Why blogging is dead – or in a coma
January 16, 2008
Apart from the obvious top blog sites, that lonely little 5% of sites that are actually viable and make money, the majority of the rest of the sites should be put in a coffin and cremated. Maybe theres an idea for some entrepeneur to setup a web site that can cremate blogs that are just taking up valuable space – Who knows ?
When we surf the net we are inundated and bombarded with so many blogs and sites that are 90% pure crap 8% filtered crap and 2% of whatever. No content, No Logic and definately no qualm…
The top 5% of blogging sites do it really well and very convincing and provide a much needed information cycle. Unfortunately as users we have to sift and sort through the other rubbish and try to decipher through content that 90% has been injected by some “newly released content creating software” developed by a 16year old working under the dim light of his desk at night when he should be in bed getting some much need beauty sleep.
So how do we awaken these “oxygen consuming” blogs and convince them to put some reasonable content onto their sites ? The answer - we dont , we let them stay in their coma induced state and let nature take its course.
How to create the ultimate blog – how , why , when and where, wanted 10 individuals
January 15, 2008
With all the information that is available on the net today regarding the setting up of a blog you would think that it is a simple matter of registering a name and watching the visitors pour into our new found platform, as we all know this is not so.
I am looking for 10 other individuals to take this journey with me, your thoughts and ideas and concepts are all that will be required. The coming together of several minds and personalities will always add keen interest and variations to the though process.
The aim of “the ultimate blog” would be to showcase to anyone wanting to setup a successful blog that this is what is required, commitment , time, collection of ideas and ultimately the desire to succeed.
We will take this showcase from the very infancy of registering a domain to the fully worked and operational blog that will highlight all aspects of setting up a wordpress blog.
So hop aboard for the ultimate blog journey – ultimateblog@zoopta.com
How to run a successful competition on your blog
January 15, 2008
Yesterday I shared some of the costs and benefits of running a competition . I ended that post by asking: “So how does one run a competition on their blog that brings more benefits than it costs?”
In this post I want to walk you through everything I know (and I mean everything) about running a successful competition on your blog - from setting objectives, finding prizes, running the competition and more.
Dear AdSense, You Broke My Heart - An Open Letter to AdSense
January 15, 2008
AdSense have sent publishers using the AdSense referral program who live outside of the US, Canada and Japan an email confirming that the program will be retired as of 31 January (published below). The email came from a ‘noreply’ email address - so publishers have no way of feeding back their response. As a result I’ve decided to reply here with an Open Letter to AdSense regarding their ‘Dear John’ (breakup) letter to me. I hope you’ll indulge me while I seek a little public therapeutic release.
What every blogger hates to see
January 15, 2008
A sudden decline in traffic stats is a bloggers nightmare, what is happening is the first thought that enters your mind, all my hard work over the previous months and instead of increasing stats im seeing the dreaded unique count drop.
What is happening…
Track back through your stats to see if there is a given day or time when your traffic started to decline, if so you will normally be able to trace this to either an article or item you may have been reviewing or promoting dependant on your type of blog.
Some basic stuff to look at , check your stats to see if you have had an increase on 404 errors on your site as it may be server issue rather than a content issue. Visitors dont normally just drop off a site. You may lose visitors if they continually have a problem accessing certain pages
Check your rankings on the search engines, if most of your traffic is organic and comes from search engines then there are constant upgrading and downgrading from all the major search engines, this can have a serious effect on the amount of traffic that you are receiving
Content – make sure you have been updating your content regularly, alot of visitors
Want fresh content daily and if they dont get it, they move onto another site. Also ensure that the content you are updating your site with is current and not from years ago.
Follow the above steps and I’m sure you will stop that loss of traffic.
How to install WordPress step by step Tutorial for beginners
January 14, 2008
How to install wordpress – Step by Step
This article will step you thru the process of setting up wordpress on your site, following up from yesterdays article -
Step by Step tutorial on setting up your first blog
Step 1 Download Wordpress latest Version http://wordpress.org/download/
Step 2 Unzip the file to your desktop
Step 3 Log in to your hosting account via ftp – if you don’t have ftp software use
The following http://www.coreftp.com/download.html
Step 4 When you have logged into your hosting account look for the folder
Public_html – upload all wordpress files into this directory
Step 5 This is where we will need to set up the mysql database – its sounds frightening and almost too difficult to attempt but if you follow my instruction it will succeed.
Step 6 Log in to your hosting account via cpanel - www.yoursite.com/cpanel
Step 7 Find the icon mysql databases and click on this
Step 8 It will come up with a screen “Mysql Maintenance” Scroll down to add new database – type in your name this can be anything but for this demo we will use “wordpress” as the name – click on create database
Step 9 BEFORE you do anything further write down the name of the database that has been created it will be something like “wordpress_yoursite” – Make sure you write this down before going any further
Step 10 Now we are going to create a user for your database, scroll to where it says current users – type a name in for the user , this can be anything, for this demo we will use “johndoe” and a password 123456 – Before you go any further write down the password , now create user – screen will come back with the user name something like “johndoe_yoursite”.AGAIN write this down. Now we are nearly finished. We need to add this user to your database.
Step 11 Scroll down to “add user to database” make sure all privileges is ticked, find your username “johndoe_yoursite” and make sure the correct database is selected “wordpress_yoursite” Click Add user
WELL Done – we have just setup our wordpress database.
