Blogging

I don’t have anything against news blogs. There is always a place for news blogs in any niche that has a lot of news. However, the problem with news blogs is that they are easy to copy. By their nature, news blogs are basically saying the same things.

You may have heard of the “echo chamber”. This phenomenon occurs whenever many of the blogs in a niche begin to link to and talk about a popular news story.

There is nothing wrong with this, of course. However, oftentimes, the bloggers just write a general post about the story. They don’t add unique commentary or a unique angle. So, when you browse through the blogs, they’re all just “echoing” each other. There is no real difference between the posts. They all say the same thing.

That’s the problem with news blogs. If you are going to start the next Engadget , why should I visit your blog instead of Engadget? If I can get the same basic information from Engadget, why should I read your blog?

Unless you have the advantage of getting the news before the other bloggers, it will be tough to be successful. Only a couple news blogs per industry will be successful. These blogs will get the bulk of the links and traffic because of their branding and their dominant positions in the search engine results pages.

Be Different

If you have a news blog, strive to be unique. Do things that will set you apart from the crowd. Write more opinion pieces. Write with a unique angle. Get an attention-grabbing blog design. Add interesting commentary of the news.

Even if you only create one unique piece of content a week while the rest of time you just report the news, that content will go a long ways in setting you apart from the rest of the news blogs.

Exceptions

There are exceptions to my principle. Here are a couple of them.

Big market
Who knows? Maybe the tech industry is bigger than I think. Maybe because of it’s huge market size, there is room for another news tech blog to be successful.

Low competition
If there are only a few quality news blogs in your industry, you could be successful.

You’re already established
Your news blog has been around. You get a lot of traffic. Many people in the industry know you. Your blog is branded well. My advice is not for you. 🙂 My advice is for people who are thinking of starting a new news blog.

For New News Bloggers

Don’t think as a new blogger, you can just enter a niche and expect to get traffic because you’re doing what the other news blogs are doing. Remember you’re competing against them. They’ve had time to build their brand, build a lot of links, build relationships with other webmasters, and age their site (Google likes old domains). Be unique and you’ll increase your chances of being successful. Also, if you’ve got the money, one of the best ways to enter a market with a news blog is to buy an established one.

Feedback

What do you think of news blogs?

[Note from Ryan: This is a guest post about the success of guest posting;-)]

…or why guest bloggers are good for your site.

By Yan Fortin (Kiltak)
[GAS] Technology News

Last week, when Ryan from Performacing.com offered to have some of his bloggers guest post on 20 blogs, I jumped on the opportunity and added my name to the hat. Considering the number of readers Performancing.com has, I can’t really understand why only around 50 people or so subscribed to the contest, particularly since it was a great occasion to get some amazing content from new voices that have never been heard on participants’ sites.

I had the incredible chance to have David Peralty guest blog on [GAS]. David wrote an interesting piece titled “Cheap Wireless For Your Xbox 360.” After publishing it, I started spamming promoting the article to some of the most well-known DIY/gaming sites around, and boy was I surprised by the result.

Barely an hour after I started promoting the post, hits started trickling in: Lifehacker, xboxscene.com, stumbleupon, maxconsole.net, which resulted in the post being featured on del.icio.us/popular and many, many other sites (about 150 different referrers).

Here are some basic stats:

I wouldn’t be surprised if these numbers double in the next 48 hours since another big referrer has added itself to the list since I took that screenshot.

David, the author, was as surprised as I by the results, particularly since he thought that the subject he wrote about was common knowledge. We can look at this experience as a lesson: Never the thought of a subject as something widely known prevent you from writing new content about it.

When writing articles for their blog, most people only do the first part of the publishing process: they create content, and let it sit on their site for their readers to admire, hoping that someone, somewhere will pick it up and point back to it. The second lesson to be learned from this experience: Oftentimes, if you don’t get the word out, no one will notice you.

Writing a press release to get the word out.

I can’t stress enough how important this is. If you’ve published a piece that you are particularly proud of, compose a brief message letting potential sources know how your content may interest them. Don’t tell them to link back to you! Just provide the facts.

