Are You Blogging With Your Neighbours?The word out there is that the world wide web is making the world smaller, giving the voice back to the people, and making us all more tolerant, more understanding, more global. But is this really happening?
When we posted our “NxE’s Fifty Most Influential ‘Female’ Bloggers” list, we went through the blogosphere as we know it: the blogs we read, the blogs our friends read, the blogs we know people to be reading. But no matter how careful we were, we still missed a lot of blogs that others would consider influential. In a world where Technorati is tracking over 112.8 milllion blogs, I hardly find this surprising.
However, there is more to learn from this than just the simple fact that there are too many blogs for us to keep track of.
The blogosphere, just like the physical world we live in, is divided into neighbourhoods that have only limited interaction with each other. The online neighbourhoods might be divided differently than their physical counterparts, but apart from that they share similar characteristics. For example, in the blogging world, I belong to an English speaking neighbourhood interested in business, productivity, serious blogging, and personal development, although physically, I am located far in the north, in the European country called Finland.
These bloggers are the people who I know by name and with whom I chat first when I plug myself to the Internet - they (you) are my neighbours. But why these people, and not some others?
First, there is the language issue. If I don’t understand the language of your blog, I can’t read it. For me this rules out blogs written in languages that I have never studied (like Chinese, Japanese, Russian), as well as languages that I rarely use such as French or Spanish.
So far so good. The language is a natural restriction: if you don’t understand a language, there is no way you can enjoy a blog written in it.
But that’s not all. There are many blogs written in English that I have never heard of. In fact, I’m willing to bet that there are blogs that are massively influential within their own neighbourhoods, but still virtually unknown to the masses because the link out from the neighbourhood is missing.
Online, just like in real life, it’s all about links. Like the popular saying goes, it’s not about what you know, it’s not about who you know, it’s about who knows you.
New friends are usually made through old friends and acquaintances. Who you know defines who you will know - unless you make a conscious decision to change that fact and build new links outside your immediate neighbourhood. And as who you know pretty much defines who knows you, this becomes an important question to think about when trying to grow your blog’s audience.
Are you blogging for your neighbours?
From the fact that you are reading North x East, I am going to make three assumptions - or educated guesses - so bear with me (feel free to use the comments section to tell me if I got these assumptions wrong).
First, I’m going to assume that one of your most important blogging goals is to gather a big audience. You watch your RSS subscriber count carefully, and you can tell the number of unique visitors in your sleep. And when the growth halts for some reason, you are not far from losing your sleep.
Second, let’s assume that a big part of your readers found you through links from other people’s blogs. This is a fairly safe guess, even if you have done all your SEO work and made Google your best friend.
Third, let’s say that the people who link to your blog are people who follow your blog.
When these three assumptions hold true, a funny (but common) situation where everything spins around in a circle is created: you link to people you know, they link back to you, and the same people read both of your blogs. Every now and then this might result in a few new readers finding your blogs - but in most cases even these new readers are people just like you, from the very same neighbourhood.
And after a while, you will run out of growth potential in this neighbourhood. Everyone who could be interested in what you have to say is already following you, and the rest just don’t care. What do you do next?
This is when you need to find a way to get noticed out from your town and look for other neighbourhoods interested in similar topics as yours.
Link and be linked to
Once you have decided to get out there and broaden your neighbourhood, that’s where the real work begins.
The idea itself is simple:
- Find a bunch of blogs from a close neighbourhood that you believe might be interested in what you have to say
- Subscribe to the blogs, and make sure to read them
- Start interacting with the bloggers and their readers through comments, e-mail conversations, and guest posts
- Bring more value to the new neighbourhood
I have to stress the last item on the list: If you just wait for new people to arrive to your blog, you’ll have a long wait ahead of you. Instead, what you need to do is to get out there and make a genuine contribution to the new neighbourhood. And only then, after you have become a part of that new circle of bloggers, you can expect the readers to be interested in what you have to say as well.
But how do you find those blogs?
First, in every circle of friends there are some people who have more connections than others. They are the connectors who like to hang out with all kinds of people, and are always happy to introduce their friends to each other. A person like this can well be the first one to introduce you to new people who you never would have met otherwise.
The risk in only relying in connectors is that if your friend isn’t really quite that well connected, all her friends are from the same neighbourhood as you. And in this case, the effect (for blog marketing, that is) of meeting new people through them is not quite as high as it could be.
