How Do I Get Myself a Blogging Mentor?

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If you’re interested in pursuing a hobby or career in blogging, you may be wondering where to start, or where to go after you’ve written your first few posts. A mentor can help you take your next steps to success.

You’re ready to work with a mentor once you understand the basic blogging concepts and techniques (you don’t want to burden someone with questions you can easily answer yourself by reading a couple articles). Then, take a stab at propping up a blog for yourself and posting some content. After you’ve familiarized yourself with the basics and created a fledgling blog, a mentor can help you get to the next level. [Read more…]

5 Easy Steps to Writing the Perfect Guest Post

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Writing a guest post for a blog that fits in your niche is a great way to attract new traffic to your blog. If those readers like your content, chances are good that they’ll hop over and check out your blog as well. This will undoubtedly lead to some new followers and more buzz about your content – all of which are great things.

That’s all well and good, but designing a good guest post can be a project in itself. There are a lot of things to consider when writing this piece – it needs to be your best work to impress the blog’s editor, as well as the readers. You’ll need to ensure it’s properly researched, fits with your blog’s niche, hasn’t been done before on that blog, etc. [Read more…]

Company Blog Tips: How To Keep Your Company Blog Out Of A Rut

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A company blog writing assignment can be rewarding in many different ways; it gives you a chance to release your creative energy; it allows you to network with other bloggers in the same market as you exchange guest posts; and it hones your writing skills until you can write anything — from a poem to a novel.

But there can be roadblocks to enjoying your professional blogging experience. Coming up with fresh content every week and editing the work of others who guest blog for you; all the while keeping to a posting schedule that you yourself probably did not have any input about. Here are some tactics gleaned from professional bloggers to help you stay fresh and post fresh: [Read more…]

The Five Fundamentals to Creating a Powerhouse Blog

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Your blog should work for you on at least several different levels: 1). As a creative outlet for your ideas and energy; 2). As a marketing tool for your brand, whether that brand is personal, educational, business, or a combined blend; 3). As a continuing interaction with others.

Yet so often people create a blog with high expectations, and then get discouraged and neglect their work. Cyberspace is full of abandoned blogs. If you’ve had this experience, don’t despair. Don’t give up on the idea of creating and maintaining a powerhouse blog. Below lists the five fundamentals that will help you turn your blog into a life-changing experience: [Read more…]

Why Publishing Blog Posts on Facebook Can Help Increase Your Blog’s Engagement

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Blogging is different from article writing; you have to sense your audience, in order to engage it.

When I first started to blog many years ago, I used to reference other writers’ blog posts. I then used the available technology, in the form of vanity RSS feeds and trackbacks, to stay up to date on mentions or opinions about our own blog. Nowadays, however, the volume of the published content is so massive that vanity RSS feeds and trackbacks are essentially useless. [Read more…]

Due.com Review: It Really Is An Easy Way to Keep Track of Your Invoices

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As a full-time writer who is consistently taking on different freelance opportunities, at different times, and from different businesses, managing invoices has always been a challenge. Because not all companies use one system, such as PayPal, all of the invoices you send manually or through different platforms can get confusing. If you run your own business then chances are you’re even more overwhelmed, which is why Due.com is such an exciting new tool to review.

It fills the gap in invoicing that the online industry is missing without having to charge you an arm and a leg. Check out the review below, improvements I think need to be made, and the verdict that talks about who can benefit most from this particular tool.

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Top 8 Personal Finance Blogs You Should be Reading

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personal-financeLet’s face it: Personal finance isn’t necessarily the buzziest or most popular industry on the web. While some industries have an easy time creating viral videos, cool infographics, and other creative pieces of content, personal finance has a subject matter that is a little bit less exciting. Still, even so-called “boring” industries have reasons to start a blog. For starters, a blog is a great way to improve your SEO by helping you get indexed more often, thus showing up on a search engine results page (SERP) more frequently.

Fortunately for us, some personal finance companies have managed to create a blog with interesting and engaging content. If you’ve been searching for a blog to learn more about personal finance but can’t find anything quality, check out some of these options below.

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The Google Hummingbird Update and What It Means to Bloggers

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hummingbirdThe Hummingbird update is a new Google algorithm update that was announced September 26 and, surprise surprise, it has marketers talking. Whenever Google makes a change it’s important for small businesses to understand what it means and how it will affect rankings. Panda and Penguin algorithm updates are the most popular and the most frequent, but this Hummingbird update seems to be the first of its kind. There is no Moz weather report to tell us when its coming and there are not countless articles telling us how to recover. For all intensive purposes, this is a scramble. [Read more…]

Google Bringing Street View to Mobile Browsers

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Although Apple might be scrambling to get some sort of mapping device on a mobile phone together, Google Maps arent faltering. One of the things that mobile users love most, especially the directionally challenged as my mom would say, is the ability to use Google maps. You never have to worry about printing out directions before you leave your house because you have your phone, and now things are about to get even better.

As of October 9 of this year, Google will bring street view to mobile browsers. Its not the most exciting news in the world, but its something that will make a difference in the long run for the mobile user as well as Google itself.

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How the Restaurant Industry Can Take Advantage of Blogging (And Why Its Not Yet Happening)

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It is no secret that creating a website for your restaurant is crucial. More and more consumers are turning to the Internet to find information on a place to eat, and so most restaurant websites include pictures of the restaurant and the food, hours and location, contact information including links to social networking accounts, and of course the menu. However, there is one aspect of a company website that the restaurant industry seems to be missing: a blog.

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