Archive for the 'Blog Writing' Category

Be a BlogStar

Published by Tim on July 11, 2008 in Blog Writing. 14 Comments

We just came across this post So You Want to Be a Blogging Star on NYTimes.com, which serves as an excellent primer on how to write and keep a successful blog.

Here at BlogBurst central we look at blogs all day, of course, and these points are spot on:

  • Don’t do it to get rich (but blog passionately and rewards will follow)
  • Blog about your passions, and in your own voice
  • Fit blogging into your daily schedule
  • Join the community
  • Plug yourself

The best thing about the suggestions above are that they’re geared toward fitting your blog into your life and building it slowly over time. We see scores of blogs that are well written and fit a niche, but which don’t last more than a couple of months. The truth is, it’s hard to sustain an extracurricular activity like a blog, especially when blogs don’t make you money unless / until they get popular (which usually takes a long time).

If you have other recommendations for blogbuilding, leave them in the comments below!

How To Name Your New Blog

Published by Tim on June 4, 2008 in Blog Writing. 5 Comments

So you’re just about to give birth to your brand-new baby blog — exciting! Time to name your little bundle of joy.

But what makes for a good blog name? Here are some tips for coming up with a monikker that you, and the Web, will love.

Pick a name and stick with it

You probably want people to read your blog and to grow it into a healthy little gal or fella (it said its first word!).

The more posts you write, the more your blog gets into the search engines like Google, and the more other people will link to you. As time passes, you build up credibility on the mysterious Interwebs, and this credibility sends you visitors. If you change names down the road, you lose the credibility you’ve built up and have to start over. Try to pick a name you can live with.

It has to sound cool to you

No matter how brilliant your thinking and your writing, our BlogBurst scientists have determined that the most important aspect of blogging may just be posting regularly and sticking with it. If you lose interest in your own name, you won’t continue. Pick something you love.

Details, details: what makes a successful name?

Your blog name should be memorable, and stick as a “brand” or a monikker, like a band name (Winger!). That said, all kinds of names can work. In the olden days before the Web (*shudder*), publications had to have super-snappy titles dreamed up by marketing teams; in the blogosphere, you can look at the top blogs and you’ll see that a lot of the names are funky and random. Look at the big ones: Daily Kos. Scobleizer. icanhascheezburger. Seth’s blog. GigaOM. Random, but all catchy (or at least memorable) in some way.

Like all Web names (”eBay”), there’s no science to what works as long as it’s easy to remember and hard to misspell. Some ideas to consider:

  • play off your own name
  • play off the topic you’re covering (see next point)
  • here are some places to see lists of blog names to get ideas from

Make it topical. Or not.

Some blogs are solely dedicated to a single topic. This can be a great thing, IF you’re willing to dedicate your whole blog to that topic; if you don’t want to stay on topic all the time, consider a more generic name. For example, Stuff White People Like or Gizmodo, the Gadget Guide are so topical that the authors have to stay close to those topics; yet In The Pink Texas (written by our beloved former editor, even if she never comes around no more) or, say, Kottke.org are open-ended enough that those authors can write about whatever they choose.

Finally, naming a blog is more an art than a science. If you have other thoughts about noms de blog, tell us in the comments!

Blog Restoration and Maintenance

Published by Dock on May 22, 2008 in Blog Tools & Technology and Blog Writing. 2 Comments

How did I let this happen?

The Mustang sat in a sorry state. Years of neglect hung heavy on the once-glorious sheetmetal; once eluded through great care, rust was now peeking through paint in the usual places. Dry rotted tires had long since ceased to hold air, door and hood hinges popped and moaned with any movement (as I winced with mechanical sympathy) and worst of all, I could detect that small mammals of the North Carolina piedmont had made several small homes within the confines of what was once my pride and joy. The only rent paid was empty seed husks and a variety of nesting materials.

This was my task - to bring this Mustang back from the brink. And your task, as a blogger, is to prevent your blog from falling into disrepair - much as I failed to do with the car. I can assure you that the old saw is unfortunately, and quite expensively, true - an ounce of prevention is very much worth a pound of cure.