A solution to this problem is to come up with a list of descriptions of possible neighbourhoods you might be interested in joining. Show this list to your connector, and she will tell you if she knows anyone who would match the profile. This list of requirements can also help you search for relevant blogs by yourself too. Just fire up Google and see what you can find.
To conclude the discussion, here are some examples of what to be looking for:
- People blogging about a subset of your topic: If you are writing about food, take a look at blogs writing about baking or making soup
- People blogging about a broader topic than you are: If you write about baking, how about checking out blogs about cooking, taking care of the home, or food in general?
- People writing about your topic in a different language. This requires that you know the language, and that the neighbourhood knows yours and will be able to read your blog.
- People from a different race. Unfortunately, race still seems to matter - people do primarily hang out with people who are just the same as they are. If you are brave enough to cross this line drawn in the air, you may soon be lot wiser, and a lot more popular than you are right now
- People of different age. Older than you, younger than you - doesn’t matter. Just find a big enough age difference so that you have something unique to learn from each other.
Are you ready to step outside your comfort zone, and start blogging for more people than just your closest neighbours?
 NxE’s Fifty Most Influential ‘Female’ BloggersAs it is often the case with technology, blogging can seem like a boys’ club to many, but this is obviously no longer the case.
As it is often the case with technology, blogging can seem like a boys’ club to many, but the average blogger is no longer (if they ever were) a geeky, twenty-something man from the US. Strong, interesting women are taking over the blogging world. They have the passion, they have the skills, and they are here to stay. Today, we’re listing fifty most influential female bloggers at the moment.
If you want to know who the blogging world is talking about, these are the names and faces to keep in mind.
No. 50
Shelley Powers
Burningbird - burningbird.net
Burningbird’s Real Tech - realtech.burningbird.net
30 Second Rundown:
Powers is an author, web developer, and technology architect who works with, and writes about open source technologies and the semantic web.
Why She Matters:
She is an outspoken proponent for women in technology, an advocate for increased involvement and visibility for women in Internet and related technology fields. In particular, she works to increase the visibility of women speakers at many popular technology and weblogging conferences as well as on the Internet. Powers once wrote that guys don’t link to blog posts written by women. Hopefully this attitude is fading away, and women both in blogging and technology in general are starting to gain more visibility. No. 49
Ms. Danielle
Danielle’s blog - msdanielle.com
30 Second Rundown:
Danielle is an SEO and PPC specialist on top of being a consistent, hard working blogger. She started her blog over a year ago as an experiment in blogging and social networking. 12 Months, 218 Posts, and 3680 Comments Later, she is fast becoming one of the most popular blogger in the niche, with her blog now ranked well in Technorati’s Top 10,000.
Why She Matters:
Through consistent blogging and promotion, coupled with her natural charisma, Danielle has made great progress in turning her personal blog into the female version of a more elegant “John Chow” blog.
No. 48
Christine O’Kelly
Self Made Chick - selfmadechick.com
30 Second Rundown:
O’Kelly is a mom and internet entrepreneur who runs a successful SEO copywriting firm and several other businesses. She is on a mission to create a substantial online passive income stream and shares her experiences on her blog. O’Kelly writes in a friendly and personal tone that has created dozens of loyal online friends and fans.
Why She Matters:
O’Kelly successfully ‘escaped’ the ‘corporate rat race’ and proved that it is possible to work on things that truly personally matters and make a good living out of it. She does a great job communicating her ideas in a clear and inspiring fashion. In addition, her ‘it doesn’t takes money to make money‘ attitude is something all aspiring entrepreneurs can learn from.
No. 47
Amber MacArthur
Podcaster at commandN - http://commandn.typepad.com/
Podcaster at net@nite - http://www.twit.tv/natn
Amber’s blog - ambermac.com
30 Second Rundown:
MacArthur co-hosts the fifth most-downloaded podcast amongst Canadians, commandN which covers technology trends both online and offline. She also works on the Sunday evening live broadcast net@nite alongside co-host Leo Laporte and writes a monthly “Web Trends” column for The Calgary Sun Urbane Magazine.
Why She Matters:
NOW Magazine declared her the “Best Geek Personality” in 2006. And in a recent Flickr image, titled MacWorld Celebrity Checklist she was ‘labelled’ as a “Real-life techno talking babe”. When this ‘babe’ talks, people listen.