When you’re done, head over to Technorati and search for blogs that fall under the category of your post. In this case, I searched for xbox, xbox 360, games, gaming, and technology. I then compiled a list of the most popular sites that may be interested in David’s piece, and sent them my press release. Overall, I contacted around 20 sites, and five of them got back to me letting me know they would link back to us.

And what about the advantage gained by guest blogging?

If you decide to guest blog on other sites, you’ll reach a new audience, which means potential new readers for you. Depending on the size of the blog where you write, this may mean dozens or even hundreds of people flowing over to your site. It can also increase your reputation and build your profile as a blogging professional, which could result in paying gigs.

To wrap up, I’d like to thank David for guest blogging over at [GAS]. He did a fantastic job, and I wouldn’t be surprised if we got the best results out of the 20 blogs that hosted the performancing guest bloggers.

I’m a blogger for hire. Companies, networks and even individuals hire me to blog. Each client has different terms to his contract, but for the most part I spend much of my day blogging for others. Some bloggers look down on me, while others want to know how to get the same deal. Today I’d like to talk to you about the pros and cons of blogging for someone else.

Pros:

• Steady Paycheck – Though I have my own well-peforming blogs, the income can be unpredictable. When I blog for others, I know I’ll be earning a monthly salary – as well as bonuses for traffic or a job well done.
• Technical Support – One thing I like about blogging for someone else is how that person is responsible for the technical stuff. I’m challenged technically and I’d much rather let someone else handle all that stuff anyway.
• Training – Blogging for someone else is a great way to learn the tricks of the trade while earning a paycheck. Many networks offer training, SEO and traffic building tips and advice and more.
• Advertising and Proomotion – Other people handle the advertising and some of the promotion. That’s not to say you won’t be asked to do some promotion, and really, if you want bonuses you’ll have to pimp your blog, but the staff does handle some of it as well.
• You have access to some great tools -People who hire bloggers do so because they want their blogs to succeed. Many of them are willing to pull out al the stops, giving you access to some nifty bells and whistles.

Cons

• Some people are clueless – Many people are jumping on the bandwagon to hire bloggers, but have no clue about what’s involved. They totally miss the spirit of blogging. I’ve worked for people who really don’t want blogs, they’re looking for articles to stock their website. I had one “editor” who used to come in and edit my work because it was too conversational. I had another who insisted I adhered to no more or no less than a certain amount of words per post. Another, shut off the comment feature because he felt it “too distracting.” Needless to say, I didn’t last long with any of these clients.
• The quotas – Most clients want you to blog a certain amount per day or week. It’s not always easy to make that quota, especially if it’s unrealistic.
• Tech Support – Though you do get technical assistance, if you’re with a network you may have to wait in line. You’re at the mercy of someone else’s server failures, coding errors and other technical issues.
• You can’t always write what you like – You might have to follow a set of guidelines.

Blogging for others indeed has it’s ups and downs. I have to say though, I’m really enjoying my job. I get to write about what I like, meet some incredible people and I’m earning more than I did as an Administrative /Editorial Assistant in New York City. I think it helps to know what you’re doing. If you know about blogging and traffic and community building, you can apply the same techniques to blogs you don’t own. You might even earn some decent traffic bonuses. Some clients cut you in on some of the advertising revenue on top of your salary too.

There’s another benefit to blogging for someone else. When I first started my own blogs, they weren’t bringing in much of an income. Building up a blogging clientele enables me to earn a living while building my own blogs. For me, the pros far outweigh the cons.

Your blog has its own personality, regardless of whether you actively cultivate it or allow it to develop haphazardly. Your readers are attracted to your blog for a reason, and its personality plays a pivotal role in attracting visitors and converting them into regular readers.

When your blog slowly converts passerbys into regular readers, a relationship of trust develops between your blog and them. It is this trust that forms the basis of how your blog deals with its readers and as such the blogger (you) must do what it takes to establish and maintain that trust.

This is where your blog’s character comes in.

Let’s discuss for a minute what I DON’T mean by character:

• I’m not talking about being morally right (immoral content goes, as long as that’s what the blog is designed for).
• I’m not talking about reporting only the facts (rumours work, as long as that’s what…you get the idea).
• This has nothing to do with the blogger (well, maybe a bit) – quite often the blog takes on a completely different personality from the blogger, and if that sells, that’s fine too. You don’t HAVE to be your blog, and your blog doesn’t HAVE to be you.

