As a follow up to my weekend question, I wanted to take a look at the main reason that the majority of bloggers are not making money – and how you can make sure you are part of the minority that do! If you were anything like me, for the first couple of years that I started blogging, MAKING MONEY WAS HARD! It is quite disheartening to see your traffic increasing and your subscriber count on the rise, but your income was going no where. Isn’t it obvious that as a blog grows in popularity that it should start making more money as well?

There Is No Correlation Between Blog Popularity And Blog Income!

I think that the first blogging myth that we need to break is that traffic or ‘popularity’ is the main ingredient for a money making blog! Because it is not! There are plenty of bloggers (even within my niche), who are getting a lot more traffic to their blogs than I am – yet are not making 10% of what I make online. Now I am not saying that to boast, I am just trying to break the mentality that you need a lot of traffic to make money!

In this post I want to highlight where the majority of bloggers are going wrong when it comes to monetizing the blog, and how you can jump ship and join me and the minority who ARE making money from their blogs!

Where Most Bloggers Fail When It Comes To Making Money

1. They Follow The Crowd

Have you ever noticed that when you visit a lot of blogs in the same niche that you are consistently seeing the same products being promoted? I don’t know about you but once I have seen an ad about 2-3 times, I get ‘ad blindness’ and that ad is now totally ignored – and I think this is one of the main reasons that the majority of bloggers are not making money. BECAUSE THEY ARE ALL PROMOTING THE SAME PRODUCTS!

Why Do Most Bloggers Promote The Same Products?

• Because They Are Sheep
  Blogging is very ‘guru based’ and people look at how the ‘guru’s’ are making money and try to copy them. But the thing you have to realise is that the reason they reached the income levels they are now at – is because they were unique – AND FOUND WHAT WORKED FOR THEM!
• Because They Are Lazy
  Some times I think that people think that all you need to do to start blogging for money is grab a Clickbank account and sign up for the 2 or 3 most popular products related to your niche. Now while this may work for some people – the fact that they are the most popular usually means that the majority of people who are going to buy it already know about it. So your chances of making any decent money from these unless you have a highly responsive email list is quite minimal!
• Because They Don’t Know Any Better
  Now I don’t want to imply that the majority of you are lazy sheep because the truth is that a lot of bloggers just don’t know any better. When you start blogging, there is no course that everyone takes to teach you how to make money from your blog – you need to learn for yourself. And since most of the successful (with income as the criteria for successful) bloggers don’t want to give away their secrets (because that means more competition) – it means you have to try and work it out yourself!

So How Do We Break Away From The Crowd?

So if following the crowd is not going to have us making money, then how do you break away from the crowd?

• Find New Products To Promote!
  Look outside of Clickbank (only about 5% of my monthly income) and find products that no one else in your niche is promoting. And before you tell me that you can’t find any, I personally spent a couple of hours today looking through all the offers on Commission Junction and found about 5 new affiliate programs (that I didn’t even know existed) that I am now looking to fit into my blogs/email lists. There are plenty of products with affiliate programs and some great affiliate networks that have a heap of fantastic products to promote – so spend some time researching.
• Look For Complimentary Products
  I think that the reason that most people promote the same products is because they only look at directly related products. For example, if your blog is about blogging – you only promote blogging products. However, most bloggers want to learn how to master Google – so what about something SEO related? Or something that will help them save time? (because we all know that the majority of all bloggers are shocking at time management!!)
• Focus On Products & Services
  Now I can only speak from my personal experience, but recently 99% (I’d say 100% but I could have forgotten something) of all my online income comes from affiliate commissions as a direct result of products or services that I have recommended. Now I do have ad’s on my blogs for information products – but for me personally, they don’t seem to convert! (On a side note – it is always best to recommend products that you use, because it gives you much more credibility).

2. They Sound Desperate

Since most bloggers are following the crowd and promoting the same thing that everyone else trying to promote – they start to worry when they are not making any sales. And that is when they start to appear desperate!

Have you ever visited a blog and it has just felt like every single article was a desperate attempt to make the blogger money? One overly positive product review after another, each just a rework of the products sales page…

Now I doubt that these bloggers start out with the intention of creating a spammy blog that adds no value to the ‘blogosphere’ but when people try so hard to make something work and they don’t see any results – they get desperate!

The Best Way NOT To Sound Desperate!

The easiest way to make sure that you don’t start to sound desperate is to keep your credibility. There is nothing wrong with promoting products or services but don’t do it at the expense of your readers.

Only promote reputable products – and if you are wondering how you know if a product is reputable, the easiest way to tell is to experience it yourself! Other than that, scour the internet for reviews (both good and bad) and see what actual users are actually saying about it.  Don’t trade quick returns for your long-term credibility as a blogger!

3. They Focus On The Unimportant

Do blog ad’s really work that well? I always look at the 125 ads in John Chows sidebar and wonder who would be stupid enough to pay $500/month to advertise there. Now, to be honest they may be converting incredibly well, but from the ads that I can track – none of my sidebar advertisements actually convert to sales (currently trying to work out what to replace them with!).

