Internet Babel

Although grammar won’t necessarily make or break a blog. I think it can go a certain way into making a blog seem more professional. Although most people don’t really care about grammar as long as what’s being said is useful or enticing… it still sort of detracts from the credibility of the writer. Even on a subconscious level, the fact that he/she can’t even use the English language correctly! But if a blog is big enough, it usually doesn’t matter.

Here are some bad grammar habits I see all the time on blogs, try and avoid these:

There for their – A lot of people confuse these. It’s simple; there is used in an instance of a location or other, “Look at that over there” or “I agree with you there”. The word their is used in the instance of a belonging of person’s. For example “If Google want to use their knowledge for evil, who cares” or “Facebook must be dribbling all over their new lump of cash”.

Wan’t instead of want – Some people assume the word want needs an apostrophe such does the word won’t. It doesn’t need an apostrophe because it is not contraction of two or more words, it’s simply a word in itself. Won’t is a obviously a contraction of will not but want is an independent word.

Post and title bar titles – A lot of people know that it’s good grammar to capitalize each word within a title. But what a lot of people mess up is which words to not capitalize. All you need to remember is that you do not capitalize any prepositions. A preposition for those who don’t know is simply a word that joins a noun, pronoun or any other word. Prepositions are usually two to four letter words (it, and, for, on etc). As you can see, every word in this post title is capitalized apart from on and… and.

Again, grammar is not always big problem in gaining readers, but it can again just go a way in making you and your blog appear more professional. Don’t take simple things for granted.

That’s enough of that, I feel like a 17yr old f*cking teacher

Just to let anyway who doesn’t know already. A Google PR Update has happened.

This blog is now a PR2

So anyone who didn’t know, go check your PR, you might be happier

For some reason people seem to be getting randomly banned from BlogRush. I’ve read a few incidences of bloggers saying their blog has been thrown out due to ‘quality’ rejection. Despite the fact their blog is quality, unique and regular content.

Most notably – John Chow parody man John Cow recently got ban.

If maybe, John Reese had thought of only accepting quality… before he launched we wouldn’t be having this problem. I can also not log in so I guess I’ve been banned but I’ve had no email saying that, no response from the support team… oh yeah I did actually. About 5 days after my message was sent and it was basically… and I’m paraphrasing now:

“You are not important enough for us to care at the moment”

A fine example of top customer service as you can see. I am also still receiving update emails so… I don’t know. I cannot understand why he launched something so underdeveloped. BlogRush are randomly banning people and updates are ‘always’ coming so they say.

For those who ‘still’ don’t know, John Chow and Shoemoney started a competition between each other to see who could get the most subscribers in the month of October. So far John Chow is 2,000 odd users ahead of Shoe, so I doubt Shoemoney can pull it back now.

Anyway, They’re both still giving away some great prizes so go check em’ out and subscribe to both. You could win something… like me

There’s a lot of speculation, worry and curiosity about the supposed upcoming so called ‘PageRank Downgrade’ meaning Google will get rid of PageRank altogether.

Some think it’s happening because of link farms, manipulation, link selling, John Chow. You name it. Here’s what I think… I couldn’t care less!

I know it’s all relevant in the context of link selling. And if you’re a webmaster who does sell links then you may be worried as your PR was one of the defining factors in link sales.

But, think about it. It’s just a number, the only reason it seems important is because Google are so huge. Google are the biggest search engine and one of the biggest sites on the net, they generate a monster income and are just… huge.

If they want to abolish PR, so be it. I could not care less. All I care about it providing quality content, making quality websites and trying to generate income. PR only seems relevant in link selling evaluation because we and Google have made it that way.

Solution = make it irrelevant.

Start selling based on quality and traffic.

PR has never mattered to me much to be honest. I think it just becomes an obsessive figure in people’s minds which they feel they must improve more and more. They worry about obscure little SEO details and make delusional accusations towards Google about lowering their PR due to this and that. It’s become almost a statistical paranoia!

I say, forget about it. Worry about quality, user experience and traffic. The rest will fall into place.

Goodbye Google PageRank!

This is a quick flash video I put together explaining how to get RSS Feeds from YouTube. I thought I’d make a nice clear video to explain it visually. Enjoy
Watch the instructional flash video here

The great thing about WordPress is the ease of use and the array of useful plugins. The following is a list of my top 5 WordPress plugins (not in order of favoritism) that I think are pretty essential for anybody using WordPress to blog.

1. Show Top Commentators – This plugin increases blog comments immensely, the reason is because it gives your readers an incentive to comment by provoking competition between themselves. Being top commentator can help them get traffic to their own blogs, if the plugin is displayed in a prominent position. So it’s in their best interest to comment. Once a few join in, it will usually entice other people to do the same.

Download and instructions here

2. Top Posts – I love this plugin. A lot of bloggers are using it now, It’s one of the most useful plugins available because it displays your top posts depending on number of comments or views. You can decide how many to display and categorize them if you like. Displaying your best work helps give people a reason to stick around and delve deeper into your blog. You could obviously just create a sidebar entitled of this nature and manually put into it your favorite posts, disregarding comment or view stats but I prefer to use this plugin as there is obviously a reason why your top commented / visited posts are that.