No. 46
Karen Cheng
Snippets of Life - karencheng.com.au
30 Second Rundown:
On her blog, Snippets of Life, which she started in 1999, Cheng talks about parenting, children, art, design, food, fashion, blogging, photography, online shopping and most of all, finding inspiration and happiness in the simple, beautiful quirks of life. Cheng is known for her happy, positive writing style and for trying to live a happy, well-balanced life.
Why She Matters:
Snippets of Life has won numerous national and international awards and been featured in both online and print publications all over the world, including The Sydney Morning Herald, The Straits Times, HWM, DotNet Magazine, About.com, SHIFT Magazine, Photoshop Support, Coolstop, Western Independent, The Oriental Post and much more. In addition, her blog is ranked as 15th in “Top 100 Australian Blogs” and 2nd in the “Top 50 Australian Women’s Blogs“. No. 45
Sarah Meyers
Pop17 - pop17.com
Sarah’s blog - sarahmeyers.wordpress.com
30 Second Rundown:
Meyers is a video journalist who offers opinions, interviews, and tech news on her Internet show, Pop17, which she describes as a “daily exploration to track, analyze and understand the new cultural phenomenon of online micro-celebrity”.
Why She Matters:
‘Video blogging’ is a relatively new approach to blogging. Meyers’ 2-3 minute daily explorations on the phenomenon of online celebrity are an interesting take on the new medium. Meyers is also quickly becoming a micro-celebrity herself, with sponsorship deals with TechCrunch and Virgin America. No. 44
Justine Ezarik
Justine’s blog - tastyblogsnack.com
Justine’s video blog - ijustine.tv
30 Second Rundown:
Ezarik is a freelance graphic designer and video editor based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She is best known as iJustine, a lifecaster, or “lifecasting star” who communicates directly to her thousands of viewers on her Justin.tv channel, ijustine.tv.
Why She Matters:
How many bloggers (video, text or sound) do you know that have a fan club of their own? Not many, I would assume. Some might say that what Ezarik is doing is not what blogging is really about, but no matter what it is, her audience seems to love it. No. 43
Leah Culver
Leah’s blog - leahculver.com
30 Second Rundown:
Culver is a computer programmer and the co-founder of internet startup Pownce. While working at another internet startup, Instructables she became a web 2.0 celebrity as the girl who funded her MacBook Pro by selling advertisement on it.
Why She Matters:
Sometimes introduced as Python’s First Lady (Python as in the programming language), Culver is building the future of the Internet and social applications together with her influential friends, who include figures such as Kevin Rose of Digg. No. 42
Gala Darling
iCiNG - galadarling.com
30 Second Rundown:
One of Australia’s most popular female bloggers, Darling, sometimes introduced as a “tattooed Miss Manners with pink hair“, is a writer and editor who loves changing her hair colour as much as her colourful tattoos. This unique personality behind the popular fashion blog iCiNG is also a freelance writer who writes a monthly fashion column for Cosmopolitan.
Why She Matters:
Darling brings her strong personality to her blogging, which is immediately evident from her blog’s design. iCiNG has quickly become one of the top destinations for fashion enthusiasts from all over the world, and it easy to see why. Where else can you get a sneak peek into Louis Vuitton’s 2009 Cruise Collection? No. 41
Cali Lewis
Video blogger at GeekBrief.tv - geekbrief.tv
Cali’s blog - icali.tv
Dear Cali - www.dearcali.com
30 Second Rundown:
Lewis is the host of GeekBrief.TV, a video show about technology that is released four days a week. She also answers tech questions at the GeekBrief.TV’s sister show, DearCali.com. Lewis also appears regularly on Leo Laporte’s radio show The Tech Guy, his TV show The Lab with Leo, and on This Week in Tech (TWiT).
