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What Does Your Blog's Tagline Say About Your Blog?

July 23, 2010 By 4 Comments

One of the most overlooked items on a blog is the tagline. As with any great company, website or personal blog, the blog’s tagline creates an atmosphere and first impression for your readers, but most bloggers do not think about it past the time they are filling in the blank while setting up a new WordPress install.

Your blog’s tagline tells your new and existing readers where they are and what they can expect in a very few amount of words that is readily seen throughout all of your blog. That is very powerful and it should be thought of carefully as it is an essential part of your branding.

That said…I need to tell on myself a little bit.

While I have always thought about taglines in all aspects of my businesses, I always left one out. While working on a new project for Bike198, my print designer (RegularJoe) and I knew we had to come up with something because this new apparel project needed to have it included. I shot him over an email throwing some ideas on the wall, but it was during a long climb in the north Georgia mountains on a humid Saturday morning on our road bikes as the sun was breaking through the low level clouds at the top of the mountain peaks…he came up with it…

“I like what you came up with, but you know what I was thinking? How about ‘Live the Ride’?”

The moment I heard it…I knew it fit perfectly. It spoke to the way of life, obsession with bikes/parts and the desire to get out on a ride every chance we get that encompasses everything that is Bike198. When new readers hit the page, they will get an emotional feeling (read what David Risley says about emotion and blog success) that portrays the site in a perfect manner. “Live the Ride” was born and we are now integrating it into the site and new projects.

What Should A Great Blog Tagline Do?

A great blog tagline should give your readers a quick glimpse into what your blog is about during that split second interaction with your logo. When you are developing your branding and how you want your blog to appear to outside readers, a blog tagline can go a long way in converting new readers because they will know who you are and what you are about as soon as they land on the page.

A great blog tagline should have several characteristics for success.

  • Should be short and to the point to prevent confusion (ideally no more than 5 words if you can swing it).
  • A blog tagline should be factual about your site’s content so new readers now what to expect from your blog as soon as they land on the page.
  • The tagline should have an emotional attachment to create atmosphere and community around your brand (ex. Ramped Up Pro Blogging in RobbSutton.com makes you feel like you are going to increase your success, traffic, income, etc.)
  • Your blog’s tagline should be original.
  • The tagline should not change multiple times (it is as important as not changing your logo).
  • Ideally…it should be placed with or close to your logo.

Some examples to get you off and rolling:

  • PCMech: Helping Normal People Get Their Geek On
  • TutsPlus: Power Up Your Skillset
  • Shoemoney: Skills to pay the bills.
  • YouTube: Broadcast Yourself
  • Steve Pavlina: Personal Development for Smart People
  • Apple: Think Different
  • Visa: It’s Everywhere You Want To Be

A successful blog tagline (much like logo design) is often the easiest/hard thing to come up with for your blog. When read, it looks like it was easy to formulate as it just seems to fit. When developing, it can be one of the harder aspects of your branding to brainstorm and get right.

Have you thought seriously about your blog’s tagline?

Filed Under: Blogging, Marketing, Tutorials/How To Tagged With: , , , , , ,

2 Routine Blog Chores That Increase Traffic and Profits

July 21, 2010 By 12 Comments

When you have been blogging for several years…or even several months…there are things that happen to your articles that will decrease your traffic and make you less money over time. Old articles are going to start to drop in search engine rankings if not cared for and affiliate links will change or go away completely has companies come and go from affiliate networks or go completely out of business.

It is your job, as the blog owner, to stay on top of these as your blog continues to grow so you can make sure you continue to build a strong reputation online. While everyone might have their own strategy for handling this situation, here is how I attack each issue on a quarterly basis on my blogs.

#1 – Refreshing Old Articles on My Blogs

If you aren’t already, you should be using Google Analytics to track your blog’s traffic, entry points, keywords, etc. With Google being the largest search engine on the planet and Google Analytics being as comprehensive as it is and free…it is a no brainer.

Once, at the beginning of every quarter, I go into Google Analytics with one primary goal: Grabbing a list of my bottom 100 performing posts in search engines.

Steps: Select Date Range –> Traffic Sources –> Search Engines –> Select “Landing Page” from the drop down –> Show rows 100 –> Sort by visits increasing

From this list of 100 articles, you now have your worst performing articles in Google and other search engines online, so it is time to get to work. I start to go down the list and mark articles that I think need to get some love. Now, not all of the articles on this list need to be edited as some are ok down there and are not too important. However, as you go down the list, you will see articles that need some serious help.

What do I do with these low performing articles?

There are several things I do with these low performing articles to get them back up to speed.

