Considering that business blogs are created with the intent to make money doesn’t it make sense to make them user friendly? The blogging business can be and is very competitive therefore it stands to reason that the site should be developed with the blog reader in mind. Their visits should be positive experiences that include making the site easy to navigate.

Site visitors should also be greeted with a layout that shouts ‘welcome’ or ‘come back’ since their loyalty will be what determines the success of the business itself.

Here are 5 details that need to be considered when creating a blog with the intention of earning an income from it.

Categories

It is always a good idea to categorize any content you post to the site. This makes it much easier for both the search engines and site visitors to find what they are looking for. Another benefit of categorizing your post is that you make older posts more readily available for viewing.

Easy to Subscribe

The point of creating a blog is to gain a loyal following to which you can promote goods and services if earning an income is your intention. With that said you want to make it as easy as possible for visitors to return to your platform. Be sure to prominently locate a subscribe button so people can pick up your rss feed.

Useful Content

Never forget that people come to your site for the content you post and not to be sold anything. It is therefore important to maintain your focus on continually creating and posting content that is useful to your readers.

‘Clean’ Layout

Do not ‘crowd’ your site with too many distractions such as banners ads or other forms of advertising like pop ups since this can be annoying to visitors. As just mentioned above reader satisfaction is your top priority and pummeling them with sales pitches is not the way to keep them happy.

Maintain a layout that is easy to navigate with a clean and professional appearance that is easy on the eyes. Remember your blog is a place of business and not a 3 ring circus!

A Little About ‘You’

Make easily available to all visitors a little background information about you or your business. Now you do not need to go in much detail here but share with people a little about your experience and how it relates to the theme of your site. Also make clear your intentions insofar as to why your blog was created and what you hope to achieve.

Business blogs are all about making money therefore ‘extra’ attention needs to be given to the ease, convenience and comfort of site visitors. Being that the blogging business can be very competitive certain details must be addressed when first creating a blog intended as a marketing platform.

Yes money is a priority with these sites however the top priority remains the blog reader upon whom the business will be built. 5 details in particular should be addressed from day one on the blog and are discussed above. By making your site comfortable and pleasing to any and all visitors you will be increasing your chances of their return. With this loyalty you can then build yourself a viable and profitable blogging business.

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About the Author:
TJ Philpott is an author and Internet entrepreneur based out of North Carolina. To learn more about creating effective business blogs and to also receive a free instructional manual that teaches valuable niche research techniques simply visit:http://blogbrawn.com/
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Building and using business blogs has become a standard for many online marketers in terms of marketing on the internet. However with the growth in popularity of online social sites many have begun using these communities as their primary marketing platforms.

In particular Twitter is being touted as a site that can supply all your business needs concerning marketing and traffic generation.

Does this mean blogging sites are now endangered in terms of their ‘leading’ role in web 2.0 online marketing? Actually this would hardly seem the case and here are 5 very strong reasons why.

Self-Hosted Blogs

Most blogs are self hosted meaning you own the site and the content and are therefore in total control. Online social sites have rule and regulations set forth by the site administrator governing behavior.

The ability to ‘personalize’ your space on a social network site is non-existent therefore ‘branding’ yourself is very difficult. You can not build a solid foundation to an online business on a site where you have no control.

Blogs Gain Authority

Comments or content you share at a social site are not displayed for very long thereby they will have no long lasting affect. On a blogging site every post, comment or useful information is always available for viewing and tends to build up the authority of the site itself.

The more content posted the more authority the blog will gain. This is a great foundation for building credibility and a business.

Symbol of Commitment

A blog is a symbol of commitment since it takes effort to maintain the site. Commitment is exactly what people look for in businesses since it is a sign of reliability. This leads to an increase in trust which is a vital asset to have when marketing on the internet. Online social sites require only that you ‘show up’ and chat a little thereby demonstrating very little effort or commitment.

