So, are all bloggers alike? What makes a particular blog stand out from others? What are the various types of bloggers and how is their approach to blogging different from each other? In this post, I talk about the 7 types of bloggers.

Experts

Expert bloggers are generally the been-there-done-that folks who’ve established themselves as subject matter experts in a specific field. These bloggers offer useful insights and tips to their readers about a specific domain. Their motivation is to help others achieve success in the same field by offering tips, advice using their professional experience.

Opportunists

Believe it or not, several bloggers have made a fortune by launching a blog about the right topic at the right time. For such bloggers, it’s all about grabbing eyeballs (read traffic) and making the most of the opportunity at hand. For example, they’d typically launch a new blog when a new high profile product/ service is launched and try to make monetary gains through advertisements, backlinks or similar means.

Promoters

And then there are bloggers who try to promote and soft sell certain products and services to their audiences. It’s fine as long as they do it in a subtle way and do not cross the line. The objective is to educate users about a particular product/ service and then pitch why readers should opt for it. Such bloggers need to draw a fine line to ensure that they do not offend readers with pushy promotions.

Opinionated

A number of bloggers use blogs as a medium to express their opinions on anything and everything. Such bloggers are typically a mixed bag for readers – they can produce valuable insights for the readers but they can also get involved in controversial postings. Their primary intention is to be heard and encourage readers to do the same.

News Reporters

There’s a whole breed of bloggers thriving on news. All they do is relay popular news on their blogs to gain traffic. Their primary focus is to earn revenue using SEO and advertisements. They often combine news content from multiple sites and serve as aggregators.

Publicity

A number of bloggers blog because it brings them publicity and fame. Most celebrity bloggers fall in this category. A blog provides them with a public channel to interact with their fans and critics.

Inspirational

Last but not the least, there are bloggers who inspire their readers. These are people with whom the audience can relate to, and inspire them to achieve what they want. The idea is that users can learn from their mistakes, get new ideas from them, and get inspired to fulfill their goals.

So, which category do you fall in? Please have your say by leaving a comment.

I’ve learned a lot about social media in the past year. Here are 10 things I’ve come to love about it.

1. Follow Friday

One of the best things about social media is Follow Friday. Its the day your Twitter stream gets clogged, but you get to see all the people whom you follow and show your gratitude. Social media is about giving, and Follow Friday is where it starts.

2. Accelerated Conversational Connection

In short, this is just all the people you meet. I have friends in Denver, Milwaukee, Portland, Miami and even further than that because of Twitter. You get greater conversational reach, conversational connection, and it all accelerates outward.

3. Statistical Overdrive

weetStats. HootSuite. Bit.ly. TwitterCounter. Tweriod. The statistics are all out there, and social media puts it on overdrive. I love swimming in numbers and finding out how engaging I’ve been, and social media helps put it all in perspective.

4. Dynamicism

The industry is always changing. It doesn’t become stagnant and stay that way. With something new every day, it keeps you on your toes. There is never a dull moment.

5. Potential

Never has there ever been something with so much potential. Things can go viral almost immediately, and more people than ever can see your content. Offline marketing can’t beat online marketing in some cases.

6. Nuanced

Social media is still new, in the sense that so many businesses have yet to use the platform, and so many people are still unsure about how to apply social media to their lives. Coaching and business opportunities are plentiful.

7. Genuine and Real

Social media is about being real and genuine. If you can’t be yourself, social media will eat you up alive. Can you afford to be fake? Maybe about 30 years ago…

What do you love about social media this Valentine’s Day? Express yourself by leaving comments below.

Concept

The underlying concept of your blog is extremely important. If you plan to start another run-of-the-mill blog, it won’t make a difference whether you promote it using old or new media as it would be just another face in the crowd. Choosing a unique concept and or theme is crucial and will often serve as the USP for your blog’s publicity.

Pitch

Pitching a blog to print and TV journalists is harder than it sounds. Make sure that you develop a unique convincing story on why your blog is the next exciting thing in the blogosphere. If you have quality content and you make the right pitch to the right contacts in old media circles, it can be mighty effective.

Local

While a blog virtually resides on the Internet, it’s always good to establish a local community of readers and followers. If a blog becomes a household name in the local community, it stands to gain publicity through word of mouth marketing. Make sure you tap local journalists and TV stations in your area to help spread the word on your blog.

Newsletters and Press Releases

A number of blogs became successful by launching complimentary print magazines. While the technique is no longer applicable to mainstream technology blogs, I strongly believe niche blogs can connect with the audience with add-ons such as printed monthly newsletters, on-paper press releases.