  • Rewrite any of the content that needs refreshing (content and times change…you also get better at blogging over time)
  • SEO optimize the article with Scribe - Scribe is a paid SEO optimizer that you probably don’t have. I didn’t believe in it at first but it has done fantastic things for Bike198.com over the past couple of months and by using it…I have been able to jump up results dramatically in certain areas.
  • Make sure all affiliate links are setup correctly – If you bring more traffic to these articles, you better have your monetization setup correctly. Now is the time to do that.
  • Write a list of articles to link back to – After I edit up the article, I write it down on a list. This list is a selection of articles that I  need to link to in future articles to get them re-spidered and indexed more efficiently.

And that is it! When I keep this cycle going, I am in constant rotation of keeping article fresh and income coming into my blogs.

#2 – Optimizing and Checking My Affiliate Links

As I mentioned before, affiliate links can change over time so you can be leaving money on the table and not even know it if your readers are clicking a link and getting no where. I optimize and check my affiliate links in a two stage process that seems to work really well.

1. Click All Of My Affiliate Links To Check Landing Pages

The only way to really find out if your links are broken or hitting the wrong page is to click them. When I first started blogging, this was an extremely cumbersome task as I had to go through each article, find the links and change them if necessary. As you can imagine, as your article count goes up, so does the amount of time and work this takes.

Luckily, these days all of my affiliate links are located in one place in a list with the Ninja Affiliate Plugin, so I can go straight down the list, clicking each link and making adjustments as necessary in an hour instead of days.

2. Optimize Monetization On Top 100 Search Engine Articles

The next thing I do is head right back to Google Analytics and sort that same low performers list as a high performers list in search engines. From this list, I go down one by one and make sure I am monetizing each article correctly. Over time, I have become better at monetizing articles, so by going back into each, I can use my new techniques to squeeze more money out of each article.

Most of my top performing search engine articles on Bike198.com center around reviews, tips and tutorials, so taking this extra step goes a long way in increasing my blog’s bottom line. You might have also picked up a new affiliate program that pays a higher commission or offers products and services that are related to that article that you did not have before. This is the time to make those edits as well.

Quarterly Cycles Insure Long Term Success

The tendency is to want to watch these items on a weekly or even daily basis to make sure you are not leaving anything on the table. However, nothing changes over night and obsessing on this will take you away from your primary goals of content production and promotion, so limit these tasks to a quarterly or bi-yearly basis to make sure you are headed in the right direction.

Products mentioned in article: Google Analytics | Scribe SEO | MaxBlogPress Ninja Affiliate Plugin

Filed Under: Blogging, Generating Cash, Tutorials/How To Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

How I Increased My Newsletter Signups By 150% In 3 Minutes

July 19, 2010 By 17 Comments

In the blog world, your #1 resource for traffic and making money online is your list. While some are hesitant to start an email newsletter, the fact remains that if you want to be successful online, it is a necessity…not an option. Since the number of targeted subscribers to your list directly correlates to your success online, bloggers like myself are always testing new ways to get people to signup. Up to this point, a Lightbox Hover has been the highest converting method to convert casual readers into newsletter subscribers and long time readers and…as you have probably noticed…the lightbox hover on RobbSutton.com has drastically changed.

How I Increased My Newsletter Signups by 150% and Higher

It shouldn’t be surprising that people really protect their email address online. With as much spam that hits our inboxes on a regular basis, online security has become a growing problem over the years. As an online entrepreneur/blogger, it is your job to show professionalism and poise when asking for email addresses. So…your first impression is everything in converting that causal first time reader into a subscriber and first impressions all come down to design.

Unfortunately for most bloggers, design is one area that is often too expensive or overlooked in the pursuit of online superstardom and even though Aweber has made drastic strides in making lightbox hovers, you still do not have a high converting, easy to setup design process that will drastically help you grow your blog…

Until now…

A friend of mine in the blogging world, Michael Dunlop, hit me up to start testing a new plugin that is now available to the public. PopupDomination is an extremely easy to configure plugin that takes your newsletter subscription service (I use Aweber) and inserts that into a fantastic Lightbox hover that goes live on your blog. While I was going to throw up some screenshots of how I configured this plugin in 3 minutes and had it live on the sites, I thought it would be better to just show you with this short video.

Product Links: PopupDomination | Aweber

As you can see by the video…I custom taylored the Lightbox to match the site, and the conversions went through the roof.

Does that mean I recommend PopupDomination? Absolutely and I think you are going to see a lot of bloggers do the same.

The $37 dollars this plugin costs has already paid for itself and more on my blogs in only 3 days of operation.

