Free Link For Your Thoughts

I want to know what you think.

There’s a Free Link in it for you.

Read on.

Spring is here and my thoughts have turned to blogging…

…and there’s a lot to do! I just updated my About page (after 10 months!) and in so doing I was reminded why I started blogging in the first place. Actually it’s worth reading to fully understand where I’m going with this post.

My reasons (totally selfish) still apply after 10 months of on-off blogging. So there’s a number of steps I have to take to reach those goals.

Get A Free Link – Limited Time Offer

I could do with a little help with taking this blog to the next level (out of the gutter) so if anyone can make a useful suggestion or two (or a useless but hilarious suggestion) I sure would be grateful. There’s a FREE LINK in it for you.

Here’s how to claim your FREE LINK. Make some useful suggestions in the comments below to claim your free link. 😉

Okay here’s the list of questions and thoughts you can help me clarify:

• Should I get a private domain name to replace https://webtooltips.wordpress.com or stick with what I have?
• I was thinking of designing a custom layout and would probably switch the site to my own server. I know there is an import option to bring this blog post over. Are there any problems I can expect when doing this?
• I know WordPress is not to fond of PPC ads and so on, should I switch platform entirely or will this be less of an issue if I’m working from my own server?
• Will I lose page rank if I switch to my own server or can I write a redirect?
• Open to advice, there’s a lot that could be improved here, what would you suggest?

So you know what to do.

Claim your FREE LINK now!

And remember, no matter how hard it gets…Just Keep Blogging!

Killer Traffic Combo! Tell Them Something They’re Too Afraid To Ask…Or Make Them Laugh

Not so long ago I posted a blog about Chuck Norris. Shortly before that I posted about an online web design service called browsershot.org.

What have the two in common? Nothing really, but they both have a similar effect on traffic to this blog.

Here’s the skinny…

When I posted the Chuck Norris blog I also submitted it to some social network sites (digg, reddit, stumble…). My traffic spiked considerably for a few days. I was surprised at the popularity of the subject. But social networks have a tendency to move on and so does the traffic they bring (in most cases). However both the posts mentioned above still continue to draw regular traffic to my blog everyday.

Here’s what I have learned:

Make Them Laugh

Popular humour can draw visitors. Personally I’m terrified that Chuck will discover who I am and roundhouse kick me to death. But offer something that will make people laugh and there’s a good chance they’ll find it, either by referral, by search or by social networks. Humour does not have to be an actual joke. It can be in the style of writing etc.

My writing lacks both humour and style. This is a serious blog.

Give Them What They Are Too Afraid To Ask For

Browsershots.org enables web site designers to see how their site will display in multiple browsers across multiple platforms. The popularity of the browsershots post made me realise that there are a lot of web designers out there that don’t know how to check there sites across multiple browsers.

This is interesting because there’s much talk about web standards and cross browser compatibility in the web design community online. I mean all designers know this stuff, or at least the talk in forums suggests they SHOULD know! Maybe those who don’t know are too embarrassed to ask their fellow designers for advice. Not knowing this stuff quickly becomes unacceptable and rather than ask, web designers are keeping their mouths shut and thinking ‘I better find out how to do this myself’.

That’s why they’re finding my blog post on the subject. Because I’m telling them something they feel they can’t ask their peers about.

Something To Ponder While You Should Be Working

• What questions are people too afraid to ask in your industry?
• Can you answer their (unasked) questions in your blog/website?
• Can you do it in an entertaining way?

If so you might have a killer traffic combination. Just like a double foot roundhouse kick to the chops from Chuck Norris himself!

If you have the guts to comment to this post work away. Or why not subscribe to my RSS feed? I did.

Seth Godin having a busy/bad day?

Who cares!

The point is that even on a busy/bad day Seth gets his posts out. He’s reduced his text to a title and and a few words in a post as follows:

“The more people you reach the more likely it is that you’re reaching the wrong people

Who vs. how many.”

Thanks for that Seth.

Now we can all sit around and speculate about Seth being a pure genius or just plain lazy. What’s important to pick up from his short post is the power of mailing lists. Yes, I probably would not have clicked the title of Seth’s post were it just another piece of noise floating around the internet. But because I subscribed to his blog I tend to give him a minute of my time (his blog is well worth signing up for!).

So the lesson for me is that mailing lists work and can work really well. Even when the list holder is being lazy, having a busy/bad day (and just trying to get his posts out) or a genius, which Seth may or may not be.