The Strength is in the Link

Socialization communities normally link to blogs as opposed to the other way around. That kind of says it all right there since it seems these communities need to ‘defer’ to blogs as a source of reliable and useful content. This does not bode well however for the credibility of social network sites!

Analytics

Blogging sites have analytic capabilities allowing then to function more fully as a business platforms. These capabilities allow the site to improve and grow and are a necessary tool for anyone serious about building a lasting business.

Business blogs have become the adopted standard for online marketers due to their flexibility, ease of use and ability to interact with customers. Recent trends however indicate an increasing acceptance/reliance upon using certain online social sites such as Twitter as free standing marketing platforms.

These social communities offer the same attraction that blogging sites do in terms of interaction and ease of use but comparisons stop there. The ability of social sites to help people ‘build’ a business when marketing on the internet is in question.

The 5 reasons mentioned above as to why blogging sites are not likely to fall from favor as online marketing platforms merely fortifies their dominance. While many social network platforms such as Twitter are great traffic sources they do not offer a solid platform upon which to build a long lasting business.

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About the Author:
TJ Philpott is an author and Internet entrepreneur based out of North Carolina. To learn more about the effectiveness of business blogs as marketing platforms and to also receive a free instructional manual that teaches valuable niche research techniques simply visit:http://blogbrawn.com/
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When I first got interested in blog design, Blogging to the Bank was one of my first purchases. It was great advice on making a lot of money from blogging. My only complaint is that there was not quite enough information on building blogs for a complete beginner.

Blogging to the Bank has gone through several valuable upgrades over the years. The author keeps adding and updating information to keep up with changes in the business climate and the internet.

I still like the package, and I recommend taking a look if you want to make money with blogging:

http://www.blogdesignjournal.com/likes/Blog2Bank3/

No matter whether you are going to build a blog dedicated to affiliate marketing, drop shipping, or your own product, it is very important to choose  a platform that will enable you to add content easily.

Today, WordPress and Blogspot are the industry leaders when it comes to the blogging arena. When you answer the following questions, it will help ensure that you are using the best platform for your new blog.

1) Is the Interface Easy to Understand and Work With?

If you know how to compose and send emails, you will most likely have few problems using the Blogspot platform.  On the other hand, if you aren’t accustomed to posting in groups, or on social networks, you may find the WordPress platform a bit more complicated.

Nevertheless, once you get accustomed to the functions on one blogger platform, you can transfer the concepts to other platforms.  Therefore, even if you feel more comfortable with the Blogspot platform, you should not automatically eliminate WordPress from your list of possible platforms.

2) Are There Advanced Features Available?

Ideally, you should choose a platform that will allow you to take advantage of new marketing tools, as well as other technologies.  This includes incorporating social networking information, as well as many other things that will give your blog a constant source of live content.

In general, you will find that WordPress outstrips Blogspot when it comes to advanced features.  For example, if you select the Atahualpa theme, you will gain access to a page menu with listing features.

When it comes to advanced features, you should also give some thought to functions that may not be seen by users.  In particular, if you are going to have more than one writer work on the blog, it will be of some help to provide each person with an account.

Even though both Blogspot and WordPress offer account setup functionality, WordPress tends to give you more options.  On the other hand, the Blogspot platform tends to be more secure.

At the very least, you won’t have to worry about continually upgrading to a new version because hackers have found yet another hole to exploit in the platform’s overall security.

3) Can the Blog Script Be Modified Easily?

Even though WordPress has an endless number of advantages, it can be very difficult to modify the basic template.

Consider a situation where the theme you select does not come with controls for changing the header image or background color. If you look at the WordPress dashboard, you may find well over a dozen files that may have coding related to these parts of the blog.

Without a question, if you do not have experience with CSS, HTML, and PHP, you may find that making even simple changes represents a daunting challenge.

By contrast, making changes to a Blogspot template is much easier. At the very least, you can edit everything in one file.

