Blogging Pointers

I don’t normally link to two posts from one blog in a single post but these two posts really spoke to me today, as I was reviewing my feeds from the last few days. (I do not spend hours every day reading feeds, and I don’t recommend it as a productive practice to anyone. But more on that in a later post.)

DoshDosh is one of those blogs that just makes you wonder whether more than one person is really writing it. Except for the unique and consistent voice, it just seems impossible that one person could come up with so much good stuff, so consistently. And yet, there you are - Maki delivers, time and again.

The first post is “The ‘Free’ Business Model: A Strategy for Attention, Traffic, and Profits.” With very little effort, Maki could expand on this and produce an excellent e-book that would make him quite comfortable, I feel sure! Here, he speaks of one of the most confusing aspects of web-based money making - the concept of the business model. It trips up so many of us who don’t understand that “free” is great, but it has to GO somewhere in order to make it worth your while. Maki gets that, of course, and shows you how to go from “free” to “paid.” Excellent post. Particularly worthwhile: the last few paragraphs …

When it comes to blogging, you often want to grab hold of the first-time user who arrives at your site. You want him or her to track your blog by subscribing to it. You do this by giving quality information away for free. Don’t be afraid to share your ‘secret techniques‘. So what if you give it all away for free? Be generous with links and publicity. Make your readers feel grateful and happy. Grab them by the throat and never let them go. Build attention for your ventures consistently by progressively catering to your audience’s needs. The more you share useful content and appear to be genuine, the more loyal your readers you will be and the easier for you to acquire support for your future projects. Never forget that people are transferable assets and crucial factors in word of mouth marketing. Listen to them. Let them tell you how they feel. You don’t have to soft sell or hard sell anything to initially make some money from your blog. You don’t even have to put any ads up at all. It’s more about attention, loyalty, connections and leverage.

The second post is more “audience participation” if you will, and I’ve already raised my hand to participate. I hope a lot of my readers will as well! The post is titled “Creating a Definitive Blueprint for a Profitable Blog: A Community Ebook Idea,” and it’s picking up steam in the comments section. Maki’s idea is for a community-written (although individually-pieced) ebook that will be available for free download. Each author would of course be fully credited and retain all rights in his/her work. (Although there’s some talk about allowing affiliate links to permit the authors to make a little cash for their troubles.)

I hope you’ll go check out both posts and if the spirit moves you, sign up to participate in the ebook!