Blogging

What is a Website Silo?

February 9, 2011 By Troy Rutter 1 Comment

Question: What is a website silo? Is it just another word for categories?

A website silo is a type of format for websites and blogs that categorizes its contents in distinct silos, or categories, and confines each piece of content (pages, posts, etc) to those silos. In addition, each silo has its own page that links to the various topics within.

By using silos on your website, you can keep your content organized, and help your search engine ranking by offering the search engines a clean “path” to indexing the content on your website. Silos are not only physical categories on your website, they also help you organize your thoughts, pages and posts into easy-to-follow areas your site visitors can quickly navigate.

Let’s look at an example website on apples.

You might have the following main categories:

type of apples
apple recipes
growing apples
apple news

Those are your silos They are usually your main topics that are listed (sometimes as dropdowns) in your navigation menus.

Each of those silos also has its own page. That page has links to all the articles underneath it.

For instance, the apple recipes silo might have articles on apple pie, apple crumb cake, cinnamon apples, and caramel apples. The main index page would contain links to all of those other sub-topics or even individual articles. The page can be in list form in a pinch, but doing so in a narrative (paragraph) format will help boost your SEO rankings.

Each article, such as apple crumb cake, would link back to the main silo of apple recipes, using the term “apple recipes” as the linking text.

Cross-linking between silos isn’t forbidden, but usually everything underneath a particular silo will link upwards, but not across categorizes.

Using a silo format on your blog/website helps keep your posts and pages within their categories, which is said to also help search engine relevancy.

Filed Under: Ask the Blogger, Blogging, Categories, Writing

My Topic Isn’t Unique. Should I Still Blog About It?

January 26, 2011 By Troy Rutter Leave a Comment

Question: I have an idea for a blog that is something I am really interested in. But there are already a lot of blogs, some of them really popular, on the same topic. Should I even try?

First of all – YES!

But your question does bring up some questions of its own. Namely the big one – what is your goal in blogging?

Defining your goal is one of the keys to your happiness and sanity. If your goal is just to make money blogging, then you will get disappointed very quickly. Building a blog up to the point where it creates a steady income takes years, and success is definitely not guaranteed. If on the other hand your goal is just to talk about what you are passionate about, and if it makes some extra income that’s great – you will find that a lot more rewarding.

Looking at a topic and finding heavy competition is definitely tough. Think about all the blogs on how to do blogging. There are hundreds if not thousands of blogs on that topic, and many are written by the top powerhouses who have books, products, programs and more. But they all had to start somewhere.

What gives your blog its uniqueness isn’t only the topic – it’s your voice. You are unique. You have your own personal spin on what you are trying to say, and your own take on the information. Two people given the same material and information will present it in two completely separate ways. And the one who presents it in the most unique way will probably come out on top.

I have written a book on a subject completely different than blogging. It was a grueling process. Every time I thought I was done, I took the chapter I just wrote, broke it in half and then added to it so each of those halves were its own chapter. Little by little I built up the book. It took over a year just to write! I didn’t write the book because I was looking for a big pay-day. I didn’t write the book because I thought I “had to”. I wrote the book because I needed to. Not needed as in money, needed as it was burning in my soul. Writers need to write!

By the same token – bloggers need to blog! I consistently see people who have tried to start a blog and after a couple of months have given up. I don’t call them bloggers. There was no need for them to start their own blog. They started their blog because they thought it was just part of the process of making money. There was no passion.

If you wake up in the morning and feel you “have to” do a blog post today – do the Internet a favor and stop blogging now.

But if you are truly passionate about your topic – get out there and do it! Who cares if there are 10-20-200 blogs on the same topic out there… put your own spin on it. Participate on those other blogs (don’t forget to put your own website link in your signature or comment!) and enjoy talking about your topic your way and on your own terms.

Yes, if you want to grow your blog, eventually you will need to examine your processes, your visitors, advertisers, and all of the things that move your blog out of infancy to the next level. But you need to get your feet wet first, and if you are doing it just for the money – that money will probably never come.

Bottom line – it doesn’t matter how many blogs there are on a topic, if you enjoy the topic, enjoy writing about the topic, have your own voice, and don’t really care about the money right now – then you have a great start on a blog already. Get out there and start writing.

