Guest Bloggers, Butterflies and Grasshoppers

 Credit: Chris Gin 

Whither Guest Blogging?  Guest blogging has being touted by some bloggers as a great way to achieve some kind of recognition and popularity. They say it will open doors for you to reach 'new heights' in your blogging experience. Let me state here that I'm no fan of guess blogging and lately I don't hear much about it unlike past years. I'm sure it's still going on somewhere in the Blogosphere but I guess it has gone lame.

The argument is that guest blogging will help generate links, exposure and traffic to your own blog. Obviously, this is the motivation that got many bloggers posting on other people's blogs to gain that extra mileage. In a sense, guest bloggers are like butterflies or grasshoppers.

If you want to move in the fast lane, once you joined the blogging community, you might think guest blogging would enhance the user experience. But first you've got to gain an 'entry ticket' before you're accepted by any other blogger whose site is your target. 

To do that, you have to show that you have got what it takes to write well - with great information, tips and whatever - to cut it though, otherwise don't even think about it...unless your host blogger is such a wooden head to let you post some fluff on his or her site. Well, there are some. You'll be surprised where you can find them!

You can run a high-octane blog if you have that kind of energy and motivation like some bloggers who seem to be able to conjure up 'endless posts' as guest bloggers. Some are doing it for the money because so-called A-list bloggers are more inclined to 'take a break' these days from blogging, so guest bloggers are welcome to fill in - and get paid for it (Well, they can afford it).

If you'd notice lately, some of these blogs are sort of running out of steam with boring articles or rehash. How many times have you come across some bloggers who write about how they are stuck with writer's block for want of new ideas to post. And, for them, there's always the fear of losing readers if they don't maintain the pace...and the face. That's where guest bloggers come into the picture to keep the wheels spinning. There are always some takers. 

Despite all this 'damage control' effort, the trend is showing that these blogs are slipping down from their high horse. You can see some interesting trends here. Of course, these bloggers should be smart enough to arrest these downward trends. They are no noobs.

Most guest bloggers you get to read are hardly more than a year or two into the blogging game. Some are so caught up with the guest blogging idea, you just wonder whether they pay more attention to other people's blogs rather than attending to their own blog backyard. We just don't buy it when some bloggers say "oh, we love guest blogging." Some bloggers are so enamoured of what they are doing, they'd go back to their blogs and glorify guest blogging to high heaven.



Photo credit: Bistrosavage

Here are a few myths that are being propagated by those favouring guest blogging:

• It makes you an authority by doing quality writing on other people's blogs. It pushes you to write better.

(If you are a good writer why can't you become an authority on your own blog? Do you mean you can't produce quality stuff on your own site? The adrenalin only flows when you are writing for somebody else?)

• It builds a good relationship with fellow bloggers.

(Is that the only way to build good relationship? There's more than one way to skin a cat, mate!).

• And, of course, it gets you deep links and increase your RSS subscribers.

(Sure, it will gain you backlinks and all that RSS jazz, but when they find there's not much to shout about at your own blog, their interest will eventually grow cold. Talk about leaving a cold trail!)

• And yada, yada, yada.
  
  Okay, there's no right or wrong about guest blogging. It's just a matter of taste or preference we either want to do or not at all. Having said that, we are the stay-at-home kind of bloggers. We like to tend to our own garden and see the flowers bloom...in our own way. We are not that desperate to do guest blogging in order to gain those extra links and get recognized in that manner. 'Nuff said.
  
  
  
  

It's been more than two years since guest blogging took off. We'll see in another year or two whether these hype-crazed guest bloggers are still running around or grinding to a halt. The very idea looks like fading into the mist of blogging history. Of course, there'll be opinions to the contrary.

Guest blogging can only take you so far - and it's a downhill ride for your blog if you don't start growing your own flowers. Hoping that guest blogging will get you some extra RSS feed subscribers (or pumping up the numbers as some would do) won't help much because, at the end of the day, the majority of these people don't read their feeds or come visiting. Most people end up with too many things to do and they can't just waste precious time reading feeds everyday or whatever. Some just forget their subscriptions.

