BLOG MARKETING CRASH COURSE

SHAME

Many people with blogs get disheartened after a few weeks or months when their blog fails to attract thousands of readers. It is a real shame, because if bloggers followed a few simple blog marketing steps, then they would probably find that there is a willing audience just dying to read about most topics. So what can a blogger do to get noticed?

Here are a few blog marketing ideas that should get most blogs getting reasonable traffic in a short space of time.

Blog about a niche: The world doesn’t really need another ‘vanity blog’ about what you had for breakfast. Unless you are a super-model good looking teenage girl who wants to put a lot of photos on your blog, then you are probably going to have a hard time getting noticed.

If you already have a vanity blog and are wondering why you are not getting traffic, then you need to know that the vanity blog market is totally saturated. Consider starting or changing your blog to some other topic – an interest or a hobby for example.

Next, you need to start posting to forums. Put the URL of the blog in your forum signature (don’t spam forums saying “look at my blog”). If you just join in the conversation naturally, then people will get curious and you will get a few more readers. If the forum you post in is also to do with a similar topic to your blog then you will probably get repeat readers from it! Try to find the most popular forums in the niche you are writing about.

To find them, just go over to Google and search for your niche keyword plus ‘forum’ and you should get a list. Try to find forums with at least a few thousand active members.

Make sure to do trackbacks and pingbacks to other blogs that you have linked to so that they know about you. When people find out that you have talked about them, they will come to see what you said. So will some of their readers. Talking about popular stories from popular blogs may get you more than just a few visitors too.

Comment on other people’s blogs as much as you can (without spamming). In most cases you can put a link back to your own blog and people do follow these links.

It is also good to target blogs that talk about the same subject as you, because then you will get targeted readers who are more likely to continue reading your blog. (Avoid using “comment spam” programs as Google can track this and will penalize you).

Most importantly, you need to keep blogging! Nobody will return to a blog that is updated weekly or only occasionally. You need to add more content at least once per day, especially in the early stages of getting your blog noticed. This is hugely important.

Now if you follow these few rules, then you should be well on the way to getting a constant readership for your blog.

Happy Blogging

STUARTPAUL

AUSSIE DOLLAR DISCOUNT

SUBJECT 1: Take advantage of the Aussie dollar discount
SUBJECT 2: Kangaroos can save you money
SUBJECT 3: The best blog coaching program at a discount price

Yaro just informed me that his Blog Mastermind
coaching program charges in Australian dollars.

Most online coaching programs charge in American
dollars, and since the US dollar is anywhere from
5% to 10% stronger than the Aussie dollar as I
write this, that's a 5% to 10% price saving for
you if you join Blog Mastermind.

You can sign-up here -

http://www.blogmastermind.com/affiliates/index.php?af=817261&u=http://www.blogmastermind.com/coaching

By now you probably know about Blog Mastermind.
Thanks to the Conversion Blogging video, the Blog
Profits Blueprint and the interview with a million
dollar blogger, Yaro's blog coaching program
opening built up a lot of buzz last week.

If you haven't seen any of the videos, or read
the Blueprint or listened to the million dollar
blogger interview, you can start right now (it
won't cost anything) by going here -

http://www.blogmastermind.com/affiliates/index.php?af=817261&u=http://www.blogmastermind.com/video

Already over 300 people have joined and are busy
studying the materials, interacting in the
community forums and using the Social Traffic Club
to drive traffic to their blogs.

Yaro explained to me that he wanted to charge in
$USD, but his Australian bank would not accept the
currency, and since it was so close to the opening
of his program, he decided to just go with $AUD.

In case you don't know, Yaro is from Australia,
though he sounds a lot like a Canadian sometimes
because of his parents.

He did say that his bank would change in the near
future, and as soon as $USD is accepted he would
switch back.

If you want to lock in the discount by paying in
Australian dollars, you should join Blog
Mastermind as soon as you can. Here's the order
page -

http://www.blogmastermind.com/affiliates/index.php?af=817261&u=http://www.blogmastermind.com/coaching

Blog Mastermind is not just a course where you are
left on your own to go through the training by
yourself. It's a real community, led by mentors
who are successful bloggers, including Yaro
himself.

