I have been contacted by people numerous times when their blogs were “broken” and they needed it fixed.  There have been a variety of reasons behind the damage, but one common cause I’ve seen is through the misuse of Microsoft Word.

Like many other people, I do a lot of my writing in MS Word.  There is nothing wrong with using Word to hammer out your blog posts, the problem lies when you transfer your post from Word to WordPress.

Bad things can happen if you transfer content from MS Word to WordPress the wrong way.  So please please, pretty please with sugar on top, never copy and paste your post from Word directly into WordPress!

When you copy and paste your content from Word, you are copying the formatting as well.  If this formatting is pasted directly into the post editor, your content may appear as it’s supposed to in the WYSIWYG editor, but things will most likely get funky when you hit that “publish” button.  I have seen entire blogs become invisible due to the underlying formatting from Word.

If you’re going to copy and paste your blog posts from Word into your blog, then either paste the content into notepad first (and then copy and paste the notepad content into your blog) or use the built in Word clipboard found in your WYSIWYG editor.

After pasting the content into the Word clipboard, I usually click over to the html view just to ensure that there is no funny business left behind from Word.  Once I’ve assured that everything looks clean, then I’ll head to the publish button.

So if you are copying your posts from Word into WordPress and your blog starts to look a little funky, check to see that you’re not adding anything to your posts that you shouldn’t be.

Even though every item here could be a blog post on their own, for now I’ve decided to just list some random thoughts I have in regards to blogging.

• The quickest way to royally screw up a blog is to copy and paste a post directly from Microsoft Word
• Having a unique “voice” is important, but that doesn’t necessarily make you special
• If blogging is becoming a chore then perhaps it’s time to rethink why you’re blogging in the first place
• A great design can’t make up for crappy content
• Great content can be hindered by a poor design and/or layout
• Chances are good that you won’t ever make a living through blogging.  Just accept it
• If everyone is agreeing with you, you’re doing it wrong
• Only a small percentage of people comment on your blog so spend some time responding to these people.  They are important
• Advertising on your blog can bring in revenue, but don’t make your blog look like it’s in NASCAR
• Linking to other blogs is a good thing.  Share the love
• Don’t let the content in your sidebar be the main attraction of your blog
• Use whatever blogging platform you’re comfortable with (I recommend WordPress)
• Don’t be afraid to ask for help. Everyone, even the “pros”, are still learning
• There is no easy way to create a popular blog. It takes time, a lot of work and some luck
• Backup your blog, and back it up often.  You’ll be thankful for doing this if and when disaster strikes
• Visit a commenter’s blog sometime. They have good things to say too
• After you have written a rant post, wait at least a day before posting it.  Trust me
• The rules that govern your blogging niche do not apply to other niches.
• Your blog is an extension of you.  Can you see yourself in your blog?
• Blogging is like baseball.  Some posts are homeruns, some are singles, and there are the occasional doubles.  Many posts are outs.
• Too many social sharing options on your blog makes your look desperate.  Don’t do it
• Sometimes it pays to ignore your Analytics stats and go spend time with your family instead

How are you including videos on your website?  Are you still using flash to embed them or have you switched to html5?

With the state of the internet today it makes sense to use the video playback features already included in modern web browsers and revert to flash playback only when necessary.  This is true for several reasons.

First, people watching flash videos must have a flash plugin installed to watch videos, but html5 does not require users to install any browser plugins to watch videos.  Removing additional requirements of video playback not only streamlines the process, it also lessens the workload on your CPU.

Secondly, and probably the most important, millions of mobile devices are blocked from using flash in any form.  This means that anyone using a device such as the iPad will never see a video if it is in flash format.  But html5 videos are viewable without a hitch on these devices.  Mobile internet devices are one of the fastest growing industries, so content providers are going to need to adapt to this arena as well as the normal desktop territory.

While html5 video has its advantages, there are still weaknesses to this new way of doing things.

The main drawback to using html5 video is the lack of a viable fullscreen option.  Watching an online flash video in fullscreen is nothing out of the ordinary, but not an option yet in html5.  Well, you can watch html5 video in fullscreen with the latest version of Firefox, but the framerate is remarkably reduced which results in a very “choppy” video.

So if you can handle the lack of fullscreen playback, then there really is no reason to use flash for videos except as a fallback method for browsers that don’t yet support html5 video.

If you don’t use html5 video on your site, what is holding you back?

Earlier tonight I had the pleasure of sitting in on Emily Grosvenor’s class on Beginning Blogging.  Emily is a talented writer who runs a great blog at Desperately Seeking Salem, so I knew she would do a bang up job guiding others into the rewarding and frustrating world of blogging.

