Currently viewing the tag: "monetize"

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Ok so let’s blow off some steam. I have recently become genuinely annoyed with the state of the blogosphere. The more time I spend as a blogger and blog reader the more I find smaller blogs bowing to pressure of Google and it’s fascist bots. Now I’ve only got a few posts up and I spend some time on SEO writing on all my posts just like everyone else but it’s not an obsession. If my content is good and  I keep at my strategy for getting my blog out there, good SEO writing or not,  people will show up and they’ll bring friends. I’m pretty sure I believe this.

Keywords and SEO Picking the meat from the bones

carcass

Carcass

Why bother driving tons of readers to your site with great SEO writing strategies only for the crowds of people to arrive have a look round and realize, that after they’ve picked the meat from the carcass of your keyword riddled body they still feel distinctly unsatisfied.This is self defeating. You’re wasting your time and you’re wasting mine! Me and my SEO illiterate, keyword abhorring friends will leave your site never to return ever again.

I believe and use the idea of SEO writing religiously

First and foremost for me SEO writing means my writing

S hould

E ngage/Entertain/Educate/Excite

O ther (people)

Pick your own ‘E’ word or any other letter I’m just illustrating a point here. The important bit here is other people. If you write content that entertains yourself, congratulations! You no longer need a television. The important thing is does, it entertain others. Does your content solve a problem for other human beings. If it’s not, you’re going to find it tough to go from a great SEO, high traffic, high bounce rate blog to a positively viral blog. Where readers arrive and for better or worse you’re stuck with them till a really offensive post you do part.

SEO and SEO writing

SEO writing is the problem, not SEO in and of itself. SEO writing is the practice of dumping in a ton of keywords then trying to hang some content on to them after. Real SEO writing that drives conversion is a by-product of good focused content. See the difference? You need to write your post then go back with your SEO glasses and give it polish.  SEO writing for the sake of SEO writing is self defeating drivel. Unless you’re a poet write clearly and plainly. Fitting the word artichoke into a sentence because it Google friendly is just dumb, artichoke. When writing a post do your homework, find a topic people have an interest in, answer questions people are asking pimp your post. If it’s good meagre SEO will be enough. If it’s bad supercharging it’s SEO will only give you a much larger group of people reading a bad post and being less likely to return.

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Writing for people is transcendental

I enjoy writing for other people, nothing excites me as much as when I receive a reaction from a reader, when I’ve made a connection and somehow my words have stripped away the many thousands of miles between me and my reader. When my words have made irrelevant the differences in culture religion and beliefs and my ideas are laid bare. Keyword abuse in SEO writing strategies tend to strip away the value in all internet writing. Keywords drive hits and become a “SEO iron curtain” behind which good sense appears to have gone to sleep. These bots don’t care about my ideas which i quite frankly find condescending and and arrogant. I mean sure i can’t read millions of lines of text a day, but I can write mean things about bots, take that bot bastards! I refuse to spin any yarns for your pleasure.

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Bots are a fickle bunch

Impressing bots is a tough job. They’re a fickle bunch and as dense as your keywords may be i can make mine denser, really I can, don’t tempt me. The problem is, there is a point where traditional SEO writing just becomes comical. The bots giggle with glee as they promote these semi nonsensical posts to the top of heap for their relevance, knowing that over the long run they’ll be overhauled by the articles actually written for people. These articles gain authority. These articles are passed around, bookmarked and linked to. Ultimately great keyword use will only get you so far. If you want traffic build a rapport with your readers not a paint by numbers SEO writing strategy.

Mannequin bots

Quality of traffic counts

Write about what you’re passionate about. Write to be understood by people. You may find less traffic but higher quality of traffic. Most every type of monetization works better when you have authority. When the reader is invested in your site and in awe of your knowledge they are more inclined to trust any offers you have on your site. When a reader lands at your site and feels that they’ve been duped with insincere SEO writing, fancy keywords and meta tags they’re more likely to think I’m not buying anything this sleazy ad serving, spammer is selling thank you very much.

How to write Content that engages other people

  • Solve a problem for your readers
  • Turn a common problem on it’s head and give a different take on an old chestnut
  • Get annoyed about things that annoy your readers, like dodgy SEO writing (oh how I hate you)
  • Be a little controversial, play devils advocate now and then
  • Use comments from your readers as content for future posts (the comments will come in time)
  • If it sounds right but isn’t bot friendly go with what sounds right
  • Read your writing out loud no one likes a smarty pants make sure your language is natural

Bots never get picked first for dodge ball

Traditional SEO writing is a reality of the modern internet however with the advent of web 2.0 we are no longer completely at the mercy of the machinations of the search engines. As a result I suggest spending time building your networks and writing content that is useful to people. Bots don’t have friends and don’t click on ads. I kinda feel sorry for them sometimes.

