Today I will be starting a weekly series which I call Applied to Blogging. Each week, I will be profiling a superstar and how their work ethic and skills can be translated to blogging and generating profit off of your blog. Today I will be focusing on one of the most recognizable athletes in the world, Michael Jordan, and how he overcame adversity to become the one of the most famous and decorated athletes.

Everyone comes from a meager background.

Michael Jordan grew up in Wilmington, North Carolina and by no means was a standout. He was basically just another kid. His family wasn’t poor but of a modest background, and Michael was a middle child. No one could have predicated such greatness. Every professional blogger comes from a similar background. The stories might be different, but no one is born a professional blogger. Don’t be discouraged if your blog doesn’t attract traffic right off the bat. Every single blog and blogger has been in that position.

You still need the natural talent and tools to succeed.

There is a famous story that has been told countless times about Michael. As a sophomore in high school, he was cut from the basketball team during tryouts. He then worked twice as hard during the summer to enhance his skill and made the team the following year. Television networks always tried to make this story about Michael’s hard work and sheer will to make it. They said it predicted his future greatness. While part of that is true, they usually omit the main reason he was cut from the team. Michael was a 5 foot 11 inch sophomore. He wasn’t tall enough to make an impact at the varsity level. Over the next 12 months, Michael shot up an additional 4 inches and was now tall enough to compete. If you are attempting to complete in the blogging world, you must have the natural talent to succeed. Everyone can improve, but if you do not have natural talent for writing and promoting yourself, you might want to look for another way express yourself.

Ask for help when needed.

When Michael came out of college as the number 3 pick in the NBA draft, they expected him to be good. They didn’t know he would be great right off the bat. But he was shunned as a rookie all-star by those who felt he was being praised too heavily. He continued to put up gaudy stats but his teams toiled in mediocrity. It wasn’t until he received help that he was able to raise his team to a championship level. There is no harm in asking for help. If you need assistance with a post, or an idea, ask you fellow bloggers for help. They will be more than happy to oblige!

Don’t stop at one goal and be determined.

When the Bulls won their first title in 1991, they said it redeemed Michael’s career and placed him among the best ever. So what does Michael set out to do? He wins 5 more. He cemented his place in history by staying fiercely determined. Even if you reach your first goal, make new ones and strive to make your own place in history!

One thing I think every blog reader likes is comfort. They want to open up their RSS reader and feel at ease with their normal daily reads. What happens when a blog they love is sold?

One of my daily reads for the past 9 months has been the Blogging Experiment. The website was started with the simple premise that a newbie will turn his blog into a professional blog within 12 months. In the process author Ben Cook detailed his journey showcasing his triumphs and pitfalls. I enjoyed going to my RSS reader to find out how he succeeded one month, failed the next, and gave us all well thought out pieces of writing. He would detail all his earnings on his quest to turning his blog into a full time income generator. It gave me a feeling I could use the web to profit as well. It was hardly a novel concept but it worked very well for Ben.

It worked too well in my opinion.

Ben was able to sell his website to a new author who has taken the reigns over at the Blogging Experiment. In the process, they have lost a dedicated reader. I am sure I am not the only one. Their stats remain high, and I am sure the new author is getting his money’s worth (although he did recently remove his RSS stats from displaying. At first I thought maybe the subscribers were dropping them, but it is possible he wanted the real estate for the ad he has in its place now)

The new author is Max Davis. He is now offering an e-book on how he sold 3 websites for $725,000. That is a bold claim. I have no idea where one would back up that claim, nor does he have to prove anything to me. I wasn’t interested in his e-book because I had never heard of him before. He did come out right off the bat and say he hasn’t been in the blogosphere so that would explain that part. He seems knowledgeable. His posts border on tedious with the amount of detail in them. I have no doubt he will help someone make money online. That someone just won’t be me. The main reason isn’t because I couldn’t learn to trust Max of feel he is leading me down the wrong path. I just like Ben’s writing much better. Ben was engaging and entertaining.

