Goals for 2009
There seems to be a rule in blogging that on January 1st, any self-respecting blogger will take a few minutes to wax poetic on one of two topics – a recap of their year previous, or an outlook on their goals of the new year ahead. All the cool kids are doing it, so I’ve decided to jump into the mix. I’m not doing anything better today, so why not? :p
I’m going to opt for the latter, and set forth some goals for my 2009. Some more important than others, but listed in no particular order.
- Work out the technical kinks on my blog. I’ve got some issues with the CSS on this theme regarding spacing in lists, so Id like to either learn enough about CSS to fix this or find a new theme that I like as much as this one. I also had a problem upgrading to WordPress 2.7 and had to revert back, so I’ll figure out what the heck was causing that & upgrade.
- Post every day. Even if it’s just a quick note about how work is going or something interesting I saw online that day. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to post crap, but just a bit more current things than necessarily waiting until the end of the week to mention some things in my Cribbed Content post.
- Get back to doing the Free Toolsday and Saturday Shopper features. I enjoy doing them, I’ve just been slacking.
- Write more guest posts & accept more guest posts. I’ve been given the opportunity, so I should collaborate with fellow bloggers more than I do.
That’s really it. If I set a lot of lofty goals, I’ll never finish them all. So these few are here. Keep me honest on this and we’ll friends. Check back here in a year to see if I succeeded!
Read MoreBlogWorldExpo 08: Making Money Online with a Blog
This was also commonly referred to as the “Super Bloggers” panel. The members consisted, in total, of:
- Jim Kukral, JimKukral.com (Moderator)
- John Chow, JohnChow.com
- Zac Johnson, ZacJohnson.com
- Darren Rowse, ProBlogger.net
- Brian Clark, CopyBlogger.com
- Jeremy Schoemaker, Shoemoney.com
Jeremy was late due to some quality Vegas partying, but once he did arrive he had some quality things to say. They all did, really, but I especially enjoyed Darren & Brian’s takes as I had never heard them speak before and I’d heard John & Zac.
Bullet Point Review!
- Jim asked what their number #1 money maker on their blog was:
- John Chow: Switching from an ad network to direct advertising sales using the OIO Publisher Direct plugin.
- Zac Johnson: Direct ad sales
- Darren Rowse: Recommended affiliate products.
- Brian Clark: Launching a membership site & selling WordPress themes.
- Selling any old crap decreases content value; sell things you actually believe in.
- Bloggers just want to write, not sell, so plugins are useful.
- Write about something that’s interesting or else it’s not sustainable.
- Revenue: 1. Direct Ad Sales 2. Affiliate Programs 3. AdSense.
- BC: Selling things (information, membership, etc) instead of advertising makes more money.
- A couple of years ago readers would complain about ads, but now they’re accepted as par for the course.
- The amount of money to be made in “non-sexy” niches is ridiculous.
- Start with what your readers want to buy, not what you want to sell.
- Offer incentives to sign up for your newsletter – 3x the money to be made with subscriptions.
- Newsletters vs. RSS – it’s way more beneficial to get people onto your email list.
- Aweber – BlogBroadcast tools count is included in RSS subscribers & sends an automatic newsletter with your blog posts.
- Many people still have no idea what RSS is, so offer delivery by email too.
- Blogs don’t have to look monetized.
- Sell yourself using consulting.
Points brought up during the Q&A
- Wait until 100 or 1000 readers to bother displaying RSS numbers on the blog.
- RSS subscriber count is powerful for branding and can be factored into ad prices.
- JC: Rule of thumb when setting an ad price – what is the ECPM for that same spot on an ad network? Double that. Offer the ad to run for a month at a time or a quarter, depending on price.
- Condense your header – big headers take up valuable space.
- How much traffic do they see through search? DR sees about 40% to ProBlogger and 60% to Digital Photography School.
- Chitika is a good ad network with powerful blog widgets for contextual, relevant ads.
- Write for your users, not Google. Search traffic is just a bonus.
- It’s a tricky line to keep your editorial integrity and still sell stuff, so don’t sell willy-nilly.
- Build a business – get repeat customers, loyal readers.
- What percentage of the time do they work? A LOT – you have to bust your ass, this isn’t a get rich quick scheme.
- Always look deeply at a product & only recommend valuable things.
- Announce it
- Talk about the product info, merchant or manufacturers information.
- Share testimonials of readers.
- Review your experience with it.
- Credibility is key with sharing information.
- Endorse, review products.
- Sell advertising in newsletters, lots of merchants love that.
- Establish yourself as an expert.
- Remember that Teaching Sells!
This was a very informative panel, and a great way to kick off the sessions. The room was packed, and I especially liked Jim’s approach to using Twitter to get questions for the audience. With a tech set crowd like bloggers, it was highly effective and a great panel for sure.
Read MoreBlogging: The Root of all Evil?
Is blogging the root of all evil? This argument is swaying, even for me as a blogger.
On some level, I have to agree. Blogging has turned many people into increasingly poorer writers. This “First draft culture” that he describes isn’t too far off, I’m afraid. This ties into a post by Jim Kukral a couple weeks back titled Your Grammar & Spelling Is Going to Ruin Your Career. I have to agree, as grammar and spelling have ALWAYS been pet peeves of mine; even in casual conversation it KILLS me to hear someone say “more better” or “funner”!
Remember that web content doesn’t go away. Archives endure and even if you completely delete your blog…chances are cached pages will exist somewhere. So do yourself a favor and treat blogging like a real job that you’re getting paid a lot of money for if you ever want to advance your career and actually get paid to blog.
And listen to some of these points and try to straighten up & fly right, will ya? 😛
Read MoreTo Continue This Blog Or Not?
I’m considering whether or not I want to continue with this blog. I’m not sure that many people really read it consistently, and I’m beginning to doubt if there’s room in this space for another marketing blog from someone who didn’t even go to school for marketing. Is my perspective that unique? Not sure… so, I’m at a precipice I guess.
The blog isn’t even a year old yet, but I find myself questioning whether or not the blog is adding any value to the space or am I yet another jackass sharing their opinion with people who didn’t ask for it? According to Google Analytics, which longtime readers will see that I couldn’t even keep THAT working, I get about 61 visitors per day. 10,072 since January 1. But how accurate is this since my reporting has had fails a couple times? And does this even matter?
Unless I receive a boom of entries for the contest by Sunday, the contest has been a complete failure with not one single entry as of this moment. I thought the prizes were pretty sweet… hell I’d love to win them myself. What did I do wrong? Not put WIN A VADO! in the title? Rely too heavily on promoting it through Twitter?
Of course, this first year is a total learning curve. Find what works, what doesn’t. I can’t expect to just jump in and be the bomb. Am I being too rash? Not patient enough?
Confusing whether I’m representing my employer or myself is also weighing heavy. Am I forsaking my employer by endorsing my personal brand within my web presence?
These things weigh heavily on my mind as more and more work seems to pile on me – both at my place of employment and at home. Sure it’s building my “personal brand”, and I’ve gotten some cool opportunities from it like co-hosting the Affiliate Thing podcast and an upcoming opportunity that I’m not quite ready to announce yet, but…is it ultimately worth it?
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