BlogRush launched its service recently, allowing bloggers to cross-promote their blogs. Some bloggers gave their approval to this service while others resisted the temptation. Amongst the few that added the widget to their site are: John Chow and Shoemoney. That being said, ProBlogger opted not to display the widget. What’s the rationale for their decision?

Note: Out of the three, John Chow is the only one to use MyBlogLog.

This goes to show that “online blog promotion” also depends on the personality of the blogger. For most bloggers, blogging also has a personal component to it. Promoting a blog online therefore is not the same as promoting a website. There is not that same emphasis on staying true to your image/ vision of things when promoting a website.

Also, different people have different perspectives on things. These three bloggers must not see the same advantage or benefit in using BlogRush/ MyBlogLog.

If you are a blogger, you already know that inspiration is not always there. The easiest way to be inspired is to have passion for what you write about or to write on a subject you’re familiar with. If, for instance, you have a hobby, why not start a blog discussing your hobby? It won’t take much more of your time and will be something you enjoy doing. Don’t start a blog with the idea that it will bring you income. It won’t.

Many webmasters make the mistake of searching for which Adsense keywords pay well and starting a blog on that basis. If, for instance, each click pays on average $2, they just need a few clicks a day to pay for their stipend. The problem is that just to get a few clicks a day is not that easy, although it may sound like it. The result? Many people start blogging dreaming of earning additional income online, just to give up a few months down the road.

One of the biggest lessons I learned as a webmaster is to be patient. Nothing comes easy or fast online. This stands is stark contrast with most people’s attention span when they surf the Web. What an irony.

“To Blog or Not to Blog, That Is the (Real) Question”

Most webmasters are faced with this simple question: how to monetize their sites and keep their sites user-friendly? There are no strict guidelines regarding the amount of ads that should be displayed on a page, but following are some considerations to keep in mind:

1. The number of ads that is acceptable on a site largely depends on the quality of the site. A good site that provides useful information is normally allowed to have more ads. Why? Because somehow the site is more credible and people tend to be “fine” or “ok with it” when they see ads on credible sites.
2. The number of ads is important, but also critical is the quality of the ads displayed. Poor quality ads look spammy and tend to be very distracting. How to avoid spammy ads? Choose what ads to display carefully and only display ads that are relevant to the theme of your site. Good ads can actually form part of the content of your site. Why do so many people buy those “trendy” fashion magazines? To read the articles? No, to look at the ads. When your ads integrate so well with your content that they form part of it, you know you’ve done a good job. Along the same line, a good way to integrate ads to your site is to give a review of a product with an affiliate link at the end of the review.
3. Diversify the type of ads displayed on your site (pay-per-impression, pay-per-action, pay-per-click, text-links, you name it).
4. The number of ads that are displayed on a site should grow as the site grows. At the beginning, your main preoccupation should be building content and traffic. In any case, most of the good ad networks won’t accept sites into their program unless those sites have reached a minimum level of traffic.
5. Choose your ad units wisely and tailor your ad units to fit the theme and feel of your site.
6. Spread the ads over the page so that they are not clumped together. As surfers go through your page and scroll down, they should see the “ads landscape” changing.
7. Some ads are more spammy than others. Choose the right type of ads. I would personally avoid pop-ups.
8. It depends on your site’s theme. Some themes are more “ads friendly” than others.
9. Be creative.

To conclude, let’s face it. We need ads to keep providing good content. If some people don’t understand, tough luck… After all, the reason they have free access to all this information on the Web is mainly due to those same ads that they despise so much.

SearchEngineWatch.com has an article on how bloated pages can have negative consequences in terms of user experience, search engine rankings, and Web analytics: Surfers, Crawlers Find Bloated Pages Hard to Digest.

* Slow loading pages are like long line-ups, except that in the real world, people are more patient… going to another store actually requires them to walk. Online, however, the next website is only a click away.

Hard to believe, but Google was only started 10 years ago, by two Stanford University students. Look where it is now!! Google is considered by some as the heart of the Internet. Indeed, search engines are where people go to find information and are at the core of Internet traffic.

This brief article gives a recap of the past 10 years: Google, at Age 10, Is the Official Heart of the Internet.

One of the biggest mistakes made by new webmasters is not positioning their ads correctly. By “positioning,” I refer to putting the ads:

1. on the right page; and
2. at the proper location on the page.

Regarding point #1, many people assume that the home page is the page that gets the most traffic. That’s not necessarily the case. Knowing how much traffic your site gets is not enough. You should know more detailed stats, such as what page of your site gets the most traffic, for what keywords does your site rank the highest, where do your visitors come from, etc. The more you know about your site, the easier it will be for you to monetize your site. Gaining traffic to your site is already difficult… at least try to make the most out of the traffic that you receive.

