How to Make Your Blog Stand Out From the Crowd

There are millions upon millions of blogs floating around online all competing for traffic and loyal readers. You can almost get lost when searching through blogs, as one blog leads to the next through their blogrolls. The average internet surfer spends roughly a couple of seconds in one place, and if they find nothing of interest they move on to the next. The only way to keep them on your blog is to catch their attention and stand out from the crowd. Here’s exactly how you cn do this.

First impressions count. Like it or not, the way your blog looks can have a massive impact on whether someone hangs around to read some more or whether they quite simply move on to the next. Try to choose a theme looks nice and is pleasing to the eye. Do not over do it with colors otherwise you will blind your visitors, and they won’t stick around long. Take the time to design or hire someone to create you a catchy logo that will let anyone know who is visiting your blog what it is about.

Don’t over do it with advertising. If your blog is full of ads and flashy banners this may put off your visitors. They either won’t stick around long because your blog looks tacky, or they will end up clicking on an ad and ultimately end up on someone else’s site or blog.

Have good navigation. It is important that people can find their way around your site with ease. As we already know the average attention span of the surfer is short. Therefore if it is difficult to navigate your blog they may simply give up and move on to the next.

Write good content. Try and write good informative useful posts for your visitors to read. Try not to use PLR or duplicate material unless you are going to rewrite it significantly. You should also write like you are writing to a friend. Try not to be condescending when giving advice and tips. If you follow these rules you should have no problems making your blog stand out from the crowd.

4 Ways to Get Instant Blog Traffic

In the last post we discussed a few ways you can monetize your blog and start earning some money, however all that information is no good if you have no one reading your blog. So now we need to discover how we can start getting some traffic to your blog, and reading your articles.

We all know that search engine traffic is probably one of the best and most targeted types of traffic you can get, but getting your blog listed in the high enough in the search engines to get this type of traffic takes time. In the meantime I am going to show you 5 quick ways that you can get instant blog traffic today.

1. Social Bookmarking

Every time you write a new blog post you can bookmark it on sites such as Digg, Reddit, and Stumbleupon. Many people take part in these sites every day looking for interesting links and information. Why not let your blog post link be the one they find. If your blog posts or articles are interesting enough you will find yourself getting a lot of traffic very fast from social bookmarking.

2. Blog Commenting

Another good way to get fast targeted traffic is by commenting on other blogs in your niche. The first rule to blog commenting is to read the whole post you are commenting on and leave a good lengthy comment that is relevant. Do not spam, as most other blog owners do not like this and your comment will either be deleted or not published at all.

3. Forum Marketing

Just like blog commenting, the best way to get traffic to your blog from forum marketing is to simply take part and not spam. Most forums allow you to have a link in your signature to any websites you own, and that is the best place to put it. First you need to find some forums that are in the same niche of your blog, register and then start making some posts. Never link to your blog from inside your forum posts, if you are helpful and write informative posts then people are more likely to click on the lnk in your signature.

4. Paid Traffic

Another way to get instant traffic is by paying for it with programs such as Google’s Pay Per Click (PPC). Although this method will bring you instant targeted traffic, it is not for the beginner or the faint of hearted. If not done right you can end up losing a lot of money very quickly. However if you take the time to learn PPC strategies then you could end up making a nice profit.

How to Start Making Money From Your Blog

Earning money from your blog and being able to live from it is most bloggers dream. Some people start blogging with the sole purpose to earn some extra cash, and others simply blog because they love to share their thoughts with the world. Even if you started your blog with the latter in mind it wouldn’t harm to earn some extra pocket money from it right? Here are a few ways you can monetize your blog and start earning from your writing.

Adsense

Adsense is part of Google’s advertizing program. Signing up to Adsense is free and is a simple process. You can then choose to place Google ad’s on your blog in a variety of formats, including text ads, image ads, link units, and Adsense for search. You can also optimize these ads to match with the layout of your blog. When any visitors click on these ads on your site you earn some money. Adsense is most effective on informational niche type blogs.

Advertizing Spots

You can offer advertizing spots on your blog to earn some money. Of course the amount of money you can make will depend on how popular your blog is. If your blog has been around a while and has a lot of visitors you can charge more for people to advertize their own blogs, sites or services in places like your sidebar or header. You can also sign up for sites that offer to connect bloggers with advertizers to make this process easier.

Affiliate Marketing

Put simply affiliate marketing is when you recommend a product or a service through your blog, and when your visitors click through that link to purchase you earn a percentage of the sale. There are many many different ways you can start affiliate marketing from your blog, and one of the most popular is Clickbank. Clickbank mainly deals with electronic informational products such as ebooks, or e-courses. You can also make money from promoting physical products from places such as Amazon and Ebay.

Which Blogging Platform Should You Use?

So you are thinking about starting a blog? Huh. You may have all these ideas running around your mind about what you are going to blog about, and how to monetize it. You are probably also eager to get started. However there is one other thing you need to take into consideration before you start tapping away at your keyboard. The first thing you need to think about is what blogging platform you are going to use.

These days as blogging has become popular moe and more blogging platforms seem to be cropping up. Just how are you going to decide which one to use. Don’t worry here are a few of the best blogging platforms for you to choose from.

Blogger.com

Blogger.com is a completely free blogging platform that is owned by Google. You will be supplied with a free domain name that will look a bit like this yourdomainname.blogspot.com. There are no restrictions on the ways you can monetize a blogger blog, and they even supply an easy way to add Adsense to your blog. You can choose from a small number of nice looking themes, althouth they can be a bit restrictive when it comes to customizing them.

WordPress.com

WordPress.com is another completely free blogging platform. They also supply a free domain name that will look a bit like this: yourdomainname.wordpress.com. They have slightly more themes to choose from compared to blogger, and you will also more likely find a nicer looking theme to suit you. If your only purpose for your blog is to write and communicate with others then WordPress.com may be the way to go. But if you want to make money from your blog then avoid them like the plague, as commercial blogs are prohibited. If you do decide to monetize your WordPress.com blog then it will probably get deleted.

WordPress.org

WordPress.org is by far my favorite blogging platform. Although you will have to fork out for a domain name and hosting. WordPress.org is a downloadable version of WordPress.com, and you have to upload a activate it on your own hosting account. There is a massive amount of both free and paid themes for you to choose from, and customizing them is a breeze. You also have the ability to add plugins to your blog which will enhance it no end. If you want to start a professional looking blog that you can do anything you want with then WordPress.org is the way to go.