Why She Matters:
Lewis represents a new generation of bloggers that draws inspiration from the world of television. Together with her husband she was able to quit her day job in 2006 and work full time on GeekBrief.TV, when their podcast show exploded in popularity. GeekBrief.TV, now fetches millions of downloads per month. No. 40
Rachel Sklar
Media and Special Projects Editor of Huffington Post - huffingtonpost.com
Editor of Eat the Press - huffingtonpost.com/eat-the-press
30 Second Rundown:
Rachel Sklar is a lawyer, and New York-based media blogger and freelance writer on a wide array of topics. Her work has been published in the New York Times, Glamour, The Financial Times, The Chicago Tribune, Wallpaper*, The New York Post, and The Village Voice. Sklar is the Media and Special Projects Editor for the Huffington Post and writes and edits the site’s Eat The Press page. She has also made several TV appearances on the Fox News Channel. Sklar is currently working on a humorous book about cultural identity, Jew-ish. (Don’t you mean Jewish? I’m not sure what Jew-ish is, and this is why I’m asking.)
Why She Matters:
Being an editor at Huffington Post is often enough to make someone influential on the internet, but Sklar is also a prolific writer on many publications both online and offline. She was also recently named to Heeb magazine’s “Heeb 100“, Chatelaine magazine’s “Canadian Women to Watch” and the Globe & Mail’s “Ten Famous Canadians You’ve Never Heard Of“. No. 39
Veerle Pieters
Veerle’s blog - veerle.duoh.com
30 Second Rundown:
Pieters is an experienced graphic designer and the CEO of Duoh!, a web development company who is currently working on a project called “The Learning Page” for the Library of Congress in Washington DC. Her personal blog is a popular online source for topics ranging from XHTML/CSS to graphic design tips.
Why She Matters:
Pieters’ blog is widely considered by many as one of the best looking blogs out there, and her tips on web design are highly valued in the web development community. If Google’s Page Rank is any measure of a blog’s influence, Veerle’s blog with a page rank of 8 is quite impressive (you don’t see many blogs with PR of 8). Her blog is also ranked well in the top 2000 of Technorati. No. 38
Ariel Waldman
Waldman’s blog - shakewellbeforeuse.com
30 Second Rundown:
Waldman is a Social Media Insights Consultant blogging at Shake Well Before Use and working as the Community Manager for Pownce as well as a columnist for Engadget. She previously served as a Digital Insights Analyst at VML, an interactive WPP agency she was with for 8 years.
Why She Matters:
According to Marketing Profs, Waldman is “cheeky and provocative, [has a] clear sense of good story … strong voice [and is an] excellent example of what is good in blogging — originality of ideas, excellent delivery and a capacity to put [herself] on the line for the sake of the story.” She has a nice following on her personal blog, but it is the diverse rage of her activities and contributions that truly makes her influential in the blogosphere. No. 37
Staci Kramer
Executive Editor of Paid Content - www.paidcontent.org
30 Second Rundown:
Staci D. Kramer is co-editor and EVP of ContentNext Media, whose main properties are paidContent.org, paidContent:UK, contentSutra.com and mocoNews.net. She joined the company in late 2004 as executive editor of paidContent.org. She has been writing about the intersection of technology with media, entertainment and sports since the days before the Web. Formerly a contributing editor at Inside.com, an editor at large for Cable World and senior editor for the Online Journalism Review, the veteran journalist has written for Time, Life, Sports Business Journal, the Chicago Tribune, The New York Times, and others. She is a former national director at large of the Society of Professional Journalists and founded a list serve for the discussion of journalism ethics, which she operated for a decade.
Why She Matters:
Through writing on multiple blogs and print magazines, Kramer has established herself as one of the most influential freelance writers on the Internet. No. 36
Debbie Weil
BlogWrite for CEO’s - www.blogwriteforceos.com
WordBiz Report Newsletter - www.debbieweil.com/newsletter/wordbiz
The Corporate Blogging Show Podcast - www.thecorporatebloggingshow.com
30 Second Rundown:
Debbie Weil is a corporate & CEO blogging and social media consultant, a sought-after speaker and the author of the widely-praised The Corporate Blogging Book. She publishes BlogWriteForCEOs.com, a Technorati Top 15,000 blog considered one of the most influential about business blogging. In addition, she is a veteran journalist with an MBA and corporate marketing experience (she previously worked for Network Solutions, Inc.)
