I have a theory that bloggers are more opinionated than the average person. Think this might be true?

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Could you make a living out of creating how-to videos? According to New York Times, people are:

Many of the clips have been played hundreds of thousands of times, turning Mr. Kedersha into the top earner on Metacafe, a video-sharing Web site that pays the makers of popular videos. In little more than a year, the site has written him checks totaling $102,000.

It makes sense, in-demand content is the fuel of the web. More and more people are turning to the web for answers. Advertisers want to be where the eyeballs are.

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Just like Raj, I also have a fondness for looking at the world through a camera lens. It's my therapy, and it gets me thinking about things other than work and stress.

Today I realized there is another benefit. I hardly ever have to rely on stock photographs!

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Today started bad and only got worse. It's days like these that make me want to escape to a log cabin in the mountains somewhere far away. Ever feel like that?

It started with me feeling nauseous and only got worse with me making someone angry, which then made me feel physically sick.

This isn't the first bad day on record, nor will it be the last. Quite a few of you will have much more valid bad-day reasons than my small troubles. But the woe we feel is real to us, even when trivial to others.

So it's not new, we all get those days, and if we are going to get anywhere we have to keep plugging away.

What keeps us going?

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I while ago I wrote a long series of blog software reviews here for performancing. Time has flown, as it does, and I was wondering if the same sorts of results would be found now as then.

Back then Drupal and WordPress came out strong. There were also a good number of well known and not-so well known names.

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Lately I have been getting back into the whole SEO thing and I have just been reading Khalids review of some very clever SEO software.

SheerSEO might have a funny name but it certainly seems to be very useful! :)

What it does is checks and reports your search positions for your most wanted keywords. Because it is automated (and currently free!) you can save a lot of time, time that you can put towards improving those rankings.

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There are many people providing social media marketing services. We do! But what you do not get with these services is paid diggs.

Your usual "deliverable" with a social media buy is a top class article, resource, widget or tool, that is attractive and compelling enough to draw votes and links naturally.

Now, obviously there is the temptation for anyone frustrated with their performance in the social media sites to cut out all this hard work and lack of guarantee. They want to buy a front page story and don't care how it is achieved.

Enter paid diggs.

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Over on PerfCast I just put up an interview with Lyndon Antcliff, who you might know better as Linkbaiter extraordinaire Lyndoman or CornwallSEO.

Get an insight into the mind of a professional linkbaiter, find out how he earns his living, what the right way to approach linkbait is ... and more.

Enjoy!

Lot's of people have blogged about ex-Wired-Editor Kevin Kelly’s “1,000 True Fans“ article. If you didn't, I wrote about it yesterday. It seems like the central theme has been lost in some translations.

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Last night I had an opportunity to interview super affiliate, conference speaker, SEO expert, blogger and popular Twitterer, Rae Hoffman, AKA Sugarrae.

Alone or with her website publishing company she has managed to dominate and profit from all sorts of competitive niches. This is one lady you need to be listening to if you want to make serious coin from affiliate marketing.

Read on after the jump to hear about networking, creating super performing affiliate sites and how to properly approach social media.

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I have just been reading some online material by two of my favorite bloggers and noticed a distinct impact on the way I express myself. So notable is this effect that I think it constitutes a "tip".

Without wanting to puff up my discovery unduly, this is the best possible writing tip I can give anyone hoping to improve their skills. Seems simple enough, common sense even. But how many people actually do it? What is this tip? Read on, I will tell you.

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This weekend I interviewed THE ProBlogger, Darren Rowse. We talked about:

• Becoming a 7-figure blogger - by mistake
• Pre-Teen Glamor Photography Vendor
• Starting a million dollar empire on a credit card - The b5media story
• Tips for beginner ProBloggers
• Darren's big news
• And more

Listen to the interview after the jump!

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Go read this now. Then this. That is all.

I am writing a special report for Hive subscribers and I have come to a realization. I need deadlines. I hate them but I need them. Sound familiar?

Without a deadline I don't know where to stop. I scope-bloat, I gold plate and ultimately I don't finish. With a deadline I stress but I do complete my work and get it out of the door.

So my solution is to create an artificial deadline. This will not work without pressure so I have told Ryan I will finish by end of today. If I do complete the report then my deadline is met. If I do not finish on time then I have let Ryan down and I have broken my promise.

I didn't say it was fun, but it is working to focus my efforts and stop me getting distracted. Well, other than telling you guys about it ;)

If you want to read the report you will need to sign up to the Hive and look out for it this week ...

You might have seen on my blog I give away a free ebook. A few people have asked me lately why I continue to give away free information when I could be selling it.

The fact is without free information nobody would know me to buy paid information.

We have to separate out the ideas of free content versus paid content and instead think of our free content as sampling for the paid stuff. Give people a taste to get them juiced up for the full thing. Also remember that your free blog articles allow you to cast out a wide search engine net to trawl back juicy new visitors.

When you give something of value away you do run the risk of being taken advantage of, of devaluing yourself, etc, but they key thing to know is you are taking the risk out of the exchange in the hope the prospect will be impressed and delighted enough to take the next step.

The secret is to not give everything away, hold something back. Give away the concepts but retain the step by step process. Give the sizzle but keep back the sausage :)