The Top 7 Twitter Imperatives For Bloggers

Many bloggers accustomed to dealing with topics in 400 to 600 words are finding concentrating their messages down to a mere 140 characters to be extremely challenging. Twitter can be a minefield and the slightest error can cost you readers and reputation, so follow these top 7 blogger imperatives for Twitter and rise to the level of a whiz tweeter, not a whizzing twit.

1. Wach ur Spelink & Gramma – Your Twitter content represents your blog and if you’re illiterate in your tweets then the reader can expect more of the same in your blog. Even though you only have 140 characters to work with, abbreviations are generally frowned upon, so it’s best to state what you have to say very concisely but in perfect English.

2. Ice your head first – The CEO of the leading company in your field has done something so profoundly cretinous that they’re making Steve Ballmer look like Albert Einstein, so your first temptation is to fire off a tweet calling him a moron and a bozo. You shouldn’t insult anyone on Twitter ever as it can come back to haunt you and will alienate many of your followers. You’re best off to criticize the factual policies, without engaging in ad hominem attacks.

3. Thicken your skin – One of the most frustrating things about being on Twitter is how many of your followers will not hesitate for a moment to call you a moron and a bozo. Just like you shouldn’t engage in vulgar tweeting about industry figures you have to restrain yourself from engaging in an exchange of expletives with instigators. Just ignore them and they’ll go find some other playground to engage in their silly games.

4. Just the facts ma’am – Twitter is a factual communications medium, so you’re best off to reserve your editorial ruminations to your blog and provide information and links which are both relevant and valuable to your reader. They read your blog to obtain the latest happenings in your industry, whether it be the specs on the latest 128GB SSD or what Lindsay Lohan has done now. “Just had a great Mocha Frappuccino #starbucks” is not really either relevant or valuable to anyone and it verges on…

5. Shill Shill Hurray (Not) – The great dirty non-secret of Twitter is that influential tweeters can cash in bigtime. When a major celebrity movie or sports star makes an offhanded remark about how great their shoe/car/watch/whatever is you can bet that their motivation is not altruistic sharing of a great customer experience but a real big check.

As a blogger you have a responsibility to remain unbiased and balanced, so ranting on about how fantastic a specific product is will communicate to your readers that you’ve succumbed to payola and your opinions can no longer be trusted to be your own.

6. Politickmeoff – Are you writing a political blog? Then feel free to engage in all the political wagging your heart desires. If your blog is not related to politics in any way then your tweets should never broach the subjects. If your readers are seeking information on your industry’s latest news, they really couldn’t care less if you’re voting for or against Obama. You can make an exception when political maneuvering affects your industry, such as the Keystone XL pipeline being momentous for the oil business or the Stop Online Piracy Act shaking up internet providers.

7. No laughs for gaffes – We all laugh uproariously when a major twitter makes a boneheaded mistake, such as Ashton Kutcher railing against Penn State Coach Joe Paterno’s firing before learning it was due to a molestation scandal, Kenneth Cole connecting the violent Egyptian uprising to his new spring fashion collection, or Gilbert Gottfried making jokes out of the Japanese Tsunami.

So… what have learned, Dorothy? Don’t repeat their mistakes! You should be lighthearted in your tweets but not ever broach the limits of insensitivity or make factual errors. The wrong 140 characters can wipe out years of work building up your blog!

Hal Licino is a successful author, award-winning freelance writer, and frequent contributor to a blog hosted by Benchmark Email, an email marketing service for small businesses.

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How to Add a Call to Action to Your Post

You might have written your best post ever — but without a call to action, it’s not going to get you the results you’re hoping for.

A “call to action” is a copywriting term. It simply means asking or telling the reader to take a specific action. That might be:

• Subscribing to your blog or newsletter
• Buying your ebook
• Sharing the post on Twitter or Facebook
• Downloading a free report
• Trying out a particular technique or idea

… or almost anything that will benefit you and/or the reader.


Your call to action should be clear and specific. Don’t simply link to a post and assume that readers will get the message: tell them “click here to read…” or “find out more by clicking this link” or similar. If you’re asking for comments, give them a specific question to think about.

There are two places to put your calls to action:

#1: At the End of Your Post

The final line of your post is a natural and effective place for a call to action: you’re helping the reader decide what to do next. It’s crucial you don’t leave this to chance. After reading a post, the reader has lots of options open — including leaving your site altogether.

Some great closing lines are:

• What do you think about [topic]? Let us know in the comments below.
• If you enjoyed this post, please share it on Twitter by clicking on the “Tweet” button to the right.
• To find out more about this, read [link to another post on your blog]

#2: Throughout Your Post

You don’t just have to put calls to action at the end of your post. By including them earlier, you prime readers to take action, and get them thinking.

For instance:

• To introduce a list post: See what you think of these ten ideas (and add your own in the comments).
• To sell an ebook: I’ve just launched my new ebook, [title of ebook]. I’ll be saying a few words about that at the end of this post, but if you want to find out all about it now, you can click on this link [link to sales page].

Now, it’s your turn. Think about your blogging goals (e.g. growing your subscriber base or your newsletter list) and come up with a call to action for your next post.


Bio: Ali Luke is a writer and writing coach, and has a weekly column on content creation for DailyBlogTips.

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The Two Biggest Guest Blogging Mistakes You Can Make

I receive around 20 guest post submissions per week. Usually I let them pile up and once a month I go through all of them, replying to the ones I think would be a good fit for the blog.

There are two types of submissions I discard right away, though, without even taking a look. I also consider those the two biggest mistakes you can make while trying to guest post on some blog. They are:

1. Not including the name of the blog owner

If by opening your email I see something like “Dear Sir” or “Dear Blog Owner” I’ll send it to the trash bin immediately. Why? because it tells me that this is a generic guest post offer, and that you probably sent the same post to dozens of other blogs.

The least you can do is to visit the site where you want to guest post and to discover the name of the owner.

2. Not including the post itself

Many of the guest post emails I receive are only asking if I would be interested in having a guest post written. Something like this:

Dear Daniel,
I have been your blog for a long time, and I was wondering if you would be interested in having me to write a guest post for you. I was thinking to write something about Facebook marketing or email marketing.
Please let me know and we’ll get moving.
Thanks,
John Doe

My thoughts when I see such emails: “How on earth can I know if I would be interested in having your guest post if I don’t know how you write or what ideas you have?”.

Sometimes the person will include the title of the guest post. Same deal. How can I approve or reject a guest post just by looking at the title?

Sure, I could reply explaining this to the person, but why waste my time?

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6 Actionable Tips to Really Improve Your Blog in 2012

Enough of the quasi-motivating “New Year posts” which promise you the world but show you no actions to take.

This post is just gonna give you the facts; no B.S. about “taking charge” of your blog’s success, just stuff you need to get done to rock it in 2012.