So what am I talking about?

Character in a blog means:

• Delivering on what you promise (integrity and reliability are cornerstones for building trust).
• Doing what you do to the best of your ability (effort and quality will be your secret weapons for converting visitors).
• Staying true to your purpose in face of adversity or success (don’t allow short-term results to distract you from long-term objectives).

You may not have the most popular blog, or the best looking, or the most profitable. All those things are important, and we’ve talked about how to achieve all these things at Performancing. You don’t build a successful blog by copying the top bloggers on what they’re doing right now – you look at what they did at the start, what type of ‘foundational work’ they did to reach this level.

Getting the foundations of your blog and removing the cracks in it should be your first and foremost responsibility – everything else flows from that.

How can you have charisma? Be more concerned about making others feel good about themselves than you are making them feel good about you – Dan Reliand

Most people think of charisma as something mystical, almost undefinable. They think it’s a quality that comes at birth or not at all. But that’s not true. Charisma, plainly stated, is the ability to draw people to you. And like other character traits, it can be developed.

And as I’ve discussed earlier, your blog (and you) have a certain personality, a brand that can be nurtured, cultivated and molded into anything that you want it to be. Because the personality of a blogger can be one of the biggest ‘crowd-pullers’ for the blog, it’s important that you get it right.

To create a blog that attracts others, you need to integrate the following points into your blog’s philosophy:

1. Be Passionate and Positive

Who would you rather spend time with – someone who is grumpy, bitter and depressed, or someone that is cheerful, positive and passionate?

Blogs are the same – most people get turned off from whiners and are attracted to those who have a positive approach towards life (I wouldn’t say optimistic – there’s a difference in having self-belief and in distorting reality). Or, as they say, when you set yourself on fire (passion), people love to come and watch you burn.

Being positive is more than just avoiding the urge to criticise – it’s a conscious attempt to focus on how things can be made better instead of focusing on what’s wrong, it’s the drive to focus on the good rather than on the bad. You cannot be blind to a fault or a mistake, but you can choose what you spend your time on – pointing out what’s wrong or showing people how to fix it.

And just about every successful blogger I know speaks with passion and conviction – it’s not an add-on trait, this is perhaps the single-most important ingredient to blogging success (and success in life).

2. Expect the Best of People

How do you react when you first meet someone or as us bloggers are likely to do, meet them online? Do you judge them on their name, on their past, on their reputation? Or do you start off by thinking of the other person as a “10”, expect the best from them and give them all your attention?

How we interact with others directly influences what they think of us. If you treat them as perfect 10’s, they’ll remember you as someone who makes them feel good about themselves – and that’s what you need to get them to come back.

With blogging and bloggers, this works on two angles. First is your approach to networking – how you interact with fellow bloggers, readers, journalists, sales reps, etc. Second is through your blog and how you treat your readers – whether you appreciate them and encourage them to do better, or whether you talk down to them, insult their intelligence and expect them to fail.

If you appreciate others, encourage them, and help them reach their potential (both through your blog and through your networking efforts), they will love you for it.

3. Give People Hope

Are you all doom and gloom or are you confident that despite hardships, it’s within your hands to achieve results? Hope does not mean optimism, it’s the confidence in your own ability (and that of others) to do what is necessary to overcome obstacles – and it is this confidence (or lack of it) that will shine through and either inspire your readers or turn them away from you.

One theme you must have noticed here is that of confidence – the kind you have in yourself and your beliefs and the kind you show in others. To be honest, because we’re online and protected by relative anonymity and our blogs, this kind of self-confidence can be faked for some time, so fake it until you yourself believe it to be true.

Take a hard look at your blog and see whether it inspires hope or instills misery – unless the answer is firmly in the corner of ‘hope’, you’ve got work to do.

4. Share Yourself

Make yourself available to your readers – whether it is in terms of replying to comments, to email, sharing your IM details on your blog or just giving more of yourself in terms of personal experiences and resources. In a recent article titled “27 Tips for Building a Kick-Ass Blog”, I talked about how important it was to ‘give first’ and ask later. Sharing yourself is all about giving in terms of your personal time and attention.