So, how do these old media means bring publicity to your blog?

Credibility and Visibility

If your blog features in a popular print newspaper or magazine, it gets unmatched in credibility. For example, a blog being focused in the New York Times or The Financial Times is likely to get several hits from the paper’s reader base.

Reputation

Old media can help build a positive reputation for your blog. Likewise, if you end up on the wrong end, negative reviews in print and/ or TV media can harm your blog’s prospects severely.

Do you have a blog? If so, do you use any old media techniques to get publicity for your blog? Please share your tips/ opinion by leaving a comment.

While Facebook has nearly 425 million mobile users, it’s not making any money out of them. Recent reports suggest that could change in March as Facebook plans to start rolling out ads within its mobile apps. It is believed that Facebook is already talking to several top notch ad agencies regarding its mobile ad strategy.

While a number of social media experts have rebuffed these claims as rumors, I, for one, believe that Facebook will introduce ads in its mobile apps sooner than later. As and when that happens, it would be a huge opportunity for businesses to tap into Facebook’s gigantic mobile user base. So, why not prepare your business for the upcoming opportunity now and make the most out of Facebook Mobile ads when they launch? Here’s my take on why and how you should prepare your business to make the most of Facebook’s upcoming mobile ad launch.

Sponsored Stories

It’s believed that Facebook mobile app ads will be along the lines of the “Sponsored Stories”  feature rolled out last year. Back then, I wrote my mind on why Sponsored Stories will eventually acceptance in the online marketer community. If Facebook does invent with Sponsored Stories strategy for its mobile ads, it could spell the death of the top or bottom banner ad.

So, how do you prepare your business for it? For a start, prepare some crispy ads that would fit the “short and sweet” mobile strategy.

Mobile Focus

I often come across businesses which still see “mobile” as a nice to have channel as part of their marketing strategy. I strongly believe mobile is no longer an optional advertising channel. Instead, it’s fast emerging as the preferred mode for advertisers as it providers anytime, anywhere access transcending geographical borders. Whether it’s optimizing your website for mobile or launching native mobile apps for your business, Facebook’s statistics are a timely reminder for businesses to revisit their mobile strategies.

Local

It’s fair to say that Location-based services have transformed mobile advertising for good. If your business has a strong emphasis on the local market, it would be well worth investing time to come up with an effective strategy to tap the local customer base with your mobile ads.

Though critics would say this is a case of “Don’t count your chickens before they hatch”, I think it’s all about preparing yourself for the next big opportunity. It’s a given that Facebook will monetize its mobile user base and advertisements are the most logical way to do so. What do you think? Please share your tips/ opinion by leaving a comment.

These are some of the questions I’m asked as the Founder and Executive Editor of Smedio. In that context, I strongly believe that you must adhere to the following 7 fundamentals for establishing a successful blog.

Quality

Content is king and blogging is no exception to that rule. If your blog lacks quality content, it will never be successful – period. There is no substitute to quality content and I can say that by personal experience. If you offer valuable insights and thought provoking content, it’s bound to bring in more readers than sensationalized/ controversial content.

Quantity

While quality is of absolute paramount importance, the right quantity (volume and frequency) also plays a key role in establishing a successful blog. Blogs which don’t get updated often enough risk the danger of being termed as dormant while others which stuff tons of posts every day to gather eyeballs achieve little. Balance is key.

Audience

A blogger needs to write like a writer but think like a reader. In other words, it’s crucial to know your target audience. This is often a crucial factor in deciding the overall fate of a blog. Most blogs cater to a certain niche and it’s best advisable to offer timely quality content based on your target audience.

Size

While there’s no golden rule to define an optimal blog post length, I strongly believe size matters in determining the appeal of a posts and overall popularity of the blog. I personally prefer to read blog posts which are well segmented into paragraphs with sub-headings as appropriate. IMO, it’s a pain to read blog posts with no markers of what’s coming next.

Marketing

A blog needs to be marketed. You can’t rest on quality content or high profile writers to bring in traffic. A number of blogs have grown manifold with effective social media marketing via email, Facebook , Twitter, other social media channels, and old media.

Impact

At the end of the day, a blog is all about the impact it creates on a reader. It’s key that your posts connect with your audiences. The headline of your posts often determines whether your readers will read the body content or not.

SEO

SEO is a crucial factor in promoting a blog. Choosing the right keywords and having a solid SEO strategy in place are key factors which determine how much traffic your blog gets. A lot of Smedio posts get ranked on the first page in Google Search Results – that’s not by accident.

