Your Blog is Your Portfolio: Landing Blog Writing Gigs - DailyBlogTips

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Your Blog is Your Portfolio: Landing Blog Writing Gigs Posted: 30 Mar 2010 08:30 PM PDT This is a guest post by Thursday Bram. If you want to guest post on this blog, check out the guidelines here. Blogging has rapidly become a big part of many freelance writers’ income. Small businesses want bloggers who can create steady traffic streams to their sites. Blog networks want writers who can keep the ad revenues coming in. Even some traditional publications want bloggers so they’ve got content on their websites between issues. That’s a surprisingly high demand, which can mean good money for a blogger with a solid portfolio. I’ve been through the hiring process with just about every type of blogging client and I’ve found, consistently, that the only thing that clients really care about when hiring a blogger is seeing the applicant’s own blog and writing clips. Sure, they may ask for a resume, but in many cases, it’s little more than a formality. A resume doesn’t show that you know how to write, after all, nor does it demonstrate that you have any skill in building traffic. What Clients Look For In Blogs While many clients want to see that a blogger already has experience writing for another client, being able to show off a personal blog can help an applicant move to the top of the stack. There’s a certain checklist that goes through a client’s mind when looking at a blog: Does this blogger post consistently? Keeping up with a regular blogging schedule can be tough. Clients like to know ahead of time that a blogger will be able to keep up with the schedule, as well as consistently come up with new ideas for topics. Does this blogger interact with readers? While a client probably won’t go through and count the comments on every post, he wants to know that you can keep readers coming back. One of the easiest ways to check is to see how you respond to comments. If there are on-going conversations on your blog, clients can tell you can connect. Does this blogger get traffic? When you com down to it, the goal of every blog is to bring in traffic. Clients need to be able to see some traffic on your personal site — preferably more than 100 readers. For most people, the first 100 readers are drawn from your own social circle. And while your mom probably likes reading your posts regularly, clients want to know that other people do too. Little signs can show your traffic, like comments, subscriptions or reaching the front page of a site like StumbleUpon. How You Can Step Up Your Blog Applications Your blog doesn’t have to be perfect to win over a new client, although the better shape you can get your own work in, the better impression a prospective client will have of you. You can do a little spring house-cleaning on your site and improve your chances of landing a good blogging gig. Something as simple as making sure that your blog is on your own domain name. Having been on the hiring side myself, it’s easy for a client to dismiss a blogger on Blogspot or WordPress.com as an amateur. More than a few clients will assume that you can’t make enough from your blogging to afford a domain name — and considering how low the price tag is for that, they won’t think too well of you. Adding in links to your work elsewhere, such as guest posts on other blogs or articles for other publications, can also help you improve your blog’s ability to sell you to a client. The fact that you get to write on sites that you don’t control can really drive home the point that you’re a good blogger and worth hiring. In general, you need to consider your personal blog your portfolio, if you want to get paid to write for other blogs. No matter what other purpose you want your own site to serve, it must showcase your ability to blog. Thursday Bram writes about the art of writing for the web at her site, Hyper Modern Writing. She also blogs for clients ranging from CNet to FreelanceSwitch. Original Post: Your Blog is Your Portfolio: Landing Blog Writing Gigs

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SearchDay: Twitter Launches New Home Page: Find Out Why It Matters To Search

Today's Posts: » Twitter Launches New Home Page  » The 4 Keys to Writing a Paid Search Masterpiece  » SEO With a Skeleton Crew  About | Blog | Forums | Search Marketing Topics | Ratings & Stats | View Online SearchDay March 30, 2010

