I'm new to blogging, like the nightlife theme, but would like to place my own image in the header.
Is this "allowed", or should the theme image be left alone? Where is the image located and where is the code reference? It looks like "screen" might be the image?
A pretty amazing community. Thanks for any help.
Best, Jerry
A number of bloggers have made a variety of informative comments recently about how they're blogging for pay. Go visit the Exchange blog for a view of some good advice. Here are a few tips of my own in the form of a point list. Keep in mind that I'm using the term biz-blogger in the sense that you are blogging for someone else for pay, be it online publishers or companies with a blog, not necessarily in the sense that you are blogging about business topics.
(1) Choose a few (niche) topics. The amount of effort that it takes to really learn one topic is a lot more than you might think. Even when you are an expert at something, there are probably new things to learn all the time. If you blog about too many topics simultaneously, you run the risk of producing sub-par work. That's what happened to me on my own blogs. Now, I try to focus most of the weekdays on client blogs, and spend the weekends for my own blogs - but at a reduced number. If I have blogs that overlap that of clients', in terms of topics, I might publish to those on weekdays as well, but I limit myself to one long article or several short posts. Read the rest of this entry
In earlier comments on Performancing, I argued that writers should pitch their own blog projects – cherry picking the organizations they want to write for.
But what if your target doesn't sell direct? What if you can't tie the blog project directly to the revenue stream? What if you're lost in the space between PR and CRM?
How do you make a compelling pitch based on blogging for the brand? Simple. Ask...
Ask them...
If they've created an online community for committed product loyalists – a place that offers customers a voice, but doesn't sink into the “cesspool of content” that typifies message boards.
Ask them...
If their customers can talk back to a $10,000 ad. Or if they've noticed the ROI of those “interrupt” ads shrinking.
Or why they're spending thousands on ads making one impression of one message instead of a blog delivering dozens of impressions of a dozen messages (weekly!).
Ask them...
Why their PR staff aren't leveraging a channel that rapidly disseminates information in an insanely networked world – one that multiplies the reach of your information instead of diminishing it.
Ask them...
Why the CRM tool that actually engages customers (instead of “managing” the relationship via largely cold, impersonal media) isn't a part of their arsenal.
Ask them...
When they're going to add humanity and passion to their marketing mix, or how they'd feel about a steady flow of Web traffic so qualified that no search engine or sales effort matches it.
Of course... Read the rest of this entry
As part of the Beta of Performancing Exchange, our free classifieds style job and blogs board, we used an AJAX voting mechanism so that members could rate jobs.
We've already had a couple of jobs voted to the homepage by the community, but there were negative comments about the value of a voting system for job offers at the beginning, and i'd like to open some discussion on it's value.
Personally I like it. A well written, interesting job offer can make it to the Performancing homepage without need for me, chris, or any other admin to decide on it's worth -- the community decides (in fact, i'd like to do this for all posts, including forum/blog/etc..).
It also provides a way for bloggers looking for job to quickly scan and discard those offers with poor scores.
What we need now, is to hear what you think, and whether you like or dislike it and why -- and whether we should move the system out onto the rest of the site?
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If you really want to attract bloggers to come work with you then it is important to think about exactly what you are trying to achieve. "Attract" is the important word here. Bloggers will not beat down your door in American Idol stylee, you need to make your offer attractive.
Since I heard about the demise of the weblogs inc Digital Photography blog it has been going over my mind a lot that their given reason for ending was no-one took up the offer to come blog for them. Hmmm ... that doesn't ring true to me; I for one would have taken up the offer rather than launch my own photography blog if A) I had seen it and B) the offer had been good. As it happened I can only find one call for bloggers from November last year and it doesn't make "attractive" reading. OK, you have said what YOU want, not much about what the blogger gets! Bit crap really. And this is supposed to be a leading outfit in the blog network space ...