In other words, there's not much value in trying to get this kind of traffic to your blog. What you need is to gain organic traffic or search engine traffic. People coming via this traffic route have a purpose and the keywords that got your site on the SERPs in the first place (ideally on the front page) are the baits that drove them to your blog.  Who needs guest blogging for that?

We don't need to elaborate on this. You can get more insights about this topic if you go over to Vic's site and hear him out on his video post "Serious Look at Why Readers Subscribe to a Feed" and Grizz's blog has this investigative take on "How to game your stats."

We are hardly out of January and we are already seeing many blogs struggling to stay afloat, especially the 'make money online' bloggers who are the most likely people to fall for guest blogging. So much has been written about the silly syndrome suffered by 'make money online' bloggers, but then, newbies are still web behind the ears!

So much for guest blogging. One nagging question: But how come those established A-list bloggers don't do guest blogging themselves? A penny for your thought. Oh, never mind, it's such a noobie question! I rest my case.

Of related interests:
Rumblings about Guest Blogging

Net Marketing: Are We All Chasing The Same Dream?

Credit: audreyjm529

Dangling Carrots Online  Superlatives abound in the competitive world of Internet marketing. If you have ever seen some of the email promotions and those splash and landing pages calling on you to 'take action' on their 'incredible money-making' products, you'll be amazed at the audacity in their style of copywriting. It's a "c'mon, get it before it's too late" kind of hard sell if you know what I mean.

In fact, these products do make money for the Internet marketers or marketing gurus if that sounds better. Yes, they earn the money you cough up because you, too, want to make money using their products. Mind you, there'll be a lot of stragglers who had bought their products and trying to catch up but more likely, there will be more dropouts than stayers.

This post is about the style and approach these so-called gurus used to dangle their carrots in the hope of making a sale. This kind of sales pitch has hardly seen any change since the Internet became the superhighway of online business wayback when. Probably, when you see one, you see all!

Every new product, you are made to believe, is a 'must-have' item that could turn you into a millionaire or, at least, make you tons of moolah. Have a go at this promotional lines: "This is the HOTTEST moneymaker I have ever seen!...No recruiting - no sponsoring - you just get paid..." And usually they end with a call for action: "Just get in line and get your money! This is what you have been waiting for...The door will slam shut in xx hours!"

Just to whet your appetite, they throw in testimonials by so-called users of their products, giving high praises and how they had started to make money in no time as they experienced a "great rush of traffic" to their sites. The IMers are just announcing the launch of a new product, limiting it to the "first 100" people who pay up and yet, they already have a long list of users recommending that product on their splash or landing pages.  How dumb can we be?

Is there a 'sucker DNA' in most of us?  When I started out roaming the Internet back in the late 90s, I had my fair share of buying ebooks to learn new skills as a web user. Gladly, those days are over for me but you can bet that many newbies will pick up one ebook or some before reality checks in.

Needless to say, it was exciting then and we tend to swallow every 'pearl of wisdom' that came our way. When blogging took roots sometime in early 2000, more of the same permeates the Blogosphere as blogging attracted millions to jump on the bandwagon.

No doubt, the exponential growth of bloggers over the years make it a lucrative online business for the IMers. For every 1,000 web users, there must be one sucker - and that adds up to a huge number considering the size of the Internet. One thing I must say about the IMers - they are very prolific in their marketing, be it via email, splash/landing pages and other gimmicks that pop at you in the face!

Now, don't get me wrong. Every IMer has every right to do what he or she thinks is the 'best strategy' to make money online. It's a cut-throat world out there and you must have the panache and sales skills to promote your products. The onus is on each one of us to have good judgment and some Net savvy to understand which product on offer is the genuine article or a dud.

