I recently started thinking of my blog as a dog. (I named him Ernie.)

Why did I do this? Why should you do the same? Because a dog needs care and commitment to thrive. If you get lazy or distracted and ignore your dog for a few days, it will suffer… it may even die.

The same can be said of your blog.

If you want your blog to thrive, treat it like a dog!

Here are four reasons to think of your blog as a dog.

1. Dogs and blogs need to be fed.

Dogs love to eat. You should “feed” your blog every day, not just when you’re in the mood. Scraps are alright once in a while, but for best results, fill it with delicious and nutritious quality content. Keep it out of the garbage!

2. Dogs and blogs need exercise.

Dogs need exercise and they love to go for walks. They want to explore, to experience new sights and smells. If they’re male, they also love to leave their mark. You should “walk” your blog every day. Explore and experience other blogs, sites, social networks. Leave your mark by commenting and participating. Be sure not to leave any crap!

3. Dogs and blogs need to be protected.

Dogs depend on you to protect them from fleas, ticks, distemper, heartworm, rabies, pissed-off cats and other threats. You should protect your blog from spam, viruses, copycats, pissed-off commenters and other threats. Use protective plug-ins like Akismet. Back up your files with a service like Carbonite. Turn competitors into colleagues. Don’t be afraid to let your blog take risks, but be wary about confronting bigger, meaner blogs!

4. Dogs and blogs need to be loved.

Dogs bring us so much joy because they give us unconditional love. They are social animals, and they need love in return. You shouldn’t have a dog—or a blog—if you’re not going to love it. Like a certain football star interested only in the money his dogs could earn, your success will be short-lived if you are interested only in the money your blog can earn. Your readers will know whether you are passionate about your niche and truly love your blog. Show your blog love every day, or it may turn on you!

Treat your blog like a dog, and you'll enjoy years of slobbery, face-licking fun!

blog tips blogging

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Yaro Starak of Entrepreneur's Journey is writing an excellent series on how to launch a membership site.

Membership sites are hot and getting hotter by the minute. They offer one of the best ways to earn money online, and Yaro is spilling the beans on how to create your own successful membership site.

He's providing detailed, step-by-step instructions, tips and resources, many based on his own case-study of building a popular membership site himself (Blog Mastermind). I've just read Part 6 of his series and can't wait for the next installment.

If this were an ebook, Yaro could easily charge $97 or more… but he's giving this information away for free.

Read the first installment here and work your way through the rest. There's a lot to read, but it's all great stuff!

membership sites yaro starak

… "Traffic" doesn't make you think of cars;

… "Conversion" doesn't make you think of religion;

… "Feed" doesn't make you think of food;

… "Tease" doesn't make you think of a flirty woman;

… "Hook" doesn't make you think of fishing (or a pirate);

… "Web" doesn't make you think of spiders;

… "Spider" doesn't make you think of 8-legged creepy-crawlers;

… "Search" doesn't make you think of finding something that's lost;

… "Spam" doesn't make you think of canned mystery meat;

… "Rank" doesn't make you think of something that "has its privileges"

… "Surfing" doesn't make you think of waves;

… "Browser" doesn't make you think of shoppers;

… "Post" doesn't make you think of something that holds up a fence;

… "Tag" doesn't make you think of being "It";

… "Digg" doesn't make you think of a shovel.

Internet marketer

John Chow, the self-proclaimed root of all evil, has launched another blog contest.

He's offering a pretty decent prize–a Nintendo Wii.

Here are his contest rules:

…just make a post in your blog about it. Link to me using the anchor text “root of all evil,” link to www.1234Pens.com using “promotional pens,” and link to this blog post… Add as much information as you want - just make sure you follow the linking rules. This contest is open to everyone. If you have blog, you can enter. It doesn’t matter where you are or what language your blog is in. After you made your post, send an email to wii@1234pens.com with the URL to your post. Once we confirm the post meets the linking requirements, we’ll print out your email and toss in to the draw bucket.

I'm not a video game player, but I know what a Nintendo Wii is and how popular those things are. So I'm entering John's contest. If I win, I'll "recycle" that prize as a prize for my own contest. (Is that evil?)

As with every blog contest, the goal is to boost rankings (and traffic) by getting a lot of other bloggers to link to your blog (or in this case, link to John's blog and a friend's website that sells promotional pens).

If you ask me, getting more traffic is a mighty good goal to have. It's no wonder so many bloggers are having these types of contests.

But are these types of contests evil? Are they junking up the blogosphere? Do they annoy you?

I'd love to know your opinion, so I'm including a little poll with this post. Please take a moment and vote. You'll see the real-time results after voting.

Here's the link to John's contest: John Chow's latest blog contest.

blog contests John Chow

Is SEO a waste of your time and money?

"Yes!" says one web expert.

Anthony Fallon, CEO of Warrington Web Works, a UK web publishing company, claimed this week that search engine optimization (SEO) is a waste of time and money for businesses.

In a February 27th press release, Anthony says that using the latest distribution technologies (like RSS), writing quality content, and taking advantage of vast improvement in search engine technology make SEO unnecessary.

"Web 2.0 it’s all about your visitor", Anthony added. "The new distribution technologies like RSS will get your message out there without any magic or manipulation of search results. The quality of Google’s Search technology is really coming on in leaps and bounds. If businesses can get in front of their customers without stuffing their content with keywords, it has to be a good thing. As for the SEO Industry, good riddance I say."