So why do most bloggers put so much emphasis on their sidebar ads?

Once again, it comes back to the ‘sheep mentality’. Bloggers see all the probloggers with their sidebar full of those 125 boxes and think that since they are making a full-time income blogging  – obviously I need to do the same as them!

The 80/20 Rule – And How It Will Make You Money

One of the biggest things that I learnt from the Four Hour Work Week was the Parento Principle (or the 80/20 rule), which simply put states that 80% of the effect comes from 20% of the causes. So 80% of the results come from 20% of the effort.

I took this principle and looked at my blogging, and more importantly my blogging income and found that this was definitely true. 80% of my income was coming from less than 20% of my sources. So then the goal was to optimise the 20% that was working for me – and removing the 80% that was just taking up my time (the unimportant!).

What is the unimportant in your blog, and what can you cut out?

4. They Are Not Strategic

A lot of bloggers fail to plan and that is why they fail.

Sure going with the flow is great, but you need to have a direction otherwise the ‘flow’ could take you in the complete opposite direction from where you want to be!

Be strategic with your blog and your writing. Know what you want and how you are going to deliver it.

Since I know that the majority of my blogging income comes from links inside of posts – I now have made the strategic decision to try and talk about my personal experiences in my posts, and how a product or service has helped me in that area. Now obviously when you are using personal experiences, you must actually own or use the thing that you are recommending – but that is what I prefer.

How I Am Being Strategic With WebsiteBuildr

Now I know WebsiteBuildr (my latest project) is not a blog (but a product), but the process can easily be transferred to the blogging platform.

The initial product is a video course for small business owners who are looking to create their own website, but yesterday I was planning out the autoresponder series – and looking for other products that I could promote that I believe these small business owners would benefit from.

Here Is A Short List Of Affiliate Programs I Found:

• Intuit Websites – Simple online based website creator (In case they struggle through my course)
• Market Samurai – In case they are interested in SEO traffic!
• Aweber – So they can start building an email list for their business.
• Vista Print – Because if they are interested in a website, they may be open to other promotional products.
• Hotels Combined – Because business owners need accommodation when they travel for business (and holidays)

Notice how none of them expect Intuit have anything to do with website design? That is because if my course is teaching them how to design a website, then why would I be promoting other website courses?

That is why I find it funny that a lot of blogs that talk about blogging are promoting ‘how to start blogging’ products (shouldn’t they be learning this from your blog?). Now don’t think I am having a go at anyone, if you scroll up and check out my sidebar you will find a couple of blogging products there (which is probably why they are not converting) – but as I said, now I know that they are not working for me, it is time to find something that does. It is all about being strategic, doing the research and watching what works and what doesn’t.

Look for complimentary products (yes, focus on products), break away from the crowd and find out what is working for YOU personally – and run with that! Be strategic with the way you promote and you will find that you don’t need to be writing desperate review posts – instead you will write honest reviews (and most likely get a better response!).

And That Is How You Can Make Money Blogging -When Most People Fail!

Why I Didn’t Discuss List Building…

A lot of you might be wondering why I didn’t add list building as a method of making money from your blog – since that is what all the ‘probloggers’ are now trying to sell us as the new ‘golden ticket’.

Well, the reason is the exactly what I have just written about.

Just because the ‘probloggers’ recommend it, doesn’t make it right for you!

Now I do build lists with the majority of my blogs – and yes, I was one of the first people to start using Popup Domination (which I still use on a few of my non-MMO niches) – but does that mean that you need to be building a list to make money from blogging? NOT AT ALL!

Once again, my online income bucks the trend – and comes mainly from search engine traffic to older posts in my archive (because of my strategic planning, and sometimes luck!). There are plenty of different methods to make money from a blog (and maybe I will tackle that in another post), but the purpose of this post was to challenge a mindset that is holding you back from making money. A mindset – not a method!

So What Is Holding You Back? And What Are You Going To Do About It?

My FREE e-course will show you the 7 Things Every Successful Blogger Has!

This is a guest post by James King of BetterStartBlogging.com. If you want to guest post on this blog, check out the guidelines here.

Are you blogging for money? Do you blog with burning ambition to aniline every blog that crosses your path? Are driven to monopolize the blogosphere with your content? Whatever your ambitions are blogging needn’t be so competitive.

Misconception of blogging

Billions of blogs exist on the internet. Many perish from the lack of: enthusiasm; interest; abundance or financial gain. The glamorization of blogging makes the medium attractive towards selected “entrepreneurial wannabes” that assume making a colossal sum of money is attainable in record time.

Reality of blogging

Successful bloggers realize that competition is guaranteed. It is crucial to focus on your reader’s needs. Blogging is about developing and serving communities rather than worrying about competition. The successful bloggers focus their efforts on solving problems. Answers to problems are more valuable and readers will acknowledge great content.

