Summer is officially here.  So I will be doing much of my brainstorming while fishing for largemouth bass.  By the way, if you are fishing for sales, leads, and readers then here’s some “lures” to consider.

5 Articles That Caught My Attention (pun intended)

The World’s Best Self-Promoter on How to Be The World’s Best Self-Promoter

Joel Stein wrote, “Man Made: A Stupid Quest for Masculinity” and promoted the living daylights out it.  He did so well that he’s become a book promotion guru.  Check out his unorthodox tips.

Facebook’s Business Model

Now you can own a piece of Facebook.  The question is; do you really want to?  Chris Dixon offers a fascinating primer on Facebook’s business model.  After reading it, I decided to pass.

Your Blog is the Engine of Community

Scott Hanselman is my hero.  In this post he argues for the primacy of the blog.  In his words

“I would encourage you all to blog more. Tweet less. Blogs are owned by you. They are easily found, easily linked to, and great conversations happen with great blog posts. The river of social media rushes on and those conversations are long forgotten. A great blog post is forever. Today’s real-time social media is quickly forgotten.”  Amen.

Google Analytics Social Reports Provide Huge Metrics Edge

I didn’t get excited about Google Analytic’s Social Report feature until I read this post.  It’s ninja stuff that you should use immediately.

How to Promote Your Blog with Social Media

I love Social Media Examiner’s blue-collar, always-consistent, always helpful, approach to social media.  They didn’t disappoint with this basic and extremely relevant guide to blog promotion.

On Pushing Social This Week

Four Incredibly Useful Metrics for Small Business Blogging

How to Get Better Results with Your List Posts

Six Sinister Blog Time Wasters

PS Reader Spotlight

Every week I highlight a PS Reader who has asked me to review their blog.  This is a shout out to them and a gentle nudge for you to check them out.  :)

This week the spotlight is on Angela May Angela’s energy reminds me of Danielle LaPorte and Marie Forleo. Right now she is working hard to build a blog platform to support her business.  I look forward to seeing how her story evolves.

Congratulations for reading this post.

Most folks run in terror when they see the word “metrics”.  Ironically, metrics are critical for your blog’s success.  Getting comfortable with your blog’s “numbers” helps you diagnose problems and improve your performance.

As a business owner you should expect your blog to “pay its own way”.  Knowing your numbers will help you focus your efforts and achieve your objectives.

 

I wrote this post keeping two assumptions in mind:

1) You have little time to fiddle with your blog
2) You aren’t a statistical wunderkind that loves finding patterns in numbers

Every moment you spend on your blog is time taken from something else.  I get it.  That means my advice for you today is going to be straightforward, simple, and effective.

Pay Attention to These Four Numbers

Unique Visits:

How many people visit your blog every day? You want to see this number move up every month.  This number reflects on the performance of your blog promotion efforts.  If this number is flat or declining then you are not promoting your posts.

Takeaway:  Hope and faith are poor blog promotion strategies.  You almost always have to leave the cozy comforts of your blog to find new readers.  Many strategies can work, guest blogging, article writing, forum coaching, interviews,  and guerilla promotion to name a few.  Remember 99.99% of the world doesn’t know your blog exists – you have to bring your magic to the people.

Pages Per Visit:

This number shows how your blog’s stickiness.  The goal is to get readers to visit multiple posts.  While most visitors will read one post and leave, the ones that stick around are more likely to sign-up for email, contact you, comment, or purchase something.  High page per visits means that your content is relevant and on-target.

Takeaway: This number is hard to move for blogs.  You will need to brainstorm ways to get people to stick with your blog past the initial post.  Using “Related Posts” widgets will prompt visitors to check out other posts.  Interlinking, providing links to other blog content within your current post, is also an effective way to increase pages per visit.

% New Visitors:

How many brand new visitors come to your blog every day?  You want this number to hover around 60-70%.  The other 30% are your locals that are coming back to your blog because they love your content.  While the percentages can be argued, the point is to keep a steady flow of new readers arriving at your blog.

Your repeat visitors are valuable but a blog without a healthy number of new visitors will stagnate.  The comments section will be filled with the same voices and you’ll have fewer opportunities to share your content with a wider audience.

Takeaway: As your blog grows, your new visitors will offer fresh perspectives, feedback and word-of-mouth growth.  On the flip side 90% new visitors is a sign that you need to do more to attract readers back to your blog.  This is a balancing act that you’ll need to monitor as your blog grows.

Goal Completions:

This number is specific to Google Analytics.  In GA, Goal completions tracks how many people took an action identified as a goal.

In other words, how many of your readers took action.  This number shows if your investment in your blog is delivering results. Your goals can be email list sign-ups, content downloads, lead generation, or direct sales.

I suggest setting up a goal for your blog immediately.  Focusing on this number from the beginning will prevent you from relying on abstract goals like “increase engagement.” which sounds good but has zero practical value.

Takeaways: I believe that your blog needs to earn its place in your marketing plan.  Paying attention to your goal completions is the best way to turn your blog into a profit maker rather than a time stealer.  If you don’t want to hold your blog accountable then agree that your blog is a hobby and not a content marketing tool.

How to Find these Numbers

Sign up for Google Analytics and use the Google Analytics for WordPress plugin to install the right code in the right places.  This should take you all of 15 minutes.

Once installed, you will need to configure your goals.  This is much easier than you may think.  Google includes visual tutorials to walk you through the process.  The process is designed for “non-geeks” so you shouldn’t have any problems.

Note: If you are installing Google Analytics for the first time, you will need to wait for 24 hours to start getting information.

The rest of the numbers we discussed are available on the Visitor Overview screen.  You can slice and dice these numbers for additional insights when you get more comfortable with Google Analytics.

Here are a few sites that will turn you into an analytics ninja:

Occam’s Razor: Entertaining and incredibly useful articles that covers web analytics and social media measurement. I read this blog religiously.

Kissmetrics Marketing Blog:  Kissmetrics blog focuses on a variety of online marketing topics with a focus on measurement.

Google Analytics Blog:  Google’s blog is incredibly helpful and is a great jumping off point to more advanced information.

{Part of the Blogging for Business Series}

The “List Post” is the MVP of blogging.  Even though blog snobs hate them, they are a consistent performer.

For good reason, they are easy to research.  All you need is a quick Google search and you’re off to the races.  List posts are simple to write as long as you can count from 1 to 10.  They also are popular often registering triple digit retweets.

But, they have one problem, a big one too.

While readers enjoy lists, they have dubious long-term benefit for you as a thought leader.  Heresy you say?

The One Night Stand

When I started Pushing Social I used list posts religiously. All of them did well earning their fair share of retweets and mentions on other blogs.  The problem was that many of the people who read the posts didn’t return.  I also saw the time spent with each new list post declining steadily throughout the year.

Digging further I saw that many people commented (or tweeted) that they appreciated the list and bookmarked it.  Oops.  A bookmark is about as attractive as getting a fake number at the end of a date.

I didn’t want a bookmark.  I wanted the reader to spend time on the blog, reading other posts, and signing up for email updates.

It was like my readers were saying “thanks for the evening”, I’ll call you – I promise.  Right.

I suspected that while my readers appreciated my research skills, they weren’t convinced that I had anything more to offer.

Content versus Process Experts

Alan Weiss, a celebrated and renowned business consultant makes a distinction between content experts and process experts.  The content experts has a well pruned list of relevant information for a specific type of business or situation.  The process expert has an approach that delivers results regardless of the business type.

Weiss strongly advocates that thought leaders position themselves as process experts. In this case, clients call because they know the process leader can devise a flexible approach that will yield the right outcome.

You have a similar choice to make.  While list posts are easy to write and capture attention, they also pigeonhole you as a “content expert”.  Readers will reference your list and forget about you.

Quick test to prove my point.  How often do you try to find the creator of an infographic?  Not often right?  You read the information, cut and paste it into a powerpoint, and move on. The same dynamic happens when a person reads a simple list of items.  They appreciate the information but tend to ignore the creator.

Your goal should be to position yourself as a process expert that has a variety of tools to address your reader’s problems.

The good news is that in this particular case you can have your cake and eat it too.

The List Hybrid

Instead of writing simple laundry list of information, create posts that share an unique approach to a problem.  Instead of a list, offer a multi-step process for getting results.  Of course, this is hard to pull off with 101-type posts but you should leave that stuff for Mashable or CNN.

Your list hybrid should be meaty with each list item delivering real information.  Your list hybrid should work as a unit, every item building on each other.  The reader should get maximum benefit by reading and implementing the entire list.