The hard truth is that every Internet marketer is chasing the same people on the Internet superhighway.

And the same people are chasing the same dream...to make money online, whether it's Internet or affiliate marketing, selling courses, software, ebooks, ghostwriting, copywriting, SEO consulting and so on.

Now I wonder: Can a marketing strategy and technique be more original than what are being churned out by Internet marketers as they try to push their products? In a way, many of us are just getting bored with the 'superlative' style of these IMers. Who are they trying to kid? Can every new product be a 'killer'? Every other month, there's a new one. You must be a noob to think so!

Will the IMers ever learn that they have stretched themselves thin by singing the same old tune after all these years? They have to invent a better mousetrap. Look at emails - you can almost call these promo emails as spam rather than sales pitch. It's not surprising that many people delete or unsubscribe them.

However, credit must be given when it comes to great copywriting in some of these email promos. But once you catch the drift, the repetitive tone, as each email comes into your inbox, can become stale. So are all those splash and landing page promos. Unless you have never seen them before. Oh boy, I could go on and on, but I hope I have made my point.

Blessed are those people who blog in a world of their own - in a personalized way and interacting with friends and relatives, not worrying about how to put money on the table at the end of the day.

Write When You Get A Brainwave!

Originally uploaded by Silvia de Luque.

Thinking in retrospect   Suddenly it dawned on me to look back at some of the posts I had written and recollect the thoughts and ideas that went into those articles. It's still early in the New Year and what better time than to bring forward these articles with internal links to them (hint, hint) so as to make it easy for those who are interested to click through to those posts in my portfolio. That is, if you are reading this post now.

In fact, much has been written about creating internal links that will help the search bots to better find the way to your old posts. Am I promoting myself? Well, yes and no. To be honest, I'm creating links back to those old articles in the hope that they will attract the search engine spiders to sniff at the trail. It's an idea that's worth experimenting, isn't it?

Okay, it's not as if this is something new. It's just a brainwave that comes when the brain cells is fully charged!

I happened to sneak back into an old post "10 Great Articles of  2007..." and that got me thinking about writing this post (hint, hint, again). Talk about some bloggers who begrudge the fact that the writer's block is, more often than not, starring them in the face.

Let me recollect this extract from "10 Great Articles..." :

Like anything in life, we need guidance. We need to go through the learning curve. We need exchanges of good ideas and profound insights to become better bloggers.

Each one of us does not have all the answers, so who do we turn to for the right answers? Yes, peer bloggers. There are many of them who can show us tips and tricks of blogging because they themselves have gone through the grind and learn a lot from their own blogging experience.

Here are some of my most read posts that have garnered comments by readers coming mainly from search engine traffic and other links (hint, hint) :

* Getting Web Traffic Without Going Bonkers

* Hey, Are You Taking Your Blog South?

* Bloggers, Reach Out with Valued Comments

* Do You Follow the Pied Pipers of Blogging?

* Wiil SnapBomb be a Snap for Bloggers?

* Are You Ready to become a Laid-back Blogger?

* On the Internet Trail of Delusion

* Predictions: The Changing Face of Internet Marketing

* Mama, Don't Let Your Baby Grow Up To Be A Blogger 


Well, there you are, one more post to boot - and now I can sit back and relax with a nice cold beer and enjoy some late night blues!

Debunking the SEO Myths

In the realm of SEO  There are enough conflicting information on the Internet and if you are the gullible type you may accept what is placed on the plate for you, not realizing that some other ingredients are missing. In the misty world of search engine optimization, there is always the gray area where you don't quite know whether you are on to something or just lost in the wilderness.

Some so-called SEO gurus will tell you to do one thing while others tell you to do the opposite. Pretty confusing, isn't it? But don't get thrown off the track yet. Gather what you have read or heard and relate it to your own blogging experience  because somewhere in there lies the truth.

