Ideas for Writing Blog Posts

December 2, 2011 By

Today’s post was supposed to be on how I managed to quadruple traffic to my blog in one night, but that article is still in the works. It’s a bit more detailed than I originally thought, and it’s taking longer then I expected. So while I’m working on that, I thought I’d give you one that will help you with your own blog, in the meantime.

Ever find yourself falling short on ideas for writing blog posts?

Here’s a handful of ideas that have helped me come up with new content for my blog when I hit a block. Read More

Filed Under: Writing

What do I look for in a blog?

November 28, 2011 By

It’s not often that I’ll add a new blog to my reading list, but when I do, I’m looking for interesting content, well written articles, an active community, the ability for readers to leave comments and bloggers who actually respond to their readers comments.

Click here for a list of blogs I read almost daily.

Filed Under: Writing

Thinking of Starting a Blog?

October 19, 2011 By

A while back a friend of mine emailed me and asked me about setting up a simple blog style website. Since I’ve built hundreds of personal websites from scratch over the years, his question got me thinking and I decided to write this article about starting a blog site.

Typically when someone is shopping for a blog website, I ask a few qualifying questions, such as budget, goals and target market. I also explain that just having a website is not going to do much, unless you are actively promoting it, with money and time. Most people are looking at their shoes at this point because they haven’t yet done any research of their own and don’t know what they’re getting into.

Understanding that some people are extremely gifted when it comes to promoting and marketing a business, but may not be very technically inclined, while others may understand the basics about blogging and even social media, yet know very little about sound business promotion techniques, I encourage people, especially those on a limited budget to hire and expert in these areas, to educate themselves and do as much of the work on their own as possible. Many people try, most fail and it’s typically due to lack of preparation and lack of motivation that are the cause.

With that in mind…

Click here to continue reading

Filed Under: Writing Tagged With:

Where to Get Ideas for Writing

October 18, 2011 By
Man it’s not true that you can just start banging away on your keyboard and ideas will eventually pop into your head to write about. Sometimes there’s no choice but to just smack your head on the desk in defeat, open World of Warcraft and start killin Ally’s.

Today I grilled some steaks wearing shorts and tank top, it was 65 and sunny. Learned a new Spanish word (motivado) which is pretty close to the English word motivated. Funny how learning that word in Spanish doesn’t really help me get motivated to work.

As you can see, I’m just writing blather at the moment because nothing meaningful is coming to mind, and I really need to come up with something to write on my blog and newsletter. It’s been a couple weeks since I’ve written anything worth reading, and I want to keep my readers interested.

With that in mind, there is always a few places I like to go to get ideas for new content. Old emails is one of my favorites. I am constantly bombarded with questions, some related to what I do, others not so much, but I always prepare a well thought out response to every question I’m asked via email.

This can sometimes lead to an excellent jumping off point from where I can start an interesting article.

Quickly digressing back to my opening statement for a moment, that is absolutely false what I wrote. It was a thought that was gobbing up space in my brain so I spewed it out onto this page to get things going, and as a result I came up with not one, but two compelling articles. Yes banging away on the keyboard and pitching out junk leads to great content. Sometimes it happens fast, other times it takes a while, but it always works.

Back to my main point, finding ideas for writing good content, or content that people will read, whether it’s good or not :D . Old emails are usually my first, but not my only source for ideas. I also maintain several online profiles at some interesting online communities, or message boards if you prefer, where I’m actively seeking out questions, in need of answering, on topics that I know well. This is a great source of ideas for articles as well as a very effective form of online marketing.

So out of frustration of having nothing to write I managed to scribble down a couple of ideas that might help some of the readers of this blog. After all, ultimately my goal is to help others, through educating and / or entertaining them with interesting information.

Please feel free to leave questions / comments below. Your interaction is much appreciated.

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