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When you first sign up for a blog on a site like Blogger, there is a wide variety of options made available that allow you to reach out to your readers.

From customizable templates to imbedded videos, audio and advertising, the new blogger seemingly has the world at his or her fingertips.

That warm and fuzzy feeling eventually starts to wear off though as new ideas pop up that may not be immediately covered by Blogger’s built-in features.

Luckily, Blogger and essentially any other blogging platform allows its writers to add any number of open source add-ons to their blogs for enhanced features and interaction with readers.

AdSense
The single greatest thing you can do for your blog is turn it into a profitable outlet for your daily writing. Google’s very own AdSense add-on is one of the easiest and most effective ways to do this. The best part is that it is incredibly easy to add AdSense to your blog through the interface provided by Google in Blogger.

All you need to do is sign up for an AdSense account using the same login ID you currently use for Blogger. Go to the template page of Blogger where you will find a visual layout of your site.

Click on any of the “Add a Page Element” links on the page and you will be asked how big you would like your ads to be, how many to place, and what background colors they will have. It is quick and easy and integrates directly into your account.

Templates
The templates page is a great place to find and make a great deal of changes to your blog, the best and most visible impressive add-on being a new template. The code for your template can be located here, within the Template tag of your blog settings. To change your template, all you need to do is find a new one that you like and copy the code.

While Blogger comes with a couple dozens templates already installed, there are thousands more options available almost anywhere you look on the Internet. So, despite what Blogger may want your site to look like, you can make almost any changes you want, assuming you can find someone who has built a template to match your desired look.

Subscribe to Comments – by email
This simple add-on can be found within Blogger’s own Buzz page, the company blog that announces new changes and updates to their website and services. To find it, look for it just below your list of blogs on your dashboard.

This new add-on makes it easy for you to stay in the conversation loop after you comment on a post. Blogger now gives you the opportunity to receive an email every time someone comments on the same post. This way,

if you ask a question of the post author, you will get instant notification of their response without having to check back on their blog. To use this feature you will need to have a Google account which will insure that someone else can’t provide your email causing your to receive email that you didn’t request.

Amazon Widgets
Another great way to make a few dollars from your writing, Amazon widgets allow you install links to products on Amazon that your readers may be interested in buying.

Sign up for a free Associates account with Amazon and you can then install these widgets with your own Associate ID number and get commission for any sales made through your site. It is a great way to make relevant ads on your site linked to posts you have written.

Bookmarking Buttons (Digg, Delicious, Facebook, etc)
These are almost required in today’s age of social bookmarking and networking. By default, the only way a reader can interact with you on your blog is through the commenting feature. However, you can install simple button links on your site to services like Digg and Delicious where they can bookmark your posts and share them with millions of other social bookmarkers.

To add these buttons to your page, visit the websites for Digg or Delicious and search for buttons and links after signing up for a new account. They install easily within the code of your template (which these sites will guide you through doing).

There are countless additions you can make to your Blogger blog through widgets and third party applications. When someone has an idea, someone else has probably already created an application to serve that idea.

The best way to find new widgets is to search Google for “Blogger Widgets” or “Blogger addons” and search through the listings provided. You can do wonders with your blog with the right resources.

Learn to blog with Google Blogger Tutorials. Over 100 videos available on the Internet showing you where to find and how to add thousands of add-ons including audio, video, slide shows, text, photos, credit cards and more.
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• Half A Billion Blog Posts Later, Google To Give Blogger A Revamp (via TechCrunch) (calculable.org)
• Battle of the Blog-platforms (souzapalooza.wordpress.com)
• Google Gives Blogger a Makeover (blogher.com)
• Will Blogger Be Able to Compete With WordPress? (pressography.com)

1. Create your Google account – enter your email, password, display name, and click continue

If you already have a Google account, just sign in.

2. Name your blog – enter blog title, blog address and click continue. Your blog address will be www.yourdomainname.blogspot.com

3. Choose a template from the existing templates. You can preview the template before you choose it too and it is very easy to change at anytime you want it.

4. Start writing your first post on your niche market.

Your Post contains a

a) Title – this is where you enter your post title or headline. Title should be as catchy as possible and grab the attention of the web surfers.

b) Body – Here is where you post the content of your post which is your articles. You can do some basic editing in like you are in Microsoft Word for font size, bolding, and choosing color, indenting and etc.

