The 7 Deadly Fears of Blogging and How to Overcome Them

: Image via Wikipedia

I remember back to early 2008, when I’d just started blogging, that even though I had great ambitions, my knowledge, expertise, and confidence as a blogger was sorely lacking. I stumbled through my blogging career for over a year before I felt I had a really good grip on things, and even then, there were many things I struggled with.

But more than anything, through all of the struggles I faced, there was one enemy that kept popping up time and time again, each time in a different form than the last. This enemy was fierce, determined, and relentless, and eventually I had no choice but to either confront it, or forever commit to a life of running.

Finally, in a Bruce Wayne moment of clarity, I decided to turn-around, face this enemy, and obliterate him. His name was fear, and there are seven ways that he tried to take me out. Here are the tactics I used to fight back.

Click here to go to the source and get the 7 deadly fears and their antidote; problogger.net

The One Thing Keeping You from Being a Blogging Master (tjantunen.com)
Are these Mindsets Holding You Back from Achieving Blogging Success? (problogger.net)
The One Thing Keeping You from Being a Blogging Master (dailyblogtips.com)
7 Ways to Find Inspiration: Think Outside the Blog (problogger.net)
Deadly decisions (wellingtonista.com)

October 11, 2010 0

Why You Should Learn By Doing

: Image by wuperruper via Flickr

Do you enjoy learning new things? I certainly do.In particular, I enjoy about learning new ways to better myself and my relationships with others. When I first started on this quest I couldn’t get enough. I read about it all the time on blogs, online magazines and in books. There came a point where everything I read was just a slightly different version of the same thing. I was stuck.

I felt as though I had run out of things to read and ideas to try, yet I didn’t feel any better. I didn’t feel as though I was a better person or that my relationships with others had improved at all. There was something missing. It was the doing.

It wasn’t until I actually started applying what I had learned in the personal development realm to my own life that it started to make a difference. All the lessons, all the truths were suddenly having an impact. There was a huge difference in simply knowing it vs. actually doing it.

If you read all the books, blogs and articles on ice skating you would likely think it’s pretty easy, and it is … in theory. But strap on some skates and step on the ice for the very first time and my bets are that you’d be sitting on the ice a whole lot more than you’d be gracefully gliding around on it. It boils down to the old saying that practice makes perfect.

via dumblittleman.com

Here’s another reason I’ve found for ‘learning new things by doing’ — it makes me more sensitive to the learners in my life by reminding me how hard it can be to try anything new. What about you?

Blogging with a Learner’s Mind (copyblogger.com)

October 10, 2010 0

10 Helpful Resources on the Basics For The Computer Illiterate

Over the weekend, I was helping a family member with transferring files to his laptop from his new digital camera. The experience showed me that what many of us take for granted with computers seems like absolute voodoo to many other people. When I told him to open Microsoft Explorer, he looked at me with a blank stare. When I said just hold down the control key to select more than one photo at once, he got up to get himself a stiff drink.

There are a lot of people – particularly older folks – that really want to keep in touch with family and friends, and interact with other people online. Unfortunately, computer technology remains a very real barrier for them. Even basic computer terminology like file transfers, blogging, torrents…it all sounds like a foreign language to a very large part of the population.

In an effort to help bridge the technological gap, I went out in search for free, high-quality online resources that can really help by providing tutorials and information about computer basics.

via makeuseof.com

You can follow the ‘via’ link above to go to the source and read the rest of the article if you’d like to dig a little deeper…

October 8, 2010 0

Your nonprofit communications course catalog

: Image via Wikipedia

Welcome, all, to the back-to-school edition of the nonprofit blog carnival. (Say, what’s a blog carnival?)

From the many great posts we received, we’ve put together this handy dandy list of nonprofit communications resources. It’s the first day of college all over again, but without the social pressure. Choose a topic, learn, and enjoy.

