Do you have a question that you’d like to see answered or addressed here at ProBlogger?
It’s not that I’ve run out of questions to answer (I get quite a few through my inbox) but every now and again I like to publicly ask for questions to get a gauge on where the wider readership is at and how I can be of more use to you.
I won’t be able to answer all questions but will try to get through as many as I can. If you don’t want your name/blog to be linked to your question feel free to ask it anonymously. Please submit the questions in comments below.
Hi,Darren can you review my site tnx
http://best-makemoney.blogspot.com/
P.S can you describe how did you get backlinks for problogger over the time?
Tnx
I want to know what your top tips are for communicating for readers.
What’s your thoughts on Shoemoney being banned from MyBlogLog?
Do you plan on doing another round of problogger tshirts? I followed the link the old store and it says “CafePress.com Product Not Found”
Thanks,
mark
Darren,
I’m getting to a point where I want to start selling my own ad space on my site without a broker.
I’ve got the sales experience and the contacts, what I don’t really know is how to put together an advertising program, how to price the ads, and how to best track their performance for my clients.
I see that b5 has a team in place to service clients across your network – is there a way you can scale down their advice for one blog?
W
Allow me to add to that question – what are your thoughts as to when it is best to even be embarking on selling your own ad space in the first place – or if you think something like AdVolcano is worth it (and why).
THX :)
Thanks to the tips provided by yourself, Yaro, and Aaron Wall I’ve just managed to finally crack into the top ten on Google for my keywords ‘motivational speaker’. I read over on Yaro’s site
here about the importance of outbound links being targeted at your niche. In terms of SEO I know there is a lot of emphasis placed on the importance of inbound links but I would like your thoughts on the importance of outbound links and the websites that you outwardly linked to.
Darren,
I noticed from one of your recent posts that you weren’t about to share your income via any more posts, and I can live with that.
However, I would love to know what type of goals you set yourself in terms of future earnings, readership, subscribers, commenters and even SEO growth.
Mainly because I’m just really nosey but also because I like to know how the BIG boys play the game.
Cheers.
I was thinking about what posts here have helped me the most, and I remember when you asked for submissions along the lines of, “If I Could Start My Blog Over, or Things I would you differently.’ I printed them, and I still learn something when I go back and read them. I would appreciate another round of that some time.
Thanks,
Linda
Yes Darren, in fact I do have a question that I was thinking of asking you through your inbox.
I have started a new blog, and I will be doing a series of articles that are quite lengthy. I have divided it into a few parts. Is it advisable to post it as a regular entry with titles that says XXX Part 1 and so on or would it be better to put all the parts in a single page with a dedicated title? Which option will be better from a SEO point of view?
What is the best way to generate revenue using a tech blog? I have some blogs that focuses on programming – OpenJS(http://www.openjs.com/), for example provides articles, tutorials and scripts for JavaScript. Do you know what kind of advertisements are best suited for this kind of sites?
They say, content is king yet harp about creating linkbaits. How do you strike the balance between what you want to write and what attracts the maximum traffic? Apart from the ideal situation of wanting to write what attracts traffic anyway, that is.
Why does your feedburner says 19234 ‘reacers’ instead of ‘readers’?
What are the URLs for the other blogs you write? :)
I really want to know whether your religious background -i.e., your faith, in any way, instrumental in guiding you towards achieving your goals? No offence intended here Rowse, just asking. I believe it does – although you may reluctance to admit.
I am curious about your thoughts on the saturation of the blogosphere. Do you think that there are too many “non-relevant” blogs and with all of them trying to make money online through blog-spamming techniques, is it making it harder for relevant bloggers to break into the “sphere”?
Bottom line: How does a new blogger become relevant without pimping themselves out or getting lost in the shuffle?
Darren,
I would like to know the life cycle of a post (average to limit variance), a chart of sorts that shows the average views for a post after a day, a month, a year, and etc. it would be good metrics to find out approximately how exponential blogging is. If possible also include examples from a couple of blogs.
Emil
hi Darren
In few days I’ll be having my own web site with own domain name. I want to know can we place the RSS buton which we see on many blogs on a web page. can it work .
Thanks.
Hi,
Probably a stupid question, but I was wondering about how cross-posting can affect the original site. I have a small political blog and was recently asked to cross-post some story I had did on Myspace and politics. I went ahead and cut-and-pasted the story over at a wikia.com site and, much to my surprise, a day later it was picked up by The Wonkette (from the wikia site).
But then I was reading about how having the same story on different sites is looked down upon by Google. Will occasionally posting the same story elsewhere ended up hurting the rankings of the original site?
Thanks,
–AG
I’d like to hear about strategies on working with vendors asking to run ads on my site. I’ve had a vendor approach me to run an ad for 6-12 mos. but I have several concerns. I’ve been blogging for several years but only recently (last Oct) did I move my blog to my own domain from my employers blog server.
