How Do you Spell school Again?

It is happened many times that when people correct errors, they create additional errors. One thinks of Winston Churchill’s famous

“That is the kind of English, up with which I will not put”

Or George W. Bush

“Rarely is the question asked: Is our children learning?”

Amusingly, Stephen Dubner of Freakonomics, pointed out an error in the Economist. He argued the Economist had unwittingly dropped an r from pastries. He pointed out that the Economist had misspelt it pasties. He blogged about it here

Unfortunately, for Stephen, he didn’t realise there is actually a foodstuff called Cornish pasties; so the Economist was right and he had a bit of egg on his face. Just to finish off the joke, the Economist sent him a chicken and vegetable pasty through the post. - Pasties, Pasties everywhere

I have seen many people point out errors, only to make more errors themselves. It’s certainly happened to me; although, conveniently I can’t remember the specific examples.

For any blogger, getting links to your blog is essential to success.

I have previously suggested some tips for building links here - Tips for getting more links

In recent months, I have been working hard in building up links on my blogs. One my favourite strategies at the moment is becoming a regular commentator on other blogs.

I don’t target the very successful blogs, but look for blogs which are relatively new and blogging on a similar theme. Becoming a regular commentator helps to build up a friendship, which often leads to mutual links as well. If it doesn’t no harm; but, on quite a few occasions it has led to blogroll links and links in posts. Don’t be tight about linking to other blogs either.

Note: a while back I said I had stopped commenting on other blogs (for Net Writing’s niche) I found it wasn’t working for this particular niche. However, in the cycling and to a lesser extent economics niche, comments have been very effective. Either I was

1. Wrong,
2. Commenting in the wrong place or
3. Maybe it just depends on the niche.

How To find Good Blogs for Developing Contacts.

1. I use google blog search to search blogs on my niche e.g. search ‘cycling’
2. If the blog is very good I add it to my RSS feed and give it relevant category.
3. Once or twice a week I go through my feed and comment on my favourite blogs
4. Alternatively, look at popular blogs and click on the people who leave good comments.
5. It is a mix between finding new blogs and establishing relationships with the blogs you like. Don’t just be a hit and run commentator

Useful Tool for checking backlinks - backlink watch

“There are only two tragedies in life: one is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.”

- Oscar Wilde

I have long wanted to work from home, but, having spent the past couple of weeks working from home, I realise their are quite a few difficulties as well as the undoubted benefits. Whilst many would like the idea of working from home; it is worth being aware of the potential drawbacks.

No Structure.

Working for yourself gives a tremendous freedom; you can choose the hours of when and indeed if you work. There is no 9 to 5. But, this means you need to be quite disciplined in setting aside time to concentrate on work.

No Finish Time.

If you work in an office, you at least know, when your work day is over. But, working from home means that you can be working until late at night. Sometimes, it is important to set a time to completely switch off and not touch any more work.

Mixing Work And Pleasure.

Sometimes your not sure whether your working or just pursuing a hobby. In a way this is a great thing. But, it means your work can sometimes lack focus. For example, I have a blog on cycling; but, I’m not sure how productive it is to watch highlights of the Tour. True, I could blog about it, but, it is not really effective work. Similarly, I spent a lot of time looking at photos from a cycling trip. I did get a blog post out of it but, it took a long time.

Continue reading →

Since entering the RSS competition at Daily Blog Tips, I have been trying a few strategies to get more subscribers to my Economics Blog. This is what I have been doing so far:

Blog Carnival.

I have set up a Carnival of the Economists, encouraging people to submit articles on economics. The hope is that people up submit to carnivals will be interested in subscribing. I think it is also important to make the most of a blog carnival, e.g. encouraging submitters to subscribe.

Posting

Frequent posting, once or twice a day. I could post more, but, I doubt this would help. There is always a danger of putting people off through overposting.

Commenting on Top Blogs.

I found a list of the top 100 economic blogs. I went through the blogs, and subscribed to those who allow comments with links to your homepage. I have been leaving thoughtful comments, in the hope some will click through and subscribe. The traffic from this has been low, but, hopefully it is good quality traffic.

Things Which would be good to Do

• Write Guest Posts on Popular Blogs. Unfortunately, most of the top economic blogs aren’t interested in accepting guest posts; it’s different to the self improvement and blogging niche. Continue reading →

Recently, I have been helping a few people start blogging, who previously didn’t have any experience.

The first thing I realised is that it is easy to forget how much knowledge which may seem ‘obvious’ to an experienced blogger, is actually a complete mystery to the newcomer.

There is also a lack of information at the absolute basics of blogging, because we take certain things for granted.

First Steps in Blogging

What is a Blog?

A blog is a way of generating a website; it is a way of generating online content. A blog can be many things, but usually it is updated on a fairly regular basis. Netwriting is a blog. You can look at my other blogs here

What Do I need to be able to Blog?

1. Buy a domain name. If you look at the top of the screen, you will see the domain name of this blog is www.netwriting.co.uk/

2. You need to host your blog with a hosting company. You will need to sign upto a hosting company. I strongly recommend choosing a hosting company which offer one click install (i.e. easy) for a blog software. I Recommend - Hostican prices range from $6 a month to $11 a month.

3. Linking Domain Name to Hosting Company.

It is easier if you buy a domain name, with your hosting company. But, there can be reasons to buy it separately. If you buy a domain name from a separate company you need to point the nameservers from the domain company to the hosting company. e.g. ns1.hostican.com. This effectively links the domain name with your hosting account so that the domain name will work on your hosting company.

By the way, it can take time for the domain name to ‘propagate’ and become active.

4. Install a Blog

Once you have a website such as www.netwriting.co.uk, you can install a blog. The blog is a piece of software which makes it easy to add content. Note, you don’t need to buy or download any software, it is hosted online.