A point that often comes up with people just getting into blogging is to start off with a free blog at WordPress.com or Blogger and later moving up to your own self-hosted platform.  I think that is great advice, and I have no problem with it whatsoever.  But I do express a little concern at what I heard someone else mention at the meeting, and that is to start off with a free blog at Blogger to get your feet wet, and then later move on to hosting your own blog with WordPress.

Let me give you a little background as to why I’m opposed to switching horses in midstream like this.  I have been known to migrate blogs from time to time.  I’ve moved blogs from one domain to another, and I’ve also moved blogs from one type of blogging platform to another.  While this is in no way an impossible task, I seriously recommend starting off with WordPress.com if you plan on self hosting with WordPress at a later date for two reasons.

First, if you learn the ropes of blogging with a free blog on WordPress.com you are going to handle the transition to self-hosted WordPress blogging much, much easier.  You will already be familiar with the admin backend, how the posting procedures work, and how to navigate and control the settings of your blog.

If you were to start your blogging adventure with Blogger and then move over to WordPress, you will probably be lost and confused for a time while trying to learn a new blogging platform.  It doesn’t make sense to train yourself on one piece of software if you are planning on using a different one later down the road.

Secondly, blog migrations have many crucial aspects that have to be followed carefully in order to be successful.  WordPress and Blogger use different permalink structures, and while you can modify the WordPress format to use the permalink style that Blogger does, I think it is easier and safer to stick with the WordPress way.

You could just leave your old blog and start fresh when you decide to self-host, but why leave all your hard work behind?  It doesn’t take a whole lot to bring your old content into your new blog and redirect your free blog to your shiny new one.  And by migrating your blog and redirecting your old one you will retain the audience that you have built up so far.

My advice to new bloggers?  Check out a Blogger or WordPress.com and see which one you like more.  And when you do decide to take total control of your blog, stick with the same blogging software you started with.

Dwight Schrute knows a thing or two about beets and how to sell them.  Dwight’s statement about placing the most attractive beets on top as a way of enticing people to pull in to his beet stand is a principle that can be applied to blogging as well.

To get people to pull in to your blog thinking “Wow! I’ve got to read this blog right now!” you are going to have to dangle something enticing in front of them.  You are going to have to pull out the “money beets” which are the titles of your posts.

The headline of your blog post can either make or break it.  A lot of people may read your headlines, but far fewer will read or click past that.  That is why having an effective title is so important; you want the title to draw your audience in closer.

I could ramble on and on about effective headline writing, but I would just be rehashing a lot of the great tips found on other sites.  If you really want to start writing better headlines, then I suggest you start with the headline writing series over at Copyblogger.

You can really learn a lot from following that headline writing series, and if you want to expand your horizons even further, check out even more sources for a free online education.

Ken Griffey Jr. is without a doubt, one of the greatest players to ever play the game.

His recently announced retirement from baseball instantly transported many people into the land of remeniscence, myself included.  Being from the Northwest, I have been a Mariners fan for nearly all my life.  I remember when Griffey joined the Mariners, his powerful bat, and his beaming smile.  He is credited for singlehandedly keeping Major League Baseball in Seattle and for being one of the main reasons for constructing the Mariner’s new stadium, Safeco Field.

When I think of Ken Griffey Jr., I think of things like his sweet swing, the numerous home runs he’s jacked during his career, and his beaming smile when he was under the dogpile after the Mariners rallied from the brink of elimination to beat the New York Yankees in the 1995 playoffs.  I have nothing but love for this great player and great human being.

Griffey’s age and numerous injuries eventualy caught up to him, and like almost all sports players, their performance towards the end of their careers rarely matches the numbers they put up when they were younger.  When Griffey was eventually traded back to Seattle, he was definitely welcomed with arms wide open, however, even with his generous salary he never was the player he was back in his heyday.

Griffey rejoined the Seattle Mariners and received a salary higher than many others on the team, even though some of these lesser paid players had better production than Griffey and much better prospects for the future.

So what does this have to do with blogging, you ask?

Well, many of us who strive to grow their blogs employ a variety of techniques in order to do so.  Sometimes we stumble across an all-star technique that does so much for our blogs that we fall in love with that method and put blinders on to anything that might say otherwise about it.

Let’s say that at one time you decided to place advertising on your blog in the form of Google Adsense.  And let’s say when you first started doing this you received outstanding results from it.  You were experiencing high amounts of impressions with a decent click rate, so the money that was coming in from Adsense was pretty good.

Fast forward to later in you blog life… Your readership has changed somewhat to a more technical savvy crowd.  Maybe there are far fewer visitors who visit your blog without having an adblocker of some sort installed in their browser.  While once you were reaping some great benefits from Adsense, now it barely registers a blip in your income stream.