The significance of an online community

The online communities created by bloggers have little boundaries. A strong online community can provide a variety of benefits including:

• An environment that encourages learning and sharing ideas

• An environment that has no boundaries geographically

• An environment where people can network and develop lasting relationships

• Opportunities to find work or participate in a project

The selfless blogger is the successful blogger

Selflessness is a trait to becoming a success. Blogging is about creating trust and rapport with fellow bloggers and their audiences. A provider of value in any marketplace is on the road to prosperity. Bloggers that develop a selfless attitude by enriching online communities with their experience and wealth of knowledge will forge stronger relationships and networks online.

Blogging provides opportunities to contribute and build rich learning environments. Web 2.0 allows bloggers to comment and create conversation.

An active community is a stronger community

Providing assistance in an active community will provide you with opportunities to be recognized as a specialist. Web 2.0 has given everybody the opportunity to express their view online. Everybody is entitled to their views look at Facebook. People yearn to belong to a community and bloggers that don’t participate in any groups are overlooking huge potential to grow their blog. Bloggers shouldn’t consider joining other communities just to promote themselves. The purpose of joining a community is to provide answers to problems. Have you noticed why forums are so popular? Look at Yahoo Answers.

Two ways to contribute to a blogging community

• Commenting

  The easiest and less time consuming method is comment on blog posts. Blog post commenting has many benefits, but most importantly you are contributing to a learning rich facility. After a few weeks of commenting on a certain blog you will be impacting on a community and become well-known with that community.

• Guest posting

  Creating an excellent guest post for a blog community takes time and needs to be planned carefully. However, the benefits for a fresh writer that has a different approach can make your readers consider content contrastingly. Your content will be viewed by a diverse audience that will appreciate some new colors to this online canvas.

A community must grow to be successful. New members must visit this online presence. A highly competitive approach to blogging is a consequence. Focusing on the number of visits you get everyday isn’t going improve your presence. Solving problems to people’s needs will. A bloggers main focal point is delivering information that helps people to succeed with their issues is the solution.

Do you contribute to an online community and focus on delivering for their readers? Do you write guest blog posts as a way of enriching a different blog? What ways to do contribute to a community? Has this post changed your mindset of blogging?

My FREE e-course will show you the 7 Things Every Successful Blogger Has!

I am sure if you have been blogging for any amount of time then you would have noticed the high turnover of bloggers. With ‘blogger burnout’ becoming more and more popular, here are 3 things that are regularly promoted as ‘good things’ that could possibly make you more prone to this growing epidemic!

If you haven’t already had the symptoms of it yourself, chances are you most likely will. ‘Blogger Burnout’ is not something that you should think will never happen to you, because in the 3 years I have been blogging I have been amazing by not only the amount of blogs that just drop off the planet – but also the quality of bloggers that disappear.

It saddens me when I find a fantastic new blogger who has a bucket load of potential – only to see that he has left his blog to become cobweb-filled and rat-ridden.

Today I wanted to take a look at a couple of the causes of ‘blogger burnout’ in part-time bloggers, because it is the exact things that a lot of the ‘probloggers’ are promoting as things that will ‘make you famous‘.

How To Fast Track Blogger Burnout!

1. Post Every Single Day

   This might be ok for full-time bloggers, but trying to write 5-7 blog posts each week, while working a full-time job is a sure fire way kick start the ‘blogger burnout’!

   Your article quality will decrease as you try to force out content. Why not focus on creating a couple of quality articles and give them a chance to be seen, instead of pushing them quickly into your archives with so many new articles?

2. Become A Commenting Junkie

   One of the most written about traffic generating strategies for bloggers is commenting. Everyone is trying to tell you that you need to comment everywhere, often and first – but this can be extremely tiring!

   I used to be subscribed to over 300 blogs and would comment on almost every new posts that came up in my feed, but I started to get the early symptoms of ‘blogger burnout’ so I cut right back on the blogs I subscribed too and now rarely comment on blogs. Don’t get me wrong, I still read a lot of blog posts – I now only comment when I have something important to add.

   Have you noticed how all the biggest bloggers rarely comment? Yet they don’t seem to struggle with generating traffic. Personally, since dropping my frantic commenting and focusing on my content – my traffic has doubled!

3. Get Addicted To Social Media

   This one is tough, because social media is a fantastic tool that can really get your content in front of a lot of eyeballs – but a lot of people let social media become an addiction (wasting A LOT of time).

   The one way that I have found to steer clearing of checking a million different social profiles is to limit my activity to just a couple of networks. I have Twitter, Facebook and StumbleUpon – because they are the ones that I have got to work to me. The problem I see with trying to build a tonne of social media profiles is that you spread yourself thin – why not focus building real relationships in just a few networks instead of spamming a heap of social media networks with your links?