What’s your secret of running a successful blog? Please share your tips/ opinion by leaving a comment.

Do you need a blog?

Before you learn how to blog, the first step is to determine if you really need a blog. Whether you are an individual or a business, a blog must have a purpose. There’s no point in maintaining a blog just for the sake of it. In fact, dormant and stale blogs are worse than not having a blog.

Where do you host it?

The second important question to ask – where do you host your blog? In case, you are stuck in this dilemma, make sure you read this post: where to blog, which highlights the pros and cons of all major blogging platforms.

How do you blog?

There are a number of desktop blogging tools available. Alternatively, you can directly blog on the chosen platform using a browser.

How often should you blog?

There is no one size fits all approach which would define the optimal blogging frequency. It all depends on the context of your blog, the amount of information that you want to pass on to your readers and the number of authors participating on your blog.

How long should be your blog posts?

Like blog frequency, there’s no golden size for blog posts. Rather than a word count, you should focus on the overall flow and impact of your blog posts. As a thumb rule, blog posts below 300 word posts should be avoided – a lot of search engines don’t index them and it’s too restricted a limit to express anything meaningful.

What not to blog about?

I generally discourage people from blogging about personal grudges, bias without reason and negative reviews without any rhyme and reason. Of course, blogs are a means to express your opinion but it should not be used as a channel to launch a personal attack on individuals or organizations for no good reason.

How to promote your blog?

This is where the magic of social media and SEO comes in. Make sure you choose the right keywords from SEO perspective. Further, promote your blog actively via your social media presence – Facebook, Twitter and other leading social networks.

How to let users subscribe to your blog?

I strongly recommend publishing an RSS feed. The other alternative is to allow users to sign up for email blog posts but that approach has several limitations – not all email clients support HTML, email servers can blacklist your mails and classify it as junk etc. In contrast, RSS is proven to be an effective solution. With that said, if you are not encouraging your readers to subscribe to your blog and other resources via email already, start now!

Do you have a blog? If so, do you want to share any tips on how to blog? Please share your tips/ opinion by leaving a comment.

Here’s a prior infographic I find interesting:

Source: Accounting Degree Online

So, which blogging platform do you choose? Should you go with conventional wisdom and choose a well-established platform such as WordPress? Or should you try your hand at microblogging revelations such as Tumblr. Clearly, there’s no one size fits all approach to choosing the optimal blogging platform.

Where to blog

In this post, I compare some of the most popular blogging platforms to help my readers take a well-educated decision on which blogging platform to choose.

WordPress

What Facebook is to social media, WordPress is to the world of blogging. It’s a been-there-done-that player in the blogging arena. Unlike many other blogging platforms which are publicly hosted on the Internet, WordPress offers a self-hosting mode as well. Here’s a quick run-down of WordPress pros and cons.

Advantages

• Choice of self-hosting & easy to customize
• Easy to install and a thriving developer and support community
• Tons of custom themes to choose from
• Robust Anti-spam capabilities

Disadvantages

• Irritating advertisements (free version)
• Plugins can be a tricky business
• Requires technical know-how (self-hosted version)

Blogger

Another veteran player in the blogging arena – Blogger is now owned and backed by Google.  Here’s a quick run-down of Blogger pros & cons.

Advantages

• Fits well in Google Ecosystem
• Free as in beer
• Good support for customization

Disadvantages

• Poor SEO support
• No self-hosted version

Tumblr

Tumblr is widely perceived as an optimal blogging platform for micro-blogging aka quick blogging. It’s advisable to use Tumblr when you need a short form blogging that integrates social media elements – the idea is to quickly share and spread content among users.

Advantages

• Short and Sweet blogging
• Third-party tool support
• Free
• Integrates well with Google Analytics

Disadvantages

• Archiving is a pain
• No support for comments
• No support for RSS feeds

Typepad

Typepad blogging platform has gained acceptance among creatives, industry leaders and businesses.

Advantages

• Offers a domain name
• Customized designs
• Personal support
• Good integration with Facebook

Disadvantages

• Subscription is mandatory
• Fringe player

There are other several noticeable players in the blogging arena including Moveable Type, Drupal, Live Journal, Xanga – each catering to a specific niche. All in all, the answer to the crucial question – “Where to blog” should be determined by individual needs, target audience, budget and integration with other social networks.

What’s your favorite blogging platform? Please share your opinion on where to blog by leaving a comment.

Source: Flowtown

Turn on the news and this becomes old news pretty quickly. From claims of class warfare to desires for a fairer banking system, the arguments cloud up the air waves pretty quickly. Interspersed between the arrests, the chants and the calls for action are examples of individuals affected and unaffected by the crisis.