Another interesting lesson from Seth’s post is still to reveal itself to me. That is, will I pick up traffic from this trackback? To be honest I couldn’t give a hoot as my blog is all but fully neglected right now, but as an experiment it will be interesting to see the results.

Who know, if it does pick up some traffic I may even post about it tomorrow, should I live that long.

Just keep blogging! 🙂

The Last Word On Blog Categories – Again

Categorize Your Blog Posts

I recently published a three part series on the topic of blog categories and why less is sometimes more. You can find them here, here , here and here, read them in any order you like, they will change your life.

Anyway, Bonnie kindly commented asking an excellent question to do with filing posts under several categories, as follows: “Why won’t you return my calls? I left like 19 messages on your machine! Call me!”

Sorry, wrong question, read on: “BTW, what’s your opinion on filing a post under more than one category (i.e., an article with SEO tips for blogs might be filed under both “SEO” and “Blogging”)?”

Are You Single?

Okay, at a guess I think that it is best to file a post in a SINGLE category, here’s the theory bit…

Search Engines appreciate topic focused writing and being asked to split their attention between a couple of categories from a single post has to diminish the value they put on the specialist nature of that post. I reckon anyway but what do I know?

If the topic of a post is about ‘blog categories’ and the author mentions possible ‘SEO’ benefits in the post, it’s probably better to file under ‘blogging’ and link to the ‘SEO‘ category or a specific post (just as I’ve done here). Sounds like ‘much of a muchness’ but I think the subtle difference is enough to make this a sensible practice. Are you sensible?

By following this practice you are telling the search bot that the main topic and the majority of the post is dedicated to blogging. You are also letting it know that you mention SEO in the post and that readers can find out more about SEO elsewhere in your blog (or another website). That’s why only the text relevant to SEO is linked out.

Search Bots Travel Buy Links, You’ve Just Greezed Yours Up

Filing and linking like this will benefit your reader by giving them further content relevant to the main topic, giving them an opportunity to expand their understanding of the overall subject. Search bots will like you because your post is subject focused while giving them good internal links to other relevant topics. Search bots travel buy links, you’ve just greezed yours up.

*Important Warning*

Be careful, Search Engines will love you for this but your readers may become obsessed with you. You’ve been warned…

How Important Is It To Have Your Picture On Your Blog?

To Mugshot or Not To Mugshot? – That is the Mugshot

I suspect it is important to add a photo of yourself to your blog, especially if you’re a model or something super like that. So should ‘regular Joes’ stick a mugshot on our blogs? Here’s my thoughts on the subject for what it’s worth.

• All the top bloggers do it so there must be something behind it (Darren Rowse, Yaro Starak are two)
• People recognize you after a while and may be more inclined to stop and read your posts
• Stalkers have something to…eh…focus on!? – Hey, stalkers are people too!

I recently added a photo of myself to the header image of my blog because it was quick and easy to do. I haven’t the time to customise the entire site at the moment (I’m lucky if I find the time to get even a couple of posts out a week!). So it’s a little bit of easy customisation, I wonder will anyone even notice, or care?

How To Put A Face On Blogging

If you’re new to blogging and if your blog is hosted with WordPress, rather than a private server, and you haven’t customized it so far, why not do the same? In your WordPress Dashboard go click the ‘Presentation‘ button and then click ‘Custom Image Header‘, the rest is a piece of cake, you’ll figure it out.

Put your photo in your header image and comment this post with your URL! There’s no time limit. Looking forward to seeing you all soon!

Blog Categories, Less Is More Focused #3

This is the last of three posts about blog categories and why less is sometimes more. Previously we’ve looked at blog categories from the perspective of search engine placement and the blogger’s perspective in relation to focus and avoiding bloggers block. Now let’s approach it from the third and equally important perspective, the reader.

Your Blog Is Not About You It’s About Your Reader, blah-blah…

How many times have I come across that statement or something along that vein? Don’t believe it. Your blog is all about you, your interests and your passions. You’re writing for yourself. When you get more traffic to your blog it makes you happy. It may even make you some money. You You You, your blog is for YOU!

What About The Reader?

You and your blog need your readers to keep the blog alive. You know the saying, “people speak just to hear themselves speak” is only partially correct. We also speak because we want other people to hear us too. We want other people to respect our opinions, to see us as being interesting or witty or insightful or whatever.

That’s why blogging is so appealing to the masses; we want someone to listen to us, ya’ hear me?

