Blogging for Greenbacks (Part 5): Writing content that generates traffic

If you are burning brain cells trying to think of content that will shutdown Blogger just like the way the controversial topless picture of Miley Cyrus shutdown Vanity Fair's website, look no further.

And unlike Carl Ocab, this advice is truly free with no strings attached.

Tips for writing content that will attract traffic are no secret and in fact, Blogger has published a set of very good tips on how to promote your blog.

Here are the basics:

Think of your audience. A good way to build an audience is to speak to one in particular. When you keep your audience in mind, your writing gains focus. Focus goes a long way toward repeat visitors.

Write quality content and do it well. If your "style" is bad writing, worse grammar, no punctuation, and an ugly design, that might be okay for a niche crowd. But the idea here is to achieve mass appeal, so fix yourself up a bit.

Keep your posts and paragraphs short. Strive for succinct posts that pump pertinent new information into the blogosphere and move on. Keep it short and sweet so visitors can pop in, read up, and click on.

Publish regular updates. Simple: the more you blog, the more traffic you'll get.

Great, huh? Is that all there is to it? Would you be disappointed if I told you, "Yes"?

Of course, there is a little more to it and it has to do with this thing called the Blogosphere -- or the world wide community of bloggers.

Here are a couple more tips from Blogger that will help you reach out and link someone:

Add your blog to Blogger's listings. When you add your blog to our listings it shows up in Nextblog, Recently Updated, and other places. It's like opting-in to traffic.

Submit your address to blog search sites and directories. People look for blog content at Technorati every day, are you on their list? You should be. Submit your blog's url to Technorati, Daypop, Blogdex, Popdex, and any other site of that ilk you come across.

Link to other blogs. Links are the currency of the blogosphere and it takes money to make money so start linking.

Install a blogroll. It's a very simple yet effective social networking scheme and it has the same result as a simple link if not stronger: traffic! So if you don't have one yet, sign up for a blogroll and get that link-list going.

Be an active commenter. This is in the same vein as linking. Most comment systems also provide a way for you to leave a link back to your blog which begs a visit at the very least. So if you feel inspired, leave a comment or two in your blog travels. It behooves you.

One tip that has worked very well for me is this:

Be on the look-out for the freshest news relevant to your blog and write your account of that news. The news is a good place to start whenever you are wondering what to write about and people (other bloggers) are interested in personal accounts of how this news affects other people (you).

Also, it would help enormously if you have a level of expertise on the matter you are blogging about. I am not saying that you ought to have a Master's degree, but you have to write things that you truly know about.

The worst thing you can do is to make some thing up and post it.

(Next up: Finding things to write about that will drive people to your blog)

Blogging for Greenbacks (Part 4): Getting rid of the barriers to higher traffic for your blog

Blogging for greenbacks is a nifty idea and people are really earning from it.

Getting a blog up and running is easy as one, two, three. Registering with Google Adsense and installing ads on your blog is also almost a no-brainer.

But between you and the hundreds or thousands of dollars are two problems:

1. Getting people to visit your blog
2. Getting people to click your ads

Up until this point, I have told you about the various methods I have tried and how they failed to get me the results that I wanted. I have also told you about the methods that I doubt really works and the methods that are sure to get your blog banned from search engines. This is the part where I tell you about the methods that seem to be working for me.

At this stage, I cannot claim to be a successful blogger in terms of the number of people who visit my blog and the amount of money I have earned.

If you are just beginning to blog for money (or just came from under a rock or just anded from outerspace), then my series of articles on blogging for greebacks is just for you.

If you are a professional blogger and who claims to have made thousands of dollars from blogging, show me the money. Or better yet, just give me the money.

With that said, the next question should be, what should you focus more energy on first? The answer, as far as I am concerned, is that you have to prioritize getting web traffic or visitors first. This is an objective you have to pursue on a number of levels.

I think that the first things you have to do to ensure your blog gets traffic is to eliminate the reasons that keep visitors from finding your blog.

1. The title and URL of your blog

The very least that a title should do for your blog is to tell or suggest what you will be blogging about.

After this, you can consider if it is:

• Made of commonly used words
• Easy to remember
• Easy to spell
• Easy to type correctly
  

Whatever it is you decide to call your blog, you should get a URL that is the same or as similar as possible to your blog's title.

2. Registering your blog's URL to Search Engines

Even if you have a great title and URL, you shouldn't count on people typing it directly into their browser's search bar. Registering your URL with a search engine will give people an additional way to find your blog (intentionally or unintentionally).