SEO myths are always floating around and people need to be circumspect in dealing with them. A lot has been written about the debunking of these myths but what was considered the 'right way' in search engine optimization in the early days may not ring true today as search engines evolve and techniques change.

One thing that remains a constant bugbear for webmeisters is the thought of not getting a good page rank in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). For obvious reasons, when you have a website or blog, you want web traffic heading your way. Who doesn't need search engine traffic, especially organic traffic? I'll be a lame duck if I don't.

Lately, as we move into 2009, people are talking about the dawn of personalized search and geo-tagging. Google has launched the controversial SearchWiki which empowers users to rearrange their own search results. They can also vote specific results up or down, make comments and do other things not doable before in the realm of search. But not everyone is happy about this new development, especially for some industry professionals. SEO and ranking will continue to be a much-talked-about topic as  the winds of change blow in.

But for now, I won't steal the thunder from Nicholas C Smith as he runs you through his comprehensive article on the myths, risks and pitfalls of search engine optimization. I like his article because it will help clear the air for some of us 'noobs' who are still struggling with the art of SEO and understanding what works and what doesn't work.  Read on...


Myths, Risks and Pitfalls of SEO

From my experience, people who try to increase the flow of organic traffic to their websites domain will at some point attempt a whole bunch of “optimisation techniques” without knowing if any of it really has had, or is having, any effect at all. Some of the SEO techniques I have seen people attempt are, whilst quite useless, based on a good idea.

Other methods continually amaze me. Perhaps people that try such things have heard spurious rumours of how to get their site into Google’s top ten listings from certain forums. Incidentally they are probably at such a point of desperation that they are willing to try anything to gain just ten more visits.

I am regularly inundated with the same questions such as: Is it worth submitting my site to 300 search engines? Will I get penalised for cross linking my sites? Should I pay to have high ranking sites link to mine? And what exactly does Google page rank do, if anything?

Questions such as these have driven me into despair and consequently writing this article during which i will attempt to explain definitively the more common SEO myths, risks and pitfalls. In this article we will examine some of the more common beliefs.

Before we get to the list it is worth noting that I have not written it in a particular order and at times I have explained the topic the myth concerns before answering the question.

Link Building

Q: Will the more links that point to my website increase my sites placement in search engines?

It will help your website as far as the major search engines are concerned. The most popular search engines use the number of links aimed towards a website as an important factor in determining the sites placement. They look for your link to be coming from sites with; high traffic, quality content and a high page rank, amongst other things. Do no cross link, do not spam your address in forums and on social networks and do not put it on irrelevant sites, or even those that seem slightly dodgy. Take your time, aim for directories that are related to your website, aim for directories with page rank 3+ or aim for blogs or similar sites that are relevant to your content.

Q: Is it worth my buying a place on a high ranking directory?

So the idea with this is that, say, a directory has a Google page rank of 7 and is very popular. Any site on it will be getting a big rub off via a higher spot on search engine rankings. However the catch is the directory charges £50 a month for your listing. Is it worth it when there are so many free directories out there?

Personally, I think it is worth it, as long as the site holds its high rank and doesn't have thousands of listings competing with yours on it. The added bonus with paid for listings is that they usually review and include your site very quickly (24hours), which by itself may be worth paying for. And if you could buy 10 spots on decent directories your site will most likely become highly ranked on search engine results.

There are problems with this though. Firstly, it is said to be against Google’s terms of service – paying to get a higher listing on Google’s organic results. (Google want their results to show the best and most relevant websites, not those with the most money behind them) They are, however, unlikely to be too bothered even if they do find out.

The next problem is the cost. For a small company or personal website it is too expensive to pay monthly for many directories to list them, and possibly not worth it. Lastly, it is not guaranteed to help your website. It should, but does not always. I have paid for listings before and noticed very little difference, whilst other times it has made a huge contribution to my sites ranking. So it may be a risk, but it can pay off extremely well.

Q: Will submitting a video about my site or product to places such as YouTube be of benefit to me?