To me, the Occupy Wall Street movement is merely a nation realizing that its finally sick from something, and whether you’re conservative or liberal or something else, there is a problem for just about everyone and their special interests and a solution for what they want to fix. At the bottom of the barrel of complaints however, its just one thing: business.

We all know that social media is part of that business, but what you may not know about business is that it takes the element of transaction to a higher level. Read on to see what Wall Street can learn from Social Media.

1. It Helps to be Transparent

Regardless of whether you believe in personal responsibility when it comes to major purchases, it is up to the business to be accountable for what they sell. If you’re going to instate a fee, it always helps to let your customers know why and the justification, just as you would let your followers on social media know what is going on with your business.

2. Business is All About Relationships

This adage is as old as any, yet has been misrepresented in today’s world. Jobs have been shipped overseas, people laid off due to their age/cost to employ and not their skills and bottom line overemphasized. Wall Street needs to realize, as social media managers know, that relationships matter in the short and long run and generate revenues that go beyond the wallet – they generate what folks forty to sixty years ago called loyalty.

3. The World is a Community

Community is a word thrown around on social media to describe followers and friends of a particular brand. Inside a community, there is collaboration, communication and a harnessing of similar values. In America, I have no doubt that people are trying to harness the same type of activity, from the teacher trying to make sure their students understand that math concept to the businessman trying to sell a product worthy of a purchase to the small business owner hiring the High School student so the student could learn what it is like to work.

In a world and country where people for the most just want to be able to put food on the table and watch their television before they go to bed amongst their community, all they want Wall Street to understand is that they should be part of that community too. A community that collaborates, communicates and takes on the values of small town America, not that where prices are manipulated and financial figures are made obscure.

4. It Helps to Engage

Social media managers and users will tell you that an experience is made much better when users engage and create that experience that’s unrivaled. So far until now, Wall Street has shown itself to largely unresponsive, leaving the work up the police to arrest and detain protestors. Engaging and at least understanding that people may be angry is the least Wall Street folks can do to get protestors to acknowledge that there is some understanding somewhere. The same goes for the Obama administration.

Are there any other tenets of social media that Wall Street can learn from. Share them in the comments below.

Author’s blog.

While there’s no doubt that mobile marketing is a powerful tool for marketers, I strongly believe that they need to avoid these 7 don’ts.

Multiple Bulk SMS

I have no qualms in accepting that despite being a marketer, I hate receiving multiple bulk messages about any campaign – it’s irritating to say the least. While bulk SMS is an effective tool, it must be used diligently rather than flooding users with unsolicited messages.

Long Messages

Mobile users have a short attention span. Whether it’s mobile websites or texts, cell phone users typically like the information to be short, sweet and to the point. Avoid using long messages and understand that there’s no point beating about the bush.

Respect User’s Privacy

Make your mobile marketing campaign’s policy clear to the target audience and make sure you do not infringe their privacy. I, for one, would not appreciate unsolicited calls without a prior confirmation via text and/or email. Avoid calling/ texting at odd hours.

It’s all about clicks

A lot of mobile marketers are merely concerned about click rates and impressions. While clicks are important, a mobile marketing campaign needs to account for several other key metrics including location, device types etc.

One size fits all

While smartphones and tablets are used by people of all age groups, it’s unwise to target them all using a one size fits all mobile marketing campaign. Have a well-defined strategy for each segment – kids, teens, adults and even baby boomers as part of your mobile marketing strategy.

No website optimization for mobile

Unless you take care to ensure that you website is optimized for mobile access, customers and prospects are going to have a harrowing time using it. A website is your identity in the online world and if people find it difficult to use it on their mobile devices, it’s bound to leave a bad impression for your mobile marketing campaign.

Don’t overdo it

I’ve come across a number of mobile marketing campaigns go wrong because they overdid it. In fact, mobile is such an effective media that a number of marketers don’t know where to draw the line. If you over do it, it ruins your mobile marketing campaign altogether.

What’s your take on the dos and don’ts of mobile marketing? Please share your opinion by leaving a comment.

And when Apple announced a special event to “reinvent the future of digital publishing”, I could sense what was coming. There was a tremendous sense of anticipation for Apple’s publishing event yesterday and based on whatever I’ve seen of iBooks 2 and the iBooks Author tool, I have to say the Cupertino giant hasn’t disappointed.

