A Blogging Conference Worth Every Penny: Want to Win a Free Pass?

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New Media Expo 2012 Las Vegas

In my 25+ years of self-improvement ventures, I can count on one hand the memorable conferences I have attended. They were the ones that actually made me better at what I do and challenged me to try some new things.

And the older I get, the ones that impress me are becoming even rarer.

I have heard speakers who have very little of a concrete nature to share. They are usually the ones with a lengthy bio, but whose main (and rather obvious) purpose is to sell their latest book.

At one writing conference, the organizers closed (and locked) the auditorium exits and proceeded to hard sell an add-on program: an inner circle “club” with a hefty price tag. Being a little claustrophobic anyway, I experienced the sheer panic of knowing I couldn’t escape if I wanted to.

At another, we were presented with Native American Dreamcatchers, wands we were encouraged to wave around with our eyes closed, as we whispered our deepest and biggest wishes. (Okay teachers’ conferences can be a little woo-woo.)

But somewhere around cruising altitude on the way home, passing over the Rocky Mountains, the magical fairy dust would begin to melt and I wondered what I really got for all that money.

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Filed Under: Blog as Marketing Tool, Blogging, Branding, Community Building, Creativity, Social Media Marketing, WordPress Blog Support Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Players and Spectators: Why Your Blog Needs Both

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I love sports analogies. Once I even compared blogging to baseball. If blogging is a game, I think of my readers as fitting into one of two buckets: players or spectators.

As in any game, the players are more visible. Noticed more.

We remember them more. Why? Because the players on your blog are the readers who join in the conversation. The ones who talk to you—and the rest of the community. The ones you know by name.

But just as important are the spectators. They are the ones Havi Brooks of The Fluent Self blog calls “comment mice.” They read. They may hang around and consume lots of content. Sometimes they become your biggest fans. But they are your silent supporters.

And yet spectators are a crucial part of your blog. Because without them, the stadium would be empty. Without them, you wouldn’t be pleasantly surprised at the moment you least expect it.

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What’s Under Your Bed?: 10 Monster Blogging Fears Worth Chasing Down

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scared girlWrite for yourself. No, you should write for your readers.

Posts over 500 words will bore your readers to death. But nothing worthwhile can be tackled in a post in fewer than 1,000 words.

Your posts don’t need to be interesting; just instructive. Wait. Your posts had better be interesting or your visitors will click away.

No wonder we freeze up. Lose our confidence. Start doubting our ability to crank out quality content. Fear that we aren’t good enough. There is just too much conflicting advice out there.

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When Blogging Is Seriously Hard

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We have all been there before. We sit down at the keyboard, poised to crank out today’s blog post. We stare at the screen, willing the words to come. We type a bunch of garbage, in hopes that the good stuff will eventually spill out.

We fidget. We frown. We try some more. But the idea bank account is empty—no, actually, it’s overdrawn.

On this blog, and on others, I have offered advice for pulling out of a blogging slump, for fighting perfectionism, and for generating post ideas. And, though I made the mistake of saying I never get blogger’s block (reminder to self: never say never), I’ve written about how reading can help bloggers discover new ideas.

Still, there are times when blogging is just hard.

Seriously hard.

Frankly, today was one of those days for me.

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The Major League Baseball Guide to Pulling Out of a Blogging Slump

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kid playing baseballThe 2011 baseball season is still in full swing (no pun intended.) For players, that means 162 games over 180 days.

That’s a long season. Long enough for players to fall into a slump.

My Seattle Mariners know something about slumps. But the funny thing is, all players go through them.

Derek Jeter, the New York Yankees superstar,  was 0-for-32 in April 2004, at the time, the worst skid for any player in 27 years.

“It’s a funny game,” said Jeter.

Our blogging can feel that way sometimes, too. Like a funny game.

Sometimes things just don’t click. Ideas for topics are scarce. It feels like the stadium is empty. Where did all the fans go?

The Major League Baseball Guide to Pulling Out of a Blogging Slump

1.  Accept your strikeouts but don’t obsess.

We have high hopes for every one of our blog posts.

