So, I’ve blogged for a while. That is to say, I’ve started blogs in blogger.com, and wordpress.com. I help my customers set up blogs for their businesses, but typically these are tourism-oriented businesses for which the blog is an adjunct. They use them to talk about what’s going on in their community and environment and create a sense of destination to encourage bookings.
Like many other new bloggers, I have built and then abandoned a few blogs. Lack of interest, lack of consistency, no clear purpose, no follow through. I finally have one successful blog that operates as a main front page to my regional tourism portal, which you can see at www.bigpacific.com.
I have watched as a number of bloggers rose in stature as mine faded into obscurity. My favorite is johnchow.com, a Vancouver blogger who was featured in our daily newspaper about 8 months ago, making $15,000 a month at the time of the article. He now makes $40k a month and has 45,000 subscribers to his blog/newsletter, and posts twice a day. His blog is about making money online. He shares his money, and his expertise, with a weekly luncheon where any blogger is welcome to attend – the Dot Com Pho.
John’s blog is fairly eclectic. In addition to the moneymaking stories, he posts on philanthropy, food, travel, gadgets, and reviews of software. It’s shown me that it’s the consistency and frequency that’s important and not so much the ‘perfect’ and perfectly targeted content.
One of his posts was about a great online blogging course, utilizing audio and video, from Yaro Starak and Gideon Shalwick called “Become a Blogger”. The first level of the Become a Blogger site is FREE. It includes a Roadmap Report – the prerequisite to starting the video courses. Remember, the 20 page report (pdf, or mp3 audio file) is FREE. It covers ‘The 5 Major Milestones You Must Reach to Become a Successful Blogger’. This section should not be skipped – it’s invaluable information that will ensure you’re not wasting your time on your blog and positioning yourself for success.
The next step in the course is a 10-part beginner blog video series. Now, as someone who has blogged, set up externally hosted blogs, and dealt with hosting, domain names, and technical stuff for over 10 years, I thought this was a bit of a time waster before I started. Boy, was I wrong. I can procrastinate with the best of them, and have needed to upgrade to WordPress 2.6.3 for quite a while, and it’s a critical part of the entire course. So that’s the step I’m at.
I’m inviting you to join me in learning how to blog, from a beginner’s perspective, and share your experience in the Grok the Net community.
If you’re already way ahead on the technical/setup side of things, I invite you to head up to the next level of the course – BecomeaBlogger Premium. This is where the rubber hits the road and you learn the ‘X Factor’ strategies that will separate your blog from the millions of others out there.
So that’s Day One. See you tomorrow!