Why She Matters:
With clients in Global 100 and Fortune 500 companies to professional associations and small businesses, it was a certainty that Weil would make an appearance on this list. Her award-winning e-newsletter, WordBiz Report, reaches out to nearly 20,000 subscribers worldwide, thousands of which are executives on big name companies. She is widely acknowledged as an expert in the field and highly respected for her willingness to share her knowledge. No. 35
Meg Hourihan
Meg Nut - www.megnut.com
Meg’s Personal Blog - meg.hourihan.com
30 Second Rundown:
Hourihan is a co-founder of Pyra Labs, the company that created Blogger before it was acquired by Google in 2003. Nowadays, Hourihan concentrates in running her food blog, Megnut.com on which she described herself as a “food enthusiast”. Hourihan is married to Jason Kottke who was ranked in the top 20 on the NxE’s Fifty Most Influential Bloggers list back in 2007.
Why She Matters:
Hourihan has been blogging since 1999, which makes her one of the earliest and longest-standing bloggers in the world. The blogging platform, Blogger, that she helped built is one of, if not, the most well known blogging platform on the internet today. She is also a well-known technology author and speaker, who makes frequent appearances at many of the large conferences. In 2003, Meg was named a “Young Innovator Who Will Create the Future” by MIT’s Technology Review magazine. PC Magazine recognized Meg as one of its 2004 People of the Year. No. 34
Anne Truitt Zelenka
Tech Decentral - redmonk.com/anne
Anne’s blog - www.annezelenka.com
Anne’s food blog - theeverydaycafe.com
Togetherism - togetherism.com
30 Second Rundown:
Anne Zelenka is an industry analyst, web technologist, and blogger who lives and works in Denver, Colorado. She works with RedMonk as an associate analyst, focusing on enterprise applications, social media in the enterprise, web development tools, and service architectures. She blogs at RedMonk’s tech decentral blog, GigaOM’s Web Worker Daily, as well as her personal food blog, The Everyday Café. She also recently launched a new site, very appropriately titled ‘Togetherism’, where she blogs about social web design and development. She has also authored a highly praised book, Connect! A Guide to a New Way of Working.
Why She Matters:
When it comes to working online and being productive at it, Zelenka is the best person to talk to. Anne served as Editor at Large for GigaOmniMedia, a blog/news-network quoted from CNET and BusinessWeek as one of the most influential websites relating to tech-news. She wrote and edited articles for Web Worker Daily and GigaOM on career, productivity, business, and technology topics. No. 33
Veronica Belmont
Tekzilla on Revision3 - revision3.com/tekzilla
Qore on the PLAYSTATION Network - blog.us.playstation.com
Mahalo Daily - daily.mahalo.com
Veronica’s blog - www.veronicabelmont.com
30 Second Rundown:
Veronica is the co-host of Revision3’s tech-centric show, Tekzilla, and Qore on the PLAYSTATION Network. Previous to that, she was a video host for Mahalo and hosted her own daily podcast Mahalo Daily. Before Mahalo, she worked as producer and associate editor for CNET Networks producing, engineering, and co-hosting the CNET podcast Buzz Out Loud. In 2007, Belmont was listed as the sexiest geek by Violet Blue.
Why She Matters:
Veronica is active on all the new social media sites, such as YouTube, Pownce, Twitter, and Flickr. She is smart, beautiful, and has the right connections. What more could a rising star wish for? No. 32
Emily Chang
Emily’s blog - www.emilychang.com
eHub - www.emilychang.com/go/ehub
30 Second Rundown:
Chang is a web and interaction designer, technology strategist and co-founder of Ideacodes, a web consultancy in San Francisco. She writes about web and user experience design, technology, and next generation web at EmilyChang.com, and is the creator of the popular web 2.0 resource, eHub and eHub Interviews. She’s also the co-creator of Twitterverse.com, a word and tag mashup based on Twitter’s public messages. Most recently, Emily launched PicoCool, a new site that’s dedicated to bringing you tiny and obscure content from the world of peer media, social networks and subcultures. “Cool content from real people.”
Why She Matters:
Chang is not only using the Internet, but actively working on reinventing it. With over 15,000 RSS subscribers on her personal blog, and another 24,000 or so on eHub, her influence on the blogosphere is in no way “minute”. No. 31
Liz Strauss
Successful Blog - www.successful-blog.com
Liz Strauss - www.lizstrauss.com
30 Second Rundown:
Based in Chicago, and regarded by some as the “most influential relational blogger on the internet“. Liz has been involved in print, software and online publishing for over 20 years, which in internet terms, is close to forever. According to her manifesto, Liz is “a writer who uses the language to paint and to play word music”. In her blog, one can find writing, marketing, business, and blogging advice, as well as regular chats and features on successful bloggers.