Know of a great post that belongs in our course catalogue? Post it up in the comments during the add/drop period.

via bigducknyc.com

You can follow the ‘via’ link above to go to the source and read the rest of the article if you’re interested in these great resources…

Social Media for Non-Profits – Slideshow (marketingsavant.com)
All Things Eco Blog Carnival Volume 114 (focusorganic.com)
Homeschool Kids Blog Carnival Deadline Looms! (blogging2learn.wordpress.com)
AP Month 2010 Blog Carnival Updated Information (attachmentparenting.org)
August Blog Carnival Wrap-Up (rpggm.com)

October 1, 2010 0

The Future Of Blogging Might Surprise You

It’s [blogging] a profound shift in how we write, read, contribute and distribute the published word. Blogs are no longer the black sheep of publishing. They have quickly become as important as the printed word. “The New York Times operates at least 50 public-facing blogs,” the Blogosphere report says. “These blogs are intertwined with the paper’s regular coverage. Readers are routinely redirected from the main site to the blogs and back again. There is a near total fluidity between the traditional coverage and the blog posts.”

via twistimage.com

You can follow the ‘via’ link above to go to the source and read the rest of the article if you’d like to dig a little deeper…

October 1, 2010 0

B2B Social Media And Lead Generation

: Image via CrunchBase

With a business blog, there are many different ways to get people to become a “lead” from a visitor. For example: including buttons in the sidebar to talk to a representative, or text links within content to whitepaper landing pages or to download content. HubSpot has found it successful to add calls to action at the end of content.

We have found that a majority of posts generating leads haven’t been published recently. Older content is generating leads.

It’s important to remember that your customers are more important than you are. For example, HubSpot has a customer in Virginia that installs pools and spas. All he does is share what someone might want to know when installing a pool. He doesn’t directly sell his products, but that’s okay. Even if people aren’t ready to buy, publishing value added content adds them into that consideration section.

Getting all team members involved in the business blog is vital. People want content from people, not necessarily just companies. Getting different people from different departments – i.e., research or product, allows marketers to expand the relevant information covered on a given blog to appeal to a larger subset of customers.

Business blogging drives leads and serves as a hub for search and social media visitors. It doesn’t feel like they are visiting a website that hasn’t been updated in years. A blog provides much better context for a business.

via toprankblog.com

Five Ways To Use Your Social Profiles For SEO – Whiteboard Friday (seomoz.org)
27 Social Media Marketing Stats and Facts (penn-olson.com)
Think social media isn’t for B2B segment? Think again. (drewsmarketingminute.com)

October 1, 2010 0

Are these Mindsets Holding You Back from Achieving Blogging Success?

This is a question I’m asked a fair bit on panels or in interviews, and it’s one that I suspect the people asking the question would like a technical answer to.
The reality is that the biggest mistakes I see bloggers making are usually things that are going on in their minds, rather than on their blogs.
A blogger’s mindset and attitude is as important more important than which blog platform they choose, their blog’s design, or how many posts they make a day.
There are two very common mindsets that I see in many bloggers (and prebloggers), and which I think hold them back.

via problogger.net

You can follow the ‘via’ link above to go to the source and read the rest of the article if you’d like to dig a little deeper…

September 30, 2010 0

5 Steps to Reduce the Pain of Starting a Business Blog

: Image by kk+ via Flickr

Blogging can be intimidating for someone who hasn’t done it in the past or grown up in the age where everyone has a personal blog. It is, however, critical that business owners and marketers ‘blog for business.’ Putting pen to paper or more appropriately, putting fingers to your keyboard is the biggest challenge for most people. So let’s talk about how to get started.

via blog.hubspot.com

If you’re interested in blogging but not sure how to get started, you’ll want to follow the ‘via’ link above to read the rest of this article. If you’re going to start, I encourage you to set a goal of posting once per day. If that seems like a lot, remember that all your content does not need to be original! In my book, there are two main types of posts; creation [original thoughts] and curation [quoting someone’s content with proper attribution]. I uses tools like Gist and Google Reader to listen to subject matter experts in my field, quote their articles, and then post my opinion just like I’m doing now…

Comment, call or use the contact form to connect so we can talk about how this applies to your business!

5 Tips To Identify Influencers On The Web (elliottlemenager.com)
In Over Your Head? Six Ways to Reduce Blogging Stress (blogworld.com)
5 Tips to Kick Start Your Link Building via Social Media Monitoring (searchenginewatch.com)

September 29, 2010 0

The Future of Online Media Is Video [?]