So, how about you stop reading the intro and start taking notes, and after that, don’t go check Twitter, start implementing them right now!

1.) Take Your Email List Seriously

It’s time to start taking your email list seriously, because building it is the “do or die” component of your blog that simply cannot be ignored  ;-) .

By the way, if you haven’t started an email list for your blog, I can personally call you up and yell at you for motivation if needed .

First things first, nailing the right spots for opt-in forms.

There are 3 main spots where opt-in forms are essential and can really be considered not optional, and they are:

1. Sidebar opt-in
2. End of post opt-in
3. Opt-ins on important pages (about me, etc.)

Two “bonus” places I would greatly consider are the above the fold feature box (like I have on my site) and the dedicated subscription page (which also lists other ways to subscribe, such as via RSS).

The other two things you need to do are:

1. Try new email collection techniques
2. Make your newsletter worth subscribing too

As for the second, you need to start creating newsletter exclusive content just for subscribers, in the form of free guides hosted on your site or elsewhere (such as Scribd) or just with plain text emails that provide a lot of value.

Your email list is everything, time to make it count.

2.) Branch Out to New Content Mediums

Time to stop with the boring text posts all the time.

Not that there’s anything wrong with the classic blog article (you’re reading one now!), but in 2012 you need to embrace the change in how people interact with content, and that means getting involved with audio and video.

This is the year where you need to start “Being Everywhere”, and this starts with learning the benefits of using video and also how to start a podcast.

I wrote a post hear on DBT specifically about how to increase your blog traffic with SlideShare, and I have a quick update: I was able to make the SlideShare homepage, get over 18,000+ views on my presentation, and attract over 2000 unique visitors to my blog!

But I’m not hear to talk about my successes, I’m here to prove a point: new content mediums work, and you are missing out on tons of traffic if you stick to your regular old text posts.
It’s time to start engaging in:

1. Video
2. Podcasts
3. Slideshows
4. Infographics
5. Unique images
6. PDF & documents (guides)
7. Webinars

All of these forms of content not only help you stand out, they will also help you attract more visitors and become known as the blogger who dominants all content forms in your niche.

3.) Start Guest Blogging With Purpose

No more of the “spray and pray” strategy of guest blogging.

In my post on creating a funnel with your guest posts, I talk about how a blind guest post (with no real purpose), while it might bring over some traffic/subscribers, is far from being as effective as a guest post that relies on “priming” readers for something on your blog.

Your goal as a guest blogger should be as follows:

1. Create amazing content (that’s a given, “price of admission” as it were)
2. Prime readers for something on your site (we’ll get into that in a minute)
3. Stand out from other guest bloggers

We’re not going to go over how to create awesome content, there’s plenty of info on that.

As for priming readers, as I stated in my post above, you need to write a guest post that does one of the following things:

• Relates to your unique selling proposition
• Relates to your opt-in freebie (e-Book or otherwise)
• Relates to whatever you are selling

The reason you need to do this is because people who have read your post all the way through will be interested in learning more (since they obviously enjoyed the topic of your post).

This is why ‘priming’ work so well, after reading an article of yours about “taxes” on a personal development site, they head over to your blog where you write about taxes and, guess what, have a free e-Book on how to get your taxes done fast.

They’ve been primed by the guest post to your specific topic/niche, and now your blog caters to that topic.

I guarantee you’ll see more sign-ups to your list, try it out and if it doesn’t work, I encourage you to visit my blog and leave me an angry comment

4.) Stop Wasting Time on Social Media.

Okay, before you draw out the fire and pitchforks, hear me out…

As tremendous of a resource as social media can be for creating connections, it pales in comparison when it comes to networking influential people in your niche.

That’s right, email is the greatest “social network” of all.

Staying in touch with people who blog about the same or similar topics as you as the obvious benefit that they will likely support your new posts a projects, sharing them to a whole new audience for you.

Reciprocation generally leads to people willing to help you out back, this is where social media can come in handy (sharing the work of others on Twitter will usually lead to them doing the same).

However, email is where all of the magic happens: guest post submissions, project discussions, debates & private chats, interviews, collaborations, all of the interesting things about your business are going down via email, with social media as the ever present “face” or icebreaker for new contacts & business relationships.

Email is also how you can “chase” traffic rather than sitting around and waiting for it: don’t spam, but for new posts that really push buttons, shoot an email to a few influential people who might be interested in your content, and ask them kindly if they would mind sharing it to their audience (stating plainly that you think their readers would enjoy it).

You’d be surprised at how much a polite email can get done when sent to the right people.

5.) Optimize Your Site Design & Speed

If you recall from this research study on web design, it’s scary how much your site design can effect people’s perception of the quality of your content (and how trustworthy you are)… before they even read any of it!

Did you also know that you only have an average of a few seconds (that’s single digits) to capture someone’s attention before they “bounce” off of your site?

Point is: site design and site speed matter, a lot, and in 2012 it’s time for you to start taking them seriously.
When it comes to site design, you need to think about the end goal of your site: are you trying to get email subscribers? Are you trying to get affiliate sales? Are you hoping people will buy your products?

If you are the typical blog, you are going to want to focus on building your list, and if that’s the case, you need to focus on having a clean, uncluttered site with plenty of reading room and an emphasis on opt-in forms.

Not those annoying opt-in forms that won’t go away when clicked, but natural forms at prime locations, as discussed in section #1.

You are also going to want an easy to navigate site: don’t have a ton of options on your navigation menu, don’t have a search field unless absolutely necessary, and don’t include useless links in your sidebar and other sections of your site (example: get rid of links to categories under your post’s description).

When it comes to speeding up a WordPress blog, there are a few things that will always apply to your site’s speed:

1. Choose a good host (cheap is fine at first, but good hosting matters if you want to grow)
2. Keep your homepage simple and clean (KISS – Keep it simple, stupid!)
3. Optimize images automatically with WP SmushIt
4. Optimize your database with WP-Optimize
5. Consider using a plugin that utilizes LazyLoad
6. Pick a good CDN service and host files there (I suggest MaxCDN)
7. Turn off non-essentials (like pingbacks/trackbacks, default Gravatar images, deleting useless plugins, etc.)
8. [Advanced] Replace PHP with static HTML where you are able (check out this great post on how to do just that)

Lastly, if you are running a WordPress site without running a caching plugin, you are doing things wrong, so make sure you have either WP Super Cache or W3 Total Cache installed right this instant! (I like W3 better, and integrated with CloudFlare)

6.) Create Content With Deliberate Practice

In a recent post of mine of the psychology behind a successful blog, I noted a research study that aimed to address why certain violinists went on to become world reknowned musicans, and why others didn’t (even though they were still talented at the violin).

Their findings?

It was due to the amount of deliberate practice that the world class students engaged in, not the amount of practice.