If you are still not sure, but because of the
cheaper price you are interested, you should head
to Google and type in "Blog Mastermind Reviews"
and see what other people are saying about the
program.

500 people have participated in the course since
it's first run back in 2007 (it was closed since
December 07), so there is plenty of feedback
online coming from completely impartial people who
have already taken the course.

It's a smart idea to do research before joining
any program, and I think in this case you will
find the general consensus is that Blog Mastermind
is well worth the cost of admission, especially
when it is in Australian dollars.

Here's the link for more information (and make
sure you watch the behind the scenes tour video
Yaro presents at the start of the page) -

http://www.blogmastermind.com/affiliates/index.php?af=817261&u=http://www.blogmastermind.com/coaching

Good luck with your blog!

Stuart

PS. The US Dollar, as you probably realize, is not
doing so well lately. There's a possibility that
the Australian dollar will get stronger, so the
discount if you are used to paying in US dollars,
will not be a discount any more - instead it will
be more expensive.

I suggest if you have any inclination to join
Yaro's coaching program that you do so soon so
you can lock in the discounted price thanks to the
currency difference.

http://www.blogmastermind.com/affiliates/index.php?af=817261&u=http://www.blogmastermind.com/coaching

TIME.

I found this recently in a book by Margaret Weis called Kings Sacrifice And thought it quite amusing but true.

Time is, as one noted twentieth-century thinker put it, so that everything doesn't happen all at once.
The measurement of time, at least by the clock, is exact. The measurement of time by the heart and the head is far different. Time passes, time flies.
It creeps or crawls.
It moves faster than light.


OH SO TRUE

stuart

MILLION DOLLAR BLOGGER

SUBJECT 1: Can you believe this blog is worth $5 million dollars?
SUBJECT 2: Interview with a million dollar blogger
SUBJECT 3: Blogging can make you a millionaire - here is proof

Whoever said blogging can't make BIG money had
not heard this story.

Yaro Starak interviewed his previous student,
Alborz Fallah, who is the owner of
caradvice.com.au - a car blog for Australians,
which was valued at $5 million dollars and
generates close to $50,000 a month.

You can listen or read the interview here -

http://www.blogmastermind.com/affiliates/index.php?af=817261&u=http://www.entrepreneurs-journey.com/952/alborz-interview/

Alborz started his blog like most people, sitting
at home, writing content each day outside of the
time he spent at his full time job. His blog grew,
he started making money and he just kept working.

Eventually he was approached by people who wanted
to buy his blog. He said no, until someone came
along who only wanted to buy a share in the site
and help it continue to grow. Alborz agreed and
his blog immediately went from part time hobby, to
full time business.

Today Alborz's blog has full time employees, he
travels to Europe to test some of the most
prestigious cars in the world and it's fair to
say he is living a dream - making big money
writing about a topic he loves.

In this interview you can hear Alborz talk about
how he grew his traffic, how he brought on
investors to help grow his site and what's it
like being in charge of a multi-million dollar
blog.

It's worth listening to this interview because
you can learn some key things to help with your
own quest to make a profitable blog, for example -

- How Alborz chose the topic for his blog is a
great lesson for anyone else out there struggling
to come up with a blog topic

- The search engine advice Alborz offers is
powerful yet simple and will immediately help your
own blog get more traffic, if you follow it

- The story of how investors came on board to take
Car Advice to the next level is unique, but
definitely worth hearing because it shows how you
can grow a blog from just making a few hundred
dollars, to making six or seven figures a year.

The interview is available for instant download in
MP3 or text transcript. Here's the link again -

http://www.blogmastermind.com/affiliates/index.php?af=817261&u=http://www.entrepreneurs-journey.com/952/alborz-interview/

Yaro released this video to inspire people to
believe what is possible with a blog.

If you want to follow in Alborz's footsteps,
consider taking on Yaro as your blog coach and
join his Blog Mastermind coaching program and you
might just become the next Alborz.