Filed Under: Ask the Blogger, Blogging, Content, Copywriting, Make Money Blogging, niche blogs, Writing

Should I Outsource My Blog Content?

January 25, 2011 By Troy Rutter 4 Comments

Question: I’ve read a lot of prominent bloggers outsource their blog content. Is this really a viable method of generating content and should I try it?

Ever since Tim Ferriss told the world how he practically outsourced his life in his book The Four Hour Work Week, outsourcing content and design for blogs and websites has seen an incredible explosion popularity. It sounds great – pay someone else a low fee per article and receive content to put on your website or blog at regular intervals. Even better – pay a one-time fee and receive 10 or 20 articles so they can be scheduled on your blog while you take a vacation to the Bahamas.

Sounds almost too good to be true, doesn’t it?

There are two main reasons to outsource your content. First, your blog is insanely popular and you just can’t keep up with the amount of content being requested from your readers. Your reader’s contact you constantly about writing an article on this topic or that topic, and you simply don’t have the time to keep up with all of them. You need help and you need it now. The other reason is the opposite: You just don’t have any ideas for more content and you need someone fresh to come up with new ideas.

Both of these aren’t necessarily good reasons.

A Voice Is Unique

Many people enjoy a good impression. But no impression can fully copy the original. For a blog to be successful, it needs its own voice. That voice can only come from the blog’s regular writers. You can set as many guidelines for the article as you want, but chances are it will have a feel all its own. Your readers want to hear from you – not a paid article or blog post writer. While you can outsource your posts, you can’t outsource your voice.

You Win Some, You Lose Some

Even Tim Ferriss notes in his book how every virtual assistant he used wasn’t the best. If you outsource your content, you may get back articles that are completely worthless or need a lot of revision. Worse, you may google a couple sentences and find the article was lifted word-for-word from another website, blog, or published article. Since you prepay for the writer to supply the article, there is usually no recourse or way to not-approve the article. It’s money down the drain.

For A New Blog, It Isn’t Cost Effective

For new blogs starting out, outsourcing content seems like the perfect starting place. And if you have a healthy budget it may be just the thing to get your blog started. But article writing is not necessarily cheap, and you have to weight whether or not that blog post or article will make the return on investment you made in having it written. If a blog post cost $5, will that post actually make your blog $5? For new blogs, probably not. The posts may bring in traffic, however, and that traffic can eventually and indirectly make that return on investment you paid – but it isn’t 100% trackable.

Still Want To Outsource?

If you still want to outsource your blog’s content, make sure you subscribe to this site’s feed. We are planning another post to help you through the common pitfalls of outsourcing to improve your chances of receiving quality articles and blog posts from your writers.

Filed Under: Ask the Blogger, Blogging, Content, Outsourcing Tagged With: blog posts, elance, odesk, outsourcing, tim ferris

Help! I’m Still Not Getting Relevant Adsense Ads!

January 19, 2011 By Troy Rutter 1 Comment

Question: I would like to know how to put ads on my blog that relate to my interests. I speak of daily things that happen in my life, my love for cooking, my family, etc. I have even mentioned some sites that I order from like Amazon UK, I am also selling a property. Yet I only get stupid non-related ads! How do I fix this? I don’t even know how to get people to follow my blog. Help! Thanks. – Luisa

Even after following all the advice in my post about Why Aren’t My Adsense Ads Relevant, it is very likely you will still see what you consider non-relevant ads appearing on your blog. Especially given the varied topics covered by your site.

Luisa gave me the actual blog address, and I spent some time looking at the topics, structure, hosting, and of course the google adsense ads being displayed. Here is what I found out.

Having a blogspot URL/domain name can trigger ads for blog software, autoresponse software, mailing list software, etc. just by having the term “blog” in the domain name.
Several little things boil down to one big truism when it comes to personal blogs like yours:

Personal blogs by their very nature do not make the best blogs to put adsense on.

The topics are too varied, the scope of the site is too large, and google gets confused about what your blog is actually about. Unless you are Wil Wheaton, Justin Bieber or a celebrity, personal blogs are one of the toughest to get started, obtain readers, and obtain advertising.

Why don’t advertisers like personal blogs?