At the same time, if you need to make changes to a widget, you can easily select an option in the editor that will give you access to the appropriate code. Therefore, even if you are not familiar with web design, you can still tweak a Blogspot template with a minimal amount of difficulty. Worst comes to worst, you can also reset the blog with ease.

During the process of choosing a blogging platform, it is very important to make sure that you will be able to manage each aspect of the blog with a minimal amount of difficulty.  This includes being able to make changes to the following basic areas:

Header and Footer
Fonts, colors, and format for posts
Background colors and designs
Number of Columns and Column Size
Login and account areas for writing teams

Once you begin comparing the general characteristics of the Blogspot and WordPress platforms, it will be much easier for you to determine which one will give you the most flexibility in each category of interest.

As may be expected, you may come across situations where one platform will suit your needs better than others.  Therefore, even though you may have chosen one platform for your first blog, there is no reason to conclude that you will never want to use a different platform at some point in the future.

About the Author:

Learn how to make money blogging today. Visit Brian’s website, http://www.HomebasedBlogging.com and learn how you can make money online from blogging using social media, affiliate marketing, podcasting, article marketing, and many other money-making topics from blogging professionals.

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Blogging has opened new ways of earning online income to millions of people around the world. Despite the fact that many run blogs just for fun, others have been able to exploit its true prospects in the online money making industry. Due to the recent hype for blogging and affiliate marketing through websites, almost everyone seems to be seeking his or her share in the industry.

If you’re experienced in blogging and know how to make money of them, you can shift your work load by offering blogging jobs to experts so that they can look after your blogs and you can direct your attention elsewhere.

Blogging jobs are becoming more and more lucrative as webmasters and affiliate marketers run multiple blogs simultaneously which is not an easy task by any means. As a freelancer your prospects in the industry are very bright as by getting blogging jobs you can earn handsomely.

The fact that blog runners have to update several blogs almost on a daily basis opens up new avenues for freelance bloggers to get hired for a decent pay. In most cases one freelancer can even take up multiple jobs at the same time which doubles the chances for a healthy income.

Several blogging jobs are advertised on online job sites and other related websites, meanwhile many online forums have also dedicated discussion boards for the sole purpose of interaction between freelance bloggers and hirers.

However, as the industry continues to flourish new ways and means to solve problems faced by bloggers are being introduced. Auto blogging may not be an unfamiliar term to you, because it has became a modern phenomenon that has changed the way we share information!

Have you analyzed the structure of the term, ‘Auto blogging’? The first impression which even a layman does not fail to catch is that it is in one way or another related to doing your work automatically.

Just imagine the implications of a tool that can update your blogs on a regular basis without you having to lose your wits maintaining all of your blogs. Auto blogging is gaining popularity as it tackles issues that frustrate even the pros in the industry.

With the help of an auto-blogger tool you get to update your blogs continuously with content so that the readership of your blog is maintained. And even if bloggers do take out enough time to update their blogs regularly, they require content, which is not that easy to produce each day.

Auto blogging functions on the lines that you as a blog owner instruct it to gather content from a certain RSS feed on a regular basis, hence, two of the most frustrating problems you face while blogging are solved quite conveniently with the help of auto blogging.

Auto blogging publishes content from other websites and blogs on to your blogs, so the question may arise in your mind if using such a technique is legal or not? The answer is in your favor.

Despite the fact that auto-blogger tool gathers content from other websites, it still gives a back link to the original source of the article or blog post, hence, the original publisher is not robbed of his or her due credit. Many people also make use of auto blogging to publish PLR articles on their websites.

The fact of the matter is that auto blogging draws its fair share of criticism as some quarters do not think it is ethical to publish content from other sites. On the other hand, some argue that it is hardly effective to set an automated program to update your blogs, when readers are more interested in personally interacting with the blogger.