Top Jobs Sr. SEO Specialist Source Interlink Media Digital Irvine, United States Sr. Product Manager, Aol Search Aol Dulles, United States Arabic Technical Search Manager Dubai SEKARI Dubai, U.A.E. Director of Search & Analytics BancVue Interactive Austin, United States Paid Search Marketing Analyst Dreams Retail Northbrook, United States Today from the Search Engine Watch Team of Experts Twitter Launches New Home Page Posted by Jonathan Allen  Mar 30, 2010 If you haven't seen it yet, here is a screenshot of the new Twitter home page. As predicted, Twitter has brought more focus to trending topics and seems to be applying some sort of algorithm to show the top tweets on the home ... » Continue reading Jeremy Hull The 4 Keys to Writing a Paid Search Masterpiece  SEARCH ADVERTISING How to draft effective paid search ad copy in 70 characters or less. » Full story » Print version Josh McCoy SEO With a Skeleton Crew  SEARCH ENGINE OPTMIZATION Crunched for resources? Here are some simple search engine optimization tactics for those faced with limited staff or budget. » Full story » Print version Search Engine Strategies New York Day 4 - Training! Posted by Guest Blogger   Mar 30, 2010 Day 4 at Search Engine Strategies New York focused on Search Engine Marketing training. One of the downsides to a lot of conferences is that one hour sessions don't allow a deep dive into the topics we really want to discuss. No fear here, as these are four hour long ... » Continue reading Social & the Marketing Mix Posted by Guest Blogger   Mar 30, 2010 Your company should be doing social media. This much you know. One only has to be alive to know something massive is taking place. But what's the best way to begin getting a handle on it all? You're still struggling with SEO and PPC. Well, coming to Search Engine Strategies ... » Continue reading Social & the Marketing Mix Posted by Guest Blogger   Mar 30, 2010 Your company should be doing social media. This much you know. One only has to be alive to know something massive is taking place. But what's the best way to begin getting a handle on it all? You're still struggling with SEO and PPC. Well, coming to Search Engine Strategies ... » Continue reading PPC or SEO? The Ultimate Search Marketing Battle Posted by Guest Blogger   Mar 30, 2010 "Pay per click is just frittering money away when SEO is free." The argument rages on. Is PPC or SEO more effective? Which is easier? Which is faster? Which is better? There are compelling points for and against each. But any marketer with the budget and resources should utilize both for ... » Continue reading The Unlikely Heroes of Search and Social Media Posted by Nathania Johnson   Mar 30, 2010 Line up the unusual suspects. When Terrence Kelleman made a video about his Magic Magnetic bracelet, he had no idea that YouTube would feature the video for 10 days. He had no idea that it would garner over 2.7 million views. It's not ... » Continue reading Why Your Harvard-Educated Writer Doesn't Attract Links Posted by Nathania Johnson   Mar 30, 2010 Quality copy is supposed to attract links, so why don't you have any? At last Tuesday's keynote panel at SES New York (I know you're sick of hearing about it, but bear with me), Jonathan Blum, Principal at Blumsday LLC, lamented the fact ... » Continue reading High Index on Yahoo not Google  Mar 26, 2010 Can anyone explain the main reason for a decent yahoo index but nothing on Google. I understand that links play a major part but any other major factors? » Join the discussion German Web Directories  Mar 26, 2010 Hi, Does anybody know a list of good german web directories? Thanks, Salman » Join the discussion Bid Management Solutions Report  Mar 25, 2010 Hey Guys, I need your expert opinions and some input, please :) A bunch of attendees who come to our training events seek recommendations on Bid Management Solutions. To help folks out in their decision making we are producing a comprehensive Bid Management Solutions report (120+ pages). The purpose of the ... » Join the discussion Help me out  Mar 25, 2010 I have a website which gets displayed in 1st page of Google's result for a particular keyword but not in yahoo results. I need some suggestion on how i could achieve this in Yahoo as well. thanks in advance for your help. » Join the discussion White Papers

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Webcast: Mobile Search Challenges As Mobile Data Access Grows

Webcast: Mobile Search - What Are Companies Challenged With Today As Mobile Data Access Grows? Mobile Version | Web Version
	Mobile Search - What Are Companies Challenged With Today As Mobile Data Access Grows? Thursday, April 8 @ 1:00pm EDT / 10:00am PDT FREE Webcast | Register now! With the proliferation of smart phones -- from the Apple iPhone to RIM Blackberry, from HTC and Motorola Droids to Samsung's Omnia II -- in the consumer's hands and their growing appetite for mobile web access and search services, mobile is poised now more than ever to explode onto the scene and offer marketers a level of interaction with consumers not yet seen. Expect to hear about: Integrating mobile search into your marketing mix Challenges large and small companies are now facing in a mobile environment and how they are overcoming them Case studies from leading brands on what successful strategies they are currently employing If you've yet to consider what mobile search can bring to the table, or if you've been overwhelmed with the challenges you face, this won't be a discussion to miss. REGISTER NOW		REGISTER NOW   Speakers Paul Cushman Dir, Mobile Strategy Yahoo Michael Bridges VP, Client Services Covario   Moderator Mike Grehan VP, Global Content Director Incisive Media   Webcast Sponsor   Get Connected
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Go Hard or Go Home, Especially If You Are Building A Website - DailyBlogTips

