Update About the Touch Typing Experiment

0 comments

Posted on 24th February 2010 by admin in blogging

, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Around six months ago I wrote a post stating that I was going to learn touch typing. When I wrote it I was already using all my fingers to type, but my speed was terrible. I was typing around 30 words per minute….

That is where we left the story. Then a couple of weeks ago one reader emailed me asking how the touch typing experiment was going, so I decided to write an update.

The experiment went out very well and just as planned. I had tried to learn touch typing in the past, but I always went back to typing with two fingers after a couple of days because it was easier. Then one day I decided I would learn all the positions of the finger and make the switch for good (which is when I wrote that post). That is, I would not return to two-finger typing no matter what.

On the first couple of weeks I felt miserable, typing 30 words per minute. Writing emails was a pain, let alone posts for the blog…. But I started to notice fast improvements, and within a couple of months I was already back to 60 words per minute or so. From there I stopped paying attention to how fast I was typing, but I kept getting faster and faster.

How fast? Today I got curious and decided to go back to the speed test. On my first trial I got 100 words per minute. I am guessing that warmed up I could get over 105 words per minute.

touch-typing-test

Six months ago I was typing at 65 words per minute, so I basically increased my typing productivity by more than 50%!

This is probably one of the best skills I have learned in a while, and I definitely recommend anyone who is not touch typing yet to make the switch as soon as possible.

Finally, if you are going to measure how fast you type, make sure to not get confused with the number of characters and words you can type per minute. The comparison is always made with words per minute. On my last post there was a guy who wrote a comment like this: “I swear to God! 152 characters per minute! 29 right and 0 wrong“….

Original Post: Update About the Touch Typing Experiment

join the daily blog tips newsletter

3 Less-Known Ways to Find Guest Posting Opportunities

0 comments

Posted on 24th February 2010 by admin in blogging

, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

This is a guest post by Ann Smarty. If you want to guest post on this blog, check out the guidelines here.

The two best known ways to find blogs accepting guest posts are:

  • Looking around your current contacts. Guest posting at your friends' sites will only make your old relationships stronger and more active. Besides, this is a good way to "learn" to guest post: adapt to various types of audience and blogging atmosphere.
  • Searching Google. I've posted about some advanced tips on searching Google to hunt great (and tightly targeted) guest posting opportunities previously, so you just need to go and check it if you haven't yet.

But as an active (and long-term) guest blogger, I've become somewhat creative in hunting guest blogging opportunities and in this post I am sharing the three of them which turned really effective for me.

1. Look for New, Rapidly-Growing Competitors

Well, the first thing to keep in mind here is that there are no real competitors when it comes to blogging (this is one of the reasons why I love it). Blogs can't really compete because each of them has its unique voice and thus takes its own place.

But there are blogs in the same niche as you are and it is a good idea to find new, emerging and rapidly growing ones and see what they are doing.

One of the best advice I've ever got was: when it comes to competitive research, think young. It is not easy to follow already established, high-authority blogs: they already have solid contacts and fans which help them move further.

New bloggers have nothing; they are hungry and they've got to be creative. Watching what they are doing and following their steps, you can learn a lot. It doesn't mean you have to copy everything they are doing – you'll notice yourself get inspired by watching those active bloggers; you'll notice yourself find plenty of unique ideas and finding your own ways as well.

Look out for "places I guest posted" and "my guest posts" sections to see where those new and active bloggers promote their content and how:

Guest posting opportunities

2. Search and Track Twitter

This is somewhat related to the previous one: you won't be able to (easily) find new bloggers in Google (because they don't have enough link authority to outrank more established blogs) but you will surely find them Tweeting. Besides, Twitter search is real-time – meaning that you'll find new and fresh guest posting opportunities.