Experts believe that the best use of auto blogging is when it is fused with human effort so that bloggers remain in touch with their audience meanwhile, this technique be used to ease the burden of work.-

About the Author:
Start auto-blogging for quick cash, Click Here to find out how you too can start a money making auto-blog in just 20 minutes.
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Image by Andrew Wilkinson via Flickr

Sometimes its nice to know who’s been visiting your blog and where they came from, rather than just a numbers game – “i had so many visitors last week” etc. Making good use of visitor statistics can help you fine-tune copy and content if you’re a serious online marketeer.

And if you’re not, then there’s still nothing more satisfying than seeing daily visitor numbers rise week on week. If nothing else, it proves you’re doing something right.

Blogger and WordPress blog platforms make it really easy to quickly add stat programs like Google Analytics and StatCounter through their Admin User Panels. In Blogger‘s case, you simply need to add a html/javascript gadget and copy and paste the StatCounter tracking code into it. It really is that simple.

However, when I came to add StatCounter stats to my Tumblr account, I found it rather more challenging.

Tumblr is described as “a blogging platform that allows users to post text, images, video, links, quotes, and audio to their tumblelog, a short-form blog. Users are able to “follow” other users and see their posts together on their dashboard.

\You can like or reblog other blogs on the site and other users can do the same to your posts. The service emphasizes customizability and ease of use” (see wikipedia)

I’ve been using to collate a fantasy iPod playlist, posting a different music track or video from YouTube each day. I now have a steady stream of fellow music lovers following my posts.

I couldn’t find anything in the help pages and most online searches drew a blank.

Then I found, almost by accident, the nugget of information I needed: how to install javascript into your Tumblr template, and so I’d like to share that information with you here.

As with all template changes, please, please make sure you’ve got a back up somewhere first (expand widgets if you’re doing such template changes on Blogger) as things can go wrong and be very very hard to recover from. You’ve been warned! (But don’t let that put you off trying altogether).

So in my case, I wanted to install the custom tracking javascript supplied by StatCounter. Here’s what you do.

1 – Log into your Tumblr Account.

2 – Click the “Customise” link.

3 – Click “Theme” and then select “Use Custom HTML”.

4 – Scroll to the end of the code and paste your StatCounter code JUST BEFORE the < /body>  </html> tags.

5 – Don’t forget to click “Save Changes”.

6 – Log back into your StatCounter account to check that it is recording visits (unless you’ve purposefully blocked your IP address from being recorded as a visit).

You can find out more about using StatCounter – a FREE visitor tracking counter at StatCounter

Jonathan Crouch is Technical Partner and website designer for Fabulous Photo Gifts – personalised photo gift company. In his quieter moments, he blogs ‘how-to’ and ‘SEO’ self help articles for small businesses and individuals, based on his own years of experience. Website: http://www.fabulousphotogifts.co.uk Blog: http://purple13.blogspot.com Tumblr: http://fabulousphotogifts.tumblr.com/
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Image via Wikipedia

By Gino

1. Blog Post Graphics

While great content and catchy titles are important, eye-grabbing images work best of all. Many people respond very well to visual graphics, so if you can find colorful, clever graphics that work well with your blog posts you should be able to pull more people in and then keep them there once they read the title and post.

You should not only have thumbnails, but also work interesting graphics into the post content to help break up large blocks of text.

2. Easy to Read Post Formatting

Many readers like to scan blog posts before they commit to reading the entire post and some people will just scan posts for quick info and won’t even spend the time to read. This is why it is essential to use proper formatting such as sub titles, bold and underlined text.

3. RSS Subscription Box

One of the biggest benefits of having a blog is having a large subscriber base that will see all your new posts. This why is is essential to have a link users can click to subscribe to your RSS feed. Many bloggers will create a special graphic in the top right section of a custom blog design dedicated to their valuable RSS feeds.

4. Clear Categories

Blog readers want to find good information quickly, so its important that your blog is easy to navigate. Having clear categories with your posts properly tagged and organized into the categories will make it easy for readers to find your great content.