I will give you two examples of what I am talking about.

http://bloggingexperiment.com/archives/new-experiment-business-makes-nice-money.php

Max right off the bat comes out with a claim that this product (which he is an affiliate to) made him $222 an hour. It is a very boastful claim to make. He then spends a lot of time explaining how it worked. The product did work in his case study, so he proved himself credible to a degree. But the post was a difficult read in my opinion. Anytime someone boats so loudly about a product that will earn them money as well, I am always skeptical. There are many comments abound that feel the same way as I do. He responds to all comments, which is always the sign of a good author, but his claims are just words. There were no screen shots. Usually, on a money making post like this, the author would show some statistical screen shots to back up the claim. Max offered none.

I have used one of Max’s techniques and it works well. So he does know what he is talking about, I just don’t like the content of the blog or the writing nearly as much as Ben’s.

Fortunately for me, Ben is still contributing thoughtful articles to the blog, such as this one about style of blogging.

Max made a pledge at the beginning. It was going to be different but he hoped people gave him a chance. I did for a month like he asked, and I am moving on from being a dedicated reader to his site. I am going to keep the link up, however, as I feel people will get good advice on how to make money online from his website.

It just goes to show how quickly you can become attached to a blog author and their style, and how fast you could lose interest in someone, even if the intent of the blog is the same.

I saw a posting on Flimjo doing a weekly recap of what was discussed on the blog the previous week. I liked the concept a lot. It was a good way to put everything all in one tidy post, and give love to those who have commented this week. I like the concept so I will be giving it a shot to see if it is worthwhile or not for the reader. Let me know your thoughts.

This week was a slower week in general as I was putting more effort in to a new layout at Review Chicago. For those who don’t know, Review Chicago is my newest website. It is dedicated to my hometown of Chicago, and I intend to make it a contributor based website. If you know anyone who lives in Chicago and would like to contribute, email me!

Sunday, April 20th I posted at length on how I use Facebook to promote a website or a blog. There are several tips included within the post, including simple instructions to creating a Facebook application.

On Monday, I discussed using alternative methods to drive traffic to your website. This is part one of a three part post. The other two parts will follow this week. In an additional post, I talked about Max Davis at the Blogging Experiment and a class he is offering on buying and selling websites.

On Wednesday, I authored an article on how to use Twitter to promote a blog. It sparked up some intresting dialogue in the comment portion.

Top Commentators This Week:

On Cath Lawson’s blog, there was an excellent guest post by Tim Brownson discussing whether or not one is a leader or one is a follower. It was a well written article and because of it I subscribed to his blog.

Diane wasn’t really active this week, but her blog is an excellent read. Check it out here.

James Mann posted a good column about focusing and taking care of business. His blog is one of those how to make money blogs, but he offers some good advice. Read and see for yourself.

Highlights from the big boys (or girls):

Darren at Pro Blogger has a great post on staying accessible to your readers even after your blog becomes more popular. He practices what he preaches, he is the biggest blogger ever to respond to an email I had sent. Some of the others have not. Caroline Middlebrook has a great new course on using StumbleUpon to drive traffic. Check it out here.

Upcoming this week:

This week I have a slew of posts coming out. I am starting a new weekly series profiling inspirational people and how their life stories can be applied to your blogging techniques. The first one is on Michael Jordan and will come out tomorrow. I also have a new wordpress theme review, this one on the Mimbo theme and a post on using timestamps effectively.

I intend to be more active here in the coming weeks, I have hit a lull with some of my other sites.

Cheers!

Last week, I started reading more on how you can drive traffic to your website using Twitter. Several bloggers that I read use Twitter daily to help find new readers and meet new people. I really didn’t grasp it at first, but I definitely got sucked in to Twitter quickly.

For those who don’t know the Twitter factor, I will drop a few stats on you.

Last week, I started actively using Twitter. Not really to drive traffic to my site, but to find new blogs that I could personally read and start following.  Immediately, I noticed a huge traffic spike to the blog. So I decided to look into it a little further.