A recent link building trend has been to submit a short video describing the webmasters site or the service it provides, to as many video submission sites as possible. The theory behind this being that search engines give more weight in their results to pages with videos. So if your site or product has a video on YouTube, when that product is searched for on the web that video will often come up in the top ten results. If this video has a link to your site in it, under it or as nearby as you can put it, it should be good news for you and your site. People find the video as it is ranked so highly in the results, watch the video, like what they see and then visit your site to perhaps purchase what they saw.

Does it work? At the time of writing, yes it does and it is probably worth doing. Make a video, even if it is just text, sound or a PowerPoint presentation, and then submit it to as many video and social networking sites as possible. People will find it and it will hopefully persuade them to visit your site. The only real problem with this being that the search engines will not like all of the “video spam” now being posted on the Internet and are likely to change (lower) the priority of videos in their results.

Google Page Rank

Q: Will having a higher Google page rank increase the number of visitors to my site?

Before we can answer that we will have to look at what exactly Google page rank is. Google page rank is a spurious form of measurement for site popularity that the company introduced fairly recently. It is unknown to everyone, except possibly Google, how exactly it ranks sites. It is assumed however that its ranks depend upon on a mixture of traffic a site receives, external links pointing towards it and the content it contains.

New websites may not have a page rank for many months. It is also possible to have a very successful website with thousands of visitors and sales and still not being ranked highly, if at all. This is because Google only ranks pages once every few months, probably around once every four-five months. So if you start your website and straight off advertise heavily you might receive a high volume of traffic but it may still take months for Google to look at your site and rank it accordingly.

To see a website's Google page rank you can download the Google toolbar and then once it is installed right click on it and select show page rank.

So back to the myth – Does having a higher Google page rank mean more visits to your site? Well, yes and no. No, because it alone doesn't actually have any effect on search placement, and as such won’t increase traffic. Yes, because indirectly it will benefit your site.

If you have a high page rank Google will prioritise your site and check back often to see if anything has changed, such as content, giving you a good chance to increase your standing with the search engine. Another benefit is that both people and sites are more willing to trust websites that have a high Google rank.

For example, if you are submitting your site to directories you will want to submit it to a high Google rank directory as Google will check them more regularly and take more notice of them and their content (which will be your link). So indirectly, a high Google rank should mean more visits for your site.

Buying In-Traffic

Q: Is it worth me buying 10,000 hits for £££/$$$?

OK, we have all seen the adverts in our email promising thousands of targeted visits for an amazingly cheap cost. And at one point or another we have all been depressed enough to be tempted by them. But just say no.

The idea is, for say 100 pounds (or 200 dollars), a traffic company will direct ten thousand or so visitors to your site who are actually interested in your content. It sounds great and some companies will actually provide what they say as far as traffic to your site is concerned. However I have never found one where the traffic is actually targeted and people even bother to look around my sites. Often it turns out to be a robot that is obviously not going to look or buy anything from me.

If not, it may be that thousands of unfortunate people have had a dozen pop up windows attack them as they bravely try to fight them off. I may be generalising slightly with this, but usually the people that are directed or redirected to your website will want nothing more than to close it down.

It could possibly work for you if your site instantly captures people and most of your money is made off of advertising that these people quickly click on before closing you down. However, do not attempt to use bought traffic whilst using Google Adsense on your site as it is against their rules and your account might be terminated without warning. Another possible benefit is that some search engines rank sites based on incoming traffic, thus 10000 more hits by anybody may actually boost your rankings. However, this is unlikely to fool search engines such as Google or Yahoo!.

Cross Linking

Q: What is Cross Linking?

Cross linking is a webmaster practice whereby a person owns many domains, uploads an identical site to each and then heavily links each domain to the others. For example, person A registers lotsofhits,com, but is not getting enough traffic. To fool the search engines into thinking it is a popular website he registers a hundred more domains, so each will have different web addresses but all have the duplicate page content of lotsofhits,com, and all of them link to one another.

