Blogging Pointers

It’s Wednesday and you know what that means! Time to pick the best of the best in our weekly Blog Watch metablogging roundup! So circle the wagons and light the campfires, cowboys and cowgirls - let’s git bloggin’! (OK, that was way too far, even for me . . . )

Put Me In, Coach. . .

Better Blogging With Michael Martine: Learn to Blog Better, Faster, and with Fewer Mistakes - Michael, as I think I might have mentioned before, is one of the meta-bloggers who really gets it - whatever “it” really is - when it comes to blogging. His recent entry into the consulting business hasn’t seemed to negatively impact his own blogging productivity one whit. This post explains why you should think about hiring a blog coach. (As a blog coach myself, I have to say this is a pretty great explanation of what we do - or what I do, anyway - and how we can help you get better at blogging, no matter what purpose your blog serves for you.)

It’s Easier To Ask Permission After All . . .

Lorelle VanFossen at Blog Herald: Newsletter to Blog: Quoting, Referencing, Citing and Not Copyright Violating - Lorelle’s breadth of expertise is just amazing to me. I don’t know how she does it - but “do it” she does. This post, covering the process of transforming a newsletter to a blog format and specifically, how to avoid unwittingly plagiarizing your newsletter’s content when you publish it in blog form on the World Wide Web.

Object Lessons

Binary Moon: Top 10 Tips for driving traffic AWAY from your website - I’m not sure I agree with all of these entries, honestly. For one, I couldn’t care less if you put Digg or deli.cio.us buttons in your feed, and I’m not sure why he does. (Then again, I don’t get why some folks don’t think you should “digg” yourself - I’m not allowed to like my own writing? But reasonable minds differ, so I don’t press the point too much. And I won’t here, either.) However, the post is very helpful especially to new bloggers and points out the value in thinking critically about your blog as a whole and as an experience in itself.

One Stumble You WANT To Take

DoshDosh: StumbleUpon Networking: How to Easily Share Content and Build Relationships - Maki gives us an incredibly detailed and content-rich primer on StumbleUpon - what it is, how to use it, and why you should. I learned a lot I didn’t know from this post, and I was already familiar with SU. There’s really nothing more to say about this post - it speaks for itself and you should read it, period.

That’s it for this week, folks - enjoy the best of the meta-bloggers!

In the Wednesday Blog Watch, I’m going to select the three to five best posts about blogging from other blogs across the Internet in the past week. I’m doing this for two reasons:

• To help readers improve their blogging by giving them the very best advice available
• To demonstrate two key blog traffic improvement tips simultaneously - one: send your readers away, paradoxically, if you want them to come back to stay, and two: blog readers love lists!

So, without further ado, here’s last week’s best of the blogs Blog Watch - it’s metatastic!

Michael Martine, who recently announced his entry into the blog consulting business, offers up some wholesome goodness fresh from the blog garden with “How to Manage Your Blog For the Long Term - Think Like A Gardener.”

At The Blog Herald, Valeria Maltoni asks us “What Is Your Blog’s Best Pick-Up Line?” This post contains great advice for thinking about your blog branding.

At Copyblogger, Brian Clark offers us “How To Write Remarkably Creative Content.” Great advice for keeping your blog content fresh and uniquely yours.

That’s it for this edition!