We want that home run. And sometimes we take it personally when we don’t hit it out of the park. But hopefully, you are in blogging for the long haul. For many seasons. Each post is just one little fraction of your total body of work.

So, this one post didn’t strike your readers’ fancy. So what? It’s just one post.

2.  Ignore the numbers and trust yourself.

Players who watch their stats too much tend to freeze up more often. Bloggers can also fall into this trap.

” 262 page views today but only 3 comments? What?”

If you are a FSC, a Frequent Stats Checker, stop it! Focus on that current post and making it the best you can write.

3.  Don’t chase bad balls.

You can’t put a good swing on a bad pitch and you can’t make a gem-filled post out of a crappy idea. Don’t work too hard on trying to turn a so-so idea into that perfect post.

Toss it and pick another one.

4.  Start with one small goal and block out the distractions.

Pro baseball players understand that tunnel vision is a good thing. There may be lots of reasons for their slump, but when they step up to the plate, they choose one small goal and focus on that.

Maybe it’s to move a runner from second to third with a sacrifice fly. Or hit one ball fair, square and inside the bases.

As a blogger, your goal might be to write a short, one-paragraph tip for your reader. Or to link to three excellent blog posts you found on the Web this week. Take baby steps.

5.  Mix it up.

Just as a baseball player may change his stance, his pre-swing, his mental approach or his use of equipment, a blogger can try different things.

A video post. An interview with someone you admire whom your readers might like to meet. Write longer if she normally writes short or vice versa. Find resources on the web and write a “Free Stuff I Found” post.

6.  Practice more.

baseball boysIn baseball, the more you practice, the better you get. The more times you swing at the ball, the more times you’ll connect with it.

Same thing with blogging. Don’t just sit on the bench. Try stepping up your posting frequency.

What?” you say. “Are you crazy? I’m ready to throw in the towel and you want me to blog more?”

Yes, I do.

New ideas spawn more new ideas. Blogging more helps you write better, faster, easier.  I’m guest posting a lot these days and I find that my own CatsEyeWriter posts aren’t taking nearly as long to write.

7.  Trust your own instincts.

Baseball players in a slump desperately need something to believe in.

Tim Naehring, who went 0-for-39 for the Boston Red Sox in 1991, had his barber carve “hit” into the back of his scalp. Cincinnati Red Leo Cardenas showered in his uniform to wash away the evil spirits. Some players have even been known to keep wearing the same underwear when they get a few hits. (I know. Blech!)

They are looking for some self-confidence, something to believe in. Because it’s a mental game.

The blogger’s equivalent would be putting herself into information overload. Reading too many blogs, listening to too much advice from the social media “thought leaders”— these things can overwhelm you.

Old-time Major League Baseball executive Branch Rickey said it best.  “A full mind is an empty bat.”

Block out all that advice, trust your own instincts and just get writing.

What about you?

Do you ever find yourself in a blogging slump?

What do you do to pull out of it?

This post was first published at For Bloggers By Bloggers.

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Blogger’s Rehab: A Remote, Old Movies and Too Much Time

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I’ve been watching a lot of old movies this week. It’s one of the easier things to do with a broken wrist.

And it keeps me out of Bob’s way. Because he actually does have some projects and deadlines.

Me? My job for now is lying on the living room couch with my pain pills, my splinted arm, my remote and an endless supply of comedies from the 80s and 90s. Waiting for recovery.

I’ve always had a love affair with movies. In fact, in my younger days, after I left teaching but before I found my true life’s passion, I launched a short-lived, entertainment-themed business.

On one of those giddy, anything-is-possible days, I struck on an idea that was born from my love of movies, my insanely intense need to make people laugh and my passion for helping people realize—and be recognized for— their talents.

On that crazy evening, scrawling on the back of cocktail napkins, my biz and life partner Bob and I hatched our plan.

We would create and act out original, fun and funny employee recognition programs based on current popular movies. We took the plots and crafted them to fit the specific industry, job positions and personalities of staff our clients wanted to honor, wrapping it all up in a multi-media ‘Oscars’ ceremony, complete with the gold statues.

And so Korporate Comedy Concepts was born.