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• Go Hard or Go Home, Especially If You Are Building A Website
• Try The Sermon Structure For Your Blog Posts
• Check Out The Improvements in Our Comment Section

Go Hard or Go Home, Especially If You Are Building A Website Posted: 30 Mar 2010 05:50 AM PDT The fingers on both of my hands wouldn’t be enough to count the times I started a website with a half-assed effort. The idea was cool, and I figured it was worth a shot, but I was not willing to put 100% of my time and energy into it. The result? A flop. Over and over again these websites failed to achieve a critical mass of traffic to become something meaningful, and I would just put them on the back burner. Had I dedicated enough time and energy to them would the story be different? I am pretty sure it would. As I said, most of the ideas were solid, so the execution was the problem. In fact the execution is almost ALWAYS the problem. Even crap ideas can become successful businesses if the owner is willing to work hard enough, persist and adapt along the way. The other side of the coin? Even great ideas will flop if the owner is not willing to back them up with hard work. Luckily I learned my lesson. These days I don’t start a new website unless I know I’ll have the time and energy to make it work. If I am not wrong, the last website I started was almost one year ago. It flopped, but due to technical problems and not because I neglected it. Sometimes I get excited with new ideas and even purchase a domain for them, but when I am about to host the site and start working on the design I always ask myself: “Will You Have Time/Energy To Really Work on This?” The answer is usually “No,” so I just drop the idea before wasting more time and money on it. Anyway I just wanted to share this aspect of my online business because I believe all of us have suffered from this at one point or another. If you are still making this mistake, well, fix it and stop wasting time and money on websites you won’t be able to make work. Ever heard the saying “Go hard or go home!”? Original Post: Go Hard or Go Home, Especially If You Are Building A Website

Try The Sermon Structure For Your Blog Posts Posted: 29 Mar 2010 01:19 PM PDT This is a guest post by Roman. If you want to guest post on this blog, check out the guidelines here. Sermon (noun): a discourse for the purpose of religious instruction or exhortation, especially one based on a text of Scripture and delivered by a member of the clergy as part of a religious service. Sermons have worked successfully for hundreds of years, so why not incorporate some of these principles on your own blog posts? The Theme For most people writing is difficult. You know what you want to say, you just do not know how to put it into words. How to start, how should the arguments flow, how to conclude? With a blank page in front of you it is hard to start writing as these questions run through your head. And then once you start the difficulty becomes ensuring that the post is clear, has a message and is entertaining. Depending on the frequency of your blog posts, this problem comes up again and again. The reason writing is difficult for you might be because you do not have a structure to follow when writing your posts. This post demonstrates the sermon structure and how it can be used to write clear, useful, and entertaining posts. The same structure medieval preachers used for hundreds of years. The Protheme Preachers of the middle ages weree faced with the same problem as modern day bloggers. Every week they had to write a sermon and present it to their congregation – they were the first bloggers, in a sense. They had weekly 'posts' that had to provide a useful, clear and entertaining message to their church's visitors. For hundreds of years, since the beginning of preaching, the structure of the sermon has remained the same. And for good reason – it works. Using the sermon structure preachers were able to turn a weekly theme into a clear and entertaining two hour speech very easily, week after week, year after year. Where did preachers learn about the benefits of structured writing? Unsurprisingly they gleaned it from the Bible: “Uncontrolled as water, you shall not excel."(Genesis 49:4). The Dilation Writing is difficult if you do not have a structure to follow. If you just sit down and begin writing ideas tend to scatter. Your writing becomes unclear and hard to follow. You lose focus as you write and coming up with the next sentence becomes a struggle. ‘Uncontrolled as water, you shall not excel’ teaches that if you want to excel at writing you need to structure your posts. Avoid liquid conglomeration of ideas that ebb and flow in any direction that your mind flows. Unstable and liquid, without a structure to follow, your writing cannot excel. A structure provides you with a framework to follow – all you need to do is come up with a single theme for your post and fill in the sections. The Exemplum The sermon structure makes it easy for you to create clear, meaningful and entertaining content. Preachers have their niche – the Bible. Within that niche are plenty of possible themes to write a sermon about. All the preachers have to do is pick a theme for the week, for example honesty, charity, death, humbleness, etc, and then plop it into the sermon structure. With little mental effort a single theme quickly develops into a full sermon. You have a niche, and within that niche you have themes. Pick a theme and create a post using the following structure: The Theme. This is an introduction. Briefly mention what your post is going to be about. The Protheme. In the protheme the sermon mentions a quote from the Bible that has something to do with the theme. Of course, for you the Bible might not be the most appropriate source – you want to use a more applicable source. For example, a news headline, a quote from another blogger, something the President said, a quote from a book, etc. The Dilation. In the dilatation the sermon would explain what the Bible quote means. Use this section to show how your quote in the protheme supports your theme. The Exemplum. This is the meat of the post. This is where the preacher provides the main arguments and examples usually with an illustrative example – a real life story that extrapolates and supports the theme. The exemplum should be most interesting part of your post. The Peroration. Here you mention the main lesson of the post. What is the take away? How have you enlightened the reader and what must they do to benefit from your post? The Closing Formula. In a sermon this is where the preacher asks the people to do good in the world and then finish by blessing everybody. Instead of blessing your readers you might want to ask them to leave a comment and thank them for visiting your blog. The Peroration In grade school it is preached that structured writing is good – it helps you write and organize your thoughts. The structure taught in school consists of: introduction, three paragraphs supporting your argument and conclusion; positively boring. This post provides you with an alternative post structure. A structure that has helped preachers churn out interesting and clear sermons, week after week for hundreds of years. If you are finding it difficult to start you post because your thoughts are scattered and you do not know how to put them to paper, or if you are finding that your posts are unclear and lack focus, try using the sermon structure. All you need is a single theme for your post. Then using the sermon structure you can turn that single theme into a clear and structured post with very little effort. The Closing Formula Let me know in the comments what, if any, structure you use for your posts. Good luck and all the best with your blog. About the Author: Roman has a blog and website describing in detail what is involved in creating, maintaining and profiting from a site. Called How This Website Makes Money, you will find lots of charts and statistics there. Original Post: Try The Sermon Structure For Your Blog Posts

