What Type of Blog Theme Do You Need?

There is no such thing as the perfect car. Some people prefer smaller vehicles that are more fuel efficient and easier to maneuver. Other people need something that is capable of going off-road. Others still need the extra cargo space that a pickup truck or SUV is able to provide. At the end of the day, everyone’s needs are different and that’s why there are so many different types of cars. You just need to find the one that best suits your preferences and needs.

The exact same philosophy easily applies to the world of blogging as well. When it comes to themes for blogs, once again, there is no such thing as the one size fits all model. Some people desire certain features while other people desire a completely different set of features. As such, it’s important to think about what you want to get out of a WordPress theme and how you can go about getting the right theme for your blog.

Just as there are individual differences in car models, there are individual differences for blog themes too. At the same time, themes can generally be classified into a number of different categories, just like cars. Do you need the subcompact, the convertible, the luxury sedan or the cargo van of WordPress themes?

The Personal Blog

If you are thinking about starting a personal blog to explore your personal interests, there are certainly a large number of blog themes to consider. In general, personal blogs should aim to be as uncluttered as possible, allowing the content to speak for itself while still providing enough of a personal touch to differentiate the blog from the rest of the crowd.

In general, personal blogs take on the now-conventional reverse chronological configuration. This means that the most recent blog entry is shown at the top of the page, with older posts being displayed underneath. It is up to you whether you want the main page to show entire posts (as is the case with Beyond the Rhetoric) or if you want the main page to show only excerpts of the posts (as is the case with Blogging Tips). There are pros and cons to either approach and it can largely depend on the length and frequency of your posts.

Most personal blogs have one or two sidebars where additional information, like category listings and social media links, can be displayed. The header area usually contains a branded image or logo, clearly showing the name of the blog. A tagline can also be shown in that area.

News and Magazine Styles

Is your blog going to be reporting on a particular industry or niche in some way? Instead of the standard “reverse chronological” layout that you find on many blogs, it may be more appropriate to take on a magazine style WordPress theme instead.

Instead of showing your blog posts in a linear fashion, these blog themes make your site look more like an online magazine. You may have post thumbnail images, for example, that are arranged in a grid-like pattern. Frequent posts may be shown as being part of different categories with feature articles highlighted at the top of the page. Good examples of this include BranfordMagazine theme and the custom theme found at Mobile Magazine.

Focused on Video Blogging

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words. So, what happens when you offer a high-definition video running at 30 frames (pictures) per second? There’s a reason why so many people online are starting to shift their focus toward video blogging (or “vlogging” if you prefer). It creates a more personal and media-rich connection with your readers (or viewers, as the case may be).

When it comes to blogs that are focused on videos, it is important to have strong integration with your video streaming service (like YouTube), as well as enough “width” in the content area to show the video in a fairly large resolution. You could be as simple as Dot Com Pho, but for the greatest opportunity for success, you may need to step up to another level.

A fantastic example is iJustine. In addition to the videos she has within her blog posts, she also highlights videos in thumbnail form in her sidebar. She also does a good job of linking back to her blog from her YouTube channel. This is critical for the success of any video blog. Another much more advanced and media rich site to check out is GameTrailers.com. It is very video focused.

The Right Blog Theme for You

Just because you really like the theme you find on one particular site does not mean that it is necessarily appropriate for your own blog. Consider what would provide the best user experience, what would highlight your type of content in the best way, and what would give you the greatest chance at success with your blog, however you choose to define it.

What Are You Going to Blog?

Blogging is a very worthwhile endeavor, but even before you dive into a conversation of finding the right web hosts or how you will go about monetizing your site, there is one very important question that needs to be addressed: Why are you going to blog and what are you going to blog about? You need answers to these before you can even start blogging in the first place.

Sure, asking what you’re going to blog about seems like simple enough of a question, but depending on your answer, the goals for your blog can swing heavily. Your blog can become a very different kind of website and your strategies can be vastly different too.

Blogging for Fun

If you are going to blog simply for the fun of blogging, you really can choose any topic that you’d like for your blog. The majority of people who start their first blog are creating personal blogs. With these kinds of sites, the blogger usually discusses personal interests or offers an online diary of sorts.

These kinds of blogs are great for learning how to blog, making new friends online that might share the same interests. For example, you might be a big fan of the Vancouver Canucks and you start a hockey blog. The goal is to have a good time, just because you want to have a proper venue for voicing your opinions. You might then get in contact with other Canucks fans around the city.

