Helpful Resources for New Bloggers

2007-03-14T18:04:00.000-07:00

Beta Bloggers Resources: Attention to All New Bloggers

Google Search for "Revert to Classic Template"

2007-02-27T12:33:00.000-08:00

Watching where my visitors come from using my site meter stats on my blogs helps me to see where and how people found my New Bloggers Resource sites and it is always very interesting to say the least. I just had to share these results with you for when people do a Google Search for a specific topic, such as "Revert to Classic Template" and the Google Search engines select my sites as the chosen top 4 positions out of 250,000. You can see this was a real thrill for me, after months of promoting my blog to be of help to new bloggers, I'm now seeing the results in the Google Searches to be very pleasing to me. ("Read more" to view the screen shot of the Google Search page at the bottom of this post)

You, my readers are the ones that have made this all possible by choosing my Helpful New Bloggers Resources and making these two blogs a popular choice for visitors. My blogs have become more visible through the search engines eyes by the number of times you have chosen my sites from the Google Search results for your answers to questions you have. Please keep coming back for more instruction while setting up your new blog and remember you can also contact me at any time if you need additional help. Thanks for all your support in my endeavors of providing helpful and useful information for you.

I took this screen grab to show what I have repeatedly found for this specific topic, other topics I have mentioned are listed here in this previous post Google Search for Specific Topics and you can understand why keywords are so important for poeple to find your niche site.

Google search shows my sites on the top four positions in results for "revert to classic template" out of 250,000 possibilities.

Resizing Widgets and Google's Search Box

2007-02-20T14:33:00.000-08:00

Resizing Widgets and Google's Search Box for a better fit on your sidebar is another recent post over at Beta Bloggers Resources for New Bloggers. I have noticed that many widgets and search boxes are encroaching the written text and thought I would help you out with a little resizing. It's so simple and will make your posts easier to read and look better as well.

Resizing Widgets and Google's Search Box

Google's Search Box: Your Site or the Web

2007-02-20T14:16:00.000-08:00

Google's Search Box has a little back dot for you to change depending if you want to search this site or do a web search (view above). You will see the little black dot set on my site and if you want to search the Web, you will need to change it.

If you are interested in changing the black dot on your Google's Web Search to Your Site Search, it is all explained here for you.
Google's Web Search vs. Your Site Search

Resizing Widgets and Google's Search Box

2007-02-20T14:05:00.000-08:00

Sorry for double posting this, see Resizing Widgets and Google's Search Box

Beta Bloggers Resources: The Importance of Responding to Your Comments

2007-02-08T20:35:00.000-08:00

This article for the "Importance of Responding to Your Comments" was originally posted to Beta Bloggers Resources. Since it's against Google AdSense policies to have duplicate material on my sites, I've added a link to this article and other articles that I have written on my Beta Bloggers Resources.
Beta Bloggers Resources: The Importance of Responding to Your Comments

Earn Extra Money Blogging

2007-02-06T13:14:00.000-08:00

Earn Extra Money Blogging

Move Over to the New Version of Blogger

2007-02-02T19:19:00.000-08:00

I moved all my blogs over to the New Version of Blogger at the beginning of the year. For those who waited for it to be mandatory, I'm just checking in with you to see how smoothly it went for you. Hoping it was a success and also wondering how many of you using the Classic Blogger still had your Classic Template in tact after the move to the New Version of Blogger. My blogs remained the Classic Template until I chose to use the Customize Design and that is when the real change took place. At that time I was able to use the new features for the Layout and Page Elements.

Since I now have two different blogs for the purpose of offering helpful tips and step-by-step instructions, this one is specifically for using the Classic Template and Beta Bloggers Resources is specifically for the New Version of Blogger with instruction for using the Page Elements in your Layout.

You have a choice to stay with the Classic Template or use the Customize Design to change over to using the new and improved features the New Version of Blogger has to offer. If you do change over to the Customize Design and you are not quite sure you like that, remember you can always Revert Back to Classic Template" with no problem. Go ahead and give it a try, one word of caution is you will loose all your links and anything you have added to the sidebar or footer of your template. This isn't a problem since you can revert back to the Classic Template and they all magically reappear.