Step 12 We will now configure the wordpress installation, again using your ftp software log back into your website, change in the public_html directory, scroll down until you find the file “wp-config-sample.php”. This is the file we need to add those details that we wrote regarding the mysql database.
Double Click on the file and it will open for you as per the following
++++++++++++++
<?php
// ** MySQL settings ** //
define(’DB_NAME’, ‘putyourdbnamehere‘); // The name of the database
define(’DB_USER’, ‘usernamehere‘); // Your MySQL username
define(’DB_PASSWORD’, ‘yourpasswordhere‘); // …and password
define(’DB_HOST’, ‘localhost’); // 99% chance you won’t need to change this value
define(’DB_CHARSET’, ‘utf8′);
define(’DB_COLLATE’, ”);
// You can have multiple installations in one database if you give each a unique prefix
$table_prefix = ‘wp_’; // Only numbers, letters, and underscores please!
// Change this to localize WordPress. A corresponding MO file for the
// chosen language must be installed to wp-content/languages.
// For example, install de.mo to wp-content/languages and set WPLANG to ‘de’
// to enable German language support.
define (’WPLANG’, ”);
/* That’s all, stop editing! Happy blogging. */
define(’ABSPATH’, dirname(__FILE__).’/');
require_once(ABSPATH.’wp-settings.php’);
?>
+++++++++++++++++++
Step 13 I have highlighted the above areas, just put your database name, username, and password into those areas – save the file, this file will then be uploaded to your host – Guess What we are nearly there one more simple process – Right click on the file that we have just altered on your hosting account – we need to rename this file to “wp-config.php”. When you have done this you are finished.
Step 14 Go to your web address www.yoursite.com/wp-admin this will complete the install of wordpress – Remember to write down the password that wordpress gives you. – That’s it,
If you follow the above steps you should have a successful wordpress installation. If you find all the above too mundane or you are time-poor like all of us, email me on wordpressinstalls@zoopta.com as I provide an installation service on wordpress for a fee.
Part 3 of our tutorial will be on using wordpress for the first time.
Text Link Advertising Is Dead? Maybe Not…
January 14, 2008
Everybody and their mother knows that Google frowns on paid text links as a way for webmasters to buy link juice for their sites. So it turned out that 2007 was the year that most of what’s known as text link advertising died. Most bloggers are so scared now that they put no follow links on all their link ads.
(By the way, if text link ads are being discouraged, why does TLA still have PR7?)
Full Story - MoneyMakingBlogs
5 Horrible Mistakes That New Bloggers Make
January 14, 2008
I use Entrecard and MyBloglog from time to time to see who is visiting my blog and to check out new blogs. I’ve seen a whole lot of new blogs trying to break into the “make money blogging” or “I want to be a problogger” scene. The growth of these types of blogs are phenomenal.
Obviously a lot of people are unhappy with their day jobs and are hoping to make money at home just writing their blogs. Maybe it’s the perception cast by some A-list make money bloggers that it’s easy and require little effort. Hey people, stop believing that. Easy isn’t going to make you a full-time income. It takes dedication and knowledge.
Full Story - Makingmoneyblogs
Step by Step tutorial on setting up your first blog
January 13, 2008
Step by Step tutorial on setting up your own blog – Part 1
One of the first things I noticed in setting up a blog was the vast information available on this topic. There was quantity but not necessarily quality, alot of the topics and instructions were from years ago and not as relevant as they should be in todays climate.
In the following guide I will attempt to step you through a process of getting your blog up and running with a minimum of fuss and technical know how, this will be covered in parts by the following sections
- Registering a domain name or web site name
- Finding a suitable hosting company
- Installing a blog platform – I personally use wordpress
- Creating a theme for your Blog
- Writing your first post.
**None of the links below are associated with affiliate marketing – I have only chosen these sites because of the ease of use that I have experiencedwith them over the past 5 years**
Part 1
Before you can jump on to the net and start blogging you must register a name for your new website. This is commonly referred to as a domain name or web name. Prices vary for this due to the fact that you can register for different periods of time. Because this is your first blog let’s register for only 1 year. This will keep your costs down and you may want to extend the registration once you have become comfortable with your own site.
I have always registered my domain names at http://www.godaddy.com , the price will vary from $6.95 to $8.95 depending on what specials may be running.
Once you have registered your name you will also be given the opportunity of having www.godaddy.com host your site, this is a very easy process of having your first wordpress site up and running with the minimum of fuss.
If you decide to host your site elsewhere you will receive an email from your new hosting company that will have all the relevant details that will enable you to setup your new site.
One very important item is if you have your name registered at www.godaddy.com you must change the nameservers to point to your new hosting company. The name server information would have arrived from the company that you are hosting your site on.
Log in to godaddy and follow the procedures of changing your nameservers.
Part 2 …
Are you Noticing Changes in Page Rank and Backlinks Numbers from Google?
January 13, 2008
if my inbox is anything to go by there’s an update going on at Google at the moment that seems to be going beyond just a shift in Page Rank. I’ve had ALOT of readers reporting shifts in both PR and back link numbers. Lots of discussion, speculation and guess work in the forums about it (here and here). Have you noticed any changes?