A fresh coat of paint

One of the more obvious ways to make your blog look factory fresh is with a new color scheme - and unlike the old Mustang, it won’t cost you a thing. I’m sure that you’ve visited web sites or blogs that looked dated - or worse, were actually painful to look at. Take a moment to assess your blog’s color scheme critically, and ask yourself if you’re happy with it. Make sure that it has enough contrast between text and background to assure easy reading. I prefer tight palettes (for instance, a color scheme that has only one or two colors and their variants to work with - like dark brown text on a light tan background) and that also avoids chromatic extremes. You actually can have too much contrast, in my opinion, so go for mid-darks and mid-lights. The very worst thing you can do is juxtapose a high-saturation red against a high-saturation blue. It shimmers horribly! Avoid.

Fortunately, most blog software makes it incredibly easy to swap between themes and palettes, or create your own - or rely on the creativity of others and grab widely-available additional themes. It is worth experimenting with - you’ll probably find something that you really like, and I’m sure your readers will like it too.

The radio doesn’t work

Something I see far too often is a feed that stops broadcasting. This can happen for a few different reasons, but sometimes the feed just flat-out breaks. Don’t take it for granted that your feed is working correctly - check it every so often by opening your feed URL in a browser window, and check that it matches your blog’s actual entries - particularly the most recent. Probably the most common cause of feed breakage is using MS Word to create your entries, and copy-pasting them in. MS Word has special characters that are widely known to break a feed. Simply put - don’t do that! Find a less “feature-rich” editor to write your entries in. You’ll be glad you did.

Too many gaudy aftermarket parts

As I accumulate gray hair on my chin, my enthusuasm for aftermarket add-ons of dubious quality and taste has, fortunately, diminished. The Mustang looks best as it did when it left San Jose in 1965, with just a smattering of vintage hop-up parts for a bit of spice and speed. The underbody lighting kits, radical suspension adjustments and bass-drunk subwoofers, I will leave for the current generation of “tuner” youth to explore. More often than not, these bolt-ons are a waste of money as they tend to diminish the overall function of the vehicle.

With so many plug-ins, add-ons, and other flashy bits to add to one’s blog, it is tempting to throw caution to the wind and build your blog to the hilt with “added functionality.” However, caution is required. Nothing is worse than having a bunch of add-ons on your blog - and then, having one of them break your blog or feed. It greatly complicates diagnosis, and more often than not, your friendly tech support agent will tell you to strip them all off in order to properly assess the situation. (I know, because I used to be one of those support folks.) My recommendation is to avoid the temptation to go hog wild, and only use a minimum of plug-ins and widgets. Easier said than done, I realize, but your blog will be far more trouble-free for doing this, and you’ll have far fewer updates to chase.

You are updating your blog software and plug-ins… aren’t you? I sure hope so, otherwise…

Someone broke in and trashed everything

Fortunately no person has ever broken into the old Mustang (aside from minor damage from the rodentia) - however, I can’t say the same for my hated Celebrity. The Celebrity was the automotive enthusiast’s equivalent of a lonely, gray exile - boring from all angles, dreadful from behind the wheel, and unreliable too - just to pour salt into the wound. I figured the rest of the world viewed the car with the same sense of pitiful worthlessness that I did… imagine my surprise when I returned home one day (after a walk back from the university campus) to discover that someone had broken in and scattered my belongings all over the yard. The thieves took nothing of value - except my peace of mind.

Unfortunately, in this day and age, there are far more ways to break into your blog than there were ways into my old beater car. Luck isn’t enough. Belief that your blog isn’t worth breaking into isn’t enough. Security requires vigilance and a bit of work - but it beats discovering that your blog has been exploited, and (in the worst case) it beats regretfully deleting your blog and starting over, if the corruption of your blog is too extreme.

Fortunately, by updating your blogging software and plug-ins regularly, you substantially increase the chances of successfully fending off an attack with relatively little work on your part. There are also some decisions you can make regarding the ways in which you handle links, comments, and other things that can also make a difference - and your blog’s platform almost certainly has some sound advice on its support pages or FAQ regarding best practices and things to avoid. It might sound like a hassle but it beats having to pull your blog back from the brink, using back-ups.