The thing was, the world class students had a tendency to practice in long, deliberate sessions were they worked on addressing their weakpoints and refining their strong points, ie, practice with a purpose.
This is akin to doing drills in athletics, rather than just “shooting the ball around”.

If you hope to create a blog that gets noticed and makes a difference, you need to take on this mindset when you write.

Write for your blog (and for your guest posts) when you really have time to sit and focus, when you have time to concentrate on creating a post that accomplishes what you set out to do from the very beginning, no matter how many edits and rewrites it takes to do it.

A lackluster effort will produce lackluster results, so if you want to become known for having word-class content, practice like a world-class blogger.

Gregory Ciotti writes about WordPress and online marketing at Sparring Mind (make sure to check it out). He also writers a weekly column for Daily Blog Tips.

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How I Got Two Job Offers and a $200-an-Hour Consulting Gig from Blogging

This guest post was written by Joe Bunting of The Write Practice.

So you started blogging to make some money. Adsense, advertising, and affiliate sales looked like a pretty good way to make a living. You thought you could make money while you slept at night.

Sounded good at the time, right?

But where’s the money?

You set up your Adsense account but you’ve only got pennies trickling in. No one wants to buy your banner ads. And the only affiliate sales you’ve landed are a few Amazon books that earned you $1.13. You’ve slaved on your blog for months, years even, working for a pittance. You thought it was going to be easy making money online.

Now you’re wondering if you wasted your time.

This is where I was a few months ago. And then something happened that changed my blogging strategy forever. Someone offered me a job.

Pretend you’re an employer, a marketing firm with 100 employees, and you’re looking to hire the 101st.
Who are you going to choose? All the candidates look the same: similar educationa; backgrounds, similar experience. But one of them has a blog with 500 subscribers, a Twitter account with 1,000 followers, and is already an expert with Google+. The other candidates don’t. Who are you going to hire?

Here is a strange but true thing I heard an actual employer say:

• “The blog is the new resume.”

Resumes are outdated and growing irrelevant to today’s employers. Your blog gives a much fuller picture of your identity and your expertise. Nowhere else can you so quickly get a sense of a person’s skill, experience, and ability to engage others around what they know.

In only six months, I got two job offers, three requests for consulting work (one for over $200 an hour), and was asked to work on three paid projects. On top of that, I generated hundreds of leads for high-priced, hourly work.

How?

Just by blogging to a group of people who needed services, in my case, to creative writers. The best part is that you can do this, too. Anyone can. It’s very simple.

Who is your audience? You need to know who your audience is because you need to figure out what services they need. Define their:

careerhobbies and interestsagedemographicsannual income.

If you’ve been blogging long with any success, you probably have a fairly good idea of this already. I didn’t need to do a survey to realize most of my readers were over 30, well educated, and wrote novels and creative non-fiction as a hobby.

If you don’t know this yet, make it your top priority. If you can figure out how they think, you can sell to them (and in this business model, what you are selling is yourself).

The best way to define your audience, in my opinion, is simply by meeting them. When someone begins to comment regularly, email him. Ask to chat over the phone; if you live nearby, meet for coffee. By interacting with your fans you solve two problems at once, you get to know your audience and you turn them into friends. Once they become your friends, you get the opportunity to make them into your customers.
If you don’t know your audience, you won’t understand what they need.

My audience is creative writers, so I developed a site that I thought would interest them. Slowly, as I began to understand who was reading my blog, I realized there was a huge need for editing. My readers liked to write, but they didn’t like to edit. I found my opportunity.

As you get to know your audience, identify what they like to do and what they hate. What are they good at? What are they terrible at? And how can you help them be better?

As you do this, you’ll begin to spot opportunities for your services. They might need:

Education: You could develop a course teaching them what they don’t know.Consulting: You could sell your time and expertise helping them solve their problems.Complimentary services: You could sell services that your audience needs.

Let’s break down the complimentary services section a bit more because I think this is where this blogging model becomes really interesting. For example, I realized my audience—creative writers—needed editing services. So I began to pitch this to some of my friends and they loved it. Some of them even approached me!

If marketers are your audience, on the other hand, offer design or copywriting services. If homebuyers are your audience, offer listing services. If your audience needs a lawyer, then offer your legal services. If your audience blogs, you could offer ghost-blogging, design, editing, or copywriting services.

Now, let’s say you’re writing to people who want to get better at internet marketing. You think your audience needs help writing copy, but you don’t have any experience in copywriting.

I had this problem. I knew my readers needed editing help. I had some expertise with editing, but I didn’t feel comfortable selling my services to the guy who comments on my blog every day. What if I do a bad job and he gets upset and leaves?

So I started reaching out to editors, asking their advice on how to be a better editor. I emailed, called, and met face to face with them. This is when the most surprising thing happened.

One of them, an editor who has worked with bestselling authors, offered me a job. So not only did I get some practical knowledge to help (and sell to) my readers, I had his name to back me up. And one of the reasons he hired me was because my blog was my resume. He saw I was already passionate and talented. It was an easy decision.

After that, selling my services became much easier. And a much better way to earn money with my blog than selling Adsense.

This is a very quick overview. Do you have any questions about how to sell your services and use your blog as a resume? Have you done this with your own business?

Joe Bunting is a professional writer, fiction editor, and platform consultant. You can follow Joe on Twitter and download a copy of his eBook, 14 Prompts, for free.

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Mastering the Art of Slow Blogging

This guest post is by Kelly Kingman of Kelly Kingman Media.
Several years ago, I hired a personal trainer and we’d work out in the park near my apartment. One day she had me run the loop around the park and noticed that I had difficulty keeping a consistent pace, I would stop and start a lot. She suggested that I run slowly (which she claimed was smoother than jogging—running experts, feel free to debate). The result was that instead of being either in a short-lived sprint or an exhausted, limping jog, I could sustain a smooth, slow running pace by dialing down my intensity.

When you take off blogging at a sprint, posting daily or even three times per week, your idea generating and writing muscles can cramp up pretty quickly. Over the past three years, I found that not only do I prefer to post irregularly—I average about every two weeks—it keeps me from burning out. I’ve even taken a month off from time to time. For example, I took November off to complete a content-creation challenge. I haven’t posted in weeks because my new website isn’t ready yet. (Stop gasping in horror.)

Economic inflation causes our currency to be worth less. Content inflation is what happens when your content decreases in value—you have more of it, but it’s not that powerful or interesting. When we’re so obsessed with posting frequently, we risk churning out less than exciting stuff, and this can water down our brand.

My blog exists primarily to support my claim that I write well, know what I’m talking about and have interesting ideas to add to the conversation. I don’t want to fill my blog so full of content-for-content’s-sake that it’s hard to find the good stuff. Plus, most of us are better writers when we are expressing something we feel strongly about or just had a flash of insight, and that doesn’t happen every day.