• Since I started actively using Twitter (last week), I have increased my RSS subscribers by 32. This isn’t an unheard of increase, but I know that most of those new readers should stay around awhile.
• My website views have increased by almost 300 hits a day. Once again, if you are a large blog, that might not seem like much. But for an upstart, that is quite a bit of traffic inflow.

Those are just the raw traffic numbers from the website. What I wasn’t expecting were the tons of compliments via Twitter, users going to my band websites from my About page and complimenting my music, and meeting several people who I have since had nice and meaningful conversations with. I have also found many, many new blogs which I have subscribed to and read daily.

So, how did I do it?

These are the steps I went through in order to build the traffic and increase my followers. There are a few people who look at these types of methods as spamming, but they key to it is to NOT spam, and use your newfound connections properly. I have yet to post a link in a tweet (which is a message) attempting to drive traffic to the website. I may from time to time, but this method works to build a grassroots following similar to how I used to promote my band on MySpace.  When I promoted my music on MySpace, I would find a similar artist to my music. I would go through and then attempt to add their friends and message them. The mindset was ‘If they like this artist, there is a better chance they would like my music than if I picked a random person off the street.’ Instead of spamming them, I would message them personally and ask them to check out my music. It worked well, until people took advantage of it and start spamming relentlessly. So far, I have found that not to be the case on Twitter. Here are the steps.

1. Make sure you profile has up to date links. I made sure that the blog I wanted people to go to was the first link on the profile. In the biography section of the Twitter profile, I added a link to the websites About page. This way if people wanted to find out about me, it would take them to my blog. (Keep in mind, I do not have advertisements on my site, I am more interested in sending them to the website so they can see what I write about, and if they like the content, will add my site to their RSS reader. However, if you are displaying ads, this is a good way to increase hits and traffic)
2. Find someone with a similar business or blog and attempt to add their followers. It seems pretty simple and it works fast. In my example, I immediately cruised over to the profile of Maki from DoshDosh. He has a wonderful social media blog, his writing is top notch, and I like his overall style. I went one by one and added every single follower. You can do it faster than you ever could add a MySpace friend. After I had added all his followers, I went to a few more profiles and added similar followers. My thinking is if someone is following another blog, they quite possibly could be interested in following my blog.
3. Download and install an application to help manage Twitter. I personally use Twhirl. It helps me manage replies and messages in a chat like setup. It is great for responding to messages.
4. Respond to every single message and tweet. You will get a fair amount of backlash from adding people so fast. The reason is because many assume that you will just be spamming them. Take interest and respond the messages. You will ease their mind and if they like your content and tweets, they may become a reader.
5. Don’t spam incessantly. One thing I have noticed, is the people who spam get removed very fast. So if you intend on building long lasting relationships and not just quick traffic spikes, make sure not to spam.
6. Give back as well as take. You will have an opportunity to meet a wonderful community and find many new friends and blogs. Make sure you give traffic and subscriptions back. I assure you that you will find something you’ll love.

I hope this continues and I am able to grow more relationships with bloggers!

I am going to be on a short break until Weds night, have a few baseball games to attend to tomorrow

I did find this interesting post from Max Davis, author of Blogging Experiment. He is offereing a class on how to buy and sell websites. Pretty interesting stuff. I would consider the class, but I still want to take more time to get to know his style through his blog. But it may be of interest to you.

http://bloggingexperiment.com/archives/training-class-open-now.php

Weds I will finish my traffic buidling post, and I have an interesting one about how you can related street vending to blogging.

Cheers!

One of the keys to having a successful blog is to be able to generate traffic from all angles. Everyone has their obligatory post about the ‘best ways to generate traffic’.  Usually it is recycled information, although some people might be able to articulate it better.  In my previous post, I mentioned my top 5 ways to generate traffic.

I started to think recently of some of the more unorthodox ways I have generated traffic to my websites and I have compiled a list.

