Spice Up Your Blog

Catching Readers By Using Personal Stories In Your Blog Posts

2012-05-22T01:40:00.000+01:00

Guest Post - Today's host is Carlina Yepinski who covers adding the personal touch your blog posts.Want to get involved ? See How To Become a guest author on Spice Up Your Blog.

There are a variety of ways that you can work to build a readership for your blog. One aspect of blogging is attracting new readers to your blog, but an equally important one is retaining those readers, so that they become regular readers of your posts. One of the best ways you can do this is to share the stories of your life in addition to the information or subject you are blogging about. For example if you are writing a food or cooking blog you can add in the details of the funny things that happened while you made the recipe or your children’s reaction to the food. These additional details are what capture your readers’ attention and keep them coming back for more. The difficult part is finding the perfect balance of detail and personal stories.

Look for Humorous Facts to Share

Some of the most popular blogs include the humorous outlook of the writer. As you go through your day look for items that stand out as unusual or funny and make a note of it. They can work into today’s post or a future post. Another idea is to look at a typical situation and try to find things that are funny about it. Sometimes when you are the most angry or frustrated, you can look back and find the most humor in the situation. For example a trip to the grocery store with little ones in tow can be a harrowing experience while you are going through it, but looking back at it, you may be able to pull out the funny moments to share with your readers.

Look for Analogies

Personal experiences also allow you to make analogies about the topic you are writing. You can take the story of your recent hike or 5k run and compare it to working hard on your art project or writing project. As you blog regularly you will begin to recognize the different ways that you can draw analogies from the things you observe in the world around you. You do not want to stretch too hard to make an analogy, but these are a great way to work some of your personal life into your blog topic and to hold your reader’s interest.

Watch the Bragging and Boasting

When you are working some personal aspects into your blog, you want to be careful about the tone of your blog posts. Although personal stories can attract and hold you readers’ interests, you may find that the bragging will drive those same readers away. This is why humor is so important to a successful blog, especially one that includes personal experiences. You can share how wonderful your life is, but be sure to acknowledge the crazy and bad moments as well.

Remember, You’re Telling a Story

Even if you are blogging about cooking or personal finances, you are also telling a story to your readers. Adding the personal touches and photos to the posts that fit will help to attract and hold your reader’s attention. Although you may not be able to fit this into every blog post, you should try to have at least one post a week that utilizes these techniques to hold your readers’ interest.

By Guest Author -Carlina Yepinski is the primary researcher and writer for networkmonitoring.org. Her most recent accomplishments includes graduating from Kentucky State with a degree in communications and computer science. Her current focus for the site involves system monitoring tools and network scanners.

A Complete Flag Translate Gadget For Blogger And Wordpress

2012-05-21T18:03:00.000+01:00

Your blog is open to readers from all corners of the world so for many it is important to offer content in the Language of the reader.Making your blog easy to translate is a great way to accommodate a global audience.There are a number of options when it comes to translation widgets and in this post we have an extensive Flag gadget.This gadget was created by Chuck at the real Blogger status and includes flags for 54 different country's or languages.This Flag translate gadget will fit nicely in your blogs sidebar ready for readers to click their flag view your content in their language.

Take a look at the demo below :

We have an quick and easy Add To Blogger button for Blogger users and the code is provided for Wordpress and other blog users.

Add The Complete Flag Translate Widget To Your Blog

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Google drive launched : Start Sharing Files

2012-05-20T13:35:00.000+01:00

Guest Post By Jalil Rehman.Want to get involved ? See how you can become a guest author on Spice Up Your Blog.

Google has been launching many new services. A few days ago, It launched Google Code and provided an amazing service to the users. But it was not just over, Now it has launched the brand new Google Drive and gave users a new experience. Google Drive actually is online file-storage service like Microsoft's SkyDrive. But as expected, it comes with many amazing features. The main goal is that, it let's users to upload files and share them with anyone on the Internet. It gives you 5GB free online storage with many new exciting features including smart tagging, image recognition etc. Let's discuss about other features.

Setting up Google Drive

You will need a Google Account to set up with Google Drive. If you have google account, then start using Google Drive with free 5GB online storage. You will be guided step by step after logging in to Google Drive. It's very easy.
What's amazing about it?

There are many unique and latest features in the new Google Drive. Watch the official video of Google Drive below to get familiar with Google Plus in detail.

Sharing and Storage

As already mentioned google drives gives 5GB free online storage. The maximum upload file size limit is 10GB. But the users which have 5GB of total storage, can upload a file of 5GB. It's really amazing. You can upload images, documents, videos etc. and can also share your files with people which also have Google Drive Account.