Less-than-great posts aren’t the only possible side effect of forcing yourself to blog all the time, you could be sabotaging your other efforts. Are you spending all of your energy blogging to the point you have nothing left over for other creative content? Are you lagging on client work because you’re blog must be fed? If you spend some time thinking about your business goals, it may make sense for you to slow down or take some time off and write that ebook or give your newsletter a little more love. The world will still be here, so will your subscribers.

I spent most of December creating pre-launch content for a new course that I am launching this month (about, surprisingly, how to build your online business without killing yourself). I am taking my sweet time to create a great opt-in offer for my new site, and in the meantime I want to keep my email list engaged by sending a newsletter two times per month. This all takes work in addition to working with clients, and I’m only human. While I actually do love blogging, I try to keep it as a piece of the bigger picture.

Much is made of creating a steady stream of traffic to your blog, but in order to practice slow blogging you’ll want to create a web of presence. If your blog is the only place you’re consistently showing up online, then as soon as you take some time off you’re essentially invisible. I’m not just talking about social media, but about an email list, a network of affiliates, maybe a Facebook page and guest posting opportunities. Diversifying the places where you connect with your target audience online will reduce the pressure to constantly be updating your blog.

There’s an important distinction to make here, and that is one of business model. The reason I can blog at a casual pace is because I don’t base my business on volume of traffic. Income that is generated directly from my blogging, in the form of product sales or affiliate commissions, is far less than the income I receive from working for clients or from my own products (for which others are affiliates).

I couldn’t even tell you how many people visit my blog on a regular basis, I never check. I focus my energy on making connections with people on social media platforms and converting visitors to email subscribers. Content is key, of course, but I make sure it gets to people on my email list first, and then the blog. When you’re small (and even after you get big) having a healthy email list—one that’s fed a steady diet of good content—is critical. There are always exceptions to any rule, but for the majority of Internet-based businesses, this is true.

If the tortoise and the hare taught us anything, it’s that good things come from a sustained, if slower, effort. In the end, blogging once every two weeks but keeping it up for three years will give you about the same total number of posts as posting daily for two months, but the cumulative impact is likely to be much greater.

The good news is that there’s no such thing as a perfect frequency for blogging. The bad news is that sometimes without a schedule, you might not find the time to post at all. The key with blogging, as with just about everything, is finding the balance that works for you. If you find that having a set schedule can actually help you stretch your imagination and come up with good ideas, by all means go for it. But if you find you dread blogging because you “have to,” it might be time to try your hand at the art of slow blogging. Your blog, and your readers, will thank you.

Kelly Kingman is a content strategist and visionary who will blog sometime soon at her new site, but don’t hold your breath. In the meantime, she’s just explained and mapped, online business models that work despite a lack of traffic, for a new course she’s co-teaching called the Way of the Peaceful Entrepreneur.

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Blogging With Kids: 9 Tips and Tricks to Keep You Sane

This guest post is by Marya Zainab of Writing Happiness.

Are you a blogger? Are you also a Mum with school age kids? Or a stay-at-home Dad?

If you’re like me, you might find it really difficult to manage your time—and your life—to get some writing done. You are talented, you are persistent. If only you could be really productive, so you can get some work done.

And you can be! All it takes is smart use of your time. This is what I recommend. Feel free to take what gels and discard the rest.

It’s okay to lie to people who don’t “get it”

Have you ever tried to tell your son’s school teacher that the reason why you can’t volunteer at the latest fun raiser is because you have to blog?

Apart from the blank stare that you’d most likely get, you would then have to explain yourself, become defensive and go away feeling very guilty, or carry a list of stuff that you ended up saying yes to.

Try telling the teacher you have other commitments that you simply can’t get out of.

One of your not-so-close friends is having a casual get together? Tell her you have some work-related stuff to do.

If the world is going to pretend that I, as a blogger, don’t have kids, I am going to pretend I have imaginary work-related commitments.

Think of the whole process as trying to save yourself the guilt trip and spare others trying to understand what blogging is. Tell people who do understand, by all means; they probably will get it anyway.

Appliances are your best friends

I don’t have a dishwasher in my house. For one, I don’t have the space for it, but the real reason is that I really don’t mind doing the dishes. This is almost a mind-cleansing activity for me.

The fact that I don’t have to use my brain to wash the dishes keeps my hands occupied while I have the time to clear my head and sort through things. I often get my best ideas when I am doing the dishes, and often go away (happily at that) to jot ideas.

But you might hate it! And that’s even more the reason to get a trusted dishwasher, if you haven’t already. While you’re in the process, get yourself a dryer, a weekly cleaning service (if you can afford it), kids’ car pools etc. Do your grocery shopping online. Let kids become a part of the solution—assign them some basic chores.

Outsource as many things that don’t require you personally to get done. This can save you valuable time.

My most favorite—TV, of course! Although use it with caution, and use sparingly. A close second is take-away one week night so I don’t have to worry about cooking for that night.

Get some help from Dad

Nothing beats a hands-on Dad. Get his help with various chores and kids activities.

Get him to cook one night of the week. Ask him to take the kids for their weekend sports. Ask him to do the night-time-bath-and-story-book thing once a week. Is he naturally more chatty, more outgoing than you are? Swap roles of being a “school mum.”

Is he stronger than you? Of course he is—remind him of this when he is grumbling about mopping the floors!

Be flexible

The only way a mum can survive as a blogger is to be as flexible as possible. You will miss out on a lot if you don’t.

There will always be things related to your kids and your household that you would have to do first. You won’t be able to write if your four-year-old is screaming for Spaghetti Bolognese right now. You won’t be able to write if your kid is at home sick—or your partner is home sick behaving like one.

Making an occasional batch of cupcakes with your kids will earn you serious brownie points and will go a long way in creating a harmonious relationship. Hopefully, they will then take a long time to eat those cupcakes as you sit down to write.

Just relax and look at a problematic situation differently. And be flexible.

Live one life

If your blog permits it, bring your children in the picture. Let them sprinkle their magic on your blog.
Then turn around the do the same for them—let your kids see you work. Show them you are as proud of your blog as you are of them. They may not understand it if they are little, but they will get used to see you do other things beside cook and clean.

Just the other day, my four-year-old told his older brother, “stop blogging me!” That lead to great laughter all around. He might not know what blogging is—he probably thinks it a synonym for “blocking”—but at least he is aware of the lingo. Many adults still aren’t.

Put on your oxygen mask first

How many times have you heard that happy parents make for a happy household?

Well, that is in fact the truth. Taking care of yourself is just as important as taking care of others. Do the things that really make you happy. This doesn’t make you selfish. Think of it as an investment. When you invest in yourself, your family reaps the rewards.

If blogging inspires you, by all means do it. Remember that you would have to prioritize some time for yourself, otherwise you will never be able to get it done.