The only thing I wish it had (which is already in development) is split testing and when that feature goes live…it is going to add an extremely strong foundation to an already fantastic plugin.

Buy You Own Copy Of PopupDomination by Clicking Here

Still not sure you need an email list? Check out this article series to see why you need to get started today: The 1 Thing Your Blog Can’t Live Without

Buy PopupDomination

Filed Under: Blogging, Generating Cash, Plugins, Reviews, Tutorials/How To Tagged With: , , , , ,

How To Deal With Content Scrapers [Blog Tip]

July 15, 2010 By 10 Comments

Content scrapers are the scum of the earth in the blogging world. They take the hard work and dedication of others and try to capitalize on it for their own monetary gain. Instead of actually doing some work, they decide to try to profit of yours. Content scrappers are as sleazy as a hit and run and as annoying as road rash…so basically…they are just the scum of hte blogging world. While most of the time you are going to ignore content scrapers as they lift your content through your RSS feed or copy/paste, there are going to be times in your blogging when you need to handle a content scraping situation and handle it accordingly.

What Impact Can A Content Scraper Have?

A content scraper, when the situation gets serious enough, can have several adverse affects to your blog that are not easily quantified.

  • Traffic loss in search engines
  • Brand confusion (same content in two places with different sites/logos)
  • Duplicate content issues within search engines
  • Copyright violation if your content carries those rights
  • In low competition markets, they can rank well for your content

When Should I Plan Action Against A Content Scraper?

There are going to be very few times you really need to stand up and take serious action with content scrapers. Luckily, Google and other search engines have gotten pretty good at sniffing out who as the real content and who is just trying to fake it. Once Google and other search engines figure that out, they penalize the other sites through their algorithm by pushing them down the list. I had a unique situation lately that made one content scraper of my content get on the radar and I had to do something about it.

When I changed domain names from mtbtrailreview.com to Bike198.com at the beginning of the year, I new that Google was going to have to catch up and spider my thousands of pages. I was prepared for the change and knew it would all get sorted out. At the same time, someone decided to scrape the content off my site and put my full feed articles and pictures on a site of their own and the only content they were using was mine.

So what happened?

They started to rank for my content that had not been fully spidered by search engines yet. Big problem.

In this situation, I needed to take action to protect my brand and my content that I have worked so hard to build up.

How Do I Stop A Content Scraper From Stealing My Content?

When you run into this situation or another one that requires action, you have to handle it very carefully.

First, go to the site and see if they have a content form. 99 times out of 100, content scraper sites do not have any form of contact form or email available on the site, so you are going to have to get it stopped by other means. If they do…send an email requesting removal of your content and see what happens. If you get no response or an ugly one, continue.

Go to whois.net and do a whois lookup on the domain that is stealing your content. When you do this, you are going to get the name of the company that hosts the site. Once you have that name, Google the hosting company to contact them directly.

When you contact the hosting company, keep it short and simple. Here is what I wrote.

You have a domain hosted on your servers, scrapersite.com, that is scraping copyrighted content from my blog network, Bike198.com.

Since there is no contact information provided on the site itself, I am contacting you to shut off the content.

Thank you,
Robb Sutton
oneninety8, LLC
Bike198.com

If the company is reputable at all (like this one was), you should get a response that looks something like the following.

Dear Robb:

Rest assured we at [removed].com and it’s parent company [removed] take this type of infringement very seriously. I have passed this message on to the account holder and have given him 24 hours to respond. Failure to respond to this within 24 hours will cause an immediate suspension of the account. Once a response has been made, I will forward the same to you to reach a settlement.

From that point forward, you should be able to get your content removed from the site.

Is It Ever That Easy?!

Well…not always. Every now and then, you will get a site owner that knows he is wrong, admits it and moves on. However, remember who you are dealing with. Content scrapers are stealers of copyrighted content, so a lot of times they do not go down without a fight. Here are some excuses you might here from a typical content scraper as you go through the process. You need to ignore the excuses (You don’t have to explain anything! They are stealing your content!) and stick to your goal of content removal, but here are some explanations.

  • “But I Link Back To Your Site” –  Hold zero weight for you. Too many one way links have almost zero Google weight and they are stealing traffic off of your content and most readers will not know the difference.
  • “RSS Is Built For This” – Nope. RSS is designed for easy digestion of content…not to make it easy to publish copyrighted content on the web. Now, if your content is Creative Commons licensed, republish with credit is allowed.
  • “I’ll Just Stop Using Your Site, I Don’t Have Time To Go Through Everything” – Your time is not my problem. You stole my content and it needs to be removed.

Now…there are a couple of things you need to keep at the forefront of your brain as you deal with content scrapers and getting your content off of their site.