   But back to the addiction, social media can quickly become a time drain if you don’t set some boundaries. If you let social media get the best of you then the one thing that you think will shoot your blog into the spotlight – will eventually be the death of your blog.

Can You Start To See The Signs…?

What do you think? Maybe I am wrong and you can keep up a full-time job while posting every day, commenting everywhere and still have time to feed your social media addiction – or maybe you can’t!

What do you think are some of the causes of ‘blogger burnout’? And have you experienced it yourself? Let me know what you are thinking by leaving a comment below (or maybe you are ready to put some of this into action – and are ready to drop commenting unless you have something important to say).

My FREE e-course will show you the 7 Things Every Successful Blogger Has!

I don’t know about you, but success has never been a thing that I have ever been scared of. The one thing I fear most is failure! I know I have amazing potential, yet I am afraid to share my dreams because of the voice in the back of my head that says ‘but what if you fail?’.

If you are anything like me, you are very protective of your goals.

Maybe it is because I am pursuing a different path than that of the majority of my friends and family, but I rarely ever talking about my blogging or online business.

Now it’s not that I am afraid of being called a nerd. I’m passed that – in fact I am embracing it! I recently got some Clark Kent style glasses which might make an appearance when I get around to doing a video – so it definitely isn’t that. What I have come to realise is that I am afraid of not achieving my goals and having all my 8-5 friends say, ‘ I knew you couldn’t do it – just get a job!‘

NO FEAR = NO DRIVE

But the problem with no one knowing your goals is that you start to put everything on cruise control – and that is where I found myself over the last month!

I was just going about business like usual – but I had hit a plateau! And for me…. plateau’s are EVIL.

So here are the steps that I have taken to smash forward towards my main goal:

Of having a location independent family, funded by my online assets.

I hope that it will encourage you to let your own fear of failure push you higher!

Step 1: Set Specific Goals!

I am a massive believer in SMART goal setting and I knew that to get to a new level and to break free from this plateau, I needed some specific goals with a time limit!

So I sat down with my wife and said:

Let’s set my job exit criteria! What levels do I need to be at to start doing this full-time?

Here is what we set: (and this is where my fear of failure kicks in!)

• To be making $,5000/month PROFIT
• Online Income must be TRENDING UP
  
• Have $10,000 in SAVINGS

Oh, and the time limit we set was JULY 2011!

Ok, so I am semi-comfortable with these goals – so time for step 2!

Step 2. Make Your Goals Uncomfortable!

The problem with comfortable goals is that most of the time they never get achieved! Because people start off thinking they have a heap of time to achieve them – so they don’t do anything. And then their time limit sneaks up on them and by then it is too late -and they fail.
That is why one of my all-time favourite quotes is:

“It is better to aim for the stars and hit the moon, than to aim for the trees, and hit the ground.”– Suzanne Oggenfuss

It is in our discomfort that we are spurred into action – and I don’t know if my wife knew that, but she has definitely made my goals a lot less comfortable. Let me explain.

We are only a newly married couple (14 months) and when we arrived back in Australia from 3 months in Canada (September last year), it just so happened that my parents were looking for a new place to rent at the same time we were -so to save money we found a big 5 bedroom house between us.

Just last month we signed another 6 month lease to end in March – with the goal of going our separate ways (my parents and us) at the end of the lease.

And my wife throws out an innocent suggestion…

Let’s go overseas  for 6 months from March – instead of waiting until July.

Now I know she was just thinking logically, because that would mean we wouldn’t have to try and find a short term rental lease , and don’t get me wrong – I love the idea! But cutting my goal by three months has definitely kicked me into gear!

Now our goals are the same as before, but now by March 2011!

Talk about a wake up call! But just in case that still wasn’t enough to drive me… here is step 3.

Step 3. Make Your Goals Public!

Setting SMART goals is great, making them uncomfortable is even better, but as soon as you release your goals into the public domain – man your productivity increases!

If you are feeling flat with where you currently are, then there is nothing like the fear of failure to kick you up the bum!

Where To From Here?

Obviously now that I am starting to get a large amount of drive, I need to channel that drive.

So I looked at my current projects and as you can see from my weekend discussion post, I am looking at making some changes to StandOutBlogger.

And as well as that, I am channeling a lot of my focus at the moment into a new project WebsiteBuildr – which is quickly taking shape (get ready for a big post about that one!)

Over To You?

Are you starting to hit a plateau with your online business?

Why not follow my lead and set some SMART goals, refine them to make them uncomfortable and then make them public!

Let the ‘fear of failure’ drive you a new level!

My FREE e-course will show you the 7 Things Every Successful Blogger Has!

Have you ever thought about how your blogs home page is viewed by readers on their first visit? What does it tell people about your blog and where does it direct them? This weekend, let’s discuss the perfect homepage design for your blog!

I don’t know if you have ever checked your blogs stats, but chances are that your homepage is one of your most popular pages.

Whether people hit your homepage straight away, or enter through one of your posts and then decides to check out what else you have on offer – have you ever thought about what type of first impression your blogs homepage gives new visitors?

