Internet Babel

There are always list posts floating around the blogesphere telling you why people do and don’t do this and that. And why you should do this that way and blah blah.

Just thought I’d make a 1 item post. I believe this is the top reason, most bloggers fail.

No More Ideas

A lot of bloggers simply run out of things to say. This happens to the best, most prolific bloggers I’m sure and has happened to me a lot. And I’m not a prolific blogger, this is my first real blog. Before this I have just spent years building and marketing static sites.

Anyway, here are a few crucial things that I feel best avoid this issue:

• Blog about what you love. If you’re honestly passionate about something, it should be hard to stop yourself from writing. Not the other way around. Think about something you love. A band, your favorite movie, actor… whatever. I bet if people mention X you can’t stop talking about X right? That should be what your blogging niche should feel like. If you don’t feel the same way about Internet marketing as you do about X, don’t write about it. Because sooner or later, you’ll get bored.
• Use inspiration to your advantage. I’m sure lots of you have read posts and thought of a response or different ways of expressing what was said. In what you feel, would be a more creative way. Use inspiration like this and draw from people you admire to create content. Don’t copy. Absorb and expand.
• Draw from experience. Use your own experiences in what ever niche you write in to make your content unique. People like personality, creativity and passion. If you’re just another generic blog saying what’s already been said over and over, and you’re doing nothing differently… It will be very hard to succeed.
• Focus. Pretty much a bland point, but valid. One way to think up new content if you’re stressing because you’ve run dry is to just FOCUS! Just actually sit there with no distractions and look at your niche. Think about what you want to read and what people need and start churning content out. Do it loosely until you find your rhythm. Just letting your fingers fire away with a topic in mind can sometimes leave you surprised at your own creativity. You can tidy it all up later.
• Write about what you know. A very basic high school like point. But it’s absolutely true. Writing about what you know is just… the most sensible thing to do. In terms of… trying to make money with a blog and marketing a blog. It’s very hard to write prolifically about something you know little about, it’s also hard to market in a niche you don’t understand. If you’re going to blog. Write about what you know.

So, this is just the top reason in my opinion. Share your top reason if you don’t believe this is the top reason

Be back soon with no doubt. A very long list post!

It’s quite amazing how you would think that logically, one of the biggest factors to contribute to the success of a writer would be their grammar. Considering it’s what they’re doing as a living and putting out there on a limb.

Now, bloggers aren’t necessarily writers but still. They do write. I don’t mind bad grammar, I couldn’t care less but it’s quite annoying when you see small time bloggers get hassle about it from what little readers they have. Yet big bloggers like Shoemoney and John Chow have really bad grammar. Understandably John Chow’s first language isn’t English so that’s fair enough but Shoe seems to be openly sloppy. Like, childlike sloppy with his grammar.

My grammar is far from perfect but I at least spell basic words right! come on Shoe, how hard is it to use Spellcheck!

Problogger Darren Rowse also makes a lot of typos and grammar mistakes. Which is quite surprising considering he has nearly 40,000 readers and his blog is about perfecting pretty much every aspect of blogging. Including writing and content. You would think with all those readers he would triple check his posts. I know I would.

Wish I had all those readers!

Ironically the 3 bloggers I just mentioned for having or sometimes having bad grammar are probably my 3 favorite bloggers and some of the only blogs that I actually read on a regular basis. They all tell it like it is, all do what they preach and are all very successful.

Content is more important than the actual grammar of the content anyway.

Pretty pointless post and I’m not having a go at those bloggers. Just pointing out quite a surprising fact that I noticed and I’m sure they’re all aware of anyway. I know Shoemoney is and he doesn’t care. Who does care, why did I even write this!

1. Advertise on Already Popular Blogs.

An advertising spot on a popular or authoritative blog within your niche can help gain targeted awareness of your brand/blog as well as giving you an obvious boost in traffic. Direct advertising isn’t always that effective unless it’s clever marketing or the site or blog that you’re advertising on is… huge. So try and make ads that move away from generic stereotype and cliche so that they will stand out from others and catch the eye.

2. Write Outstanding Content

The most effective way to get return traffic is obviously, by writing great content. Getting traffic to your blog is half the battle, the main goal should be to get people coming back to your blog over and over again. Trying to get more subscribers should be the no.1 aim for your blog. Making money with it should be secondary, because without a readership, there is no one to market to. You can afford to lose some readers with advertising if you have a static and stable readership, but if you have average or poor content and your blog is covered in Adsense ads… you will just get visitors coming and going like clockwork and will gain no stability. Write to the best of your ability to avoid this.

3. Brand Your Blog

Branding your blog helps establish you much more as an authority or at least a more trustworthy source. It gives you and your blog an identity to associate with. An image. A visual representation of what you want to communicate with your blog, or at least a class logo to catch the eye! brand your blog with a professional image or representation to help establish it more seriously in the blogesphere and to separate yourself from generic blogs.

4. Be Provocative

Now when I say be provocative. I don’t necessarily mean bad mouth people or be over controversial to provoke arguments. Although that is one way! but what I mean is. Leave room for discussion. Provoke your readers into wanting to comment and input their own opinions by a) not covering every single aspect in a post and b) actually giving an opinion. If you don’t input an actual opinion, your posts become static and non-provocative. If people don’t have anything to question or disagree with then your just another blog pumping out bland viewpoints with no real input or opinion. Give YOUR viewpoint on things to provoke other people to give theirs.

