This is a guest post by Andrew Rondeau. Unless you’ve been walking around in ear-muffs and dark glasses for the past few months, you’ll have noticed that a new excitement is gripping the UK. Everywhere you turn, red, white and blue merchandise is creeping in to supermarket shelves, and people are discussing what tickets they…
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How to Recognize a Spammy Guest Post Request (and what to do about it)
Once your site has enough traffic, you will receive automated guest blogging requests. These are sent out automatically by software programs, which scan sites looking for contact forms and which automatically fill them out and submit the message. By the time you reach this point, you’ll also be getting real guest post requests from actual…
3 Tips for Creating the Perfect Infographic (Ironically not an Infographic)
If you were to hold the edge of your hand across your throat, just under your chin, that would be the “here” I’ve had it up to with the infographic craze. I know I’m not alone. But I’m not here to rant… I’m here to help. Because people just freaking love the damn things and…
12 Sneaky Business Blogging Tricks to Dominate Your Market
Warning: I’m gonna get a little “sneaky” in this post. I don’t subscribe to the notion that it’s not enough for me to succeed, my “enemies” must also fail. And I do believe in showing mutual respect and taking the high road when dealing with people. But I’m also playing to win, to dominate the…
Screencasting: Editing, Pacing and Effects
Time for the next installment in my “Screencast Like a Pro” series. Between client work and then getting deathly ill, I haven’t kept up with this series as planned and a couple weeks slipped by, but here we are now, so let’s dive in. By the time you’re done reading this, you’ll have a good…
$4,000 worth of Proof You Don’t Need a Huge List to Sell Your Ebook
This is a guest post by Emilie Wapnick. When I launched my first ebook, I had 500 subscribers on my email list. I remember that day vividly. My heart pounded as I hit “Send.” The gurus voices echoed in my head. I remember hearing that 1,000 was the magic number, that you shouldn’t even think…
How to Give Your Blog A Conversational Tone
This is a guest post by Sam Peters. Reading most of the blogging advice out there would suggest that a successful blog has little to do with the actual quality of its content. Success, instead, would appear to be determined by the blog’s use of SEO tactics, social media integration, WordPress templates, and affiliate marketing….
How to Record Video and Manage Media Collections for Your Screencast
So far, we’ve covered planning your screencast and scripting & recording audio for your screencast. In this part of the series, we will cover how to create the visual portion of your screencast and get it ready for editing. Our goal here is to create pro-quality screencast videos that are head and shoulders above what most…
How to Script and Record Audio for a Screencast
This is the 3rd part in a series on Screencasting. Check out the previous post in the series: How to plan a Screencast or start at the beginning: How to Create Professional-Quality Screencasts. Scripting for Screencasts Nobody wants to sound like an idiot when they make a recording. You want to sound like you know what…
WTF is Smart YouTube Plugin?
In this latest “WTF” video (I’ll try to do one of these at least once a week) I’m showing you a nifty WordPress plugin that anyone who puts YouTube videos on their blog will want to have: Smart YouTube Plugin. (Can’t see the video? Click here.) Why is thing so cool? Well, from my viewpoint it’s…
How to Install WordPress Plugins
This video will show you how to install WordPress plugins into your self-hosted WordPress site. There are two ways to do this: search and install from within WordPress itself, or find a plugin out on the web and download it. I’ll show you how to do both in this video. This may seem simple and…
What WordPress Plugins I Use and Why
Plugins are, in my opinion, the big reason why WordPress has become the juggernaut success story of content management systems. Plugins let you extend and enhance the functionality of your self-hosted WordPress-powered website. Anything from a simple contact form to full blown e-commerce functionality can be added to your WordPress site with plugins. But because…
How to Plan a Screencast
If you want to have a professional-quality successful screencast video, you do not simply hit the record button on your screencasting software and go. Unless, of course, you want to look like a total idiot. But if you want to look like a confident pro, a bit of planning is in order. Planning a screencast…
WTF is Pinterest?
Pinterest is exploding right now. Pinterest is a virtual bulletin board or pin board. You create boards, give them names, and then create “pins” which are mostly pictures you find on the web of stuff you like. Then, you share your boards and pins with friends and everybody has a good time. It has a…
Poll Results for Streamlining Social Media
A few days ago I conducted a poll on whether or not people were abandoning social media accounts. The number of people who participated isn’t large enough for the results to be considered as representative of the majority of my readers and the results are not unexpected (at least, by me). Here are the results……
Poll: Are You “Streamlining” Your Social Media?