You will have to install a software for Google Drive in your PC, and then it will create a folder named "Google Drive" on your Desktop. You just have to drag and drop the file you want to upload and share, in that folder and your files will start uploading on your Google Drive account. The files which are uploaded will appear on your account and you can share that. People can download, view, comment and edit your files with your permission. You can also sync your files with iPhone, Android etc.

By default, you will be provided 5GB of free storage. Maybe that's not enough for you. You can extend it at reasonable prices as given below. You can buy up to 1TB of storage.

25 GB = 2.49$ / month
100 GB = 4.99$ / month
1TB = 24.99$ / month

Integration

You can integrate your uploaded files with many products of Google e.g Google Code, Google Docs, Gmail etc. You can choose file of any format and even you can also covert your format before uploading.

Smart Tagging and Search Filter

These are one of my favourite features of Google Drive. You can filter anything from your files e.g you can find images, videos, documents etc. from a bunch of files in seconds. You can tag the images with different labels and then find them easily with one click.

Text Recognition and Offline Viewing

If you've forgotten the name of any file and you want to find it, then Google Drive can find it by matching your given text with the text in the files. Viewing your documents offline is another goal of Google Drive. You just have to install an app in Google Chrome, and then you can view your documents offline in Google Drive.

Google has always tried to provide the users with latest and unique tools and features. Google Drive has many features which other related sites don't give. I hope Google will update this Google Drive and provide more flexibility to users.

By Guest Author - Jalil loves to write about Blogging Tips and SEO Techniques. He is interested in tweaking templates and creating Blogger Widgets.

Photography Blogs - SEO Mistakes To Avoid

2012-05-19T12:36:00.002+01:00

Guest Post By Charles Mburugu.Want to get involved ? See how you can become a guest author on Spice Up Your Blog.

Nowadays, more than ever before, the Internet is intensely competitive. With hundreds of photography websites and Blogs being launched on a daily basis, it has become increasingly difficult to rank well in search engines. This is why search engine optimization is vital for the success of any website. Research has shown that search engines like Google and Yahoo account for more than 70% of traffic.

When it comes to photography sites, the following are some of the SEO mistakes to avoid.
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How To Add Your BuySellAds Marketplace Page To Your Blog

2012-05-18T05:08:00.000+01:00

BuySellAds.Com (BSA) is by far the most popular direct advertising site for Bloggers.Recently BuySellAds updated the site to version 3 introducing not only a fresh new design but also some new options for Publishers.One of these options is to place your Marketplace page on your actual blog.The Marketplace page is the page people are directed to on BuySellAds when they click the Advertise Here banners on your site, the page displaying your available ad spots and stats.

BSA call this option the Ad Sales Widget "..Show your ad availability and pricing right on your website. Most publishers use this as their entire "Advertise" page for their website.."

You can see a demo of the Ad Sales Widget for Spice Up Your Blog Here.

If your not yet a user of BSA or have had trouble getting approved take a look at out post "BuySellAds.Com Review And Interview With Founder Todd Garland"

Add The BuySellAds Ad Widget To Your Blog

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7 Fresh Ideas To Deal With Bloggers Block

2012-05-17T15:08:00.000+01:00

Guest Post By Grace Pamer.Want to get involved ? See how you can become a guest author on Spice Up Your Blog.

Blogging is a phenomenon of the Internet age that has few precedents from the past. Bloggers have to come up with new ideas for articles on a regular basis, write and edit their work, and post them, ready to move on to the next blog entry. On the whole we undertake no formal training for such demands and yet the pressures can sometimes be intense. We often work in a particular niche, sometimes alone, and on occasion may feel the constraints of such choices. In fact, in many ways, the only activity prior to the advent of web logs (blogs) was the work of professional column writers at newspapers and magazines for they had to come up with new ideas regularly to maintain their readerships expectations - and they were paid to do it!

As such we blog writers can become overwhelmed by the task of creating new content especially when we feel like we have ran into a wall of non-creativity. In addition real life problems also play their part in causing blogger's block and it can sometimes be difficult to get back on track after life has thrown us a curve-ball. But rest assured there are tried and tested ways to overcome this problem, and to feel productive again. When you need a consistent well of ideas for articles, here are some methods to consider.
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Sticky Bar Widget - jQuery Scrolling Social Bookmarking Bar For Blogger

2012-05-15T13:40:00.000+01:00

The most requested tutorial over the last few months has been for the scrolling share buttons that sit alongside posts and scroll down the page with the reader.This gadget is popular on all the top blogs and really does help increase the number of times your posts get shared on Twitter, Facebook and other social networks.Using jQuery we attach a bar to the side of your blog posts with bookmarking buttons, as the page scrolls the bar neatly follows giving readers the option to share at any time.The gadget I have been using for the past few months and I share with you today has the following options : Twitter Share, Facebook Like, Stumble Upon, Google+, Pinterest Pin It and a Rss Feed Icon.Wordpress users can try out the Wordpress Share Bar listed in this post.