“At Monday’s IAB Mixx conference in New York, Gawker Media Founder Nick Denton took the stage with AllThingsD’s Peter Kafka to discuss the future of the blogging network — and that future is all about images and video. “People don’t really want to read text,” Denton said. “They want videos, they want images, bigger, more lavish.” In other words, consumers are looking for online media products that more closely resemble TV and magazines. Denton cited Gizmodo’s notorious leak of the iPhone 4 as an example, which quadrupled traffic for the blog that week. “There is a huge kind of hunger for that image, for the video we produced,” he said. “The core of that story was the image of the phone.” Text, he contended, is more useful for providing context and explanation for more visual kinds of media, rather than serving as the primary medium itself.” Source: Gawker Founder: The Future of Online Media Is Video

Ummm. Not so fast, Nick — what about metadata? What about search? A picture may be worth a thousand words, but visual search is not a reality yet. Until it is, this ‘vision’ may be a little too far reaching…

via ScribeFire

September 28, 2010 0

400 posts redux; Lesson #1

: Image via CrunchBase

This is the first post in what I anticipate will be a 7 part series…

11 months ago, I posted this introspective piece on the results I was getting from blogging…

Yesterday, I passed the 400 post mark. 400 posts over 18 months. Wow! Roughly a post a day for a year and a half. Is that a lot? Is that too little? I really don’t know. What I do know is this — when I use my ‘pass or play’ methodology, traffic to my site increases and my ‘pipeline’ fills…

My good friend [and brother in law] Jim Gilligan has a blog that he’s starting for his life coaching business at EffectiveLiving, LLC. Jim asked me how many posts he should create before he goes ‘live’. I told him a dozen or so is enough to get started but recently I did an experiment and I believe the number at which you start to see good results is closer to 100 over a 3 month period. Here’s a real world case study…

I had neglected my business blog for a little over a year — my passion was politics and I was attempting to leverage my social media skills in the political space. My political blog was ranked most influential in Wisconsin a dozen times earlier this year and my Alexa ranking rose to within the top million sites in the world, but it didn’t get me what I wanted. More business. One year ago today, my business blog, however, had only served up 147 page views for the month. The whole month. Two weeks ago, I got 233 pageviews in a single day and my traffic so far this month is 11 times greater than a year ago [and the month’s not even finished yet]. By the way, the Alexa rank on my blog is currently 338,142. [That was in the US at the time — now my rank is 341,593 global. ed.]. All this as a result of 100 posts over a 3 month period. Pretty good return on investment, I think.

via e1evation.com

Yesterday, I passed 2,400 posts — 2,000 additional posts — in less than 11 months. What do I think I’ve learned? Here are some more or less random observations…

1. Blogging is the best, fastest, least expensive way to establish a thought leadership position. Period.

The key to thought leadership is having a point of view that is ‘searchable, findable, knowable and shareable‘ as I say in my seminars. There is not better way to do that then frequent reiteration of that point of view on the internet. If you use the right set of tools, it’s easy and fun to do as well…You can read my posts on blogging here, but two of the best I posted within the past week; read ‘Why I blog’ and ‘Confessions of a really new blogger‘ for two different perspectives on why blogging rocks. It is helpful, however, if you have a simple, repeatable process so that you don’t burn out…

There are 6 more lessons that I’ll roll out over the course of the next week or so; be sure to collect all 7…

How To Increase Alexa Rank (bloggingtips.com)
Has The Alexa Chrome Extension Improved My Alexa Rank? (blazingminds.co.uk)
How Does Alexa Rankings Work? (shoutmeloud.com)

September 27, 2010 0

The Rev. Robert Barron takes to TV, blogs, YouTube as a new-media Catholic priest

The Rev. Robert Barron, a Chicago-based Roman Catholic priest, has made himself a new-media messenger for the church, bringing a Catholic perspective to topics from “Avatar” to atheism to the use of steroids in baseball.

The author of 10 books, he has posted more than 180 cultural commentaries on YouTube and delivers a weekly homily on Relevant Radio (WNTD-AM/950 in Chicago). He contributes guest blogs to CNN.com and ABC.com, adding pithy, pointed commentary to hot topics. He has filmed a 10-part documentary, “The Catholicism Project,” which he hopes will air on public television next year.

On Sunday, he will begin presenting a half-hour television show, “Word on Fire with Father Barron,” on WGN America. It’s paid programming, the airwaves’ equivalent of vanity publishing; his messages, from earlier DVDs, will air nationwide for 13 weeks (at 8:30 a.m. Sundays in Chicago). The airtime will be paid for by private donors; he declines to reveal the cost.