Even though we launched the business in southern California, coming up with the idea was decidedly easier than getting clients to pay for it.  We had a few gigs, but decided to pull the plug when our seed money ran out.

Revisiting these films this week, in the midst of my restlessness and boredom, got me to thinking. Some of them would make prime plots to drop bloggers into.

Here they are three:

Home Alone

In this remake of the 1990 John Hughes holiday classic, Kevin McCallister, all grown up, is a blogger, WordPress expert and social media celebrity. When he oversleeps and misses the van to the airport for the last remaining flight to BlogWorld 2010, his first-time conference speaker plans are spoiled and he finds himself stuck at home.

As BlogWorld execs 3,000 miles away are cutting his photo out of 5,500 conference programs, Kevin has his own challenges. Hackers threaten to duplicate his blog content on a tacky WordPress for Short People site. And when evil spammers start lurking outside his blog, plotting to take it over with disgusting Viagra ads, he sets a series of ingeneous traps that go way beyond CAPTCHA.

In perhaps the film’s most touching scene, Kevin learns the true meaning of Christmas when he helps his cranky old neighbor open a Facebook account on Christmas Eve so she can find out if her high school love is still alive, mend her relationship with her long lost grandson and creep out her great niece by ‘friending’ her.

This Is Spinal Tap

In 1982, movie lovers were reintroduced to the sights, sounds (and smells) of one of music history’s greatest fictional rock groups. In this rockumentary, This Is Spinal Tap, the British heavy metal group, billed as the ‘world’s loudest band,’  stages their much anticipated comeback tour.

In this 2011 remake, the team at For Bloggers By Bloggers, has lost its way. In a blogging world where content is still king, they haven’t published a single blog post in 8 months. In a comeback bid of momentous proportions, Judy Dunn has a scheme for bringing the blog traffic back with a series of well-calculated appearances on top blogs.

When her plans for becoming a weekly contributor for ProBlogger fall through, she tries unsuccessfully to get guest spots for the group on the Where Is This Blogger Now? blog, only to be rejected and humiliated publicly. She perseveres through the pain and in the end finds guest gigs on a bunch of up and coming niche blogs like snorkelingnuns.com, Horny Toads Rock and the popular Swedish blog Lutefisk Today.

When that pond is all fished out, the bloggers, once in demand, have no choice but to go their separate ways. In one of the final scenes, that brilliantly captures the group’s downward spiral to obscurity, Judy is helping a group of senior citizens at Rolling Hills Assisted Living Center brainstorm topics and create an editorial calendar for their new blog Rockers and Rollers.

Rain Man 

This 1988 Best Picture movie has been beautifully remade, updated with a decidedly post-Millennium, social media flavor.

On the death of their father, a frustrated, angry and almost broke blogger Charlie Babbitt meets his autistic brother Raymond who doesn’t remember. As they drive across the country, it becomes clear that Raymond has an uncanny ability to select blog topics that Charlie’s readers are wildly interested in. He can also predict the times of day when posts will get the most page views and social media shares.

It’s just the kind of information Charlie needs to attract more subscribers and advertisers.  He becomes convinced that Raymond is key to turning his failing blog around. Reader to subscriber conversion rates go through the ceiling as Raymond seems to instinctively know where to place the calls-to-action for the best results.

In an interesting twist on the hilarious boxers vs briefs scene in the original movie, Charlie gets a glimpse of Raymond’s resistance to change when his brother insists that blog post headlines must always be five words—no fewer, no more.

Finally, in an act of desperation, Charlie pulls the car over and jumps out, gesturing wildly:

“What difference does it make how many words it has? A headline is a headline! It is a headline whether it has 3 words or 9 words or whatever!”

In this pivotal scene, Charlie begins to understand that his brother’s needs are different. At first intent on using Raymond to grow his subscriber list to 10,000, he now wants what’s best for his brother. Which makes that final train station scene even more powerful.

What about you?

Any other movies you see as ripe for a remake with a blogging theme?

What movie would you like to have the lead blogger role in?

 

This post was published in its original form on bestbloggingtipsonline.com.

 

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The Broken Limbs Edition: 3 Painlessly Simple ‘Evergreen’ Posts

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evergreen blog postsLast Thursday evening, I climbed up on on a 3-foot stump in our yard because “I just need to clip one more tree branch.”