  • Keep a level head and keep emotion out of the picture. – You have just caught them stealing, so they are going to battle their way out. If you really want to see this issue resolved, you have to keep a level, business head without interjecting emotion no matter what they say to you.
  • Work with the hosting company - The hosting company has the power to shut down the site, so as you go through the process…keep a good working relationship with the hosting company as you move forward as they are going to be your partner in this. If you piss them off, things are going to be harder.
  • Do not make threats you can not keep – Do not throw the idea out there that you are going to call your lawyers if you do not have lawyers. You need to stick to what you can do and keep to your guns. If you have lawyers…by all means throw the book at them if you need to.
  • Don’t believe their threats – In the process, the content scraper is going to throw out threats they can not backup. If they were really that good or had that good of a lawyer, they wouldn’t need to steal your content for a couple of bucks a month.

In the end and about 17 emails later, my content was removed and things are back to normal. Will I need to spend my time hunting down every single content scraper going forward? No. Will this be the last time I have to deal with this? No. I deal with content scraping when it makes sense to invest the time into making sure the situation gets resolved.

Basically, if they hit that hard on my radar, it is time to do something about it.

Scum Image by ?japaneseblues

Filed Under: Blogging, Tutorials/How To Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Riding The Big Wave Of Blog Traffic: 8 Ways To Go Big or Go Home

July 8, 2010 By 8 Comments

Watching trends is just a part of blogging. With information changing as fast as it does online, if you are not paying attention to what is going on around you, you might as well get used to being left in the dust.

In every niche, there is going to be an event or time of the year that you are going to have to be on your A game. Big name print publications are even looking to blogging as a way of providing real time information and updates for their readers, so where do you fit in as the blogger and how can you capitalize on trends in your niche to cash in big? Let’s take a look at my example and how you can apply it to your blogging.

Covering Real Time Events In Your Niche

As you can probably imagine, things are pretty busy over at the road biking side of Bike198.com this week. With the largest cycling event of the year taking place with the 2010 Tour de France, it is a jam packed 3 weeks of Tour results, information and coverage. As a blogger, I need to position myself as a reliable, return resource to capture the benefits of the largest event of the year without actually being in France. This is not always an easy thing to accomplish even if you have a vast amount of resources. As you can see by this traffic graph from Google Analytics…things are going pretty good so far.

Road Bike198.com Tour de France Traffic

So what can you do to get a 68% traffic increase on your blog and rake in the cash from this new traffic at the same time?

8 Ways To Go Big Or Go Home

So…you want to cover something big in your niche or ride the trend wave, what do you need to get done to enjoy the benefits of a drastic traffic increase over a period of time? Here are some tips to help you cash in on the increase and keep a larger percentage of those new readers as your blog moves forward.

#1 – Have Your Blog Prepared – Monetization and Conversion Items

You are going to see a sharp wave in traffic like the graph you see above, so you are not going to have much time to change and edit your blog. You need to have all of your conversion items and monetization strategies in place before the wave starts. About a week before you start your coverage, you need to make sure you have everything in place. During this time period, your main focus is going to be on delivering the content goods and not on blog design or monetization strategies. By planning ahead, you can cash in even bigger.

Money Making Note: It is also a good idea to throw in 1 or 2 extra monetization strategies for this time period. It will bring in extra income for your blog at a time when readers will not be as sensitive to the idea. Even this big publications are inserting a couple more ads here and there to cash in.

#2 – Credit External Sources

Since I can’t be in France to take my own pictures, I have to rely on the pictures and other resources of the people on the field. Because of this, you have to be extra careful about using pictures and make sure you credit the photographer and organization responsible for the shot. Unless you want to really piss people off to the point they will never work with you again, go overboard on giving credit where credit is due.

#3 – Integrate In Other Content Types

Your goal during this process should be to increase traffic to your blog but also to convert that traffic into regular readers. One of the best ways to do that is to mix in other content types with your coverage to show new readers what they can expect on your blog. Ideally, you want to mix in more pillar type articles to really feature your best of the best. For example, on Road.Bike198.com, I am mixing in in-depth how to articles and product reviews…my two “showcase” article types that convert the highest on that blog.

#4 – Be Prepared To Work Longer Hours

Right now is one of my busiest blogging times of the year, to even scrape together the precious minutes to put together this article took some planning. When you are covering realtime events or a growing trend in your niche, you need to be prepared to work longer hours than you are used to. There is time to research (or stay glued to the TV for hours in my case), write articles and stay on top of what everyone else is covering in your niche as well. All of this has to be done at the same time you are still mixing in your regular content. Tired yet?

