If bait is so good at delivering traffic, why would you not want to post bait all the time? People love to link it, read it and bookmark it, right? Actually long term, they don't. Bait is great used tactically, but not effective at growing a loyal audience if over used. You need a mixture of posting to maintain a readership and I believe there is such a thing as "bait fatigue". What happens when you post a bait is quite like a shot of espresso with 9 sugars. You get an enormous … [Read more...]

How can you get good strong links? What can you do to get big name blogs to take notice of you? Yesterday I got lucky and was linked to by Duncan at Techcrunch which led to Techmeme taking notice of our Google Hijacking 404 Pages story at the Codswallop blog. This all came about from a tip-off from Wendy (a generous act when you consider she could have written about it herself, just shows how nice she really is!). Getting a scoop is the top way to get big sites to notice you with least … [Read more...]

A common frustration from bloggers is they get to a certain level of momentum then stall. It's like there is a ceiling that they can not break through. Rather than steaming ahead toward your goal, do you feel like you are going round in circles? How can we keep driving our growth? I often see patterns in blog growth. Rather than being a straight line or even an upwards curve most bloggers grow their audience in spurts. It is like a series of small hills, two steps forward, one step … [Read more...]

Someone on Twitter remarked that they were sick of all the "Why blogging is like ..." posts. To be honest I like them, and I will continue to write posts like that, but I am not surprised this particular person is sick of them. It is like top ten lists and all the other formula style posts, once they hit some success they get used a lot. As I say, I will continue writing them. I still do top ten lists. Heck, I am not going to say "never again" for any style of blog post. Why? If I think you … [Read more...]

I know you read at least read one blog. You would be surprised though how many people want to be successful bloggers without bothering to read what it is they are meant to be writing. As you might have guessed from the title, this brings to mind cooking. How can you create an excellent dish without being a lover of food? Top chefs live for food. They love flavors, aromas, the look of the finished plate, and they also get a kick out of seeing people enjoy it. Can you say the same about your … [Read more...]

Lately I haven't watched a lot of television, for a couple of years actually now I think about it. But, thanks to my handy satellite dish and DVR (Sky+ for the locals) I do keep up with some of the latest geek viewing. This is lucky because Ben over at Blogging Experiment has got a meme started that combines your fave TV shows and blogging. What geek could pass up that? post one lesson bloggers can learn from their favorite TV show. Each person then tags another 5 people and the chain … [Read more...]

A popular gripe of bloggers is the scraper scum. You know, the people who copy your content then slap ads around it or use it as search engine fodder so they can pimp their spam. It might be apparent that these gits annoy me too. Today I am installing a solution which I hope will go some way to mitigating the problem. Damian has updated his WP_RssSticky plugin that I use to put the free ebook download link into my feed to allow you to insert the title and URL of the current post. If wish to … [Read more...]

Is your blog Reader-Centric? Yuk, I know, horrible buzz word, but stay with me! What I am asking is important to your blog success; how well do you cater for your reader when working on your blog? In the programming world people talk about "user centric" where the users needs are elevated and in customer service people like to think of their systems and procedures as being "customer centric" where the needs of customers come first. It's all about prioritizing the end user, the person who … [Read more...]

You can be charismatic or be innovative, if you had to choose, which would you prefer? I asked on Twitter and got overwhelmingly "Innovative!" as a response. This is pretty much what I hoped and expected to hear. While most people would say they value innovation more highly than charisma, I look around and I am not sure this is how the world works. Take politicians for example. Who gets voted in? As Scott Adams likes to point out, the tallest candidate with the best hair. We don't tend … [Read more...]

Interesting thought here from David PeraltyI think that writing on numerous blogs can be detrimental, but as Chris Garrett has proven, it can also be very helpful, as everywhere I turn around his name pops up Do you think I'm getting over-exposed? As David says, part of my personal branding has been from writing so much and for so many sites. I get enjoyment out of it, and have made some great friends, so even if there was zero financial incentive I would still do it. The downside comes … [Read more...]