Every time I complete my blogging goals for the day, I feel on top of the world. I am a happier mum, I am a joy to be around, and my kids love me even more.

You don’t have to be a poster parent

Resist to be a contestant for the race of being the Best Mum in the world. There are plenty of things you can do without:

• You don’t have to bring adorable, homemade snacks to your kids’ school. Realize that you can buy cookies from the supermarket and nobody will really care.
• You don’t have to have your house in tip-top condition. Well in case nobody ever told you, kids are messy: they make a mess everywhere they go! Must you clean after them all day long? Avoid doing activities that lead to even more messes, especially when you are running short on time.
• Ironing your family’s PJ’s? Hello

Well in case nobody ever told you, kids are messy: they make a mess everywhere they go! Must you clean after them all day long? Avoid doing activities that lead to even more messes, especially when you are running short on time.Ironing your family’s PJ’s? Hello!

A blogging parent and pedestal parent are not mutually exclusive. Stop comparing yourself with others. Aim for “good enough.”

Focus

It’s about the quality than quantity. Be present. Be truly present in the moment, whatever you are doing. Whether it be playing with your kids, or writing that next blog post that goes viral. If you are distracted and spread yourself too thin, you will end up totally exhausting yourself.

• Plan your day well ahead of the schedule. If there’s one thing every blogger mum or dad needs, it is to manage their time. You have to become extremely organized and self-disciplined—and you need an organizer.
• Create more detailed to-do lists.
• Plan weekly menus.
• Organize your outfits for the week if you work outside the house.
• For a clutter-free house, give something away when you buy something new. It’s a great lesson to pass on to your children as well.

Take this advice, and you’ll have more meaningful time to spend with your family, and even some left over for yourself. Best of all, you won’t feel so guilty about the time spent blogging.

Find a great blogging partner

While it sounds fantastic to have some real-life friends who are mums and bloggers on top of it, it’s very unlikely you will magically discover them.

I am very lucky to have a best friend who actually encouraged me to take up blogging in the first place. She is the most wonderful person to talk about my blogging “habit,” as even my husband struggles be understanding sometimes.

Find yourself other blogger mums online, take your time time to get to know them and then befriend one or two as real friends—not just the networking sort of friend. You will sleep better knowing you have one person who “gets it!”

Blogger mums and dads, what tips and tricks can you add to this list? Share them with us in the comments.

Marya is a communicator of ideas – writing for bloggers, writers and content creators.

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Forget Blogging as Usual: 5 Outrageous Tips for Super-sized Attention

This guest post is by Neil Patel of KISSmetrics.

It happens every minute. About six thousand new blog posts are published. That’s a lot.

Blogs have given enormous power to people. It’s given them a chance to have a voice in a world that used to be controlled by gatekeepers like traditional media. While I’m happy about this, this makes it very hard to get attention in the online world.

Do you want attention for your blog? What about super-sized attention—the kind you get when someone likes Drudge or Time magazine links to your blog because of your work? Well, here are some tips on how to do that.

One of the most popular sites on the web is a user-generated site: I can has cheez burger. Sure, it’s silly, but it’s a valuable lesson: people want to laugh and share stuff for an audience, no matter what it is.

Another site that does this really well is Dear Blank Please Blank. This user generated site is simple. All you do is fill out a short form, click if you want to be notified when it’s published and then submit. That’s it.

While I think this site is genius for the simplicity of the idea and ease of execution, I think it’s simply beyond genius when it comes to the way readers can interact. For instance, after reading the entry, you can choose five options that describe what you feel about it. “How Dare They,” “You’re a Douche,” “Hilarious,” “Like This,” and “Umm, WTF?!”

Of course, you can also comment. The point for you is to think of outrageously different and unique ways of generating user content, because sites like Dear Blank Please Blank show that people want to contribute a lot.

According to the 2011 Technorati State of the Blog report, 90 percent of bloggers use some kind of multimedia on their site. This shouldn’t surprise you, but the most popular form is photos:

With this in mind, just putting photos on your blog or website postings isn’t going to get you a lot of attention. The Boston Globe’s Photoblog is one of the most unique blogs in 2011 because of its use of photos. At over 990 pixels wide, these photos are big and bold and are hard to ignore. They look good when they show up in my RSS reader.

A lesser known but equally powerful blog, Fiked, peppers each post with dozens of powerful photos. The copy is lean, so you move very quickly through each post, but the posts are also very long. Think of it as a list post on steroids.

Another fantastic site is Cabin Porn. They take it even further than The Boston Globe and each photograph fills just about the entire screen.

One of the things I try to do over at Quick Sprout is give readers a very technical and detailed understanding of my topic. This is the best way to go about it, especially since the Panda and Farmer updates, which essentially targeted sites and blogs with lots of low-quality content.

Besides, because of the glut of blogs and post, people are not going to pay attention to half-page, half-baked posts. They are not going to bookmark or share them either.

You need to create high-quality, interesting content if you want people to read, comment and bookmark. Here’s a short list of questions you can ask yourself that will help you create technical and detailed blog posts:

Is what you wrote original?Can you provide practical advice or relevant research?Did you correct any spelling, grammar or factual errors?Is the topic of interest to a reader or a machine?Is the article well edited?
Does your site have authority?Are you providing insightful or interesting information beyond the obvious?Would you bookmark your article?Is your article cluttered with call-to-actions, ads or promotions?Would a magazine or journal print your article?Is your article short, weak and useless?How much time and attention did you give to detail?Would someone complain if they saw this article?

Writing high-quality content takes time. But if you ask yourself those 13 questions each time before you write your chances of creating great content will improve.

It used to be that everyone would tell you to blog every day to get the attention you need. Believe me, it’s not easy to keep up that kind of production. Eventually you’ll wear out of ideas and produce crap.

But it also has an effect on your readers. One of the things I learned over the years is that the frequency of blog posts affects interaction. In some of the tests I’ve done, when you deliver long posts that are detailed on a less than frequent basis, like once a week, my readership and number of comments rise. I think it’s because you give space for readers to read, comment and absorb what you wrote.
You do have to keep in mind that this flies in the face of research by Hubspot in their 2011 State of Inbound Marketing. According to their report, bloggers who blog daily will get five times as much traffic than those who blog once a week or less.

Personally, this hasn’t been my experience, so I recommend you test what frequency works best for you.
Whatever you’re feelings for Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, you have to admit that he was a genius when it came to drawing battle lines.

There were enough people in the world who felt like their government was keeping secrets from them, especially in the U.S, and Assange used that anxiety to create an information empire and become an international celebrity.

That tactic is also a common theme when it comes to copywriting. In his “Influential Writing” course, copywriting legend Dan Kennedy used to talk about the “rally against a common enemy” strategy. If you can identify a person, industry, organization or thing (like a disease, for instance) that enough people feel threatened by, you can create a following by waging war against that person or thing.