“My job is to bring the Catholic perspective to bear,” says the Rev. Barron, 50. Catholicism, he says, “has been underrepresented in the conversation.”

via chicagobusiness.com

Here’s one priest who’s taking the Holy Father’s admonition to start blogging seriously! What about you others? Let’s use the internet to spread a little Gospel and Community! Comment, call or use the contact form to connect so we can talk about how this applies to your parish…

The next Fulton Sheen? (beliefnet.com)
Skateboarding Catholic Priest Becomes YouTube Sensation (popcrunch.com)

September 27, 2010 0

Blogging is Alive and Well, Says Report

via readwriteweb.com

You can follow the ‘via’ link above to go to the source and read the rest of the article if you’d like to dig a little deeper…

September 27, 2010 0

21 Creative Blogger Bio Pages

via mashable.com

September 25, 2010 0

Blogging is NOT for Everyone!

Let’s be honest… BLOGGING IS NOT FOR EVERYONE.

Blogging works for me, and I enjoy it, but I can’t say the same for some other proven lead-generating activities often used by real estate agents:

Cold calling (I just don’t do it)

Farming (I’m not consistent or patient enough)

Print advertising (I’m too cheap to do much of that)

Open House (I haven’t figured out the magic formula for generating traffic)

Buying leads (my response time and follow-up aren’t what they should be)

There are plenty of agents out there who swear by one or more of these, but don’t blog. That’s okay. We’re not all alike, and we don’t have the same talents and interests. That’s okay. The world would be a very boring place if everyone liked the same thing, wouldn’t it?

via activerain.com

You can follow the ‘via’ link above to go directly to the source and get the rest of the story if you’d like…

September 23, 2010 0

Tumblr Leaves Posterous in the Dust [?!]

: Image via CrunchBase

Rising social media rockstar Kelly Neuville of Envano sent me an article from ReadWriteWeb [you can follow the ‘via’ link below the graph to the source and read the rest of the article if you’re interested] that would seem to suggest at first glance that I should abandon my love of the Posterous platform in favor of my first interest in this space, Tumblr. If I apply logic like this at every level in my life, I would learn a lesson from the flies on my farm and favor a steady diet of cow manure — after all, the sheer volume of their vote would indicate that manure is clearly a better food product, right? :-D

Now I’m not saying that Kelly was wrong to send me the article or that Tumblr = cow manure, although it would appear my analogy is heading in that direction. What I am saying is that there will always be a reason why the masses favor one product over another and it may have nothing to do with elegance or technological superiority. I posted the same data from a different perspective yesterday here; the article postulates that ‘The growth in Tumblr’s visitors probably has something to do with its popularity among celebs.’ and says ‘Earlier this week John Mayer made waves this week by shutting down his Twitter account, where he had 3.7 million followers, and switching to Tumblr full time.’ If that’s the case, then Tumblr has an ‘unfair advantage’ — it’s becoming the destination of choice for the MySpace crowd. My response? Meh…

via readwriteweb.com

Laura Ingraham was right — entertainers should shut up and sing. What I want to know is what are the thought leaders using? I was really impressed with Tumblr until I saw that Guy Kawasaki picked Posterous for his Holy Kaw! blog and then I wondered “what did I miss”?! And what about social media rockstar Steve Rubel? And what about me? Seriously, Posterous rocks at the two most important things I could expect any blogging tool to do; ingest almost any content for creation and curation effortlessly and autopost as part of my homebase and outpost strategy. I use Posterous as the foundation of my ‘e1evation workflow‘ and it made me one of the top thought leaders in my industry on the internet rapidly elevating my site to within the top 40k of all websites in the US in 3 months. I will and I have put my humble Posterous blogs up against the best and they’ve held their ground — believe me when I say I have no fear of Katy Perry on Tumblr…

Tumblr Leaves Posterous in the Dust (nytimes.com)
Tumblr Doesn’t Leave Posterous in the Dust (or “Why Facebook is scared of Twitter”) (tonywright.com)
Tumblr leaves Posterous far behind in Competition (techie-buzz.com)

September 19, 2010 9

John Mayer, Katy Perry Agree: Tumblr Crushing Posterous

via observer.com

Hmmm. I’m a massive Posterous fan — it truly has changed my life, my business and my workflow. I do, however, have to do due diligence and revisit Tumblr [which was actually my first bet in this race] to see what they’re up to…