Posts Tagged ‘Blog Management’

I was very excited to see the responses and the conversation that my post on the 10 reasons you shouldn’t start a blog gathered. In addition to the great comments on the blog itself, it stemmed some awesome conversations on twitter and facebook. What many people asked was if these were the reasons not to start a blog, what reasons are there to start a blog.

After a lot of thought, and a few great conversations with followers and readers, here are the 10 reasons you should start a blog:

1. Because you have a unique view on a topic. If you can find a topic that everyone wants to know about and give it a unique spin, you’ll definitely find a readership.
2. Because you want an internally facing conversation. Blogs don’t always have to be written for the outside world – internal company blogs are great for communication!
3. Because you want to. Blogging just because is perfectly fine – as long as you don’t try to force the world to care.
4. Because you want to improve your writing. Writing is improved through p[practice, and forcing yourself to write often on a blog is a great way to do so. Just know you won’t have millions of readers.
5. Because you get a million questions about your business. FAQ’s are great for blog fodder. If you get tons of the same questions, turn the answers into posts!
6. Because you have a strong marketing strategy and want another way to talk to your audience. If you have a strong brand and a budding social strategy, a blog is a great place for your audience to learn more.
7. Because you understand keyword choices. If you have taken the time to research your keywords, learned how to optimize your writing and will be dedicated, then better SEO a blog will bring! (sorry, watched Family Guy last night, and have Yoda stuck in my head…)
8. Because you are the best at something. If you are an expert in an industry, share your knowledge! How to and learning blogs are great for people who have a thirst for knowledge! (self-proclaimed experts need not pay attention).
9. Because you just have a lot you want to say about a topic. This is like the writing and the want to…go for it, write about whatever you want, just be okay with the fact that others may not care and don’t force it on people.
10. Because you want to ignore the 10 reasons you shouldn’t just to annoy me (hey, I wouldn’t be surprised!)

The big “a-ha” moment I want you to take away? Blogging isn’t easy, but if you know what you are getting into, understand the limitations and aren’t trying to force yourself on the world, then blog until you are blue in the face. Of course, if you need help, it is just a click away

And for your participation points today: If you have a blog – why did you decide to start it? Is it the same reason you still have it?

A month ago, I wrote a post about how much I despise blog titles and my boycott against the tradition of them. I challenged myself to break the status quo and only use one word in my blog titles. After one month, I have to say I still don’t like blog titles and I love this new approach. It is actually more difficult than I thought it would be, coming up with just one word, but it has allowed me more freedom with my writing and less stress about the titles.

One of the questions/comments I received when I started the plan was to look at my analytics and see how they were effected. While I noticed a small drop in searching, I noticed more people clicking on my posts to read them from twitter – which means that the one word was either more intriguing or easier for people to understand. I also had a few people comment that certain posts really could have used two or three word titles to help them to make more sense. This was a valid point, and I agree that forcing myself to use only one word was stifling my creativity a bit.

Overall, I learned that I prefer one word titles because then the content takes center stage – but that sometimes, one word is not enough. So from this point on, I am going to treat titles in the same manner that I have been in the last month – as an after thought and not as important as the content – but not worry about the number of words that I use. Will I probably try to use less words? Absolutely! But sticking to only one word for every post? Probably not.

What did you think of the one word titles?

Are you actually ready to take on blogging? Let’s find out:

What would you do if someone told you that your thought/idea was a bunch of crap, that you have no idea what you are talking about and have zero right to be talking about what you do.

• Calmly tell them that they are being rude and that you can write whatever you damn well please.
• Cry, yell back that you do so! and then cry some more.
• Explain to them why you feel the way that you do, but that you appreciate their opinion!

Your friend invites you to an all-day party but you know that you have work to do. What do you do?

• Go to the party, but only for an hour…which turns into 3.
• Go to the party, duh! I can work tomorrow!
• You’d already known they’d invite you so you got all your work done yesterday. Time to party!

You are having trouble with what you are working on. No matter what you do, it just doesn’t want to work right. What do you do?

• Call a friend that is an expert with it and leave a message. They’ll get back to you when they can.
• Hit it with a bigger hammer.
• Send out a tweet and a facebook post asking for help to your 1000+ followers and 300+ friends.

