What is a Blog?

Blogger, a free blogging service now owed by Google, is very popular. However, beginners are often faced with "how to" problems. This site will be a collection of "how to" tips. Some of the tips are also relevant to those using other blogging services. There are many posts here and you will not see all the tips on the main page.

To navigate around the site, type in the key words into the search boxes, check CATEGORIES at the top of the sidebar, refer to PREVIOUS POSTS or use the ARCHIVES. and find the relevant post. Regarding the search boxes, I would suggest you use both the Google sitesearch as well as the blogsearch at the top navbar as I have found that often, when one doesn't produce the results, the other one will. If you are at the archive page or an individual post page, to get back to the main (home) page click the blog title at the top of the page. If you want to search all the previous posts, the way to do it is to start with the main page, look at the previous posts there, then click the last post. This will take you to the next set of previous posts. Do this consecutively and you will get to see all the previous posts.

You may also choose to get the book "Publishing a Blog with Blogger Content". This book covers the basic and the not-so-basic concepts and technologies that you need to know in order to thrive in the blogging world.With this book, you will learn how to use Blogger's Post Editor and Dashboard to create sophisticated postings that include images and hyperlinks, and how to change the look and feel of your blog using templates. Other topics include making money using Google's AdSense and Amazon.com's Associates program, using photo blogging services, adding a site counter so that you can track your readership, using Blogger Mobile for mobile blogging, and how to archive your blog.

For those of you who have your own Web hosting, you will learn how to publish your blog to your own server.This book takes a rational, no-nonsense approach in a compact guide. The book is written to give you the basics fast!Technical accuracy is assured by Biz Stone, Former Senior Specialist on the Google Blogger Team.This book comes with this free bonus material: 1. Bonus Chapter: "Blogger Security" 2. Bonus Chapter: "Blogger Development with the API"

Earn Money by Blogging - What You Need and How to Do It

Blogging is hot these days and everyone knows it. What everyone doesn't know is how to change their blog from a hobby into a profession. In this article you'll learn what it takes to create a successful blog that will keep bringing in a steady revenue stream for you month after month.

For the purposes of this article I'll assume you already have a blog up and running, either on a free host site like Blogger or on your own web space. If you don't already have a blog, head over to Blogger and sign up. You can also download Wordpress from Wordpress.org and install it on your own web space. Some hosting companies already have Wordpress all set up and ready to install with just a few clicks so you may not even have to download it.

So, you've got a blog and you're wondering what to do now. Or maybe you have a blog and have some idea what needs to be done to monetize it but you're not sure exactly where to start. Well, first, if you don't already have it you're going to need traffic. More traffic isn't necessarily better. What you want isn't massive hits to your site, though that's always nice for an ego boost. The thing you're looking for is targeted traffic--traffic that is interested specifically in what you have to say rather than a random visitor from the web who has never even heard of the topic you're writing about. There are a few ways to get the targeted traffic you're looking for and we'll start out with the easiest: commenting.

Commenting on other blogger's blogs will allow you to draw some of their readers to your site. If they like what they see, it's a good bet they'll be back to read more of your blog so it's important that you're commenting in blogs that are in the same niche as your own. If you run a blog on automotive widgets then you certainly don't want to be trying to attract traffic from blogs about knitting. When commenting, try to leave a comment that is meaningful and shows that you actually read what was written; don't just post "Nice blog." and expect anyone to come and read yours.

Another way to get traffic to your site is through signatures in forum posts. If you're already a member of one or more fourms in your blog's niche then all you have to do is add your blog's URL to your forum signature and make some posts. Once again, don't spam, make meaningful on topic posts in the forum and the traffic will come. The other forum members will see that you know what you're talking about and they'll eventually see your link and come to see what else you have to say.

Now you have a blog and you're getting some targeted traffic, what do you do now? Now you monetize it. AdSense is by far the easiest way to do this and, depending on your blog's topic and traffic, this can be quite lucrative. If you don't already have an AdSense account, head over to google.com/adsense and sign up. They'll look your blog over and within 24-48 hours they'll accept you as long as your blog isn't adult in nature, full of hate speech or illegal in some way. Once you're approved, sign into your AdSense account and choose the type of ad you want to display (banner, square, etc) and the AdSense website will generate the code for you. Copy the code and insert it on your website where you want the ad to appear and you're good to go.