I’m pretty hilarious as a gardener anyway.

But it was worse this time because I was tired and all logic had been zapped out of me by that big orange ball in the sky,  beating down on me, making me squint.

I had pruned back three tree branches but the last one was out of reach.The stump that sat beside the tree looked safe enough.

I climbed up on it and reached upward with my pruning clippers.

Just one more branch.

 

That is when I fell off the stump. Like one of the drummers in the movie Spinal Tap, I was the victim of a bizarre gardening accident.

 

I wrapped my right hand with tape and put a cold pack on it. The next morning, when I looked at it, the bump was the size of a baseball. Well, a golf ball at least.

The x-rays showed a broken radius, the largest bone in the wrist. So much for the sprain theory.

So, here I sit, typing with my left hand, chewing painkillers and offering up, in honor of the pine tree that lost some limbs so I could injure mine, three painlessly simple ‘evergreen’ blog posts.

Pieces that can be published and enjoyed again because they are as fresh in July as they are in December. As you read them, ask yourself, “What is it about them that make them useful and timeless?”

And think about a new topic you could write an evergreen post of your own about this week.

 

Okay, I’ll go back to drowning in the pain and humiliation of having made an astoundingly poor gardening decision. Hope these three posts are helpful. :

5 Magical Headlines to Make Your Blog Posts Go Viral


Did you ever see someone’s blog post go viral on Twitter or Facebook? The number one reason this happens? The headline. In this post, I show you how to write headines that get massive click-throughs, too.

Do you doubt your competence?


My tell-it-like-it-is friend Patti K nails the emotions we feel when we spend too much time “following” the social media stars and not enough on getting things done in our little corner of the world. Thoughtful, inspiring advice.

The Major League Baseball Guide to Pulling Out of A Blogging Slump


With a season of 160 games over 180 days, pro baseball players know when they are in a slump, when things just don’t click.  Here some lessons I dug up for you. Oh, and on # 7, do feel free to change your underwear.

There you go. Three painlessly simple blog posts to start your week, from a (temporarily) disabled, left-handed blogger.

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The 7 Habits of Highly Successful Bloggers: It’s Not All About Content

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good studentSometimes in the business of blogging, we are so focused on the craft, so hard at work on our content, that we forget certain things.

Important things.

Things—behaviors, really—that if practiced consistently, will move us from an average blogger to an outstanding one.

I’ve been watching bloggers for three years now. I’ve visited a few of my own readers’ blogs this past week in preparing to select my first guest blogger. I’ve watched bloggers on Twitter and Facebook. Revisited the comments they’ve left on my own blog,

It is what they do around and outside the actual act of blogging that takes them to that completely different level.

The 7 Habits of Highly Successful Bloggers

1. They are open to new learning.

They are sponges, always absorbing new ideas. They experiment (So what if this one post bombed? Look what I learned!). They ask questions and weigh answers—from other bloggers and from their readers.

And they don’t get offended when someone takes the time to make a suggestion for improvement. Because it just may make their blog better.

2. They read widely.

Some of the smartest bloggers I know have voracious appetites for books. They understand that reading across multiple genres opens up their minds, makes them think in different ways and helps them understand all kinds of people.

What could be better for priming the blogging well?

3. They recognize and promote other bloggers.

Many of the successful bloggers out there find ways to shine a spotlight on others. They share links to some of their posts on Twitter and Facebook. Give them increased visibility with a guest post. Comment on and support their blogs. Write posts like “5 Bloggers I Admire.”

4. They are inspired by the ordinary stuff of life.

They can take an ordinary observation, like seeing a woman driving a car with her dog in her lap, not seat-belted in—something that we’ve all seen— and apply that to a marketing lesson. Or find blogging lessons in an episode of Sex and the City.

They observe life—I mean, really watch— and find gems of wisdom and insight. Then they blog about it.

5. They admit their mistakes.

This can be a tough one to swallow. Sometimes a reader will catch you not following your own advice. (Happened once to me.)