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Take back your Time

Take back your Time

I find that every week, every day, every hour I have less time, less minutes at my disposal. More and more I find that somewhere during all work and play I’ve lost sight of what is important. Where is the meaning in our lives. When did we stop trying to live meaningfully in the time alloted to us.

I put it to you that the meaning in our lives does not live in the big things the huge projects or enormous undertakings. Rather the meaning is standing in plain sight in all the minutes between this one and the last one you’ll ever see. Tomorrow is nothing, next year even less. Meaning is realizing that we can have 60 memorable moments or one average hour. Meaning is time well used. Meaning is the conversion of time to goals successfully completed, to dreams realized, to relationships cemented. Time spent meaningfully not squandered.

When I find the world is taking from my enjoyment of the universe I fall back on some of these great ways to forget about the lonely hours and scary years and take pleasure in those silly minutes we allow to slip by so recklessly.

Take some time and breath

Take 60 seconds and concentrate on your breathing- Besides the spiritual well being breathing correctly brings, physiologically it’s a great tonic too. As we become more stressed our breathing becomes more and more shallow, hunching our shoulders and limiting the amount of oxygen available to our bodies. You’d think your body knows how to breath properly, and yeah it does but with the the sedentary lifestyle we currently all live we become so accustomed to our stressed state our bodies adapt that as a norm. Want to know how bad it is let’s take a deep breath now forcing as much air into your lungs feeling your chest expand and your diphragm pushed down. Feel how unnatural that feels? That’s the way you’re meant to be breathing. That’s the state every second should find you in. Lungs full, head clear and ready to react. If you can concentrate on breathing correctly for just one minute you’ll immediately find yourself more centred and able enjoy yourself.

Take some time to Rock out!!

Get your favourite song out and play it. Listen to it and don’t do anything else just enjoy all the reasons it’s your favourite take some time and remember those. Maybe it reminds you of your first kiss or that summer that went on forever or perhaps it just makes you feel warm and fuzzy inside. Whatever the reason you’ll find that when you connect with those feelings you make them real again and each time we play that song as background music we kill some of the meaning. If you’re not a music person dig out that painting that makes you want to weep. That poem that makes you laugh or that garfield cartoon you haven’t read in ages and let yourself remember what it felt like the first time you did that. Ok so this one would take a bit longer than 60 seconds sue me!

Rate your coffee

Go now grab a cup of coffee. Start drinking it and try describing it as if you were reviewing it. Are the tastes bold and earthy or bland and lifeless. Be as descriptive as you can don’t use the word nice for goodness sakes. Let your imagination run wild and grab some words from the musty recesses of your mind that you haven’t used in a while and dust them off and shine them up today we’re taking them to town. You can use this for any of thing you currently take for granted even some of those things you currently find distasteful. How about a play by play on the drive home or a review of the last excuse you gave your boss for that late report. The important thing is to take the time to look at something differently. Explaing the mundane moments an you may find that those moments become progressively less mundane.
 

There are many other ways to kickstart your if this post teaches you anything let it be that your time is as valuable as you make it. If we spend our time waiting for the next hour, day, week or year we lose out on all the things we have the power to do right now. Truly our minds are the most powerful tools we have at our disposal and if we use them we’ll find more and more ways to make our time count.

So how does this fit in with the idea of monetizing our lives? All of the minutes of our lives have value. One cent is only one cent but think of this $100, $1000 or even a $1m dollars is nothing but a collection of cents. When we play fast and loose with those little coins we stop our chances of becoming truly rich. Find more ways to get the most out of those minutes of your life and you’ll soon find that the hours, days and weeks will see to themselves and your life will become progressively richer.

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This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Nexx Online. All opinions are 100% mine.

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Hosting by any other name

When I started my first blog 12 months ago I was adamant that I would keep my site on free hosting providers forever. I’m a bit of an idealist and handing my hard earned cash to over priced hosting providers just felt wrong. Twelve months on with 6 site to my name I’m a convert.

I spent 6 months going from free provider to free provider and lost my blog once and had to recover my blog from backups 3 times after being taken in by less than reputable free hosts. The number of scams out there is horrifying. In the realm of hosting much like everything else you get what you pay for.

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Stop SOPA

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