by Philip on February 11, 2007
Whatever your goals are for having a blog, there are a general set of Key Success Factors to reaching those goals.
Your blog must be:
- Remarkable–A unique viewpoint, a rare tip, a useful resource (e.g., “flagship” content). All of these things (and others) make your blog remarkable. Simple rehashing of content found elsewhere is much less remarkable but generous linking out to useful content goes a long way to making your blog remarkable.
- Easy to understand–A blog is an “engaging” (i.e., a dialogue between you and your subscribers) and a “transmitting” (i.e., a vehicle to convey your thoughts) medium. A prerequisite to both is that your blog must be easy to understand. Get away from jargon (unless your audience is generally familiar with such jargon).
- Elegant looking–A blog should be elegant. Elegant design goes a long way to generating inbound links from other sites. People view elegant looking websites as conveying more authority and “expertness”.
- Linkable–All of the previous key success factors make your blog “linkable”. Links are the currency of the web (how many times have you heard that?) and without them, your blog voice will never be heard.
[I tip my hat on this post to Chris Garret for his excellent article on creating Killer Flagship Content (where I got the idea for KSFs) and Jeremy Wright's Blog Marketing book (for the discussion on "engaging" versus "transmitting" websites).]
by Philip on February 10, 2007
I happened across a rant post a while ago at Pearsonified, one of my favorite sites. Chris Pearson, the designer of Cutline (the backbone of this site), pointed out that someone had taken his hard work on Cutline, modified it, and then claimed the whole theme to be an original creation.
Rightfully, Chris was pissed. And then he let everyone know he was pissed. Because Chris is such an awesome designer (he’s done some fantastic work), he has a huge following (including me) and to each of us, the name of the guy who ripped off Chris’s design was mud.
That was three months ago. If you rip off someone else’s hard work and/or don’t give proper credit where credit is due, you risk ruining your reputation forever. Because the blogosphere is such an efficient medium a momentary lapse in judgment (or worse) could destroy all the hard work you’ve done to build up your reputation. Sometime down the line the stuff you do (good or bad) will surface again.
Of course, if you (or your employee) ever did make a mistake, owning up to it immediately and making the necessary corrections is the best policy.
by Philip on February 10, 2007
Some claim there are over 12 million blogs in the US right now; a significant number of which are not being updated regularly. I guess it’s easy to have a general idea as to why one would want to start a blog (e.g., make money, be heard, etc.). And it’s easy to start a blog. But without concrete goals, it’s hard to blog consistently and well. I’m not saying that goals can’t evolve or change, but they need to be somewhat specific when you start a blog.
Don’t get confused with statistics like revenue, number of readers, number of comments, number of links, etc. Those are all just measurements of how close (or far) you are to your goals. Setting specific goals helps you focus. Having focus allows you to blog consistently and with one voice. It’s easier to find topics to talk about when you have focus.
A couple of examples of some goals include:
- Being known as the first to post on breaking news on a particular topic
- Being an expert in a particular subject
To be truly useful, goals must be engage you on a daily basis so that you are motivated to seek topics to discuss all the time. Nobody wants a blog that isn’t updated.
Here’s a discussion on What Determines Your Blog’s Popularity and Success that is relevant to our discussion on goals for blogging.
Now, what are you goals for blogging?
by Philip on February 9, 2007
The “About” page is one of the most important pages you will ever create for your blog.
Think about the last time you happened on a blog. You either (1) found the site via Google (or Yahoo or MSN or whatever…) or, more likely, (2) found the blog because someone else linked to it. What did you do soon after you arrived at the blog? If you are like me, you likely read the post that got you interested and there in the first place and then you went straight to the “About” page to figure out what the blog was all about.
Your brain wants collaboration to what was said in the posting. Does this guy (or gal) know what he is talking about? What are his credentials? What’s his/her writing style? Should I become a subscriber and continue to read his/her blog? Why should I spend my scarce time on his site in the future? Did the person who sent me to the blog add value to my day?
All great questions that can only be directly addressed in your About page. Make no mistake about it–your About page promotes you. A permanent page to sell yourself to every potential visitor to your blog and to turn that visitor into a subscriber and/or repeat customer.
An awesome About page should:
- Be witty (not dry or boring)
- Convey expertise
- Convey purpose (why are you blogging?)
- Convey personality and writing style
- Sell YOU!
- Answer the questions above
- Use pictures/visuals, if possible (but not too much!)
For inspiration, here are some awesome About pages:
Ever hear the question, “If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, does it make a sound?” My answer to that is, “Who cares if no one is there to hear it!” Don’t be that tree. Be heard. An awesome About page gets you off on the right foot to being heard.
by Philip on February 8, 2007
My name is Philip Liu and this is my blog about tips on becoming a better blogger and making more money from blogging. I live in New York City and by profession I am a corporate finance lawyer (please don’t hold that against me!). I have a passionate interest in blogging and making money from blogging and set this site/blog up to record my experiences, thoughts and ideas and to share them with others who are also passionate about blogging and making money from blogging. I occasionally may incorporate business concepts in my blog posts but I promise to keep the language “plain English”!I own a successful blog called Cell Phone News which I started in 2005 that now regularly gets ranked organically in the top 10 in each of the major search engines (Google, Yahoo, MSN) for any number of keywords. Cell Phone News gets tens of thousands of visitors a month and, by my measure, is a successful website that generates a very significant and steady.
Goals for 2007 (in no particular order):
- Increase exposure, traffic and income to my websites
- Read more
- Become more of an expert in blogging (like Darren)
- Work smarter, not harder
- Participate more on other blogs
- Attend at least one major industry conference
- Meet others with similar interests in blogging
- Create at least four “Flagship” resources
On my bookshelf:
- Blog Marketing by Jeremy Wright
- Seo Book by Aaron Wall
- Free Prize Inside and Purple Cow by Seth Godin
- All Marketers Are Liars by Seth Godin
- Permission Marketing by Seth Godin
- Small is the New Big by Seth Godin
- Unleashing the Ideavirus by Seth Godin
- The Long Tail by Chris Anderson
Contact me:
Do you share the same passion for blogging? Do you have an interest in how to make more money from blogging? Do you have an idea about blogging you care to share? Do you just want to contact me because I’m a cool dude? You can reach me at:
Email: ihelpyoublog (at gmail.com)
Skype: pliu12
Comment: Leave a comment below!