Think of the story of David and Goliath. We root for the small guy. A consumer advocate blog like The Consumerist is a good example of going after a common enemy. You can even think of Drudge as being an advocate against a common enemy, namely traditional media.

If you want to get a lot of attention for your blog, then you need to start ignoring the traditional ways of blogging and embrace some more outrageous, out-of-the-box ideas. Hopefully the above examples and tips will help you do that.

What other outrageous ideas can you share about getting massive attention for your blog?

Neil Patel is the co-founder of KISSmetrics and blogs at Quick Sprout.

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5 Blogging Lessons from NaBloPoMo

This guest post is by Karen Andrews of Miscellaneous Mum.

As problogger.net reported earlier this year, November is traditionally National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) and National Blog Posting Month (NaBloPoMo). This year I decided to set myself a personal challenge by giving them a try. Yes, together. In the spirit of imparting some tales of my intrepid adventures, I thought I’d share with you some important (and surprising) things I learned along the way.

Is your blogging routine as old and worn as your favorite pair of slippers? Do you post at the same time on the same day, week in and out?

I see the comfort this can provide, and usually prescribe to the method, but on the other hand might this negate a thing blogging is often known for—the spirit of experimentalism? What if an alternate time, or topic, or way of publicizing your content happened to work even better? Isn’t it worth trialling?

It’s an old adage that the more a muscle is exercised, the better it performs and is strengthened, and I think this applies to writing. I found that by making the commitment, I found the time I needed to perform my tasks—in batches, I will add, as I have a child at home—and I sat down to work guilt-free and purposeful. This more positive mindset really helped.

It would take a remarkable talent to post thirty straight days (or more) of absolute winning content: talent, planning, assistance, and even a little luck might be closer to the mark. Even the most serious and best of us have silly off-the-cuff days, and I, personally, find them refreshing to both read and write.

It gives you the chance to share a part of yourself that a different kind of reader will identify with and appreciate. If your blog is more business or niche orientated this might be trickier, but I can cite some instances here on problogger.net where Darren has done something similar with great results—like an April Fools joke post which stated that ProBlogger had been acquired by Google, or a special guest post by his son.

So I’m issuing a challenge: post your own photographs instead of sourcing them from creative commons, write some flash fiction. Do you draw? Show us!

Once the month is over, stand back and take a breather. You’ve earned one. But what’s next? If you’re like me, worrying about traffic and subscribers takes a backseat when you’re in the middle of the task of laying down words until you emerge from the fog. Lucky there’s a wealth of information waiting to be looked over via Feedburner or Statcounter or Google Analytics (if you choose to do so).

Sometimes you’ll be able to tell what worked “better” by commenter count or good old gut instinct. The question now is: which way will you go? Will you apply your new tactics or chalk them up to mere play? It’s never an easy question to answer, but think about it this way: you’re better situated to do so now than you were a month ago.

Did I finish NaNoWriMo? No, I barely cracked the 3,500 word mark. What happened? Illness, end-of-year school concerts, events, errands. You know the usual excuses. Still, those 3,500 are better than nothing—which might have happened if I hadn’t signed up at all. Besides, I still met the NaBloPoMo goal.

I believe above all else that the best thing you can offer your blogging is the best you. This might mean taking a rest or postponing such challenges if they become too untenable. The best thing of all is, you’ve got the next thirty days, you can begin again. Go solo if you want, you’ve already got the practice in. Maybe recruit some blogging buddies, and make it a community project. You can do it.

Karen Andrews is an author, publisher at Miscellaneous Press, award-winning short story writer and poet. She is also known through her personal blog as ‘Miscellaneous Mum‘. She is on Twitter as @miscmum.

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9 Steps to a Daily Blogging Schedule

This guest post is by Caz Makepeace of y Travel Blog.

I publish almost daily on two blogs.

I have many people comment and ask me how I manage to do it, especially since I have two children, one being three months old.

While it is by no means easy, and I spend a lot of my sleeping time awake, there are still many strategies I employ to make it more manageable.

The old adage less is more works here. You don’t have to write a lengthy, verbose story to gain a following.

Short, snappy posts that entertain and get a point across work well too, especially considering the attention span of our society’s inhabitants.

Think photos, poems, thoughts, quotes, community involving questions, giveaways, reviews, curating information for your readers, and highlighting other blogs.

Why not have someone do the writing for you?

If you have strict guidelines attached you can make the whole process that much easier, as your guest writers understand how to format and promote to your liking.

Having someone write one post a week on your site frees you up to write a guest post for another site and attract a new set of readers as well.

Why would I say this in giving tips on how to publish daily? I think you want to know how you write daily, right? Kinda neutralizes my advice.

It’s simple. The more often you write, the better you get at it, the quicker and easier it gets, the more in tune you become with your voice, and the more ideas start to flow to you as a result.

This post is an example. It took me ten minutes to write it on a train. My mind has been blog-post trained in its thinking due to my total immersion into daily writing.

Once you tap into your voice, you tend to write more from your heart and soul rather than your head, which means less of the “logical and fearful” thought processes and more of the flow of words that pack a punch.

All of this ultimately means less work. Less work thinking, writing and editing. I don’t have to edit a post much that comes from deep within.

Find new ways to reproduce your old content. Turn old articles into podcasts and vice versa, turn newsletters and guest posts into new articles on your blog.

The work is already done; the ideas are there, they just need some tweaking and a slightly different angle.

If you have two blogs, like I do, you can use the same photos and content, but just tweak it a little. I often turn a travel experience I wrote about on my travel blog, into one that has a family or child angle for my personal parenting and lifestyle blog.

From conversations, passing billboards, songs and random thoughts, it is amazing what will spark an idea for a blog post.

If you don’t jot it down you will lose it.

I recently flew from Sydney to Melbourne for the Problogger conference. Within 30 minutes I had the outline for five posts recorded in my notebook. Had I not had the notebook that would have been five easy blog posts left at the departure gates waving me off.

The more I write on my blogs and spend time doing what I love, the more I come to understand what time wasters humans are.

Minutes and hours spent aimlessly wandering lost and filling the void with crappy reality TV shows and trashy magazines.

Check how you spend your time.

Ask yourself, “Is this somehow enabling me to grow? Is it fulfilling me? Can I write a blog post out of it?”

If not, put that time into something else a little more productive. We all do still need our down time, sure enough, but just don’t make it more than your on time.

If I check out to watch a movie or a TV show, or go to the beach or out to dinner, I usually find the blog post ideas won’t take a break anyway, and I hurriedly write my ideas in my notebook that is close by.

All creation comes from inspiration. Do those activities that inspire you. You will move mountains when you operate from an inspired state.

