My last post “Are you following Colin Powell’s rules?” was submitted to ProBlogger’s “Killer titles” group writing project last week. I made it in just 30 minutes before the deadline, which worked out great because it meant my post was listed in the submissions for day 4 of the project which landed me fifth from the top of the list (see the full list here).
As predicted by Darren participating in this project and being listed in the submissions page brought a spike of new visitors to this website. I admit it was great fun reading through the titles and visiting some of these sites that I had never seen before to read their own submissions.
The results for me were very pleasing:
- triple my normal daily traffic for the two days after my link appeared
- an average time on site for readers referred from ProBlogger of 4:23, indicating most visitors read the nearly 1500 words in the post
- a reader liked it enough to submit to Digg
- a few visitors left comments which I appreciated
What I didn’t get:
- many Diggs :-P
- any other social traffic
- any new subscribers
Things to take away and address:
- Better titles for my posts. The traffic spike was nice but not overwhelming, and my title was nowhere near as good as the best ones among the rest of the submissions.
- Social media submissions. A better post title may help, but I also need more social media friends to help spread the word about my website. As a starting target I’d like to write a quality post (not a blatant linkbait) that hits 100 Diggs.
- Better placement of feed links. My current RSS placement is awful and it wouldn’t surprise me if it goes completely unnoticed by visitors. I need to move it, make it more prominent, and add email subscription options as well.
All in all the group writing project was fun and entertaining to be a part of and I’ll definitely be watching out for the next one.
In Colin Powell’s autobiography “My American Journey” he lists the 13 rules that he lives his life by. Powell developed these rules during his 35 year military career, but I also think they apply perfectly to bloggers. So here they are, Colin Powell’s Rules for Bloggers!
Rule #1 - It ain’t as bad as you think. It will look better in the morning.
Have you ever sat up late at night in front of your computer, slaving over a blog post, crafting what you think will be the perfect traffic magnet, the post that will take your blog from obscurity into the Technorati Top 100. You submit it to your favorite social media sites, and then watch as… nothing happens! Your beautifully written blog post has been published for an hour and has seen only a trickle of visitors and a handful of Diggs. You’ve failed! You aren’t cut out for this blogging thing! You go to bed in despair.
But then something good happens. You wake up in the morning and check your statistics. Your post got Dugg a few more times and then Stumbled, which took it from dozens of visitors to hundreds, your highest number of visitors in any one day to your new blog. Its not the thousands you were dreaming of, but its a good step along the road to a successful blog.
Building a successful blog takes time, and if you live or die by the visitor count mere hours after publishing new blog posts you’re setting yourself up for an emotional rollercoaster. Write your posts, go to bed, it will always look better in the morning.
Rule #2 - Get mad, then get over it.
When Darren Rowse found himself banned from Stumbleupon he was understandably angry about it. He could have used his powerful soapbox to launch a vicious rant against Stumbleupon but instead he got over it and got on with finding ways to get unbanned. Not only that but he got some great material out of it for his blog!
If something gets you mad don’t let anger guide your actions. Get over it and start working towards the best possible outcome you can achieve. You may even learn something along the way that is worth blogging about.
Rule #3 - Avoid having your ego so close to your position that when your position falls, your ego goes with it.
Like him or hate him you can’t deny that John Chow is successful at making money online. For nearly a year he has posted monthly earnings reports on his blog as proof that the methods he writes about work. Earnings followed a consistent upward trend until June 2008 when he fell nearly $2500 short of the previous month’s earnings through his regular channels, but was saved by a $10000 “pay it forward” payment he received.
With a reputation built on demonstrating his ability to grow his earnings every month John had a choice to make - risk another shortfall the following month that might damage his credibility, or protect his reputation by ceasing his earnings reports. He wisely chose the latter.
Rule #4 - It can be done!
Of course it can. The only thing stopping you is yourself.
Rule #5 - Be careful what you choose. You may get it.
Social media is huge right now. One of the attractive things about it is that the little guy with the right blog post can pull big traffic if they can just get up on the Digg front page. When you’ve just started your blog and visitor numbers are low social media traffic can help get you some loyal readers. There are lots of articles on how to write for Digg that make this almost easy. If you get good at it you can hit the Digg front page every week.
But is the traffic of any value? Digg traffic is notoriously non-sticky. If you’re writing Digg-able linkbait like “Top 10 x’s you can do with y” (hint: if its something about the Apple iPhone you’ll draw visitors like bees to honey) and at the same time not focusing any effort on writing good quality content then you’ll attract very few genuinely engaged visitors. And like Seth says, whats the point of that, really?
Rule #6 - Don’t let adverse facts stand in the way of a good decision.
When I started Crane Factory the facts were clear - I’m entering a crowded sector of the blogosphere, writing about WordPress and blogging in general. However launching this blog was still a good decision. In blogging about these topics I’m learning more and more about WordPress, PHP, web development, SEO, writing, social media, marketing and promotion that I otherwise would not have learned. All of these skills are important for the projects that are in development now. Without them these projects would never even get off the ground let alone appear on the web in the near future.
Rule #7 - You can’t make someone else’s choices. You shouldn’t let someone else make yours.
Are you letting someone else make the choices when it comes to the advertising that appears on your blog? I know I was, by using Google Adsense here on this site. That is until I got sick of displaying ads with no relevance to this site whatsoever. I decided to take more control over the advertising that appears on this site and removed Google Adsense code from my WordPress theme.
Rule #8 - Check small things.
Sometimes we get so caught up in the excitement of writing our blog posts, responding to comments, and participating in social media that we forget to check the small but important things, such as what your blog looks like in the latest version of Firefox, or how your blog posts appear in Google results. When was the last time you checked some of these small things on your blog?
