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Written By Steven Porter

Here are the top 10 blogs that you can learn from

www.problogger.net
www.johnchow.com
www.shoemoney.com
www.dailyblogtips.com
www.techcrunch.com
www.tylercruz.com
www.dailyblogtips.com
www.winningtheweb.com
www.bloggingfingers.com
www.copyblogger.com

So check out any of the top 10 blogs and you will find hundreds of tips to help your blog.

Steven Porter

This article is the second part of “The Most Important Characteristic of A Successful Blog”. If you have not read this article, I would like to recommend you to read it first. Ok, as what I have said in the end of the previous article, “Everyone can blog, but not everyone can blog correctly”, here I would like to point out certain major common mistakes that I have observed in most of the blogs. These mistakes are lethal and these mistakes are the reasons why most of the blogs are not successful.

Firstly, I have observed that many people are rushing to earn money and they chose to monetize their blogs right from the start. Which means, the blog has non or very little content, but is full with advertisements such as Google Adsense. Let’s think logically, if you are the visitors, what will you think? I will think that the author is not sincere in sharing information, the author is just want to make money out of me! Do you agree? There, in my honest opinion, I think that a blog should not have any advertisement, or at least minimize the advertisement until the blog is established, full with concrete content. This shows your sincerity. So please keep in mind, do not monetize your blog which has no content and no traffic at all, this will waste your time and your blog will never succeed.

Secondly, many people think that they are Search Engine Optimization professional and make a blog that is highly laden with keywords. It is good to optimize your blog to get high ranking in search engine. However, most people have done the same mistake – they make the blog for search engine, not human! What I mean here is the whole article is laden with keywords, which makes the whole article unreadable, or confusing. Visitors do not like to be shown this kind of content, what they want are useful facts, not keywords! So, my suggestion is to make your blog for human not for search engine, not for Yahoo!, not for Google and not for MSN. Write articles according to your feeling, do not forcefully add in keywords.

Many people may think that if they do not do SEO, and create articles full with keywords, then they will not be able to get traffic. No… you are wrong. I would like to tell you that SEO is bad if you are using it wrongly. You should create readable and useful content. By doing this, your credibility and your authority will increase, visitors will increase too. Your blog may be reviewed by other people, and hence you will slowly build backlinks, which will eventually increase your ranking. Can you get the main idea here? If you are writing your content correctly, then eventually you will get good ranking.
So, in conclusion, do not rush to earn money in the beginning. Slowly develop your blog and create good content. Content in King, I’m sure that everyone knows this.http://bestinternetblogs.com

Do you need a website to be successful on the Internet? If you don’t have a website and you’re trying to make money on the web this question is probably foremost in your mind.

The answer is no!

There are other ways to make money such as becoming an affiliate for various products. Becoming an affiliate simple means advertising other peoples products and receiving a commission for each sale you make. There are numerous ways to do this, you can sign up at Clickbank and sell digital downloads. Commission Junction, they have numerous items you can sell. Stores such as Walmart, Sears, and most other stores have affiliate programs. Do you need a website. No.

Ebay is another way of making money, buy low and sell high, drop shipping, or sell downloadable products like ebooks. Is it easy? No! Why? Unless you have an unusual item or can buy items in large quantities at low cost the competition will wipe you out.

Do you need a website? Again the answer is no.

Would you a better chance of earning on the Internet if you had a website? Why of course you would. How many of the guru’s were successful without just one but many websites? They have a site for every product they sell. You could sell affiliate items on your site, direct ebayers to your site, or sell your own creations on your site.

What do you have to do or learn to make your own websites? Programming? Scripts? Uploading? C-Panel? Going round in circles? Pulling your hair out? The yelling? The screaming? Wooooow! Sure seems complicated. Not any more. There’s an easy way.

Profitmatic is here. I recently found this fantastic program and it’s like a weight was lifted from my shoulders. If someone had told me a program like this existed I wouldn’t have believed them. It’s so eeeasy to use. I’ve been building websites so fast I even amazed myself. Profitmatic is the answer to my prayers. I decide on a product or subject and a half hour later I have a site ready to go. No uploading, no FTP to figure out. It’s absolutely amazing.

Other benefits with this fantastic program include unlimited hosting and unlimited websites. You can build, and build, and build some more. Forms, links, html, no problem, it’s all included and they also have a great referral and profit sharing program. The creators of Profitmatic put in all the bells and whistles so a complete novice can have the whole program figured out so fast he or she will go to bed smiling.

Want to include adsense? It’s easy. Photo’s, images? No problem. Want your own list? Put a sign up on all your sites. Piece of cake. If that’s not enough you can even try it for 14 days free. That’s 2 whole weeks to check out all the features. But I must warn you, if you try it, you’ll like it, and you won’t want to give it up.