Check Out The Improvements in Our Comment Section Posted: 29 Mar 2010 05:29 AM PDT As many of you noticed, a couple of weeks ago the links on the name of comment authors were removed from this blog. Some readers emailed asking if that was because of spam problems or what. In reality yes, it was connected with spam problems. But I was not just planning to remove the links and that was it. The community we have around this blog is much more important to me than the spam problems, and I know that the link to the comment author is part of that (after all it allows other readers to know what is the website of the comment author, and to visit it if so they desire). So what was going on? Basically it was an idea I had a while ago, to reduce the spam problem and improve the community aspect at the same time. Here is how it would work: people who had only 1 or 2 comments on the blog would not get a link on their comment author name. People who had 3 or more comments, on the other hand, would get a dofollow link. This would combat the spam problem because spammers usually just leave one comment and move on, and it would also rewards members of the community who comment often by giving them some dofollow links. The first step was the remove the author link from all comments. After that I got a friend of mine trying to tweak the WordPress code to check if the comment author has posted 3 or more comments in the past, and if that was the case a dofollow link would appear there. The code worked, but it had one big problem: it made posts with many comments (i.e. 20 or more) terribly slow to load. This happened because for every comment that was loaded we needed to perform a database check. Long story short last week I dropped this idea, and over the weekend I made some changes to our comment section to make it more user friendly. First of all the comment author links are back. Even if you posted a comment while they were turned off we have recorded your website and your links will be displaying normally for those posts. Second, I have finally added the threaded comments feature. Now you can reply directly to any comment, and even reply to a reply (I am using 3 levels of discussion). Not sure about you guys but I was tired of using @johndoe to reply to other people…. Finally, the design has been tweaked slightly to make the comments look cleaner. For example, I removed the number on each comment to make more room for the comment text. Anyway, I believe it is a good improvement in comparison to what we had before, and it should foster the conversations even more. I for one will certainly answer to more comments now that we have the “Reply” feature working. P.S.- As soon as someone leaves a comment I will reply to it, so you’ll see how it looks. Original Post: Check Out The Improvements in Our Comment Section

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