#5 – Partner With Other Media Sources

One of the best ways you can lighten the load and have higher quality content during these periods of mass blogging is to partner with higher profile media outlets for content. For the Tour, I got together with the crew at Bicycling to use pictures, interviews and Tour stage explanations on my blog crediting back to Bicycling. This cuts down on my research time and provides Bicycling magazine with more vistors to their online real estate. It is a win/win for the both of us.

#6 – Bring Something Different To The Table

Everyone and their mom is providing the same cookie cutter information on whatever you are trying to cover. By bringing something a little bit different to the table in terms of related content, you can improve the stickiness of your blog during this time period. Since my readers are used to riding tips and product reviews, I am going to mix in articles related to the Tour from those two categories. This will differentiate my blog coverage from the typical news media coverage and bring readers back to Bike198.com.

#7 – Test, Test and Test Again

Unfortunately, the preparation you made at the beginning of the process might not be converting. If your monetization strategies or conversion items are not doing well during this time period, you need to put in the extra hours to get it right. This is your one and only shot at this, so make sure all of the extra effort isn’t going wasted.

#8 – Pre-Write and Plan Content

Do you have other blogs or already know what you want to mix in during your coverage? Pre-writing and scheduling content the weekend before you are covering a large event is the best way to lighten the load during periods of high blogging stress. If you have other blogs that are going to take up precious time needed to continue your coverage, schedule those posts ahead of time or get in some guest posts to lighten the load. The worst thing you could do for yourself is sacrifice your hard work in other areas just because your focus as shifted temporarily.

Stressed Yet?! It’s better than you think…

While this may seem like a stressful time in a bloggers life, it can also be one of the most rewarding. During times of extreme blogging, you can make the biggest gains and get over that plateau of traffic and earnings that you have been hopelessly sitting on for months. If you put in the extra effort with content and planning, you will see the increases and enjoy the fruits of your extra labor for years to come. You just have to go after it! Do large spikes due to special events last for forever? Of course not, you are going to see a decrease in traffic after the event is complete, but the idea here is to leave with more traffic and conversions than you came in with. If I am seeing a 68% traffic increase during the Tour de France, I would expect to retain a 20% increase on the backend with new readers and subscribers.

And remember…as the blogger, you have the unique ability to adapt and change on the fly unlike the big print publications.

Wave Image by mikebaird

Filed Under: Blogging, Generating Cash, Tutorials/How To Tagged With: , , , ,

Copywriting Tips: Technical Writing With a Twist

June 29, 2010 By 3 Comments

This guest post has been written by Trinity Nick from the UK. In this article, she explores unique ways of delivering tech reviews

While technology is a thrill for some people, it can be a real kill for others. Those with a flair for technology can quickly grasp its essence. However, there are many who lack this inclination and find it difficult to understand the profundities of technology. Bloggers or technical writers can play an important role in bridging this gap, and helping readers understand and appreciate technology. This is how “technical writing with a twist” comes into the picture.

Apart from using simple language and images to get the idea across, there’s one more useful means of helping readers understand technology better – that is, drawing a comparison with real world objects and scenarios. This can prove to be very effective in enabling people understand the intricacies of technology.

Let’s take the example of the operating system (OS) on a laptop or PC. When explaining what the OS is technically, one might say:

“The operating system is the most important program that runs on a laptop or computer. It is a platform which other applications use for their execution. All computers must have an OS in-order to run other programs or applications. The main functions of the operating system are:

  • managing peripherals like keyboards, printers, mouse, monitors etc.
  • managing all the active applications and prioritising them.
  • managing the system resources, like memory, processor activity, registers etc.
  • understanding the input provided by the input devices like the keyboard.
  • providing output to be displayed on the monitor.
  • managing data on the disk.
  • managing the security of the system.”

Those readers who are familiar with a computer will be able to understand the description faster. However, a layman might not be able to get the complete picture. Now relating the OS to a real world object can make a big difference.

How To Make Complicated Parts Simple: Relate To Life

Let’s compare the functioning of an operating system to the functioning of a chef in a hotel. The waiters who take the orders from customers are like the programs that run on the computer or like the peripherals which interact with the computer. Just like how the applications need some task to be accomplished by the computer, the waiters need the chef to prepare the delicacies on their respective orders. The waiters can also be compared to the peripherals which provide input or accept output from the computer (OS actually). Just like how the OS manages all the resources of the computer, the chef manages all the resources inside the kitchen, like the utensils, the fuel, the vegetables, the meat, the spices and other things.