I'll speak to you soon,

Stuart

10 BLOG TRAFFIC TIPS

In every bloggers life comes a special day - the day they first launch a new blog. Now unless you went out and purchased someone else''s blog chances are your blog launched with only one very loyal reader - you. Maybe a few days later you received a few hits when you told your sister, father, girlfriend and best friend about your new blog but that''s about as far you went when it comes to finding readers.Here are the top 10 techniques new bloggers can use to find readers.

These are tips specifically for new bloggers, those people who have next-to-no audience at the moment and want to get the ball rolling.

It helps if you work on this list from top to bottom as each technique builds on the previous step to help you create momentum. Eventually once you establish enough momentum you gain what is called "traction", which is a large enough audience base (about 500 readers a day is good) that you no longer have to work too hard on finding new readers. Instead your current loyal readers do the work for you through word of mouth.Top 10 Tips

10. Write at least five major "pillar" articles. A pillar article is usually a tutorial style article aimed to teach your audience something. Generally they are longer than 500 words and have lots of very practical tips or advice. This article you are currently reading could be considered a pillar article since it is very practical and a good "how-to" lesson. This style of article has long term appeal, stays current (it isn''t news or time dependent) and offers real value and insight. The more pillars you have on your blog the better.

9. Write one new blog post per day minimum. Not every post has to be a pillar, but you should work on getting those five pillars done at the same time as you keep your blog fresh with a daily news or short article style post. The important thing here is to demonstrate to first time visitors that your blog is updated all the time so they feel that if they come back tomorrow they will likely find something new. This causes them to bookmark your site or subscribe to your blog feed.

You don''t have to produce one post per day all the time but it is important you do when your blog is brand new. Once you get traction you still need to keep the fresh content coming but your loyal audience will be more forgiving if you slow down to a few per week instead. The first few months are critical so the more content you can produce at this time the better.

8. Use a proper domain name. If you are serious about blogging be serious about what you call your blog. In order for people to easily spread the word about your blog you need an easily rememberable domain name. People often talk about blogs they like when they are speaking to friends in the real world (that''s the offline world, you remember that place right?) so you need to make it easy for them to spread the word and pass on your URL. Try and get a .com if you can and focus on small easy to remember domains rather than worry about having the correct keywords (of course if you can get great keywords and easy to remember then you''ve done a good job!).

7. Start commenting on other blogs. Once you have your pillar articles and your daily fresh smaller articles your blog is ready to be exposed to the world. One of the best ways to find the right type of reader for your blog is to comment on other people''s blogs. You should aim to comment on blogs focused on a similar niche topic to yours since the readers there will be more likely to be interested in your blog.

Most blog commenting systems allow you to have your name/title linked to your blog when you leave a comment. This is how people find your blog. If you are a prolific commentor and always have something valuable to say then people will be interested to read more of your work and hence click through to visit your blog.

6. Trackback and link to other blogs in your blog posts. A trackback is sort of like a blog conversation. When you write a new article to your blog and it links or references another blogger''s article you can do a trackback to their entry. What this does is leave a truncated summary of your blog post on their blog entry - it''s sort of like your blog telling someone else''s blog that you wrote an article mentioning them. Trackbacks often appear like comments.

This is a good technique because like leaving comments a trackback leaves a link from another blog back to yours for readers to follow, but it also does something very important - it gets the attention of another blogger. The other blogger will come and read your post eager to see what you wrote about them. They may then become a loyal reader of yours or at least monitor you and if you are lucky some time down the road they may do a post linking to your blog bringing in more new readers.

5. Encourage comments on your own blog. One of the most powerful ways to convince someone to become a loyal reader is to show there are other loyal readers already following your work. If they see people commenting on your blog then they infer that your content must be good since you have readers so they should stick around and see what all the fuss is about. To encourage comments you can simply pose a question in a blog post. Be sure to always respond to comments as well so you can keep the conversation going.

4. Submit your latest pillar article to a blog carnival. A blog carnival is a post in a blog that summarizes a collection of articles from many different blogs on a specific topic. The idea is to collect some of the best content on a topic in a given week. Often many other blogs link back to a carnival host and as such the people that have articles featured in the carnival enjoy a spike in new readers.

