Thursday, March 31, 2011

What Makes A Successful Business Blog?

Is your blog accomplishing the goals it was created for and producing results as you expected? If not, then you need to know a few tricks to make your blog successful.
If done correctly, blogging can add a lot of value to your business by attracting traffic and building long-term loyal customers. Conversely, wrong blogging approach can wind you up in trouble and create a negative impact of your business. Following points have been listed to ensure your blog is driving more customers rather than warding them off.
BE ON TARGET
Business owners normally get a blog and start posting entries on a number of diverse topics, which is the wrong way to initiate. The winning key is to make your blog targeted in nature and stick to any one theme. You can’t merge a fashion blog with a politics one, so make sure the theme of your blog is single and very clear.
FOCUS ON THE PURPOSE
Every business starts blogging with a certain set of goals in mind. Some blog to attract customers, some blog to advertise their goods and services, some blog to create brand image while some blog for higher search engine visibility. Whatever may be your goal, just stick to it and don’t wander off in different directions.
MAKE THE CONTENT WORTH READING
Blogging is all about writing. The more unique and interesting information you provide to the readers, the more successful your blog will become in terms of readership and followership. No one wants to read old and boring articles so you have to add some spice to your writings if you wish to make them readable.
CREATE A VISUAL APPEAL
Each entry made into your blog should be visually attractive. You can either add relevant pictures and images to supplement the article’s content or you can break an article in proper paragraphs, bullet points or sub-headings to facilitate the reading.
PSSSSTT, SPREAD THE WORD
It is absolutely useless to launch a new product into the market without promoting it among the users first. Similarly if you want people to know about your blog and read the useful information it provides, you have to advertise it properly using both offline and online marketing methods.
If you don’t have a blog yet, get a free blog today and add value to your business.

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

The Many Uses of Blogs

In the recent past, blogs have gained considerable popularity and recognition within the online community. With the creation of so many blogging platforms, it has become easy for a person to get a free blog and start blogging. Today every other person, young or old, is seen busy writing articles and posts for their blogs.
But the most interesting question is that why do people blog? Or what are the uses of blogging? Generally speaking, people blog to broadcast and publicize information. This information can be anything you can imagine and depends upon the interest of a person. For example, an actor will blog about movies and other actors, an accountant may blog about tax policies, a college student may blog about studies, a house wife may blog about cooking recipe and so on.
Blogs as virtual diaries: Blogs are a good replacement of offline personal diaries and people can use them to discuss about their day-to-day activities and express their individual thoughts and opinions on routine matters.
Blogs as educational tools: Many people use blogs to inform and educate the masses on issues like joblessness caused by economic slump, the impact of global warming, controlling child labor etc. These blogs are purely information-based and set up for the purpose of awareness.
Blogs for business expansion: There is a two-fold purpose of using blogs by online business owners: firstly, to promote their business products and services and secondly to capture customers. Blogs are considered to be a good medium of advertising and marketing for any online business.
Blogs for promoting talent: Another imperative function of a blog is to showcase individual talent. There are many people who exhibit their natural gifts via blogs. For example, an artist displays their paintings on their blog. A musician shares their music and songs. A photographer shares their pictures and so on…
Remember, all blogs are created for one purpose: informing readers! So if there is anything in your mind that is worth sharing, get a blog and get going.

Monday, March 21, 2011

How to Write a Blog

Writing a blog post is no rocket science, but writing the one people actually want to read sure is! If your blog entries are receiving zero attention from the reader community, perhaps it’s time to re-tweak your blog writing style.
Here are some best blog writing practices you should adhere to:
Starting Without a Plan? You Have Got To Be Kidding Me…
Everyone can get a blog and start writing, but only a few know exactly what to write. Before starting with your writing, mark out all those things you want to blog about. It is just like producing a simple outline plan to lay the foundation of an effective blog post.
Go Easy On the Language
Remember, readers minds are not dictionaries. Usage of complex words can certainly impress your high school teacher and improve your grades but it is not applicable in the blogger community. It may not be possible to interest a potential reader and put across your message if you are using a difficult language.
Irrelevant Details Are Boring – Yawn
Many novice bloggers attempt to jot down every single piece of detail they know about a topic. Suppose you are trying to compose a blog about the ‘economic unbalance caused by the earthquake in Japan’ and you start explaining the entire history of Japan’s economy, will it not be a torture for the reader? Save your readers from such irrelevant details and only write what truly matters.
The Idea Is To Communicate, Not Dictate!
Blogging is all about creating a conversation with the readers. While reading your article, readers should feel that they are being directly communicated to instead of feeling that they are reading a research paper telling facts. Remember, there is a huge difference between blog writing and other forms of formal writing and it is your job to do the justice.
Conclusion Is the Goodbye KISS
Every blog article should end with a KISS, meaning “keep it simple stupid.” Just wrap up your entire discussion in about two to three lines and try leaving the conversation open to receive reader comments and feedback on your blog.
This was just a general idea of how a successful blog post is written. Hope it helps in making you a better writer and drawing maximum number of readers to your blog.