How you react determines what you are made of. You can get all defensive in an oh-that-wasn’t-what-I-really-meant kind of way. Or you can say, “Yeah, boy. You’re right on that one. Thanks for calling me on that.”  In the process, you either lose a reader or gain a fan.

Because honesty is in short supply these days.

6. They network with and find ways to recognize their readers.

Successful bloggers have a way of giving their readers a voice, too. Engaging them in the comments. Asking them to share resources and tips and giving them a link back to their blogs. Publicly recognizing a thoughtful comment they made on another blog that you both read. Even giving them an opportunity to write a post.

7. They don’t take themselves too seriously.

At BlogWorld last year, I was struck by a scene in the hallway outside the main conference room. There was a small knot in the center where a mini-crowd of 20-something women were gathered. They were focused on the person inside the circle.

As the circle opened up, I recognized the guy in the center as one of those social media “thought leaders.” (Man, do I hate that term.) He wore a t-shirt that said, “I’m kind of a big deal on Twitter.”

His groupies fan club appeared star struck.  He seemed to be enjoying it. I’d say he was taking himself a little too seriously.

And then there are the other ones. The ones who don’t get freaked out when your eyes glance down at their name tag because, though they may be “famous,” you don’t recognize them by face. One such person saw me look at his name tag and held out his hand. It wasn’t until then that I knew who he was. And he didn’t seem to mind in the slightest that I needed an introduction.

The successful bloggers don’t focus on themselves, but, rather, on others. And they are even able to laugh at themselves from time to time.

What about you?

Aside from producing stellar content, what behaviors do you think successful bloggers have in common?

Did I leave something out?

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I Think, Therefore I Am: The ‘Make Believe’ World of Blogging

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girl with magic wandI was smacked in the head today over just what a strange and diverse bunch we bloggers are: from parenting, politics and photography to blogs about Japanese style cooking, the chronicling of someone’s high school years, sales and marketing, and the craft of fiction.

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. There are 144 million blogs out there.

My friend and teammate Joey Strawn over at For Bloggers By Bloggers got me thinking about all this when he published a brave post yesterday. He got a little push back in the comments (and a fair amount of love as well).

The title of his post was controversial enough in itself: Are You a Blogger or Just Posting Stuff Online? Joey went on to offer his definition of blogging. I’ll let you read his definition and decide for yourself.

“What?” you say. Put blogging in a box? This thing that has evened the playing field, made us all publishers and content creators?

The point he was making is that blogging should be considered an art, a form of writing to be valued and taken seriously, by the mainstream media and by bloggers themselves.

He said that, because anyone can play the blogging game, that people think that blogging isn’t real writing.

He had no intention of dividing his readers, but some of them felt that he was excluding them from the circle. That some people are welcomed into the club and not others.

That some people are bloggers and some people just post stuff online.

Are bloggers real writers or imposters?

So, anyone who writes is a writer, yes?

Though I’ve published my share of magazine articles and written for newspapers, I’ve never made it (yet) as a published novelist. Does it mean I’m not a writer?

No.

Because my definition of a writer is someone who writes. Yours may be different, but that’s mine.

If you do three pages of free writing in your journal every morning, in my book, you are a writer.

For me, making money from it has nothing to do with it.

So, want to know how I define a blogger?

You guessed it. Someone who blogs.

And, to me anyway, bloggers are writers, too. They write blog posts, don’t they?

I think that with all new art forms, we wrestle with defining them. And blogging is such a personal act that it’s almost impossible to put in a box. But the reason I love it is that it is what you make it.

Blogging isn’t journalism (by the strictest definition). It isn’t opinion. It isn’t an academic research paper. It isn’t a magazine article. It isn’t a diary entry. It isn’t a poem. Or a short story.

And yet it can be all of that—and more. It has allowed citizens, we ‘common guys,’ to communicate with the masses. (Or not, depending on our subscriber numbers.)

We are all publishers now!

And we accomplish great things every day: helping people heal, teaching people how to be better parents, sharing the beauty of our art with the world, solving marketing problems for small businesses, entertaining our readers with stories, you name it.

Can you define what it means to be a blogger?