Most of all, the reader should finish the post hungry for more information.

The good news is that the post is still easy to digest.  You can still use the proven list post headline template (i.e. 7 Annoying Social Media Disorders).

The difference is that the reader gets a firm idea of how you think and approach the world.  When they think about their problem, they’ll remember each of your steps to solving it.  You become more than a librarian you establish yourself (post by post) as a Thought Leader.

Time is slippery.

On a Monday, it creeps along taunting you minute after agonizing minute.  Sunday evening it races along pulling Monday morning toward you at breakneck speed.

It seems arrogant to believe time can be managed.  Yet, we do.  My iPhone is stuffed with time management apps and at least three-different time-management systems jostle for attention in my laptop backpack.

Think about your schedule today.  Most likely you have a sense of what you want to accomplish.  You have appointments penciled in.  You have tasks listed.  You are ready to go.

However, by the end of the day something insidious happens.  Your task list only has one or maybe two completions.  You’ve been busy but nothing has been accomplished.  In your heart you know you had more than enough time but somehow the day has “gotten away from you”.

As a creator and publisher, I must  “ship”.  Time is money.  Ironically, I manage time best when I ignore the “systems” and focus on eliminating time wasters. I suspect that the same will work for you.

The War on Waste

In the Pursuit of Happyness, Will Smith is a investment trainee that has a list of cold calls he needs to complete everyday.

He can’t stay late to make his calls because he needs to hustle across town to check-in at the homeless shelter before it’s full.  In his words, “I had to do in 6 hours what they (his colleagues) could do in 9”

Necessity breeds innovation and Smith looks for any way to shave time wasters from his day.

He realizes that if he didn’t drink water during the day, he would spend less time in the bathroom freeing enough time to make a few more phone calls.  After a phone call, he keeps the handset on his shoulder, saving another 9 minutes adding  another several phone calls.  Eliminating waste creates time.

Inspired, I looked for similar wasters in my day.  I found six.

#1: Stalling

Stalling is different than procrastination.  Stalling happens after you’ve started a task.  It interrupts your momentum. My favorite blog writing stall is looking for a photo before I write the post.  You see, I have a post in mind but I decide to look for the perfect photo.  My conscious is appeased because I’m still writing a post – right?  Wrong.  Just stalling.  These little moments are so subtle that I don’t see how they steal hours from my day.

What are your favorite stallers?

#2.  Disorganization

The blank page steals another hour a day.  I used to start with a title and begin writing.  Most of my time was spent tapping the backspace key as I tried to create something from nothing.  My posts came out as jumbled streams of conscious requiring hours of editing.  What a waste.

Now, I never write unless I start with an outline.  I also gather all of my research and place it within easy access.  I follow the outline without wavering.  I don’t edit until the outline has been fleshed out into a full post.

Guess what happens?  I write 700-1,000 word posts in 30 minutes.  Just 10 minutes spent on an outline saves me at least an hour in deletes, rewrites, and head-scratching.  Disorganization – find it and kill it.

#3. Untimed Work

I used to love lazy Sunday afternoons.  After coming home from church, I would sit in front of my computer with a luxurious four hour time span to write my posts.  Heaven right?  Wrong.  I almost always spent the entire time fiddling with one post. The more time I had, the more I managed to waste.

Instead, I started setting a limit on my writing time.  Just one-hour to write, edit, and upload a post.  No more. Incredibly, the post ALWAYS got done.  For you quality naysayers out there, try this, my best posts are the ones I write in under one hour!

Why?  I believe that It’s hard for your brain to understand a “work until it gets done” directive.  On the other hand, your mind kicks in when it must marshal resources to beat a deadline.   Eliminate the “open time” temptation and watch how much time you gain.

#4.  Lack of Schedule

Similar to Untimed Work is an empty calendar.  I’ve learned that an “open day” is a wasted day.  Beat this time waster by scheduling your work and your breaks.  That’s right, fill your entire time with specific tasks and breaks.  I schedule coffee breaks, writing time, walks, Twitter responses, and more.

The cool part is that these days are incredibly efficient.  In fact, scheduled days are so productive that I often finish each task early.  My theory is that the saved time comes from time usually spent trying to decide “when” I will work versus just getting sh*t done.

Pull up your schedule.  Add your blog writing time.  Fill in your breaks.  Shoe-horn in other priorities.  Now get to work.  It will work, I guarantee it.

#5. Time Management Doodads

Productivity software and time-management apps just get in the way. All you need is today’s calendar,an egg timer, and an outline to get started.  Seriously, schedule your time on the calendar, set your egg timer for each task, follow your outline.  That’s it.

Before you waste precious time “testing” yet another system, ask yourself, “Does the app allow you to do more than one thing in less time?  Does this software noticeably improve the quality and value of my work?  If not, it might be a doodad that wastes time and not manage it.

#6. Multitasking

Multi-tasking is the antichrist of time-management.   Surprisingly, a recent study by the Harvard Business Review concluded that multi-tasking led to a 40% drop in productivity, increased stress and a 10% drop in IQ.  Multi-tasking makes you stupid.  Nice. Don’t do it.

I have an non-negotiable rule that states that I will only work on one-project at a time.  Blog posts are done in one block of time: no excuses, no exceptions, period.  Adopt the same rule and watch your posts get done in less time.

Putting It All Together

Try this tomorrow or even do this today.

Get to your desk 30 minutes early.  Write down three tasks that must get down.  One of those should be to write a blog post.

Print out your schedule for the day.  Grab a pencil and schedule each hour, include your three priority tasks, breaks, lunch, and drive time (for day job warriors).  Hint – your calendar should be full.

Next, write the outline for today’s blog post.  Set a timer and spend 15 minutes on this.  You will feel an irresistible urge to just write the post. Resist the urge.  Just write the outline.

Follow your schedule.  Interruptions will beguile you all day.  No worries.  Just return to your schedule.  When you get to your post writing block, perhaps at lunch time, pull out your outline, set your time to 30 minutes (leaving time for editing and uploading), and write the damn post.

Ever watch the Terminator, you know, the movie about the relentless cyborg that achieves its mission no matter the obstacle?  Well, you are a Pushing Social Terminator.  Complete your mission.

Come back here and tell me how you do.

{A Blog Moonlighting Installment}

I kicked of a new blog series, talked about ghost blogging, and even got a little militant with a Manifesto.

Enjoy.

5 Great Social and Business Articles Worth Reading Twice

5 Easy Ways to Drive Business with LinkedIn

LinkedIn doesn’t get as much attention as its glamorous cousins.  It’s dismissed as being a digital rolodex.  But, savvy pros are using it everyday to build relationships and power their business.  Laura Click offers 5 quick ways you can start using LinkedIn for your business too.

The Difference Between Money Work and Busy Work

Are you actually earning money or just staying busy?  This concise gem cuts to the core of the most important question in business – where do you spend your time?

What Does it Take to Write a Billion-Dollar Marketing Story

What can Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles teach you about marketing?  Plenty, in fact a billion dollars worth of marketing advice is packed into this incredible post.  Take a look.

PR Pro: I Bought Twitter Followers

I love articles like this.  As a social media thinker I often get distracted by the faux ethics of social media.  This author bought followers and offers a clear reason why.  Sure he’s getting the predictable tsk, tsk from the social priesthood but his reasoning is sound.  See for yourself.

How I Built a Blog That Earned $10,000 in 5 Months

Show me the money!  This is a great article by the genius behind Kaiserthesage  - an amazing blog about cutting edge SEO tactics.  The author set-up a blog and used solid techniques to earn $10,000 quickly.  Follow his roadmap and get his results.

On Pushing Social This Week:

3 Sure Signs That Your Small Business is Ready for Social Media

I believe in the power of social media even social business.  However, social only works if you start with a solid business. Here’s a slap on the rump to stay focused on the “real deal” first before getting carried away with social media.

The Pushing Social Manifesto

I respect you and your dreams.  This manifesto describes exactly why.

3 Ways to Get Blog Content When You’re Strapped For Time

An awesome debut guest post from Lukas Pleva.  He offers an in-depth guide for using freelance writers for blog content.  It’s a must read.

How to Grow a Spectacular Blog Even If You Have a Day Job

I’m kicking off another series that will cover the productivity, time-management, and balance side of running a successful blog.  I’ll serve up the first installment on Monday.