Over 1,000 People Visit My Homepage Each Month!!

I was shocked to find out that my home page was my 3rd most visited page last month (following my ebook cover tutorial and Facebook landing page posts) with over 1,000 visits in July.

Chances are that a good percentage of these 1,000 visitors are new readers and I don’t know about you but sometimes I’m not sure that my blogs homepage is the best tool to keep readers interested in my blog.

Something that has got me thinking about this is Jordan Cooper’s redesign of NotAProBlog -and more importantly, his new home page.

So I wanted to put this weekends question out to you….

How Can We Best Optimise Our Blogs Homepage For New Visitors?

1. Latest Posts (Regular Blog Homepage)

2. Try To Sign Them Up For Our Email List?

3. Highlight Blogs Popular/Best Posts

4. Something Else…??

Now I know this will be different based on what the focus on your blog is, but throw your thoughts and opinions into the ring and let’s get some discussion happening!

My FREE e-course will show you the 7 Things Every Successful Blogger Has!

If you read my recent interview with SEO expert Dan Lew, then you would have noticed that he recommended Market Samurai. This is a product that I personally use and here are a 5 reasons you should download the Market Samurai trial.
If you are a blogger that even cares slightly about SEO then the one product that I use and recommend is Market Samurai. They have a 12 day free trial of their software and I recommend that you grab a copy and start focusing on SEO (read my SEO vs Social post). I think this product is a ‘must-have’ for any professional blogger (or those looking to become one), and here are my:

5 Reasons That You Should Download The Market Samurai Trial Today!

1. Helps You Find ‘Buying’ Traffic

   I would dare say that 90% of my blogging income is generated thanks to Market Samurai! The truth is that I had never focused on search traffic before about 12 months ago (when I purchased the software), and at that time I was probably only making $2-400/month online.

   Market Samurai is a keyword research tool (with a HEAP of other cool features), that allows you to find out what people are looking for – and how much competition those keywords have. So I used it to find keywords related to the product I was looking to promote – that let me know that people were looking to buy (not just looking for information).

2. It Tracks Your Rankings For Targeted Keywords

   If you are now purposely trying to rank in Google and the other search engines for certain keywords or phrases, then you want to know where you are currently ranking. With Market Samurai you can input all your keywords as well as your domain name (so it knows what to look for), and it will give you all your rankings in one place – as well as allow you to see the history of each ranking!

   If that is not enough, you can also get a full detailed analysis of the top 10 websites for a keyword and see what work is ahead of you to rank well for that keyword. It shows you the top 10′s backlink count, indexed pages, PR, and whether the keyword is in their domain, description and header – it even tells you how many .edu back links the page has and whether it is DMOZ listed (how is that for a great resource?)

3. It Is Free To Trial

   If you are not already using a tool to help you increase the search traffic (or even if you already do), you would be crazy not to take advantage of the opportunity to trial the full working version of this keyword research machine – for 12 whole days! That is plenty of time to work out if it is something that that will boost your search engine traffic.(And did I mention they DON’T take credit card details).

4. It Comes Highly Recommended

   From what Market Samurai themselves are saying, over 117,000 people are using their software! I don’t about you, but for me – THAT IS SOCIAL PROOF!

   If that is not enough maybe you have heard of Ed Dale, Mike Koenigs and Darren Rowse (ProBlogger), these are just 3 of the 117,000 people using the software (and they all recommend it!)

5. By Trialing Market Samurai – You Can Buy It Cheaper

   As well as all the reasons above, probably one of the worst kept secrets is the fact that if you download a trial of Market Samurai they offer you a 35% discount off the regular price if you purchase within 6 days of signing up for the trial. That is a $52 saving if you bought Market Samurai outright.(Read my ‘You Don’t Need A Market Samurai Promo Code‘ post for more info).

BONUS REASON: The Keyword Research Module Is FREE (Even After The Trial Ends!)

I know I said 5 reasons, but this is something that a lot of people promoting Market Samurai don’t tell you. If you download the trial of the software, you get 12 days of using the full product with no restrictions. However after the trial is over, you still get FULL ACCESS to the keyword research module of the software – forever! (That is my favourite part of the software).

So what are you waiting for?

My FREE e-course will show you the 7 Things Every Successful Blogger Has!

My mate Rob Rammuny just posted a fantastic article on his blog titled ‘How To Stand Out In A Crowded Niche‘ and while the whole article is kick-butt, one point he hits on that I have personally been working on lately is creating an ‘Inner Circle‘.

What Is An Inner Circle?

In Rob’s post, he talks about how all the major bloggers in the ‘Make Money Online’ (MMO) niche all seem to interview each other, as well as promoting each others products.

This is much more than just about making more money. It is about networking, and working together to build each others scope of influence.

It is this collaboration and networking that we also need to be doing – if we want to increase out influence – or ‘Stand Out’ in our niche.