The Problem (Students)

There’s no doubt that a book is a man’s best companion. It’s an incredible source of knowledge and information. Though paper books have been around since decades, they suffer from the following major limitations –

• No portability
• No durability
• No interactivity
• No searchability
• Obsolete content

The Problem (Book Creators)

Though digital publishing has grown by leaps and bounds in recent years, it’s still a tedious process for book creators as it requires specialized tools and a substantial learning curve. To make matters worse, there’s no universally accepted format for digital publishing and creating a digital eBook for each platform is a daunting task.

What is the iBooks Author?

Simply put, the iBooks Author is an Apple-developed app, available as a free download from the Mac App Store, (ideally) makes it easy to make books for the iPad. The idea is to let educators and smaller publishers to create their own books for inclusion in the iBookstore and the best part – it isn’t limited to textbooks, you can create cookbook, travel book, story book, history book, or more.

How do you sign up?

To use iBooks Author, you need to have an iTunes account with a current credit card on file. As with apps, Apple takes a 30 percent cut of all sales, so it mandates having a U.S. Tax ID as part of the iTunes Connect sign-up and authentication process.

The Advantages 

Schools and colleges are using iPads as a norm rather than an exception these days. Given the widespread penetration of the iPads, the new interactive experience provided by iBooks 2 and the do-it-yourself functionality offered by iBooks Author, Apple’s done a great job of providing an end to end solution for the educational segment.

Moreover, for educators who are familiar with iWorks, using iBooks Author would be a natural learning curve. Additionally, it provides flexibility to format/ customize your book using a WYSIWIG interface or by directly editing HTML5 or JavaScript.

The Disadvantages 

The only major disadvantage of Apple iBooks Author is that it’s a proprietary tool. Apple holds an envious position in the education segment and it’s clearly trying to encourage writers and publishers to go all-in on its platform. The problem – books published using the iBooks Author won’t work on Android tablets and in a sense, it’s still not a cross-platform run-it-anywhere solution.

What’s your take on the iBooks Author platform? Do you think it will prove to be a disruptive technology for the publishing industry? Please share your opinion by leaving a comment.

Source: Online Schools

On its part, Google says that the motivation of including Google+ in search was to “transform Google into a search engine that understands not only content, but also people and relationships.” So, essentially Google+ data as part your Google searches is Google Search Plus. The idea of Search Plus is in-line with Google’s long-term vision to personalize your results by including more Google+ profiles, business pages, posts, and Google+ and Picasa Photos.

While some of the criticism around Google Search Plus is understandable, we should realize there’s no looking back and therefore I’ll focus on how your business can leverage Google Search Plus.

How does Google Search Plus work?

Google Search plus Your World results will introduce the following 3 categories of results – personal results, profiles in search, and profiles and pages. Personal results include data from your own Google+ photos and posts, as well as any sharable Google+ data from people in your circles including non-public Google+ photos and posts that were shared with you or posts you shared with a select group of people.

From an individual perspective, there’s definitely some amount of learning curve required to understand how Google Search Plus works and what public/ non-public data would be show up in search results.

Platform

Google has always maintained that Google+ is not a social network. On the contrary, it’s always projected itself as a platform. As I mentioned back then, I’ve strong admiration for Google as a technology company mainly because of its robust and scalable ecosystem. Google was never a search-only company, instead it focused on building a platform and search was just the first, and one piece of the whole puzzle. It’s understandable that Google is now bringing all its ecosystem goodness to Google+ in the form of Google Apps, Hangouts and the newly introduced Google+ updates in search results.

IMO, Google Search Plus is just the beginning of Google’s broader plan to integrate search, social media and SEO. From a business perspective, it opens up a new opportunity to leverage Google+ profiles for search as well as SEO.

SEO Factor

SEO is a key consideration for businesses. Google’s own services have always ranked high in search and SEO. These include Google Checkout, Google Book Search, Google Maps etc. With Google Search Plus, Google is now bringing Google+ into the SEO and Page Rank game. While Google hasn’t disclosed the algorithmic details, one thing’s for sure – popular Google+ profiles can help businesses up their SEO rankings.

Customer Perspective

It’s an encouraging sign for businesses that several customers have actually found Google Search Plus to be useful to see if someone in their circles searched for the same stuff. If that’s products or services which they recently bought, it shows up in the search results and this would help businesses with passive promotion.

The best part – if people don’t like Google Search Plus, they can turn it off so it’s not like Facebook enforcing you to follow its mindless privacy changes.

Of course, it’s still early days. Despite all the criticism, I see plenty of business positives of Google Search Plus. What about you? Please share your opinion by leaving a comment.

Click image to enlarge

Source: H&R Block