How to Blog Day 2. Write a List Post.
Write A List Post!
Seriously. That’s the day 2 instruction. How many list posts that really do not need to be lists have you seen? I’m blaming this book as the cause of it. We all know what a list is and how to use it. Some of us are now claiming to have lists fetishes. This is ridiculous, but here is my list post for ridiculous statements I’ve found in the 31 Days To Build A Better Blog
Write a list post like List Post King, David Letterman. Image via Wikipedia
- You need an elevator pitch. Not everything requires jargon. A good heading that tells what your blog is about would do the same thing wouldn’t it?
- You should write a list post. Wouldn’t that come natural if you were writing about something that required a list. Now every subject requires a David Letterman style approach.
- You should promote your post. Yes, and this book should promote promoting your post and give more details about the best approach. If nobody finds your post, you’ve wasted your time. This could be considered a “secret” and only slight reference to this is a great way to keep it that way.
- Go look at other blogs and do what they’re doing. I don’t think so. Sorry, it goes against my principles. I’m here to create my own blog. If I’m going to do the same things as others, I’ll just make a huge link directory and point folks elsewhere.
- Take a trip to the mall to improve your blog. What if your blog is about a topic that doesn’t have anything to do with the mall? Loitering at the mall? Is this one of the big secrets to 6 figure blogging?
Ok, this list gets the point across. Hang in there. There are some good points in the book. Most of them are sparse on details, but there is enough to get a beginner started. I’m started to think that this book would be very good for beginners and that they’ve completely missed their target with the inaccurate title.
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How to Blog Day 1. Create an Elevator Pitch.
I couldn’t resist buying the book 31 Days To Build A Better Blog
I’ve already glanced through the book. I didn’t find any secrets. I’m worried. Another book of secrets lacking secrets. Maybe I’m missing something in these secrets books. Just to be fair, I’m going to give the book’s suggestions a try though.
I’m going to test out some ideas on my personal blog. It’s been idle for a while, so I can’t really do any harm here. I’ve already switched it to WordPress and converted the Drupal content to WordPress. I’m going to test the outer-limits of conformity. According to the book, I’ll be setting pretty on a six-figure income at the end. That will be handy.
The first lesson = “Create An Elevator Pitch”.
An elevator pitch is the sub heading of every blog. It’s supposed to be a catchy little phrase that sparks interest and tells the reader what the topic is of your blog.
I have violated the general rule that tells you to make your blog about one specific topic. This idea is pretty worthless for a personal blog unless you truly are a person with a one-track mind. So I’m going with, “My Internet Stuff” as my elevator pitch. Nowhere to go but up from a line like that. It does inform, just fails to spark interest. I hope this doesn’t blow that six-figure income promised in the book’s “elevator pitch”.
Gaining More Ground on Twitter
I’ve posted on this before, but as soon as I think I’ve found a use for Twitter, my interest fades and I forget about it. Once again, I’ve ventured back and I’ve found out a few more things. I’m starting to “get it”. Don’t get me wrong, Twitter is one of the easiest tools to learn to use, it’s what to use it for that’s the hard part. If you’re already a Twitter veteran, there’s probably not much for you in this post.
I found Seesmic. It’s an application that puts everything into a desktop application. This eliminates the need for a browser window. I like Twitter much more when it’s just hiding in the corner of the computer with a simple alert when new posts arrive. After learning Seesmic in a few minutes time, I have removed the act of going to the Twitter website. This is a big deal because I just want a quick glance at anything interesting that someone I know may post and I want to see it as it happens. Problem solved.
The next issue is the question, “Who should I follow?”. Family and friends are a given, but who else? I had been following to many people posting to many things that I don’t care about. It’s not that they were posting anything wrong or bad, it’s just that I wasn’t interested. I was interested in them in the same level that I would bookmark their website. I want to see what they’re doing occasionally, but not every time they make a post. I am removing these people from my follow list.
Finding those I want to follow is starting to become clearer too. Seesmic has a search function. I find posts that are related to a topic with the search function. When I see that someone is tweeting consistently about things that I care about, then I follow them.
The big advantage would be how it all happens in real time. If I make a blog post, it could be a few days before Google picks up on it. Then, a person has to find the post by searching and that post my be hundreds of pages deep in the search results. With Twitter, if someone is searching, they get the latest posts right now. The quality of the posts is completely irrelevant, but it is great for finding the latest information.
Now that I have that figured out, I need to get the cell phone configured. It’s obvious to where the cell phone is important with Twitter now too.
If I’m correct, learning the benefits of Twitter isn’t that difficult to explain. I must still be missing something. If it were this easy, someone would have told me how I could use Twitter this way.
Artisteer Problem Solved
This post for WordPress Artisteer users only.
I was having a weird problem with the editor for the footer. It kept adding slashes for any edits. The fix for the footer backslash problem is this code. You have to go way to the bottom of the forum post before you find where someone found a solution
Category Count Removal in Artisteer Theme on WordPress
Artisteer themes were driving me crazy because they either do not have a way to turn off the Category Count(the number in parenthesis that shows the number of posts in a category) or I can’t find the setting to turn it off.
I took the time to find it in the theme code. All that you need to do is set the show_count variable from a 1 to a zero.
Go to your dashboard, then the appearance tab, then the editor tab. From there edit the sidebar1.php (or whatever sidebar your category block is in) file this way.
Change this:
<ul>
<?php wp_list_categories(‘show_count=1&title_li=’); ?>
</ul>
To this:
<ul>
<?php wp_list_categories(‘show_count=0&title_li=’); ?>
</ul>
That should remove number and the parenthesis from the category listing.
First Day of New Blog System
I finally made the switch from Drupal to WordPress. For those that don’t know, they are just 2 different ways of presenting a website. Drupal is great for certain applications and it has it’s strong points, but WordPress has evolved into an almost acceptable system. WordPress does make life easier which promotes more posting, but I expect challenges in it’s usual shortcomings. It has been a learning experience.
I’m sure there will be some problems to iron out. I already see images that are not linking up correctly and a few other problems. Fun stuff at any rate.
Why the switch if WordPress isn’t better? The same reason PC’s outsell Macs. Convenience and popularity. WordPress problems are many, but the multitudes of people that work on solutions make up for it. When I write a blog, I don’t want to code unless I have to. Fixing and coding takes time away from creating and I’m here to have fun and create.
I’ll get the problems fixed quickly and move on soon.
Enjoy.
‘Scambaiters’ Turn Tables on Nigerian E-Mail Scam Artists
‘Scambaiters’ Turn Tables on Nigerian E-Mail Scam Artists – Revenge is sweet and sometimes permanent for a growing legion of ‘scambaiters’ who have taken it upon themselves to punish the thieves behind those Nigerian e-mail scams. [Fox News Headlines]
Now this is funny stuff. The scammers from Nigeria fall for far more ridiculous exploits than they send out. Going so far as to get tattoes. The scambaiters are going to make money off of some great websites following the antics created too. Great stuff.