– If I accept the ad am I entering into a potential quagmire?
– How should I price the ad?
– What terms should I consider?
– Should I ask for payment up front?
– I don’t want the same static ad running for that long.
I have lot’s more questions but I figure that’s a good start.
-Steve
My question.
What’s the best way to consistently promote Cost per Action affiliate programs like Azoogle Ads and Text Link Ads on a blog, in order to achieve sustained conversions and earnings in the long run?
Can we just rely on optimized passive ad placement or do we need to pitch the program relatively frequently to achieve success? How should we integrate it with other contextual ad systems?
How about discussing long term blogging strategies. So many bloggers seem to just ‘go with the flow’ and have a daily to-do list but no real strategy of where they’d like to see their blogs in 12 months or even 5 years. You can be blogging ‘full-time’ but unless you have a plan it may as well just be a hobby.
Hey Darren,
Have you ever employed any software to prevent click fraud. I know its a serious thing and quite risky when you are using Adsense. Now a days there is a debate of Open Source Adsense Tracker, “Adlogger”. I am really concern that whether or not Adsense allow you to do so. If it is the case how can a publisher avoid click attacks on his ads.
Hi Darren ,
How can I know where the readers of my blog mostly come from? Search Engines? MyBlogLog? Other Blog’s Links?
Thanks
Darren, how to define an ad price for a blog if I am going to sell my own ad place without any agent?
What is the biggest mistake you ever did as a blogger?
While I love and read everything you write, I’ve found that a lot of the articles are written for “pro-bloggers” and those just getting started – who are possibly in the majority of your readers. Things like SEO, Ad positioning and RSS optimization are not entirely relevant for those who are new and just starting. Content is king.
I was studying John Chow’s traffic patterns through Alexa and noticed that his popularity really surged after four of his articles were listed on Digg and his traffic went through the roof. He was “discovered” through these and his traffic levels have never really looked back.
And receiving a link in one of your posts has done wonderful things for my traffic!
So my question is, “What were landmark posts or actions that you did in order to receive the traffic that you have now? Was there a single post or link that sent your traffic sky-high and made you a ‘pro-blogger?”
Thank you for your consideration,
Kumiko Suzuki
Correction – in my previous comment I meant a lot of your articles “are written for ‘pro-bloggers’ and NOT those just getting started.
How important is it to have a highly customized (WordPress) theme? And how risky is it to choose one that might not get the newest security updates?
Hi Darren,
I’ve been running a site with a few affiliates on it, I have enjoyed a healthy relationship with said affiliates, and likewise they’ve commented to me on a number of occasions that I have generated business for them from my site. Recently my site has experienced a huge upturn in visitors, and the amount of money I’m getting from the affiliates – which previously covered my hosting bills – is no longer covering it.
I am wondering if it is reasonable to ask at the end of the current agreement to ask for more money. If so, how would you go about asking them?
How important is it to have “old articles”? How much traffic do 1 week old articles get in comparism to the rest of your articles?
My question relates to comments on a low-traffic blog. If there are very few comments due to lack of readers (not lack of regular posts), can this emphasise the lack of readers and reflect badly on the blog? If high activity on popular blogs conveys an impression that the blog is valued and has worth, then can a lack of comments give the opposite impression?
I currently don’t allow blog comments due to bad experiences with my website’s guestbook a few years ago. Deleting the spam, rubbish, abusive and indecent comments took far too much time, and my website is just a hobby. When I tacked a blog onto it last year I disallowed comments to avoid spam, but of course this goes against the community spirit of blogging. (The reader comments on your Comments Policy are useful here)
Now I’m reconsidering; the web page that caused the old guestbook spam gets 8000 visitors per month, but the blog only 400, so moderating blog comments may not be a problem. On the contrary – with so few blog visitors my concern is that the infrequency of comments won’t be a good look.
Having a niche blog means that I will never have the same amount of visitors as some of the larger technology/media blogs. This means that advertisers such as blog ads will not allow me to use their ads as they see me as having lower visitor numbers. Traditionally manufacturers in my niche are wary of the internet even though they have websites – I have contacted a few and state my visitor numbers etc but still they are unwilling to even trial. I think it is because my blog is “personal” but in my niche I can get away with that as it is classed as a diary.
Any advice ?
I have a couple of questions/queries:
1) Some ads services require a minimum amount of traffic (Text Link Ads does), and some don’t (Google AdSense). I’m guessing they might change their policy over time but a table recapitulating this would be quite welcome for the beginner/intermediate blogger who’s thinking about monetizing her/his blog.
2) How accurate is Technorati? From my server stats, i can see a certain number of incoming links from blogs that don’t show up on my Technorati stats. Is it a bug, or is it because they aren’t registered with Technorati?