When writing your exchange ad think very carefully from the bloggers point of view, particularly around the WIIFM aspect (What's In It For Me?). As I said before, they have to actually be able to find the ad too so don't be shy about promoting it outside Performancing.
Brettbum has started a thread on what advertisers need to include, please do take a look and contribute. It will help us all.
I just read that Darren Rowse of Problogger.net is opening a jobs board, not unlike Performancing Exchange, the free classifieds style blogging board we put out in beta a couple of weeks back.
There are probably 2 main differences here:
So far we've had some excellent paid blogging gigs written up on Exchange, and I know there'll be room for both services and that we'll continue ot have fun with the Exchange, that with Raj Dash and Ahmed Bilal moderating and evengelizing, can't go far wrong!
The winner here is hopefully the professional blogger looking for a job, and the company, blog network/enteprise looking for those pro bloggers.
Good luck with the venture Darren.
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Brian Clark mentioned equityas one form of payment for corporate blogging. If I've interpreted correctly, I'm assuming that Brian means things like accepting options, shares, or a percentage of partial payment from a client company. (I'll continue on the assumption that that's what he's saying.)
It's a great idea, and if you choose that form of payment, either partially or completely, understand fully what you're getting and giving. You still need to clearly define for both yourself and the client what your fee for the project is. How you choose to accept payment is secondary.
For example, my brother runs his own PR/ad agency with a biz partner. They've got an "angel" project whereby they do work for both cash and equity for select, carefully screened client companies (percentage of future revenue and/or shares and options). Sometimes the effort hasn't been worth it. Other times it has. They also do a great deal of charity work for non-profits in return for the awards it wins them, as well as links from the resulting high-traffic sites. Read the rest of this entry
I am pretty pleased with our progress so far on Exchange. Already if you really want to be a pro blogger there have been several opportunities, some paying gigs and others simply for link credit. We even in our first week have our first blog for sale. Exchange might even help do some good in the world.
For people who want to take up these offers, some tips to help you land your plum blogging gig
And if you are making an offer
The biggest tip is probably just try it. Can't hurt and even if it doesn't work out first time you get a little more publicity.
Only some few hours after launching Performancing Exchange, a "classifieds style marketplace for the professional blogging community", we've already got a ton of feedback, and the service has already began to reshape.
One of the things we found early on was that the category "services offered" was just asking for trouble, particularly when the service is free... Also, a better place for individual bloggers to showcase their talents and skills is the newly redesigned user profiles, which are soon to be made searchable by "for hire".
Keeping it very simple certainly seems the way forward, and now we have just 3 categories:
No posts were lost when the old categories were removed, but they don't appear on the /exchange page any longer.
There are certainly a few good blogging exchange posts, including B5Media's business bloggers wanted, and they'll certainly be more to come.
As always, opinions and susggestions most welcome.
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If you are business blogger (or a blogger chasing the dream of a high-paying business blogging gig), here are a few problems that you probably face (or will face) and some suggestions on dealing with them.
The benefits of blogging - for organizations, businesses (big and small) and individuals - are evident to us bloggers, but not so clear to most other people. Especially when you talk about corporate blogging, there's a knee-jerk tendency to dismiss blogging as being a waste of time and to concentrate instead on more traditional means of advertising and connecting with customers.
Chris Garrett hits it on the head when he says that "there needs to be a distinction between offering writing services and providing a blog service". Bloggers are NOT merely $5/post writers - they have a lot more to offer and as Raj discusses here, it is best to offer your services as part of a package (including blogging, metrics analysis, research, knowledge of an industry, etc.) and it is a very effective way to demonstrate that blogging is a cost-effective and reasonable alternative to traditional advertising.