If you picked number 1 the most, you are getting close. You are not quite ready to be a blogger because you don’t utilize your resources to the best of your ability, you don’t quite have time management down, and dealing with people’s negativity still needs improvement.

If you picked number 2the most, step away from the computer and nobody gets hurt! You can’t handle criticism, you definitely can’t handle time management and should something go wrong, everyone needs to be afraid. Just stick to doodling. Or better yet, avoid pens and paper altogether.

If you picked number 3the most, you’re ready to tackle the blog world. You know how to deal with trolls, you understand how to manage your time and should something break, you know how to use your network to get things fixed quickly. Go you!

Now I know that this is a short test, and there is a lot more to blogging than just being able to deal with mean people, your time and using a network, but these are three very important factors. If you can handle these three, you are well on your way to handling a blog! And of course, if you can’t handle them but you still have content you want to share, think about hiring a blog manager

So it’s the title is not quite one word, but it’s close…wanna know why?

Blogs have two options: breadth or focus. General topics or specific topics. You simply can’t have both. For example, Brogan writes great general business blog posts and appeals to a large audience but if you are looking for advice within a specific niche, you need something different…something that is focused our your topic and only your topic.

So how do you find those writers/blogs?

• Find one blog, find one more: If you find a writer that fits your niche, ask them for suggestions of other writers in that area.
• Use Alltop.com: You can search by very specific categories, allowing you to narrow down just what you are looking for.
• Ask your twitter followers: Most likely, you have followers that are in your niche, so ask them what blogs they read. It is always a great chance to connect and learn more.
• Search long tail keywords on Bing (yes, I suggest Bing, I don’t like Google): Instead of just searching for a one word keyword, try a longer term. For example, rather than search “blog management”, try “strategies for easy blog management”, this will help get you to the exact topics.
• Write a  niche specific blog: If you can’t find the blog you are looking for, why don’t you write it? Start something new, lead the revolution and let others find you.

Finding a focused blog will help you to focus your strategy.

What other suggestions do you have or tools you’ve used to find niche specific blogs?

Image courtesy of laffy4k from Flickr

So many people I know want to start blogs, want to improve their blog or want to just write more for their blog. Unfortunately, most of us have days that are packed to the brim, we’re taking phone calls, tweeting, facebooking, planning our calendars, checking emails and putting together task lists on top of doing all the actual work…basically, we are insanely busy. How do I know that we’re all this busy? I see the tweets, read the emails and have the conversations about how little time we have left in our days. With days like this, things like writing, which for most are secondary, end up getting pushed to the back-burner. But, this does not have to be the case! Writing is not easy, but by taking 30 minutes every day out of your schedule to work on writing, it can be made much easier. How can you do this?

First, schedule 30 minutes in each of your day, just like you would schedule a meeting, for your writing time. Plan it out ahead, that way you can’t cancel it or avoid it. Do not let yourself skip it! Then, during that time, close all browsers, twitter applications, silence your phone, close your email, do whatever you have to do to eliminate all distractions for those 30 minutes. Once you’ve done this, start writing. Jot down notes about everything and anything that you want to talk about. Then, write down some things you don’t want to talk about (knowing the don’t want can help with the do want). Finally, go back through what you think you want to talk about and add more detailed notes on the topics that you can. Keep this as a constantly available document (either on your computer or on real paper) so that anytime you come up with a new idea, you can just jot it down and keep it for the future.

At first, it will be tough to take that 30 minutes, but when you see the results you get from concentrated writing time, you will realize how worth it 30-minutes can be.

Oh, and if you’re wondering why this post only has a one word title, read my stand against blog titles.

image from Striatic on Flickr

So I am definitely not a psychologist…in fact, I am sure a psychologist would tell me that I probably need a little help. But, what I do know is blogging – and there is some serious psychology to the way people blog. What I have learned from my experience is that they way you keep your office organized says a lot about the way that you blog. There are three different types of organizers (and bloggers). The hyper-organized ones, the outwardly-messy ones, and the hidden-messy ones. Each type has a different way they manage their office…and a distinctly different way they manage their blog:

Think about some of the people that you know that are hyper organized (everything has it’s place, there is always a stapler when you need it, never a stray paper on the desk, and never a hunt for what you need). If you are not one of those people, you probably think that they waste a lot of time trying to keep it all so put together. But the reality is, it would take them more time to do things if they didn’t keep everything in its place. They love the feeling of clean spaces and open areas. In blogging, this means that they plan…a lot! They work out which posts go where, based on content, making sure that all the holes are filled. But they rarely have drafts…they always make them perfect before placing them in wordpress so that it is clean and organized with only top content. They also like their blogs to look pretty (lots of white space, and everything very easy to find). Their ideas tend to be a bit calmer, not really stirring the pot too much with crazy ideas or controversial posts. You may even feel like they leave some stuff out in order not to offend anyone. They will be the first to update plugins but will wait to update wordpress until the new version is out for awhile.