The minute I start traveling or spending time with my daughters—the themes of my two blogs—the ideas start flowing and I can produce an incredible amount of blog posts with fresh original content.

I am able to do all of the above things without raising a sweat, or resenting the writing work. In fact I do it with a rush of gratitude and good feelings, because I love it.

When you love what you do it does not feel like work and you are more than happy to spend every waking minute doing it and the sleeping minutes as well.

The more you love the more you can do.

Caz Makepeace believes that life is all about the memories and inspires others to travel and make their life a story to tell at her popular, y Travel Blog. She also owns Mojito Mother, a blog aimed at putting the mojo back into a mother’s life, where she shares her experiences as a mother and a woman following her own dreams.

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No Matter What Your Blogging Goals for 2012 Are… We’ve got a 50% Off Deal For You

Over the last week on Digital Photography School we’ve been running a 12 Deals of Christmas promotion where we’re offering some big deals on photography related products over 12 days (each lasting for 24 hours).
A number of readers of both ProBlogger and dPS have asked whether we are going to run a similar promotion on ProBlogger – hoping to pick up some ProBlogger eBooks at a discount.
We were not planning on it but who am I to say no!?!
Starting today we’re running a 50% discount for 3 days on any (or all) of 3 ProBlogger eBooks.
Lets call it the Three-For-Three-At-A-Half Sale (cheesey I know but this is spur of the moment).
Here’s what we’re offering:
For three days you can save 50% on any of these three great blogging eBooks, and there’s something for everyone…

If you’re just getting started …

First Week Of Blogging – just $9.99 and it’s yours!
Making great early choices is vital to the long-term success of your blog. This ebook guides you, day by day, through your first week of blogging so you can make the most of those critical first few days.
It will ensure you’re blog is build on a rock solid foundation — a Probloggerdation.

If your plans are to turn your blog into a page view power house next year …

31 Days To Build A Better Blog (2012 edition) just $14.99!
New and updated for 2012, 31 Days to Build a Better Blog is a downloadable ebook designed to help you revitalize your blog.
One step at a time, it will transform your blog into the page view powerhouse you’ve always dreamed of — because we all love seven digit numbers on google analytics!
This is our best selling eBook ever – so join with many others and get involved.

If your plans are to start earning real money from your blog in 2012 …

The Bloggers Guide To Online Marketing (normally $99.99) now $49.99.
A comprehensive, 31 chapter blueprint for your blog’s ongoing profitability – right from the ground up (AKA more cash!).
Backed by an extensive library of practical templates, printable worksheets, and in-practice example documents, this kit delivers all you need to make your blog turn a profit now, and over the long term.






Three 3 deals are good for 3 days only, so make sure you don’t miss your chance to pick up a last minute Christmas bargain.

Grab one or Grab All Three – But Don’t Delay

I’ve chosen these 3 eBooks because they represent the 3 biggest needs among our readers – starting out, giving things a kick start when they’re slow and making money. So whatever your blogging goals are in 2012 I believe we’ve got you covered.
This sale ends in 3 days time on Friday 23 December at midnight US Eastern time) so don’t delay – they’ll all be full price again from 24th and into the new year.

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What Blogging for Fun Taught Me About Blogging for Profit

This guest post is by Becky Canary-King of Direct Incorporation.

There’s really too much to say about the benefit of a good blog for your business. A well done blog can bring in new customers, establish yourself as an expert in your field, open up communication with your clients, and support your SEO and marketing.

Recently I discovered that the blog I write for fun about body image issues has a higher Google page rank than my company’s blog! Of course, we get a fraction of the web views, but without pointed effort, I managed to make my personal blog keyword rich, get lots of backlinks, and ranked high in Google’s page rankings. Now that I’m writing for my company’s blog, here are the lessons I’m taking with me:

Be specific. Want to be a catch-all related to everything about your industry? Great. But you’re going to have a lot of competition, and major competitors with more resources and established viewers. Instead, focus on what you do best, the niche area that you have a unique perspective. What is the blog that only your company could write?

Establish your credentials. Let your readers know why they would want to hear from you about the topic. Just the fact that you are selling the product or service is not necessarily enough to gain your reader’s trust. Sharing your education or career path is a quick way to add credibility; but it’s not the only one. I never got a degree in “Body Image Sciences”, but my genuine interest in the topic makes me a credible source to readers.

Know your part in the blogosphere. Read other blogs on your topic! Getting to know what’s already out there helps you establish where your niche will be. You also get a feel for what readers on the topic are interested in and can borrow some tricks on what works.

Comment and share. Guest post, link back, comment on other blogs. All these actions convey your interest in the topic and establish your unique point of view. Blogs can act as a community of learners, experts and interested parties. Join in enthusiastically!

Let your readers know what they can expect. Doing a series is a great way to get readers coming back for more. Or pick a day when you write on a certain topic, or have a certain type of post. Personally, I do a body positive music post every Friday, featuring a song or two I enjoy. I have been linked back to as a place where you can consistently check out body positive music.

Encourage and ask for feedback. Trying to get commenters on your blog can be really frustrating at first—it normally doesn’t happen automatically, but keep at it! At the end of every post ask questions or encourage them to give you feedback on the topic. Respond to comments right away with a real response, rather than just a thank you. Readers are a great resource for your blog, so let them know they are valued.

Now get writing!

Becky Canary-King is an Account Manager and Press Contact at Direct Incorporation, a company focused on providing a more economical and efficient alternative to using a law firm for common legal/entrepreneurial issues. She is passionate about women’s empowerment and blogs for personally for Happy Bodies, and professionally for Direct Incorporation’s Blog, offering tips for the first 6 months of your small business.

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Charles Darwin’s 12 Rules of Blogging Survival

This guest post is by Tom Treanor of the Business Blogging Telesummit.

Blog readers have a myriad of reading options for almost every topic you can think of. In fact, within your niche, potential customers may be enjoying blog posts written by your competitors while they ignore your blog like the plague.

So what do you do about this dire situation? Do you hire ghost writers to create more content? Do you promote your content more via social media? Do you get better at SEO so you can attract more search traffic?

Well. These may work to a degree. You may see some minor bumps with more Tweeting, Facebooking and catching more long tail keywords in Google. But, it’s a long and slow process if you’re using these brute-force tactics.

There has to be a better way. And there is.

Like Darwin’s finches, which evolved different beak sizes over the generations to better suit their differing environmental conditions and to survive, your blog has to become better suited for your audience’s needs over time. You need to develop more “evolved” blogging strategies that are more effective at differentiating your blog and attracting and keeping the readers that you target.

You don’t want your blog to end up on the wrong end of Natural Selection, do you?

Here are 12 ways for your blog to survive and thrive.

Explain the things that most people in your niche assume don’t need to be explained. Answer all of your potential customers’ frequently asked questions in writing, with pictures and (or) in video. Do detailed tutorials on fundamental as well as on in-demand advanced topics.