In this situation, you know that you used to do a lot better with Adsensein the past, but since you have such fond memories of how it performed, you refuse to remove those ads because of how you feel.  This is almost how it was like with Ken Griffey Jr. in his last seasons with the Seatle Mariners.  Fans remembered this future Hall of Famer for his past achievements and most chose not to say anything about his lack of performance as of late.

Are you doing anything with your blog that worked out great at first but now it has become not so great?  Are you a little reluctant to do anything to change it because of how you remember it originally worked?

The world of blogging evolves just like so many other things.  Many things that you may incorporate into your blog WILL have a limited life span, and pushing it too far can often have negative side effects.  It is important to recognize when what you’re doing is no longer working as well as it should, and when that time happens, you need to bring in the next generation of blogging techniques.

Do you want to know a really low key way to boost traffic to your blog while also increasing your overall visibility to others?  The answer isn’t something magical or complex; it is something you can easily accomplish with just 10 minutes of effort every day.

Just like how linking out to other blogs is a great way to expand your blogging empire, commenting on other blogs can be a powerful method of building your blog’s presence.  Blog commenting can be a good marketing tool when done right for several reasons.

Nearly every blog gives you the option of entering your website’s address in the comments field.  Your name (use your real name please!) will then link to your blog or website.  This link pointing to your site can drive visitors to your site under several different circumstances.

First, if your comment on the article at hand is insightful, witty, or somehow memorable, many people are almost certain to click on your name and visit your website.  Your comment grabbed their attention and they may be interested in reading more of what you have to say.

On the other hand, if your comment is controversial in nature, you will probably get a few other people clicking over to your blog.  They may be wondering something like, “Who is this jerk?” and want to see a little more from you.

Then there are what can be referred to as “curiosity clicks”.  Someone who has never heard of your name before may see your name in the list of comments and clicks through just to see who you are.  This happens a lot with blog owners, but it is just as common with blog visitors as well.

No matter the reason that causes people to click on your name in blog comments, the end result is always the same; exposure for your blog.  As more and more people are exposed to your blog, your level of traffic, readers and subscribers will all rise.

If you’re a little skeptical of what I’m saying, why don’t you try a 30 day experiment with blog commenting.  Every day for a month, go out and leave 2 meaningful comments on other blogs.  You can comment on other blogs within your niche, but also expand out a little and comment on blogs that are not related to your field.  This requires very little effort and should take no longer than 10 or 15 minutes per day.

At the end of the 30 days take a look at some of your blog’s stats and compare them to a month ago.  I’ll bet you see higher daily visitors and an increased level of subscribers.  In fact, if you make it a habit to frequently comment on other people’s blogs then you are practically guaranteed to see your blog grow in the process.

Last month I decided to try something new, and I signed up at Text-Link-Ads in order to get paid for publishing links to other websites from my site.  At first it looked like an easy way to do a little monetization of this blog, but in retrospect I would have to say it wasn’t worth it.

If you’re not familiar with Text-Link-Ads, it is a service where a person can either pay a certain amount to have other sites link to them, or you can be paid for hosting those links.  Granted, it violates Google’s law on paid links but a lot of sites do this every day.

After I signed up I only had to wait a day or two before 5 people signed up to be listed on my site.  The monetary amounts they paid to do so were small, and after Text-Link-Ads took a 50% cut, the amount was laughable.  But at that time I didn’t mind too much; this was my first time trying something like this out and I wanted to see how well it would work for me.

Those 5 advertisers stayed with my site until the end of last month and beginning on the 1^st of May one of them dropped out leaving the 4 remaining advertisers.  Since my start with this, I had 5 quick signups and no interest afterwards.

Everything so far remained smooth with Text-Link-Ads until a week or two ago.  I started to notice that my site wasn’t getting as much love from Google as it used to.  I know that the only thing to have changed on my site was the addition of these paid links, so I assumed that I may have been slightly penalized for their inclusion on my site.  I have no hard data to back this up, but it has a ring of truth to it.

If you understand some of the principles of linking and search engines, you know that websites that link to another site deemed to be a “bad neighbor” often get penalized by the search engines.  My thoughts were leaning towards the idea that I may have been linking to someone that may be on Googles bad list.

In the end, there were a couple of things that I took issue with concerning Text-Link-Ads, and those reasons are:

1. According to their Terms of Service, I am not allowed to modify the code that displays on my site.  Therefore, I am unable to convert the paid links to “nofollow” in order to stay within the good graces of Google et al.
2. By removing the paid links yesterday I forfeited all monetary gains made this month.  Yep, Text-Link-Ads kept what I should have earned for the 19 days I posted those links.
3. I felt that my decline in Google love can be directly attributed to the fact that I was publishing those links on my site.  Maybe things would have gone a little better in that department had I shown a little more diligence in investigating who I was linking to.
4. With the 50% cut of the payment taken out by Text-Link-Ads, the money I made for posting these paid links seemed hardly worth the potential costs of pissing off Google.