Read this post on Beta Bloggers Resources for futher detail.
Move Over to the New Version of Blogger

My Goal and Commitment to Start this Blog

2007-02-01T16:05:00.000-08:00

My original goal and commitment to develop helpful resource blogs has been focused on being able to help other newbies going through the beginning stages of blogging. I personally had lots of difficulty just navigating around blogger when I first started, so I guess you could say, I've been there-done that.

Once I started to feel comfortable, I then wanted to help others that may be feeling the same way as I did first starting out. Researching specific questions I had was very time consuming and I thought how nice it would be to find the answers for newbie questions in one location. Since I was using the Classic Blogger, many of the tips and step-by-step instructions I have explained are no longer relevant for The New Version of Blogger. With the encouragement from Rose at BloggerTalk, I started another blog focusing on The New Version of Blogger. All new bloggers are using The New Version of Blogger (formally know as beta) so I now have another blog focusing on tips and step-by-step instruction for the methods used in The New Version of Blogger. Feel free to navigate between the two blogs, Classic Bloggers Resources and The New Version of Blogger Resources to acquire the needed information for the specific topic of your interest. I'll answer any of your questions to the best of my ability or refer you to someone that does know the answers.

Please do not hesitate to contact me for further instructions. If I have been able to help answer any of your concerns or questions, I sure would appreciate you taking the time to leave me a comment. Better yet, link to Bloggers Resources in your sidebar for future reference or for another newbie blogger that just happens to visit your site.
Happy Blogging....Sherry

Word of Mouth Marketing

2007-01-23T11:25:00.000-08:00

Word of Mouth Marketing has and always will be a most effective form of advertising.

Make a Clickable Link Within Your Post

2007-01-17T18:59:00.000-08:00

Making a clickable link within your post is used when it is necessary to refer your readers to another website or source of information. This is how it will look using HTML tags and the final result is just a few words for your readers to click on. In this example I am using my blogs address, http://helpfulresourcesfornewbloggers.blogspot.com however, I only want it to read "Helpful Resources for New Bloggers" for the clickable link. You may title your link whatever you want between these brackets in the example below.
Enlarge the image to view the example Since I'm on the subject of creating clickable links, here are a few other popular posts you may want to review.
Make a Post Title a Clickable Link
Edit or Add Links in Your Sidebar
Create an Email Me Link
Make Links Open in a New Browser Window

WHAT? Google Contradicts AdSense Policies!

2007-01-17T08:38:00.000-08:00

Most of us using Google AdSense on our blogs have or should have read the Google AdSense Program Policies before implementing Google AdSense on our blogs or websites. Well, the topic titled "Incentives" is very clear that publishers are not permitted to use deceptive or unnatural means to draw attention to or incite clicks on referral buttons, right?

What if I told you, "oh yes you can"?!!

In fact Google encourages you to actively endorse referral products such as AdSense, AdWords, Firefox with Google Toolbar, Google Pack and Picasa by calling attention to the button or text link. If you believe in the product that you're referring, feel free to let your readers know! Of course you may not click on your own ads nor encourage others to deceitfully do so.

Treat referral products as site content rather than the traditional ad space. You may integrate text links or buttons into related content within your page. This will enable your readers to easily find the referral buttons you discuss in your content. You are allowed up to a total of four referral products on any given page.

Be sure to choose only relevant referral products to refer to your readers, such as a site about blogging or web hosting, an AdSense referral unit would probably work best for you.

Rotate referral products when you rotate content, always checking to see that the relevance of your referral product is not diminished by any change in your content.

Are you still wondering why I think Google is contradicting themselves? Then read Google AdSense Help Center and it will all become very clear to you. See the examples of websites listed below for helping you to optimize your referrals implementation.

2007-01-14T15:36:00.000-08:00

MyBlogLog Branded Community as a Social Media Network

2007-01-11T12:35:00.000-08:00

Checklist for Pre-Publishing to your Blog

Adding a Search Box to My Blog

2007-01-07T12:30:00.000-08:00

Adding a search box to my blog for your convenience was on my agenda today. You can search the web or my blog about a specific topic. There are so many helpful topics in the archives and they seem to get lost. I have the Helpful Resources for New Bloggers Site Map for all my posts, however, it is always easier to type a few keywords into the search box to find exactly what you are looking for. This should help you navigate around this blog more efficiently. Please contact me if you are looking for something in particular that you didn't see covered here on my blog. I will be glad to research the topic myself and get back with you via email.