PS Readers Spotlight

Every week I highlight a PS Reader who has asked me to review their blog.  This is a shout out to them and a gentle nudge for you to check them out.  :)

This week the spotlight is on: Meredith Johnston at Yoga Vibes.   Yoga Vibes is a cool online learning center for anyone interested in Yoga.  I offered the Yoga Vibes team 10 recommendations for bringing their blog up to the same level as their innovative service.

Not all businesses are ready or even suited for social media strategies.

One of most important decisions you make everyday is where to spend your time.  Social Media takes time sometimes lots of time and you should be sure you’ll get a return for your investment.

I noticed that the people I respect the most in the business world don’t wax poetic about “being human” or get misty-eyed over “engagement”.  These business owners care about their customers.  They are serious about building great products. Most of all, they want to get paid.  They recognize that profits create jobs and grows businesses.

Sometimes social media contributes to that goal.  Sometimes social media is a waste of time.  Beware of anyone who are enamored with the idea of social more than its effective application.

When I’m asked to create a social media strategy, I look for three signs.  These signs have never steered me wrong.  Apply them to your business to see if you are really ready for social media.

#1: Sales and Customers

Specifically, does your business know how to create a great product and sell it to customers?  This is much harder than it sounds, 80% of new businesses fail this test every year.  If you can convince a complete stranger to give you cash then you have the foundation for building profitable relationships.  Pound for pound, customers are the best sources of new and repeat business.

Customers will follow you on Twitter.  They will check out your Facebook page.  They will comment on blog posts.  Customers have a vested interest in your success.  Before you spend time debating the merits of auto-posting on Twitter, invest time in getting a growing roster of delighted customers.

#2: A Product Hero

People love sharing stories about products that delighted or surprised them.  Unfortunately, they also love telling people about product disappointments too.  Before you obsess over your Facebook Cover Photo, make sure you have a product that creates word-of-mouth moments.

There is a local coffee shop that roasts and brews absolutely incredible coffee.  The owner taught me how to make my own pot of coffee using a fascinating “slow pour” method,  Now, I can brew my own killer cup of coffee at home.  I’ve told this story at least a hundred times.  This coffee shop is ready for social media because they create these word-of-mouth moments every day.

Are you creating these moments with your customers?  Are your customers asking for cards to pass out to their friends?  If so, your business is ready for social media.

#3: A Passion for Service

Are you obsessed with customer service?  Does it pain you to know that some customers don’t understand your product or service?

The best social media strategies are executed by businesses that are built around customer education and satisfaction.  Companies that are motivated solely by process and profit often stumble in the social arena.  Southwest Airlines’ social success isn’t a fluke.  They have a passion for service.  They make it a priority to create content that will help their customers.  Other airlines falter because they lack this singular dedication to service.

I believe that local businesses should excel in this area.  My neighborhood grocer has my permission to share his local growers initiative with me.  The local italian restaurant has earned the opportunity to show me how to create gnocchi in my own kitchen.  The local tanning booth…well anyway you get the picture.

You can’t fake it until you make it with social.  You have to get service right before you can inspire others to share.

What if You Fail the Social Media Test?

First, congratulations for being honest.  You’ve probably already identified an area that needs your attention.

• A lack of sales points to a communication mismatch between customers and your product.
• A clunky product means testing, steady customer feedback, or even starting over.
• Poor service requires a “culture makeover.”  Time spent on these issues will yield real success.

Here’s the deal.  You won’t find the answers to these questions on social media blogs.  These are business questions not Twitter, Facebook, or even social business questions.  I recently encouraged an audience to find new role models.  This is definitely the case if you are working on your business.

For me, I rely on Marie Forleo, Eric Ries, Brendon Buchard, Brian Clark, for solid business advice.  When I want to connect the dots between social and business I ignore “opinion”  leaders and seek out veterans like Mark Schaefer, Mitch Joel, and Jay Baer.

Tell me.  Did you pass the test?  Is it time you found a new role model?

If you are a business owner and are reading this post, you’re probably all too familiar with the benefits of maintaining an active blog.

Blogging provides a low-cost platform for demonstrating that you’re an industry thought leader, driving more qualified traffic to your website, and eliciting meaningful engagement from your prospects.

The magic word, however, is “active”, and that’s where the problems start.

After publishing a lengthy post outlining the reasons why blogging is an essential component of a successful Internet marketing strategy, I had a lot of small business owners contact me for advice on what they can do if they want to blog, but just don’t have the time.

As the son of two successful small business owners, I definitely sympathize. When you own a business, marketing is just one of the many responsibilities that you have to attend to each day, things like payroll, inventory management, customer service, and, you know, actually running the business!

To make the content acquisition and publishing process a bit easier for folks who are barely getting any sleep as is, I figured I’d share three tried-and-true ways of securing quality content for your company blog without breaking the bank:

IN-HOUSE BLOGGER / FREELANCE WRITER

If you don’t have the time to write your own blog posts on a consistent basis, hire someone else to do it for you! There are a lot of people who (try to) make a living by blogging, and they are almost always looking to take on more clients.

Many of these folks are former journalists, so if you look hard enough, there is some quality talent out there. When hiring a freelancer, be sure to spend some time looking over their portfolio, and don’t be afraid to ask the hard questions.

There are both paid and free options. For the former, be sure to check out the ProBlogger jobs board. Although I haven’t used it personally, people I trust and respect swear by it. A 30-day listing costs $50, but again, from what I hear, it’s more than worth it.

For free alternatives, consider posting a project on Guru.com, Elance, oDesk, and/or Freelancer.com. Each of these sites is unique, but the basic idea’s the same, employers post a project and companies/freelancers apply by submitting bids. At the end of the bidding period, you can either pick a winner or simply let the posting expire.  A basic posting is free, and there’s no obligation to actually hire someone.

I’ve successfully hired freelancers from project postings on Guru.com, but here’s a word of caution: always do your research. There’s a lot of noise, and too many stories of people getting ripped off. If I was ever looking to hire guest bloggers, I’d pay the $50 for a ProBlogger posting. As the common saying goes, you get what you pay for.

GUEST BLOGGERS

The idea behind guest blogging is simple. There’s you, the business owner looking for blog content, and there’s the blogger, looking connect with new audiences and earn an inbound link pointing back to his or her website. Sounds like a match made in heaven, no?

The blogger provides you with a free, bylined post that you can publish on your own blog in return for a link that helps the blogger’s own search engine optimization efforts (links are a significant component of the algorithm that determines how high a website ranks in search results).

Here are two of my favorite (and free!) platforms that I use to find and connect with potential guest bloggers:

BloggerLinkUp — essentially a guest blog mailing list, meant to be used by both bloggers and people looking for content. You fill out a short form with details like your blog URL, what industry you’re in, and what your specific needs are.

Cathy Stucker, the brains behind the operation, then compiles all of the requests into an email that’s sent out to all Blogger LinkUp subscribers three times a week (Monday, Wednesday, and Friday). Since it’s a really popular service, there’s a lot of noise, but in my experience, the hidden gems are more than worth it. 

MyBlogGuest– similar to Blogger LinkUp, but in a forum/message board format. You create a profile and then post requests in the relevant category. If you use WordPress, you can enable a feature that allows authors to submit a post directly into the WP interface (you still have to approve the post). This means you don’t have to spend time on proper formatting, which is a nice perk. As with LinkUp, do due diligence before you agree to actually publish something.

A quick note before we move on. Unless you are already a very established writer, it’s unrealistic to assume that you can sustain your blog with guest posts alone. Remember, the point of maintaining a blog is to showcase YOUR expertise, and to demonstrate to potential clients and customers that YOU are the authority.

If your blog is full of posts by people who are not you (at least judging by the byline), the blog will start to lose its purpose.

GHOSTWRITING SERVICE

 Not my favorite option, but definitely a viable alternative to websites like Elance and Guru.com if you’re on budget.

There are countless services that employ bloggers and freelancers as contractors. If you’re looking for a one-time writer, you submit a request that specifies the post topic and approximate word count. In most cases, you’ll also be able to indicate the level of quality that you’re looking for; the better the quality, the more you’ll pay, usually per word. The bloggers are employed as ghostwriters, which means that you’ll be able to publish the posts with your own byline.

There are quite a few platforms to choose from. I’ve had pretty good results with TextBroker.com, opting for the four-star quality rating (maximum is five). The key is to be as clear as possible in your description of what an ideal post looks like, and to submit constructive revision requests.

Before we wrap up, let’s talk briefly about a major concern that accompanies having someone else write for your blog (even if your name appears in the byline): sounding authentic. There are plenty of companies with in-house bloggers that run successful blogs, so rest assured, it can be done.