The chef takes the orders from the waiters, manages all his kitchen resources, and prepares the required delicacies. He then hands the food to the waiter to be served to the customer. He also multi-tasks, depending on how many extra stoves or utensils he has. This is exactly what the OS does. When the programs or applications want some tasks to be performed, they let the OS know about it. The OS uses all the system resources and gets the tasks done. The results are also handled appropriately, i.e. they maybe returned back to the application or displayed on the screen.

Sometimes one of the waiters might bring in a message saying, “He’s our regular customer.” or “He’s a big guy around this place, so let’s serve him first.” The chef thus sets a higher priority to that particular order, just like how the OS sets priorities to the applications running on the system.

Now, what would happen if the OS was not present. Imagine the kitchen without a chef. The waiters might get their orders to the kitchen. Since there is no chef, they might try fixing up something themselves. They might fight for the utensils, the spices, the vegetables and stoves and create a big mess. This is what would happen if there is no OS in a system. All applications might try accessing the system resources simultaneously and create havoc.”

This drawing of comparison to a real world scenario makes understanding technology a whole deal easier. The readers will remember these examples much better. Letting loose one’s imagination can really help in stumbling upon some exciting or innovative ways of drawing comparisons. And this creates the “twist in technical writing”.

About the author:

This guest post has been written by Trinity Nick from the UK. She reviews laptops and mobile phones that are launched in the UK. She as well contributes guest blogs to other websites.

Filed Under: Blogging, Content, Tutorials/How To Tagged With: , , ,

The Gizmodo Trap: Don't Fall Into A Negative Blogging Tailspin

June 28, 2010 By 10 Comments

Over the past couple of days, Gizmodo – a reputable tech blog on gadgets – has been on a tear trying to rip apart the new iPhone 4 during its initial release. This all stems back to the prototype iPhone 4 leak and Apple not inviting them to the iPhone 4 release or making a review unit available for their site. Now…while that is the bare bones of the history between Apple and Gizmodo over the previous weeks, what has happened over the last couple of days is something that you need to pay close attention to as a blogger. Gizmodo has decided to take their fight with Apple public and go on a tear trying to discredit the iPhone 4 and…by doing so…has sacrificed some of their credibility in the industry.

Unfair Bias Leads To Credibility Decrease

No one will ever really know what goes on behind closed doors, but during the span of your blogging, there are going to be times that you get into disagreements with other bloggers and companies. The initial ego reaction is to use your spread online to bash and attempt to bring down the other participant in your disagreement because you feel you are right and other people should know. However, by doing this, you are destroying your credibility and losing subscribers by showing an unfair bias and prejudice against one individual or firm.

The first couple of articles that Gizmodo published on the new iPhone 4 (I have 2 of them by the way!) addressed some issues with the initial release. Now, they were not the only ones covering this part of the story as other Apple related blogs were also following suit. At this point in time, it was more of a reporting atmosphere on the initial units and not an online bashing argument. Like most gadget/electronic redesigns, there are going to be those that love it and those that hate it. With a couple of small issues being reported amongst early adopters (specifically the signal and screen issues…both of which do not affect my 2 units), Gizmodo used this opportunity to publish content that was being searched for on a second by second basis.

Then something changed…

All of the sudden, the Gizmodo articles moved from reporting issues to multiple articles in succession that were pure flame war styled publications. Whether it was an attempt at humor or getting their feelings hurt over the past couple of months, Gizmodo decided that this would be a good time to stretch their jaw bones and try to take their chunk out of the Apple. Take a look at some of the responses…

Gizmodo is becoming the Apple bashing site- how many people are reporting this- everyone I know, including me, with iPhone 4s has not experienced any problems…. It’s not good journalism to create inflammatory headlines when the real story is much simpler.

giz is so noob. they are just apple haters. remember, they didnt get ticks for othe last keynote? anyway, intelligent people dont get convinced about this noobish site, which isnt credible!

Alright, I get it. Gizmodo hates apple and has a big axe to grind.

Giz calling apple users a cult is going a little far me thinks. Especially after being kicked out of the cult so recently. Have you no class?

Used to love gizmodo. But ever since they were raped over the iPhone all they do is bash apple.

Of course…the flipside to these comments are the readers that get entrenched in online drama and love to get in on the bashing ring. But, the reality is that Gizmodo has not shown this much negative attention to anything else in the past.

Gizmodo Forgot The #1 Rule In Marketing

While Gizmodo may have thought they were being funny or “revealing the truth” as they say it, they forgot the #1 rule in marketing that will actually get you the opposite result you are looking for if you go down this same road.

Even bad press is good press.

