Written on June 9th, 2005 at 12:06 pm by Tris Hussey
Can you spot the Pro Blogger?
Tris Hussey is a professional blogger and blog consultant, the Chief Blogging Officer for Qumana Software, and Managing Director of Qumana Services. He can be reached at tris AT qumana DOT com or tris AT trishussey DOT com.
Written on June 8th, 2005 at 05:06 pm by duncan
Pretty pictures :a question of blog aesthetics.
Is a blog that uses pictures in its posts more likely to succeed that a blog that posts identical content but doesn’t use the pictures? Sure, we know that there are many other considerations in the success or otherwise of a blog, but take a pure economists view of a perfect market where both blogs are identical in every other way. We know that the quality of content is important, but I’ve come to a rather interesting conclusion, at least in the field of consumer and general interest blogs (as opposed to political blogs): blog aesthetics matter, and the prettier the pictures in your posts the more likely you are to succeed.
This in itself causes me a great deal of stress, mainly because editing and uploading pictures is slow in comparison to the creation of content. WordPress doesn’t allow you to just paste a picture directly into a post, and I’m presuming that other DIY packages are similar. The case in the free market may be a little different, for memory I believe you can cut and paste using blogger, but at the end of the day as a enternetusers you’re more likely to be using a DIY or Paid hosting package as opposed to a freebie. The second point of stress is the extra demands on your site in terms of bandwidth: pictures slow down site loading times and cause bandwidth to be gobbled up at a faster rate. My immediate example is my new Weblog Empire Blog: The Gadget Blog, lots of pictures here, which are necessary and I’ll add are working a treat, but the bandwidth usage is 4 times that of the Blog Herald over similar visitor numbers. In other words pictures can also cost money.
The consideration though is whether the expenditure on pictures is rewarded by increased traffic and repeat visitor numbers. I’m thinking yes at this stage, although I’d welcome everyone’s views.
Written on June 8th, 2005 at 02:06 pm by JSLogan
Why Do You Write, Read, and Comment on Blogs?
Last week, Bob Bly asked a simple question on his blog - …why not just read books, periodicals, and Web sites? Why do you read blogs … and bother writing posts on them?
Here was the comment I left in response to his question:
I own a few of the books you’ve written. I like them. One in particular has helped me in my career. I thought of writing you in thanks, but never did. I always thought you were too busy or must be receiving unsolicited input all the time. In short, I always thought I’d be a bother.
Then you started to blog and as such, I had an easy means to reach you. You opened a dialogue and I can communicate with you as easy as leaving this comment. Since then, you’ve emailed me a few times in acknowledgement of comments on your blog. We even had a short conversation on the phone. All because you blog.
Why visit your blog? You are very good at offering insght and opinion - opening a conversation. Books, magazines, newsletters and such are often better thought, more informative, and better written than blogs I read…but I never “met” you until you blogged. You’re better here than in your books. You’re human, one of “us.” You lead and participate in the conversation. That’s why I read and comment on your blog.
I blog because it makes me think. I learn from what excites people, what gets them talking, and what leaves me speaking in the “dark.” I’ve met and joined in conversations with people across continents, and have learned from comments left on my blog.
Blogging makes me better at my profession - that’s why I blog.
For those of you that blog, why do you do it? For those of you that read and comment on blogs, what do you get out of it? Why participate? Why blog?
Written on June 8th, 2005 at 12:06 pm by duncan
Does size matter?
No, this isn’t a post involving a dirty subject, Darren has had all of us guest bloggers sign in blood that we will behave ourselves here at enternetusers, but it is a serious question. Does size matter in terms of blog layout.
There is any number of different theories on this one, but its something else to think about whether you are starting a new blog or overhauling an existing blog.
I did try to find some public stats in terms of screen size of viewers when putting together this post, but had no luck. What I do recall reading somewhere is that there are still a lot of people using Windows computers with a screen size set to 800×600.
If you’re not as old as me and weren’t around in the early days of the internet, when we use to run Windows 3.11 and connected at 14.4k (ok, it use to display at 640×480 or similar, I’m just obsessing again about turning 30 in September), right click on your desktop and change your settings to 800×600, then visit a few high profile blogs.
What you’ll find is large portions of some blogs flowing off the screen on the right hand side.
Sure, I can guess in advance that some readers will say “well, why should I bother about those people, they should update their systems”. Fair enough, but like yesterdays post on making sure that your blog works on different operating systems, failing to make sure you blog renders well at different sizes can result in lost viewers who may find it difficult, if not impossible to view your blog in an accessible fashion.
For myself, I take a strategy I call the “what my mother is looking at” strategy. My mother owns a 19 inch LCD monitor, and yet keeps Windows set at 800×600. Yes, the icons are huge, but she likes it this way, she tells me its “easier to read this way”, and no, she actually has a better PC setup than I do (latest P4 processor, 1gb ram etc..). If my mother was to view one of my blogs, would she be able to read it easily? The point I make that its not only people using old computers with small screens that use 800×600, other users do as well.