• Create Free Wordpress Themes. This may be easier said than done, I know. You do need some graphical design knowledge and a little programming knowledge, however. The results can be stunning.  Each time it is downloaded and implemented, you will get a back link. Plus, there are many places where you can submit them. The traffic could be just a trickle, but if you create a theme that breaks through, such as Prosense (from Dosh Dosh) the traffic could be enormous.
• Bribes and Contests. A lot of bloggers will not stoop to this level because they are more interested in their blog being revered for content. That is fine and I can respect that. However, for those who are interested in a quick traffic spike to try to boost ad revenue, contests and bribes are the way to go. I once offered a $100 gas card on one of my money making blogs, and I picked up nearly 300 RSS subscribers in 2 weeks. Epic? Not really, but a huge increase. And my traffic went up quite a bit for a while. I kept offering more, and the traffic stayed high. I was able to sell more ads because the traffic stayed consistent.
• Join a D-List. The D-List is a ‘do follow’ list of blogs. People will comment on your blog because your website will give ‘link love’, or in more technical terms, the links will count in Google page rankings. Courtney Tuttles website has a list that is pretty extensive.

This is part one. Tomorrow, I will have a few more ideas which you may or may not like

A few days back I posted some tips on how I use MySpace to promote my blogs and website. Today I will be discussing Facebook.

I don’t have nearly as much exposure to Facebook as I have to MySpace. Facebook was in its infancy when I was promoting my band heavily online, and in addition, you had to be a college student to access it.

But times have changed and everyone is now on Facebook. Personally, I love the layout of Facebook and they way it operates a lot better than MySpace. It is extremely viral. It is cleaner, less advertisements (for now I suppose) and there are better spam blockers in place. One good thing, is there are several million less dead profiles on Facebook than there are on MySpace. However, it is much more difficult to add people via Facebook. Some of the same rules apply to using Facebook as Myspace, so you may see some overlap.

1. Make sure you have a legitimate profile. I send out messages from my personal profile. This shows any potential friends that I am sharing a bit of myself, so they don’t have to be scared of my message or what I am trying to plug. If you create a secondary profile, make it feel as human as possible. Do not make the default photo a logo or a graphic. People will be less likely to add you. Make sure you push your website on your profile, but don’t over do it. A couple links or a banner will do just fine. Avoid making hideous layout creations. Try to keep it clean, simple and professional.
2. Personalize each message you send. I never use a form letter. They don’t work as well as they used to because people just think they are spam. In addition, make sure you put a good subject header.  I have been using “Greetings from Scott at _______”. In the message itself, stay professional and explain to them how you found them, and why you think they should check out your website. People are still receptive to things they feel will benefit them.
3. Create a Facebook Application for your website. This is one of the great things about Facebook. Any developer can create a Facebook Application for their website and make it go viral. Facebook Applications sets them apart from MySpace. Any friend you have can send out requests to add an application. I created one for a website I have that targets Chicago and it went viral pretty quickly. If you aren’t the programming type, there are step by step instructions on how to create one for your Facebook at Widgetbox.com.
4. Use Facebook notes to promote your site but do it sparingly. Notes are similar to MySpace bulletins. They can get very spammy, however. Just post when you have something important to say. This will keep your credibility in check for those who have added you. This way, they will be more inclined to read your note since you don’t send them out all the time.
5. Convince friends to link to your website. This may be difficult, but as you get to know some of your friends, see if you can convince them to promote your website on their profile. Their friends will see it, and may add you as a friend. Try to convince friends to send out occasional bulletins talking about your website or product. It may only result in a trickle of extra traffic, but it can grow fast if people cling to your site. Facebook has a specific spot for website links it the profile editor. Try to convince your friends to put your site in there.
6. Keep Active. The more you work at it, the larger your network will grow. And if you do it correctly, it will be a very fruitful endeavor.