The goal is to cultivate a long-term relationship with a few select bloggers that you’ll be able to consistently rely on, regardless of your posting frequency.

If you’re hiring a freelancer, take the time to get to know the best applicants, and ensure that they fully understand your business and the brand that goes with it. This might take some time, but it’ll be more than worth it in the long run.

If you’re relying on a platform like TextBroker, be prepared for some initial hit-and-miss. Over time, if you identify authors that you can really connect with, start working with those bloggers directly. TextBroker provides this option via its DirectOrder module.

Finally, if you’re opting for guest blogs, make it a requirement for guest authors to read through past posts that you had written yourself, and which provide the best examples of the tone that you’re looking for.

All right, folks, that about wraps it up! If you have any additional tips that I didn’t mention here, feel free to share in the comments!

LukasPleva is a blogger, SEO enthusiast and aspiring inbound marketer. When he’s not a student at The University of Chicago, he oversees online marketing campaigns for St. PeteBagelCo., an online bakery specializing in the sale of NYC bagels and bialys.

People are often surprised to hear that I have a “day-job”

Yep, Pushing Social is my “second” job. After working eight hours, I come home, hang out with the family, and then write, plan, and scheme for several hours every night. I have been doing this for the last two years. As Pushing Social has grown so has my time commitment.

While attending Social Slam, I discovered that many people are Moonlight Bloggers. They split their time between a career that feeds their family and a blog that feeds their soul. Sometimes the two goals overlap and at other times they don’t. The common denominator is that everyone is working their tail off.

Since I’ve started Pushing Social, I’ve been filling a notebook with little tips and tricks I use to manage being both Peter Parker and Spiderman.

My grab bag of techniques is split between 5 Moonlight Blogger “Challenge” areas:

Time Management:

Moonlight Bloggers work hard all day from 7am to 11pm. Every minute is squeezed for maximum productivity and quality. I talked a little about how I manage my time in a recent post. I have a lot more that I want to share.

Productivity:

Getting Things Done, To-Do Lists, priority lists, I’ve tried them all. I’ve learned that productivity is blend of passion, energy, and focus. If you have all three then you will be productive. The trick is increasing your passion, energy, and focus and finding balance among all three.

Tools:

The right tool is a force multiplier that creates exponential value from one activity. I’ve tested, discarded, and implemented dozens of tools that make blogging easy and fun. It’s easy to get lost in the expanding jungle of apps, websites, and gadgets. I can help you navigate this jungle and find the tools that are best for you.

Creativity:

I’m “left-brained” to the core. I love language and logic. The challenge is that successful blogging is a mix of logic and imagination. Over the years, I’ve learned ways to hack into my right-brain when I need a burst of inspiration and creativity. I’ve also worked with right-brain savants that need ways to organize their fantastic creative powers. So I’ve reverse engineered my hacks to help to creatives organize and implement their blogs.

Balance:

I’m not wired to be calm and balanced. I’m a classic Type-A professional that loves a shot of adrenaline with my morning coffee. On the other hand, frantic multitasking, creating chaos, and disorganization annoys the piss out of me. I’ve had to learn how to balance time management, productivity, tools, and creativity into a system that yields results quickly.

Here’s the deal. Up until now, I’ve been hoarding all of my tricks and tips to myself.

It’s time to share them with you.

The Moonlight Blogger Series:

For the next 5 weeks, I’ll show you what I’ve discovered. These posts will be a mixture of podcasts, blogs, and videos (when I find a quiet moment…tough to do with three boys).

I want to make this series as powerful and effective as possible, so I need your help. Take a moment to share two things with me:

1. Which area you have the most trouble with and
2. How much time you have to blog every day.

Your answers will help me zero in on the information that will be most helpful for you.

Let’s get started.

{Image credit: NotoriousJEN}

I spend a lot of time talking about your email list for one reason: you are not converting 100% of your visitors into buyers, leads, or repeat visitors.

This means that you spend 100% of your time trying to find NEW blog readers.  This is the rat race that burns out 80% of bloggers within one year.

On the other hand, successful blogs have a head start because they have an established audience nurtured via email. The lesson is simple. You won’t grow unless you invest time in email.

The big question now becomes: “How do I get people to sign up for my email list?”

I can write a book on this topic (I might) but today I’ll focus on helping you create an effective subscriber bonus.

Why You Need a Subscriber Bonus

People HATE giving away their email address.  Simply asking for it won’t get the job done.

The best way to get their address is to trade for it.  You give them something valuable in exchange for permission to send them email.

You might be saying: “Stan, I already offer blog updates”.  Sorry.  That isn’t good enough. They can get your blog via RSS or just visit every day.  Since they don’t know you, your visitor will need to see more value. That’s where your subscriber bonus comes in.

How to Create A Subscriber Bonus in 90 Minutes

I want you to get your subscriber bonus done before the end of the week.  I’ll do my part to show you how to get yours done in about 90 minutes.

Step 1:

Brainstorm the answer to this question:
What information does my audience always look for (or ask for) that is a pain for them to find?

Ideally you are looking for a problem easily solved with a list or explained with a step-by-step process.

For example:
“How do I raise a responsible teenager?”

Step #2:

Write a 2-page post that solves the problem identified in Step #1. I suggest writing your post in Google Docs or other program that  can save/export your document as a PDF.  This will be important in later steps.

Yes.  You can write more than 2-pages.  But if I hear a week from now that you are still writing the next Great American Novel,  I will find you and say mean things (probably).

Step #3:

Edit your post.  Add an introduction that explains the problem and how you plan to solve it. At the end of the post explain a little about yourself and the big idea behind your blog.  For a gold star add a call-to-action to follow you on Twitter or Like you on Facebook.

Step #4:

Create a catchy title that has a specific benefit.  Nothing clever or vague.  Use the proven “How-To” title format to make it easier.

For example:
“How to Get Your Teenager to Do Their Chores Without Complaining – A Simple 3-Step Process”

Step #5:

Dress up your Post.   If you have design skills you can add a fancy cover and other accents.  I normally don’t fuss over this stage. You’ll be okay with just adding page numbers and section headings to make it easy for your reader to skim the information.

The goal is to provide useful information not win a design contest.

Step #6:

Save your Post as a PDF.  PDF is a popular document format that almost anyone can read.

Step #7:

Revise your current email opt-in form telling readers about your free bonus.  You may not have a lot of room so keep it simple.  For example: “Sign up for updates and get a free copy of “How to Get Your Teenager to Do Their Chores Without Complaining”

Final Step:

Configure your email autoresponder to send the PDF report as an attachment with a welcome email.  You can also save your PDF on your server and offer people a download link.

KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid)

I love to complicate things.  Seriously.  I can create a 10-page manual for making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich!  Resist the urge to make your email bonus into a literary masterpiece.

Notice that I tried to “seduce” you by calling your bonus a post.  It’s much easier to write a post than a big bad “Special Report”.  Just sit down and write a helpful post on one problem.  That’s all.

If you find that people absolutely love your bonus then you can go back and pretty-it-up.  Like I said, for now we want to offer a solid informative bonus to entice more sign ups and grow your list.

Avoid “Newsletters”

I’m going to go out on a limb here and say, “I hate newsletters.”  They sound corporate and boring.

I mention this because some of you are scaring the beejesus out of your readers by offering them a newsletter.  They can’t visualize what it will be so they ignore it all together.

If you are calling your current email bonus a newsletter, try changing the label.  Call your offering a Guide, a Report, even a Note (i.e. “Every week I’ll send you a quick note with the latest news and tools”).

1,500+  Subscribers in 90 Days

I offer the 7 Minute Blog Strategy Guide as a bonus for my email subscribers.  My list jumped to over 1,500 subscribers immediately after I started offering the bonus.  You’ll see that others have seen similar success.

Here’s the deal…

This is so important to your blog’s success that you should put off writing your next post until you’ve finished this.  When you do, tell me about it below so I can hoot and holler about it on Twitter.

Ok, go to work and let me know if you have any questions in the comments below.

This is a guest post by Gregory Ciotti, founder of Sparring Mind, the psychology + content marketing blog.

I’ve always said that if you want to create content that gets shared, you need to be pushing people’s buttons.

The kind of blog post that gets noticed is the one that generates real “emotional arousal” from the reader: your blog shouldn’t read like a vanilla, vapid, and needlessly dry Wikipedia article!

The problem bloggers run into: How to create content that evokes an emotional response, without pissing everybody off!

Today I’ve got a great content creation tactic that will help you solve that exact problem!