Great blog by the way, loads of useful information :-)
Hi Darren,
I’m writing from uruguay, and I’d like to know:
Your views on Google referral ads. Do you make money out of them, or is it something to run away from?
What is in your opinion the best strategy, a few quality blogs, or a myriad of two nickles a day blogs?
Do you ever get writer’s block? (bloglock?) If yes, how do you manage to overcome it?
Before creating a blog, what kind of market research do you do, and what tools do you use?
thanks,
gabo_uy
We´re reading almost the same posts on every top blogs – it makes me feel that:
1. there´s nothing really new on making blogs;
2. blogs are past.
So, what´s next?
I just started a new blog a week ago. I’m writing one post a day, in the mornings before I go to work. I have a problem with obsessively checking my blog stats and comments during the day at the office. Surely I’m not the only one! Is there anything you can say that might discourage this behavior? Or are there some good desktop widgets that I can run unobtrusively in the background? My regular career would probably benefit from it. I would love to go pro one day but I’ve gotta pay the bills for now!
And I just wanted to thank you for the great blog. I’ve been reading for a while and finally started started my blog. It’s a very niche topic (plus-size sewing, crochet and knitting pattern finds and reviews) but I’ve followed some of the basic rules and am now getting about 90 readers a day…after only a week! To me, that’s grand. :) I’m going to be studying up on more of your tips and redesigning it this weekend. Hmm, I guess that’s another question – I know a better layout would be more useful to my readers. Is it better to redesign early in the game?
When will you post the next Group Writing Project?
I have a website and blog which is well established, many inbound links and high traffic. But the blogging software I can use is limited. It is difficult to customize and the categories are too big and slow to load.
Is it better to keep going with an imperfect blog software and lots of links
or start afresh with the best blogging software?
I thought of this question after this blog post “Don’t make me think – Don’t make me wait.”
http://www.richardpettinger.com/blog/archive/2007/02/23/dont_make_think_wait
What is your personal “secret?”
Hi,Darren can you review my site tnx
http://digitalworld4u.blogspot.com/
And let me know how to gain more traffic and adsense unit are in good place or not
1. Have you ever had a thought about quitting to blog?
2. Did you put in more hours of work at the beginning of your blogging career or now?
3. What changes do you expect in the blogosphere 5 years and 10 years down the line.
4. What do you think about the future of podcasting? Can you give some useful tips for beginners?
5. Do you plan to retire? If so, when?
Hey Darren, here’s one I’ve been thinking about that it would be nice to get some professional feedback on. Tagging, or better yet the use of the word “tag” in a link. I’m curious what you think might be better, to use a url like domain.com/tag/widgets or domain.com/widgets? Thanks
Hi Darren, I’m very interested in your work flow and routines. What is a regular day in the life of a ProBlogger like and how is it different from when you were first starting out.
I’m especially curious about how you split your time between many blogs. Do you work on one blog at a time or do you work on one task (brainstorming, writing, marketing) at a time.
5/8/10 must do’s for the beginning blogger – who isn’t necessarily interested in problogging.
Hi Darren, I would like to know, why you have to pay so much attention on others in the blogoshpere? I mean, isn’t it enough to get high google rankings, which isn’t related that much to other blogs.
Why I ask this question is because I’m writing about “color blindness”. And there are definitely not a lot other bloggers interested in this topic. Of course some write single posts about it but I couldn’t find others writing something in this area.
Is it important to get links from the blogosphere in such a topic and why?
Thanks a lot for you terrific work,
Daniel
Hi Darren
I got a problem with one of my blog where my blog url is not ranking for any of the small or big keywords. But the blog Feeds are ranking well and even the pages were the site links are spread, are also ranking well. I cannot understand what is the reason for it. Could you suggest me something what to do so that my main site comes in search results and not my site feed or links on third party sites.
I hope you got my problem.
I started a new blog about a month ago. I got about 40 topics written. But only 2 comments.
I’m thinking of faking comments, making a few users and get a nice sample of comments on some of the blog posts i’ve made.
Is this not a good use of my extra time, and i should do something else related to my blog? or spending some time doing this, is a good idea.
My website is http://www.streetmagicblog.com/
Hi Darren
You may think that I am asking you too many questions. But the reality is that I have too many questions actually for which I am looking for a solution. This question is related to the “Supplemental page” of a site. If they are bad for a site and if what are the ways to minimize or have no Supplemental pages on a site.
I will be putting in some more questions when I got the time as I have to go now…..
Most of us that read this site regularly are bloggers and many are trying to get to a place where they make a very nice income or at least a second income from blogging. While getting started is pretty easy, what can we do to get over the proverbial hump and break into the wild blue?
What tips/advice can be given for those of us who are on our way, but just can’t seem to get off of the plateau?