It is easy when you are blogging to lose yourself a little creatively. It is natural to lose focus from time to time. Some bloggers are even writing outside their comfort zone in an attempt to make a little money.

Wow, that sounds exactly like a lot of musicians I have met over the years.

When I was either writing records, or producing records, there were always a few simple rules we would follow in order to get the most out of the songs. Fast forward a few years, and I notice myself following similar rules while blogging. I am going to break down the rules I follow while writing songs, and show you how they can apply to blogging.

There rules only apply if you are looking to make a commercial product out of your blog. If you are writing for artistic purposes only, while these rules may help you, there are no rules. I write songs for commercial purposes and artistic purposes. I only use these rules when attempting to write a commercially viable song.

1. What is the aim of the song? The first and foremost thing any songwriter does is figure out the direction and purpose of the song. Is it supposed to be catchy and poppy? Is it going to be a deep cut? (meaning buried somewhere around track 8 of the record) Is it a song written with the sole intention to win the girl? When blogging, you must do the same thing when determining the aim of the blog post. Personally, I don’t like to outline posts because I feel it is more honest when it is coming unscripted from the mind, but you definitely need to find the aim early.
2. What is the hook of the song? The most important part of song viability is the hook. Hooks are unmistakable. They are the part of the song that you keep coming back to and remembering. Often, the main premise of the hook is repeated over and over again through out a song. In a blog post, your title is the hook. Make sure your hook is to the point, catchy and memorable.
3. Do the lyrics convey the story correctly? Lyrics are often abstract and are open to interpretation. But as a lyricist, you must refine the lyrics so they convey the story you want to tell. I used to revise my lyrics often in the early stages of writing, because I wanted to make it ‘perfect’. When I blog, I notice myself doing a similar revision. I will go back after writing the initial post to make sure I conveyed the idea the exact way I had intended.
4. Does the song first the scope of the record? Often times, I would write a song that did not fit the sound of the record, and sometimes, the sound of the band. It is easy to do that while you blog. Make sure what you are writing about fits the overall theme of the blog. It might be the best post since sliced bread, but if it doesn’t fit your overall vision, it will fall on deaf ears.
5. Can we trim the fat? Every songwriter instantly falls in love with a song. But sometimes, it needs to be edited and trimmed down. The bridge might be too long or the chorus might repeat too much. I make sure that there is no content that is irrelevant with every blog post. It might not be a perfect science since relevancy is in the eye of the beholder but it helps keep the reading pace fast.

Just like with any art medium, blogging is completely subjective. There is no right or wrong. However, just like with song writing, there are ways to make blogs commercially viable as opposed to just art. Some of the best songwriters I know have no goals at all to profit or make a career out of their art. Which, to me is honorable. But if you are looking to make money off of your blogging, you have to think of your blog as a commercial product. When you look back at your blog do you feel it is a hit or a deep cut?

I must admit. I used to be a MySpace junkie. For years (yes, I mean years) I would sit on that website and promote. At one time, my band had over 25,000 MySpace friends. I even had over 3000 on my personal account.

I wasn’t really blogging back in those days. I was using it to promote the band I was in at the time. When MySpace first started offering music players for artists, it was like the holy grail of remote promotion was being given to the select people who had the time (and patience) to use it as such. Before sites like MySpace (and sites that predated it, such as the old MP3.Com) the only ways to hit markets outside of your home market was radio or touring. Each of those had it’s own difficult set of challenges (payola anyone?). The web, and MySpace in particular, changed all that. There are many success stories from bands who put up a few songs on MySpace and promoted their way in to a music career.

I would spend hours friending people, writing them nice letters asking them to check out our music, and would watch the music plays ratchet up. When we were coming through on tour, I would make sure to send a note reminding the people in those towns to come out to the show, meet us, and check out the music in full living color.

Then bands, musicians and labels started abusing it. Programmers created applications to automatically add friends and the ‘friends’ got fed up with it. Now it is virtually impossible to use MySpace as a promotional tool unless you are already established as a musician. But what about for blogging? I felt there had to still be worth in a network of over a hundred million people.