The “Flag Planting” Content Method

Of all the methods to get people fired up about a piece of content, I’ve yet to find one as effective as what I’ve termed the “flag planting” method of content creation.

When people are forced to pick sides, emotions are automatically triggered: look at how sports fans behave, they often state that, “We won yesterday!”, when referring to their favorite team, despite the fact that they aren’t a team member.

And yet, they feel like a team member because they’ve chosen a side, and if politics or soccer riots are any indication, aligning yourself to a “side” evokes VERY strong emotions.

The question is: why bother?

Well, in a recent Wharton School of Business study entitled “What Makes Online Content Go Viral?”, researchers Jonah Berger & Katherine Milkman determined that content that evokes a high emotional arousal is the most likely to get shared.

Flag-planting allows you to create this emotional arousal by picking a side and “fighting the good fight”, which is sure to result in people who agree with you leaping to your defense.

On the flip-side, those who disagree with you will want justice, and they will end up giving verbose explanations as to why they disagree, or posting an outraged rant slandering your good name down in the comments section.

Why would you want to do this?

Well, truth be told, utilizing the “flag-planting” technique can be dangerous, and you definitely don’t want to do it for every blog post.

The reason why it’s risky is that we all know it’s not going to work if you pick a side on a boring or totally obvious topic:

I don’t care what ANYONE thinks, I’m here to tell you that pizza is delicious!

In order to make this tactic work, you need to be picking a controversial topic in your niche, or making claims that may be controversial to the community surrounding your blog’s topic.

Luckily, I’ve found a way to regularly create content that allows you to engage in flag-planting, all the while avoiding many of the risks involved…

Before we get into that though, let’s look at creating flag-planting content ‘al natural’, with a great example of why pushing buttons can be incredibly beneficial.

Marcus Sheridan Speaks His Mind

The following is a great example of flag-planting content even though there wasn’t a “black and white” outcome to the issue at hand.

What I mean is, there wasn’t an A/B option in this situation, but the blogger in question (Marcus Sheridan of The Sales Lion) managed to stir up a buzz by planting his flag steadfastly in one “camp” of opinion.

In his blog’s most popular post (400+ comments), Marcus outlines the apparent hypocrisy of the 2011 Blog World Expo.

In the post, Marcus is very critical of how things were handled in the last keynote, citing that the lack of focus, vulgarity, and the absence of professionalism shown by some of the speakers “acts” was not doing justice to bloggers who wished to be taken seriously in a young and budding industry.

Particularly, Marcus laid blame on the organizers rather than the panel itself, claiming (with a well reasoned argument) that so much of the content of the last panel just wasn’t appropriate for the event, and a huge disappointment.

Furthermore, Marcus claimed there was hypocrisy because another presentation containing the word “douchebags” was censored due to ‘lack of professionalism’, despite the fact that the final keynote seemed to be where it was lacking (thus, the hypocrisy).

Marcus himself has talked about how popular that post was for him, and it’s no surprised that it stirred up buzz: he took a side and laid out a well reasoned argument for his strong opinion, which is the essence of a great flag-planting post.

No surprise, the comment section is reminiscent of a political debate, with sides in support of and in disagreement with Marcus:

—

Against:

For:

—

Did he write the post just to get the traffic for creating drama?

Of course not, if you’ve ever seen Marcus interviewed you’d know that his passion about blogging is genuine: this post was definitely from the heart.

Given that, it’s hard to deny the benefits of picking a side on something you feel strongly about and “letting ‘er rip”.

Sometimes you just need to lay out your stance and stick to your guns: you’ll see from the comments of Marcus’ post that a lot of people felt the same way, but just didn’t speak up until Marcus made the first move.

How Can I Avoid Pissing People Off?

I mentioned above that there is a way to utilize this method on a more regular basis without creating an angry mob around your brand.

How is this possible?

Through a method I like to call the “vanguard evidence” technique.

Essentially, when writing a flag-planting post, you can utilize evidence to support your case as the icebreaker to your entire article.

I’ll give you a great example to showcase what I mean.

Derek Halpern wrote a piece called the “Content Is King Myth Debunked”, where he outlined his thoughts on why content isn’t king, and that it’s design that has the biggest effect on the trustworthiness of a site.

Big claim to make, and one that undoubtedly was going to push some buttons.

Firmly planted in his “camp”, Derek was smart to direct attention away from his own opinion and onto his evidence.

For that, he used a study called “Trust and Mistrust in Online Health Sites”, which was a research study that showcased how people judged the trustworthiness of a website mostly by it’s design/layout, rather than it’s content.

Essentially, Derek was able to state a strong opinion in a flag-planting post but was also able to direct the actual debate to be focused around a piece of evidence, rather than his own personal opinion.

You Can Do This Too!

You don’t need to be into psychological research like myself or Derek Halpern to quote studies as your evidence.

All you need is some source of information on a buzzworthy topic that you’re about to write about.

People trust information even if it contains only a few additional sources because there is a strong faith in data for most people, whereas faith in the opinions of others can be quite low.

Data doesn’t intentionally lie, people do.

Check out how Copyblogger set up a post called “Is Pinterest Traffic Worthless?”.

Here’s another post by Josh Kaufman (author of The Personal MBA) on IWillTeachYouToBeRich.com on paying for college and grad-school, describing the false assumptions that many people have.

In both of these examples, the aim was to get people fired up, yet the potential wrath of naysayers was re-directed towards “emotionless” evidence rather than creating a me vs. you feeling.

In the Copyblogger post, analytics from the Copyblogger Media sites were used to justify many points.

In the Josh Kaufman post, numerous articles from the NYTimes and The Economist were used when making the biggest claims.

In both, the authors stood their ground on their opinions, but you can tell from the comments (even the dissenting opinions) that the discussion was based around “arguing the evidence” rather than arguing with each other.

That’s the key with these posts, even though you won’t be able to please everybody, utilizing 3rd party (or even personal) evidence in the form of data or other types of information, you can direct conversation away from being a mudslinging fest (like in a political campaign) and create a comment section that has the feel of an orderly debate over information, rather than over personal opinion.

Over To You

What do you think of this tactic?

It’s been incredibly useful for me in building Sparring Mind, since I focus on psychological studies.

How do you plan on using it for your blog’s topic?

Gregory Ciotti is the author of Sparring Mind, a blog that takes psychology + content marketing and makes them place nicely together. Check out his free e-Book on ‘Conversion Psychology’ if you’d like.

Tim Ferriss, author of the The Four Hour Workweek and The Four Hour Body published a video that documented his day.  Tim is a New York Times Bestselling author and has an outrageously successful blog as well.  That’s why I paid special attention to his writing environment.

As you would imagine, Tim’s writing environment is optimized for creativity.  He uses a stand-up desk to keep him focused on writing and not lounging.  He drinks a special tea along with a glass of wine to relax and prime his creative juices.

Problem is…I’m not Tim Ferriss

My modest 3 bedroom home packed with 3 boys isn’t exactly an oasis of relaxation.

Shouting and wrestling aside, My writing environment is as important asI consider my writing environment to be as important as my computer and text editor.  I refine the environment constantly looking for the optimal balance of calm and inspiration.

You should too.

This is what you should consider:

1.  Standing or Sitting:

The standing desk movement is starting to build momentum.

It seems that standing actually is healthier and aids focus.  I plan on giving it a try soon.  The point is that you want adopt a posture that leads to maximum focus.  Sitting sometimes aides distraction rather than concentrated work.

2. Music:

I’ve been experimenting with music variations for years.  I’ve found that a piano arrangement is the mother’s milk of creativity.  It’s easy to slip into the zone and pound out page after page of copy.

Research says that music works best for people who need a high level of stimulation to focus.  These are the folks that need the TV, radio, kids scurrying under foot, and an open magazine to concentrate.  Low level of arousal people need complete silence.  Most of us fall in between.

Test to see what works for you.

3. Priming the Pump

I often watch a TED video before writing.  The inspiration rubs off on me and I can channel the feeling into my writing.  I have a friend that can sit down and start writing immediately.  I envy her.

If you have difficulty “getting started” think about ways you can “prime the pump.”  Read an inspirational short story, watch a video, or remember a time when you operated at your peak.  Now channel that into the spark you need to get going.

4. Distractions

On the Mac, you can set-up a desktop scheme that blocks out all other apps (AKA distractions).  You can also use a text editor like Byword to blank out your screen except for text.    I use these tricks religiously to keep destructive distractions at arm’s length.  In my book anything that calls for your attention should be put away.  For me, this includes Twitter, Facebook, email and my iPhone (another computer in disguise).