Blogger’s Ego – Readers Required

So now that we have identified the needs of the blogger we now know that the reader is essential to the growing needs of the blogger’s ego (which expands with every new visitor and deflates with a drop in numbers). The reader has the power to make or break you, to turn you into a quivering mess, so best to make things as easy for them as possible if you want them to come back to your blog.

Important, Readers Time Is At A Premium

How do we do that? Well one way is to make it easy and quick for them to find what the hell it is they are looking for. If they are reading your blog on their 45minute lunch break, chances are you’re not the only virtual destination on their list so time is important.

Lot’s of blog categories means lots of scanning and looking for one of interest. When the reader finds one they think fits the bill they click it, wait for it to load, have a quick scan of the posts and decide if this is what they are looking for; if not it’s back to scanning. If this goes on the frustrated reader will be off checking their mail, looking in recruitment sites and so on.

Speed Up The Selection Process And They May Read A Post

Just make it easy for your readers by staying focused on your topics as part of a single theme and by keeping your blog categories to the minimum. This will make the reader’s selection process much faster, won’t offer too many distractions and they may actually read a post or two instead of just browsing your blog categories.

Remember, if you want your readers to admire your intellect, your humour, your humanity, they have to read your posts first!

Dear Reader…

Show me some love, make a comment and turn me into an egotistical monster!

Blog Categories, Less Is More Focused #2

This is part two of a three part series about blog categories and why less is sometimes more. Part One Is here.

It’s a Categorical Fact Yor’ Honour

In the fist part of this series I proposed a theory based on may years of research, and countless sci-fi movies, that there is a search engine optimization (SEO) benefit to keeping blog categories to a minimum of related topics.

This second post deals with the human side. I offer my experiences as a fledging blogger struggling to avoid or overcome bloggers block. No, you are not alone!

Bloggers Block Kills Blogs

Bloggers block is a blog killer. Every blogger learns that we should post daily if we want our blog to be successful. Suddenly a hobby, a mild interest, turns into a “success or failure” activity.

You love your posts, you reread them and admire them daily, you view your stats constantly, each new visit a personal triumph. You realize if you want to keep getting that ‘hit’ of seeing your stats go up a little over a week or a month that you will have to blog more, probably daily! But it’s a lot of hard work, and what to blog about?

Congratulations, you have now reached the point of make or break. You will either find a way to continue blogging and improving your writing and increasing your visitor base or you will crumble under the pressure and become not a ‘writer of blogs’ but a bitter ‘commenter’ on other peoples blogs. Shame on you! Shame on us all…

Good News, It Doesn’t Have To Be This Way

No it doesn’t. There are practical steps you can take to reduce the scourge of bloggers block. One of them is to keep your list of categories tight. Do not make a new category for every second post!

Stick to absolutely necessary categories ONLY and write about what you know and are interested in ONLY. Sticking to a small amount of blog categories will help you to keep focused on writing about what you know best.

YOU Can Be THE Authority

Following this advice will help you maintain your interest in your blog. An other benefit to this approach is that you will research and learn more about your categories as you are forced to push your knowledge further beyond your comfort zone. You will soon build up a large backlog of blog posts of ever increasing value and quality, all relevant, all focused on your core theme. You will also become an authority on your core topics in a relatively short time.

Too Much Choice Is Sometimes Bad

Bloggers tend to have curious minds and will jump from one subject to another. Too many categories offer too much choice, so keep it tight and become the specialist you were born to be.

I Have 15 Categories At The Time Of Writing This Post

You can probably see that a couple of my categories could be merged into one or deleted from the list. I will have to cull! It will be interesting to see how many blog categories I’ll have a year from now.

Don’t Be Too Hard On Yourself

We all know we should post at least once a day to build and maintain our presence on-line, but if you miss a few days don’t be too hard on yourself, it’s not the end of the world. Just keep blogging!

//Related Posts:
Content Tips For Bloggers With Bloggers Block!
Creative Tools For Bloggers with Bloggers Block!

Blog Categories – Less Is More Focused (SE’s Perspective) #1

Less Blog Categories Better Than More?

This post is one of three that deals with blog categories and asks whether having less blog categories is better than having more. This post takes a look at the issue from a Search Engine’s perspective (and is based on my own theory only).

Who Gets No.1 In Search Engines?

So, lets say someone has searched for the term “red cabbage”. The search request is sent to the search engine and bots are dispatched to crawl for suitable results.

