell’s pub:

I also met with a number of other bloggers including Jeffrey Keeler and Tamar Weinberg. Mike Levin from HitTail.com was there as well and I had an interesting conversation about his tracking software with a twist. I will definitely be investigating it in the near future! Unfortunately, I forgot my business cards so I didn’t get to enter into the draws!

It was a great success and hopefully there will be more to come! Thanks Darren and Text-Link-Ads for sponsoring the event.

In the short life (so far) of I Help You Blog, my 101 Great Posting Ideas is so far the most popular post. It has been featured on the home page of del.icio.us as well as del.icio.us/popular/blogging. Over 560 people have so far bookmarked the post.

I hope it has inpired you to create Great Posts for your blog. To keep the spirit alive, I’d like to encourage all of the readers of I Help You Blog to make a post on their own blogs based on one of the ideas off of the list. Choose one of the 101 ideas listed. Everyone who participates will get a link back from me. I’ll accept all posts provided the rules listed below are satisfied.

Rules:

1. Write a Great Post in the form of one of the ones on my list of 101 Great Posts.  The post has to be new and not one that you’ve written before.
2. Somewhere in your Great Post, write a blurb about how you got your idea for the Great Post from I Help You Blog. You can put the blurb at the beginning, in the body of the post or at the end.
3. In your blurb, provide a link back to the homepage of I Help You Blog.
4. In your blurb, provide a link back to my 101 Great Posting Ideas page so that others can also get involved in creating Great Posts and getting a link back.
5. Your post must be at least 250 words.
6. Only one link back from I Help You Blog per blog.
7. Email me (at ihelpyoublog /at/ gmail /dot/ com) a link to your Great Post and which of the ideas from the list of 101 Great Posts your post falls under.

For example, your blurb may look like this:

“I was inspired by I Help You Blog’s “101 Great Posting Ideas For Your Blog” to write this post about [describe the type of post and subject].”

Your blog can be about any subject. When I get 10 Great Posts, I will publish a post that links back to all the blogs in that set. I intend to categorize the Great Posts into categories the same as the 101 Great Posts list so that we can all go back and look at examples for inspiration.

Happy posting!

Here are some quick thoughts on how you can make more money with you blog/website.

Affiliate Programs

Don’t just join some affiliate program, paste some code and be done with it! You won’t make very much money that way. Affiliate programs are best done when you make a thorough article post on the affiliate product. I think the most successful affiliate posts are ones that compel the reader to come to the conclusion that the best solution to their problem is the product you are recommending (i.e., your affiliate product). Here is an outline of how to do that:

1. State and describe the problem (that the product is designed to solve).
2. State and describe each of the benefits from having the problem solved.
3. Describe a product that will solve the problem partially (but not completely).
4. Describe another product that will solve the problem partially (but not completely).
5. Describe a third product that will solve the problem partially (but not completely).
6. Describe your affiliate product recommendation and how that product is able to fully solve the issues the other products are not able to.

Google Adsense

One technique I’ve seen used that I think could be very effective is to have links to pages dedicated to displaying Google Adsense ads. I’m not talking about using Ad Unit links nor am I talking about blending ads into the navigation to confuse the reader.

Rather, create a page dedicated to a particular product (for example, “Unlocked GSM Cell Phones”) with a minimal amount of commentary (so that you’ll be able to give your Google Ads “context” to display the relevant ads). Then link to that page in your blog’s “advertising” section with the same title. Make sure it is evident that what your reader is clicking on is a link to ads.

When they click on the link, they are taken to your specialized page which then displays relevant ads. Because they’ve been “pre-qualified”, your click-through ratio should be higher than elsewhere.

Google Co-Op Search Engine

Did you know you can make money on Google Ads that users click on when they do a search on a co-op engine that you’ve created? A Google Co-Op engine is simply a “roll-your-own” search engine which is designed to either search only the sites you determine or to search the web but with emphasis on the sites you determine as having priority.

I can see an enterprising blogger creating a vertical search engine for his/her niche (with, say, a thousand hand-selected sites) and promoting that search engine to its readers to use when trying to search for information on that niche. Every time an ad is clicked, the blogger gets some money.