5. Submit Your Best Work to Social News Sites

Social news sites like Digg can help generate huge traffic to your blog if a post goes big. It’s not the easiest thing to get big on Digg anymore because of the absolute flood of people submitting such a vast range of things all the time. It’s hard to provide something fresh. Something that hasn’t been done a thousand times over. Especially in a niche like Internet marketing, with pop culture and gaming it’s not so hard. It’s just about being the first to break a good story. Submissions about Half Life 3 get huge because people can’t wait for it so they salvage any info they can on it. But to come back to Internet marketing, so much has been repeatedly said on the same shit; over and over. It’s hard to provide something interesting enough to get dugg by the masses. But none the less, submit any of your good stuff. Because you never know!

6. Email Your Best Work to Other Bloggers

I had never really done email marketing before this blog. I did quite a big push not too long ago which I also posted about. I think email marketing can be really effective if done right, you need to market to the right people and be persistent but I think it can pay off. Don’t be annoying about it by emailing bloggers every day or week with your work but you could try a realistic email marketing schedule of once a month. Just contact some top bloggers or authoritative bloggers in your niche every now and then. As long as your emails aren’t spammy or demanding then I don’t see why they would mind. I don’t mind it if I receive articles from people. As long as it’s decent content, it’s no harm. So set aside some time, get some contacts rounded up and start some email marketing for your blog!

7. Have an Eye Catching Design

There are so many boring and generic blogs around using the same free templates or standard layouts. Having an eye catching design separates you, aesthetically at least, from these blogs. Blogs that stand out, get readers. Blogs that stand out, get comments. Blogs that stand out… make money. Help your blog stand out by getting a professional design. You can either:

- Get a free template and edit it to suit your style.
- Pay a designer to create a unique one from scratch.
- Design your own template, from scratch.

Either way, you should aim at having a blog design that people look at and think “I would like this on my blog” it’s designs like that which increase revenue and return traffic. It also adds a lot to the perception of your professionalism.

8. Use Images in Your Posts

A very well known mini-booster in traffic. But it can be a bigger booster if tapped into correctly. Putting images in your posts works on two levels to bring you traffic and to keep traffic interested in your posts. Firstly it helps the generic appeal of your posts, images that catch the eye will invoke a reaction from a reader, giving them the opportunity to read on. Original art is the best, if you can design; you should create some nice images of your own to make your posts even more unique. Secondly, images will bring traffic from image searches if tagged and optimized. Try and use images whenever you can to enhance your posts.

9. Interview Well Known Bloggers

By interviewing well known bloggers, you give your readers a peak into the mind of a successful blogger. In effect: giving them a peak into the secret of success. Getting well known bloggers to do an interview for your blog isn’t always the easiest task, but can be done. Just approach them, no matter how big; they are only human. They’re not celebrities or scholars, they just have a popular blog! it’s nothing to be afraid of. Don’t be afraid of rejection because it will happen, in more areas than not. But just approach whoever you want to get honestly and abruptly and ask them. So far for Internet Babel I have interviewed: Shoemoney, John Chow and John Cow. How did I get them? I asked. And the Shoemoney and John Chow interviews provided a nice little surge of traffic at the time.

10. Be Fresh

Posting non-stop opinion and news on popular topics is almost a surefire way to gain traction, in terms of the content. But sometimes it can pay to be a bit more unique and creative. Constantly writing about topics people are always talking about, on a broad level probably will bring you consistent traffic, but sooner or later your blog will become a second rate news filter. There are already huge news sites where people can check news and what not, as well as Google News. Now if you’re giving an individual perspective on some news, I think that’s fine. But always remember to be creative with what you post, look at other blogs and do things that they aren’t. Be fresh and creative and reap the rewards.

11. Find a Niche and Stick to it

Some bloggers can diverse a bit too much sometimes. If your blog is about sewing… write about sewing and hammer the niche to death! however tedious you may tend to think non-stop on-topic blogging may come to some. That’s what you should be aiming for! an absolute authority blog, by slowly slipping into other topics with your niche blog, you end up spreading yourself thin. Slowly becoming confused about what you really want your blog to say or be about. If you have a niche blog, hammer it. Stick it out and you will begin to love writing about that defined topic more and more, it’ll become a writing obsession. But a good one!

12. Post Regularly

Obviously, posing regularly is the backdrop to great content. The content needs to be great but posting regularly is a feat within itself. After a while, due to lack of results – most bloggers just give up. Thus their blog slowly but surely dies. Make sure you post regularly to stop this from happening to your blog! even if you feel writers block is present, try and get something of some relevance out. Rack your brains to come out with more content because content wins but regular content rules.

13. Don’t Post too Much

As a sort of ironic contradiction to the above point, posting too much I think can also have a negative effect. Try and post regularly but not so much as to the point of overloading your readers with so much information that they don’t have time to read it. I have trouble keeping up with some popular blogs posting 2, 3, 4 times a day. I’d say 4 a day should be a realistic limit, anything above that and I think people will just get sick of plowing through it all. Provide your great content in doses not overdoses.