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Over on Twitter last week @ChrisGuthrie asked me – ‘At what point should you quit a blog and move onto the next project?’

It is a good question and one that I’m not sure that there is any single answer for – however I can certainly talk about what has led me to quit some of my previous blogs. There have been a variety of reasons – in fact in most cases it was more than one reason that led me to quit a blog. The reasons included:

1. Lack of Passion/Interest in the Topic – I went through a phase where I decided to choose topics to blog about that I thought would be profitable – rather than choosing things I had an actual interest in. After a few months of blogging on these topics I soon realize that I simply could not sustain them.
2. Lack of Traffic – there have been a few instances where I started blogging on certain topics that I did have some interest in – but which didn’t attract traffic. In one case I think it was because the niche was too narrow and people just were not searching for the topic, in another instance there was so much competition in the niche it was difficult to break into but in other instances I think it was probably more to do with my lack of passion for the topic shining through (people can tell if your heart isn’t really in it.
3. Lack of Profit – this one tends to flow out of a lack of traffic (which can flow out of a lack of passion….. see how they’re all linked?) but at times I’ve quit a blog simply because I couldn’t justify keeping it running for the amount of time I was putting into it.
4. Lack of Engagement/Lack of Personal Satisfaction – one of the blogs that I quit a couple of years ago actually got quite good traffic (mainly from search engines) and actually was quite profitable – however I found the idea of developing a blog purely for search traffic to be quite un-stimulating and unsatisfying. The lack of reader engagement and the fleeting visits from visitors didn’t really leave me feeling I was doing much that was worthwhile – I so I let the blog die to create blogs that were not only profitable but also hopefully more engaging.
5. Running out of Things to Say – this one relates to a few of the other reasons however is worth saying. I can recall one blog which I started which I simply couldn’t think of more than a handful of posts to write about. The niche was too narrow to really sustain it over the long haul.
6. The life of the Niche Ends – one of the first profitable blogs that I developed (in partnership with another blogger) was one on the Athens Olympic games. While it was an amazing experience to blog about it and it was a very profitable time in the lead up to and during the games – the niche simply ended. We could have possibly extended it with blogs on future Olympics but in the end we felt we could do better by concentrating on different niches.

I’m certain that other bloggers will have quit blogs for other reasons (please share yours below).

Two Extra Thoughts

There’s two more things I want to throw into this discussion:

Don’t Quit Too Early – One thing I do want to emphasize is that I think many bloggers quit blogs too quickly. Not every blog will be hugely profitably or get loads of traffic – however those that do often take quite a few months (if not a year or two) to start reaching their potential.

In having talked to thousands of bloggers over the last 6 or so years I’ve found that most bloggers who quit blogs tend to do it in the first 2-3 months. While you can get a bit of an indication on some factors in this time (factors like your own passion for the topic, whether there’s much to say about the topic etc) it is certainly not long enough time to expect your blog to have reached its traffic potential.

It takes time to build a profile, to get ranked by search engines and to develop an archive of useful content. In my experience 3 months is just the tip of the iceberg of a blogs potential. My own blogs have not really ‘taken off’ for at least a year to 18 months after launch.

It is OK to Quit – The other balancing factor that I’d throw into the mix is that it is ok to quit a blog. I’ve talked to a number of bloggers over the years who ended up feeling trapped by their blogs. They realized early on that the blog wasn’t getting traction and that they might not have had a real passion in their topic – but because they’d been writing content every day for it for a period of time they felt guilty in giving up on it. As a result they continued to blog for years to come despite knowing that it probably wasn’t worth doing.

Hanging in there an giving a blog time to grow is one thing – but continuing to blog on a blog that you know deep down isn’t really going anywhere it probably not a wise thing. In this case I’d be encouraging a blogger to consider either ending their blog, hiring or partnering with someone to help them blog or even selling their blog – all of these things will enable you to move onto something else that perhaps is a better fit for where you are.

Tomorrow: How to Quit Your Blog

In my next post I’m going to continue this train of thought and share a few options from my experience on HOW to quit a blog.

Post from: Blog Tips at ProBlogger.

When Should You Quit a Blog and Move On?

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When Should You Quit a Blog and Move On?

Dot Com Pho returns to Happy Pho for another excitement filled episode. This time we had seven people showed up to dine on a variety of Pho dishes (mostly consumed by Chef Aaron Koo AKA the new Stephen Fung). To makes thing even more happy, Michael Yurechko discovered that Happy Pho had wireless Internet access (not in the restaurant but nearby).

This episode of Dot Com Pho celebrates the heroes of entrepreneurship. Evan Carmichael came up a great idea for trading cards featuring famous entrepreneurs. The entrepreneurs were selected by 33 famous bloggers (of which I am one). The bloggers were asked to name their favorite entrepreneur. That entrepreneur is featured on the front of the card and the blogger who selected him is featured on the back.

All process from the the sales of Entrepreneur Heroes trading cards goes to Kiva. They will use the money to help entrepreneurs in third world countries. The Entrepreneur Heroes trading cards goes on sale in April. Pre-order your packs today and save 20% off the regular price – only $3.95 per pack of 5 cards instead of $4.95. There’s free shipping if you order three packs or more. In addition, you’ll receive a limited edition hologram gold Steve Jobs or Woz card for every three pack pre-order. There’s also a chance to win a baseball signed by the Woz. Watch the episode and then go buy some cards!