When you’re blogging for fun, just about any topic will do. This is because you are likely less concerned with profitability and other metrics. It’s more about making friends, having a proper venue to have your voice heard, and learning about the different technologies and innovations that are available to bloggers today.

Blogging for Business

If you are going to blog as a branding exercise for your company, your goals can be very different from a personal blog. Corporate blogs and official company blogs are an entirely different animal from the blog of a regular individual.

With business blogs, two main trends seem to emerge. On the one hand, some companies will only blog about company business. They may offer customers and partners an “insider’s look” into the company, showing them what happens behind the scenes. This is the case with the Disney Parks blog, for instance. They can also use the blog to highlight new products and other company announcements.

Alternatively, some companies use their blogs as a way to establish themselves as experts in their field. While some posts relate directly back to the company itself, many blog posts are simply about that particular industry. A financial services firm, for example, may offer posts that discuss the current economy, setting up your accounting books, and so forth.

Blogging for Money

More and more people are getting into blogging with the sole purpose of making money from them. They see larger sites like Engadget and TMZ making substantial amounts of money and they want to get in on the action. This is perfectly understandable.

If you are thinking about starting a blog with the goal of turning it into a viable business on its own, then you will have to take a completely different approach than you would with a personal blog or a corporate blog.

In the next chapter, we will discuss in detail how you can go about finding the right and profitable niche for you to start blogging about. Choosing the right subject matter can mean the difference between making thousands of dollars a month or barely being able to afford the hosting costs.

Adding Images, Links and Categories to Your Blog

The most successful blogs in the world are the ones that provide the best information, link to outside sources and have great images throughout their respective sites. These can sound like daunting tasks for people new to blogging, but WordPress makes it extremely easy to add these types of features to your blog. In this article, we will show you exactly how to do it.

Adding Images to Blog Posts

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words. A relevant image that adds something to the article can be worth much more than that. Whether you need to illustrate a point or you simply want a picture to draw attention to your post, having an image (or more) attached to your post can be very helpful.

So, how do you do it? First, go into the area in the WordPress administration panel when you can write a new blog post. This can be accessed by the button near the top-right corner or via the navigational links in the sidebar.

When you are in the “Write Post” area, you’ll notice that there are a series of icons located between the title text area and the body text areas. When you hover over the first of these, you’ll discover that it is used to upload and insert images. Click on this icon.

In doing so, you’ll see a new dialog box appear on the screen with three tabs at the top: from computer, from URL, and media library. The first of these allows you to upload an image file (JPGs and PNGs are usually best) from your computer. You can then go through some of the available options for sizes, alternate text, alignment, and so on.

The “From URL” tab allows you to embed an image that is already located somewhere else on the Internet and the “Media Library” tab lets you choose images that have already been uploaded and associated with the blog post.

Linking to Internal and External Sources

A blog post never really exists in isolation, so it is important for a myriad of reasons to link to both your own articles and to resources outside of your website. This helps to give context to your articles, as well as supporting materials and related reading.

There are several different ways for creating these links. If you are familiar with HTML, then you will likely want to deactivate the “visual editor” in WordPress (you can do that in the user profile options). You can then use basic HTML tags for creating your links.

If you are not as familiar with HTML, that’s okay too. WordPress has been designed to be as approachable and easy to use as possible. Going back to the area where you can write a new blog post, you’ll notice a “link” button above the main body text area.

Clicking on this will create a pop-up window asking for the URL that you’d like to link to. Copy the URL in there and click OK. Type in the “anchor text” (the actual text in the area that will be linked to the URL), then click in the “/link” button to “close” the tag. That’s one way to do it.

Another way to do it is to highlight the text in your article that you would like to be linked, then click on the same “link” button. You once again enter the target URL and click OK. This creates the same result as the method described above.

Organizing Content with Tags and Categories

Just as you have folders on your computer to help organize all your different files, you can create a similar type of organization in your blog to manage all your different blog posts.

There are two systems that are built into every WordPress installation: categories and tags. These work in a similar fashion, but you’ll likely want to use both for optimal performance. Categories act like folders on your computer, while post tags are like keywords related to your post.

Along the right side of the area where you can write (and edit) your blog posts, you’ll see fields for choosing your post categories and post tags. For most sites, you’ll want to keep the number of categories relatively low (less than 20), but you can usually use more tags, assigning several to every blog post.