Sell Ad Space On Your Most Popular Pages

If you’ve created a resource that is receives a lot of traffic, you could potentially monetize that particular page by selling advertising just specific to that page. This would be separate from other advertising on your site and you can charge a premium for ad space on that specific page. For example, I can see this working well on a page that had been Digged or bookmarked on Del.icio.us or has a lot of backlinks.

Sell Sponsorships For Individual Posts

I see some bloggers selling individual post sponsorships. You would have to have a lot of traffic but you can charge, say, $15 for a permanent link in a post.

Do you have a question about blogging or anything related to blogging you want answered? Feel free to email me your question and I’ll do my best to answer it.

Every week, questions I receive may be featured in a Q&A post on the weekend.

Email your questions to ihelpyoublog /at/ gmail /dot/ com.

I don’t think there are an unlimited number of original topics a blogger can write about. At some point, all bloggers repeat something that has, in essence, been previously said. But the really great bloggers are the ones that are able to take a topic that has been previously discussed and recycle it in such a way that the delivery is entirely original.

There are an unlimited number of ways to deliver the same message repeatedly. For example, pick a topic that has been addressed before and head over to my list of 101 great posting ideas and go down the list. Just because a topic has been previously covered doesn’t mean we can’t add originality to it. After all, the whole Techmeme thing is all about what the main discussion points are in the blogosphere at any one point in time.

Of course, original idea/news plus original delivery is the lethal combination we are all striving for. Each one of those posts brands you as a thought leader and brings in scores of readers and admirers. But not all of us have the connections to be close to the people making the ideas/news or have the influence to make ideas/news ourselves. And, even if one did, it doesn’t happen all the time.

Instead of always trying to be the first to scoop an idea or story, perhaps we should focus some of our energy (or the majority of our energy) towards ways we can increase the penetration of an existing message. If your delivery of a message is clearer than others, you’re on your way to making a great blog post IMHO.

I’ve been watching carefully the auction for Problogger.com first when the domain went into the domain name aftermarket after the previous owner let the domain expire.  Someone acquired the domain north of $4,000 then tried to flip it on eBay for a profit.  After seven days, the eBay auction didn’t complete because the reserve wasn’t met.  Today, just out of curiosity, I checked the domain again to see what was happening.

Well, I’m happy to report that it appears that Darren Rowse is the new owner of Problogger.com!  Well done Darren for acquiring the dot-com domain for Problogger!  I always thought you should have owned the dot-com domain from the beginning!

Darren will now get all the type in traffic from from the Problogger brand name that he’s built up through all his hardwork over the last two years and readers don’t have to remember that Problogger was actually a dot-net domain.

I went through a similar process when I wanted to acquire the dot-com domain for my main blog (Cell Phone News).  I already owned the dot-net domain but felt very strongly that the dot-com domain would give my site much more exposure and perceived legitimacy.  So, I contacted the dot-com domain name owner and in the course of 5 hours we negotiated, paid for and transferred the dot-com domain name to me.  Unfortunately for Darren, I know his process was much more drawn out.

Let me ask if any readers out there have an opinion as getting a dot-com versus a dot-net.  Would you get a dot-net if the dot-com wasn’t available?  Or would you try to come up with a new dot-com domain name?  I know Darren covered this question recently on his blog and got lots of responses.

But in light of the above, would anyone now change their mind if it occurred to them that years later, after they’ve built up their name brand (like what Darren did with ProBlogger), it would cost them $1,000, $4,000, $10,000 or even more than that to acquire the dot-com?  Would you be willing to pay that much or else always forgo the type in traffic and always having to remind people to type in the dot-net (or whatever) all the time?

From time to time I see comments on this and other blogs that indicate concern amongst bloggers that linking out too much is bad. The nature of the concern is two pronged. One, some feel that linking out too much results you sending traffic away and reducing the stickiness of one’s own blog. Two, some feel that linking out too much will have a negative effect for search engine rankings. I don’t think either should be a concern for the quality blogger.