Why She Matters:
Successful-Blog is ranked in the top 4000 on technorati, not bad by any standards. Her articles are read by many, and well-known for their potential to ’spark’ conversations between readers, which is one of the reasons why her blog has raked up tens of thousands of comments throughout the years, a feat not many other others can boast. Liz’s blog is also a member of b5media, one of the biggest blog network on the internet today. No. 30
Cyan Ta’eed
FreelanceSwitch - freelanceswitch.com
30 Second Rundown:
Ta’eed is the co-founder of Eden Creative Communities, the flash community marketplace - FlashDen, co-creator of the popular FreelanceSwitch blog and co-author of the freelancing book, How To Be a Rockstar Freelancer. To top it off, she also recently co-launched AudioJungle.net with her husband Collis, a digital marketplace for music tracks, audio loops and sound effects.
Why She Matters:
FreelanceSwitch has quickly grown to be the ’single most’ influential blog on freelancing, providing tips, information and news to more than 25,000 RSS subscribers every day. And Cyan most probably isn’t stopping there. It is a safe bet to expect something mind blowing from Eden in the upcoming months. No. 29
Beth Kanter
Beth’s blog - beth.typepad.com/beths_blog
Beth’s site - bethkanter.org
30 Second Rundown:
Kanter’s blog is a major voice for use of social media tools in non-profit and social change field. Kanter also acts as the Contributing Editor for Nonprofits and Social Change at BlogHer and writes for the Netsquared blog. She also assists in many blog community projects, most recently for the World Cafe Stewardship Dialogue blog and NCDD.
Why She Matters:
Through her active work in non-profit organizations, Kanter has demonstrated that blogging can be a powerful tool for creating awareness on important issues and as a catalyst for creating social change. No. 28
Violet Blue
Blue’s Blog - Tiny Nibbles (Link is Work Safe)
Open Source Sex - Open Source Sex (Link is Work Safe)
30 Second Rundown:
Blue is a sex writer, podcaster, blogger, editor, sex educator, and sex columnist. She blogs on her popular blog Tiny Nibbles, as well as on Fleshbot (Link NWS), an Alexa top 3000 and technorati top 2000 sex blog ran by Gawker. She also writes a weekly sex column for the San Francisco Chronicle. Her podcast Open Source Sex, in which she reads erotica and talks about topics such as fetishes and oral sex, has been listed high as number three in ITunes’s daily charts. Blue is the author of several bestselling books on sex and has edited several volumes of erotica anthologies.
Why She Matters:
In January 2007, Forbes named Blue one of The Web Celeb 25. She is considered the leading sex blogger online and the sex educator of the Internet generation. No. 27
Tina Su
Think Simple Now - thinksimplenow.com
Su’s travel blog - adamtina.com
30 Second Rundown:
Su works as a ‘User Experience Designer’ and ‘Technical Program Manager’ at Amazon.com, but she is also a professional photographer with her own studio, a co-founder of an internet start-up, and a successful blogger.
Why She Matters:
In just a couple of months of blogging, Su has been able to create a strong blog with nearly 6000 RSS subscribers and have elicited a lot of comments. She was possibly most popular for her blog gathering over 2000+ subscribers in 90 days. Doing this with zero prior blogging experience is quite an achievement. Su is now one of today’s fastest rising pro-bloggers. No. 26
Mary Hodder
Founder and Chairman, Dabble - www.dabble.com
Editor, Napsterization - www.napsterization.org/stories
Mary’s Personal Website - www.hodder.org
30 Second Rundown:
Hodder was a graduate student at UC Berkeley and has written for half a dozen different blogs. Her most popular probably being Napsterization, a blog which discusses the transformation of traditional media into digital media. In 2005, she founded Dabble, a site that aims to help people collect and share videos, no matter where they’re hosted. She’s also works on a number of systems, most notably of which is Technorati.
