Blog Exercises: To Comment or Not to Comment

In the September 20, 2013, issue of the New York Times, an article caught my eye called “No Comments.” It is also available on Umano via mobile app or desktop for a listen. The article by Michael Erard discusses comments on the web, including a long look back at the history of interactivity on the […]

Blog Exercises: Current Events September

It’s time to blog the news and current events for September in our Blog Exercises. This month, I want you to dig deeper into the news, targeting your specific industry and niche. With several months of blogging the news once a month under your belt, you should have set up some good resources in your […]

Blog Exercises: Current Events January

Every month in this series of Blog Exercises I will ask you to check the news and report on something in the news that relates to you and/or your site’s purpose. It may directly relate or indirectly. Fascinated with the alignment of the planets, I wanted to share my enthusiasm with the ease of watching […]

Blog Exercises: Define Your Target Audience

The phrase “target audience” is an advertising and marketing phrase designed to help you aim your content at a specific group of people. Do you know your target audience? As a crafter, you may offer a wide range of craft ideas and projects, so your audience might be all crafters and do-it-yourself folks. If you […]

Taking Your Blog Off Topic

What happens when you take your blog off track and publish an off topic post? Do you ever take that risk? When you do, why do you do it and what’s the benefits or harm? In a two part series, Sam H, Editor of Football United, shared his insights on working with “hundreds of football […]

WordCamp Las Vegas Began With Blogger and Social Parties

Last weekend, my world was rocked in so many ways at 2009 International CES (Consumer Electronics Show) and WordCamp Las Vegas. I have so much to tell you about my experience, but you’ll have to settle for pictures right now. The first set of photographs started with a blogging event at CES with Robert Scoble […]

The Art of the Fan-Based Blog: Connections Make the Blog and the Community

By DB Ferguson of the No Fact Zone Another treasure trove of knowledge from my series on The Art of the Fan-Based Blog that can help you to be a successful fan blogger is to reach out to your peers, fandom webmasters. You’ve build the community, now it’s time to make those connections pay off. […]

The Art of the Fan-Based Blog: Copyrights for You and Your Content Sources

By DB Ferguson of the No Fact Zone I know I just recommended aggregating news stories from sources outside of your blog in my series on The Art of the Fan-Based Blog, and that search engines were your friend. They are. However, I cannot stress this enough, be extremely mindful of every single word or […]

The Art of the Fan-Based Blog: Create a Game Plan

By DB Ferguson of the No Fact Zone Are you ready to plunge into your own fandom blog? Then it’s time you started thinking more like a webmaster than a fan. A fan is all agog with the thrills and spills of their star, but hosting a fandom blog means making a plan and sticking […]

The Art of the Fan-Based Blog: Cultivate Your Passion

By DB Ferguson of the No Fact Zone If you’re going to build a fan site, it’s assumed that you have a passion for the subject of the blog. You don’t have to know everything about the subject of your site, but you do have to really be passionate about this journey you are about […]

Blog Struggles: Negative Campaigning Isn’t Just For Politicians

With all the negative campaigning and nasty spin by the media wrapped up in election campaigns and conventions, it surprised me to find a connection between a politician commenting on negative campaigns and my continued defense of bloggers attacking other bloggers and going negative. I thought it worth talking about in my ongoing series on […]

Power Blogging Tips: Comment on Blogs From Within Google Feed Reader

One of the most frustrating aspects of reading blogs through feed readers is the process of commenting on blogs. The typical step-by-step process is: Scan through the blog post titles. Find an interesting title and click on the title to open it and read. Want to respond or read more? Open the post title in […]

Blog Struggles: Life 101 – Books That Changed My Life and Blog

One of my long time favorite authors, Peter McWilliams, has most of his books online for free. These include: LIFE 101: Everything We Wished We Had Learned About Life in School-But Didn’t DO IT! Let’s Get Off Our Buts How to Survive the Loss of a Love You Can’t Afford the Luxury of a Negative […]

Weekly Digest: Catching Up, Speaking San Francisco, Future Post Mixup, Talking to Blogger Talks, and More

Yikes, it’s been a rough few weeks. Along with some nasty business stuff, which is actually normal in my line of work, I was supposed to be on my first real, non-working vacation in 14 years, which turned into a workation. What should have been normal was much less fun than usual as my husband […]

Do People Get Your Blog?

Everyone has their idea of the perfect holiday or Christmas card. In fact, I’ve been hunting for the perfect card for years, buying up simple but charming cards of tress covered in snow and snowy scenes of mountains. I admit that I’m not into the reason for the season aspect of the end of the […]