Discover the SECRETS I’ve Learned to go from zero a month to over $40,000 a month from blogging. Download Make Money Online with John Chow dot Com for FREE!

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Dot Com Pho – Entrepreneur Heroes Edition

Earlier in the week we looked at the importance of ‘niches’ when it comes to building profitable blogs. Today I want to extend the topic and gives the process that I tend to use when working out if I want to start a new blog in a particular niche. I hope you find it helpful.

Many factors will come into play when it comes to choosing a niche to blog about – but the following are those that I tend to pay most attention to:

1. Your Interest in the Topic

I started out blogging on topics that interested me – but as I began to see the potential to make money from my blogs began to experiment with topics that I had less interest in but which I thought would be profitable.

What I discovered in creating these blogs that had potential for profit, yet which I had little interest in, was that I couldn’t really sustain them. I had little to say on the topics and when I did write something I suspect that those who read my content could tell that it was a topic that I was not passionate about. As a result the traffic did not come, I did not become known for the topic, nobody linked up and the blogs were far from profitable.

On the flipside of this – the blogs that I did have an interest in and a passion for have flourished. My interest in the topic is not the only factor that made them successful but I suspect it is a fairly important one that underlies much of the success and profit that I’ve had.

One question to ask yourself in choosing a niche is ‘What are YOU about?’ Choosing a topic that reflects you means you’ll be in a position to be able to find enough to write about and you’ll write it in a way that engages with the topic and your readers.

2. The Popularity of the Topic

You can have all the interest in the world around a topic but if nobody else shares your interest you’re going to be fighting an uphill battle to build a blog that gets much traffic.

This doesn’t mean you need to choose the most popular topics going around – in fact they may not be a wise choice due to the competition also targeting those niches – however you will want to choose a niche that has some level of demand for content.

There are many ways to do research on this whether topics are popular – here are three that I use:

1. Google Trends – do some searches on Google trends for keywords around your niches (and compare them) and you’ll see whether the topic you’ve chosen has been growing or shrinking and how it compares to other topics.
2. Market Samurai – I’ve written about the potential ofhttp://www.marketsamurai.com/c/problogger(affiliate link but it gives you a free trial)tool for optimising posts on your blog for SEO – but it is also a useful research tool in looking at the popularity of topics – particularly the module that allows you to assess how many searches are being done on different tools in Google.
3. Your Local News Stand – perhaps one of the simplest ways to look for popular topics is to head to a local news stand and look at what publications are being sold there. Not only look at the topics of magazines – but check out what is being written about as hot topics IN the magazines and you might find an emerging sub-niche to focus upon.

Ultimately you’re looking for topics that people are interested in, passionate about, want to learn more on and/or that people want to talk about and interact in a community around. There is an unlimited number of topics and ways to tap into them. Watch TV, talk to your friends, head to a local library, read a newspaper – see what people are into and you could just identify a topic worth exploring.

3. Competition

One of the factors that I see some bloggers failing to acknowledge in the choosing of a niche is how much competition (and how strong the competition is) in their potential niche.

The danger in choosing some popular niches is that you might be competing against some very powerful sites in those niches. While this isn’t always going to be a factor to stop you exploring a niche it should definitely be considered and it can perhaps help you to shape your niche to be something that will give you a competitive advantage.

There are a variety of ways of assessing the strength of competition in niches.

One of the simplest is to simply do some searches on Google to look at how many sites exist for keywords on your topic. This won’t give you an indication of the power of the competition – but it will give you some indication on the ’size’ of competition and it will identify some sites that you will want to be monitoring.

Market Samurai (mentioned above) is one tool that can take your analysis a little deeper. As highlighted in my recent optimising posts on your blog for SEO post it has a module that will not only show you how many competing sites there are but also how strong they are (around a number of factors). It’ll also identify what type of level you’ll need to get to in order to compete with them.

As you begin to assess your potential competition in a niche don’t be completely put off by niches with lots of strong competition. Instead as you analyse what other sites are doing look for opportunities in two areas:

• ways to differentiate yourself – as you look at other sites look for gaps in the topic that they’re not covering or things that perhaps you could do that might differentiate yourself. Perhaps there is a sub-niche that everyone is ignoring, perhaps they all ‘look’ the same, perhaps they all approach the topic in the same sort of ‘voice/style’. These things could be things to explore in offering an alternative to the established sites.
• ways to interact and leverage the competition – as you look at other sites look for places that you might be able to connect with, contribute to and leverage in the building of your own site. Perhaps the competition has the ability to submit guest posts or articles or perhaps they have a forum area for interaction. Find ways to be a genuine contributor to your competition and you might find ways to help build your own site indirectly.

4. Is the Topic Sustainable?

Another factor that I see some bloggers neglecting in the choosing of a niche is consideration of whether the topic is one that they’re able to sustain.

This partly relates to the interest and passion that the blogger has for the topic – but it also relates to the topic itself and whether it is dynamic enough to have content written about it on a regular basis.