Thursday, March 17, 2011

How To Write A Successful Blog

To reap profits from your blog it is necessary to load it with first-rate content. It is easy to get a blog and start blogging but what’s difficult is to popularize your blog and attract large volumes of traffic to it. The posts you write are the yardsticks of success measurement for your blog. Quality content makes your blog successful while crappy text makes it a failure.
Here is a list of ways by which you can improve your writing and make your blog entries worth reading:
Hook the Reader with Your Title
Every entry you make into your blog should carry a crisp and captivating title to it. Attractive titles and headlines act as a hook that captures a reader’s attention into the main body of the post. While posts with dull and boring titles are likely to be ignored no matter how wonderfully they have been composed.
What’s More Important, Content Quality or Quantity?
Answer would be BOTH! Where writing large quantity of content full of keywords will be helpful in attracting the search engines, quality writing will act as a bait to capture readers and build your blog community. It is thereof important that you learn to keep a balance between the two.
Stimulate The Reader’s Brain Cells
The information offered in your post should be presented interestingly and in a lively manner, even though the topic under discussion is somewhat boring and technical. You can narrate personal experiences and fantasy stories to make your articles appealing and valuable for a potential reader. Even better, you can ask questions within your post and make the reader guess what the answer could be before moving further with the reading. The more you enable readers to use their imagination, the more successful your posts will be.
Invite Feedback from the Readers
Internet users of today like involvement, so give them some. Offer people to leave their comments and feedback under your posts. You can also establish a separate discussion page on your blog site where readers can actively engage in discussion related to your current topics.
Don’t Forget To Review for Lingual Bloopers
Before posting an entry to your blog, make sure it has been thoroughly proofread and reviewed for spelling and grammar mistakes. Nothing can lose your credibility as a writer as fast as lingual mistakes do. Give your readers a good reading experience and they will return it with a positive appraisal.
Every popular blogger of today is just a normal person like you. So what makes them so popular and you a no body? Perhaps it’s the writing!

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Blogging - A Beginner's Guide

The word “blog” is the short form of web log. Just like a paper diary where you record your daily routine and thoughts, a blog is a virtual journal that allows people (or bloggers) to broadcast their opinions and experiences on the internet. Anyone, from a business man to a college student can launch a blog and become part of the huge blogosphere community.
Confused in setting up a blog? If you have no idea how to get a blog and what to do after it has been created, start reading the following points:
1. Find a Blogging Platform
Just like there are a number of web browsers and word processors to choose from, you also have an option to choose a blogging platform depending upon your requirements. You may find a number of free and paid or hosted and non-hosted blogging platforms to choose from. The most popular ones include Wordpress, Blogger and LiveJournal.
2. Choose Your Template Style
After signing up with a blogging platform, you will be exposed to a large list of ready-made templates. Out of these templates, you can choose the one with your desired color scheme and layout for the blog. If you have basic technical knowledge, you can even customize these templates with minor coding.
3. Control Your Blog Privacy
Do you want the public to read your blog content? Or you only want your family and friends to be able to access it? You can make your blog a password-protected platform and control whosoever can view and read its content.
4. Start Posting
After you get a free blog and have tweaked the settings according to your suited requirements, it’s time to start writing! One question that is often asked by beginner bloggers is what should they write about? There are many topics to blog about and a good advice would be to base your blog on a specific niche, it can be anything from personal experiences to factual financial updates to latest fashion to top news stories. An entry can be based on any topic possible!
5. Don’t Forget to Market
If you have set up your blog to advertise your products or grow your brand, marketing is important. Start with optimizing your blog for the search engines followed by leaving comments on other popular blogs and publishing your blog URL in various web directories.
Follow these basic guidelines to start your blog and ultimately you will learn the strategies of being a successful blogger.