As I mentioned, this is something that I have personally started working on over the last couple of weeks and I wanted to introduce a couple of bloggers that I have started networking with (and who I see as becoming part of my inner circle).

Bloggers Entering My Inner Circle

(Let me have a small disclaimer, that these are just early relationships, but I love what these bloggers are doing and these are my thoughts – so if they disagree, they can comment below!)

1. Rob Ramunny (@RobRamunny)

Rob (yes, the same one who inspired this post), has been on my radar for quite a long time, but we have only recently started to connect. All I can say is that he is incredibly switched on and his success is only going to grow!

At just 16 years of age, I cannot wait to see what he is doing at 18 or 21! I highly recommend Subscribing to His Blog and signing up for his free video course!

Rob is definitely someone that I want in my inner circle!

2. Ben Lang (@EpicLaunch)

Ben has an interesting story. Starting an eBay business at just 14 years of age, he has been interviewed on Channel 12 and has been running Ben-Lang.com very successfully.

Recently he realized that his blog was becoming a multi-author platform and made the smart choice to rebrand to EpicLaunch.com.

Ben is definitely one to watch and subscribe to!

3.  Dan Lew (@DanLew)

I have been seeing Dan pop up everywhere lately!

While running a successful SEO company, this Aussie blogger is making $2,000 a month from his blogs and I can see this growing dramatically.

This week I had the chance to ask Dan a few quick questions, so make sure you subscribe to his blog and keep an eye out for my blog posts featuring him (coming in the next couple of days!).

People I Would Like To Know More

These are people who have recently jumped onto my radar and have a heap of potential. Looking forward to connecting with them more.

1. Paul Cunningham (@PaulCunningham)

Another Aussie blogger, Paul actually lives about an hour down the highway from where I live, and has been making some great waves with his blog Blogging Teacher and as moderator of the ProBlogger Community.

Paul also runs Exchange Server Pro while freelance blogging on two other blogs (all this while working on client projects and developing his own stuff). If there was one thing I wish I could learn from Paul it would be how he fits all this into his day!

Make sure you Subscribe To Blogging Teacher!

2. Onibalusi Bamidele (@DataEntryForAll)

Onibalusi is a blogger that I have seen around a lot, because he is such an active guest blogger!

The thing is, that he is making it work for him and his blog YoungPrePro and young entrepreneur blog that is quickly growing in influence.

So I recommend checking out his blog, and grabbing his RSS feed!

3. Kevin Tan (@imKevinTan)

Kevin is a Chinese blogger that has only just relaunched his blog imKevinTan and it good to see him back in action.

He has kicked it off with some fantastic content, and looking forward to seeing how he is going in a couple of months!

Subscribe to his blog if you are interested too.

4. Mark Bell (@MarkBell10)

Mark is currently completing his PHD and I’ve only recently come across him and his blog.

His blog seems to be shooting at quite a few different topics and it would be nice to see a bit more focus, but he is focusing on community and looking to build his network – so I can only see bigger things coming up for Mark.

Check out his blog and subscribe!

If you are on this list, and do not want to network with me, feel free to let me  know! But here is my very early ‘Inner Circle’, I’d love to hear who you are networking with!

My FREE e-course will show you the 7 Things Every Successful Blogger Has!

I have thought about this ever since I started blogging, but I never took the steps to put it into action. Do you have a blogging schedule? Should I have one? Let’s take a closer looks at the advantages of planning vs why it is good to be spontaneous.

If you are anything like me, then even just hearing words such as ‘planning’ or ‘schedule’ just make you cringe.

I don’t know about you but for me, I much prefer ‘spontaneity’ and ‘as I’m inspired’. But what I have come to realise is that for most bloggers:

Inspiration is an Excuse For Laziness

How many times have you heard bloggers say something along the lines of, ‘it is always best to writer when you are inspired. Don’t force yourself to write because then you will just end up writing rubbish that no one will want to read‘.

The truth is that inspiration is EVERYWHERE!

If you cannot find enough inspiration for one new blog post each day, then I am not trying to sound rude – but you are not looking hard enough.

I have found that when I spend all day on the computer, I struggle with inspiration. My posts start to sound like all the other bloggers in my niche and I do not put out my best work.

So if you are struggling with inspiration:

1. Get Off Your Computer
2. Get Outside
3. Interact With Nature and People

Inspiration comes when you make yourself available to it.

Now that we have cut out the ‘waiting for inspiration excuse, we are brought back to our initial question:

Should We Have A Consistent Blogging Schedule?

What do I mean by a blogging schedule?

A blogging schedule is a predetermined time-line for when you are going to post on your blog.

If you are going to post once a week. What day will you post on? Or three times a week… which three days?

And then to take it a step further:

If you are posting multiple times through the week, will you have different themes for each day? For example, I am looking to start implementing a weekend question, which will mean that sometime throughout each weekend I will pose a deliberate question to my readers. This will mean little content, but room for big discussion.