There are plenty of tools allowing to search and track Twitter; I am using Seesmic Desktop because it is cool, feature-rich and clutter-free. Here's how it noiselessly updates me of new related Tweets:

First thing to do is to configure its settings to notify you of new search results. Go to Settings > Notifications and put a tick next to "Notify about new search results":

Seesmic settings

You are almost done. Now use Seesmic built-in search option to search Twitter for what you need. I was searching for "guest posts" in general, you may want to restrict the search to your niche like [guest post diet], [guest post money].

Use Seesmic to track guest posting opportunities

Quick tip: create a separate search for each synonym you'd like to track: [guest post money], [guest post finance], [guest post save], etc.

Your search will be saved automatically and from now on Seesmic will quietly notify you of new search results via small pop-ups:

Track guest posting opportunities with Seesmic

Now whenever you have new results, just go ahead and check out the new blogs and what they are doing.

3. Join Blogging Forums

Bloggers' communities are plenty. Some are generic ones where people discuss all things blogging. Others are more focused and targeted like, for example, Blogher (which unites blogging women) and 20 something bloggers that unites bloggers aged between 20 and 30 (and thus having common interested, styles, priorities, etc).

I have recently created another community specifically targeting people looking for guest bloggers and / or guest blogging opportunities. It is called My Blog Guest and if you are interested in guest blogging and plan to do a lot of it, you may want to check it out.

I am doing my best to keep the bar high enough: I don't really want the forum to turn into buy-sell thing, so only join it if you are interested in long-term partnerships and "pure deals".

My blog guest

If you've had some success hunting for guest blogging opportunities, please share your most effective methods in the comments!

Ann Smarty blogs on search, social media, branding and blogging at her SEOsmarty.com blog.

Original Post: 3 Less-Known Ways to Find Guest Posting Opportunities

join the daily blog tips newsletter

How Do I Get Backlinks to My Posts, Making Sure They Will Get a Good PageRank?

0 comments

Posted on 24th February 2010 by admin in blogging

, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

questions and answersThis post is part of the Friday Q&A section. Just use the contact form if you want to submit a question.

Mathew asks:

Do you spend a lot of time and effort on SEO and getting some quality/relevant backlinks to them right away, or are they mostly organic links from people linking to them?

Also, what’s the best ways to get backlinks to my inner pages with older posts on them?

I was wondering because I’ve noticed almost all of your older posts have very good page rank.

I used to spend a lot of time and effort on SEO and on getting quality/relevant backlinks a couple of years ago. That is because the blog was new and had a small audience, so publishing outstanding content alone wouldn’t do the trick. How did I go about attracting backlinks? Doing three things mainly:

1. Submitting my posts to social bookmarking sites. There are plenty of do-follow social bookmarking sites out there that will send you link juice even if you are the only one voting for your story. On top of that I also tried to promote my killer articles on Digg, StumbleUpon and Delicious, and whenever I managed to score a front page a big influx of organic links would come.

2. Networking with fellow bloggers. Building a relationship with bloggers inside your niche is essential. This means that I would link to them often, and many times they would return the favor. I am not talking about link exchanges but rather about natural links to quality content that your fellow bloggers post.

3. Guest blogging. As you probably know I am a big fan of guest blogging. Back in the day I used to do it a lot, which sent both new readers and backlinks my way. Sometimes instead of using the byline link to my homepage I would point it to a related post I had published on my blog, and that can help a lot with search rankings.

Over time, however, I started to spend less and less time trying to get backlinks, because as my audience increased so did the organic backlinks. That is, every time I publish a normal post these days I get 5-10 backlinks on it. When I post a killer article I get 50-100 backlinks. So I just focus on producing content these days, because the promotion side pretty much walks alone.

There are two other things you can do to maximize the link juice of your single posts, however. They are:

1. Having an HTML sitemap. This is basically a page within your blog that you’ll link to all posts you have ever published. You could make this by having an “Archives” section, as I do. This is a very efficient way to distribute your link equity because all pages of your blog will link there, and it will link back to all pages of your blog.