I decided to once again use a MySpace promotional approach for some of my new websites and I have been happy with the results so far. You just have to do it all with a personal touch. As a blogger, you have one important thing going for you that bands do not. Many, if not most, of the users on MySpace now have it set where they will not accept friend offers from ‘bands’. By creating a personal and not ‘band’ account, you have a lot more luck finding people without that first line of spam defense. Here are some of the techniques I have been using.

1. Make sure you have a legitimate profile. MySpace users can smell a phony profile a mile away. It will be virtually impossible to do anything unless you appear as a living, breathing human. I send out messages from my personal profile. This shows any potential friends that I am sharing a bit of myself, so they don’t have to be scared of my message or what I am trying to plug. If you creat a secondary profile, make it feel as human as possible. Do not make the default photo a logo or a graphic. People will be less likely to add you. Make sure you push your website on your profile, but don’t over do it. A couple links or a banner will do just fine. Avoid making hideous layout creations. Try to keep it clean, simple and professional.
2. Make sure you use the filters to properly target your market when searching for friends. When I started doing promotion using MySpace, the tools were not quite as robust as they are now. You can actively filter your search to the exact market you are looking to target. Once you isolate your target, make sure you filter it by last login. There are millions of dead profiles and you want to avoid sending messages that will never get read.
3. Make sure you message a friend as well as add their profile. By messaging them, you show them that you are real and not just an add-bot trying to generate huge numbers on an account. It will take twice as long as just hitting the add button, but you will see twice the results.
4. Personalize each message you send. I never use a form letter. They don’t work as well as they used to because people just think they are spam. In addition, make sure you put a good subject header. Users of MySpace (especially female users) have become very tired of messages with the subject “hey” just to open it up and it be a spam letter or someone trying to pick them up. Be descriptive but short in the subject. I have been using “Greetings from Scott at _______”. In the message itself, stay professional and explain to them how you found them, and why you think they should check out your website. People are still receptive to things they feel will benefit the. Make sure to not overload the message with graphics.
5. Once you add a friend be sure to stay in touch. This is the the most important part of social networking, right? Make sure you keep in touch with those who added you. They obviously like something about what you had to say. If you have a secondary profile, make sure you link to your ‘real’ profile so they can see that you are a human and not a fake profile. Comment people but don’t over do it. Make a category for the users you feel will be the most likely to assist you in your promotional efforts, and give them a little more attention.
6. Use bulletins to promote your site but do it sparingly. Users of MySpace have become so used to spam bulletins, they will just look past them if you do it too much. Don’t post bulletins daily. Just post when you have something important to say. This will keep your credibility in check for those who have added you. This way, they will be more inclined to read you bulletin since you don’t send them out all the time.
7. Convince friends to link to your website. This may be difficult, but as you get to know some of your friends, see if you can convince them to promote your website on their profile. Their friends will see it, and may add you as a friend. Try to convince friends to send out occasional bulletins talking about your website or product. It may only result in a trickle of extra traffic, but it can grow fast if people cling to your site.
8. Keep Active. The more you work at it, the larger your network will grow. And if you do it correctly, it will be a very fruitful endeavor.

I know most people who have blogs will use some of the hipper social media sites such as Digg, but MySpace is still massive. There is a ton of opportunity waiting to be had, and you just have to reach out for it.

Tomorrow, I will post the ways I use Facebook to promote my blogs.

Every so often, I post a simple post talking about one of the websites I frequent. Obviously, they are much more established than me, but the whole blogosphere is built on bloggers helping each other out.

I posted about the Blogging Experiment, which was one of the first websites I stumbled upon when I was moving from straight content websites to writing about them in blogs.

Another blog that I stumbled upon early on is Court’s Internet Marketing School.

Author Court Tuttle has a very no nonsense approach. He will well it like it is, and that is what makes his website so refreshing!

So, for those who haven’t heard of his site, go take a look around.