You, of course, are regularly making back-ups… right?

Show and shine

If you take a little time every now and then to keep your blog’s software updated, make tweaks here and there, and keep the add-ons down to a reasonable level, you’ll have a blog that you’ll continue to enjoy (since it is much less likely to fall apart unexpectedly) and your readers will appreciate your rock-solid and consistent uptime. Maybe you can’t drive it to the Dairy Queen for the local show-and-shine, as I did with the Mustang this evening, but you will have pride of ownership just the same. You’ll almost certainly have spent far less money than I did, too.

Get More Comments

Published by Adam on May 6, 2008 in Blog Writing, Making Money Blogging and Promoting Your Blog. 1 Comment

BlogBurst participating blog and DIY marketing expert Duct Tape Marketing enumerates 7 ways to get more blog comments. DTM’s suggestions are made mostly in the context of furthering your small business efforts, but applicable to most blogs nonetheless.

Guide to Blogging From BlogBurst Bloggers

Published by Daysha on March 18, 2008 in Blog Writing. 3 Comments

Editors at BlogBurst always try to offer as much advice as possible surrounding the art of blogging. But who better to offer blogging advice than your fellow BlogBurst members? Check out these informative posts from BlogBurst network bloggers for some great tips and tricks for starting, maintaining, and attracting visitors to your blog.

Ecommerce Sites are Boring! Add Personality and Passion with a Blog!
From Better Blogging with Michael Martine

Blogging is Easy? Um, No. Here’s the Cold Hard Truth…
From Better Blogging with Michael Martine

Journalists who learn to blog help their online sites grow beyond shovelware
From howardowens.com

How to install WordPress on your computer?
From Createlf

Plugins By The Bucketload
From My Radical Blogs

5 Easy Wordpress Tweaks For SEO and VEO
From Social marketing, Web 2.0 News, & Blog Promotion

Top Bloggers Essential Research Tools - How Amy Gahran Maintains Info-Provocateur Status
From B.L. Oschman’s weblog

The A-List, Part 2: Be The Source
From Everybody Go To

Is embedding better than quoting?
From Matthew Ingram

7 Tools For Blogging On Your Phone
From Mashable!

How to fight trackback spam in your WordPress blog?
From Jammed: Full into Capacity

How to Unlame Your Business Blog: 10 New Tricks for Old Dogs
From Business BlogWire

Ten Tactics That Could Save Your Online Reputation
From Mashable!

Blogging Ethics 101b - Commenting
From Better Blogging with Michael Martine

Say Anything — Managing Your Blog Vacations

Published by Dock on January 16, 2008 in Blog Writing. 4 Comments

Occasionally, there comes a time when you simply can’t write your blog. Sooner or later, the blog comes to an end, or goes a long hiatus. There are certainly any number of reasons you can’t get a post off (temporarily or permanently) and that’s certainly understandable.

It could be a family emergency, a machine failure, a long, well-deserved vacation, a lack of interest in the current topic, a dearth of information about your current topic, you switched domains, you simply can’t find the time - or you just plain don’t wanna do it anymore!

Any of the above reasons are fine, and don’t require a bit of justification. I’m sure there are plenty more I couldn’t come up with - point being, the reason doesn’t matter.

There’s a small problem though. You probably have a readership - and almost certainly have an RSS feed.

My suggestion is that if you know that your writing will become slow (or stop) then please - take the time to write a post (however short) that simply says something to that effect. It could be as simple as “Hi folks - sorry about the lack of posts - I don’t expect to be posting much in the near future” or as complex as you care to make it. You might explain the circumstances, or redirect people to your new shiny blog on a different topic (or subdomain) but in any case - say something. You don’t have to make any promises to write more, and you don’t need to make it up to anyone. Just say something.

Say anything.

This is far more helpful than you might think. It will certainly be of benefit to me, your readers will appreciate knowing what’s going on, and honestly you’ll probably feel a little bit better knowing that you took a sliver of time to keep everyone in the know - even if it’s one last time. Also, should you take blogging back up in the future, you may find that your act of courtesy ticks the wheel of internet karma to your advantage a bit, as you’ll be remembered more favorably by previous readers.