• Will it be possible to keep new content flowing on this topic?
• If the blog will be a ‘news’ blog – is there enough news or developments happening on this topic to keep reporting on it?
• If the blog will be a ‘how to’ type blog – Is the topic deep enough to be able to come up with enough tutorials or tips?

A number simple exercises to help assess the sustainability of a blog (depending upon the type of blog you’ll be developing):

• Brainstorm topics – set aside 10 minutes to brainstorm topics for blog posts. Do you run out of ideas or are they flowing easily? This will give you an indication on how many posts you’ll be able to write.
• List ‘problems/needs’ of readers – if your blog will be a ‘how to’ type blog list off problems or needs that your potential readers might have that you could tackle.
• Google News – if your blog will be a ‘news’ type blog – check out Google News for your keywords and see how often news is breaking on the topic. Is there lots of news or is this a topic that only has occasional news breaking?
• List Products – if your blog will be a ‘product’ related blog – do some research into how many products there are in that category and how often new products are released.

Got the picture? Really it is about doing a little analysis of the topic to see if there is enough in it to keep producing new frequent and regular content. If there’s not enough – perhaps consider either another topic or a different format for your site (blogs tend to do best when they’re updated but you could create a more static site).

5. Is the Niche Profitable?

This won’t appeal to everyone as not all people want to monetize their blog but if it’s a goal to make money from your blog then you’ll want to assess the potential for profit before you start.

There are a few ways to get indications on whether a niche will be profitable – including:

• Google Ads – do a simple search on Google.com for your topic/keywords. Look at what ads Google is serving for those keywords over on the right side (or above the search results). Doing some analysis of these ads can be useful on a few fronts. For starters they’ll show you if any advertisers are actively targeting those keywords. This is handy to know if you’re planning on running AdSense on your blog. It will also be handy to check out who is advertising as they could be potential direct sponsors of your site. The other useful thing to note is whether any of the ads are for products that have affiliate opportunities as they could be products you could promote as an affiliate.
• AdWords Analysis – another related way to check on the value of a niche is to do some analysis of how much people are willing to pay as advertisers in the Google AdWords program. Just knowing there are advertisers is a healthy sign but they could all be just paying a cent or two to have their ads appear. Using the AdWords Keyword tool will give you a bit more of an indication of what people are paying to rank highest for their ads.
• Affiliate Products – speaking of affiliate products – do a little hunting around to see if you can find any products online that have affiliate promotions that you might be able to promote. Sometimes this is as simple as Googling ‘keyword affiliate product’ but other times you’ll want to check out affiliate networks like Commission Junction or PepperJam (aff) to see if they have any relevant products listed for your niche.
• Brainstorm Potential Products of Your Own – what could YOU sell directly to readers? As you’re pondering a niche it could be well worth while keeping in the back of your mind potential products that you might be able to develop to sell from your blog. These might include information products (e-books, training etc), membership areas (where people pay a monthly fee for extra teaching, community etc), personal services (coaching, speaking etc), a physical product relevant to your niche – or something else. More and more bloggers are turning to developing their own products as ways to monetize their blogs so keep this option in your mind from the beginning.
• What are others in the niche monetizing with? – one of the quickest ways to work out whether there is potential to monetize a niche is to check out what other sites are doing to make money on that topic. Check out the biggest sites first and look at whether they run advertising (and what sort), whether they’re promoting affiliate promotions, what kinds of products/services of their own they sell etc. You might find that you come up with a quick list of things to start monetizing your own site with very quickly by doing this.
• Market Samurai – I know that Iv’e mentioned Market Samurai already in this series but it’s a tool that also has a monetization module that allows you to look at the profitability of a niche. In fact there are a couple of tools within the Market Samurai system that are worth using when assessing the profitability of a niche. One is in the ‘keyword research’ module which gives you options to look at three factors including the Adwords value of the work, the SEO value and some assessment of whether people are searching with the intent of ‘buying’ or just surfing for ‘information on the keyword. The other module allows you to search for affiliate promotions relevant to your keywords (very handy).

6. What Else Do You Bring to the topic that You Can Leverage?

Previously when I’ve covered the topic of how to choose a blog niche I’ve stopped after exploring some of the above points. However there are almost always a number of other factors that individuals bring to certain topics that can make those niches more sensible choices.

I guess ultimately it comes down to looking at what you have at your fingertips that you will be able to leverage to help you get your blog up and running and working really well.

There are many factors that might come into play including:

• Expertise/Experience – you might be someone with years of experience in the industry which would give you a real head start in the creation of content and also building authority and profile in the niche.
• Contacts/Network – perhaps you already have some good contacts with other bloggers and web site owners in the niche that you’ll be able to leverage to help you promote your blog.
• Established Sites on Related Topics – maybe you already have another blog, newsletter list, website, forum or site on a related topic that you could use to help you launch your new blog.
• Repurpose-able Content – some people already have a lot of content written for other purposes that they can use as the basis for their new blog (for example I met one person recently who had been training in an area and who had already created hundreds of documents for offline use that could easily be used on a blog).

This list could quite easily go on and on. Essentially you need to do a bit of a SWOT analysis of the topic and see what strengths and opportunities that you uniquely have that will help you to get a leg up into this topic.