5. Equipment

I focus on holy trinity Mouse, Monitor, and Keyboard.  Surprisingly, I watched my productivity soar when I used an app called Fl.ux to change the brightness of my screen to a calm warm glow at sunset.  The warmer screen did wonders for my concentration and relaxed me at the same time.

I usually work with two monitors, but I always turn one off while I write.  This helps me resist the temptation to fill it with Tweetdeck!  As for monitors, I go big.  This helps reduce eyestrain.  Use what works best for you.

Your mouse should be effortless, ergonomic and unobtrusive.  I love the Logitech MX Mouse.  It’s silky smooth, fits perfectly in my hand, and is accurate.  However I have been using the Apple Magic Trackpad and it’s slowly growing on me.  The Trackpad allows gestures and seems to disappear after a while.  The point is that your equipment shouldn’t stand in the way of your writing.

Bonus Equipment: I received a pair of Bose QC15 Noise-cancelling headphones.  They are magical.  They reduce 90% of ambient noise and have great sound quality.  I won’t write without them.

6.  Software  

I’m somewhat of a software junkie and I have tested dozens of applications.  As you would expect, software choice is based on the personality and style of the writer.  So there isn’t a perfect tool for everyone.

I use Google Docs.  Yep, simple Google Docs.  I like the auto-save and having my document automatically available in the Cloud.  ByWord is a close second because it helps eliminate distractions and has configurable paper colors that helps ease eye strain.

From here, I cut and paste my blog posts directly into WordPress.  I never write in WordPress.  When I’ve attempted it, one of two things happen: I hit the “publish” instead of update or inexplicably lose everything when the software seizes up.  So I write in the Docs first and paste when I’m finished.

7. Location 

I think it’s romantic to write at the coffee shop.  However, it’s usually a disaster for me.  I find myself obsessing over my next cup of coffee, people watching, and other well-meaning distractions.

My best place to write is in my home office, behind a closed-door, with the headphones on.  This arrangement is easy and leaves little room for procrastination.  Just go in, shut the door, and start typing.

Find a place that works for you and stick with it.  Experiment when you have low-importance work to get done until you are comfortable with your new location.

No Hard and Fast Rule Other Than…

Write!  When I started, I focused on everything but actually writing my darn posts!  So if you write best sitting on your back porch, in your boxers, sipping a margarita, with your laptop perched on your knees then do it.

I’m curious.  What is your perfect blog writing environment?

I‘m still on a high from the excellent Social Slam conference last week.  If you are stuck, discouraged, or burned out then find a conference and meet up with your customers, suppliers, and social friends IRL (In Real Life). It’s a terrific way to recharge.

Let’s end the week on a high note with 5 incredibly helpful links I found this week:

The Story of Money Is Not a Straight Line

Seth Godin visually explains (in a round about way) why free access to information doesn’t necessarily mean the reader will act on it.  Great insight for people who sell information, coaching, and training for a living.

The Heart of Innovation: The List of Lists

Inspiration, creativity, and innovation are the fuel for business success.  This list of lists will point you to the best resources on creativity and innovation on the Web.  Be careful, you can easily spend your entire day reading this captivating content.

Google+ Hangout Can Energize Marketing Plans

Bit by bit, I’m becoming a Google+ believer.  This article shows how to use Google Hangouts for impromptu and planned get togethers with your key customers.  Worth considering!

Traditional Advertising is Truly Dead

Robert Bruce makes a devastatingly accurate critique of the current state of traditional advertising.  This post is also a great example of an opinion post done well.

5 Ways to Open the Social Side Door and Build Relationships

Want to get noticed?  This article is an amazingly helpful guide to accomplishing your goal.  All 5 suggestions are unorthodox, proven, and unique.

On Pushing Social This Week

Blogging Tips for Coaches and Therapists

Specific blogging tips for professionals working to get clients for their practice.

7 Blog Promotions Tests You Should Try Now

Always Be Testing is the theme of this article.  Pushing the envelope and actively testing new promotion approaches is the only way to grow your blog readership.

The Key to Writing Blog Posts That Get Noticed

No it isn’t headlines, subheadlines, or other well-worn suggestions.  Actually, the key is much simpler than you think.

Digging Deeper: 10 Big Blogging Ideas for 2012

An in-depth at my 10 Ultimate Blogging Ideas presentation from Social Slam #SoSlam.

PS Reader’s Spotlight:

Every week I highlight a PS Reader who has asked me to review their blog.  This is a shout out to them and a gentle nudge for you to check them out.  :)

This week the spotlight is on: Shelley Miller at Home Exchange Expert .   Shelley has an amazing story and writing style.  I was so engrossed in her stories that I forgot that I was supposed to be critiquing her blog!

By far, the most common question I get from coaches and therapists is:
“How do you publish a blog that attracts clients without giving away free consulting?”

Coaches and therapists wrestle with this question because they need to demonstrate their expertise but leave room for an opportunity to sign a new client.  Social media purists would scoff at this notion and advocate a Give and have Faith approach.  Give away all you can and have faith that clients will materialize due to your largess.

Unfortunately, this isn’t practical.  If you have hungry mouths to feed, the Give and Have Faith approach quickly turns to Scream and Panic.

The good news is that there is way to use your blog to build your client base without “giving away the farm.”

“Pre-Sell” Posts for Coaches and Therapists

Note: I will use the term coach and therapists  interchangeably.

It’s important to remember that your future clients are looking for proof that you can get results.  For example, the career coach must prove that they have an approach for helping clients successfully transition between industries.  Their clients want to know that they will get value during their very first session.

Your blog is the stage for demonstrating value, building relationships, and getting the first call.

Each post must move your client closer to the point of decision.

Try these  “Audition” posts that convince and empower your clients to contact you:

Diagnosis:

Diagnosis posts help your clients pinpoint and articulate their challenge.  The first coach that can explain a client’s problem wins.  Use Diagnosis posts to give your clients a vocabulary for describing their problem.  This common vocabulary will create the first strand of trust needed to convince your client of sincerity and expertise.

Diagnosis posts often take the form of checklists and Yes/No flowcharts.  The goal is to offer your client an “aha” moment where they say: “Finally, someone understands what I’m feeling.”

Buying Criteria:

In high-end consultative selling, sales people work hard to frame the buying criteria for a solution.  For example, a compensation/benefits consultant wants to be the first to publish “The 7 Characteristics of a Great Compensation Consultant”.  This post sets the “buying criteria” and makes life hard for every other consultant being considered.

You want to do the same with your practice.

Help your prospective clients understand how to search for and select a therapist.  These posts work best if you are honest and comprehensive.  Don’t try to rig the list in your favor.  Client’s are suspicious of businesses that can “do it all”.  Remember that you win by simply getting your client to use your buying criteria.

The Results Appetizer:

Go to LewisHowes.com and sign-up for a webinar.  Lewis is a LinkedIn expert that has a high-powered consulting approach.  He’s a popular webinar speaker because he can get results for webinar participants immediately. While on the call, he shows how to get ranked #1 on LinkedIn and sure-as-heck it works.

Tell me, wouldn’t you want to immediately hire someone who can give you a “Results Appetizer?”  Absolutely.  This lowers the risk of the investment and helps you visualize what you’ll get. Look for an opportunity to do the same for your clients.  Contact me if you need a sounding board.

Your Approach:

It’s important to understand that you promote what you do and you get paid for “how” you do it.  Use your blog posts to thoroughly explain to what you do.

The best techniques for framing your approach are frameworks, case studies and stories.  Frameworks provide a step-by-step process to understanding your method they also prove your expertise.  Case studies are effective tools for concretely showing you have clients that benefit from your approach.  Stories make you approachable and irresistible.  Who can resist a coach that can tell an uplifting, thoughtful and relevant story?

Change of Pace

As you noticed, I’m shifting the Small Business Thursday Series to focus in on specific types of businesses.  If you would like me to feature your industry or niche then put your request in the comment section.

{Image credit: mnadi}

Just so you know, I promised a traffic building post every week for everyone working on the 1,000 New Blog Reader Challenge.  I missed one last week, so I’m making it up to you today.

When I started, I remember doing all the standard stuff ( guest posted, commented, participated in forums, writing good headlines) and asking “what’s next?”  Like most, I was frustrated that all the “new” advice was just old-advice with better packaging.  So, I started conducting experiments and tests to find strategies and tactics to take my traffic to the next level.