You can also add images from your computer file or from the website. Just enter the file destination or URL address. There are a few layout to choose from whether your image is to be position on the top right , top left or none.

You can allow options for readers to comment on your blog.

After you have posted your blog and you feel like to edit it for better. You can go to edit post and select the things that you want to change.

Click edit and save or publish. Every post that you write has a date and time. You can choose not to put the same time as you publish your post. Just change the time of the post and that’s about it. Isn’t that as simple as 123?

Tiffany Lee is is personally interested in topics related to blogging for newbies. The video presentation that she has will give you a easy to start up in blogging arena.
Blogging for profit and fun, visit http://www.untoldsecretsofblogging.com to get free articles report.
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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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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/

As far as I’m concerned, I had subscribed to 100′s of blog in my blog niche and here are some of my motives solved due to that:

By subscribing to top blogs in my industry, I stay updated with all latest happenings and bloggers reaction.
By subscribing to them, all of their latest posts are accessible to me in my account. So I’m can keep track of what is being covered by various bloggers in my niche recently.
By looking at some of latest posts into my RSS Readers and email accounts, I’m actually go to the actual posts that really interest me and leave some comments of mine there. So this helps me to get some valuable links, readers and traffic to my blog.

When we spend some time going though our favorite blogs, it gives us ideas about drafting our next blog post on many occasions.

When we go through the latest blog posts from our favorite blogs, can submit them on some of social networks where we are active like on our Twitter account, Facebook account or on some social Bookmarking websites like Digg, delicious, Reddit etc.

On some occasions, we may link to some of blog posts written by other blogs when creating a new post for our blogs if linking to those blogs adds more value to our post.

Suppose, I’m writing a post about how to use Yahoo Buzz, then people will also be interested in knowing how to add Yahoo Buzz buttons in our blogger and wordpress blogs. So if any blogger has written a manual about adding Yahoo Buzz buttons to Blogger and WordPress blog, you can include links to those pages for adding more value in your post.

There must be some blogs in your niche whom you are competing with. By subscribing their RSS, you can stay updated with the amount of content they are placing on their website so that you can plan your content strategy accordingly.

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About the Author:
Anil Gupta writes about lots of interesting topics like Sponsored-Reviews, Google backlinks and how to promote facebook fan page on his Scopeformoney.com blog.
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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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Often times it is these ‘little things’ that make for a successful blog.

Here are 3 ‘practices’ every blogger should adopt that will only contribute in a positive way to the satisfaction of every blog reader who visits your site.

Contribute Your Own Content

When posting many will often use the content of others to place on their site and this is a perfectly acceptable practice. What you do not want to do is let this become such a habit that most of the content on your site originates from somewhere else. Make the effort to compose plenty of original content yourself to help give your site more of an identity. This will also give any visitor a more reason to visit your site.

Give Credit Where Credit is Due

Above it was mentioned that an acceptable practice is to use the content of others on your own site. The key to this that makes it acceptable is to ALWAYS credit the author since by not doing so you are ‘stealing’ the hard work of somebody else. Although the internet is vast in size this type of behavior will be identified quickly damaging your reputation and credibility.

Avoid Large Blocks of Text

Always try to compose your entries so that the sentences and paragraphs are short if possible. This helps to minimize large blocks of text on your site that not only discourages people from reading it due to its size but is also stressful on the eyes.

Most every one of the most popular blogs found online share 3 common characteristics that contribute immensely to their popularity. Although the quality of the blog entries viewed on any particular site has a large impact on reader loyalty there are other factors involved as well.

Subtle ‘little things’ such as the 3 suggested practices discussed above also help gain the appreciation of the blog reader. People are looking for reliable and ethical sources of good information online.

Admittedly the blog posting of any particular site is the first thing that catches their eyes. But over the long haul the manner in which information is managed and presented will be a contributing factor in making the site a successful blog.

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About the Author:
TJ Philpott is an author and Internet entrepreneur based out of North Carolina.To learn more about becoming one of the more <a rel=”nofollow” target=”_blank” href=”http://blogbrawn.com/”>popular blogs</a> in your niche and to also receive a free instructional manual that teaches valuable niche research techniques simply visit:<a rel=”nofollow” target=”_blank” href=”http://blogbrawn.com/”>http://blogbrawn.com/</a>
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