Sleep On It

My last advice on choosing a niche for your blog is to take your time and don’t act too hastily. While you don’t want the process to drag out too long – I look back on the 30 or so blogs that I’ve started over the years and wish I’d taken a little more time going through this process. I went through a phase where I impulsively started a series of blogs that I quickly knew were not right for me – if I’d only given the ideas a little time to breath I might have discovered before I started that perhaps there were better ways to use my time going forward.

So take your time – share what you come up with with a trusted friend or two – do a little research into the topic and then, when you’re ready and are in a good position to make a decision – ACT!

Also keep in mind that you might need to go through this process with a number of topics before you find one that fits for you. You’re unlikely to find a topic that fits all of the above criteria perfectly – but hopefully something will stand out to you a little to help you make an informed decision.

Questions for Discussion:

1. What other factors would you say come into play when choosing a niche?
2. If you already have a blog – what were the most important factors for you in choosing that niche?

Post from: Blog Tips at ProBlogger.

How to Blog: How to Choose a Blog Niche [6 Tips]

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How to Blog: How to Choose a Blog Niche [6 Tips]

As this post goes live I’ll be in the process of arriving at SXSW Interactive in Austin Texas.

I was fortunate enough to at SXSWi two years back and it was one of the best conference experiences that I’ve had – so I’ve made it a priority this year to return.

My schedule is pretty open. The main thing that I’ll be doing is a book reading this Friday night. I’ll be talking about some of what Chris and I have included in the 2nd edition of the ProBlogger book (due out next month).

The book reading is on at 5pm, Friday 12 March on the Day Stage. I hope you’ll come!

For those of you involved in the Third Tribe there is a drinks/meetup the next evening (on Saturday 13th from about 5.30pm) at a bar called ‘Lovejoys’ at 604 Neches Street (2 blocks north of the convention center).

Note: I originally thought that my reading was on Saturday and we’d do one after the other…. but I messed up the time so the book reading is Friday and the Drinks/Meetup is Saturday. Sorry for the messing around 3rd Tribers.

Other than that I’ve got a pretty open few days and am looking forward to checking out a few panels and keynotes and doing as much networking as possible. If you’re at SXSWi I’d love to meet you – feel free to come up and say hi any time!

Post from: Blog Tips at ProBlogger.

Let’s Meet at SXSWi!

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Let’s Meet at SXSWi!

A 40 year-old unsolved murder mystery. Strange cryptic codes in a bible. Sweden, sandwiches, and many, many cigarettes. The badass-est female protagonist since . . . forever. And an author who has, posthumously, caused quite a ruckus in the book world and in the minds of conspiracy theorists everywhere.

Yes, I’m talking about The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. If you haven’t heard of it, the rest of us are inviting you to come out from under your rock. Stieg Larsson’s Millennium Trilogy (The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest) is topping bestseller lists as we speak and the theatrical release of Dragon Tattoo hits the U.S. next week.

I had the good fortune of screening an advanced copy and, of course, my mind went blog, blog, blog. Because that’s what blog obsessed people like us do. So here are the blogging lessons I learned from this tattooed ‘girl’ . . .

Gasoline feeds a fire, but first there has to be a spark

At one point in the movie, a man lies under a car. Having just flown off the side of the road, both he and the car are demolished, gasoline is spilling out everywhere . . . and he waits, watching, trapped. Finally there’s a spark . . . and then fire, total combustion.

So often we have all of the ingredients, right? The design is just right, the writing is perfection, the research says that there’s a need for the content . . . but then, nothing.

No traffic, no comments, no buzz. No combustion. What’s missing?

There has to be a spark.

Maybe it comes in the form of a new partnership, a referral, or an outside event (like a shortage of light bulbs) that makes your product (candles) suddenly burst into high demand.

Maybe you have a life-changing event that triggers your passion. Maybe you read a book that causes something to click in your brain or your heart.

And then, there’s no stopping the heat.

Nothing more, nothing less

Lisbeth Salander, the girl with the dragon tattoo, is a woman of few words, but they’re always the right ones. She communicates through her gestures, carefully chosen words and even her silences. To some people around her, this is maddening. But others totally get it and they pay incredibly close attention to her. They listen closely . . . and they also watch.

As a blogger, what you don’t say can be as important as what you do say.

Do you find the positive in challenging situations, gleaning lessons and inspiring others? Or do you bitch and moan, spreading negativity?

Do you stick to your topic? Or is your blog scattered, full of everything under the sun?

Do you promote everything that could be remotely related to your blog? Or do you bow out of a big launch that, for one reason or another, isn’t quite right for your readers?

What is the significance of what you leave on the blogging room floor?

Document everything

In the movie, as Blomkvist and Salander try to solve the mystery, they are aided again and again by the record-keeping of other characters, the police, the newspapers, and themselves.

It’s the last, ‘themselves,’ that holds the lesson.

Working to uncover this decades-old secret, the investigators look for the needle in the proverbial haystack. With so much unknown, their path to discovery lies in documenting every thought they have, literally pinning them to the wall for examination — and never, ever brushing aside even one moment of insight or possibility.

Ideas for blog content, joint venture partnerships, promotions, ebooks — and even tweets and Facebook updates — often shoot through our brains at a fast and furious pace.