About The Author

Doug Sheridan enjoys researching and writing informational articles and testing various programs and software offered on the internet. Here is his review of the website software “Profitmatic”. To see the software capabilities go to: http://zzd.in/profitmatic

Copyright © 2005 Priya Shah
http://www.priyashah.com

Blogging is the latest buzzword in online marketing and PR.

But with so many marketers jumping on the blogging bandwagon, few people are giving a thought to whether blogs are really up their alley, or taking the time to consider the best ways of going about it.

If you are planning to start a business blog, ask yourself these questions before you take the final plunge.

1. Do you really need a blog?

Writing and maintaining a blog takes a certain degree of commitment, as well as a passion (or at least a liking) for stringing words into a decent sentence. If you don’t enjoy writing that much, you could always create an audio or video blog.

But would your business objectives really be served by starting a blog? Or could other methods of online marketing - like SEO, ezine advertising or newsletter publishing work just as well, if not better?

2. Whom do you want to reach with your blog?

The first step to reaching your audience is understanding where they go to find information about your products.

If your audience largely consists of people who live in your town or use products that they search for in the newspapers, offline advertising might be more suited to your purpose.

If however, your target audience belongs to one or more of these segments, a blog might be just the thing to boost your business.

- Internet users

Does your target audience really use the internet? If not, then starting a blog (or any online activity, for that matter) will just be a huge waste of time and effort.

- Blog readers

Does your target audience read blogs? Or do they prefer to get their information in their inbox? If the latter is true, then an email newsletter might be a better option than a blog.

- Search engine users

A blog is an excellent way to boost your search engine rankings and get listed for a lot of your target keywords. If you know that your audience uses search engines to find information, a blog will increase your chances of getting their attention.

3. What do you want to achieve with your blog?

There are a lot of things that a blog can do for your business. Blogs can help you -

- Increase your visibility and search engine rankings

- Brand yourself, your products, your services, your company

- Build a community and network with people who have similar interests

- Expand your reach to those outside your current sphere of influence

- Establish your credibility as an expert or thought-leader in your field

- Put a human face on your business

- Reach out to potential customers and stakeholders

Deciding exactly what you want to achieve with your blog can help you get focused, so that you can spend your time and effort in activities that help, not hinder your business objectives.

4. How much time can you spend on your blog?

Serious business bloggers not only spend time writing their own blogs, but also spend a great deal of time reading up on current events and browsing other blogs in their field for information.

If you are prepared to put in the time and effort required to do that sort of research, your blog will serve as a good branding tool for your business.

If not, you should either hire someone to do the research or seriously rethink your decision to start a blog.

5. What blogging platform will serve your needs best?

Deciding your blogging platform is an important step that you should take only after becoming familiar with the features and benefits of each option.

The reason it is so crucial is because it can be extremely difficult to migrate an established blog to a new platform once you have started it. Moving your blog can result in you losing your data, search engine listings and readers, so don’t take this decision lightly.

Decide which platform will best meet your marketing objectives, time constraints and personal preferences before you make your first post.

According to T.L. Pakii Pierce who writes at “How to Blog for Fun & Profits!” http://blogforfunandprofit.blogware.com, if you are short of time, and want to spend more time writing, then a hosted solution like Blogger, Blogware, Squarespace or Typepad might serve your purpose better.

This might also prove a better option if you want to get started as soon as possible, are new to the internet, or are unfamiliar with scripts or code.

If, on the other hand, you’re a control freak (like me) and don’t mind spending some time and effort to customize your blog, then a server-installed software, like Wordpress, b2Evolution or Movable Type might be just right for you.

If you don’t want to install the scripts yourself, choose a hosting solution with Fantastico, which comes with a one-click install of a number of blogging software.

6. How do you plan to promote your blog?

Why is it good to know this before you start your blog? Because it will help you decide where best to invest your time and effort when you need to build traffic to your blog.

You’ll learn more about the methods to promote your blog when you subscribe to the email course below. Some of these tasks can be outsourced, while others you would have to do yourself.

Decide what you want to take on and look out for service providers to handle the other functions so you can start building traffic to your blog as soon as possible.

7. How will you assess the success of your blog?

To determine how successful your blog is in boosting your profile or profits you will have to measure your blog traffic and track sales or leads that have come through it.

Planning this in advance will help you take more informed decisions about your blogging metrics, choice of blogging platform and degree of customization you require on your blog.

Understand that blogging is not for everyone. It’s just another form of communication.

Don’t get so hung up on the technology that you end up ignoring more appropriate ways of communicating your message.

Some things may be easier to communicate face to face, in a conference room, or even through the good old telephone.

But if you asked yourself all the questions above and decided that blogging meets all your objectives, then a blog may be just what the doctor ordered for your business.

Priya Shah is a former journalist who writes on business blogging and publishes an internet marketing newsletter. Subscribe to her free eCourse on Blogging for Marketers