Easy – visitors to personal blogs are not as likely to actually click on the ads and buy something. The audience for a personal blog is comprised of a completely different mindset than those who visit a niche topic blog and who may be ready to buy or research a product. Visitors to a personal blog come to read your experiences and stories. The visitors to a niche blog on say paraplegic skydivers are there to not only read the author’s topical posts, but perhaps to book their next adventure, buy equipment, read reviews, etc.

Two completely different audiences.

That is not to say a personal blog is looked down upon, or a personal blog is not “worth” doing – not at all. You just have to be honest with yourself that a personal blog is not generally not going to achieve the type of monetary success an actual niche blog would have. If I were in your position, I would remove all the adsense ads from your personal blog and start up another blog just about your cooking passion. Link from your personal blog over to your cooking one. Place adsense ads on the cooking one and see what happens.

Chances are your cooking blog, since it is more focused, will attract more visitors. Once they get to know you there, they may jump to your personal blog and get to know you on a different level. You might also consider going deeper with your cooking blog and focus on a particular style of cuisine.

Personal or general topic blogs are extremely hard to monetize, I hope this gives you some guidance.

Filed Under: Blogging, Google Adsense, Make Money Blogging, niche blogs

What is a Blog Editorial Calendar and Do I Need One?

January 7, 2011 By Troy Rutter 1 Comment

Question: What is a blog editorial calendar? Do I need one?

An editorial calendar is a tool many professional bloggers use to keep track of and organize their daily blog posts. It can be as simple as a grid of post-it notes on the wall or as intricate as an Excel spreadsheet. A dated Excel sheet, but a good resource can be found on Andy Wibbels’s blog.

The month is broken down into days, and each day is assigned a particular category of blog posts to help the blogger think of topics for that particular day. Underneath the days are different blog topics you have written or intend to write.

Another page on the spreadsheet could contain all of your blog ideas for future posts. When you are ready to write and publish a post, it goes from one spreadsheet to another.

Many bloggers don’t use an editorial calendar, but it can definitely be useful if you are having trouble finding a blog topic for a particular day or to keep track of possible topics for future posts.

Organizing different blog topics for different days can help overcome the dreaded “what am I going to write today” obstacle. For instance, on a web design blog you might have assigned the following topics to the days of the week:

Monday: jQuery examples
Tuesday: Site of the day
Wednesday: Tips and Tricks
Thursday: Cool Tools
Friday: News from around the web
Saturday: Off
Sunday: Off

Categorizing your main toipics this way will help direct your posting, plus it will also provide consistency for your readers.

Whether you use a formal editorial calendar or its all in your head, breaking your blog into definite categories for different days of the week can greatly increase your producitity.

Filed Under: Blogging, Content, Writing Tagged With: blog posts, Blogging, calendar, word press

How Do I Jump Start My New Blog?

January 4, 2011 By Troy Rutter Leave a Comment

Question: How do I jump start my new blog? I feel like it’s just me.

Starting a new blog is always an uphill battle. According to WordPress.com, there are tens of thousands of new blogs started every day – that is a lot of competition. The fact of the matter is, until you build up a following, you may actually be the only one reading your blog, but don’t let that get you down.

Start with your inner circle of friends and colleagues. Let them know about your blog. Whether it is a personal blog or a company blog – you need to get the word out. Put it in your email signature (careful about putting personal blogs in your company signature!), make sure you send out a tweet on twitter every time you make a post, post it on your Facebook profile – whatever you need to do. Let people know.

A great way to get more readers is to create a facebook fan page for your blog. Some bloggers use their personal facebook page as their blog “landing page” but you can create one for your blog as well. By creating a facebook fan page, you will be listed and searchable in the directory giving you access to millions of potential readers.

Another great way to get your blog out there is to do video blog entries, or at the very least a video describing your blog, and upload it to youtube.com. Remember to put a link to your blog in the description and your profile so people can click and get to your blog easily. Doing regular video blog entries and successfully using categories and tagging will drive readers from youtube to your blog and will be very targeted traffic.

Above all – write great content! The first second of someone finding your blog are crucial and can mean the difference of them coming back or leaving for good. Good content – GREAT content – is a surefire way to get people not only reading your blog but spreading your link for you.

This is an important point. You can do all the promotion you want for your blog. You can spend money on advertising, widgets for trade shows, and more. But if you don’t provide good content, it all doesn’t matter.