Blogging fodder is everywhere. It’s in the conversation you have with the souvlaki guy outside your building every day at lunch, it’s in the color of the car that just drove by, it’s in the ad that you saw for hairplugs.

If you don’t grab these ideas as they fly by, they will keep flying. Trust me.

Write it all down. Nail it to the wall. Even the thoughts that seem impossible, unreachable, or just plain ridiculous.

The clue to your own success will lie in your own observations and insights. Don’t lose them.

It’s hard to be brilliant all by yourself

The story’s protagonists bounce their ideas off one another — and often hear brilliance in their partner’s ramblings.

Blogging is about community. Who can you bounce ideas off? Who might hear your mumblings and, in turn, grab you by the shoulders and tell you that you’re actually onto something? Who can you help by being a sounding board?

You might have someone’s missing piece in your back pocket.

Like a tattoo, things are permanent on the internet

Lisbeth has many tattoos, including a dragon covering her entire back. Getting ink like that is a serious commitment. Yes, you can have laser surgery to get a tattoo removed, but from what I can tell, it never completely disappears. A scar is left behind. And I’m told the process is neither pleasant nor easy.

If we really want to get deep here, we can go so far as to say that your memory of the tattoo can never be removed.

Blogging is also a commitment. We commit our time, we commit our creativity, we commit our resources. And every time we hit ‘publish’ we commit to our ideas.

The internet is a pretty permanent place and it’s hard to ‘take it back’ once the words are out there. Yes, you can go to the trouble of having something uncached — but again, it isn’t pleasant or easy. People will remember your post, they may have even printed your words on paper. We’re time-stamped and cached, linked to and quoted, and even scraped.

Be as sure as you can be each and every time you share.

Don’t underestimate anyone

Played perfectly by Noomi Rapace, Lisbeth is mysterious, tattooed, and pierced. She’s also tiny, often mistaken for a skinny, 14 year-old boy and underestimated because of her small size.

But she’s able to fight off grown men — both physically and mentally — time and again. I believe the appropriate term here would be scrappy ass-kicker. And it works to her advantage. She has surprise on her side and she’s impressive, even to those who don’t particularly like her.

With a blogosphere more crowded than a Twilight premier (and some days with just as much screaming), it’s a phenomenal idea to stand out.

It’s the old case of man bites dog. What can you do, how can you say it, where can you share it so that it lands like a snowman in a cranberry bog? (That is: with a splash, much coolness, and bright by contrast.)

Lisbeth is also the underdog. To be honest, she’s the runt.

But a few people look beyond that (or don’t even see it at all) and take a chance on her. It helps her, of course, but it also helps them. They don’t see her size, her income, her appearance, her odd personality, her history. They see her skill, her brilliance, her dedication, her inherent goodness.

How many Top 10, 25, 50, 100 lists have you seen that tout the best bloggers, the best writers, the twitterati?

Sadly, many people get caught up in these lists and think that these people are the only ones to do business with or read, because they look good on paper. But we all start somewhere.

Chris Brogan just wrote that it took him 8 years to get 100 subscribers on his blog — and look at him now.

As bloggers we can only help each other and the quality of the blogosphere by discovering new talent, sharing what we know and giving people a chance.

No matter how small and skinny . . . no matter how many tattoos.

About the Author: Julie Roads invites you to join the Dragon Tattoo Blog HUNT — an internet wide scavenger hunt tied to the feature film launch of bestselling book The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.

You can win great prizes — free movie tickets, books, movie soundtrack, posters and more. To join the contest, start at the beginning of the HUNT by visiting www.dragontattoofilm.com/contest for full details and the first clue. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is in theaters near you starting March 19th.

THE NEXT CLUE: Rachel Bilson & Christina Ricci are celebrity supporters of this national network that fights violence against women. Their strong volunteer program just goes to show that when kindness RAINNS, it pours.

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Blogging Lessons from The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

Anyone who’s been involved in web development for any length of time has likely encountered the Developers VS Users situation. It’s a mistake that can often lead to expensive problems down the road. So what exactly is the problem? And how can you spot it–and solve it–before it derails you project and causes you to make a costly mistake? Here’s how…

Most developers became developers because they want to work on and build cool stuff. Like everyone, they want to build things that gain the respect of their peers. This aspiration is where the problems get started. Unless you happen to develop for an extremely technical audience, users don’t want cool stuff. They just want stuff that works and makes their life easier. For example, let’s say a developer wants to build a weather dashboard with real time satellite video feeds, an AJAX module that show the latest temperature, barometric pressure and wind speed/direction, the sunrise/sunset times, and tidal data. A regular user, on the other hand, just wants to know “is it going to be sunny or cloudy and do I need a jacket or umbrella today?”