By going on this tear online, Gizmodo is not achieving the goal they have set out. They are…in reality…actually selling more iPhone 4′s for Apple than they are hurting sales. If there is one true thing in marketing, it that even bad press is good press. Now, even people who had no interest in the new iPhone 4 are wanting to check it out to see if Gizmodo’s articles are true…and this comes at the expense of some of Gizmodo’s credibility.

When you start to jump into EGO blogging, you might feel good for a split second, but you are sacrificing all of the hard work you have put forth to try to win an online argument. And guess what…no one wins online arguments.

How To Avoid The Negative Blogging Trap

Feeling like you need to vent online? Here are some tips to bring you back down to reality.

Remember You Are Running A Business

Are you willing to throw all of your credibility on the line and possibly lose everything? By taking the flaming path, you have to be ready for backlash that will inevitably ensue afterward. Personally, I am not ready to throw away years of hard work to try to show how cool I think I am online. I run online businesses and I treat them that way. When was the last time you saw Coke make a political like flaming to Pepsi? You don’t…why?…because that would actually make Coke look bad instead of bringing Pepsi down.

Honesty Does Not Mean Flaming

Blogging is built upon the principle of honest opinions. But there is a difference between your honest opinion and biased flaming. It is all in the delivery, so even as you have negative things to say about a product or service, deliver that message in a respectful, fact based manner and you should keep your integrity/reputation in tact while not pissing off the company and your readers at the same time.

Think Past Today

Do you actually think Gizmodo is going to have a good working relationship with Apple after this incident? Even if they do, it is going to take a lot of work to get that trust built back up again. As you look at the temptation to flame online, take a serious look at how it will affect tomorrow and not just today.

Take A Deep Breath

Draft up your article and then walk away for awhile. After you have had some time to calm down, go back a re-edit the article. You might be surprised what kind of perspective you will have after you get out of the heat of the moment.

What Kind Of Readers Do You Want?

Do you really want the kind of readers that feed off of that kind of controversy. As you look at the most successful blogs online, can you count on more than one hand the ones that take that tactic? I can’t. Controversy blog readers are typically the least profitable. They are more interested in controversy and online arguments than they are with value and consuming your products, services and content. When you are trying to make an income online, you need readers that will value your content and products to make money online.

The Gizmodo Aftermath

Will Gizmodo lose all of their readers and fall off the face of the Internet. No…probably not. With a blog that large, things will appear to go on as normal even if they do see a small subscriber decrease. In the world of blogging, it is much easier to weather those types of storms the larger you become and they are probably justifying any decrease with ego.

However, as you look at your blog with 100 to 1,000 subscribers or even up into the 25k range, are you willing to throw it all on the line by taking a similar stance on an issue in your niche?

Filed Under: Blogging, Content, The Web, Tutorials/How To Tagged With: , , , , ,

The Secret To Blogging Success Is No Secret: Niche Blog Marketing

June 21, 2010 By 9 Comments

If you are starting a new blog or trying to torque some success out of your current one, there is one thing that will always hold true. Without anyone actually reading your words, you are not going to see success in blogging. With all of the competition today on the net, many beginning and experienced bloggers find difficulty in rising above the noise so their voice can be heard. This frustration level can be alleviated greatly, but it takes looking at blogging in a new light by mimicking the experience of large companies and corporations. That’s right…the success in blogging is actually found through copying actions of that brick and mortar world. It should also not surprise you that 99.9% of successful bloggers do this simple fact…so let’s get rolling.

It’s A Law Of Numbers That You Need To Win

When Hyundai originally entered the North American automobile market, they were not the same company you see today. Knowing full well that they would not be able to compete in the largest automobile market in the world with a “me too” product (luxury sedan, suv, etc.), Hyundai took a different approach. Hyundai carved out a niche market in the US by providing an extremely affordable, new car with a blistering good warranty program.

By providing a car that was not currently available in the market, Hyundai was able to weasel their way into the US auto market by creating a niche product that consumers wanted to buy.

After a couple of years of making a name for themselves, Hyundai turned into the automobile company you see today through expansion into other niche market areas like the SUV, luxury sedan and affordable sport coupe. As we look at this short case study, what do you think would have happened to Hyundai if they came to the market with their current lineup right off the bat? They would have been laughed straight out of the market by companies with larger brand presence, gigantic marketing dollars and a stable reputation amongst consumers.

Hyundai saw the automobile market as a law of numbers. They needed to build a reputation within the market by providing something new and then…through expansion…they could take on the other sectors with a strong brand presence.

Niche Marketing + Expansion = Blogging Success

The #1 mistake (I know…I say that a lot!) I see beginning bloggers make is trying to take on too much at once. New bloggers look at experienced bloggers that are seeing a lot of success within a given subject matter and think…

Wow…I am really into that subject too! I’ll start a blog that covers all of those areas and see if I can make it!