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Blogging for Profit and Traffic

Of all the money-making techniques online, blogging is considerably a new and unusual one. In the recent past, blogging was been adopted by a number of entrepreneurs to promote and popularize their websites and online businesses. However, now this trend is taking a stride towards new dimensions and business men are looking to generate profit and traffic through blogs. All they require is to get a blog and get started!
Turning your blog into a tool of generating money and traffic is not as easy as it seems. It requires extensive hard work, careful planning and lots of patience. Webmasters generally fail to monetize from their blogs mainly because of two glaring reasons. Firstly because of their unrealistic approach in making a blog successful overnight and secondly because of their lack of planning before stepping into the blogging arena. They have to realize that the true quality of a blog lies in realistic thinking and effective planning.
In order to attract large volumes of traffic and make your blog a money-generating platform, it is important that you learn only the methods that are workable so you don’t end up wasting your time and efforts in doing what does not work.
Nail Traffic with Interesting Content
We all know that the success of a blog lies in the amount of traffic it is receiving consistently. Therefore, to attract people to your blog it is imperative you supply them with useful and meaningful content. Write interesting articles and short essays to build the interest and make sure your articles provide knowledgeable value to the reader. Format your articles properly with bullets and sub-heading instead of presenting them in a boring large blurb form.
Comments Trading
Don’t be the comment spammer who says “good post” or “I agree”. When commenting on other blogs and forum discussions with the purpose of spreading your own blog links, drop in a genuine comment. Worthy and meaningful comments not just increase your value but will also allow people to trace back to your blog. Furthermore, the more comments you post on other blogs, equally you will receive and be able to increase your blog traffic.
Planning Beforehand
The first aspect that cements your blog success is planning. After you get a free blog, don’t expect generous profit for a few months. Choose a good theme for the blog, post interesting material on it, and make it presentable enough before starting its marketing. Establish a set of goals you have to achieve wih your blog and conquer them one by one.
Remember, establishing a popular and profitable blog requires efforts, not magic!

How To Make Money From Your Blog 5 Tips

Blogging is generally recognized to be a technique by which entrepreneurs promote their products and services, brand their business image and provide valuable information to readers with the motive of client-building. In short, blogging is typically used by people to maximize their online business productivity and make money.
You need to learn a few important strategies in order to generate income from your blog. Remember, there is no single formula for successful blogging, but a blend of helpful tactics can help you achieve your money-making goal. Here are enlisted the top 5 tips shared by all the profitable blogs around the internet, have a look:
Tip#1: Blogger-Reader Connection
You adore your blog, but do your readers have the same feeling towards it? In order to ignite the interest of your readers in your blog you can hold regular competitions, extend prizes to the ones answering correct answer to quizzes and offer articles that are written in an exciting tone instead of a boring one. The closer your relationship with the readers is, the more successful you will be as a blogger.
Tip#2: Bring Out the Real You
The only way to popularize your blog is by being real and genuine. The more stories you share of yourself and the more realistic examples you present in writing, the more the readers will trust you. Blogging is a good way to reveal your real personality and allow clients to love the real person residing within your body.
Tip#3: Create Your Own Product/Service
If you get a blog to promote a certain product or service, make sure it is of top quality. It’s even better to have someone create a product for you that you know is absolutely genuine and worthy of discussing. The image of your blog will shatter the day readers find out the poor quality of your advertized goods, so beware of such tactics.
Tip#4: Build Your Subscribers List
Capture email addresses of your readers by offering them free goods in exchange of their email addresses. However, don’t sell this data to third parties and instead use it to send regular emails to the readers about new offers, products, articles, discounts and so on…
Tip #5: Keep It Easy!
While blogging, make sure you are not generating complex content. The more difficult your writing is, the more it will be disliked by the readers.
Readership plays a great deal of role in making or breaking a blog. Focus on that by following the above tips and money will flow in eventually!
 

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