Keep the quality high and listen closely to your audience when you pick topics and develop the content. When competitors start sending customers to your site to understand a complex topic, then you’ll know you’ve won!

Getting personal can lead to a deeper connection with your audience and pay dividends in terms of allegiance to your blog and brand.

Many business bloggers put up a barrier between their personal lives and what they share on their blog. Including aspects of your personal life is one way to differentiate yourself from your “plain vanilla” competitors.

People love to laugh. Using humor well is hard, but can separate your blog from the pack. if you can successfully pull off inoffensive humor (depending on your industry), you’ll bring a lot of readers back again and again. You’ll also likely increase the amount of social media shares that your blog gets.

It’s uncomfortable to do. Saying what everyone else thinks is really hard. If you can be the “voice of reason” without upsetting everyone around you, you can gather a tribe of people who say “Yes!” to every post.

Don’t focus on widgets: focus only on the custom-designed, high-end widgets from Alaska.

If you can focus on a specific, but important sub-niche within your industry and become the authoritative source, you can develop a big advantage against your competitors in that area. Once successful, you can extend from this beachhead into the broader widget market.

Tie your blog to a bigger goal. What far-reaching vision can you use to inspire people to join you in your mission? Can you align your company and blog with a bigger movement that is out there? Can you create your own far-reaching vision that aligns with your passions as well as with your company goals?

Go much further than the other blogs in terms of topics, challenges, transparency or risks. It doesn’t have to be dangerous, just extremely different. You’ll get noticed.

If everyone’s writing articles, why don’t you mix in video? How about being the first infographic producer in your industry?

Try new topics, writing styles, media or blog post structures. Think of other ideas that will provide value while separating your from the rest. Give yourself permission to try something unique.

Do you only work with other real estate-related blogs or influencers? How about looking at the lending, architecture, finance and relocation industries?

Spread your tentacles where your competitors never dreamed of going by guest posting, blog commenting or connecting with other bloggers in those industries. If the target audience is the same, you can gain some great benefits from this kind of cross-pollination.

Find the best information that others have written and posted online—the best articles, charts, tables, infographics, videos, or pictures. Collect it in a logical, easy-to-use navigational structure on your blog.

Make sure you link to and give credit to your sources and only summarize (or take small portions of) the articles you link to. Content curation is a way to share great information that is already available and to become seen as a key source of great information.

Focus on being the source of timely news and analysis for your industry. To be able to keep up with the news cycle, this often means a combination of curated content mixed with some original content or analysis.

Niche or industry news blogs can do very well because they get lots of shares, links, SEO benefits and subscribers. Just have a plan for getting regular, high-quality updates onto your site.

Sometimes all the right things are in place but you don’t have the results yet. Working hard can pay off, but pace yourself and don’t burn out! Grab more virtual land than the competitors to create a barrier to entry for “lazier” niche-mates.

Just like nature’s many variations (which we never could have predicted), come up with your own unique way to differentiate your blog. The blogs that thrive in a given niche will be the ones who evolve in ways that allow them to meet the needs of their audience better than the competitors’ blogs.

Avoid finding yourself on the wrong side of Natural Selection by using one of the strategies above, combining a couple or by developing your own differentiated strategy.

Tom Treanor is the founder of the Business Blogging Telesummit, designed to help SMBs succeed with their blogging and social media efforts. Visit his blog at RightMixMarketing.com.

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Define Successful Blogging for You

At the recent ProBlogger training day in Melbourne, surprise guest Tim Ferris said something that resonated with many attendees (if the number of tweets it got was anything to go by). His message was simple: define what success means to you.

Many bloggers that I meet start out with a goal of having a successful blog, but have little idea what that actually means.

Image copyright GIS - Fotolia.com

They want “opportunities to open up,” they desire “influence,” they want “lots of readers,” they want to be seen as “authorities”…

None of this is bad—but it’s also quite vague and I wonder if it could be a contributing factor to wishy-washy results.

Good things do sometimes just happen to people, but more often than not, the people who achieve most with their blogs have in mind some goals that they’re looking to achieve.

When I started blogging in 2002, I didn’t have any idea that blogging would last beyond a few weeks (I had a history of not sticking at things) and as a result, I had few goals. However, over the coming couple of years I began to see the potential of blogging to be more than just a hobby, and to even become a way of earning an income.

The problem was that my dreams remained very vague. While I hoped one day my income would grow, I never got specific with what I was aiming for and as a result, I never really gave it the effort that I should have.

It was only when I sat down with V (my wife) one day and we set a specific goal that things began to really take off. The goal was to be working full-time as a blogger within six months (note that I’d already been blogging for some time—the full story is here).

For the first time, I had a definition of what success was for me. I wanted to be a full-time blogger. I also had a timeframe in mind—six months to achieve my goal.

Suddenly I started to take my blog more seriously, treating it as a business and doing the things I always knew I needed to do (but had always put off).Suddenly I had a concrete target to aim for—and motivation like I’d not had before.Suddenly I had consequences to face if I didn’t meet my target (I decided I’d have to go get a “real job” if I didn’t succeed).Suddenly I had something with which to filter the opportunities that came my way. when invited to do something, I was able to ask, “Will this take me closer to my goal, or is it a distraction?”

Defining what success meant for me drove me to action and sped up my blog’s growth. A few months later I needed to come up with a new definition of “success,” as I’d already achieved the full-time goal.

Recently I came across an old Moleskine notebook from the period after I’d defined success for the first time (2004). In it, I’d dedicated a number of pages to goal-setting and planning how I’d act on those goals.

5-year plan: The way I did it at the time was to set a five-year plan. I had a full page of notes of things that I had wanted to achieve by 2009.

In it, I had some pretty lofty goals. i wanted to have written a book, I wanted to have started another photography blog, I wanted to be doing public speaking regularly, and more. Much of what I wrote back then I’ve actually achieved (some of it was way off track), but at the time I couldn’t have been further away from much of what I was dreaming of.

1-year plan: With that five-year plan or dream in place, I then created a 1-year plan. At the top of that page I’d written “what do I need to do this year to take me closer to my goals for 2009?”

That page then contained my goals for 2005. They were smaller goals, and each of them was a stepping stone to the big dream.

1-month plan: The next pages broke down my 2005 plan into monthly action items—things I’d need to do to achieve my one-year plan.

The key was to start with the goal (a definition of success) and then break it down into achievable steps.

This may all sound highly organized, but these plans were all hand-written and took up a total of five pages in a small notebook. I’d probably put it together in a few hours, yet these decisions gave me a powerful plan to move towards my definition of success.

Your definition of success is likely to be a little different from mine. We all blog with different motivations and goals, and that’s totally fine. The key is to have something to aim for.

So what does success look like for you?

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