When they take this route…they fail 99% of the time.

Why? Because they forget that their favorite successful blog is not 1 day old. That successful blog has been built over time and has expanded its topic offerings over time to promote growth. When you start in a small niche market (ex. basketball shoes instead of all things basketball), you are able to do several things that can guarantee you early success that you can build off of.

  1. You are competing on a much smaller field (greater success in long-tail keywords in search engines).
  2. You build a reputation as an expert in your field by providing quality content to that smaller audience (growing subscribers and traffic).
  3. You open up the opportunity to expand into other areas (ex. basketball goals).
  4. You attract more links in through niche content (builds authority in search engines).
  5. You open up the opportunity to make money with niche products.

Overtime, as you continue to add to your content offerings, you can find yourself several years down the road competing with the monsters in your niche with news, editorials and product reviews! But it does not come overnight and it does not come by taking on the world all at once.

The trick is to have a defined topic focus that you can write on for at least a year (don’t go rambling off topic unless you want to lose subscribers) and then start to look into your options for expansion down the future as it relates to your niche. With this constant business development and focus, you will see success over time.

When you start that first post of your new blog or hit that one year anniversary, remember one thing.

Blogs are an ever evolving process. What you are blogging about today will expand and change with the times. Your success is dependent upon the management of that expansion that complements your current offerings to provide your current readers with more content and attract new readers through that new content.

Image by mugley

Filed Under: Blogging, Content, Tutorials/How To Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Video Blogging Lesson: Treating Your Blog Like A System

June 15, 2010 By 18 Comments

As many of you know, I do blog consulting on the side and one of the biggest problems I see with most blogs is the lack of system integration between the blog and other social media outlets. It is almost as if the blogger thought about each individual part, instead of how they affect each other as a whole. Your Twitter account, Facebook account, email newsletter and blog are all apart of a system that you, as the blogger, use to convert casual viewers into longtime readers and customers. Without this integration and planning, you create branding confusion amongst the different mediums and your conversion rates suffer. So let’s take a look deeper into how you need to treat your blogging like a system.

Video Blogging Lesson: Treating Your Blog Like A System

Discussed In This Video – Logopond.com | Aweber

Ok…so the idea here is that you want your blog and your related sites/social media to be a sum that is greater than it’s parts. With branding and design consistent across mediums, you are able to build trust in your content and brand through integration. Think of it this way…what do you think when you switch from someone’s blog to their Twitter account and finally to their Facebook account and everything matches? It helps you remember who they are and what they are about right? Well…that is the idea.

So…how do we treat our blogs like a system?

While the video goes more in-depth on the subject, here are the cliff notes.

Your Blog: On Page Optimizing

Your blog is typically your first line of attack with your readers. It is what creates that first impression and gets a new reader to start absorbing your content. On your blog you need to have some items that all look seamless within the design and compliment your goals.

  1. Unique Logo in the header.
  2. Social Media Icons that match your color scheme and design.
  3. Newsletter Opt-Ins below content and in sidebar that carry the same color scheme and design. (Preferably through Aweber)
  4. Personal photo on about page that is professional looking even if it is humorous.

From your on page blog system optimization, you are laying the foundation for your other social media and newsletter elements.

Your Social Media and Newsletter: Off Page Optimization

We carry this same theory to your off page sites using your blog as the foundation.

Facebook Fan Page
  • Professional picture – Matches the picture on your about page.
  • Matching Logo – Same as the one in the header of your blog.
  • RSS Feed – Deliver your content to your Facebook fans.
Twitter Account
  • Professional Looking Personal Avatar – Matches your Facebook fan page and blog about page.
  • Logo – Located in the background of your profile page.
Newsletter
  • Same voice and style in content as blog content.
  • Same color scheme and logo if html formatted.

There Are No Assumptions in Blogging!

The biggest excuse that I hear bloggers say as they choose to ignore this crucial part of the process is…

I don’t have to worry about that…they’ll know.

Well…guess what? They don’t. It is up to you as the blogger to operate under the assumption that there are no assumptions. You have to make your blog and your brand stand out from the competition by making everything easy to recognize and as simple as possible. Any confusion will only hurt you in the long run. It is not always about what you like or what you think looks good. It is about what converts the best while keeping within your personal voice and originality.

Next time you are jumping around blogs being a consumer of content, take a look at how the successful blogs attack this theory. Chances are…if they are seeing a lot of success…they are holding true to their branding and voice across all of their outlets.

Filed Under: Blogging, Content, Social Media, Tutorials/How To, Videos Tagged With: , , , , , ,
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