Thanks!

Blog Titles: The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly

Published by Daysha on January 4, 2008 in Blog Writing and General. 4 Comments

The great thing about blogging is the freedom that comes with it. Depending on what you blog about, you develop a specific audience that is keenly interested in what you have to say. One of the best reasons to join BlogBurst is to expand your readership and drive more traffic back to your site. Once your blog is featured on a publisher’s site, readers can click on your blog link or byline to click back to your site.

But just what hooks the reader (aside from your brilliant post)?

The title of your post, of course

A well-written title can mean the difference between readers losing your headline in the busy content on publisher pages and enticing the reader to click through, exposing them to your post and your blog. A great title is the starting point that just might turn a new reader into an avid fan of your blog. Keep it succinct, give it some punch and help draw the reader in to all your blog has to offer.

Check out a few of these title comparisions:
The Bad vs. The Good

Bad: “Happy New Year!!!”
Good: “Welcome to the New Year: Kathryn’s Fashion Predictions”

Bad: “Weekly Book Review”
Good: “Book Review: How The Dead Dream by Lydia Millet”

Bad: “How to Dress Fashionably”
Good: “10 Ways to Blend Hipster Chic With Classic AND Trend Pieces!“

Bad: “The [Blog Name’s] Top 10 List”
Good: “Bye Bye Microprints! (And 9 More Trends We’re Happy to Leave in 2007)”

Bad: “Breaking News”
Good: “Iowa Caucus: Prognostications, Results and Breaking News“

Bad: “News Roundup”
Good: “Yer’ Drug War Roundup”

Bad: “Blog Carnival”
Good: “Carnival of Financial Goals #2 - A Walk With Sam”

Bad: “Links for the Day”
Good: “Daily Links: Moses to Sandy Koufax”

Bad: “Month/Year in Review”
Good: “Year in Review: Best Homebuilding Products of 2007″

The Ugly

“Untitled Entry” - No explanation necessary. Always title your posts.

“–==Mu$IK C0Ncert ReVieW$==–” - There was once a time when Internet users placed punctuation marks before their screen names in order to move their name to the top of instant messaging and directory lists. The trend later evolved into using multiple punctuation marks and crazy capitalization as a form of artistic expression. For me, I can think of no better expression than a well formulated post that presents a unique point of view and is creative in nature. Aside from looking bad, wacky formatting can also trigger dirty word filters that prevent publishers from using your content.

Unnecessary profanity - When using profanity in your post, ask yourself if it is really necessary. Can you emphasize your point without it? Profanity, regardless of whether it is spelled out correctly, abbreviated, or has characters replaced with punctuation, triggers a filter that prevents your posts from being picked-up by publishers.

Beating the Tyranny of the Blank Page - Part 1

Published by Dock on December 19, 2007 in Blog Writing and General. 0 Comments

The tyranny of the blank page

Bloggers occupy an interesting position within the larger world of content creators. Neither fish nor fowl, a blogger is an interesting hybrid of opinionated editor mixed with junior journalist. Bloggers, generally, are free to shift their voices when it suits them, from table-banging invective to breaking news. Further freeing the hands of bloggers, there exists no credo of blogging standards (currently anyway), no ethos which constrains the direction a blogger can take. And bloggers have a large, low-cost distribution channel popularly called “The Internets” that stands to potentially be one of humankind’s transforming achievements - even if the traffic about the Spears family (Jamie Lynn too!) and Lauren Upton remains disproportionately high. It’s all about potential, after all.

At first blush, this whole blogging thing and its concomitant freedom sounds like a creative paradise. For creative people, though, this can sometimes create a syndrome known as “the tyranny of the blank page.” To wit - you can write anything you want! Now… what will that be? Fortunately, your particular muse comes through occasionally… letting your writing take flight. But what happens when the muse fails to report for duty? Do you have a process of any kind which allows you to generate good content when needed, outside of inspirational bursts?