Download and instructions here

3. Democracy – This is a poll plugin. Polls help provide an interactive aspect to your blog. By placing a poll somewhere on your blog, you give people yet another reason to get involved and study your blog longer than they usually might.

Download and instructions here

4. Subscribe to Comments – Nice little plugin that provides your readers with an option of subscribing to comments on a particular post via email. It’s simply a little opt-in check box that appears underneath every comment box on posts, with a text field for their email. This is great for reminding people of your blog. If somebody happened to not subscribe to your RSS because they forgot or whatever but they did subscribe to a post’s comments and forgot about your blog then they can handily be reminded via email next time someone comments on said post. They then may proceed to subscribe to your feed.

Download and instructions here

5. Buy Me a Beer – This plugin can be inserted in the sidebar alone or at the bottom of every post. It’s a nice creative plugin that basically asks for a donation in a unique fashion. It’s quite strange that the huge majority of people will not donate if they just see ‘make a donation’ but some of those people will donate with this plugin simply because it’s a bit out of their comfort zone in terms of initial thought.

Download and instructions here

On top of those 5 I would also like to mention the Askimet plugin. This is automatically installed with WordPress so no need to download it but if you haven’t already. Activate it! it’s a great spam protector plugin that will catch about 98% of all spam comments.

I’ve never really done email marketing to the full extent. I’ve tried it in the past with not much to varied success but I’ve just never found it to be much of a lucrative marketing medium for me. But the other day I watched a video on email marketing on John Chow’s blog as I was going through his Archives (I was bored).

After watching this I randomly decided to do a little email marketing campaign myself. So, I went onto the Top 100 list of ‘make money online’ blogs (which was actually what the video was on) and one by one visited and contacted the top 50 blogs on that list… give or take a few. All in all I probably did about 45. The emails I sent to each of them were unique each time and promoting some of my ‘best’ work on this blog. Such as; Making Your Blog Unique and 10 Ways to Fail at Blogging.

Of the 45 (probably about that) that I contacted, 6 replied. So far. Though I doubt anymore will reply. The following bloggers / blogs are the ones that responded:

1. Adnan from Blogtrepreneur.com

2. Ades from Adesblog.com

3. Carl from Carlocab.com

4. Patrick Altoft from Blogstorm.com

5. Seth Godin from, well… it’s Seth Godin!

6. Daniel Scocco from Dailyblogtips.com

So thanks to all of those.

Now with Seth Godin, I actually sent him my John Chow interview. The reason I sent this is because… I assume he is very busy and gets tons of emails every day from people promoting all kinds of rubbish. So by sending him this, it’s a little better as it’s technically not my content, it’s an interview. The questions are mine, but the content, realistically is John Chow’s given that he gave the answers. Also it was a little name drop as it may of caught his attention more with John Chow in the subject title.

I actually saw a rise in traffic after these emails. Obviously because of the bloggers who opened and clicked the links but Andy Beard also Stumbled me which helped a touch. Every little helps.

Emailing this volume of bloggers can result in a lucky backlink, mention or feature. Or just generally help establish awareness of your blog.

So, I would say – if you haven’t already, go do what I did and try your hand at email marketing. It’s free and you’ve got nothing to lose.

Here are a few things to remember when conducting your emails:

• Do not try to sell anything – Whatever you do, don’t do this. If you email a bunch of professional marketers or bloggers and try to promote a product or an article stuffed with affiliate links… it’s just not going to work so you could just put yourself on bad terms with someone for no reason. Avoid this.
• Don’t be too formal – If you are immediately too formal in an email such of this nature, it may seem as you are trying to gain instant professional approval therefore probably selling something. Some may not even read on. Remember, they’re only people on the other end of your email, address them casually.
• Don’t ask for a link – Asking for a direct link when you don’t know someone won’t work. You might get very lucky but I seriously doubt it. It will just seem a bit… cheeky to email a well established blogger and ask for a free backlink. They probably won’t even respond so don’t bother. At best, hint at one but don’t ask directly.
• Be honest – Make sure that you’re honest. Marketers can be bullshitters if they chose and you should remember to never shit a bullshitter! Just tell them why you are emailing them. Don’t be too upfront but just explain why you are contacting them right away. Busy people are busy people. Make them want to read on!

As you can see from my results… I didn’t have the best response rate. At all! but… some of the ones that didn’t respond, backlinked me and at the end of the day. Some responded. Getting any blogger or marketer to respond to an email promoting your content I think can be rare. Especially if they’re big bloggers.

Let me know how it works out for you.

These are some of the best, most honest Internet marketing / enthusiast presentation videos I’ve ever seen.

So anyone who hasn’t seen these, check em’ out, they’re brilliant.

The Reese Formula

Build A Business Not A Moneymaker

Open Your Eyes and Find the Gold

Sell What’s Already Selling

The Internet Rich Get Richer

It’s All About Authority

The Only Way to Change Your Reality is to Face Your Reality

Always Do More Than is Expected of You

For anyone who doesn’t know, John Chow and Shoemoney are having a competition between each other to see who can gain the most subscribers this month.

As part of the drive to get more, they’re both giving away prizes.

Just found out I’ve won a free page on MillionEuroWiki. Which is nice.

I’ll link to it once it’s up