We’ve seen several examples of this played out in public in our little tech-bubble-blogosphere in the past year:

• Google Wave: Google wave is cool. It doesn’t solve any problems that any real people have but it does a lot of great things that developers get excited about. It includes embedded video, sound, and chat from multiple users that a user can enable playback from… Yeah, I was saying just last week how I wished I could do that. The only useful thing I’ve ever seen done with Google wave is the Pulp Fiction movie (1000% NSFW).
• iPad: When the IPad first came out, I (like many others) complained that it was an oversized iphone with less functionality. However what we missed was that it really wasn’t for us. The iPad is for regular users, not developers or techno weenies. In other words, people–in fact, most people– want an internet appliance that just works. They don’t want to have to deal with nonsense like registries, print drivers, patches, updates, and so on. Why does everyone have a refrigerator in their house? Because it’s easy to to use! You plug it in and go. Imagine for a minute if you had to play with the evaporator driver or download and install a thermometer patch update every week. Your refrigerator “works” because 99% of the time it just does its job without any fiddling.
• Google Buzz: Google assumed that everyone wanted to share all of the stuff they are doing, reading, and looking at with people they talk to. Because many Googlers have become victims of their own hubris, they assumed everyone is like them, wants to be like them, or should be like them. However when the realities of everyday life entered the equation, in the shape of something like an abusive ex-husband, it was a condition that didn’t exist in the artificial utopia of the Googleplex. Google failed to test the program in the real world and instead relied on the developer’s vision of what the users wanted. The result? Failure.

So how do you recognize when you are in this situation? If you, your developer, or anyone on your team makes these kind of statements, chances are strong that you are on the wrong path:

• Can’t the users open their eyes and just read? The answer is right there in front of them.
• The users need to use a little common sense. We can’t keep dumbing down the world for them or we’ll end up like (insert tv/movie/pop culture reference for stupid people here).
• They use the term UX to mean user experience or UI to mean user interface in common everyday speech and would feel comfortable using it when speaking to the CEO or board of directors.

What can you do to prevent this kind of mistake from ruining your project? Here are some ideas:

• In most cases, developers don’t make good team/project leaders. They carry with them the bias of wanting to be cool, respected developers. If you have or can find a developer who has a proven track record of placing user needs above cool programming features, ignore this recommendation.
• User testing: find someone who is not involved in the project or, even better, get a NIF (non internet friend) to try out your website. Put them on the homepage and ask them to try and do what your primary goal is, whether that’s to create a gift registry, put something in a cart and checkout, find a specific piece of information, or something else. Whatever it is, ask them try and do it. If you can video tape them, that’s great; otherwise, watch without interacting and take notes.
• Test different options. Use services like Crazyegg or Google multi variant testing to try out different options. See where users are and aren’t clicking then make adjustments based on data not on intuition. (disclosure: Crazyegg is an advertiser here)
• Don’t make changes because they are cool, neat, interesting, or stroke the ego of your developers. Make changes that solve problems people have. This is one of the biggest complaints I have with Wordpress as a platform. They coddle developer’s whims instead of addressing real problems like security.

At the end of the day, you and everyone involved needs to understand that, for your project to succeed, it needs to solve a problem users have first and foremost. Stroking the ego of the CEO, making the marketing department look clever, or making a developer feel stimulated are not real goals.

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This post originally came from Michael Gray who is an SEO Consultant. Be sure not to miss the Thesis Wordpress Theme review.

Developers VS Users

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Developers VS Users

While I get many questions from bloggers asking for advice on ‘how to blog‘ perhaps one of the biggest questions a new blogger needs to ask themselves before they move on to the HOW to blog question is ‘WHAT will I blog about?’

There is no real right or wrong answer to this question as blogs come in all shapes and sizes and focus upon all manner of topics. However thinking through the question before you start a blog will help you make some of the other decisions that you’ll want to make later on in this guide (for example the domain name and the name of your blog will probably come out of this decision).

Reasons to Focus Upon a Niche with Your Blog

Choosing a niche to blog about is important for a number of reasons. These include:

1. Niche Blogs Appeal to Readers

My first blog was a personal blog with no real niche focus. It did start with a main focus upon Spirituality, but over time began to cover a large range of topics including blogging, photography, culture, politics, personal stuff that I was doing etc. The more topics I covered the less I appealed to everyone.

Sure a certain group of people were interested in Spirituality and Blogging, but less of them were into photography, even less also liked my stuff about Australian Pop Culture….. each topic narrowed the chances of me writing something that would appeal to all of my readers. I started to get complaints from them – ’stop writing about XXXX’.

When I began to break topics out onto their own blogs my audience responded well – those who were into photography gathered around that topic, those that were into blogging gathered on that blog.

In the end this is about relevance – people seem to be drawn to niche focused blogs because they know that they’ll see content on them that focuses upon the things they are specifically interested in.

2. Niche Blogs Monetize Better

I tried to make money from my personal blog for a while but found the going really tough. At the time I mainly tried to make money from advertising and found that sponsors were simply not interested in promoting their product (which had a specific focus) to an audience who were there to read about a whole range of things.

What camera manufacturer wants to promote their latest camera on a blog about photography that also touches on spirituality, politics and what movie I saw on the weekend?

Niche blogs also tend to work better with contextual ad networks like AdSense. AdSense is getting better are providing ads that related strongly to what is on a specific page of content but I have seen instances where blogs covering lots of different topics attract ads that don’t always relate to content on a particular page.

The other thing about AdSense is that it is a system that gives advertisers the ability to target specific sites. These types of targeted campaigns can be quite profitable but they are less likely to happen if a blog covers a large range of topics, many of which don’t relate to that advertiser.