After my recent 5 Profitable Business Blogging Predictions for 2012 post, life coach Tim Brownson wondered in the comments if others like him had “streamlined” their social media. In other words, did they shut down or ignore social network accounts in favor of only a few “big ones” they either liked more or profited more…
5 Killer New WordPress Plugins
New plugins are created constantly, so it’s easy to remain unaware of what just may be the perfect plugin for your self-hosted WordPress blog. That’s why I went looking… just for you. You might find something in this list you didn’t know you needed until you see it. Please note that I haven’t tested these, and…
Series: How to Create Professional-Quality Screencast Videos, Intro
Video rules. There’s no denying that. Videos show up prominently in search results and YouTube is the second largest search after Google itself. It has been proven that video advertising online is more effective than other ad media. I don’t believe that it’s a stretch to extend that dominance to content marketing and blogging. There…
Does Your Blog Need an Alignment Check?
This is a guest post by Tim Brownson, who apparently couldn’t be arsed with putting in links or subheadings, so if he doesn’t like what I did with it, well… tough shit for him. Please note all the links below to his new book are affiliate links. Because I need beer money, of course. Even…
5 Profitable Business Blogging Predictions for 2012
Business blogging continues to grow up and evolve. Like some kind of Borg-like unkillable alien species with an insatiable appetite for absorption and assimilation, business blogging thunders on through the blogosphere, the socialsphere and beyond. What originally started off as simple blogging in the late 90s has now become the content management cornerstone of many…
Why “Know, Like and Trust” Could be Killing Your Blog
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swE3EcHTMZ0″
This is a guest post by Tommy Walker. Why do you blog? No, really. Have you asked yourself lately? You want to use your blog to get people to know, like, and trust you. To build rapport and ultimately sell more stuff. But, you’re creating content on a regular basis, and your sales don’t budge….
Start the New Year Right for Your Business Blog
Another year is about to end, and where are you in your online business plans? How’s your blog doing? Not as well as you’d hoped? You want a fresh start for the new year. You want things to change, to be better and different. But you feel like you’re spinning your wheels, not getting the…
How to Find Your Voice When You Blog
Is your writing voice distinct? Would we know it’s you even if we didn’t see your name on it, based just on how it sounds? In this post I’m going to share with you everything I know about developing and using your writing voice. A million blogs out there will give you tips on all…
Why You Should Get Headway before November 25
You guys all know I love Headway and work with them, too. I use it to design all my clients’ sites (here’s the latest). Many of you already use and love Headway. So it is without apology that I am going to shill hard for Headway in this post, because if you’re not using it…
Plan Your New Website Content Strategy Using The Rule of Fives
This is a guest post by Matt Hooper. Every successful website needs to have a plan and, as we all know, a plan comes long before any action ever takes place. This is why I always find it odd when someone comes to me saying they want a website but they don’t know what to…
17 Ways to Turn Your Blog Readers into Loyal Fans
This is a guest post by Tea Silvestre. Sure. You read Remarkablogger and all the best blogs about blogging. Your content sparkles. Your design is flawless. You’ve optimized for SEO and ticked off the long list of best practices. You’ve fine-tuned every aspect of your site. It’s all humming along quite nicely, thank you very…
How to Set Up the Digg Digg Social Media Sharing Plugin for WordPress
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LNM_pY8Lj1o”
I use the Digg Digg social media sharing plugin because it rawks, but it takes a bit of setting up. So I thought I’d make a little tutorial video to walk you through it step by step. If you can’t see the video, visit the blog directly or watch it on YouTube. I do more…
Everything is One
Everything is one. Back when me and the ex were together, we’d have these long conversations about life/the universe/everything that would start innocently enough about one topic and end up at a point that was so all-encompassing that I would just throw my hands up and shout: “EVERYTHING IS ONE!” Because it’s true: everything is…
A Bright Light has Gone Out from the World – Thoughts about Steve Jobs from a PC User
I’ve used Macs before and I have an iPod Touch. I use iTunes on my PC running Windows 7. I get what Macs are all about and have Jobs to thank for why Windows is now a halfway decent operating system. Microsoft has always been a systematic copier/usurper. Despite their huge research budget and facilities,…
Do You Feel Like You’re 10 Different People and You Don’t Know What Kind of Online Business to Create?
If so, you may be what Emilie Wapnick calls a multipotentialite. What’s that? A person who does not specialize, but is excellent at several types of endeavor. A person who could never just pick one thing and do that for their entire lives. These people are real. I know because I am one. And so is…