Have you ever used the services of a text link broker such as Text-Link-Ads?  If so, what was your experience like?

I get my share of ridiculous spammers commenters on this blog as well as on other blogs that I own or manage.   After bottling my thoughts on this for so long, I’ve decided to say a thing or two about this.

I love flattery as much as the next person, but when you leave a comment stating, “What a wonderful read thanks for the insight loved it ! …” it will never see the light of day when your name happens to be “wholesale polo shirts”.  I’m sorry.  It’s nothing personal, I just don’t like your name.  If you had a name like “Jeff Nelson” it would be a different story, but until then I just can’t bring myself to let it go through.

Then there’s the case of the comments from a person named “retail”.  Is that your first name or your last name?  Or do you think that your fame recognition is so high that you can get by on a single name basis like Cher or Madonna?  I don’t think that’s going to happen so I’m going to require that you change your name as well before commenting again.

Oh, you don’t believe me Mr. “government grants”!  You can legally change your name.  I just saw it happen last week.  There was a comment left by a person named “pharmacy technician schools” and the very next day that same person returned and left another comment.  Only this time his name had been changed to “pharmacy technician program”.  So you see, name changes can and do happen.

Because I keep getting the same comment from you “emt training”, I’m really starting to think that maybe you’re not really a person at all.  Maybe you’re just a script that posts the same comment on thousands of blogs in the hope that all those no-follow links pointing back to your website will somehow improve your search engine rankings.

Well, I’ve got bad news for you and some of your friends.  Like I said, I’m going to need you to at least change your name before I ever even think of publishing your glowing bits of praise.  But until that day happens, I am considering an alternative.  What if I go ahead and publish your comments, but instead of having your crazy name link to your website how about if I link it to one of your competitor’s website?  Wouldn’t that be a gas!?

Now I probably wouldn’t actually start doing something like this, but the thought of messing with comment spammers in this way does have an appealing ring to it.  I like the irony in this if someone wants to disrespectfully use other people’s blogs as a marketing tool to boost the traffic and SEO of their site.

What are your thoughts on keyword stuffed “names” in regards to blog commenting?

I ran into a friend I hadn’t seen in a while this weekend and he expressed to me his plan to start a blog and jump into this “new blogging thing”.  He sounded pretty enthusiastic about it and we talked a little about how he was going to go about getting into blogging.  He had some good ideas of his own and I offered a few tips to help him out.

One thing that I steered him away from was his plan to start out with a free blog on WordPress.com and then switching over to a “real” blog after he got his feet wet.  I know that a lot of people choose this route as their way to go, and I can’t help but point out the benefits of starting out with a blog of your own as compared to a free blog.

Yes, a blog of your own does come with a price tag, but in reality the cost is minimal.  After you tally up the cost of your domain ($10 or less per year) and hosting (less than $10 per month) you’re looking at a grand total of around 30 cents a day to be the proud owner of your own little space on the internet.  When you consider everything you get by owning your blog instead of “borrowing”, you’ll soon consider this to be a bargain.

First off, when you own your blog you have total control over your site.  You are not limited to what you can and can’t do like you are if your blog is hosted at WordPress.com or Blogger.  When I say total control, I mean the following things:

• You decide what your blog looks like. You choices are not limited as to what themes you can install on your blog.  Or how much you can modify them.  When you own your blog you can do whatever you want and tweak everything to your liking.  You can’t do that with a free blog.
• You decide what is on your blog. Some free blog services display ads on your blog and there’s nothing you can do to remove them.  If you don’t want other people’s ads on your site, then you need to have a site of your own.
• You can write about anything you want. Not that I would ever endorse or encourage some types of content that free blog services forbid in their TOS, I still strongly feel that people should have the freedom to say whatever they want to say.  If you want total freedom to say whatever you want you are going to need a blog of your own.

There are some technical issues that you would incur when moving from a free blog to a blog of your own as well.  All your prior efforts will stay at your old blog (links, traffic, etc.) and you’ll be basically starting from scratch all over again.  Sure, you can possibly do a redirect from your free blog to your new one, but unless you can implement a detailed 301 redirect for your old site you are going to lose most of what you’ve accomplished so far.

After explaining these few things to my friend, as well as including the benefits of having an email address associated with his blog, he decided to take my advice and start with a blog of his own.  I am going to help him get everything set up properly and show him how things work and I think he will do just fine.

Are you planning to start a free blog instead of starting a blog of your own?  What do you find appealing about free blogging?  What are your concerns about starting a blog of your own?  Leave a comment below and let’s start a dialogue!

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