A bot finds lots or results for the search term and begins the process of separating the wheat from the chaff. The search finally comes down to two blogs. Which will the bot reward with the coveted number 1 placement for the search results?

All Things Being Equal

Well, for arguments sake we’ll say that both blogs have posts of equal quality on the subject of “red cabbage” but there is one noticeable difference between them.

While one blog has multiple categories, almost a category for each post (a category for red cabbage, one for greyhound cabbage etc.) the other blog has only a handful of categories, all related to the topic of cabbages. In this second blog the post about “red cabbages” is categorized under ‘Cabbages’ along with 39 other posts about cabbages.

Here’s The Science Bit (Not)

Now I’m no Google bot but if I was and if I wanted to keep my job I’d go for the blog that was focused on the search term and that had more related posts in that same parent category.

To me 40 posts about cabbages in one category ‘Cabbages’ comes across as being more specialist than one post under category ‘red cabbage’.

This is a theory of course. I’d welcome other bloggers opinion on this.

Next Thrilling Instalment…

My next post is based on my personal experience (fact not theory) and will deal with the human side of blog categories and argues that less is more when it comes to writing blog posts.

Creative Tools For Bloggers with Bloggers Block!

This post is connected to an earlier post of mine “Content Tips for Bloggers with Bloggers Block!” and was part inspired by Ric Richardson’s post “Lifehack for the creative: Muse station for brainstorming”

Bloggers, Back to Basics, Back I Tells Ya!

If you want to be creative or expand on ideas I suggest you switch off your PC (not right now, wait till you’ve finished reading this post) grab a pen a paper and start work. PC’s are great for delivering ideas in a finished format but usually not for creatively developing a topic.

Inventor Ric Richardson I think would agree. Ric has come up with a portable Muse Station, a hard back board ideal for quickly jotting down and working on ideas.

Okay, we’ve seen something similar to this before but I think Ric is just reminding us that getting back to the basics may be all we need to unleash the creative juices once more.

Leave Room For Spin-Off Ideas And Other Topics

I usually write or design on paper before even firing up the computer. I always leave a margin for spin-off ideas and other topics that occur to me while I work which is a great source for future posts or designs.

I recently realized this creative resource while working an idea on paper that has lead to several blog topics without too much hard work. The first post I wrote “Content Tips for Bloggers with Bloggers Block!” might be of interest to all you bloggers suffering the dreaded Bloggers Block.

Backlog Of Ideas

Anyway, whether designing websites or writing for blogs I think Ric Richardson’s Muse Station is something we should all have close to hand, you never know when inspiration will strike… and when it doesn’t you’ll already have a backlog of ideas to run with.

If you’d like to say something about this post don’t bottle up, let it out! Happy Blogging!

Go Way Back In Time To A World Without CSS and AJAX

This post is related to my previous post “Content Tips for Bloggers with Bloggers Block!“, read it and all will be clear.

Fun With The Way Back Machine

Internet Archive have been archiving websites since 1996 right up to today. They’ve managed to archive over 85 million websites so far and counting.

Internet Archive’s Way Back Machine is a window into the Internet’s colourful past, allowing us to travel back in time to visit websites that are now only a distant memories (and archived in the Way Back Machine of course – not that distant really). For some website designers those old defunct websites are best left to rest, but to our eternal embarassment people can still get a glimsp of those table hack websites with nasty JavaScript of yester-year.

Enough Talking Time To Travel Back In Time…

I found one of my very first websites on the Way Back Machine and it’s not as bad as I thought it was. Join me on a trip back to May 24th, 2002.

• First, go to the Way Back Machine
• Enter the URL http://www.socialistparty.net (BTW, I’m not a socialist, they had to pay me)
• Hit the ‘Take Me Back’ button (you are now travelling back in time…)
• You should now be able to see the search results, click on May 24 2002, the date I worked on the site
• Result, the site is loaded, all-be-it without some graphics that I guess were deleted from the server at some time.

Lets Be Practical

Okay, this is the kind of web tool that I could spend hours playing with but it’s not just for fun, yes, it has a practical use too.

Tip: If you’ve lost information from a website because you saved over it or whatever, it might be worth checking the Way Back Machine to see if the pages were archived prior to you totally destroying them (I just checked one of my websites and it was last archived May of this year).

With luck you’ll be able to retrieve the website content you’re looking for and get on with the rest of your life.