Advertising Your Blog

"The importance of your site is based on how many other sites link to yours and how important those sites are." (Professional Blogging for Dummies)

Now that you have set up your blog, it's time to get the word out.  Start by telling your family, friends and business associates.  Make a business card with your blog address.  My card says "Writer" with a picture of a typewriter in the background.  Send a mass e-mail sharing the details.  Include a link to your blog in your e-mail signature.  Advertise your blog on your website.  If you have a business blog, give a brief description of it in your company boilerplate (a brief description at the end of a news release).

Set up an ego search online which lets you know when your blog is mentioned or linked to other blogs.  Set up a Google Alert search of a topic that you blog about.  You can even do a Google Alert for your own name.  Link to other blogs regularly.  Leave comments on other blogs to identify yourself as part of the blogosphere.  Remember to keep your comments relevant and new, rather than just repeating what other readers have written.  Make sure to mention if you have a personal interest in the topic.  Comment on topics that have no interest to you twice as much as topics that do, thereby showing you have no immediate value in doing so.  Remember to reread your comment for errors and tone before your click Send.

Social media is an excellent way to promote your blog.  As of 2010, Facebook already had five million active viewers.  You can set up a like button on your Facebook page.  Similarly, you can set up a Like button on your blog which can link back to your Facebook page.  Read Facebook for Dummies (http://www.amazon.ca/Facebook-For-Dummies-Carolyn-Abram/dp/1118633121) by Leah Perlman and Carolyn Abram for more information.  You can also share your blog on Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn or Google Plus as I do when I write a new post.

Try writing a guest blog for someone else.  A one time deal might only drive your traffic up temporarily but if you do it on a regular basis ex. once a month, you'll likely see a lasting increase in your blog hits.

Another way Internet surfers can find your blog is through keywords.  Google analytics can tell you the keywords people use to find your blog based on algorithms, proximity, frequency and page rank. Sometimes, the strangest keywords come up ex. kosher clowns, ghetto chicken head, pregnant man or yellow balloon cake.  It is a good practice to get into to include keywords at the end of your blog. However, remember that people read your blog for its tone, not for its keywords.


For more information, visit http://www.thesitsgirls.com/make-money/30-ways-to-grow-your-blog/.

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Why Success Often Begins With Failure

"Behind every success story is an embarrassing first effort, a stumble, a setback, a radical change in direction." (Amy Crawford)

Think back to your child's first steps.  I know when Thomas learned to walk, he didn't just decide to take off one day.  He started with rolling over...crawling...pulling himself to a standing position... furniture walking...and then taking off for a Christmas stocking hanging on the door knob.  

It's the same with riding a bike.  When Jacqueline first learned to ride a bike, we took her to the church parking lot.  She rode around it several times on her training wheels.  One day, Thomas took the training wheels off her bicycle and she rode on the grass beyond the parking lot (just in case she wiped out).  After some wobbling, she started to balance on the bicycle.  The next day, she took off across the parking lot.  

Failure is an essential part of success.  And yet we try so hard to avoid it.  Seth Fiegerman discovered this to be true after graduating from New York University, landing a research editor job at Playboy, and promptly being laid off.  While at the magazine, he had discovered archives interviews with celebrities from Marlon Brando to Malcolm X.  The common thread in most of the interviews was how the celebrities turned their failures into successes.  

Seth realized that perseverance, not innate talent, was each celebrities most important asset.  He started a website, OpeningLines.org, illustrating the origin's of famous people's careers.  In the meantime, the unemployed writer was able to secure a job at a tech news website.

Thomas Edison, more than most, knew the value of failure.  Failure was what led to many of his 2,332 inventions including the incandescent light bulb.  The inventor explained that:  "Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up."  

It seems like the only failure is in giving up, or in not trying in the first place.  Whether your task is something as unusual as inventing a light bulb, or as commonplace as learning how to walk, the key is to embrace failure...until you succeed.

For more information, read http://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/why-the-best-success-stories-often-begin-with-failure-3851517/.

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