With the Weblog Empire standard templates I’ve kept the width to 780. Sure, it’s limiting and I’d like nothing more than to expand out to 900, 1000 or even more, but at the end of the day whether your reading a site like PVR Spot or even the Weblog Empire blog itself, I know exactly how it will present whether you are viewing it at 800×600 or a 1024x 768. There are of course, other ways to cater to this, including the use of percentages for content areas, but from experience I know that sometimes this can cause more problems in itself.
For some it may be too hard, but as enternetuserss we are in the business of numbers, and excluding potential recurring visitors doesn’t make good business sense.
Written on June 8th, 2005 at 12:06 am by JSLogan
Blogs Are an Incomplete Customer Communications Tool - How Would You Make Them Better?
Blogs are interesting tools of business and business communications. There are a lot of useful things you can do with a blog. Interestingly, they’re lacking in the one benefit most touted - customer communication. Only the blogger can open the conversation, the reader can only respond.
That’s poor communication.
Readers are without doubt the most valuable part of a blog. Without the reader, the blog is nothing more than a stream of conscious pouring into an empty room. The blogger and reader need each other, otherwise his dialogue and exchange of ideas never takes place.
The reader is the one that really makes the blog.
How ironic then that it is only the reader that can’t start a conversation. Only the blogger can open a topic for discussion. The blogger decides what and when something will be discussed. That isn’t the nature of communication, that’s not how we’d communicate were we together at a party, conference, or business gathering.
Sure, a reader can always send the author an email or contact them in other ways to initiate a post or topic for discussion, but that’s not the issue. The issue is how do you make it an integrated process? For example, anyone in your neighborhood can stop at your house and say hello, but how do you make them feel welcome to do so and part of your home?
On my own blog, I started a feature called Your Turn to Speak. The concept and process is simple, a reader submits a post for publishing on my blog by filling-out a short form. The reader can now start the conversation and the rest of us can follow. While the reader could always send me an email or call me to open a topic, no one ever did so until I invited them and gave a process. It’s a new feature and too early to tell if it increases conversation. There may be a better, simpler, and more intuitive way to integrate the reader…we’ll see.
Do you believe blogs are lacking in providing two-way communication? If so, how would you better integrate the reader? What are some creative ways you can think of to better integrate the reader into the blogging experience?
Written on June 7th, 2005 at 09:06 pm by duncan
Browser compatibility of your blog
I’ve put up a different version of this post up at The Blog Herald, but knowing that Darren is a Mac user I wanted to share a slightly different version on the theme here at enternetusers: professional bloggers are ignoring compatibility issues.
I know from experience that many of the better bloggers in this world are Mac users, and I do honestly envy you. If I had a couple of thousand spare dollars sitting in my account to buy a new computer I’d most likely go with a Mac. The unfortunate reality is, that whilst Weblog Empire is going well, it’s not producing similar figures yet to Darren’s Mac powered network. Mac’s cost more, and while I can still build a new PC from parts for around $500 AUD (a decent one at that) I’m not changing yet. I also know that the chances are that the majority of you reading this use a PC running Windows as I do. Whether Macs are better or not is irrelevant, as enternetuserss we specialise in content delivery, not whether one OS is better than another.
The cold, hard facts are that there is a strong chance that your blog works great when you read it in Windows, but might not work on other operating systems. In the earlier days of the blogosphere, when I first started with The Blog Herald, this didn’t even figure in my thoughts. I know now that the earlier version of the Blog Herald didn’t work in other browsers and operating systems, and as such I was excluding many potential readers. I was fortunate enough to be able to learn from experience, because when I started The Blog Herald, Technorati didn’t track 1 million blogs yet, Nick Denton and Jason Calacanis were still dot com refugees and blogging for money wasn’t heard of. Today, as enternetuserss, you don’t have the same luxury. Mac users might still be in the minority, but they continue to increase in number, and demographically they are more likely to be blog readers.
In terms of operating systems, I’m fortunate because I’ve got an old laptop (I bought it at auction for $10, it was cheap so I had to buy it :-) ) that runs Linux that I can test the Blog Herald and other Weblog Empire sites on, but I don’t have that luxury for Macs. A new site is now available to allow you to do just that: Lixlpixel Safari Screenshot Generator. It’s not always super quick (because it appears that a lot of people are trying it out) but its free and it allows you to see how your blog appears in 3 different Mac browsers: Safari, IE and Mozilla.
There is a commercial service available at Browsercam that gives you a fuller range of OS’s and browsers, but is only open to a 24 hour trial before you have to pay.
As enternetuserss if you’re not checking that your blog works on different operating systems and browsers, you are losing business. I don’t have all the answers in terms of coding and the like, but there are a couple of simple rules to use with your blogs
1. Make sure your site uses CSS, not tables
There is a particular blog network that runs on tables and I’m not sure how they get away with it. CSS is the safest way to get close to assuring that your site renders well no matter who is looking at it. Once you get into it, it’s not that hard to learn: I’ve never studied it formally but I’ve made it my business to learn and can now say I’m fairly confident with understand how it works, even if I’m not the best coder of it.