Video Tutorial - For extra help at the end of the post I have a video tutorial displaying the steps.

At the moment this gadget is in use here so you should be able to see it, you can also see another demo below.

As this is an advanced gadget there are 9 steps to add it to your blog so more than ever its important to back up your template first in case of mistakes, then take your time and you should have no problems.

Add The Sticky Scroll Bar To Blogger

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For the Beginner College Blogger: Increasing Traffic

2012-05-14T17:35:00.001+01:00

Guest Post By Samantha Gray.Want to get involved ? See how you can become a guest author on Spice Up Your Blog.

Deciding to start up a blog while still in college is an excellent choice—not only can it help improve your writing and communication skills as well as improve your computer skills, but a blog can also help you find a job after graduation, especially if you create a blog that's in your "niche" or " industry." For example, if you want to become a music journalist, then creating a blog where you review bands and albums can help you get your foot in the door. But in order to show that your blog is influencing other people, you have to have an audience—i.e. continuous traffic visiting your blog. But word-of-mouth isn't enough. That said, below are few ways that can earn you some loyal readers.
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Guidelines For Photoblogging On WordPress

2012-05-07T13:51:00.001+01:00

Guest Post By Charles Mburugu.Want to get involved ? See how you can become a guest author on Spice Up Your Blog.

A photoblog is basically a blog which does not focus on written content, but rather on photos. This is one of the best ways in which photographers can build a portfolio of their work. WordPress is a great platform which you can use to create a self-hosted blog for sharing your work. There are many web hosts that allow WordPress hosting, with some having an option of installing WordPress automatically with just a few clicks.

Once you find a web host and get WordPress installed, the following are some guidelines for setting up your blog.
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6 Common Do’s and Don’ts For Blogs

2012-05-03T02:00:00.000+01:00

Guest Post By Liz Nelson.Want to get involved ? See how you can become a guest author on Spice Up Your Blog.

Consider this a friendly reminder or a refresher course for your blog. There are a few common do’s and don’ts to reflect on before you blog your next entry.
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How To Delete A Blogger Blog Using The New Dashboard Design - Video Tutorial

2012-05-02T12:29:00.002+01:00

In the last post we had a video screen cast showing how to Back Up And Restore A Blogger Template in the new Blogger design.In this post we continue with the new Blogger design tips theme and show how to delete an unwanted blog.Remember when you delete a blog on Blogger you have the option to restore it within 90 days.Check out the video below and look out for more screen casts on using the new Blogger in upcoming posts.

How To Delete A Blog On The New Blogger Design

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How To Save, Back Up And Restore A Blogger Template Using The New Blogger Dashboard - Video Tutorial

2012-04-30T16:28:00.000+01:00

Last week i was busy making some video screen casts with tutorials for the new Blogger design.In the next few posts i will be sharing the videos with you here on Spice Up Your Blog.Whether you like the new Interface or not we do need to familiarize ourselves with it.I'm sure as with all new Google products or updates the Blogger team will continue to make improvements.I'm certainly not over impressed with the new design and did leave feedback with 8 changes or additions I would like to see.

The first video covers Making a back up of your Template, as we know when you edit your template it's vital to make a back up in case of mistakes.

How To Make A Back Up Of Your Blogger Template Video Tutorial

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How to Choose Your Blog Niche

2012-04-26T22:31:00.000+01:00

Guest Post By Sally Shaws.Want to get involved ? See how you can become a guest author on Spice Up Your Blog.

You’re dying to blog. You’re an avid reader of other blogs and you’re aware of just how much money bloggers can make working from home, in their pyjamas; or even in the buff, if the weather is warm enough.

Or so they say. The truth of professional blogging is that it’s just like any other job; hard work. It requires dedication, some guts – you’re going it alone – and savvy about how to make a success of blogging.

The first task facing any would-be professional blogger is to choose the niche he or she is going to pursue. This comes long before you commission a web designer, or start thinking about themes for your blog. Themes are just wallpaper, after all. What you’re choosing will be the guts of your operation and you want to be sure they are healthy and long lasting, not keeling over within six months.