Rule #9 - Share credit.
The internet is a giant community, and no one blogs in isolation from everyone else. Whether you’re giving your personal spin on a news article, sharing the solution to a problem, or using images in your blog posts, be sure to give credit where it is deserved and link back to the original articles, forum posts, and photographer’s that you drew information and inspiration from.
Rule #10 - Remain calm. Be kind.
If your blog has had visitors then chances are some of those visitors have left comments on your posts. Some of these will be positive (woohoo!) and some will be negative (oh no!). Negative comments are something that can really kick your emotions into top gear. You might get angry, you might get upset, or you might get excited that someone has picked a fight and fire off a negative comment back at them.
A better approach is to simply remain calm. Sometimes it is best to just ignore the negative comments. If you’re going to respond then be kind. Your blog will be tarnished more by your own negative comments than by those of an anonymous visitor.
Rule #11 - Have a vision. Be demanding.
Steve Jobs has both a huge cult following and a reputation as an egomaniac with an overly aggressive management style. The aesthetic style and quality of Apple products is a testament to how driven he is to perfection. If you could take just a fraction of Steve’s drive and apply it to your own vision then you too could find your vision becomes a reality, and find success along the way.
Rule #12 - Don’t take counsel of your fears or naysayers.
If there is one thing every good idea has come up against it is someone who thinks it is a bad idea. Sometimes that someone is your own inner self, voicing your fears that your idea is just not good enough or its already been done as well as it can be done by someone else. And other times it is your friends and family who tell you that you are wasting your time.
Universal Studios turned down George Lucas’s idea for Star Wars. J.K. Rowling was rejected by 12 publishers. Success often comes off the back of a lot of failure. I have ten times more bad ideas than good ideas, but if I did not let each idea pan out and try to develop it to its full potential then none of my good ideas would ever see the light of day.
Rule #13 - Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier.
You may be just a single person or a small team but if your enthusiasm and optimism are greater than that of a bigger team then you can be more successful than them. How else do you think the little guys who are passionate about their ideas end up taking over the world?
Like many bloggers I have been using Google Adsense to fill some advertising space on this website, specifically the horizontal banner after the first post on the front page, and also on single post pages just before the comments. I’ve got the Google Adsense code running in a three way split with Amazon and Performancing ads.
Though this blog is fairly new I still feel it has enough content for Google’s crawlbots to understand what it is about, which is why I’m disappointed to see ads like this appearing:
Neither of these really have anything to do with this site (though I can sort of understand the ads for cranes, the word “crane” is far from the most widely used keyword on the site… “WordPress” anyone?).
So its time for Google Adsense code to go. I’ll be keeping the Amazon and Performancing ads for now running a simple A/B split. Google ads may make a comeback later on as I’ve had some success on other blogs with them, but on this blog the relevancy is just too far off the mark.
Gaps in your blog posting schedule can happen for any number of reasons. You may be travelling, fall ill, have a family event, or maybe you’re just letting your blog go. A lack of posting frequency can lose you readers, so what can you do about it?
Let it go
The most common outcome of a lack of posting is that it is the first sign a blog owner is letting their blog die. Of the millions of blogs started each year relatively few get past the initial burst of “Hello world!”, “Here’s this cool thing I found today!”, “I’m eating for lunch…”, and then nothing. It is so easy to start a blog for free that letting them go is just as easy for most people.
Make an excuse
The next most common outcome of a lack of posting is an excuse post explaining the absence, maybe apologising for it, and usually promising a renewed commitment to posting more often. The “Sorry I haven’t posted in a while but…” post is very often the last one before the blog is simply let go.
Use it for a post idea
What am I doing right now? My last post was the 11th of August followed by a two week gap and now I’m writing a “What to do about gaps in your blog posting” post. Another method would be to use it as a lesson learned, such as when we travelled to New Zealand. I had every good intention of blogging while over there but ended up running into technical difficulties and some good old fashioned poor planning.
Just get on with it
Quite frankly this is my preferred approach. I subscribe to blogs I’m interested in via RSS, and follow enough of them that if one goes quiet for a week or two it doesn’t really bother me. I’d prefer my favourite bloggers sorted out whatever is keeping the preoccupied and then just get on with writing for their blog again when they’re ready. It takes a pretty long gap for me to start thinking about unsubscribing, so don’t be too alarmed if you need to take a break once in a while. Just fire up your browser and start writing again!
I’ve been reading reviews of the new Performancing Ads service on many of the popular blogs recently. Integrating ads into your WordPress blog can be a real chore, so I was interested to try out this new service that so many bloggers were saying was simple and easy to use.
After registering as a publisher I set up my site and then setup a region. A region is basically a space on your website that will contain advertising.
All of the ads sold on Performancing Ads are the popular 125×125px format, and you can choose the number of ads you wish to display across and down, the price for those ad spots, some filters (to keep competitors out), and finally the margin between ads (up to 10px).
Once your region is defined you are provided with the PHP code to insert into your template where you want the region displayed, and the link to download the WordPress plugin. If your template is widget enabled you don’t even need to edit your code, just install the plugin and drag the widget into place. With this simple system I was able to remove dozens of lines of code in my site template that were in place for positioning and rotating several ads.
Besides being free to use for publishers one of the other great features is the ability to book your own ads. So for example if you have some affiliate programs set up you can create those as ads in your Performancing Ads control panel, upload your own 125×125px creatives, and then book those ads into available spots on your site.
If you’re looking for a simple and easy way to place advertising on your blog I highly recommend you give Performancing Ads a try.
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