Why She Matters:
Hodder is one of the leading-edge bloggers writing about and experimenting with new web technologies, she is constantly engaged in discovering new roles that digital media can play in our lives today. As such, her views are widely influential. Also, she’s extremely active on many social websites, and interacts profusely with the online community. No. 25
Skellie
No. 24
Tara Hunt
Horse.Pig.Cow - www.horsepigcow.com
30 Second Rundown:
Hunt, also known as “Miss Rogue”, is a marketing expert specialising in community marketing. Her blog, Horse.Pig.Cow, is a place where people come to find new ideas and inspiration. Hunt is also a frequent speaker at technology conferences on the subject of marketing and community building. She is the co-founder of Citizen Agency, a consultancy that specifically helps companies (mostly start-ups) connect with their communities. Hunt also practices what she preaches and is a community-based movement evangelist, spending all of her free time on Pinko Marketing, Barcamp, Coworking and Winecamp.
Why She Matters:
Online communities are a vital part of the internet today, so if you are in a business, or even just a blogger wanting to go professional, you need to pay close attention to what Hunt is saying about building communities and how to market them.
No. 23
Anita Campbell
Editor of Small Business Trends - www.smallbiztrends.com
30 Second Rundown:
Anita Campbell is a lawyer by training with a wide range of interests, as reflected in her varied background in banking, information technology, human resources, marketing and eCommerce. Before starting her own business, she held various executive positions in the corporate world, working with companies such as Bell and Howell. Her company, Small Business Trends, publishes one of - if not - the most popular blog on “small business issues and news”, Small Business Trends. Her opinion is often quoted in the media, including the Wall Street Journal, Inc Magazine, Entrepreneur Magazine, numerous trade publications, websites, podcasts and more.
Why She Matters:
With her strong experience and background in running businesses, Campbell is widely accepted as one of the leading experts in small business issues on the internet today. Her blog provides small business operators with an insight into the future, by following and analysing trends in the market today. It is because of this that her blog’s popularity has exploded in recent years, with nearly 180 thousand subscribers following her blog on RSS. Small Business Trends has also won many awards, including Forbe’s “Best of the Web” award for small business blogs and the “#1 Most Practical Blog” award from About.com. No. 22
Susi Weaser
Susi’s blog - www.susiweaser.com
Editor at Shiny Shiny - www.shinyshiny.tv
30 Second Rundown:
Weaser is the editor of the popular UK blog ShinyShiny, dubbed “A girl’s guide to gadgets”. Recently the video reviews she posted on YouTube for ShinyShiny were noticed by BBC who then signed Weaser to appear in their Sunday morning entertainment and cookery show “Something for the Weekend.” Through these ‘turn of events’ she has become a small celebrity in the UK where newspapers have come to call her “an inspiration to bloggers” and an “internet phenomenon”.
Why She Matters:
Weaser not only helps run a successful gadget blog, but she is also a perfect example on how blogging can lead on to bigger opportunities in the industry. Her success story is an inspiration to all the bloggers out there. No. 21
Wendy Piersall
Spark Plugging formerly eMoms at Home - www.sparkplugging.com
Blogger at Entrepreneur.com - inspired.entrepreneur.com
Personal Development Coach - wendypiersall.com
30 Second Rundown:
Piersall is an Internet entrepreneur, self-employed for 8 years and an active blogger on many different blogs. Her flagship blog, eMoms at home was recently reworked into Spark Plugging. eMom at home originally offers support and useful information for moms and dads working from home, however, all these has changed, SparkPlugging now caters to all people who wants to make ‘a great living while working from home’.
Why She Matters:
Piersall is passionate about helping people succeed both as entrepreneurs and parents, and thus has been helping many more people in getting started with their online businesses. eMoms at Home, before being reworked, received thousands of visits a day and received praises from many of the top business and entrepreneur websites on the internet. No. 20
Jessica Morgan and Heather Cocks
Go Fug Yourself - gofugyourself.typepad.com
Morgan’s blog - ultratart.typepad.com
Cocks’ blog - dancingbrave.typepad.com
30 Second Rundown:
Morgan and Cocks runs the hugely popular fashion blog Go Fug Yourself that ridicules fashion disasters by stars and starlets. In Febuary 2008, Morgan and Cocks co-authored a book, The Fug Awards, with honours to the worst offenders in celebrity fashion, along with the same kind of commentary that can be found on their blog.