5. Most Popular Posts

Every blog has its best posts so why not showcase them to new readers? This is a great way to turn new readers into lifetime readers. Many blogs display the top 5 or 10 most popular posts in the right sidebar of their blogs. You could even have most popular posts for each category and if you are using WordPress for your custom blog designs their are plugins available to display popular posts based on different factors such as number of comments or total views.

About the Author

Gino Orlandi is an online marketing expert who owns his own North Carolina Search Engine Optimization Business.

(ArticlesBase SC #936439)

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/ – 5 Most Important Elements of a Blog Design

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I use several plugins to promote WordPress blogs via Twitter. They mainly fall into three categories:

Getting users to tweet individual posts.

Getting users to follow you on Twitter  (so they are reminded to come back).

Automatically tweeting about every single post.

Getting Users to Tweet Your Posts

There are others, but the plugin I use to get readers to tweet my posts is Tweet This. It offers a nice selection of buttons. I get to select which button it will insert at the end of each post.

Getting Users to Follow You on Twitter

The Twitter badge that remains in the upper right (or the left, if you choose) corner of the blog window is one of my favorite Twitter-related blog add-ons. It is attractive and can be eye-catching without being intrusive. Basically it takes up no space.

You get the badge for free at http://www.go2web.com. You select the color, the wording, even the exact position (left/right, and distance from the top). The site generates the code to create the badge on your blog.

The Twitter badge is not technically a plugin, because you have to use the Appearance > Editor and insert it in the PHP code (usually on the footer page), but that is actually quite easy. And the thing just works.

You can edit the color on your own site (instead of regenerating it at Go2Web.com) if you want to. Simply change the hex code in the tiny script you pasted on the footer page.

Tweeting Posts Automatically

Automatically tweeting a link to each post seems to be the most effective of all the Twitter tie-ins I have tried. There are several (at least) plugins that do that, and all of them that I have tried work just fine. Here are the ones I use:

Twitter Autopost

Tweet This

Twitter Tools

Twitter Autopost

Twitter Autopost is the simplest automatic tweet plugin I’ve ever seen. It is not free. I bought it with another automation plugin for less than $5.

Tweet This

Tweet this is free. You can find and install it, using the Add New feature in your WordPress dashboard. Besides adding a Tweet This button as described above, it can be easily set up automatically post to a Twitter account. Just enter a Twitter username and password.

Twitter Tools

Twitter Tools is a whole complex of tools. It allows you to not only tweet automatically when you make a blog post but also to automatically post tweets to your WordPress blog. You have to be careful in setting up this plugin, or your tweet-post-cycle can become circular.

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The WordPress blog software has taken the Internet by storm. There are so many things you can create with it—automated blogs, static websites, article directories, advertising sites, and more—using easy-t0-install plugins and themes.

For many people, though, WordPress remains difficult to install, despite the huge number of tutorials now available. One answer is the Fantastico feature offered by some web-hosting providers.

Unfortunately experts say that blogs installed by Fantastico are not secure. Such blogs may be able to be made secure, but if you are expert enough to do that, you will not be using Fantastico.

And WordPress blogs need all the security they can get. Now that WordPress installaitons have become so popular, hackers and so-called “script kiddies” are constantly trying to break in and vandalize them.

Blogs must be carefully installed and maintained to fend off outside attack. Otherwise, not only is your blog endanger, if it is on a shared server, an unsecured blog endangers all the other sites on that server, because hackers could use your blog as an entry point to attack the server.

The best protection against outside attack is to do two things: install your blog in a secure way to begin with, and then quickly install each WordPress security version as soon as it is available. There is no such thing as a set-it-up-and-forget-it blog that is secure.