Regarding point #2, putting your ads at the right location on a page can have a dramatic impact on your earnings. How to know what location works better? Experiment. If it means changing the layout of your site to accommodate your ads, do it. By experience, try to put yourself in the shoes of your visitors and ask yourself what catches your attention on a page. Once you’ve answered that question, position your ads around that area.

Networking is about building connections. There are two aspects to networking:

1. expanding your network; and
2. strengthening your network.

A good and sustainable online campaign is about more than just building links. In fact, when you think about it, building links is part of networking. Why need a strong network? Because it will increase your presence on the Web and your credibility amongst other bloggers. Take this scenario for instance: You have an announcement to make, but have no connections online. You probably will have to issue a press release. Press releases only reach so many people. The other scenario: You have a strong online network and send an e-mail to all the members of your network asking them to spread the word. What happens? You tap into their readership. Want to go further? How strong is your network? If it is very strong, you can ask them to forward your e-mail to their network and so forth. That’s how a “word of mouth” campaign is built online. Add this to your press release campaign and you have a better/ far more reaching online marketing campaign.

So for those focusing only on “link exchanges,” this is not the way to go. And, as a last note, nothing bothers me more than someone suggesting a link exchange and not following up on it or suggesting a blatantly unfair/unreasonable/unjustifiable exchange (i.e. home page link vs. resource page link)… duh!

Promoting a new blog is hard. Why is it so hard? Because it’s an uphill battle. You are competing against other blogs that are already established. As most webmasters already know, one of the key ways to gain visibility online is to have inbound links - meaning having other sites linking in and, hopefully, linking in with relevant keywords. That is hard to do because why would another site go out of its way to help you gain visibility? You would just represent additional competition to them… That’s one of the reasons why webmasters enter into “link exchanges.” They try to exchange links of equivalent value in order to benefit both sides.

From experience, the easiest way to promote a blog/ site is to start with the objective of building something good, as opposed to something spammy. Writing good content will bring added value to those who visit your site and, if some of those people happen to be webmasters, they might link back to you or include you in their network.

That said, one of the main things when starting a blog is to try to get the attention of other bloggers/ webmasters that are writing on the same subject(s) as you. How to do that? Two simple ways are:

1. participate in forums and have a link in your signature directing people to your site/ blog; or
2. comment on established blogs (most of them allow a link back to your site as an incentive to encourage people to comment).

There are many other ways to get other bloggers/ webmasters’ attention, but the above is very easy to implement.

One last word of wisdom. Don’t try to actively promote your site too early. It is not good to promote an “empty shell.” Patience is key. Let your blog/ site grow and, as it gains a critical mass, you can start with more active promotion.

Starting a blog is hard work and requires commitment. Many people start with a lot of goodwill and enthusiasm, just to let that go after a few weeks or months. The rewards of blogging are first and foremost personal from my perspective. Writers write because they enjoy it and, as a plus, hope to make money out of it. Same for blogging. If you start a blog with the expectation to make money, you will soon find yourself disillusioned. Traffic doesn’t come easily… and without traffic, money doesn’t come. Money on the Web is a simple process: build your traffic and then monetize that traffic.

The best when starting a blog is not to write too many posts. At the beginning, nobody will read your blog anyways, so why put in the effort? From experience, it is better to start slow and find your rhythm. Once you have found your “style” and what makes you different, you can proceed to write more frequently. By that time, your number of readers will probably justify you investing more energy into your blog.

Start slow but try to be consistent. Ever heard the story of the turtle who beat the rabbit in a race?

“Websites” (please refer to the distinction made in the previous post) offer more flexibility in terms of design. Although it would be preferable to have some knowledge of html, that is not necessary. There are few softwares on the market that allow people to make websites such as FrontPage, etc. (FrontPage is now discontinued by Microsoft, but I forgot the names of the new programs currently on the market. I say “new programs” because Microsoft has one for normal websites and one for SharePoint websites.)

The good thing about having a website as opposed to a blog is that a “traditional” website can have static content, meaning that you don’t have to feel compelled to write an entry regularly. On the other hand, a blog that is not updated on a frequent basis cannot succeed.

Another consideration when choosing between starting a blog or a website is the purpose of your undertaking. Obviously, a blog would not be the appropriate format for an online store.

The above being said, many people choose a “hybrid solution,” which is to have a website and a blog incorporated as part of the website. A blog incorporated as part of a website does not have to be updated as frequently, yet is a good medium to communicate with visitors without being too formal.