This, in theory, should boost the pages rank, as Google, along with other search engines, determine the importance of a site based on links from outside websites pointing to it (along with a few other things). It would also mean that there are a hundred more sites on the web that sell the same product as lotsofhits,com that could all possibly be found.

Q: Will Cross Linking my site(s) be penalised by search engines?

This is not a myth - search engines often penalise or even temporarily ban sites that Cross Link. If Google detect completely duplicate content on even just two sites that link to each other, then they will at least lower your page and result rankings, if not ban both sites.

Q: Heard Cross Linking is fine as long as the sites do not have completely duplicate content. Is there any truth in this?

If you are determined to cross link, the safest way would be to own two or three domains that link to each other but each of which have completely unique content and link to other sites as well as one another. It is hardly worth creating two or more unique sites for the sole purpose of cross linking and I would not recommend doing so anyway.

SEO Software

Q: Is it true that there is no point in doing any manual search engine optimisation or search/site submissions when you can buy software that will do it all for you?

There is a little truth behind this, but not much. Whilst certain software might make for an excellent tool in assisting your SEO campaign, in the end there you will find there is no substitute for hard work. For example you can download a program that will submit your site automatically to 10,000 search engines or put a link to your web page on 50 other sites. The problems there being: only four major search engines exist and between them they take over 80% of all search engine traffic. Those search engines will find your site automatically and rank it according to, amongst other things, relevant and unique content – making the 10,000 search engine submission promise redundant (even if it were true).

There are good tools available that will track your visitors (Google analytics), tell you how your site could be made more search engine friendly and software that even tracks how each of your keywords are ranked in major search engines. However, if you are purchasing such software, try to find a trustworthy independent review first so that you are sure you are not getting ripped off. Also try to make sure that any software you use does not go against Google’s terms of service.

So, whilst certain software can and will be useful to you, there is no replacement for hard work and unique content and regular updates. The search engine rankings should then take care of themselves.

About The Author: Nicholas C Smith is project manager at Breakfrom Limited, who specialize in affordable ecommerce solutions and general web design knowledge and advice. For more information and advice visit http://www.breakfrom.com 


Disclaimer: The information presented and opinions expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of TheNextPost.com and/or its associates.

Nose To The Blogging Grindstone

    Credit: Alberto Alerigi 


Blogging into 2009  It's a whole new year right ahead of us. The blogosphere has come a long, long way. I read somewhere there are now more than 1.5 billion bloggers (correct me if I'm wrong) and that says a lot about people who want to get online either to impart information and knowledge, to communicate or just to flaunt themselves.

Hey, didn't they tell you that blogging is as easy as eating apple pie and it's fun? Well, that depends on how you want to go about it.

Truth be told, it takes passion, determination and true grit to really achieve some kind of notoriety as a blogger.

We know bloggers come in all sizes, shapes and temperament. Some blog for fun, others for money.  But once you take the plunge, you'll soon realize that keeping a blog updated on a regular basis is different from having breakfast, lunch and dinner as a day-to-day routine.

So, have you got what it takes to put your nose to the blogging grindstone?

No doubt, the blogging terrain is full of potholes but if you know your way around, you might end up feeling like a blogging prima donna with your head in the clouds.

But let's not forget those bloggers who, after the initial flourish of posts, would be going through a period of inertia known as "writer's block. "

Sooner or later, this dysfunctional characteristic will creep into you and you'll be going through a period of non-productive angst. It happens to most of us.

Blogging burnt-out has taken its toll on a number of bloggers. But then, there are others who seem to be able to churn out post after post like they are coming out of a factory line. Are you one of them, or do you think it's crazy?  Or is it cool?

Blogging is mental and addictive. It can be an obsession.  A full-time job. A business venture. A vehicle to rant and rave. A media for socializing. A playground. And what have you.

And what kind of blogger are you gonna be?