I recommend Wordpress. If you goto your control panel. You will see a function called ‘Fantastico’. This is because it is fantastic in saving time and effort. Then you choose to install wordpress. You can install at /blog or install at the root just leave / blank. It doesn’t matter too much, whether you install at /blog like www.cyclinginfo.co.uk/blog. or at the ‘root’ like netwriting.co.uk/

Continue reading →

I have entered Daily Blog tips competition for increasing RSS subscribers.

I decided to choose my economics blog - economics help.

I may regret choosing that blog because:

• It’s my only blog on blogger (inferior to wordpress)
• June / July has seen a significant dip in traffic due to the end of the academic year.
• I may have had more success with a niche on blogging. People interested in economics do not necessarily know what RSS are

However, the strengths of the blog include:

• Reasonable traffic from Google already.
• I will have no problem writing articles on economics.

My motivation for entering the competition is not to win the money (I don’t expect to do that). I predict the winners will be a blog with already over 500 subscribers.

However, if I can increase my subscriber base by 50 in a month, I will be happy. More subscribers means hopefully more commentators and more links. A few more links to the site would help alot.

I’ll let you know how I get on. It’s good to have a challenge now that I am working full time as a blogger.

By the way, if you fancy subscribing to a fascinating blog about Economics, I’d be grateful…

For the next 3 months I will be ‘working’ as a full time blogger. As a teacher, my term doesn’t start until mid September, so I will be spending the summer living the lifestyle of a ‘problogger’.

Usually, in the summer, I take on an onerous job of marking exam papers. But, thanks to the income I earn from blogging, I have been able to retire from marking.

These are some of My early Observations from Working as A Full time Blogger.

I rarely do a full days work.

On average I spend about 5-6 hours working on my websites. Working from home gives more leisure time, like an hour lunch time to watch an episode of Sherlock Holmes and spending several hours cycling. Therefore, even living as a ‘full time blogger’ I haven’t been doing a huge amount more than when I was working part time.

I enjoy the Work

This is the best aspect of blogging, generally, you are writing on topics that interest you. You can choose your topics and work to your own schedule. Whilst flexible time certainly as its challenges, it definitely has clear advantages that a strict 9-5 job can never give.

50% of My Work is Offline

One of my main focuses for this summer is to write more, increase the number of pages and keep 5 blogs going at the same time. This requires a lot of writing; therefore, I spend alot of time, writing in cafes providing the basic content, which then takes the rest of the day.

Projects.

I have set a few mini projects to give a structure to the full time job opportunities.

• Write an Economics Dictionary of upto 1,000 entry
• Target increase in RSS subscribers on certain blogs. This includes taking part in a blogging competition to increase RSS subscribers.

I think as a full time blogger it is important to set challenges and think big, growing blogs in a new direction. Continue reading →

As a blogger, one of the main tasks is writing. Finding time to write is one of the main challenges bloggers face. If you can’t find or create the necessary time, your blogs will lose impetus.

These are some tips I employ to increase the productivity of my writing.

Batch Writing

Writing requires a certain concentration and mental space. It’s not something you can dip into for the odd 10-15 minutes. It is important to give yourself a decent time period to get into the writing groove. Once you have started writing, it is best to maximise the writing environment and keep going. When writing blog posts, I will often write 2-6 posts at the same time. Often once you have writen one post, you get ideas for a second; your brain becomes attuned to the concept of writing.

Clarity and Simplicity.

For writing to be effective, you need to have a clear mind and clear schedule. The more distractions you can remove the better. For example, online access is one potential distraction, especially, if you have your email notifier open. Similarly I try to keep my writing desk free of distractions. Alternatively, I will go to a cafe, where there is little else to do apart from drink coffee and write. Continue reading →

Came across this interesting video at Copyblogger. Basically, Ira Glass talked about how the mundane can be made interesting. The key is ask questions of the reader so that they are drawn in and are compelled to keep reading. What is the formula for creating compelling stories? Using his idea, I wrote the following:

Boris woke up at the crack of dawn; there was an profound silence throughout the house.

With a certain inner fear, he rose from his night’s slumber and threw on some clothes.

Sleep often cleared his mind, but, this morning there was an inner disturbance with many thoughts running through his mind. However, although his mind was noisy, there was a great silence pervading the house as he descended into the kitchen.

Still, here in the kitchen, the morning’s silence was only broken by the sound of passing cars in the distance….

Basically, this story is saying. Boris got up, got dressed and went downstairs for breakfast. But, here where is the drama, the interest in saying that? There is no bait or anything to get people wanting to read more.

However, in the above story, there is something in the writing which makes us want to keep reading. Why is the house so silent? Why is Boris a little perturbed? It has us hooked and we want to keep reading to find out why?

Good writing tries to pull us in and keep us guessing. It throws up questions and wants us to keep reading. The only problem is do we have a good reason why the house is silent?

Maybe its always silent? Maybe it’s a bank holiday and Boris has forgotten? Or maybe it is something more sinisiter

This is one thing you notice in the writing of J.K.Rowling and Dan Brown. The end of a chapter is a page turner - what is going to happen next?

See also: 7 Tips to make your writing interesting

On my mortgage site, I frequently get people offering to buy text links. If I had sold these text links I could have made quite a lot of money, and I have to say it is rather tempting.

The problem is that Google say that webmasters shouldn’t do it.

You can understand why Google are against buying text links.

• Links are an important factor in determining page rank and search engine positions. Therefore selling links will distort search engine results. It will benefit sites who can afford to pay for text links and not those who deserve to be higher.
• If getting search engine results requires webmasters to buy links, it will cause a bidding war, where the people willing to pay the most will get the best search results.

Because Google say don’t do it, I am reluctant to ignore their advice. Why? Continue reading →