If you’re starting a new blog, you’ll need to purchase a domain name for it. If you have self-hosted WordPress blog, your host probably offers free domain registration with your hosting package. However, if you use another platform, like TypePad, you’ll have to register the domain on your own.
The easiest to use domain registry service is GoDaddy.com. Yes, I hate their sexist TV commercials, too. However, I love their pricing and their excellent customer service. I’ve had an opportunity to troubleshoot domain hosting problems over the phone, as have many of my clients. Their customer support reps are knowledgeable, helpful and always available – even on weekends and evenings. Believe me, no question is too dumb, so go ahead and ask.
Domain extensions
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When I posted Two Ways to Improve Your Writing Skills, I mentioned online writing classes. But did you know that there are online problogging classes, too?
Most of the pro blogging classes out there have a definite “make money blogging” slant. However, if all you’re interested in is honing your blogging skills to grow readership, then check out Darren Rowse of Problogger’s 31 Days to Build a Better Blog, a downloadable e-book. It’s designed to help you revitalize your blog by giving you 31 tasks that will help you turn it into the page view powerhouse.
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If you’re reading this, I assume you’ve been doing this blogging thing for awhile now and feel you’re a fairly competent writer. Posting frequently helps build up your writing chops, and was one of the reasons I started blogging at A Mama’s Rant over five years ago. Still, at some point you may feel like you’re stuck and could be a better writer. So what are ways to improve your writing?
Books on how to write
Many books have been written about the process of writing. Two of my favorites are:
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Recently, a friend who is new to blogging asked me if she should join a blog network. She wondered if the exposure would be beneficial to her writing career and if the money was any good. Here’s what I told her.
What is a blog network?
First, I explained that a blog network is a group of blogs and bloggers writing under a common banner, similar to writers working for a newspaper. While most of a network’s bloggers aren’t employees (though the site’s editors may be) there usually are contractual agreements between the network and the bloggers, and editorial requirements like posting so many times per week with a minimal word count. Examples of these types of blog networks are b5media, 9Rules, and Examiner.com (which claims it’s not a blog network, when it pretty much is in my opinion.)
What’s the pay like?
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Branding is a big buzz word in blogging. So what exactly does it mean? Simply it’s the way all the elements of your blog (layout, design, blog name, URL, monetization, writing voice and posting style) convey an image to readers. You can think of it as your style or even your online reputation.
The important thing about branding is that it should be consistent everywhere you’re at both on and offline. For example, does you business card look similar to your blog? Does your Twitter background copy the design elements (graphics, color and type) of your blog? Most importantly, is your online presence the same everywhere?
Your virtual life
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WOW! Women on Writing is an online magazine devoted to supporting women's creativity, energy, blood, sweat and tears, throughout all stages of the writing process. They promote communication between women writers, authors, editors, agents, publishers and readers and hope to fill the missing gap between writing websites and women's magazines.
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If you’re going to make an investment in your blogging this year, you should check out two ebooks being offered by a couple of top bloggers – Darren Rowse of CopyBlogger and Chris Garret of ChrisG.com.
Darren Rowse’s 31 Days to Build a Better Blog
The downloadable workbook gives a series of 31 tasks to help bloggers get their blogs going or revitalized. Usually this is offered as an online course over a month, but this way you have it all in one ebook.
Each day you get:
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Have you noticed that you’re following people you haven’t heard from in awhile – like all those people who are tweeting as Mad Men characters? Well, UnTweeps is a Twitter application that lets you unfollow those dead accounts.
This free service has you log in via Twitter, which will then bring you back to the UnTweeps site. After you enter the number of days in the past you want to check (the minimum is 15), click on the “Check stale tweets” button. For example, if you enter 30, then anyone who hasn't updated their tweeted in the last 30 days will show up on your list.
All of the stale Twitter users are automatically check marked as ones you want to unfollow. If you don’t want to unfollow them, just un-check mark them.
When you’re ready to clean up your account, click the "Unfollow Selected Tweeps" button. UnTweeps sends the list to the Twitter API, which does the actual unfollowing. There is a lag time, so have patience if the users you just unfollowed still show up in your Twitter follow list.
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I just attended all three days of BlogWorld Expo. It was the first year I had the full access pass thanks to winning a 50% discount on the BlogWorld Expo Facebook page. I’m so glad I did, because I got to sit in on Internet Marketing for Smart People. This session featured Darren Rowse, Brian Clark and Chris Brogan and was moderated by the fabulous Sonia Simone.
I took FLIP video of the whole session (almost 1 hour) but had problems downloading it. Luckily, John Chow, who was sitting just down the row from me, was able to successfully download his video of the session. (I think you can hear me laughing in the background.)
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