Although this is an ongoing process I have 7 tests that are doing exceptionally well.

Take a look:

1. Write A Weekly “Curated” Post

According to Hubspot, businesses that post daily will generate 5 times more traffic than those that post weekly or less.   Now this statistics probably terrifies you.  You might be struggling with posting once a week!

I get it.  I know you are busy.  Let’s compromise with adding one more post a week.  Run a month test where you publish a weekly wrapup post on Friday.  This post should include links that would interest your readers.  Look for tools and resources that haven’t been covered in the mainstream press.

That’s only 4 extra posts a week.  You probably can re-use the links that you’ve posted on Twitter throughout the week!

2. Add Blog Teasers to Your Facebook Page

Do you have a strong Facebook audience that doesn’t visit your blog?  Try posting teaser excerpts on Facebook.  These excerpts would tell the reader why they should read the post.  Add a link to your blog post.

Do this for every post for a month.  Watch your “Referral Traffic Sources” in Google Analytics.  You are looking for an increase in traffic from Facebook for the test period.  Even better if you see significant spikes on the days you post your excerpt.

3. Answering Questions

Marcus Sheridan, The Sales Lion, recommends listing all your customer  questions and creating online content that answers them.  Of course, blog posts are a great way to answer these questions and encourage engagement.

Gather your team, go to the coffee shop and list every single question that you can.  Review your list and group your questions into categories.  The categories could become the title for a blog series.  Start with the most frequent questions and write informative “how-to” content.  Tackle the rest of the questions in order of priority.

I suspect that you have enough questions to fill your editorial calendar for the next year.  Tell me if I’m right in the comments.

4. Adding an Email Blog Update Opt-In

Let’s be frank.  You probably threw up a standard “Get Blog Updates” form on your sidebar and called it a day – right?  Ok, scoot close because I want to tell you something.

I get close to 400 visitors a day from email subscribers about 40% of my daily traffic.

The social movers and shakers quietly cultivate and protect their email lists because they know it’s their #1 marketing asset.  Take a play from their book and give your Blog Update sign-up form the attention it deserves.

Tell your readers “why” they should sign up for blog updates.  Offer free bonuses for signing up to jumpstart the process.  Regularly “surprise and delight” your email list with exclusive content and offers.  Focus on this for a month and see how you do.

By the way: I know that it can be difficult to set-up a decent sign-in form.  Let me know if you need help.

Click to see the original

5. Create a Post Manifesto and Add to Pinterest

The folks at Shareaholic published a study that reported that Pinterest drove more Traffic to online publishers than Twitter in February 2012.  This caught my attention and I’m actively working on a strategy for testing Pinterest’s traffic building credentials.

Lately, Copyblogger has been publishing clever one-line shots across the bow. The latest one “1,000 Words Can Make You Immortal – 140 Characters IS Just Distribution” was published on Copyblogger and “pinned” on Pinterest.  The graphic has been pinned 136 times in the last 6 weeks.

Hmm…

Here’s what I recommend…

Review your posts and look for a pinnable quote, manifesto, or point-of-view.  Spend some quality time with your graphic software or call your graphic designer and post to your blog.  Add the Pin It button to your social icons (easy with BufferApp) and see how you do.

Have you already tested this?  How did you do?

6.  Gentle Keyword Optimization

Bloggers cast a skeptical eye at SEO.  For good reason, content publishing focuses on reader needs not search engine algorithms.  But…

Google loves blogs and routinely gives them traffic love.  So to borrow a phrase from the Scribe folks, you should look for ways to “gently spoon feed” keywords to the search engines.

For this test, use the Google Keyword Tool to create a list of 2-3 work keyphrases that describes your blog’s content and subject matter.  Now look for opportunities to use the keyphrases and words in your blog title, leads, and subheadlines.  That’s it.
Keep this up for the next 60 days.  No need to obsess over this – just include the keywords when you can and only if it makes sense.

7.  Add Blog Post Teasers to Google+

Google is working its butt off to transform Google+ into a viable social platform.  I’ve gained a new appreciation for Google+ as I’ve seen my traffic rise as I spend more time sharing on the platform.

Like Facebook, I recommend publishing blog post teasers to entice readers to your blog.  Of course, you can publish your entire post on Google+ but you’ll miss out on readers browsing your blog for more content.

Thirty days are all you need.  Like the Facebook test, keep a close eye on your “Traffic Sources” in your Google Analytics reports.  You should see Google+ show up or often.

Are you a heavy Google+ user?  Have you seen traffic increase with your involvement?

ABT – Always Be Testing.

Get obsessed about testing.  Keep an eye out for platforms that appeal to your audience and look for ways to attract them to your blog.  Determine how you will measure success (ie. uniques visits, time on page, bounce rate, etc) and keep a close on your numbers for the test period.  When something works, repeat the process to validate your findings.

If there is a secret to explosive blog growth – here it is – Always Be Testing.

See that comment area down there?  You know what to do.

P.S. If you want a few more proven blog traffic magnets from my goodie bag then take a look at this no-fluff special report

{image credit: Calsidyrose}

You’ve started a blog and have been writing your heart out for months.

Sometimes your post hits a nerve and get noticed but most times they languish without shares or comments.

It’s easy to use the standard blog post writing tool box and prescribe better headlines, different post types, and fancy diagrams depicting the perfect post.

The problem is that these solutions focus on “manipulating” the reader rather than giving them what they want.

What do readers want?

They want specific, relevant, and concise guidance for their particular situation.

However a review of many blogs show a wealth of first-person perspectives posts that are long on passion and short on relevant information. I call these “encouragement” posts and they are the staple of first-time bloggers, especially those in the coaching and self-help niches.

While, encouragement posts are easy to write, they have a significant weakness. They turn your reader into a spectator. The first-person narrative at the heart of encouragement posts puts you at the center of the story. This is the kiss of death for readers because they would rather put themselves at the center. They want to be the hero – as they should be.

I advise my blog review clients to review their editorial calendar and only write encouragement posts 1-2% of the time. This feels awkward at first but its necessary for you to reap the benefits from writing what I call “Guidance Posts.”

Write More Guidance Posts

I wrote about this before while exploring “The Hero’s Journey” and is critical for bloggers to understand.

Guidance posts teach and coach readers. They offer new concepts, frameworks, and points of view. They are the meat of your approach and value proposition. Readers love guidance posts because they are the hero. The narrative is pointed directly at their issue and they leave the post with tangible advice they can use.

Guidance Posts get shared. Guidance Posts get comments. Guidance Posts get promoted by influencers.

That’s why I recommend filling 60% of your editorial calendar with guidance posts. (For you math nerds out there, the other 38% focus on tools. More about that in another post.)

You are reading a guidance post now. If you look over my past work you’ll see that I rarely write encouragement posts. When I do, I always sneak in a little guidance

A Quick Look at a Scary Word

It’s Meta-Cognition or thinking about how you think.

The best teachers, speakers,and writers have a clear idea of why they think the way they do. Slightly confusing I know but it’s important.

A blog is a powerful tool for dissecting your thinking process. Seth Godin says that this is the primary reason why he blogs. If blogs are the platform then guidance posts force you to be explicit about your approach.

This is great because people pay for your approach. They hesitate to pay for your opinion.

Make sense?

Last week I spoke at Social Slam in Knoxville, TN. It was an absolute blast and the best conference I’ve ever attended. Huge thanks to Mark Schaefer who invited me and Fluency Media who sponsored my trip.

My talk followed the innovative Social Slam format which allowed me only 10 minute to share 10 Big Blogging Ideas for Social Media. Four other whip-smart social pioneers presented 10 ideas in their respective specialities. This meant that we had to cut to the meat pretty quickly before we got the hook.

I absolutely loved the format. The only drawback is that you can’t take questions or dig deep on specific ideas.

But that’s what I have a blog for! So I’ll give you the “expanded” version here.

Enjoy!

10 Big Blogging Ideas for 2012

Micro-Niching

Small is the new social black.

The large broad subjects are dominated by mega blogs with armies of writers. In 2012, blogs will succeed by identifying small audiences with specific problems that beg for novel solutions. If you are trying to write a general subject blog, pause, and rethink your focus. A smaller audience can help you zero in on a specific reader and give your blog more reach and engagement in the process.

You can refine your focus by looking for the subjects and challenges that are consistently popular with your audience.  Look for the common thread and look for ways to expand upon the subject.  You have a winner if you can identify a small to medium-sized audience that consistently engage around the subject.