In order to prove his point, Anthony wrote an article, "SEO Mind Crime," posted it on Wednesday and told his readers to search for "SEO Mind Crime" on Google over the coming days. Within 24 hours, the article appeared at positions 3, 4 and 6 on Google's first page (out of 826,000 indexed pages).

According to Anthony, this isthe ultimate proof that SEO is no longer required in our Web 2.0 world.

I'm not so sure.

Anthony's test may have worked for an obscure phrase like "SEO Mind Crime" (I doubt ANYONE would normally search for that phrase without being specifically asked to do so), but we need results from "real" visitors searching for "real" keyword phrases.

What good does it to to be ranked high in search engine results for phrases people aren't using?

The REAL test is whether non-SEO tactics like those Anthony promotes can be as successful as SEO with commonly used keywords and search phrases our target audiences are likely to use.

That being said, I totally agree with Anthony that we need to put most of our emphasis on non-SEO tactics such as: (1) providing quality content, (2) using technologies like RSS and user-friendly media like video, (3) promoting and marketing our sites through social networking and bookmarking services, and other Web 2.0 tools.

But I do not believe that SEO is completely worthless. Sorry, Anthony!

Here's the link to the press release: Search Engine Optimisation A Waste of Time and Money

Anthony Fallon search engine optimization seo

Here's my new way to describe a BLOG:

B = Bewildering
L = Laborious
O = Overwhelming
G = Gratifying

Those are the four pot-holed paths I've traveled as a new blogger. From what I've read on other blogs and in online forums, I know others have taken a similar bumpy journey.

We set out with good intentions and high expectations. Blogging is the path to success, right? If you're online, you gotta have a blog. Everyone who is anyone in the online world tells us that! We read successful blogs and marvel at how informative and entertaining they are–and at how much money their authors are (allegedly) raking in!

Blogging Pro: "Do a blog."
Me: "Why?"
Pro: "Because… blah, blah, blah… passion… blah, blah, blah… SEO… blah, blah, blah… traffic… blah, blah, blah …money…"
Me: "Wait! What'd you say about money?"

So we get the message. Some get it sooner than others; I've been online since 2003 and didn't begin blogging until late 2006. Late bloomer, late blogger.

Bewildering

Anyway, we decide to blog and this is where the Bewildering path begins.

Blogger? Typepad? WordPress? Slugs? RSS? Feeds? Trackbacks? Plugins? Permalinks? Tags? Pings? Archives? Blogrolls? Widgets?

"Arrrgghhh!! My brain is melting!"

Read more

blog+definition blogging blogging+lessons blogging tips how+to+blog

One-Way Inbound Links to Your Site are Gold!

Search engines place more value on one-way inbound links than reciprocal links (where you and another webmaster swap links to each other's sites) because they see them as genuine, unbiased recommendations of your site.

Here are a few ways to obtain quality inbound links to your site:

Read more

exchanging links inbound links linking strategies obtaining links seo

'Twas the blog before Christmas, and here in my house,
I was tapping my keyboard, and clicking my mouse.
My ads were all placed on my pages with care,
In hopes that my visitors would click on them there.
My husband was pouting alone in our bed,
While visions of a blogless wife danced in his head.
But at my computer, with a cup of French Roast,
I'd just begun writing another blog post,
When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I hit "save" and went to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I strolled with my cup,
And opened the blinds to see what was up.
The motion-sensor light gave off a bright glow,
Illuminating for me the objects below,
When, what to my bloodshot eyes should appear,
But a fancy laptop and other high-tech gear,
With a guy at the keyboard, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be a trick.
More rapid than broadband his Wi-Fi kicked in,
As he typed and clicked with an odd, evil grin.
"Now Pop-Up! Now Phishin'! Now Splogger and Scammer!
On, Duplicate Content! On Virus and Spammer!
To the core of the hard drive! Right through the firewall!
Now infect the data, and erase it all!"
As I realized the danger I ran and clicked "enter"
To launch my McAfee Security Center.
The horror of it all made me drop my cup,
It'd been several months since I last backed up!
I saw, in a twinkling, all my hard work wiped out,
My computer began smoking, I let out a shout!
As I spun in my misery, and was turning around,
Down the chimney the culprit came with a bound.
He was dressed all in black, latex rubber I think,
And he farted and belched, a horrible stink!
A bundle of tools he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a psycho just opening his pack.
His eyes, how they twinkled! They were practically glowing,
His cheeks were all sunken, his insanity showing!
His droll little mouth was pulled down in a frown,
And the beard of his chin was tangled and brown.
The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
The smoke made me gag and wilted our wreath.
He had a mean face and a giant beer belly,
That shook when he moved like a bowlful of jelly.
He was smelly and plump, a frightening old elf,
And I screamed when I saw him, in spite of myself!
A glint in his eye and a twist of his head,
Like a guy in a Stephen King novel I'd read.
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And trashed my home office, the mean little jerk!
Then sticking his finger inside of his nose,
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose.
As I trembled with rage and continued screaming,
My husband shook me awake, "Hey Honey, you're dreaming!"
My relief was enormous, my smile bright an big,
"Happy blogging to all, and to all a good Digg!"

Blog Christmas