1. Adds Structure

As a blogger (especially a part-time blogger), time management is critical. I can be so easy to have a couple of days or a week go by, without realising that a post has not been written. So in the case for a consistent blogging schedule, the benefit I can see for the blogger is structure.

By letting your readers know when to expect posts through out the week, those who don’t subscribe will know when to visit your blog – and those that do subscribe will be ready and waiting.

And by adding topics to certain days, it gives you time to plan your weeks out in advance – and get a head start on your writing.

A whiteboard would be a fantastic tool to make sure this all runs smoothly!

2. Directs Blog Focus

When you start writing as your are inspired, the truth is that your inspiration comes in so many different directions that it can take your blog to topics that you do not really fit into your blogs scope.

By having a structure posting schedule, that has predefined topics, you are making sure that your blog is moving in the direction that you want it to go!

3. Allows Better Monetization (WHAT?!?!)

This point may seem a little out of left field, but something I have been testing since the relaunch of StandOutBlogger is unique page templates that target ad’s to the topic of the post.

For example. if you read one of my post on Market Samurai Promo Code, you will notice that the ads are for Market Samurai and other SEO products. However, if you see my Ebook Cover Tutorial, you will notice ads targeted towards ebook cover creators and Photoshop.

What I came to realise, was that with the diversity of my blog posts, some of my post popular blog posts were bringing me traffic that would have no interest in blogging products at all – so why not target advertising directly to them.

To do this I create the individual page templates in Dreamweaver (usually just means creating a new sidebar with the new ads) and then using a free WordPress Plugin called ‘Custom Post Templates‘ which allows me to select the the post template for each individual post, in the same place you write the post.

Now currently I have only created a few page templates, mainly for the posts that are getting good SEO traffic, but what if we had a consistent structure to our posting, that was limited to a few defined topics? You could create page templates that would target advertising to those topics – and I am sure you will see an instant increase in your blogs revenue.

Do You Have A Blogging Schedule?

This is something I am still looking at myself, and would love to hear from people who are either using a blogging schedule – or those who aren’t (and why?).

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This has become a bit of a pet peeve with me (and it is not directed at anyone in particular). The thing that gets me most, is the fact that this was something that I not only did with my blog for the majority of it’s existence – but something that I also promoted as a good idea.

What I am talking about is bloggers incessant need promote their blog before themselves.

You know what I am talking about, people who:

• Use Their Logo As Their Gravatar
• Leave Comments With Their Blogs Name

Everything is about people knowing about their blog.

Like I said, I used to follow this ‘marketing strategy’ but since dropping it, I am starting to realise how annoying it really is.

Who Want’s To Communicate With A Brand?

I don’t know about you, but I want to talk to people. I want to know about the face behind the blog.

I love reading ‘about’ pages.

I love it when I can find and use a persons real name in social media conversations, comments and emails.

I want to know that I am talking to a person a and not a product!

What Is Best In The Long Run?

I understand the desire to try and brand your blog. But in all honesty, the only reason people stick around once they have visited your blog is because of you.

Content is great, but anyone can write content. People are looking for personality, who you are and how you write needs to connect with what they are looking for.

Branding will only get you so far, but start building personal relationships and networking and you will be shocked by the opportunities that arise.

The Changes I Made

With the relaunching/rebranding of StandOutBlogger it wasn’t just the blog design that got an overhaul.

I completely changed the way that I interacted with everyone. I wanted to put a name and a face behind StandOutBlogger.

So I:

• Comment With Just My Name
  Every since I had started this blog, every comment I made on another blog was always ‘Tom | StandOutBlogger’ or ‘Tom@StandOutBlogger’ (if they used KeywordLuv). Everything needed the blog name on it.

  Now everywhere I comment, it is just ‘Thomas Sinfield’ – and if a blog has KeywordLuv, I don’t use it) I Want the bloggers to know that I am there to add value – not to try and drag their readers away to my site.

• Made Twitter More Personal
  I changed the background and icon from my logo to a photo of myself. I also included my name in my Twitter background. Previously people would have had no idea on Twitter if I was male/female or what age I was. Now with one simple change it shows everyone exactly who I am – and have you noticed how much easier it is to tweet with a face as opposed to a logo?
• Changed My Gravatar
  In the transition from logo of photo, I also made my Gravatar a nice little head shot of me.

I don’t know about you, but there is an increasing amount of spammy comments (and I am not just talking about the auto generated ones). I am talking about the commentators who just skim your content to pick up on key thoughts, so they look like they are leaving an educated comment – but in all seriousness they are just trying to get a link to their blog and a trickle of traffic.

So while I will approve comments that add value. Very rarely will I visit a commentators website, unless their name or a photo makes up part of their comments ( usually takes both).

Am I Saying Everyone Should Do This?

In a perfect world, ‘YES’. but in reality not everyone has the same goals. And while I am working on building community and credibility, other people are looking for traffic and profit (which funnily enough come when you have community and credibility).