Joint Blogging

Multiply your blog’s content and reach by partnering with up-and-comers in your niche. Bloggers are often solitary souls that pound out their posts in mood lit small offices. Reaching out to other bloggers isn’t our first thought. However, Joint Blogging is a smart way to expand your blog’s visibility, finding inspiration, and actually earning money.

I suggest looking for someone that has a complementary message. Offer them a guest post on your blog. Take the relationship a step further and work on a joint special report or ebook. From there you can collaborate on marketing and share in the revenue. You’ll find that many of the fast-rising blogging superstars are using this formula to multiply their efforts and expand their resources.

The Power Trio

Blogging is more than text. Add Podcasting and Webinars to your content mix to attract larger audiences and build deeper relationships. Podcasting will introduce you to a growing iTunes audience significantly expanding your audience base.

Webinars are a terrific tool for building closer connections with your audience through group coaching and education. You can start small with Google+ hangouts and expand to a GotoWebinar platform as you get more comfortable with the format.

Guerilla Promotion

Look outside of your blog for ways to promote your content. My favorites are invoices, packaging, bags, business cards, and any advertising you are running. Humble ads in your local yellow pages are full-time billboards that can bring in new readers.

Make sure to add a compelling “reason” for visiting your blog. Simply saying “connect with us” doesn’t convey a specific benefit.  Try “get exclusive offers, inside tips, and in-depth reviews at”.  This call to action communicates exclusivity and relevance an irresistible combination.

Mutant Content

Make your content work harder. Repurpose your blog posts to live on content hubs such as Slideshare and Pinterest. Take this idea one step further by turning your posts into a script for a podcast and turning slides into screencast videos. Slightly changing your content helps it appeal to readers who prefer to consumer information in ways other than text.  This is the reason infographics are so popular.  Targeting content hubs increases the chance that your content will appeal to the hub’s audience and attract new readers.

Bright Faces

People love people. Your readers want to see faces and not logos. Help them out by looking for opportunities to showcase your employees, customers, and even supplier photos in your blog posts.  Showcasing your audience also encourages them to share your content with their network – a Win-Win for everyone.

Blog Pep Rallies

Your readers are searching for a cause. They want to rally around a shared experience and solution to a problem. Give your readers something to be proud of. At Pushing Social, about 60 people are working together to get 1,000 new readers to their blogs.

Look for a similar cause for your blog readers. Your cause will unite them and build bridges of support.

Intentional Evangelism

Fans are not born. They are trained.

Think of every interaction with your audience as an opportunity to train a future fan. Ask yourself, “What would a reader need to know to be an advocate for my blog?” Should they know your mission? Do they know your core principles? Are they aware of your speaking engagements and other opportunities to meet you?
Adopt a Reader

Get a New Role Model

It’s easy to collect a group of role models that in your niche. The problem is that this often leads to echo-chamber posts and group think. Look outside your niche for inspiration. For me, I am an avid collector of anecdotes about Tim Cook, Apple’s new CEO. Tim Cook has a daunting challenge and I’ve already gained inspiration and more than a few blog post ideas from his efforts.

I challenge you to select a role model that isn’t a leader in your area of focus.  Look for someone with a different personality type and approach.  You’ll find that focusing on your role model will broaden your perspective and inspire new approaches.

Get The Presentation – Complete with Cool Pictures

You can see pretty presentation slides here.  Before you do that tell me which of these Big Ideas resonated with you?  Which one will you start on first?

Piers Morgan had his hands full.

Across from him sat the king of self-help, Anthony “Tony” Robbins.  Tony’s 6′ 7″ frame was folded into his chair and 110% of his energy was directed at Piers.

A bit shaken, Piers started with softball questions about Tony’s childhood.  Robbins absorbed the question and segued into his favorite topic – helping people achieve their potential.

Stymied, Piers focused on the abuse in Tony’s childhood.

Tony smiled and explained how the abuse in his childhood trained him to be a “Practical Psychologist”.  He went on to show how he used this tough training to help a quadriplegic learn to love life and his wife again.

Piers tried again with an edgy question about the role of government and what it should be doing for American citizens.

Again, Tony deftly redirected the question into a 5-point checklist on the promise of government and its opportunity to make a difference.  My wife leaned over and whispered, “I wish he were running for President”.

Piers had met his match.

You see, Piers Morgan’s job relies on a healthy dose of skepticism.  His brand is built on asking the hard uncomfortable questions.  CNN needs him to deliver the edgy interviews that accentuates the negative.  This is what the public wants and this is what Piers is paid to give.

If Piers Morgan penned a daily blog, I imagine it would be filled with cynical analysis of our leaders and a dubious outlook for our society.  I’m sure he would get attention in the short-term, but I doubt he would achieve Tony’s status.

Tony Robbins has become a multimillionaire and cultural icon by being positive.

Tony doesn’t rant.  He doesn’t attack his peers in thinly veiled opinion posts.  He just invests in people and helps them overcome the challenges in their lives.

Tony’s secret sauce is unbridled optimism.

Optimism – Is Exactly What Your Blog Needs

If you solve problems then you need to bear-hug optimism.

Optimism puts pep in your message and attracts readers to your cause.  Optimism gives your blog a glow that outshines the others who focus on the short-term attention offered by cynicism.

It’s hard to keep optimism at the core of your blog.  You’ll want to shout, rant and rave at the injustices around you.  It will be difficult to ignore the call of righteous indignation, but you must.

Your readers need to know that they get a healthy dose of empowerment from your blog.  Your readers should be able to bet on your unflinching resolve to be optimistic.

That’s how you succeed in blogging.

One Simple Optimistic Tip

What do you believe in?  What are your core values?  List ten.

Look at your list.  Is their at least one value that focuses on affirming and empowering others with raw unabashed optimism?  If not, then strongly consider doing what it takes to add it to your list.

Once you’ve finished your list of values, evaluate your blog through the lens of optimism.  Are you empowering your readers?  Which side of the interview table are you on – Piers or Tony’s?

Love to hear what you think about this.  You know what to do.

I fell in love with you all over again.

Just read the comments on the “Gory Details” to see why.  :)

In the meantime, here’s what caught my attention this week.

8 New Google+ Changes and How They Impact Your Business

Google completely changed the look of their signature social service – Google+.  Although the jury is out on Google+, I am intrigued with how to use it for business.  This Social Media Examiner offers 8 solid tips for whipping your Google+ page into shape.

How I Increased My Email Subscribers by 500% in One Week

How can you ignore a headline like that!  Normally these type of posts are long on hype and short on real advice.  SocialMouths delivers the “real goods”.  I immediately began analyzing Pushing Social using the solid email marketing advice offered by Francisco.  You should too…

Richard Feynman: The Pleasure of Finding Things Out

This post has nothing to do with social media, blogging, or content marketing.  It’s about how to think.  It’s valuable for that reason alone.  These are the types of posts and videos I read to stretch my creativity muscles and get inspired.  Take a look.

The 7 Bad Habits Of Insanely Productive People

If you want to know the secret to growing a blog to Copyblogger status then observe that headline…. The 7 Bad Habits of Insanely Productive People.  It’s a work of art that ambushes your eyeballs and hijack your attention.  Oh, and by the way it’s an insanely great post.  Check it out.

The Real Secret to 1,000 Blog Subscribers in 60 Days or Less

This post has some incredibly in-depth and rock-solid email subscriber advice.  But it’s on my list this week because it reinforces the need to produce incredibly useful content.  Neil Patel always delivers information worth reading and sharing.  Steal his methods if you know what’s good for you

On Pushing Social This Week:

7 Local Business Blogging Tips

Another installment for Small Business Blogging Thursdays.  This week, we turned our attention to building blogs focused on local readers.

How the 5 Whys Can Answer Your Most Challenging Blog Questions

Are you wrestling with a blogging or business challenge?  Try the 5 Whys.  They can help you diagnose and find the best way to overcome your challenge.

A WordPress Blog Hacking Nightmare – The Gory Details

This post has gone viral. It chronicles my horrific run-in with a blog hacker.  See how I restored Pushing Social and learned some valuable lessons in the process.

5 Unorthodox Tips for Finding Blog Inspiration 

Inspiration is a blogger’s most valuable resource.  Here are five ways to keep your inspiration well full.

PS Readers Spotlight:

Every week I highlight a PS Reader who has asked me to review their blog.  This is a shout out to them and a gentle nudge for you to check them out.  :)

This week the spotlight is on: Bronwyn Clee at Inspiring Change .   I love how Bronwyn uses her blog to give her potential clients a peek at the person behind the coach.