How to Get Blog Traffic That Sticks

TweetOne major priority of bloggers is getting traffic to their blogs but a lot of people make a great mistake nowadays, not because they don’t know how to get traffic but because they don’t know how to make their traffic stick. It doesn’t matter how many visitors you’re able to get to your blog there is no point in it if you’re unable to make them return. While it is important to know that you can’t make 100% of the visitors to your blog stick you should also know that there are some things...

The Jersey Shore Guide to Irresistible Personal Branding

The Jersey Shore is back and up to its old antics again. My guess — you being a respectable content marketer who finds that sort of display crude, irresponsible and embarrassing — is that you’re not tuning in. Hey, I hear you. But do you know who isn’t offended by it? The 8.4 million people who tuned in to the season premiere last month, making it the network’s most-watched series episode ever. Whether you’re a true fan of Snooki, or you credit...

Outsourcing: the Secret to Blogging Success

This guest post is by Mark Collier is the author of Link Building Mastery. As an Internet entrepreneur, it’s easy to develop this sense of single mindedness—the if-I-can’t-do-it-no-one-can attitude. I call it RTODIY (refuse to outsource; do it yourself). Although the name does need a bit of work. Maybe I should outsource it… The symptoms are: excessive DIY, penny pinching when you could outsource for little or nothing, and learning the basics...

The Easiest Way to Make Money Online

This is a post by contributing author Bamboo Forest. I’ve been blogging for a couple years now and except for a few affiliate sales from ads, consulting is the only way I’ve made any money from blogging. Ways to make money that might make you cry If you told me that to make money I’d have to build websites, acquire thousands of emails for my list, have a hundred thousand monthly unique visitors for Google ads, or write an amazing eBook that must compete with the zillions of other eBooks already...

The Ethics of Pay Per Post

Suppose you ask me to write something nice about your company. I do it and you give me a $10 bill. If I work for you, then it’s a paycheck. If I don’t work for you, then it’s Pay Per Post and that’s a whole different bowl of noodles. . . or is it? If I disclose the fact that you paid me the money to write the post as required by the FTC, then I’m in good shape, right? But if I disclose the fact that you paid me, maybe the value of the post decreases...

Are You Too Busy to Write? Seven Ways to Blog More Productively

Is finding time to blog something you struggle with? A number of people have asked me how they can find time to blog on top of everything else that I have going on. Writing content is vitally important for your blog. It is your source of direct visitors, plus the meat of what you share in social media, the combination of which is essentially all the marketing many of us do. Your content attracts and maintains a relationship with your subscribers,...

The New York Times’ Pathetic Case for the Decline of Blogging

If you feel that the New York Times has the pulse of the Internet then the answer to our headline would be yes. In fact, the Times article which ran on Sunday is titled “Blogs Wane As Young Drift to Sites Like Twitter”. That’s a pretty heavy statement especially when you are saying even the shortest blog post idea can be just as effectively conveyed in 140 characters or less. Maybe TweetDeck will end up being the “Anti-Twitter” by allowing over...

7 Mistakes that Lead to Guest Post Failure

Guest posting! The highway to unbridled blogging success! Nab yourself a spot on an A-List blog and suddenly it’s your name in lights. Traffic, engagement, the undying adulation of the unwashed masses! Sounds great, right? Well, it is, actually. But what about those of us who really crave a bit of failure? The ones who like to start every anecdote with “One time I almost” or “I was this close …”? What does guest posting offer for us? Well,...

My 6 Favorite Blogging Locations

Where do you blog from? One of the most attractive parts about blogging as a profession for me is the independence and flexibility that it brings. I can work from anywhere that I can find an Internet connection. In fact, I don’t even need that at all times—I just need some kind of device to capture the content that I produce (something to type on, a camera, and/or a microphone). This flexibility, and the opportunity to be location-independent,...

The Idealist’s Guide to Raking in Tons of Cash

I know what you’re thinking. You see the title of this post and you see who wrote it and you just might assume that I’m going to ask everyone to join hands and sing Kumbaya. Again. Maybe you figure that idealism is all well and good for pink-haired bleeding hearts, but it doesn’t pay the bills. Sure, it’s great to donate and volunteer and do pro bono work … later. Right now, you’re trying to make the cashflow work. Right now, you need to take...

I Do: Tips for Co-blogging with Your Spouse

This guest post is by Mr. Broke Professional: the husband in the husband/wife team behind Brokeprofessionals.com “I think you need to rewrite that last paragraph,” she said. “And this time, maybe try to be just a little more concise.” She said it gently. Yet the words stung. She could tell I was a little hurt, so she tried to smooth it over. “I really like this blog post. I think it is going to be well received by our readers.” I patiently waited for the “but.” And after a moment or two it...

Several Reasons To Avoid Writing Free Samples

TweetI don’t know about you, but sometimes I feel like a crow that’s obsessed with picking up anything shiny when it comes to the free samples that people ask us content writers to provide to get the work that pays our bills. It’s hard to discern between the people who will rip you off and take the sample and never return any of your subsequent emails, but I’ve found there are certain criteria that can be helpful when trying to separate the honest...