In networking, this means helping out people you meet in solving their problems – trust me on this, if you just go out and help the next person who asks you, without asking or expecting anything in return, the rewards are tremendous. And you don’t just have to do this in person, you can do it on your blog as well. If you readers want something, give it to them, even if it means you having to spend extra time on your blog to make it happen.

Examples

A lot of the more ‘popular’ bloggers are well-known not only for being charismatic but also because they excel in their fields. However, to show you how sheer charisma can turn someone into a superstar, take the example of Edward Harrison.

Ed is a 60-something retired IBM employee, who started a blog about the football club Newcastle United in April 2007. Within a couple of weeks, his blog was gaining traction and in 2 months one could safely say that it was a roaring success. In the 5 months since the blog has been live, we’ve received over a hundred emails from readers and thousands of comments on the blog telling Ed that his blog is the first thing they check in the morning.

For me, that type of loyalty and appreciation cannot be bought, it has to be earned. Ed did not win over his readers by being the best writer, or the most knowledgeable, or the most insightful. Instead, he did it by doing 4 things right:

• He’s a passionate Newcastle United fan, and it shows in the hard work he puts in the blog (anywhere between 5-8 posts per day) and in everything he writes. He’s also positive about his team – it shines through in his writing, is infectious and his readers love him for it.
• He’s built a close rapport with his readers by trusting them to police themselves on the blog. Where you might see snarkiness run rampant on sports blogs, Ed’s blog is usually clean – and if there’s a troublemaker, it’s not Ed who has to speak up, it’s the readers. The community keeps the house clean.
• He gives his readers hope by seeing the positives in his club and constantly thinking of how the team can go forward (as opposed to constantly criticising them). If you follow a sport, you’ll know the value of hope – and Ed gives that to his readers in spades.
• Ed shares himself – responding to each email personally, taking the time to answer comments (which in my estimate takes him an hour a day) and has given his readers what they want by going the extra mile to fulfill reader requests for things like team stats and adding a forum, which takes up even more of his personal time.

When it comes to talking about something he loves, Ed is incredibly charismatic. He’s been my benchmark for a while now, and he’s the perfect example of how a blogger can become #1 in his niche by sharing his passion and enthusiasm for a subject with others.

Barriers to being Charismatic

• Pride – Do you think you’re better than everyone else? How many arrogant, pompous, self-important bloggers do you know who are well-liked (and popular, for that matter)?
• Insecurity – If you’re not comfortable with who you are and lack confidence in yourself, how can you make others feel comfortable and confident about you?
• Moodiness – You may accept being nice one minute and snarky the other as perfectly acceptable behavior for yourself, but put it the other way around – how would you treat a person who behaved like this with you? Not with too much confidence and trust, I imagine.
• Perfectionism – Like it or not, no one’s perfect. A perfectionist zeal can cause to focus on the small stuff – the 20% of the problems that aren’t important. You may love to nitpick (I’m a sucker for it) but resist it the first time.
• Cynicism – Do you shoot down the ideas and opinions of others or do you encourage them to chase their dreams?

Self-Analysis

Self-analysis is a bitch – it makes you feel like hell and as a result most people resist the occasion to find flaws in themselves (you can’t be too self-critical though). I admit, I have all the traits I listed above, and for me it’s a conscious effort every day to not succumb to being cynical or snarky, and it’s quite tough at times to find the self-confidence to move forward with conviction.

However, I think that once you believe in something for long enough, it starts being your reality. In terms of habits, this is doubly true.

So take a good hard look at your blog and your own blogging habits. Chances are, you’re not doing everything as well as you thought you were. Chances are that you could use a gut-check and increase your blog’s charismatic appeal.

And to make it happen, there is just one thing you really need to remember:

When it comes to being charismatic, the bottom line is othermindedness.

There’s a writing forum I visit from time to time to read news and catch up on what’s going on in the freelance writing world. In the blogging section, one of the regulars wondered if it was really necessary to update daily. He cited an expert who claimed to regret posting so often. He felt if he only drops a post every few days his readers have a chance to really understand and digest the information leading to more comments. Besides this being rather insulting to his readers, I think this is the wrong approach.