At the end of the day, corporate blogs are customer-relations management (CRM) tools, and should be promoted as such. I've talked about this more in point 3, but the main idea is that in order to "sell" blogging, you have to talk to organizations and businesses in their language and tell them how you will benefit them using metrics that they are familiar and comfortable with. This isn't always possible with blogging and its intangible benefits but if there is anything that I've learned from direct marketing and copyblogging is that the results often speak for themselves. Read the rest of this entry
Deciding what to charge your business clients for blogging is a really tough call. If you're new to blogging or copywriting, you're probably not ready. But even if I'm mistaken about that, bizblogging still has a ways to go before it gains enough respect to pay well. Brian Clark has some wise advice about valuing your work in his response to TCWriter (whose comment I vaulted off of earlier when discussing why companies should have a blog).
While I agree with Brian that you should not undervalue your bizblogging, it may be tough for a while to ask the same kind of writing rates that you can get for print projects. Big companies may not yet value blogging, and small businesses can't afford to pay a lot.
So what do you do? Well, if anyone is doing corporate blogging for $5/post, I'm sorry but you're an idiot. You're better off doing the $5/post thing for a network, because the amount of research is generally a lot less. Read the rest of this entry
In TCWriter's response to Ahmed's post about what role Performancing Exchange might play, the idea of corporate blogging comes up. Obviously, companies are in business to make a profit, and it's the wise business person that knows that happy customers make repeat customers. Those of you involved in technical or scientific fields may not have realized an opportunity for you to make your customers happy: publish a blog. (The advice below applies to non-technical companies; you just have to extrapolate to your industry.)
Exactly what would your company's blog be about? Well, besides being about the industry you're in, and general ongoing news and events, how about specific tips on using yourproducts?
As a long-time technical writer (interwoven with my experience as a programmer/ consultant/ webmaster), I found that some of the juiciest, valuable tips on using a particular product are often buried deep in a manual somewhere. Why not blog about these tips? Not necessarily everyday, but at least once a week. Read the rest of this entry
Here are a few points regarding Performancing Exchange that I've been thinking about since morning - hopefully this will foster some debate on what the Exchange can / should do and on the future of "blogging for hire" as well.
Blogging does not pay as well as mainstream media traditionally does - and as a result both sides have to accept that a compromise has to be made.
Bloggers need to realise that we are still at a stage where blogging is new and definitely not considered as profitable or valuable as traditional journalism. That will change, but only with time. Till then we're going to be paid less (most of the time) and will have to deal with it. That's why it's important to know how to leverage your blogging gig to help you land a better job and to negotiate for perks within your blogging that may not cost much to the employer but could help you in your career. Read the rest of this entry
So. You're a serious blogger now because you secured your first blogging client. Seasoned freelancers know about the 80/20 rule: the bulk (80%) of your revenue will come from the least number (20%) of your clients. It's sometimes called the 70/30 rule.
However, Chris Anderson, editor of Wired and author of the Long Tail book and website, says that the Internet turns the rule on its head for some types of digital media, in specific situations, thus giving certain content more sales life. Or at least, that's my interpretation.
But the fact is, in any business, it's generally easier to secure repeat clients than get new ones. But unless you (1) are a very disciplined saver, (2) have great faith in your biggest clients, or (3) have a partial stake in a venture, you probably do not want to rely on a single blogging client. Read the rest of this entry
Your blogging clients may or may not have a mission-critical posting schedule, but if they do, consider what you have to do to not let them down. As I learned the hard way recently, having a second or third way to access the Internet is often a necessity.
My blogging activities are back into the 12-16 hours/day territory again because of new projects. But while writing an article may take me only 15-30 minutes, it's all the research and the hyperlinking that increases total overall time spent per blog post. So I surf the net a lot, scanning and mentally filtering over 800 web feeds (some weeks) and countless articles, as part of my regular weekly research.
Recently, my regular Internet access was down for a few days. My alumni account at the local university had run out, as well. Fortunately, my father offered me use of his broadband access for a couple of days, or I would definitely have been letting down a big client.
So when posting articles daily is mission-critical to a client, make sure that you have back-up online access.
Boost your traffic, improve your blog and become an authority in your niche with Peformancing Services.