Okay, now think about the people whose desks are always a mess (papers everywhere, files stacked on files, no rhyme or reason to their system). If you’re not one of those people, you probably think they are slobs, that they waste time by searching for things that should be easy to find. These people are outwardly messy – they have no problem with their piles, in fact, they love their piles and would be more than happy to never have to move them. These people have a million drafts going at the same time, and are constantly making changes in wordpress. They have tons of great content, but it is sometimes all over the board. They will talk about controversial issues, but will do so by sharing all sides and really leaving it open for discussion, keeping their thoughts out as much as possible. These people are also more likely to have busy sidebars and a a lot going on in the blog. These people will always make solid points, but it will take some time to get around to it. Expect really content filled posts, but also a lot of fluff on top of the serious content.

Finally, we have the group that is a mix between the two. This group always has an organized desk, but what you don’t see is that their desk is normally super messy…they just cleaned it up by shoving everything into drawers before you arrived. They like to pretend they have everything under control with their organization, but the reality is, they can barely find anything in their mess because they are not one with it like the second group. They want to be clean and organized like the first, so they are stressed when they can’t be, and yet can’t figure out how to make messy work for them either. These are the fun bloggers. The ones whose posts make you laugh hysterically, or get you really angry. They talk controversy and drama…no matter the topic. They are very popular with their readers but also have a lot of trolls. These bloggers tend to write their posts on whatever they have at the moment and then attempt to put it all together in their blog. The topics will vary every day, and will be whatever came to them that moment. But, they will write often and will write longer posts…unless they are having one of those days, then it will just be a picture and a line of text. Their blog will have a ton of content on it…just a lot of it will be hard to find.

Of course, these opinions are only based on what I have experienced…

So, what do you think about organization and blogging?

Can you guess which one I am?

Amanda (@funomenalrealtr) and I were chatting today about blog topics, and I asked her if there was a topic she would like to see covered by me. Her request was for a simple step by step for setting up and starting a blog.

There are two different types of bloggers: bloggers who are adding a blog to their already existing website and bloggers who use their blog as their website. Bloggers who are just looking to add a blog usually already have a domain name, design and goal to their site, the blog is just a secondary piece of the puzzle. Bloggers who want a blog as their website do not have a website yet, usually are just starting with an idea and have no design.  This article refers to the second kind – the ones who don’t have a website and want just a blog. The following are the steps I give my clients who are starting a blog from scratch:

1. Decide what your site is about. The first step to any website is to determine what it is for. What are you going to blog about? Who is your ideal audience? Knowing why and for whom you will write will make designing the site easier.
2. Choose a domain name and get it hosted. Your domain name should either be your business name, your name or something that refers to your site. Make it something relatively easy to spell or say so that people can remember it. Also, try to keep it short. Super long url’s are never easy. For hosting, I recommend (and use) Lunarpages, as they have great customer service and are affordable.
3. Wait 24 hours for your site to finish propagating (basically means that the hosting company is setting up the site). Sometimes it will take less time, but I recommend waiting until then.
4. Install WordPress. If you choose to use lunarpages, you log in to your lunarpages control panel. Once you’ve logged in, find the ‘WebApp Pool’ on the left hand side and select to install wordpress. You will want to install it directly onto your site, so leave the subdomain blank. Provide a user name and password you will remember.
5. Go to the WordPress.org theme’s section and choose a design. There are over 1000 free themes offered on this site, all of which are specifically designed for wordpress. Once you choose one that you like, just remember the name of it.
6. Login to your website using the information that your wordpress install provides you. This is your wordpress dashboard. On the left hand side, you will see ‘appearances’. Click on that and then select ‘add new themes’. Enter the name of the them that you found that you liked and click search. Once it comes up, you can then click install. After the theme installs, click activate.
7. Upload plugins to make using the site easier. There are tons of great plugins that I use, but the 5 I recommend to everyone are: All in One SEO, Disqus, WordTwit, Akismet and Contact form. Each have great explanations of how they work when you install them.
8. Add widgets with your social media buttons and links. SmashingMagazine.com has a great collection of freebies that you can use for social media icons. Once you find ones that you like, download the files. Then, click on ‘media’ and upload the images that you want to use for your social media buttons. Copy the url that wordpress gives you once it has been uploaded. Click on ‘appearances’ and ‘widgets’. Add a ‘text’ widget and paste the url for the image into the box. This way you have it for the next step. Next, you want to turn it into a usable link for your site. To do this, you will use the code: <a href=”http://url of the website you want people to go to”><img src=”http://url of the image”>Text if you want any after the image</a>. This code can be used any time you want to insert an image into the sidebar. If you want to just insert hyperlinked text, remove the section in blue.
9. Start writing your blog. For this, I refer you to my posts on writing blogs: Managing your time, the blog management puzzle, blog post topics, and creating a blog calendar.
10. Start promoting your blog. Link it up with twitter through the wordtwit plugin, add it to the networked blogs through facebook, and ask your friends for support. Soon you will start seeing comments and people sharing your content.

This is a very quick paced set up, and does not include a lot of the small details that will make your site successful, as many of those take a lot of time, and a lot of explanation. What this will do is get you started and get you going while you take time to learn the deeper details and start to integrate them.

What tips can you share for someone getting started with a blog? Or what other questions can I answer?

If the only place you can work on your blog is sitting in front of your laptop at a location with wifi, you are missing out. Today, WordPress for Blackberry left the beta phase and entered full availability. iPhone addict? Check out WordPress for iPhone (wordpress for iphone)!

I’m using the Blackerry app…and just might be in love. Super quick to install, and set up, easy to use interface and overall really, really cool!

Do you have easy access to your blog?

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, this weeks post topics are all courtesy of my twitter followers and friends. Today’s question/idea came from @hagre, who asked me to share a how-to on something I do well.

In the last few months, I have shared tutorials on many things, blog management calendars, complete blog designs, improving your social media, how to be a better writer. But what I noticed was that none of these discussed the root tutorial, the “how-to” everyone needs to have in order to actually do any of the above “how-to’s”. The tutorial I was missing? How to manage your time and enable yourself to actually have a blog.

99.9% of business can benefit from a blog, but a very small percentage of those actually have a blog. Why? Because the majority will write a few times and then give it up. They won’t have the time, and won’t be willing to hire someone to do it correctly. So, the blog will fail, and the company will blame it on the blog instead of the real culprit – lack of time management and organization. A blog takes a serious time commitment, and a lot of dedication. I tell anyone who asks, a successful blog requires a minimum of 7 hours of dedicated time per week. If you have more than that to give, you will be better off, as you can really work on quality posts, and making sure every single one has the highest level of content.

Now if your wondering how I define success, I believe a successful blog is one that brings you more traffic to the site, more sign ups on your mailing list and gives you a way to converse with potential clients in an open environment. Fair enough?

Okay, so back to those 7 hours per week. Remember, this is the absolute minimum I recommend, on my own blog I spend about 10 hours a week, on a good week, it’s closer to 15.  So where do you find those hours? Trust me, they are already there, you just haven’t been capitalizing on them! The biggest part of time management is finding ways to use your hours more effectively. If you were to give 10 people the same projects and the same amount of time to do them in, no one would finish at the same time. We all have different ways we work – which is why an “exact” time management plan is difficult. So instead of a one size fits all solution, we are going to walk through a normal day, and see where we can pull out some extra time…remember, just 1 ½ hours each day and you will have enough time for your blog! Here is my average day, and how I get my blog managed. The amount of time (in pink) is the actual amount of time during that part of my day that is quality blog time.