But I think the main point I am trying to make, is that if you are interested in networking, then please give us something to work with? No one wants to communicate with a logo and a company/blog name!

Your Say: Blog Promotion vs Networking?

Maybe I am wrong. Maybe people do not care if they are communicating with a person or a brand. If you have something to add to this discussion, add your comments below.

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Have you ever felt like your goals just seem unattainable? I felt exactly the same, and this is how I went about fixing things (without lowering my expectations).

Goals Are Great.

Everyone should have them. But with everyone talking about dreaming big and setting BHAG’s (big, hairy, audacious goals), I think it can be easy to get overwhelmed in inaction and leave you 6 months down the track wondering why nothing has changed.

Does This Mean That We Should Give Up On Goals?

Of course not!

I know just like you that goals are important  if you really want to create change in any area of your life. But why is it that some people seem to create and grow and improve with such ease – smashing their goals, while the rest of us are left resetting our targets after we failed to achieve them once again.

Are we just dreaming?

You’re Dreaming Not Goal Setting

The thing that I have found is that the majority of people who say that they have goals, really don’t – they have dreams.

A dream is a goal without legs. Set something that will take you places.

They realise that to succeed and to move forward they need to set some goals. So they start writing their ‘wish list’ and then sit down and think, ‘ glad that is over, now I can get back to what I was doing.’

If you are serious about creating change in your life turn you dreams into goals by giving them some legs!

How To Give Your Dreams Some Legs

But how do you make sure you are not going to wake up to find that your dreams were just that, dreams. What is it going to turn your dreams in goals that are going to lead you in the direction your are pursuing?

Stepping Stones…

I know it sounds simple, but the easiest way is to break your dream into smaller, more manageable chunks.

How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.

As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, sometimes our goals can seem unattainable – and that is what stops us from pursuing them.

So Take Your Big Goal And Break It Down

For me, I have some massive goals personally and for this blog. In this post I will stick with my blogging goals; let me share just two of them.

1. I will have 5,000 people on my email lists by the end of 2011.
2. I will make $100,000 through my blogs in 2011.

I don’t know how you are with big goals, but these ones really scare me!

The first thing that I always do when I write down my goals is think about where I currently am (in relation to those goals) and instantly feel like I am drowning.
Is it just me? Or do you get the same feeling?

So Let’s Start To Break These Goals Down

Ok, if I am planning on having 5,000 people on my email lists by the end of 2011 and I currently have about 500 subscribers that means I need 4,500 more subscribers in the next 17 months.

I’m not sure about you, but 4,500 is a little bit too big of a number for me to grasp at the moment, so what I decided to do was break it down.

4,500 in 17 months, equals 264 subscribers a month. Or 8 a day.

Now which goals seems more manageable? 4,500 subscribers in 17 months, or 8 each day? My goal feels so much more attainable when it is broken down to a daily target.

And since I added Popup Domination to this blog I have actually been averaging over 8 new subscribers a day (just from this blog).

By breaking it down to a daily target it is easy to keep track of and allows you to map out your journey towards your goal – which means that you can see when you are missing your target, so that you can reassess and fix on a daily basis.

Well, that one is sorted, I just need to continue to get 8 new subscribers a day  and I will have 5,000 subscribers by the end of 2011, but what about my $100,000 goal?

This is the one that really scares me! $100k broken down over a year $8,333 a month! Now currently I am averaging about $3k a month so I have 17 months to practically triple my current monthly income – tell me a job that you can increase your salary that quick!

Let’s break it down again…

$100,000 in a year equals $8,333/month or $274/day!

Now I know the daily target worked for my last goal, but making $274 from my blogs each and every day still feels unattainable to me – so I need to break it down further.

Set Smaller Targets

Now I have 17 months to reach my goal, but in reality the goal is only for the 12 months in 2011. That means I have the next 5 month to set myself up into a position that will give me the best chance of achieving my goal.

I Will Have A $5,000 Month By The End Of 2010!

I know that if I can build my online income up to a level of $5k a month by the end of 2010, I will put myself in a great position to smash my 2011 goal.

Obviously I will have to put strategies into place to make sure that my income is continually increasing. I will need to set traffic goals and content creation goals. I will be creating new products and working on ways to make my current ones more profitable – but I will only continue to do this as long as my goals stay within reach.

Continually Reassess Your Targets

Now that you are starting to break down your goals, so that they are measurable on a consistent basis, you are giving yourself the opportunity to know where you stand in relation to your final destination.

This means that you will know if you are on track to meet, exceed or fall short and this allows you the chance to reassess your goals.

If you think you are going to fall short, is there anything you can do to make sure that you meet your targets? If you are on track to smash your goal then realign your goal higher and push it further.

The most important thing is that you do not get swamped by your massive goals, but you begin to start taking action towards them with small stepping stones.

What Are Your Goals? And How Are You Making Sure You Achieve Them?

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