2. Test your site
This is an obvious point, but overlooked. As I’ve detailed here there are sites available now that let you do as much. Include them on your list for any new blog, and for an existing blog, check as well
3. Web standards
Where possible try to stick with web standard in terms of html, php or similar. It’s difficult, and I know that none of the Weblog Empire sites quite meet the criteria yet, but I’m a lot closer than I was a year ago. Web standards are your best friend in assuring that as many people as possible can read your blog.
(in part via Threadwatch)
Written on June 7th, 2005 at 01:06 pm by Chrispian
Blogging at work
I just read Blogging On The Boss’ Time and it got me thinking, how many of us “enternetuserss” who still have day jobs blog from work? I know many companies are starting to monitor blogging activity, but part of my job is actually blogging at work. But I find at times I’m blogging on my own sites. Usually I restrict this to very short posts, slow times, or something that just can’t wait. I’ll often post something at lunch, but that’s my time.
Personally, I try to blog whenever I can but I try not to take advantage of my employer. I don’t want to get dooced, after all. So, I thought I would ask, how many of you post from work (your day job) and does your company have a blogging policy?
Written on June 7th, 2005 at 04:06 am by Arieanna Foley
Marketers are turning to blogs for online ad spending
Research out of Forrester is showing a growing interest to place advertisements on blogs and/or in RSS feeds. This should be no surprise, given the mainstream business coverage of blogs that has issued recently.
Of those surveyed by Forrester, 64% would be interested in advertising on blogs, while 57% would be interested in advertising through RSS. Both these figures represent more interest than advertising on mobile devices - this just shows which way the industry is set to grow.
Forrester estimates that total online advertising and marketing dollars will reach $14.7 billion for the 2005 year - that’s 23% more than in 2004. Banners/sponsorships will grow 11% per year to $8 billion by 2010. We’ll also see a large increase in spending for search engine marketing over the next few years, up to $11.6 billion by 2010. Online marketing spending is the only area of growth in advertising spending as a whole - so interest is definitely present.
By 2010, however, online marketing will only represent 8% of total ad spending. This is not to say that there will not be a lot of online marketing going on, but perhaps just that online marketing is less costly - an ad online will not run you into millions such as television would.
So, advertisements on blogs and in RSS represent a significant growth opportunity in the market. The also represent a very relevant opportunity to bloggers who want to monetize their blogs. As a recent professional blogger, this is something I’ll be seeking for myself, as well as for others through my services.
Via ZDNet
Written on June 7th, 2005 at 03:06 am by Tris Hussey
Canadian Professional Blogging Podcast: No. 1 On becoming a professional blogger
Intro and outro music - Josh Hundert and The Kitchen
Written on June 6th, 2005 at 10:06 pm by Nicole Simon
Improve your typing skills
Being a professional blogger means in most of the cases: publish content, targeted at your audience, structured, and well written.
But the other part is: It has to be typed. And the more you want to publish, the more you have to type, and edit, and retype … If you where writing a book, you could give your handwritten manuscript to somebody else, but as a blogger, you are on your own.
If you don’t have good typing skills, blogging will be much more of an effort for you - and then you publish less. But other than being a good writer is at least part talent, being a speedy typer is purely training.
So let’s take a quick look at your typing skills:
- How many fingers do you use when typing?
- Do you need to look at the keyboard while typing, or do you ‘type blind’?
- Compare the speed of your typing when using mail / chat language (everything lowercase, kind of sloppy, simpler words, type as you speak) or pro blog language (correct spelling, not natural flow of words but keyword oriented)
- If you type blind, does this include special characters and keys like Delete, Backspace etc?
- Do you know your frequent mistakes while typing and know how to get around them?
- How many times a day do you change between mouse and keyboard? Do you need to take look each time you want to reposition your hands on the keyboard?
See any possible improvements there?
Thinking about these basics can have a valuable impact on your blogging business. If you have not done so, consider taking a course about using the 10 finger system. It will take you some time to learn, but it will be worth the time.
The money side of it:
No matter how fast you think you are with 2 fingers, you will always be faster with 8-10. It is not so much about hitting keys faster with one finger at a time, it is about muscle memory and your body knowing “this word, these keys, in this order = these fingers to be move now! “. With a 2-5 finger system it is about “move one finger from this key to another”
Less time used in typing down your blog entries means more blog entries in the same amount of time. And you will start to do more editing, because it is not so much of a hassle. Improving your typing skills also does speed up mails and IM conversations. Being able to position your hands on the keyboard without having to look at it, just start typing, etc, all adds up over the day.
If you can type blind, you also can look at your notes and type them down, instead of reading the notes, looking at the keyboard, refocus again on the notes, and so on.
The health side of it:
Typing with all fingers of your hand means less abrasion. Being able to focus on your screen instead of the need to look down on your keyboard has its benefits too.
Any tricks for faster, more secure typing you would like to share?
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