When I went niche I found monetizing with advertising a lot easier. In fact monetizing with a variety of methods seems to be easier on niche blogs. Affiliate promotions and selling your own products work better because your audience is there to get information on certain topics – so when you promote products on those topics…. they’re much more likely to buy.

3. Niche Blogs Do Better in Search Engines

It is possible to rank well for all kinds of topics on a generic/multi topic blog. It’s possible – but I find it is easier when you have a blog with a focus upon a niche topic. If your whole site is about the one topic Google treats it as more of an authority on that topic the more content you add, the more you interlink the posts, the more other sites in your niche link to it etc.

There are certainly exceptions (mega sites like Wikipedia are obvious ones) but unless you have the pulling power of a massive site like that a niche focused site could be the way to go.

4. Niche Blogs Build Credibility and Profile

One of the consequences of moving to more of a niche focus with my blogging was that I noticed I was starting to become known for that topic.

The first time this happened was after I started my first photography blog and 2 months later had a phone call from a city-wide newspaper asking for a quote on a photography related story. This had not happened to me before as a result of my personal/multi topic blog but having a site purely focused upon a single topic gave a perception that that topic was ‘my thing’.

For me having niche focuses has helped me to become known on different topics – which has led to all kinds of opportunities in those niches – including writing books, speaking opportunities around the world, main stream media appearances and all manner of partnership opportunities with wonderful people in my industries.

Not everyone wants to build their profile and become known in an industry – but if that’s part of your goal then a niche blog on those topics can be powerful.

Note: Niches Need Not Just be Topic Related

Before I conclude this post on niches I thought it might also be worth noting that a blogs niche need not only ever be focused upon a topic. I explored this more fully in a post titled – Does Your Blog Focus Upon a Niche Topic or a Niche Demographic? As the title of that post suggests – there are some successful blogs around that cover a variety of topics – that appeal to a similar type of person or demographic.

So instead of just writing about video games – a blog might choose to blog about topics that appeal to teenage boys – video games being one of the topics that they might have an interest in.

Worth noting though is that if you do decide to target a niche demographic rather than a niche topic – you could be opening yourself up for a lot of work. Covering a diverse range of topics can certainly work – but to cover them all comprehensively can take a lot of time and energy.

How to Choose a Niche for Your Blog

Now that we’ve looked at some of the reasons WHY a niche can be a powerful thing to think about before you start looking at HOW to blog – later this week I’m going to continue this post with a followup post exploring a number of factors that those looking to start a blog might consider when choosing a niche.

Post from: Blog Tips at ProBlogger.

How to Blog: Choose a Niche for Your Blog [Why Niches are Important]

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How to Blog: Choose a Niche for Your Blog [Why Niches are Important]

My friend Jonathan Volk is hosting a free PPV (Pay Per View) webinar this Wednesday night for all the people who downloaded his new Affiliate Marketing 101 guide. If you have the guide, you’ll be receiving an email with the time and URL to the webinar room sometime today or tomorrow.

If you haven’t downloaded Affiliate Marketing 101 yet, you’re missing out big time. The guide contains 17 sections of pure content. It even comes with a warning declaimer that states, “Your brain might explode from awesome information.” Not only is the guide free but it might win you a brand new Apple iPad as well!

Learn the techniques I have used to personally generate over $4,000,000 in affiliate commissions!

In this guide I go over the who, what, where, when, and why of affiliate marketing. I then take you step by step to learn Pay per click affiliate marketing, Pay per view (cost per view) affiliate marketing, social media marketing (facebook ads), and finally media buying.

Download Affiliate Marketing 101

I have been getting more and more into PPV marketing. In many ways, it’s better than PPC marketing and has more potential. Johnathon Van Clute used PPV to win the Top Affiliate Challenge. He was generating over $4,000 per day in affiliate commission with PPV.

This is one webinar you will not want to miss. Jonathan promises to reveal a bunch of great tips and inside secrets on how to really make money with PPV marketing. Ensure your spot now by downloading Jonathan’s free guide. See you at the Webinar!

Download Affiliate Marketing 101 by Jonathan Volk

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Free PPV Webinar with Jonathan Volk This Wednesday

They always say that blogging is already saturated. Saturated especially if you are going to use blogging to target a wide audience and then make money. I’m always observing the blogosphere and while I can’t argue that there are so many blogs out there on a certain topic, I think it’s not enough to call it saturated yet. Not even close if you ask me.

I always classify bloggers into three. There are those who we call professional bloggers, the medium caps bloggers and the average bloggers. Pro bloggers are those who are considered the experts, the famous ones or simply “web celebrities”. Mid cap bloggers are the ones who I describe as bloggers who do things right but not as popular as probloggers are yet. And obviously average bloggers are the pollutants, they are the majority of what comprise the entire blogosphere.

Ok, I understand that pollutants is a bit of a harsh term but unfortunately, most people don’t realize that they just fall into this category. In this post I will give a list of 10 signs why you are just an average blogger. Without further ado, here they are.

1 .You don’t have a goal (and specific goals)

Goal Setting is a very important part of every business. And blogging is an internet business, so you need to set one as well. When I ask people what is their goal, their usual response is to make money. David Risley recently made a very good post on how people should get things done. In that post, he outlined that most people just put a long haul general goal and the problem is that almost all of the times, it’s not attained.