Also as a reminder to all new bloggers and those who have now switched over to The New Version of Blogger, you will find Helpful Resources for The New Version of Blogger here.

Switching Over to The New Version of Blogger

2007-01-01T13:06:00.000-08:00

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!
Starting the New Year out right, I have switched all my blogs over to The New Version of Blogger and it only took a matter of minutes to complete. Everything is working fine and what a delightful surprise to find all my Classic blogs remained the Classic template and nothing disappeared on me.

Although when I reverted my Classic Blogs over to The New Version of Blogger format to use the New Blogger Layout and Page Elements, things disappeared on my blog (the ability to use the expandable post summaries, Google AdSense at the bottom of my posts and all the links on my sidebar). No problem I just Reverted Back to the Classic Template and the expandable post summaries, Google AdSense and links I previously added to my sidebar were all there again.

The biggest advantage for switching over to The New Version of Blogger is the speed in which you can publish, edit and republish. As far as the new Blogger features for Layout and Add Page Elements go, I prefer to stay with the Classic Template and do things the Classic way for now.

Google Search for Specific Topics

2006-12-26T15:42:00.000-08:00

We all search the web using keywords or keyword phrases for many topics using search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN, etc to provide us with useful information on a particular topic.

I have been watching and noticing the stats on my site meter for the location my visitors came from, such as a Google Search. Listed below are a few of the keyword phrases that have been used to find Helpful Resources for New Bloggers as one of Google's choices for the information pertaining to these keyword phrases.

revert to classic template
blogger lost username
adsense code around text
google ads in text wrap blogger
customizing blogspot
customize blogger
expandable post on beta blogger
new blogger expandable post summaries layout
How can I create expandable post summaries in blogger
BlogItemBody new blogger

Do you ever wonder how others will locate your blog or website by doing a Google search for a specific topic? When choosing your keywords or keyword phrases remember to use variations of the same words in your sentences and think of other keywords that might also be used in doing a Google search for your topic.

Do you have a way to monitor where your traffic is coming from? If not, you may want to review How to Add a Free Site Meter to your Blog. The site meter will give you information as to how many visitors and page views you receive in a day, week, month and a year. The site meter can also be very helpful to learn the location your visitors came from and what keywords they used to find your site (look to referrals on the site meter for this information).

Selective Expandable Post Summaries

2006-12-24T10:07:00.000-08:00

We have all enjoyed using the expandable post summaries in our blogs or website for those long entries, however there are many times when it really isn't necessary. After receiving a comment asking how to do an expandable post summary on a select few entries in her blog, I thought this might be something you would also like to know how to remedy. Here is a new and improved method so you can be selective and won't see the words 'read more' at the end of every post when there really isn't anything more to read.

Follow the step-by-step instructions as previously posted for implementing Expandable Post Summaries using the Classic Template.

If you are using The New Version of Blogger you can Revert to Classic Template to use this same method or follow these instructions for expandable post summaries using The New Version of Blogger.

The portion of html code (in red) that you placed in your template which looks like this below the <$BlogItemBody$> tag. Delete the 'read more' in between the tags so it looks like this. Save Template Changes.

Go back to the dashboard, click on the title of your blog, click on view blog and now click on the title of your post by going to previous posts in your sidebar. Your browser window will now display the URL of this post. Drag and drop this http:// address you see in the browser window to the desktop.

Go back to the dashboard to edit your post, drag and drop this http://address into the post at the area you want to separate the text for the expandable post summary. Notice this HTML code in red, you need to add this before and after the URL of this post. The example below is how the text will look for your post using the Edit Html. Now when you click the 'Read more'..... in your published blog it will show the full post only for this selective expandable post summary. You have now Created a Clickable Link to implement the 'read more' in your selected post. For all future posts you will need to follow this same method when you want it to be expandable but at least you can be selective for each and every post.

Blogger Checklist for Your New Blog

2006-12-20T14:03:00.000-08:00

A blogger checklist for your new blog was inspired by visiting BloggerTalk. After reading a post by truthdancer mentioning a checklist in the order of importance would be beneficial for new bloggers.