If you are blogging for no one but yourself—and I hear this surprisingly often—if you have no intended audience, are you still a blogger? Does a blog need readers to be a blog?

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does it still make a sound? (As a 7-year-old, the future writer in me used to love to think about that one.)

Do you need to be a professional (substitute “income generating” here) to qualify?

Does the low barrier to entry (anyone can build a blog and start putting stuff up) and the absence of any standards make blogging less respectable than other kinds of writing?

I’d love to hear what you think.

Are you a blogger?

Do you think that because you blog, you are also a writer?

And what about blogs with photos only? Blogs that are online diaries? Are they still blogs?

How do you define blogging?

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The Myth of Fairy Dust: One Reason I Never Get Blogger’s Block

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girl fairy w/wandA couple of days ago, someone asked me where my inspiration as a blogger comes from. The unspoken question I sensed was more like, “What do you do when you get ‘blogger’s block’”?

(You know bloggers’ block, that close cousin to writer’s block?)

“Oh, I have a special fairy for that,” I said.

There was a deep silence on the other end of the phone line.

Of course, I was being my usual smarty pants self.

I’ll be contributing my real answers to that question in a future guest post on Leo Babauta and Mary Jaksch’s wildly popular Write to Done blog.

But for now, let me just share one insanely simple reason I don’t get blogger’s block.

I read.

I heard on an NPR radio show last week that 27 percent of Americans did not read one book last year.

Not a single book.

Okay, I may not be the norm on this issue. I’ve been a book junkie since I was five.

I was the one who had to consume words with my breakfast. I read the back of the Trix cereal box, and even the side—all the way through those disgusting ingredients like high fructose corn syrup, red dye and trisodium phosphate.

And yes, having taught first graders to read for 10 years, I value education.

But still. One in four read not a single book.

I read, on average, a book a week. (Business books don’t count.)

My tastes run everywhere from Harry Potter books to Les Miserables. And in between that, every memoir, biography or true crime book I can get my hands on.

5 reasons bloggers and writers should be readers

Bloggers and writers should be avid readers. Reading opens up the mind, makes you think in different ways and helps you understand all kinds of people, even if they are in a fictional setting.

Whether you consider yourself a blogger, a writer or a business owner who blogs, reading lots of books across multiple genres helps you:

1. Discover more new ideas—or new slants on old ideas.

As strange as it sounds, new ideas for blog posts come to me when I am reading. I keep a notebook by my nightstand. Something will happen in a book, I’ll ask myself, “What if…? and sometimes a new post idea springs to mind.

2. Improve your vocabulary.

If you are ever pained trying to think of just the right word to use in a sentence, you’ll find the words coming to you easier the more you read.

3. Claim your voice and writing style.

Reading lots of different authors helps you nail your unique voice. For a while, I fell in love with different authors’ styles—Mary Carr (The Liars’ Club), Natalie Goldberg (Writing Down the Bones, Long Quiet Highway) and others. I tried on pieces, a few at a time, and in the process found my own.

4. Touch emotions.

No matter the kind of blog you have, your readers want to feel something when they open up one of your posts. Because if your blog is bland, if it doesn’t connect with your readers on an emotional level, they probably won’t hang around long.

When you read a lot, you get a sense of how different writers appeal to the senses and emotions. As you write each post, ask yourself, “What do I want my reader to feel?”

5. Tell your stories better.

One of my guest posters, the brilliant A. Victoria Mixon, recently showed us how we can improve our storytelling with basic fiction techniques.

As you immerse yourself in the characters and plots in the books you read, you’ll soon begin absorbing more ways to do that.

Just in case you’re curious about the last 5 books I read, here they are:

Old Friend from Far Away by Natalie Goldberg

An American Childhood by Annie Dillard

The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown (unbelievably, I hadn’t read it yet)

About My Sisters by Debra Ginsberg

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte (for the gazillionth time)

What about you?

Do you find time to read?

Is reading a lost art?

Do you think reading more makes you a better blogger?

If you liked this post, I invite you to subscribe to the Cat’s Eye Writer blog so you don’t miss a single issue.


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Is Writing a Guest Blog Post Really Worth It?