Linking out equals less stickiness:

Blogs are essentially communication mediums. They allow us to share our thoughts, opinions and knowledge with others. Part of communication is the ability to back up and/or provide examples to support these thoughts, opinions and knowledge. In this respect, linking out gives our communications the “color” needed to put things into perspective. Otherwise the blogger’s thoughts are conjecture and without support.

A well formed posting should therefore have sufficient links to back it up. Readers want to know what real examples look like and what others are saying, and linking out to suitable resources/other blogs accomplishes that goal. Rather than causing one’s own blog to be less sticky, the opposite is true. Well formed postings equals quality postings equals more stickiness and readers.

Linking out hurts search engine rankings:

The main concern here is with theories about how Google’s Page Rank system works. I think this started because someone tried to analyze the thesis put out by Sergey Brin and Larry Page (and others) when they were at Stanford about web hyperlinks as a method of citation. From that analysis came the conclusion that there was only a certain amount of “Page Rank” for the entire universe of web sites and that if one site gains PR, another site must lose some part of it (i.e., that PR is a zero-sum formulation).

I don’t know if that’s true since I’m not a math whiz. But I don’t really care. Big sites link out all the time and it doesn’t seem to hurt them. I link out on my other blogs all the time and it doesn’t seem to hurt my rankings. My point here is that I shouldn’t worry about whether I’m leaking any PR. Rather, I should just worry about doing what’s natural. If natural means linking out, then I link out. Simple (and natural) as that.

If that’s not enough, Danny Sullivan (who is certainly an expert on SEO) doesn’t believe in PR leakage either the last time I checked. If he’s not concerned, I’m certainly not going to worry about it either. That’s why I’m not concerned about giving link love to my commentors (i.e., there are no nofollow attributes on the comment links flowing out of this blog).

I don’t know if Tony Hung did it on purpose or not but he got himself some real attention by baiting Jason Calacanis to respond to Tony’s blue collar blogging post. Good for him for creating some buzz around an issue that may or may not have ever existed. Tony set up the bait and Jason bit it.

In summary, Tony defended the right of bloggers who aren’t big name (like Jason) to make money by doing paid reviews. Jason has made it clear how he feels about bloggers who do paid posts (i.e., they have “no integrity”). Tony argues that not everyone has the name pull and influence of bloggers like Calacanis, Scoble and Jarvis (who can make a living just opining). There are those stay-at-home moms and others who do everything they can to monetize their blogs, and to denigrate them just because they chose to do paid reviews is classist and elitist.

Jason responded by calling the whole thing “the dumbest argument in the blogosphere.” Then he proceeded to list off a bunch of criteria that would make anyone “A-list” in less than 90 days:

1. Blog intelligently. Think about your post for a day before you hit publish. Do research–do primary research in the real work. Write something with insight, and include links to other folks ideas.

2. Go to 2-3 events or conferences a week.

3. Get a great domain name that is easy to remember and spell (i.e. buzzmachine.com).

4. Go to TechMeme and write an insightful piece daily about one of the top stories.

5. Start emailing other bloggers with feedback on their stories. (don’t beg for links)

6. Be smart.

7. Don’t be an idiot.

In spite of what you think of the whole blowup, Calacanis does offer up a few nuggets of advice. While number 1 is obvious, it is number 2 and number 5 that caught my attention. I do remember reading a few industry blogs a couple of years ago when Calacanis wasn’t as big a name as now and Gawker was (and still is) the big boy in town. Nick Denton didn’t think too much of Jason at the time (my opinion) and I do recall reading about Jason being referred to as the wannabe at the conferences trying to talk up the big boys. But schmoozing with the big boys did work it seems–look where Calacanis is now. You can’t say Jason didn’t follow his own advice.

The other point is emailing bloggers with feedback on their stories. I didn’t know he did that. Well, good for him that it worked. I’m not so sure it would work as well today given the the exposure top blogs get and the amount of email the top bloggers receive. I suppose for blogs about anything other than tech, it would be fine.

If you want to take your blogging to the next level and join the A-list for your niche, doing those two things above might make a difference for you (unless your blog is about anything related to tech).