I have made a checklist for new bloggers to follow using my previous posts. I don't believe you have to follow the exact order of this list, however they are all things you will want to accomplish to have a successful blog. Review Blogger Resource Site Map for other topics of interest.

The instructions for adding code into the template are based on using the Classic Template. If you have changed over to Beta, you can't switch back to the Classic Blog but you can Revert Back to the Classic Template to use this method.

For Beta Bloggers go to the dashboard to manage your blogs, go to Layout and Add a Page Elements for adding a List, Link list, Picture, Text, HTML/JavaScript, AdSense, Feed, Labels, Logo.

Make the Post Title a Clickable Link

2006-12-16T17:49:00.000-08:00

You can make the title of your post a clickable link. This is a nice option for your readers when using Expandable Post Summaries. They will have the choice of 'clicking on the title' or 'read more' for the complete article.

Make sure you have customized your blog Settings by going into formatting to change the Title and Link field to read yes, Save changes.

Go to previous posts in your sidebar and click on the title of the post.
Drag and drop the http address you see in your browser window to your desktop.
Edit eash post you want to make a clickable link.
Drag and drop the http address for each post from the desktop and put that into the Link field under the Title field of each post.
Publish post/Save changes.

Comment from Lorelle on WordPress

2006-12-12T18:05:00.000-08:00

I have recently received a comment from Lorelle on WordPress thanking me for the recommendation I gave her on Defend your Site with a Plagiarism Warning Banner, you can read her comment there.

Lorelle also wanted to respond to my post about Links Opening in a New Window. Explaining to me this is bad manners today and in violation of web standards, especially those dealing with accessibility standards. Lorelle on WordPress is a professional blogger and I have taken her advice very seriously. I thank her for taking the time to inform me as a new blogger this is against web standards. I am happy to say, no more links will open in a new window on my sites thanks to Lorelle. :)

Lorelle also goes on to say, "put all your energy into your content and the links will come to you". Traffic and readership take time!!!

I feel honored that Lorelle, a professional blogger took the time to send me her comments. Thanks again for all your advice and encouragement Lorelle!!!

Ultimate Google Adsense Secret (for free)

2006-12-11T18:05:00.000-08:00

Ultimate Google Adsense Secret (for free)
By Kaspar Gering

(can be found from expensive e-books and from this free article)

Introduction

In our previous articles you read that to maximize your Google Adsense revenue, you should have some seo done, you should have ads on more than 1 website, you should have high traffic and more importantly, targeted traffic. To get that traffic, you are advised to optimize your website for search engines (this is called SEO). You have learnt that if you get 1000 visitors a day and if you acchive at least 1% of them to click on your ads (which is a low click-trough-rate or CTR), and if one click is somewhere between $0.1 or $0.5, you get $1-5 a day (because 10 x 0.1 = 1).

You are wasting your time and traffic if you are having 500-1000 unique visitors a day and you're only making $1-5 a day. Lots of e-books are saying they've found the secret, they've found the goose that lays the golden eggs, they say they know how to squeeze more revenue from Adsense. But guess what, we've also found the secret, and we are giving it away for free!

How To Maximize Google Adsense Revenue

The main key to maximize your Google Adsense profits is to try getting ads targeted on high-paying-keywords. Instead of $0.5 from one click, you could make $5-30 from one click, which then means that to make serious money, you might only need 100 visitors a day. The key is to find those high-paying-keywords. Only one service that we know is showing you the prices of keywords.

Using Google Adwords To Find Keyword Price

Google AdWords? Yes, Google Adwords is for advertisers but you can register. Of course, it would be polite if you'd also use this service in the future in the proper way and if you would pay for some campaign. When registering an account with Google Adwords, lots of people stop right in the beginning because they see that they need to set up an advertisement campaign. Yes, you must set it up first, but you don't have to pay for it yet. You can pay for the campaign later (or you can stop using this service and not to pay at all). In the meanwhile you can use Adwords tools, like Keyword Pricing Tool etc.

When you're setting up campaigns, Google wants you to enter some keywords to target your ads for the right audience. When you're typing in the keywords, it shows you the possible prices of the keywords. Lets say, if you want to check the price of a keyword "broker", you just type "broker" into the field and Google shows you that you need to pay $25-30 for each click that is targeted to broker keywords. So in general, lets say that you see a website and it's content is about brokers and brokering, and it also has some ads on, it's pretty sure that the site might get 25 dollars from each click on those ads, of course, only if broker ads are shown at all, if the webmaster has had a good job optimizing the website and optimizing the content for those keywords.