To find the right blog carnival for your blog, do a search at http://blogcarnival.com/.

3. Submit your blog to blogtopsites.com. To be honest this tip is not going to bring in a flood of new readers but it''s so easy to do and only takes five minutes so it''s worth the effort. Go to Blog Top Sites, find the appropriate category for your blog and submit it. You have to copy and paste a couple of lines of code on to your blog so you can rank and then sit back and watch the traffic come in. You will probably only get 1-10 incoming readers per day with this technique but over time it can build up as you climb the rankings. It all helps!

2. Submit your articles to EzineArticles.com. This is another tip that doesn''t bring in hundreds of new visitors immediately (although it can if you keep doing it) but it''s worthwhile because you simply leverage what you already have - your pillar articles. Once a week or so take one of your pillar articles and submit it to Ezine Articles. Your article then becomes available to other people who can republish your article on their website or in their newsletter.

How you benefit is through what is called your "Resource Box". You create your own resource box which is like a signature file where you include one to two sentences and link back to your website (or blog in this case). Anyone who publishes your article has to include your resource box so you get incoming links. If someone with a large newsletter publishes your article you can get a lot of new readers at once.

1. Write more pillar articles. Everything you do above will help you to find blog readers however all of the techniques I''ve listed only work when you have strong pillars in place. Without them if you do everything above you may bring in readers but they won''t stay or bother to come back. Aim for one solid pillar article per week and by the end of the year you will have a database of over 50 fantastic feature articles that will work hard for you to bring in more and more readers.

This article was by Yaro Starak, a professional blogger and my blog mentor. He is the leader of the Blog Mastermind mentoring program designed to teach bloggers how to earn a full time income blogging part time.To get more information about Blog Mastermind click this link:

Click here to join the Blog Mastermind Mentoring Program

Content Creation

My wife is watching the all blacks playing against the wallabies, so I thought I would take the oppurtunity as I'm not that much of a rugby fan to write a bit more today.

The topic I want to talk about is content creation.

Content can be a hard thing to come up with sometimes, even if you are passionate about your subject. You might start out with a hiss and a roar, and you produce several or even a couple of months worth of articles, but sometime you might find yourself at a loss of something to put fingers to keyboard about.

I find it hard to put my thoughts down in black and white and as I am not particularly passionate about one subject, being as I term myself as a JOATMON [jack of all trades master of none].So I was pleased to be invited the other day to watch a webinar produced by the million dollar publisher Peter Martin.

In it he introduced us to the secrets of his success, He explain the processes he went through to aquire his content. But not only that,he showed us how to aquire public domain books and articles and how to make them your own to do with as you wish, wether it be to on sell them from your site or to offer them as free bonuses or gifts for signing up for a service that you offer.

I myself have used some of his tips to reasearch content for a blog soon to be produced on herbs and related topics and found it to be very useful.

He also pointed out what he terms as the hot markets for niche sites.

What he also offers is a 52 week training course at a very reasonable price of only $27/mth, in it he goes in depth step by step, including how to market your product.
So if you are interested in joining the course click on the link below.

Million Dollar Publisher

If you want to watch the webinar just to give you an idea on what he offers you copy the URL below and paste in your browser as I am currently unable to create it as a link sorry, but if you decide to take up the offer for the tutorial don't wait to long as there is limited seats available.

www.milliondollarpublisher.com/webinars/peter martin/peter martin.html

Well I,ll sign off for now as we have what is called a weather bomb happening at the moment and has interfered with the transmission of the rugby game so my wife is not happy being the avid fan that she is. If you check out the webinar can you leave a comment on what you thought of it, thanks.

stuartpaul.

FIRST POST.

Just a short post to explain this blog a bit more.

In this blog I will show you some of the things that I have found as I have learn't my way through the blogosphere and netscape. I will address subjects such as content creation, traffick,and other subjects.

You may find a few ramblings of my thoughts now and then as I muse about some things, so I apologise in advance.