Here’s why I don’t think it’s a good idea:

It’s not good for traffic. While you may get a couple of people who check back often for comments, the majority of your readers are only going to stop by every few days if you’re only posting every few days. Maybe even less if they don’t feel you’re making an effort. The best trafficked blogs are those that post often, meaning several times per day. Your post will still be available for digestion even with new content.

It’s not good for revenue. Really, it isn’t. The only way to get people to click on your links or buy whatever it is your selling, is to get them to visit – often. How is this going to happen if you’re only posting once or twice a week? You want daily revenue, not just on the days you post something.

It’s great for the competition – Here’s the deal. People who read blogs want to read them every day. They read blogs to procrastinate at work, pass time during their lunch hours and learn something new. If you’re providing good, engaging content, people will take the time to read and comment, even if you post several times a day. By suggesting your readers aren’t digesting what you write is rather insulting to them. So don’t post often. Meanwhile, other blogs in your niche will post once or several times a day and that’s where your traffic will go.

Lazy blogging

It was suggested in that same thread that if you post often, your content is watered down and useless. That’s crap. Lazy bloggers post watered down content. People who blog outside their realm of expertise post watered down content. Bloggers who truly know their niche, can blog all day and still hold the attention of their readers because they always have something useful to throw out there.

No time? Enlist help

After school ended last spring, I found myself with less time for trolling for job leads. I made the mistake of only posting job leads to Freelance Writing Jobs two or three times a week, so I could concentrate on building up my other blogs. My visitors were still loyal, but they spent the rest of the time visiting my competition and traffic went way down. Though revenue was down too, I paid someone to post leads in my absence, plus I posted discussion topics once or twice a day. I also brought in guest bloggers to pick up the slack. Traffic soared and continues to rise. Is the rise in traffic due to my posting job leads every day only, or could it have to do with also posting great content? This week, I found out.

Thanks to construction across the road, my power or cable is knocked out at least once a month. Yesterday, my power was out for a good chunk of the day, and the day before it was sporadic. As a result, my helper posted job leads on Thursday and Friday, but I didn’t post any discussion topics. Traffic and revenue took a dive, as did the amount of comments I receive on a regular basis.

It’s not just FWJ. I maintain several blogs for myself and for others. I learn during these power outages that you truly get from blogging what you put into it. If you’re only going to post the network minimum, you’ll get paid the network minimum. If you want the traffic and revenue bonuses, you have to post often. Sometimes that means several times a day.

Don’t underestimate your readers

Don’t underestimate your audience. By thinking they don’t take enough time to digest your information, you’re inadvertently sending them to seek out information elsewhere. They may not abandon you altogether, but you’re missing out on some great traffic and revenue opportunities.

Earlier today Shane wrote about staying motivated and staying consistent in your early blogging days when the rewards may not be as immediate or … rewarding … as you’d like them to be.

It’s sound advice and it can be extended to blogging in general. Blogging for the most part is all about delayed gratification. When you see a successful blog that gets 100s of comments for each post, you see potential and an opportunity for you to be successful as well. What you don’t see is the sheer amount of hard work that went into building that success.

What you don’t see is the daily slogging and an insane amount of consistency behind the blog.

This works both ways. If you’re consistent and work hard all the time, your blog will eventually grow and become successful (but that success won’t show up now – it’ll show up 3-4 months later). On the other hand, if you have a successful blog and you let up your blogging efforts for a few weeks, the crash won’t happen then but in a few months as you’ll find your user base eroding and your blog set back by anywhere between 6 months to an year because you took your foot off the gas.

The next time you sit down to write on your blog, remember that you’re not blogging only for your readers today, you’re also blogging for your blog’s success several months down the line.

Following Darren over at ProBlogger, I thought it would be cool for Perf members to post images or video of their ‘puter and office setups. Post them in this thread, but make sure to kill 2 birds with one stone by heading over to Problogger to share there as well.

I’ll kick things off with my College Startup / Performancing HQ

It’s a 2 computer setup. One laptop (old and borderline useless), one desktop (a souped up powerhouse with 4GB RAM). Each computer has its own distinct public IP address. I prefer safety in redundancy. If one machine goes down, the other is there. If one IP address gets put on some blacklist, the other is there.