Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Alexa Matters To Bloggers



The Global Leader in Analytics

Alexa is the leading provider of free, global web metrics. 


   When seeking blogging jobs it is a common question to find; what is your Alexa score? Unlike other kinds of scoring though the lower number in this case, the better. Alexa ranks you among your pears online and your country along with many other possible things like key words. The big thing with them though is your first number, ranking your site over on the web. 

 Many companies want to work with blogs below 500,000 and many want to work with ones below 200,000! I have noticed many blogs are well over the 1,000,000 mark range though and once my main blog was as well. 

  How did I get the number to go down? 

 First, as always, post post post! posting more often brings traffic to your site and traffic helps drive your Alexa score in the right direction. 

 Second, get the Alexa tool bar, it helps track what sites you are on and gives those sites credit, including your own! 

 Third, get your site certified! Register your account on Alexa as you as the owner.
 A certified site has an Alexa script installed that allows Alexa to directly measure traffic metrics on the site.

 Forth, join an Alexa hop! Find a group on facebook or a blogging forum and join in a Alexa hop. In short a group of bloggers agree to hop around to each others blogs and read a bit., This also can help your Alexa score a lot. Try to do this weekly! 

 Fifth, be sure to have other pages link to yours. A good way to do this is with guest posts. Write articles for others about topics you know about and ask other bloggers if they would be willing to put your writing on their page. Often they will, sometimes they trade guest blogging spots. In your post be sure to include a link back to your own blog with a proper key word anchor text. 

   

   I hope you find this helpful and please feel free to share what you have learned here with others. 
Bloggers have to stick together! So far my main little blog has reached an Alexa of 235,000 but went back up to 249,000. This blog on the other hand...  13,681,778 and clearly needs some attention. Someday it will get it! For now though it is just a journal of how my other blog goes and hopefully it is a path other bloggers could someday fallow to become a blogging goddess! 

Sunday, July 29, 2012

Make Money on your Blog


  How to make Money on your blog

This is a common question and one I get asked often know that I know how to do just that and I am getting fairly good at it. Still not a blogging Goddess though! Working on it. 

 I was asked this question by a good friend who blogs, she wanted to know if there was a website she could go to in order to get work. Thinking on it a few things came to mind. First being that my best jobs have found me, my second best jobs come from word of mouth from other bloggers, and that 3 there are a few sites but there can be issues with them. I gave her personal contact information after asking said contact if it would be ok. I can not post such information at this time on this blog as this would overwhelm those who do this job for companies. Stick around though, if I know you I might recommend you too! 

There is a site that came to mind 
https://www.blogsvertise.com

I used to get a bit of work from here, they pay out a month after you post and this is the longest pay out time I have seen, most are within days and my best is within hours if he is working when he gets my posts. 

This however was not the reason why I did not right off the bat give this site to my friend. I like my friend after all. This company over and over asked me to post things and not include the legal disclosure they know is needed. When I felt I needed to say something I stopped getting jobs from them. It was that clear cut, I mentioned it and suddenly they had nothing for me. 

   You could be fined if you do not disclose, you could be sued even. It is not something to mess around with and this company, or those they work for, asked me to break the laws. I wanted to work with them to promote for them legally but they had no interest in it. 

   So I share them with you to do with as you see fit. Maybe you can do some legal jobs with them or maybe your not in America so the same laws do not apply! 

    Good luck becoming a blogging Goddess and be sure to check back here for more tips and links to help your blog grow and put money in your pocket! 


Saturday, July 28, 2012

Blogging Tip - Photos Photos Photos



They say a photo is worth a thousand words, and they are in the blogging world! 
I get a lot of my hits from google images. The best way to do this is to take your own photos, give them descriptive names such as funnysmilingdog.jpg and post them on your blog. 

You should try to get a photo in at least every other post in my opinion. Even if the photo is not your own! Of course DO NOT break any copy right rules but if you either have no camera or are bad with it or have no editing ability you can still add some great photos to you blog! 

You can pay for a site with stock photos or find a free site such as the one a got the doggy photo from to help add another level to this post about needing photos on your blog. 