Expert WordPress is a service that lets you install a safe, secure WordPress blog in a couple of minutes—just as fast as Fantastico, but with a completely secure database and blog. And the blog you install with Expert WordPress is also monetized with built-in Adsense and provided with an easily customized special theme. You can, of course, change the theme if you want to.

Over the last three years, I have tried many blogging packages, including a bunch of WordPress tutorials. Expert WordPress is by far the easiest and best I have found. Expert WordPress makes it actually fun to create new WordPress blogs.

The only catch is that the instant installation feature works on only Cpanel hosting software. However, even without using the instant install feature, the Expert WordPress package is so comprehensive , with a complete installation package, including plugins, plus a manual and the absolutely best step-by-step videos I have ever seen.

I love using Expert WordPress to install blogs on Hostgator, but I also use it on IX Web Hosting, which does not have Cpanel. It takes a little longer, but it is still by far the best blog-installation solution I have ever found.

Further, the members area of the Expert WordPress website is comprehensive, and the support is prompt and courteous. Over the years, as both a beta tester and a customer for his products, I have found owner Alex Sysoef to be tremendously responsive and helpful at all times.

Free monthly webinars offer advanced training and give everyone a chance to ask any questions we may have. Expert WordPress even provides a huge package of free articles for blog content, plus a monthly blog content package. Plus, there are promotion tools and other member perks.

I highly recommend Expert WordPress (in case it is not obvious). It is so much fun to make blogs with EWP; I often build them just for fun.

Oh, by the way, did I mention that the basic Expert WordPress blog package (with the recommended plugins included) is free? Yep. You really should check it it.

A blog, believe it or not, when properly prepared creates content, and quite often is put very fast in the top ten of Google. Why it is so, try reading the following contribution to enlighten yourself:

A blog of domestic implements from a few features, allow search engines to crawl the content very quickly. The result was the fastest I have ever witnessed, added a new post within 20 seconds (including the top 10 ranking) for relevant phrases. How can this come about?

BlogPing

BlogPing is a protocol that implements any popular blog system. It serves primarily two things:

1. Blogs to notify each other (They were linked)

2. Notify search engines (Google Hello, I have published a new page)

Especially with the integration of Google Sitemaps that go on WordPress with a click of the hand, you need a search engine’s new content page to look once more. Sitemap opens directly to crawl a new page.

High degree of optimization of the source code

In WordPress usually retains very accurate web standards. A title is reported only as such. The same is true with other HTML tags. The quality of the templates is such, that the code can almost always run easily to W3 validation process. This also simplifies the search engines crawling a site.

A clean URL structure

WordPress provides the possibility of a rational use of URL structure. This is also helpful.

Performance

In conclusion, you don’t have to worry about the performance website. Because WordPress is indeed far from being resource-saving, it also provides a plugin called wp-super-cache.

Good internal linking

A blog encourages even the structural reasons to link an already written word. This is partially automatically handled by features such as tag clouds and the category classification of the contributions.

Latest content

Many blogs are designed to publish updated information. This is also one of the reasons for the short-term transport in the top ten. It is because blogs often contain the latest information about a topic. This also fits with the current real-time strategy Google uses. One carried a no-name content that is thought to be of high quality and watched the development of the link as the residence times, etc.

Another point concerning the timeliness is: A blog is posting updates itself. This is done firstly through features such as tag clouds or looking for constant movement on the sides. Another way is by comments that are received every now and then.

Blog instead of conventional web pages?

I am always wondering if it is best to ask a blog instead of a static Web site. The answer is clear: Why not? WordPress is ultimately nothing more than a content management system. Of course, it can create quite conventional looking pages. One thing is certain: Blog contents are not mainly preferred, because they are thought to be blog content. They are preferred because WordPress is so well optimized, and can be optimized by plug-ins.

Find the best premium WordPress themes for your WordPress powered blogs from the large collection of themes at ThemesAndMods.com

Article Source:http://www.articlesbase.com/blogging-articles/advantages-of-blogging-wordpress-blogging-1683945.html