Practical Use Of This Secret?

If you have a website and some content or you're planning to make a website, get as much as keywords from your industry that you can think of or that you can find and use some "keywords tools" (which can be found from the tools section) and find relative keywords for them. Find how many times are they searched for etc., too. Then check the price of your industry specific and relative keywords with Adwords, find the keyword that pays the most.

Then optimize your content for that specific keyword, or if you want to make your site more optimized, choose the keyword that is searched for more than others and that pays high, too and then optimize your content for that keyword. How to do that? Read keyword optimization articles, which can be found from our article section, too.

That's it, now you know how to really maximize your Google Adsense revenue. Now you know the secret that e-books are selling for $49-99. You got it free. Thank you for reading this article and thank you for not wasting your money on things that you can get for free

You are advised to check out Manfred-Knows.com for more articles like this. You can also find information on how to optimize your website with keywords etc.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Kaspar_Gering

How much is My Blog Worth?

2006-12-10T14:51:00.000-08:00

Find out how much your blog is worth, I have done this several times and have seen an increase in value, makes me think I'm doing something right. :) You can check your blog for the fun of it also.......
How much is My Blog Worth?, enter your URL and submit.

Section Targeting Google's Ads

2006-12-04T07:49:00.000-08:00

Section targeting is a way for you to suggest to Google sections of your content that you would like to emphasize or downplay for matching ads to your site's content.... You have probably experimented with using Google's AdSense on your site to maximize your potential revenue and then you find your ads are not relevant to your content. This is a good reason why you should be using Google's AdSense Support for instructions on the use of section targeting. You will enhance the experience for your readers with ads that are well matched to your content and their search. All you need to do is add a set of HTML tags at the beginning and end of the section that you would like to emphasize. Google doesn't make this very clear as to where to add these HTML tags so while I was doing some research of my own, I came across this site SEOnoob and I liked how he explained wrapping the HTML code around the <$BlogItemBody$> in your blog template. This is one step further than Google explained, let me know if that makes any sense to you. For Beta Bloggers, you can "revert to classic template" to find the <$BlogItemBody$> portion of your template so you can use this same method.

Google explains that you will need a significant amount of content within the section targeting tags and they can't guarantee results, it may take up to 2 weeks before the crawlers take into account any changes you have made to your site.

I have experimented over that last few weeks with using the section targeting by adding the HTML code around the <$BlogItemBody$> in the template and I have seen a difference. I know some believe the HTML code could also be used at the beginning and end of each post. Others are happy with their contextual ads and CTRs they have been receiving from Google without doing the section targeting. Do your own experiments and please let me know how it's working for you.

Don't forget, we are the ones providing this medium for Google to place advertisements on our free blog or website as a benefit to our readers who are searching for information. If we don't have the information our readers are searching, there are valuable resources close at hand that just might have what they are searching for. I believe section targeting is our answer to more relevant ads for our content. This becomes a win-win situation, our readers benefit with more information available to them for research and we benefit by getting paid to supply content for the web.
Display Relevant Ads In Blogs by Digital Inspiration

Google's Webmaster Tools

2006-11-30T13:43:00.000-08:00

Google's Webmaster Tools will enable you to see how Google crawls and indexes your site. Simply log in with your Google Account to get started, now click on your site name to view Diagnostics, Statistics and Sitemaps.

Diagnostics - Summary of the last date when your home page was successfully accessed and when your pages were included in Google's index status. You will also be able to see any web crawl errors.
Statistics - Provide distribution information for pages Google has crawled for google.com index and also shows the PageRank of your pages in Google.
The Query stats show you the top search queries.
The Page analysis shows you how the Googlebot sees your site.
The Index stats show you samples of your pages in Google and you can also do an advanced search to find out how your site is indexed.
Sitemaps - Show when you submitted your site to Google, the last download and your sitemap status.

Don't be alarmed if you have just started a new blog and when you click on your site name and notice the search "did not match any documents". This all takes time, so remember to continue adding new content and promote your blog to generate traffic.