Just double check the permissions on each photo no matter where you get them. The one for this photo says: 

morgueFile free photo
You are allowed to copy, distribute, transmit the work and to adapt the work. Attribution is not required. You are prohibited from using this work in a stand alone manner.

Helpful right? So now you have no excuse to not add photos to your blog! They really do make a difference! 

Friday, July 27, 2012

Blogging Tip - Join a Challenge


If you find yourself out of ideas for content one of the best things you can do is to join a blogging challenge. There are so many different kinds of challenges to choose from. Do a quick search and I am sure you will pull a lot of them up. Some last a week, others a month, and still others last a year or longer. Here is a new one you can check out! It is hosted by a crunchy parenting blogger but the challenge is so open ended it would work for most any blog type. 






This one could last even more than a year of you only post once a day. I recommend at least once a day if you recall and more than once a day is even better. This blog is even offering a gift to the blog that finishes the challenge first! How great is that? 

So join a challenge and fill your blogging spiritual cup to the brim with wonderful new content!

Thursday, July 26, 2012

Blogging Tip - Content Content Content



    My blog is now getting over 20,000 views a month and I have been at this as a "part time job" for near 8 months. Not bad! I am reviewing items a few times a week and getting paid sponsor work a few times a week as well. It is all coming along. 


  So what is my problem? I have been so focused on reviews and paid work that my blog is a mess with it all and content is not longer the theme. Certainly there is content but woven into so many of those posts are paid for links. I need more fresh content that is just content, only content. I have gotten so far from it though that I am bit lost. I am worried my blog will drop out from under me soon if I do not get back on track. 


  BLOG TIP: CONTENT!

    Don't end up stuck like me, focus on your content, your passion. Keep posting every day and make sure your posting from your heart and not just your wallet. In the long run it will make the biggest difference! 


  

Saturday, June 23, 2012

How am I doing



TIP: While it might bother you not to use punctuation in your title it is important to leave it out so that google will not pass your post over! I know it bothers me too! 


See this rainbow that was in my yard the other day? It made me smile. It is the small things in like that add up and make one feel whole and happy. 

I am certainly happy with how my blog is coming along. Blogger shows over 17,000 page views now for it! I am up to 4k fans on facebook and about 2500 on Twitter. 

TIP: Work on your Twitter followers, Facebook only shows your post to a few people on your fan list! 


I wanted to share something with you all that has had me rather pissed off. Someone I know in short basically told me that blogging is useless and no one reads it. I had brought it up as I know the person has no job and needs work and I know they could make money blogging. It would have been fine to say that they are not interested, I mean I would make nothing from it if they did, I was trying to be helpful. Instead they insulted something I have come to love and that I know does in fact have value. I have reviewed hundreds of dollars worth of items and sites and I had just pocketed $300 for a few moments of work placing some sponsored links on my blog for a company and that blog is still only Google Rank 2. 

I wanted to bang my head on a wall talking to that person. 
That person is just flat out wrong says the products I get daily and the pay I get as well! 

The time of the bloggers is NOW. 
We rule the internet connecting brands to readers and readers to social media and social media back to brands. We are a strong part of the web connected to so many things for so many reasons. Your voice does matter and people are reading, or at least they will once you learn what your doing. For that matter more will read my blog once I fully figure out what I am doing. Thus this blog, so others can learn from my mistakes and hopefully from this blog learn faster than I have! 

Happy Blogging! 

Thursday, June 21, 2012

Grow your Blog!





  If you want your blog to grow, your going to have to work at it. It is not as simple as writing and posting. This I have been learning the hard way. If you want to blog better this summer follow these tips!

1. Get your own domain name!   yaddayadda.blogspot.com does not look as good as yaddayadda.com not to readers and not to advertisers and companies that may want you to review for them!

2. Photos! Go back over your old blog posts and add some photos. Photos say a thousands words and they do help with google image search to bring up your blog as well!

3. Blog every day. Every. Single. Day! I can't say this part enough!

4. Join some giveaways, search for free blog opportunities to be included in giveaways simply for posting about it and promoting it on your social networks!

5. Make sure your blog has at least it's own page on Twitter and Facebook, these are a must!

Happy Blogging!