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blogging dogI’ve been writing quite a few guest posts lately. I blogged about ‘inventing’ subscribers if you don’t have enough, about why first graders would rule the blogging world and about what Hollywood can teach us about writing a better blog tagline.

I love writing guest posts because they challenge me to find just the right angle for a slightly different audience of readers.

What guest posting can do for you

Is it really worth a blogger’s time, writing all those guest posts? What do you really get from it?

Well, for starters, I got:

Spikes in traffic to my own blog. When I look at my Google Analytics stats, I’ve seen double and triple the site traffic if a  post intrigues the readers on the guest site. Because they click through to find out more about me. And some of them become subscribers and commenters on my own blog.

More credibility. What better way to show my blog coaching prospects how much I know and how I can solve their problems? And the ‘social proof’ that comes with someone else promoting you on their blog? Priceless.

A chance to build my brand. More people get what it is I do and what kinds of people I like to help. It’s been especially helpful since I harrowed down to the specific niche of blogger and blogging coach.

6 quick steps to writing your first guest post

1. Start with blogs you know.

The right person may be right under your nose. Who has a blog with a similar or complimentary audience as yours? That’s a good place to start.

2. Do your homework.

Find the blog you’d like to post on before you write your post. Get involved. Read. Comment. Become known by the blogger. It’s the best way to become recognized.

And don’t assume it always has to be in your specific niche. I guested on Becky McCray’s Small Biz Survival blog, but it wasn’t on blogging. I wrote on the things I learned when I moved my business to a small island.

3. Be sure your site is ready for more eyeballs.

This is a common mistake. Take advantage of the increase in visitors you’ll get when people click on the link in your guest post to learn more about you.

Be sure you have an intriguing about page and some kind of prominent call to action on your blog’s home page, like a visible, in-your-face subscription sign-up box.

4. Offer choices of topics.

Make it easy on the blogger you want to guest post for. Study her blog, then offer 2-3 suggestions for topics and let her choose. And always ask for the preferred word length.

5. Create and submit your post.

Remember that you are not selling here. You are adding value. Find an interesting topic and give it an original twist. Make your post title search engine-friendly by throwing in a couple of keywords.

If your post is not accepted, don’t take it personally. Ask for feedback and whether the blogger would be open to a rewrite or a new submission. If not, move one. There are many other blogs.

6. Promote the heck out of it.

This is the most important step. Tell everyone you know about your guest post. Provide a direct link to it to make it easy for your friends and colleagues to read and leave a comment.

Share it on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter. Your host bloggers will by impressed by—and grateful for—the additional readers.

What about you?

Have you ever written a guest post?

What’s holding you back?

What else do you need to know?

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Filed Under: Blogging, Community Building Tagged With: , , ,

The Art of Turning A Negative Comment Into A Positive

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boy crying

Welcome to another edition of Top 10 Tuesday, a semi-regular series introducing you to some of the finest bloggers around, my fellow winners of a Top 10 Blogs for Writers award.

This week, meet Ollin Morales from Courage 2 Create. At his blog, Ollin chronicles his journey as he writes his first novel.

Take it away, Ollin:

When you’re a blogger, you can’t help escape the fact that no matter how great your content is, no matter how good of a person you are, and no matter how noble your intentions can be, sooner or later you are going to rub someone the wrong way—and that someone is going to come to your blog and slap you with a negative comment.

That’s why it’s important that you learn how to deal with a negative comment in a productive, positive way, or else you might risk letting that comment become one of the biggest downers of your week.

The Difference Between A Constructive Comment and A Negative Comment

It’s important to point out the difference between what I am going to call a “constructive” comment (which is always a good thing) and what I’m going to call a “negative” comment (which is never a good thing).

A constructive comment may illustrate a point of disagreement reached through the use of logic and reason; it can call you out for a factual mistake you have made; or it can seek to elaborate a point that your reader feels might be misunderstood.

On the other hand, a “negative” comment is just that: a shot of negativity thrown your way that often times has no rhyme or reason behind it.

A negative comment is filled with a toxic energy that you can almost feel coming at you from behind the words.

Whereas the intention of a “constructive” comment is to enlighten and improve, the intention of a “negative” comment is to confuse, throw you off balance and—sometimes—tear you down.