So don’t worry if it is “only you” when writing your blog. A successful blogger not only writes on their blog, but also is out there on the Internet promoting their blog and adding value to other people’s blogs. Being active in your niche is one of the most important things to remember. It isn’t all about your blog, its about reaching your readers no matter whose blog or website they are on. Be an active participant and people will find you.

As well as the search engines.

Filed Under: Ask the Blogger, Being Successful Online, Blogging, Content, Increasing Website Traffic, Online success, Video Blogging, Writing

5 Ways To Make Money Blogging in 2011

December 29, 2010 By Troy Rutter 7 Comments

It’s every blogger’s dream – to make a living blogging. But the odds are against the part-time blogger making even the smallest payout from Google adsense their first year (if ever.) So how do you beat the odds? These tips should help

Find Your Own Advertisers

Putting up an advertising space saying “advertise here” is not going to get you anywhere. You may think advertisers should be trampling each other for that above-the-fold 125×125 ad on your homepage, but chances are it will never come. So go to them. If you don’t have a rate card for your the spots you are selling then you better make one fast. An ad for $30/mo. is still $30 more a month you didn’t have.

Find a local angle to the niche your blog is about. If you are writing about “silver lab puppies” seek out a local breeder specializing in that type of dog. Likewise, if you have a more general blog such as “sailboarding” you may not have a sailboarding shop near you, but chances are you might have a local sports or outdoor supply store that sells life jackets.

Just because you have a “national” focus does not mean you can only have national advertisers. I hope you are active in your local blogging and twitter community and follow (and are followed by) other people in your area. They are probably reading your blog regardless of content. There is always a local advertiser you can hit up for some exposure. It’s great if they have a shopping cart and ship nationally or internationally, but even if they don’t – they may be interested in advertising.

Bottom line: don’t wait for advertisers to find you, go out and find some.

Post A Product Review

There must be a product or two on Amazon.com you can promote with an affiliate link. I’m not talking some random product but a product you actually use and would not hesitate to recommend. Look it up on Amazon and lin kto it with your affiliate ID. If you don’t have an amazon affiliate account – get one. Now. Seriously.

Some people do review sites for the sole purpose of making money through affiliate programs. Some are successful, most are not. So if you really love a product, review it. If you tried multiple products that are related, compare and contrast them. Some of the best performing blog posts are comparisons of similar products. An example might be The Flip video camera vs the Kodak Zi8. You aren’t just copying the description from amazon, you are doing an honest-to-goodness comparison you yourself have tried.

THAT is authenticity.

Review Your Adsense Stats

I admit it, I don’t spend nearly enough time figuring out google adsense placements and performance. I log into adsense, check my balance and then look at it again in a few hours. Repeat throughout the day.

But there is a lot of information waiting to be mined. Like everything it takes time and effort. Look at your pages and figure out the best placements for your ads. Maybe all of your ads are in the same place on every page – maybe not. Try testing different placments and sizes. It will take a while to get the relevant stats, but once you hit upon the formula for your site, it can mean the difference of tens or hundreds of dollars a day.

Review A Site or Product for $5

This one is a bit controversial so stay with me. There is a great web site called fiverr.com. On it you can buy (or sell) practically anything for $5. Everything from a phone call impersonating Kermit the Frog, to a picture of your dog posted in the middle of Tokyo’s biggest street.

One of the ways people used to make money on their blogs was through a site called ReviewMe. It’s still around, but you had to be selected by an advertiser based on your traffic, and personally I made about $20 in 2006, then nothing.

But on fiverr, not only can you sell a “review” but you can also just sell a link if you want. Now, if you want to remain reputable you would include the proper attribution such as “Sponsored Post” before your blog post, or s a similar disclaimer letting people know you are getting something in return for reviewing or linking to the site. Go ahead and search fiverr for some other ideas.

The Donation Button

We’ve all seen them, and most of us hate them, but in this day and age, who cares. The old “tip jar” is a viable way for your readers to make a donation to your site. Even Adam Curry supports his podcasts The Daily Source Code and No Agenda through listener donations. Yo may never see the $1,000 donations Adam sometimes sees for his show, but you might make a few dollars a month. PayPal makes an easy Donation button that gives you an embed code you can just copy and then paste into your blog.