There are two parts to choosing your niche: the What and the How .
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How to draw a fine line between plagiarism and inspiration

2012-04-25T14:35:00.000+01:00

Guest Post By Michael Evans.Want to get involved ? See how you can become a guest author on Spice Up Your Blog.

"Good Artists Borrow, Great Artists Steal” – definitely an inspirational quote for all those artists out there who are struggling to give their creativity wings. So, to be a great artist, you need to master the art of stealing right? Well, in the blogosphere, stealing is a dirty little word abhorred or seems to be abhorred by artists from all walks of life. So, everyone around hates “Stealing’ right? An emphatic Yes is likely to follow but what about the latest trends of blatantly copying the concepts of others and then passing it off as another great case of drawing sustenance in the form of ‘Inspiration’. Be it movie, music or our very own blogosphere, stealing in the name of inspiration has become a common practice and of late, it has become a disturbing trend. Now, the million dollar question is how we are supposed to differentiate between simple inspiration and plagiarism.

A tough nut to crack but let’s give it a try.
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Blogger SEO - Add A Meta Description To Your Full Blog And Each Post (Video Tutorial)

2012-04-24T23:37:00.000+01:00

Last month Blogger added some great new search options to help your blog be indexed and rank higher in search results on Google and other search engines.Two of the main options added are Meta descriptions, a full blog description and individual posts descriptions.In the video below we show you how to set up and add meta descriptions to your blog and posts.

Blog Meta Description - This is a description of your entire blog.You use this to describe your entire blog to search engines.

Posts Meta Description - This is a description added to every individual post on your blog.You use this to tell search engines what each post is about.

Blog Meta Description An Post Meta Description Video Tutorial

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7 Ways To Get More People To Share Your Blog Posts

2012-04-22T13:36:00.000+01:00

Guest Post By Diana Maria.Want to get involved ? See how you can become a guest author on Spice Up Your Blog.

As an active member of various social media platforms, you would be searching effective ways to get consistent and referral traffic for your posts. Viral marketing is the way to go if you want to measure the success of your posts. But getting people to share your posts can often become a cumbersome task. One needs to get rocking on the engagement strategies amongst the followers and fan group. To gain more insight and to learn tricks of the trade, continue to read below.
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Make Money On Blogger With Google Affiliate Ads

2012-04-19T14:05:00.001+01:00

Blogger have introduced a new way to make money with your blog.Google Affiliate Ads can be easily added to your posts to display links and image ads connected to your content.The ads run through your AdSense account, payments will be added to your AdSense account so of course you will need an AdSense account to run the Affiliate ads.The ads can be easily added via the post settings in your Blogger Post Editor.Importantly Google Affiliate ads are only available to Bloggers in the USA.The Blogger team put together the video below to explain how it works.
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Vintage Style Rss Subscribe And Social Follow Icons Gadget For Blogger And Wordpress

2012-04-18T03:22:00.000+01:00

I recently came across a set of icons i thought would be perfect for a Subscribe and Follow section on blogs.The icons have a vintage design and we have icons that will link to your Rss Feed, Email Rss Feed, Twitter, Facebook and Google Plus.Just for a little extra style i added a very simple opacity effect on hover.You can download the full set of Vintage Social Icons if you would like to add more profiles.

For Blogger i have a Easy One Click add to blog link and Wordpress users can simply add the code to a text widget on their sidebar.Take a look at the demo below.
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Five Bookmark Folders Essential for Successful Bloggers

2012-04-17T14:01:00.000+01:00

Guest Post By Grace Pamer.Want to get involved ? See how you can become a guest author on Spice Up Your Blog.

Bloggers who want to be taken seriously need to know where to find reliable information online. Linking to these sources is, after all, how your writing will be checked and trusted by your readers. Bloggers also need to know how and where they will share and crowdsource information online both in the creation of a blog and after it's completion. Other needs include SEO resources that can help with improving your online reputation, as well as social media and CMS troubleshooting sites. Here are the five specific types of web sources you absolutely have to have bookmark folders for:
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Add Cool Css Speech Bubbles To The New Blogger Threaded Comments

2012-04-15T13:34:00.004+01:00

Blogger introduced Threaded comment replies to all blogger blogs early in January 2012.The option to reply directly to comments on Blogger was one of the most popular requests by Blogger users.So a great update but the style of the default blogger comments is still quiet bland.In this post we have a tutorial to add some style to Blogger comments.The Css styles we are adding places the comments in a rounded speech bubble with an arrow to the authors avatar, the reply link is also highlighted.Take a look at the demo below, scroll to the comments..