How to Turn A Negative Comment Into A Positive

So, you’ve received a negative comment. Congratulations! You’re a real blogger now.

But, you wonder, how can I turn this negative comment into a positive? Here’s how:

1. Reflect Your Best Self

Don’t forget: everyone is watching you.

When you’re a blogger you have to remember that your discussion is not happening in a secret cave in the middle of nowhere.

No, it’s more like your discussion is happening in one of those police interrogation rooms where there’s just you, the negative commenter, and a one-sided mirror on the opposite wall. You know that there are a lot of people on the other side of that mirror watching and listening to everything you say—you just don’t know exactly WHO is listening at any given time.

For instance, you don’t know whether the guy on the other side of that one-sided mirror is just a rookie, or the Police Chief himself.

Why take a risk, then?

Here’s what you should do:

Even if it may not be true, assume that your boss—or your next boss—is reading your blog and seeing how you handle this negative commenter.

Then act the way you would act if your boss were on the other side of that mirror, watching your every move.

2. Try To See It From Their Point of View

I know this is hard, especially when you are being unfairly attacked, but—I hate to break it to you—this is part of being a professional blogger.

You need to try to see the issue from the commenter’s point of view. Even if it is a stretch, still, try to find a point of mutual understanding.

3. Act Quickly

If you find ANY reason why your negative commenter has a point, then you should address the issue right away. Then, after you have addressed the issue, let the commenter know, and apologize for the misunderstanding or mistake.

This move should cool things off enough for the commenter to back down.

However, if after you corrected the mistake, your commenter continues to attack you, then maybe it’s time to take the discussion “outside” of the blog.

4. Take It “Outside”

If you have made contact with this negative commenter outside of your blog (i.e., e-mail) you should ask to hold a private conversation with them outside of the blog.

At this point, you are no longer in an interrogation room, so you can relax, but you should still remain professional.

First, tell them how their negative comment has affected you.

Although they may not want to see things from your point of view, you have every right to let the commenter know that their negative comment has hurt you.

If you feel hurt then there is no need to doubt that the commenter has said something to hurt you. You have every right to voice your feelings and demand to be treated with fairness. You can say something like:

“Maybe you didn’t mean to hurt me, but what you said made me feel THIS WAY, and I didn’t appreciate it.”

This gives the negative commenter one final chance to recognize the wrong they have committed and ask you for your forgiveness.

If they recognize their wrong and apologize, then it turns out this was just a small blip in the relationship. Maybe the commenter was just having a terrible day and took it out on you without thinking about it.

If, however, your negative commenter stubbornly refuses to see that they have done anything wrong, then I’m afraid it’s time for the both of you to go your separate ways.

5. Go Your Separate Ways

Although it might not feel like it, you have done an EXCELLENT job of dealing with the negative commenter. You have managed to keep your moral high ground, covered all your bases professionally, and also asserted your right to be treated fairly.

Unfortunately, it is now clear that this person is NOT a commenter you want to have around anymore.

You’re a good person who works hard and you don’t deserve to be met with negativity on you blog.

It’s time to halt all communication with the negative commenter, put them on all your blacklists, and move on.

You might even go as far as moderating your comments from now on, like I have done.

6. Shine Brighter Than Before

As I said before, the negative commenter’s ultimate goal is to throw you off balance. So, if you allow them to topple you then you are letting them win.

DON’T let them win.

Show your negative commenter that they haven’t achieved their aim by making a big move–in a positive direction.

Take that big step to finally monetize your blog, or offer new and better services to your readers. You can make a new goal to double the amount of guest posts you write, or take a risk by reaching out to those big players in your niche.

Then, as you grow and become wildly successful because of your new efforts, you’ll smile inside knowing that some big bad villain at their laptop somewhere is crying because their diabolical plan to ruin you and all the good you stand for has failed—big time.

At that point you could pat yourself on the back.

Congratulations! You have successfully turned that negative comment into a HUGE positive.

much love,

Ollin

Have you ever received a negative comment from someone?

How did you handle it?

Filed Under: Blogging, Community Building Tagged With: , , , , ,
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