• Morning: When I get up, the first thing I do is turn my computer on, while it boots up, I make my coffee and think about my dreams. Anything happen that make me think of a post? If so, there is a notepad next to my coffee pot. I pour my coffee, sit down at the computer and the first 30 minutes are spent with only one window open, my blog. I spend that time working on current drafts, or adding new blog posts. I don’t edit, I just write, get out as many post ideas as I can and create drafts of each one. Most will never see daylight, but some will turn into quality posts. (30 mins)
• Checking in: Once I’ve spent this 30 minutes on my blog, it’s time to focus on my day. I check emails, flagging anything important (which sometimes includes post ideas from friends who send me great articles). I open tweetdeck, the other browser windows I need for my clients and start work. I always keep my blog window open so I can add thoughts if something pops up like a good tweet, a question on a site, or an interesting link. (15 mins)
• Meat of my day: This is the section where I can focus on the most work for my clients, they are available to talk and I can get quality work finished. This time is dedicated to everything except for me. On days that my client projects are small, I use this time to look for new clients and send emails to prospectives. My goal is to not write for myself during this time, which can be hard, but I need it to be focused completely on my other agenda.
• Driving time: I have at least 30 minutes in the car almost every day…heading to meetings with clients, getting a workout at pole fitness or running, or heading to the store. During this time, I talk outloud…and my phone records me. Don’t have a recorder on the phone or need more time? You can get an inexpensive recorder from Amazon. While you are driving, press record, set it in your lap and start talking. When you get home, you can transcribe your ideas and now a 30 minute drive has a useful purpose! (15 mins)
• Evening: I love to cook, so I make dinner almost every night. While I make dinner, I have time to think back through my day, usually over a glass of wine, which helps me to loosen my thoughts and let things flow. So, I use the same notepad that is next to my coffee pot to add more ideas while I cook. Sometimes it’s just notes, other times, I will stop and write, standing in the kitchen, while dinner cooks. The hubby laughs at this one… (15-30 mins)
• Watching TV with my hubby is one of my favorite times to write, I can just sit next to him with my laptop and jot down thoughts and work on posts. I have also gotten ideas from TV shows, or things that have been said on the news. (1 hr)

Adding it up, my average day provides me with about 2 ½ hours of time where I am working on my blog. While some of it is broken time, it still counts, and still helps make my blog possible.

Where can you find more time in your day? Try going through it in sections, and see where you can pull out some time.

If you already manage a blog successfully, what is your time management schedule?

I often have topics I think I should cover, but sometimes I like to relinquish control and give it to my readers instead. So, last week, I asked my friends and followers on Facebook and Twitter to share some topics they would like to see me cover on my site. I got some incredible ideas, and this first post is courtesy of @healthOC! She asked me to share how the market has affected my business, and others in my industry.

To start, if you are a new reader to this blog, you probably wondered how my business actually got started. Well, my business is actually a product of the horrible economy. In early 2009, I was working for a company as their marketing manager, overseeing 4 different smaller businesses. Wright Creativity was just a blog, I shared my ideas and business creativity. I had a few people I had helped with blog management, but it was very small, and my prices were very low. I was doing it more for fun than for business. But then, the economy hit the company I was with, and I was looking down the barrel of unemployment. It was that point that I decided I no longer was happy working for others and took the *huge* leap to become my own boss. Because I was a small business, just starting, my pricing was much lower than those who were set in the industry. I worked like crazy, and made every single minute count. This hard work and lower pricing helped me to get clients who needed help but couldn’t afford the big firms with the market problems. In addition to keeping me busy in the beginning, it allowed me to build a strong portfolio, great referrals and so now, when the market has started turning around, I am able to bring my pricing up to market level and still have all the clients I need. The economy downturn turned my blog into a business. I am thankful every day that the market took a downturn, and am hoping every day that it continues to go back up!

As far as other companies, I have chatted with quite a few people about the economy, and there seems to be two responses. Those who are active in social media, blogging and participate with their community are still finding success in their industry. They were able to take on smaller projects to subsidize their income from the big clients lowering the amount of help they needed. They could find new clients less expensively, and could create a network of referrals. The other group? Those who are sticking with traditional marketing on the other hand, seem to be struggling a bit more to keep themselves busy. These are the companies that only take on the large projects, and the ones that are feeling the heat when the large corporates cut their marketing budgets to almost nothing. I think that everyone can do well even if the economy is down, it just requires changing the way you work to fit the way that others need you. People need small help, and companies who can take on the small work will be better off in the end. If you can be there now, they will call on you when they can afford large projects.