To make it easy for you, just click these links and accomplish the online forms. Don't forget to click submit.

Add your URL to Google

Add your URL to Yahoo Search

Add your URL to AOL Search

Add your URL to MSN Search

3. Registering your blog on blog search sites

Blog search sites are websites that are devoted to keeping track of blogs and rank them according to the number of visitors it has, the number of people who link to it, the number of people who vote for it as their favorite, etcetera.

The thing is, you should count on the fact that your visitors will most likely be other bloggers.

For a list of blog search engines, you can go here

As for me, I have only so far registered with Technorati

4. Employing feed services for your blog

This is how Feedburner describes what a feed service is: If you publish a blog, you publish a feed. A feed is the format that allows your content to be delivered (and subscribed to) on the Web.

Translate this to mean that more people will read your blog more often.

5. Cross-feeding your blog to Multiply, Facebook, Friendster and other social networking sites

If you have an account in Multiply and Facebook, you ought to know that you can import your blog into these social networking websites. Meaning, that if you post an entry in Blogger it will be automatically displayed in your Multiply and Facebook accounts.

Ask yourself, who else but your friends will be interested in whatever it is you have to say about anything.

(Next up: Generating traffic through content)

Blogging for Greenbacks (Part One)

A long time friend Yet Abad for pointed me to Technorati's State of the Blogosphere 2008 report. It is a hefty and hearty article about how blogs are continuing to change the way people interact and do business on the internet.

One section of the report which caught my attention is Blogging for Profit. It points to the established relevance of blogs to the field of marketing and advertising.

Tehcnorati says:

Blogs are an increasingly attractive platform for advertisers. The majority of bloggers we surveyed have advertising on their blogs. Marketers realize that bloggers are creating high quality content and attracting growing, loyal audiences.

More than offering testimonials, blogs sometimes give more involved and more personal analysis of products, services, events, and personalities from a credible source. As far as blogs are concerned, credibility is not solely based on one’s expertise but also the strength and span of one’s connection within a community.

Blogs sway popular opinion

A blog by your friendly Tito Boy (as in Rex Navarete’s Tito Boy) ranting about the virtues of Adobo oil as a lubricatant can be as influential as say Yugatech’s blog raving over the virtues of his I-Phone. In anycase, this means that blogs have a greater ability to convince people to use of a product/service or support a movement/personality.

A local (Philippine) and more recent (December 2008) case that illustrates this point is the firestorm that exploded over Bambi Dela Paz’ blog. The entry basically told about how Masiu Mayor Nasser Pangandaman allegedly beat up her father and brother at the Valley Golf and Country Club. More than three hundred people commented on the post and with scores of bloggers linking up their blogs to Bambi’s.

Perhaps Bambi’s blog created the media storm or perhaps it was main news media organizations that popularized her blog. It could be part blog buzz and part tipping point, because certainly, somewhere in Bambi’s circle is a news reporter or media personality of some importance.

However and whatever happened, the conflagration in cyberspace apparently created enough pressure to get government agencies such as the Department of Justice and the National Bureau of Investigation to issue formal statements regarding the matter.

Moving public opinion is one thing, but earning money from blogging is a whole different ball game.

Earning money from your blog

I am one of the probable millions who have fallen for the lure of making money from blogging. For some time now, my failed attempts of realizing a significant level of income have laid the basis for substantial personal doubt on the matter.

Technorati’s 2008 Blogosphere report, however, shows some proof that people actually do earn from blogging. It says that:

The average annual blogger revenue is more than $6,000. However, this is skewed by the top 1% of bloggers who earn $200k+. Among active bloggers that we surveyed, the average income was $75,000 for those who had 100,000 or more unique visitors per month (some of whom had more than one million visitors each month). The median annual income for this group is significantly lower — $22,000.

Bloggers with advertising invest an average of $1,800 annually in their blogs. U.S. bloggers earn an average of $5,000, though bloggers in Asia earn 50% more on average and European bloggers earn an average of 75% more than U.S. bloggers. High revenue bloggers skew the mean revenue. The median revenue for U.S. bloggers is $200 annually (and the median annual investment is only $50).

Most of blog earners in the survey conducted by Technorati for its report receive income by carrying search ads, display ads, and affiliate marketing on their blogs.

Among the more popular programs is Google Adsense which basically pays blog owners a few cents to a couple of dollars when their visitors click on the Google Ad displayed their site.

(Next up: My Experience with Google Adsense)