If you don’t have any kind of process, but find yourself locked into a staring contest with a blank text field from time to time, I recommend that you create a process - one that will work for you. This week, I’ll be focusing in on the importance of laying out a process, and I’ll also share some creative methodologies that can be employed within just about any creative endeavor, and should be helpful when you find that the muse is long gone.

Why it matters

Unless you’re a “pro blogger” (in which case, you may well have your own methodologies, because you are likely under the gun yourselves) you may find that there are effectively no consequences for having a low or uneven posting frequency. After all, it’s your blog… what does it matter, aside from potentially disappointed readers? From within the framework of Blogburst, I can certainly say that if you have a higher posting frequency, it goes a long way toward your odds of successfully appearing on a publisher’s page. Our editors are looking for fresh content, twice daily if possible, for our our publishing partners. I know, for a stone-cold fact, that there are certain blogs that are successful in the eyes of the publishers because they provide constant, high-quality content. If you want to know how to get the attention of our publishers, having a posting frequency of twice daily (or more!) is as close to a golden ticket as you’re going to get. Believe me, it’s an enviable position to be in, and a strong regular posting frequency is a great way to get there.

nano_participant_icon_large.gif nablo07120x240.jpg

Outside of Blogburst, the memetic popularity of NaBloPoMo and NaNoWriMo has led many a blogger to try their hand at one or the other of these mini-marathons. I think any honest participant in one of these will tell you that there were times when the well ran dry - or at least threatened to. Of course, that’s all part of the fun of participating (pride in accomplishing a difficult objective) but it is somewhat frustrating if you don’t make the finish line. Having a creative process can make the difference between finishing or not.

With that, I’ll sling some juice to some of our fine bloggers, with links relevant to NaBloPoMo posts in particular - check it out:

Mommy Instinct’s take on NaBloPoMo

Crafter By Night crosses the finish line

Slackermama - not so slack!

Born Again Bird Watcher breaks the tape

Next post, I’ll start digging in to the ins and outs of generating your own creative process. Until then, feel free to comment away - do you have a creative process of your own that you’d like to share? Any great creative breakthroughs that helped you turn a corner? Let us know!

Continue Reading: Part 2

Skip to Part 3

Stopping Content Theft

Published by Tim on November 27, 2007 in Blog Writing. 2 Comments

It’s a dark and dangerous world out there, and all sorts of people would love to steal your content for their own aims (making ad revenue, gathering search engine traffic, etc.)

I’d write a post about how to stop content theft, but The Blog Herald already did a bang-up job of it yesterday. Check out The 6 Steps to Stop Content Theft.

The overview (with details on each at the originating site) is:

  • find out who is copying your stuff
  • preserve the evidence
  • copy the plagiarist first (if practical)
  • contact the plagiarist’s advertisers
  • contact the plagiarist’s host
  • contact the search engines

Why You Need an Editorial Style Guide

Published by Tim on November 14, 2007 in Blog Writing. 2 Comments

style.png OK, so we know you’ve got style, but do you have the right kind? We’re not talking personal flair here — if you want a great blog, you’ll need to think a little about editorial style.

Your editorial style includes the conventions you use for spelling certain words (email or e-mail? Web site or website? Colour? Theatre?) and the basic rules of grammar and punctuation you follow.

If that all sounds too much like school, it doesn’t have to be complicated. The key is consistency. At the simplest, you can keep a list of common words that have more than one spelling (email, website) and always spell them the same way. Decide if you’re going to use the second comma in “this, that, and the other” and thereafter always do the same thing.

An easier way to handle style is to follow a style guide. Not sure if you should use the second comma? Just look it up.

The AP Stylebook is sort of the gold standard for journalists. The Columbia.edu online style guide is a nice online alternative.

If you use other good resources for editorial style, leave a comment!

p.s. As a tangent, it’s interesting (to me. a dork.) how style changes over time. When I started working on the Web in 1995, not only did my AP Stylebook not include any Internet terms, but I thought that email should be spelled e-mail (”it’s electronic mail, after all — e-mail!”) and website should be spelled “Web site” because “World Wide Web is a proper noun!”

Now that ten years and more have passed, I see email and website as words of their own.