In doing so, it is easier for readers of your blog to find related content. If you wrote on your experience with your new iPhone, for example, it might fall under your Technology category and it could be associated with tags like Apple, AT&T, and smartphone. Visitors can then look up other posts using the same tags or categories to find related content on your blog.

Providing the Best Information

This is perhaps the hardest part of blogging! With so many blogs on the Internet, it can sometimes be difficult to get noticed. That’s why it’s so important to provide the best possible content that you can, giving value to your readers that they won’t find anywhere else.

How can you help your content get noticed? We’ll go over some possibilities in the next few sections.

Selecting a Domian

A domain, as you may already know, is a set of characters that maps a website to a particular Internet address. The domain for Google is Google.com. The domain for the New York Times is NYTimes.com. Having a great domain name is very important for any website or blog, but it is not completely necessary for success.

There are several websites out there that are very successful, even with less than perfect domain names. On the flip side, there are countless websites with fantastic domains that are anything but successful. A domain name is only one part of the equation, but it can be a very important part.

Choosing the Domain Extension

You have a lot of different choices when it comes to creating a domain name for your blog. You can get varations of .com, .net and .org domains, as well as domain extensions (also known as TLDs or top-level domains) that are based on your country or specific type of business. Canadian sites, for example, can end in a .ca extension.

While it is perfectly possible to include dashes and numbers in your domain name, these are usually less desirable. You will also likely want to stick to the main .com, .net or .org models whenever possible, as other domain extensions can be less than optimal for a myriad of reasons. Unless your site is country-specific, you may not want a country-specific TLD.

A Simple and Descriptive Domain Name

A great domain name is something that describes your blog without having to go into much explanation. If you had dictionary.com as your domain name, for example, it would be pretty obvious that your blog was based on the concept of a dictionary. Keep this concept in mind when choosing your domain name.

This doesn’t mean that you need to necessarily stick with real words that someone could find in a dictionary, but it helps when the name is as descriptive as possible. Groupon, for instance, is a portmanteau of group and coupon. Engadget, as an another exmaple, has the word “gadget” in it. These relate to the core subject matter on both sites, even though both domains by themselves are not real words.

Registering YourName.com

If you are going to create a personal blog and just wated to write about your own interests and what is going on in your life, you may want to try and secure yourname.com.

I’m sure you are not going to be the only person in the world with exactly your name, so if it’s available, I would grab your name as a .com domain. If that is not available (or even if it is), it could be a good idea to try for the .net or .org version of your name. This helps to secure your online identity and it’s easy enough to set up links to other online profiles through this domain.

For instance, ZacJohnson.com/Facebook redirects to Zac’s Facebook page and MichaelKwan.com/Flickr redirects to Michael’s Flickr photostream. This can be very useful for branding and ease of access purposes. If you don’t buy your name as a domain, someone else who shares the same name might snatch it out from under you.

Do You Want to Sell Your Site?

When you are first starting out with your blog, perhaps the furthest thought from your mind is the possibility of selling your blog. However, this is something that you will want to think about when selecting your domain name.

For this reason, having the domain name for your blog as your real name is that you should then never try and build your blog into a business that you might want to sell one day. If you have the slightest inclination that you will want to grow out your blog into a sellable business, stay away from using your personal name.

A Blog as a Business

If this is the case, it helps if you can have a relevant keyword as part of the domain instead. Let’s say that you are personally interested in science fiction movies. If you may want to sell the blog one day, you may not want to call it JoeAnybody.com. It may be more appropriate to get SciFiMovies.com if you can.

Finding the right domain name for your business-based blog is just as important, if not more important, than your personal blog. The way you select your domain name for your blog can have a dramatic effect on your search engine rankings. It should be related to your topic and it is better if it is shorter.

If you stick to domains that are no more than three words, ideally with no numbers or dashes, you lend yourself to the greatest possibility at success. For search engine optimization purposes, the more generic (but targeted) domain name is best. BloggingTips.com, for example, ranks first for the search term “blogging tips.”

Where Can I Buy Domain Names?

I current purchase most of my domain names through GoDaddy.com and NameCheap.com. You can register your domain name through either of these companies. Alternatively, web hosting providers, which we will discuss in the next article, mostly also offer domain registration as one of their services.