This tutorial comes courtesy of the great Noct blog, make sure to check them out.Lets add some style to your blogs comments.

Add Css Styles To Blogger Threaded Comments

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How To Write Posts Effectively When Covering A Boring Topic

2012-04-13T13:57:00.001+01:00

Guest Post By Grace Pamer.Want to get involved ? See how you can become a guest author on Spice Up Your Blog.

When writing a post, a good rule of thumb is "if it is boring and dull to you, it will be the same for your reader." The obvious reason is because the topic is, most likely, just plain uninspiring to write about. But another reason your readers are at risk of losing interest is because your disinterest will show through in your writing.

If you've been writing wonderful, engaging posts about redecorating your home on a budget and giving it a complete makeover, but your readers also need information on how to clean all of the windows in the home, you need to still keep them inspired. But cleaning glass is one of the least inspiring topics to write about - so what do you do?

Don't despair because these 5 tips will help you through the most boring of topics, keeping your loyal fans coming back for more:
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How to write about a technical subject in plain English

2012-04-10T22:15:00.000+01:00

Guest Post By Mike Sorensen.Want to get involved ? See how you can become a guest author on Spice Up Your Blog.

One of the many challenges that blog writers face is the question of how to write about technical issues for an audience that includes non-technical folks. As a blogger, you want to appeal to everyone who might read your blog, not only to those who are aficionados in a particular area. For example, I write about soundproofing technology on my blog. I need each posted article to have broad appeal, so that everyone understands it, no one is talked down to, and yet the interested knowledgeable reader isn't turned off by too simple an approach. I have readers who are seasoned audiophiles and know all about soundproofing, and readers who have never handled a piece of acoustic foam. My writing has to be attractive and interesting to both of them - I have to reach out to a wide spectrum of people. How to do this is the question, so here a a few tips.
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Mashable Like Subscribe And Follow Sidebar Gadget For Blogger

2012-04-09T14:51:00.000+01:00

There was a time if you wanted to follow updates from your favorite blogs the only options you had were to bookmark or remember the URL and keep checking back or use the basic web feed if available.Now as a blogger it's expected to give subscription options such as Rss Feed, Email Feed and Social networks like Facebook, Twitter and Google +.Its been proven the most effective position for your subscription options is at the top of your blogs sidebar, this is above the fold and instantly visible to readers.

So in this post we have a subscription gadget with all the most popular subscribe and follow options you can easily place in your Blogger sidebar.The gadget is in the same style as popular tech blog Mashable and includes options for Google+, Facebook, Twitter, Rss and Email Rss.You also have the option to add bookmarking options for 16 of the top social bookmarking websites.Take a look at the demo below then see the instructions to add it to your blog.
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DIY Earned Media - How To Get Free Publicity For Your Blog

2012-04-05T23:19:00.000+01:00

Guest Post By Jennifer James

Last year, the Nielsen Company reported 156 million blogs on the Worldwide Web, and Technorati, the blog search reported that bloggers were updating their sites more frequently than in previous years.Blogging is now mainstream, making it more difficult than ever to gain success in this medium.The following are real-world examples of how I garnered favorable publicity for my blog on sites like the Washington Post and MSNBC, and how I even landed a weekly radio commentary on public radio.

In my profession, which is public relations, this is often referred to as earned media.It's earned because unlike advertising you don't pay for it, at least not with cash.You earn it through time, relationships, reciprocity, quality products, ingenuity and creativity.
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New Google +1 Button And Google+ Badge For Blogger

2012-04-04T13:49:00.001+01:00

Blogger today added two new options to the gadget gallery, the gadget gallery is a collection of gadgets you can add to your blog via the "Add A Gadget" option on your blog layout page.The two new options are for the new Google +, Firstly a Google +1 button for readers to recommend your blog, and secondly a Google + badge for readers to follow your Google+ updates.

Imagine being able to share your blog with like-minded people across the web. Today we’ve made doing that easier with the introduction of two Google+ gadgets, the +1 button and Google+ Badge.Unlike the +1 button that can appear below a post, this gadget is specific to your blog. Displaying it on your blog will allow visitors to endorse your blog and share it with their friends.

As stated above you can add these new gadgets to your blogs sidebar, footer or anywhere that accepts gadget.Simply go to your blog layout page, click Add A Gadget and choose the gadget you want.For the +1 button you have options for the style while to add the Google Plus badge you will need your profile or page ID (A link to instructions is provided).

Have you added Spice Up Your Blog to your circles, also check out the official Blogger post here.

Drop your comments and questions below.