Of course the biggest way to make money blogging in 2011…

Keep writing great content. Write regularly, write well, write write write. There is no shortcut for great content. Great rewards come with great work. If you only give a few minutes or hours for blogging a day, then that is what you are going to get out of it. A great blog requires a lot of work. Making a good income with your blog likewise requires a lot of work – but it is possible.

Here’s to a profitable 2011!

Filed Under: Ask the Blogger, Being Successful Online, Blogging, Content, Google Adsense, Make Money Blogging, Professional Blogging, Writing

What Is A Niche Blog?

December 23, 2010 By Troy Rutter Leave a Comment

Question: I’ve been hearing the term “niche blog” a lot lately, sometimes good and sometimes bad. What is a niche blog?

Great question!

If you are new to blogging, you may hear about “finding your niche.” In fact, most blog mentors advise people to start with a niche they enjoy, and grow their blog from there. Sounds great, doesn’t it! It is… but that isn’t the kind of niche blog being talked about these days.

Today, the term “niche blog” is used a lot of times to refer to what used to be called “MFA” or “Made For Adsense Blogs.” These are blogs on a super niche topic used only to put up SEO content to rank high for keywords, so they can earn adsense revenue from people coming to the site.

By having no real content, when a visitor arrives at the site, they will more than likely want to leave right away. The best way to do that is through the google ads presented on the page. In this way, MFA or niche blogs are very popular with the types of bloggers who want to “get rich quick.”

There are many themes catering to this niche blogs easily and quickly. By purchasing a developer license from the theme’s creator, the niche blog author can use the same theme over and over again on hundreds or thousands of different niche blogs.

Some people claim niche blogs have a short shelf-life, making money quickly at first and then falling off. Others say they their niche sites earn as much today as they did 6 months or a year ago. One thing is for certain though, you have to produce a lot of niche sites just to be sure your income stream is not depleted should one or two stop earning revenue.

If you are running a true “niche blog” then really it is just a blog. Mentioning you run a niche blog may get some strange reactions from others in forums, especially if there are those who think niche blogs are spamming the Internet.

Filed Under: Ask the Blogger, Blogging, niche blogs, Writing

How can I manage my posts from the main page?

December 21, 2010 By Troy Rutter Leave a Comment

Question: How could I manage my news or posts , from main page, without wasting time editing HTML code.Is there any widget or code that makes it possible?

It sounds like maybe you are editing your website or blog the “old fashioned” way – with hand (or computer) coded HTML and CSS code. The best solution I can offer is simply:

Convert your site to WordPress.

With WordPress, your front page can automatically show the “latest posts” similar to the way the latest questions are presented here on asktheblogger.com.

In previous years, people would make a website based on HTML files, and then have a separate blog. This is no longer necessary. WordPress themes can have different styled pages within themselves, making the need for a separate website and blog a thing of the past.

But if you do still have your blog “secluded” from your website, there are several widgets available that will allow you to enter in the feed address of your blog, and by pasting a special code into your HTML file, it will automatically display the last 5-whatever entries.

One of my favorites is called rssinclude and you can find it here.

You just enter in your blog’s feed and you can customized how it will look when embedded on your site. You will then be given a code snippet you just insert into your page and voila! Instant feed.

If I misunderstood your question, please feel free to resubmit it. And thanks for visiting asktheblogger.com!

Filed Under: Blogging, RSS

How Long Should A Blog Post Be?

December 18, 2010 By Troy Rutter Leave a Comment

Question: How long should a blog post be?

The easy answer is – as long as it needs to be!

Some people follow a strict formula of X many words, with a keyword phrase mentioned Y times, and a photo at the beginning, etc etc. But what really matters is:

What are you trying to say?

Remember, people are reading your blog because they have an interest in what you are saying. Blog the awesome. Don’t supplement your blog with uninteresting babble about being home sick with the flu – you are writing a blog about something.

Some of the best blog posts are less than 150 words. If you have something major to say, then by all means, go for the 1,000 words and more mark! A blog’s length should not be dictated by a formula or a strict set of rules.

Say what you are trying to say, the best way you can say it.

That being said, there is a style of blog writing that is easier for readers to digest.

Details on that coming up in a later post here on asktheblogger.com.

Filed Under: Blogging, Writing