Power of Blogging

In the early days of Internet marketing, companies scoffed at the potential of the so-called world wide web. They cast the concept of bloggers even further into the shadows, thinking that they weren’t relevant to their customers. My, how times have changed! These days, blogs are not only mainstream, but they have become even bigger than their traditional media counterparts!

More and more people are turning to TMZ and Perez Hilton for their celebrity gossip. Tech enthusiasts point their browsers at Engadget and Gizmodo instead of waiting for a magazine to hit the racks. After all, that magazine will be reporting on news that is already a month old by the time it hits stores. Blogs, on the other hand, are quite literally on the pulse of the industry, quite literally being up to the minute with their relevance.

The major blogs have very much become massive communities on their own and they are no longer in the shadows of traditional outlets like the New York Times and Wall Street Journal. Blogs are big business and are worth millions of dollars, getting thousands, even millions of visitors on a very regular basis. Even celebrities are recognizing the importance of blogging, keeping their names at the top of the public’s mind at all times. People want to know and they want to know right now.

Blogging is a very powerful tool and popular blogs are being sold for millions of dollars. What started out as independent ventures have quickly become parts of major media empires. Take a look at Gawker Media, for example, a conglomerate that runs such popular blogs as Kotaku, Lifehacker, and Jalopnik. These sites are huge with monumental followings. This is powerful for branding and powerful for audiences.

Moving forward, personal blogs will surely still exist, but professional blogs are very much not only the future, but they’re already the present. Blogs are big business. This cannot be re-iterated enough. With multiple updates each day and loyal fan followings, blogs represent huge opportunities for advertising revenue. And for the businesses who choose to launch their own corporate blogs, even if no advertising is involved at all, the blogs represent a very powerful marketing and branding tool.

Blogs may have once existed on the fringe of the Internet, only read and used by those “in the know,” but blogs today carry huge mainstream appeal. Better still, there is still so much more potential yet untapped. Going back to Gawker Media, for example, they’re recognizing the importance of multimedia and its prominent role in blogging in the future. The sites are almost becoming like TV channels that are completely on demand. Users can choose exactly the programming they’d like, interacting with the authors and building that community even further.

Gawker competitor Weblogs, Inc. runs such sites as The Unofficial Apple Weblog, Download Squad, Joystiq, and TV Squad. It is a subsidiary of AOL, a company that may have otherwise fallen into Internet obscurity in recent years if it were not for this blog network of about 90 blogs. The key to success on the Internet is staying up with the times and AOL recognized the opportunity when it came to professional blogs. These make money and they have increasingly large audiences.

And the same can be said about Blogging Tips. I can’t say for sure what blogs will look like ten years from now, but one thing is for sure: blogs are here to stay and they’ve still got a lot of room for even greater growth.

4 Dead Ways to Attract Readers to Your Blog

What’s the single most important factor involved in building a better blog?

Readers..?

Yes, you’re 100% correct!

For anyone who’re running online business need to attract more people to their sites. Undoubtedly finding more readers is the biggest challenge to succeed online.

Without having potential readers and customers, it’s almost impossible for anyone to make more money from their online businesses.

So how to find and attract more readers to your blog?

Is finding new readers really easy?

No, it’s not..

But when you’re working consistently using the following simple tips, it’ll be a breeze to find more readers to your blog.

Are you ready?

#1. Have a killer blog design

90% of the bloggers are either using

• Free themes or
• Mediocre design

That means if you seriously focus on having a killer website design, you’ll have more chances to stand out from the crowd, which ultimately means that you’re inviting more people to read your blog.

Who will not be interested to reading a blog which stands out??

So make sure to invest some money on buying premium themes or unique design for your blog. Remember, blogging is a business and business needs to proper investment to succeed.

#2. Always create award winning headlines

Most of the online readers prefer skimming the content. So what makes your content unique and to quickly grab others attention?

Obviously your headlines..

Be sure you’re spending more time on crafting killer headlines for your blog posts. If you’ve succeeded in creating mind blowing headlines, you’re actually grabbing more bloggers attention.

When you’re consistent in creating valuable content and titles for the readers, you’ll be attracting more readers to your blog. Having killer headlines can also boost your comment count on every single post!

Few quick tips to make your headlines go viral:

• Copy the most popular headlines from other blogs and tweak them until they become unique
• How-to guides will attract more readers.. because they’ll make them curious to read the content
• The headlines which contains numbers will grab everyone’s attention.. because they’re easy to skim

#3. Make sure your content is keyword rich

Though search engine optimization has became a big headache for the bloggers, it’s still the ONLY way to bring more readers to your blog even after years.