2. Cross linking between your posts. Linking to older and relevant posts is another practice that can increase your PageRank and search rankings, apart from adding more value to your readers. Whenever you are writing a new post, therefore, think about what you have published in the past and trying to find something relevant to link to.

Finally, notice that having lots of backlinks pointing to each of your single posts is not necessary to make sure they will have a good PageRank. If you have a good amount of backlinks pointing to your homepage, and use the two methods I mentioned above, your link equity will naturally spread all over your website, and even single posts will no backlinks at all will gain some PageRank.

Original Post: How Do I Get Backlinks to My Posts, Making Sure They Will Get a Good PageRank?

join the daily blog tips newsletter

5 Simple Ways to Find Your Passion and Take Your Blog from Zero to Hero

0 comments

Posted on 17th February 2010 by admin in blogging

, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

This is a guest post by Henri Junttila. If you want to guest post on this blog, check out the guidelines here.

Blogging is hard work. It can easily take up to a year or two before your blog starts taking off, if it ever does. I’m not trying to be pessimistic, just realistic, because there are a lot of people out there that believe they can jump in, start writing and the money will start pouring in.

But when you mix passion with blogging savvy, the results can be amazing. Before I started my blog, I decided to join a blogging course. I have always been big on finding a mentor, someone who has done what I want to do and then learning everything I can from them.

If you are passionate about what you’re doing and have the determination to work hard, the internet is full of excellent blogging courses that will help take your blog from zero to hero. With all that said, let’s look at how you can find your passion:

1. The Elimination Method

The elimination method is extremely simple. You start by writing down every topic you’re interested in, you then compare each topic to each other one by one and eliminate anything that you do not like.

Say you like cats, dogs and parrots, just to keep it simple. Let’s start with cats. Compare cats to dogs, do you think you’re more passionate about dogs? If yes, then you discard cats and compare dogs to the rest. We only have dogs and parrots left, so whichever one you’re more passionate about, wins.

2. The Money Question

What would you do if money didn’t exist? Would you write about dogs? If you never had to worry about food, clothing and a place to live, you would have no choice but to do things you enjoy, because there would be no reason to do anything else.

This is a simple, yet powerful question. Really think about what you would want to do if money didn’t exist on the planet. There are no 9-5 jobs. Everyone is doing what they love. What would you be doing in this scenario?

3. Your Feelings

Most of us have been taught to ignore our feelings from a very early age, but the truth is that feelings act as signposts for if you’re heading in the right direction. If you’re working a 9-5 job that you hate, you will feel bad and it will only get worse with time.

Whenever you’re doing something you love, you’ll feel happy, content and at peace. Time just seems to fly by. This is how feelings were meant to be used. It takes some practice. It is easy to misinterpret your feelings, which is why many people think they are passionate about making money, which is basically a feeling rooted in fear.

4. Taking Action

If you’re not quite sure what you’re passion is, the best way to find out is to just start somewhere. You can sit there and analyze what it might be, but you will never get anywhere. It’s okay if you start a blog and find out that it isn’t what you like.

Mistakes are there to teach you. If you want things to be perfect before you start, you will never start. Believe me, I’ve been there and when I started feeling okay about making mistakes, my life became so much easier.

5. Feedback

Once you’ve been blogging for a few months, you’ll start to find your voice and start getting some traffic (if you chose a good niche). You will have a bunch of data that will tell you if you’re heading in the right direction.

Comments, e-mails, bounce rates and the average time people spend on your website. All of these factors vary from blog to blog, which is why it can get difficult and why a mentor can be so helpful. The main point I want to get across in this article is that without your passion, you will not have the fuel to keep going for the months or even years when nothing seems to be happening.

Henri Junttila writes about following your passion and being successful at life on his blog WakeUpCloud.com, he also shows you how you can discover your passion in 5 days.

Original Post: 5 Simple Ways to Find Your Passion and Take Your Blog from Zero to Hero

join the daily blog tips newsletter

« Older Entries