Assuming you're getting targeted traffic that is interested in your topic it shouldn't be long before you begin to see money showing up in your AdSense account. If you follow these simple guidelines to get targeted traffic to your blog and AdSense to monetize it you'll be making a tidy sum of cash in no time.

Perfect Web Writing 101 - Practice Practice Practice

"Success isn't a result of spontaneous combustion. You must set yourself on fire." -Arnold H. Glasow

If you think about it, when a writer only writes 15 minutes a day he is actually writing one book a year. But to start a real fire in your web writing career, what you really need to do is write every single day at least 30 minutes a day on something that you are really passionate about, regardless of whether you can sell it or not. That's why you started writing your blog in the first place, remember?

PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT


This is one of the most common phrases heard on planet Earth. It also is an important fact to remember as far as writing is concerned. Writing every singles day hones those skills needed to make sure you are on the cutting edge of web writing techniques that can change drastically every week. For example, I just started using the technique of making all of my headings all caps and all bold whenever possible.

That technique allows the reader to find out if he is interested enough in the subject matter to continue reading the following text, or if he just wants to read the last paragraph topic concerning keyword usage or whatever the last paragraph's main topic is on that specific web page. You should also try to highlight your main headings in a similar manner if you want to drastically increase the amount of web page hits to your website or blog site by allowing the reader to decide exactly what he wants to read in your web pages as well..

WHY ARE YOU WRITING?


One of the reasons so many blog writers out there suffer from writer's block is because they are not passionate about the subject matter they are writing about. It's always good to remember that most readers don't actually care about your encounters with people we don't know anything about. No, most readers find your content compelling when you write about your true passions in life, including the smallest details about why you care so much about them.

When you write honestly about how you feel regarding horror movies, for example, you need to describe your favorite horror movie down to the smallest detail. You need to describe what it was like when you were fifteen years old and you were at a drive-in watching "Dracula has Risen from the Grave". You can describe your feelings when you marveled at the scene in which a female victim had her throat slit and the blood poured out into Dracula's ashes, causing his eventual rising up from the land of the dead.

If you think that scene might be too graphic to impose on your many readers, who cares? It's what you felt when you were fifteen years old, and if somebody is offended, they can always read another blog by you regarding the exquisite beauty of Picasso's great painting "The Harlequin Family", and how Picasso never really achieved the great success that other painters did when he was alive. The point is, you risk a lot more by NOT writing about your passions as opposed to offending that one person who is repulsed by horror movie gore. If you don't feel passion about your subject matter, there will be no fire in your words, which always leads to deadly dull content, a definite web traffic killer.

BE CONCISE


A writer's ability to edit himself is probably the biggest writing technique he will ever be able to develop. By editing yourself every time you write, what you are actually doing is giving your own unique voice to your written word.Think about it. When you first began your writing career, I'm sure that your sentence structure went on far too long and had way too many details dealing about topics that did not concern the main subject you started writing the article about.

Relax, even Hemingway started out like that, but he was able to edit his content to such perfection in his later years that he is today recognized as one of the greatest American writers of all time. Attempting to write like Hemingway is a lofty goal to be sure, but at least you should be able to emulate the editing style he used on his manuscripts. You owe it to yourself to read a biography on this great American writer to learn how he edited out entire pages from his classic novels by extracting every word not essentially needed in bringing his enthralling stories to their stunning conclusions.

By using writing techniques like editing yourself and never going a day without writing about something that you are truly passionate over, you will see your writing skills increase exponentially on a weekly basis, no doubt about it.

3 Top Ways to Make Money With Blogging

There are several ways to make money with blogging. You can take any of the ways you like. Here the 3 top ways to make money with blogging are-

Advertisement – Get advertisements for your blog. When your blog is popular you will have more visitors to visit it. When your blog is popular and more visitors come to it, companies and brands will come to your blog for advertising. You will be paid more money for advertisements than other blogs or websites. Your chances of getting similar or related advertisements to your blog or blog content are more.

Write reviews – You can write reviews in your blog. Blogging about products, services and companies will get you more money. As they will like to spread the name, so these companies and brands will offer you money for the reviews. You can also write paid reviews for different companies. Write reviews in such a way to create positive impression on the readers. The experienced and popular you are, the better reviews you can write.

Get paid for blogging – You can get paid for blogging on a particular topic or subject. People, organizations need Bloggers fro blogging about their products or services. They hire Bloggers for blogging and creating a buzz about their products and services. This will help in promotion and goodwill creation for the companies. This is a cheap method to let the world know about the products. Blogging will get you periodical money from such companies.