When your content is properly optimized with the potential keywords, you’ll have more chances to attract the new readers. But don’t keyword stuff your blog posts to get search engine traffic, it may considered as spam by Google and you may won’t even get search traffic to those posts.

Optimum keyword frequency for any blog post is: 2 to 5%

There are lot of tools to know how much keyword frequency you’ve in your content.

You can use premium tools like Easy WP SEO, SEOPressor etc

Or you can also use free tools like free keyword density analyzer, keyword density checker etc

#4. Try to be a go-giver than go-getter

Connect with every blogger in your niche. I know it’s really difficult to connect with every blogger in your niche.. but if you’re connecting with as many bloggers as you can, you’ll be definitely bringing more readers to your blog. Use social media networks like Facebook, twitter or G+ to get to know other bloggers and start doing conversations with them.

Make sure you’re connecting with them not to take their help, instead, focus on giving something useful.

Whatever it may be, try to add value to their blogs, either by blog commenting or doing guest posts on their blogs. This way you can grab more people attention to your blog in no time.

Connecting with others should be your top priority, you can never say who will be useful for your blog in the long run. So be kind to all of them.

Spend time on other blogs too. You can’t attract more readers to your blog when you work only on your blog. You also need to spend quality time on other blogs to find more readers. Show genuine interest to helping others.

Over to you

What are your thoughts about finding more readers to your blog? Do you’ve any extra tips? I’ll be glad to hear from you.

5 Ways to Write a killer Guest Post

Are you creating remarkable guest posts?

When I say remarkable, I don’t mean -

• getting more likes
• comments, tweets or shares

Are you getting enough email subscribers or sales from your guest posts?

If your answer is no, use the following top ways to write a killer guest post that converts more.

Writing killer guest posts is not a rocket science, but you should know few tips to write a guest post which attracts more people attention.

#1. Analyze the pattern of your targeted blog

First off, analyze the pattern of your targeted blog. Which posts are going viral, getting more likes and shares?

And what kind of topics are attracting more visitors?

By doing this type of research, you’ll better understand the potential readers of your targeted blog.

And that’s the ONLY thing you need to know to attract more readers using your guest pots.

It’s not about writing the similar type of content more awesome, it’s about creating killer copy for a topic which no one has talked before!

If you want to get more leads from your guest posts, in your author bio, don’t link to your home page. Even if you’re linking to homepage, make sure you’re either using a landing page or above the fold concept to convert visitors into subscribers.

Derek Halpern of SocialTriggers introduced the concept of ‘Above the fold’ and it’s converting really well for him, because it’ll be the most visible places on any site which the visitors can’t ignore viewing it.

#2. The headline of your copy is 90%

The best way to create a persuading copy is this: spend some time to create attention grabbing headlines.

Because headlines play a vital role in opening your posts.

If your headlines are really interesting, your job is almost done! That’s the importance of having great headlines.

Use the following 3 methods to write killer headlines to make your next guest post go viral.

1. Use these 10 tips to write a captivating headline for your next guest post.

2. Ask questions in your headlines [which really creates curiosity]

Examples:

• Why most of the blogs fail?
• Are you destroying your own blog using these 10 methods?
• Need more tweets and shares on your posts? Try these..

3. Use numbers in your headlines [list posts work because most online readers are lazy, hence they love to read these list posts to easily skim the content]

#3. Nurture the style of your guest post

Are you using long blocks of content in your guest posts?

Do you know there’s a lot of difference between online writing and offline writing?

For those who’re not interested in reading the above post, here’s the short summary:

Offline writing consist of long paragraphs where as online writing should be created according to the skimmers.

So make sure you’re not

• using long paragraphs in your guest posts and
• creating scannable content

#4. Trim your words

Remove the unwanted words ruthlessly.

There’s no thumb rule to write long or short articles on your guest posts to make them go viral. All you need is to create a tight copy!

Use short sentences. Cut the complex words. Don’t make your guest posts fluffy.

#5. Focus on ONE single topic

This is one of the effective strategies to write a guest post that sells – focus on one single topic!

If you’re talking about SEO tactics to rank high, there’s no need to cover landing page secrets..

Focus on one topic and go deep into it. This can make your guest post more authoritative and can bring you massive results for your blog.