Setting goals, targeting specific tasks and outlining subtasks are important for online success so make sure you’re not neglecting this one.

2. You don’t build a list

I used to think that list building was for spammers only. But as I’ve observed how famous people use list to their advantage, I realized that it’s really a must-have for all serious bloggers. My blog has been up for 2+ years and its just last year that I started building a customer’s list.

Remember each and every of your readers is your potential customers. They build your business for you and it’s really imperative to collect them.

3. You think of making money too much

Most bloggers get into this mistake. They start a blog then put some content, market it a bit and then go full force into making money. Most of the times they do it by plastering ads to their site or by simply switching from giving good value to their readers by having the obvious intention of making money.

Listen, do you really just want to waste all the effort you exerted by forcing your monetization tactic? It’s hard to build a loyal base of audience and once they start clicking that unsubscribe button, it’s gonna be hard for you to make them come back.

4. You have a crappy design

The problem with this is that usually people really don’t realize their blog design sucks! Just because you think it’s cool it doesn’t mean it’s great in the eyes of the majority as well. The thing is you really need to follow the majority. If they think it sucks, then ditch it!

One of my tips is to actually just make use of forum review sites. Most people think its sole purpose is for quick traffic but the use of it is still to provide reviews. Most forum lurkers are pretty straightforward so you’re going to expect some great suggestions there. People always say content is king, but isn’t it that design is part of the content?

5. You don’t utilize social media

Social Media represents Web 2.0. I’ve seen some bloggers who skyrocketed their profiles in their blogs by just maximizing its use of social media. If you’re new to social media then please consider taking some time on reading about it, understanding it more.

When I was in my early stages I even studied how each of the social sites work, built relationship with reputed people and just invested an ample part of my time. If you’re not into social media as one of the tactics in your blog then you’re missing out a lot.

6. You think blog commenting is the best marketing tactic

Blog commenting is cool especially if you just started a new blog. It’s a pretty great way to say “hey I exist!” But one thing I see most bloggers do is use it as their no.1 marketing ploy. Sure there’s nothing wrong in commenting but just doing that will bring you nowhere!

Consider who’s going to gain more traction between the two. The first blogger comments on 150 blogs everyday while the second blogger do guest posts at least thrice a week. Who’s going to get more traffic and readers at the end of one week? You judge!

7. You don’t do Guest Postings

Reading the previous one, it’s obvious that we’re going to head into this topic. Guest Posting is probably the quickest way to spit your brand out there and get noticed in a very wide scale of audience. I bet all of you guys reading this article know it but I doubt you put this into work.

Writing guest articles is not just doing it three times, four times or eight times. Man, you have to do it in bulks! You can easily notice as well that even popular bloggers do guest posting. That’s because of the unending search for a new audience that would turn into a loyal customer. Guest Posting is probably the most cost-conscious method that you can use to drive great traffic to your blog.

8. You spread yourself too thin

This is the common mistake that most bloggers make. They believe they already know the recipe for success and as a result, they create multiple blogs. In order for anyone to be successful in blogging, it takes a lot of hard work and dedication. In short, you need to spend a considerable amount of time in your blog to make good progress. Don’t fall for this common mistake, don’t spread yourself thin.

9. You mass market your blog

There is nothing anything worse than seeing someone create a thread in popular forums only to say “hey check out my blog, its cool”. Or going to a high traffic social site like BlogCatalog only to spam your link out there. This is another crucial mistake that most bloggers are still doing! They think that by letting as much people as possible see their blog, they’re going to convert well.

It’s really a huge mistake not only because you get to annoy people there who cause them not to even look at your site, but more importantly you’re most likely targeting the wrong demographics. Remember, quality is more important than quantity.

10. Your content doesn’t make sense

OK, assuming everything is in line now. You now have that good design, have done a ton of really great guest posts, have an awesome list, you focus only on one blog and stuffs. In the end it all boils down to this last point, writing good content.

This has been rehashed probably a million times already but obviously everything that you’ve done is useless if you don’t write good content. Just imagine, you managed to guest post on several authority blogs, people love what you wrote and as a result they are clicking to your link. What if what they saw in your site is post about your cat? Or how ugly is your enemy? Or how you loathe you Math teacher?

In the end it all goes to waste. You see, it’s really a tough pill to swallow isn’t it? How do you write good content then? By sticking to your niche. I discuss a lot how professional blogging isn’t about having perfect grammar, superb fluency and being boring. And writing good content doesn’t have to be like that. As long as you think you’re connecting well with your readers, you’re fulfilling their needs; you’re doing your job.

Conclusion

So to end this one, I would leave it all to you. If you have been blogging and you think you’re exerting some effort and still not growing, then maybe it’s time to re-evaluate, time to jot down notes on things that you are working hard with, yet are not producing good results for you. Remember those average bloggers never evaluate things. Just by doing your job now will put you way ahead of most bloggers.

Melvin is a young blogger and entrepreneur who blogs at MelvinBlog Dot Com. He has also created a report for his readers entitled Blog Marketing for Fame which is available for download.

Discover the SECRETS I’ve Learned to go from zero a month to over $40,000 a month from blogging. Download Make Money Online with John Chow dot Com for FREE!

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10 Signs Why You Are Just An Average Blogger