Why They Matter:
Morgan and Cocks have coined their own word, “fugly”, which as they described is “a self-inflicted state, and no one seems to excel at dwelling in the depths of fug quite like pretty people with money to spare and little sense of how to spend it.” Their blog was named one of Entertainment Weekly’s 25 favourite entertainment sites in their June 2006 issue. In 2005, it was named one of the 50 Coolest Websites by TIME magazine and one of the Top 100 Best Things of the Year by CBC. No. 19
Amanda Marcotte
Amanda’s blog - pandagon.net
30 Second Rundown:
Marcotte runs the issues-oriented liberal political blog Pandagon, known for its insightful and often humorous political blogging. Before Pandagon, she was blogging at a blog called Mouse Words, which won the 2004 Koufax award for Best New Blog. At the beginning of 2008, Marcotte worked as John Edwards 2008 presidential campaign’s blogmaster, until the situation got nasty and she had to resign from the position to return to her other blogging activities.
Why She Matters:
What shot Marcotte to fame was undoubtedly her participation in John Edward’s 2008 presidential campaign. While she lasted in the position for less than two months, it was enough to bring blogging to the forefront of the public’s attention. Marcotte is a prime example on how difficult it can be to keep a personal blog separate from a blogging job. Her opinion on political issues often sparks debates and controversy, which may be why her blog is one of the most linked to political blog on the internet today. No. 18
Tamar Weinberg
Managing Editor at Search Engine Roundtable - www.seroundtable.com
Tamar’s technology blog - www.techipedia.com
(Tamar Weinberg is a) Schwag Addict - schwagaddict.com
30 Second Rundown:
Weinberg is an active figure in the world of blogging and community building, running multiple blogs including the popular technology blog, Technipedia and writing for many more, including Search Engine Roundtable and Lifehacker. She is present on all imaginable social networks and attends a ton of conferences. She recently joined the social networking news site Mashable as the Director of Community.
Why She Matters:
Weinberg is active on many fronts related to blogging and is connected to tons of people both online and offline. No. 17
Kathy Sierra
Creating Passionate Users - headrush.typepad.com
30 Second Rundown:
Sierra is a game developer and programming instructor best known for her blog, Creating Passionate Users and the Head First series of books on computer programming, which takes an unorthodox, visually intensive approach to the process of teaching programming similar to the style used on her blog. In April 2007, Sierra stopped blogging after receiving a series of threatening comments. She wrote on her blog: “I have cancelled all speaking engagements. I am afraid to leave my yard, I will never feel the same. I will never be the same.”
Why She Matters:
Even after a year of no updates, Sierra’s blog still ranks high on Technorati and many people miss her and remain subscribed to her RSS feed just in case she would start blogging again. No. 16
Kara Swisher
BoomTown - kara.allthingsd.com
Co-Executive Editor of D: All Things Digital - allthingsd.com/d/
30 Second Rundown:
Swisher is a technology columnist for the Wall Street Journal, as well as being a very popular blogger and commentator online. Boom Town, a column that originally appeared on the front page of the Marketplace section of the Wall Street Journal and WSJ online, has been reintroduced as an online only blog called BoomTown at AllThingsD.com, which she co-blogs with Walt Mossberg. Together with Mossberg, Swisher hosts the Wall Street Journal’s annual D: All Things Digital conference, in which top technology leaders are interviewed on stage by the two columnists. She was cited as the most influential reporter covering the internet by the Industry Standard magazine.
Why She Matters:
Swisher is an experienced technology columnist that is highly respected by the technology circle as well as the general public. With access to the big names of the tech biz, such as Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, her writing provides an insight that makes her a voice worth listening to. No. 15
Stephanie Pearl-McPhee
Yarn Harlot - www.yarnharlot.ca
30 Second Rundown:
Pearl-McPhee is best known for her successful blog about knitting, The Yarn Harlot, but she has also contributed articles and patterns to knitting magazines such as Cast On, Interweave Knits, Knitty, Stranded, and Spin Off and written six books on knitting. Pearl-McPhee is an active figure in organizing activities around knitting: in 2004 she founded a non-profit called Tricoteuses sans Frontières (Knitters without Borders) which has raised over $434,000 CAD for the non-profit organization Doctors without Borders.
Why She Matters:
Known as the ‘Knitting Sensei’, Pearl-McPhee might not be the most important figure to everyone, but the knitting world pays close attention to what she says and does. Pearl-McPhee is not only the most influential knitter online, but also a knitter who uses her position for greater good through her non-profit organization. Her blog was also recently voted the ‘Best Canadian Blog‘ of 2007, as well as the ‘Best Hobby Blog‘ on Blogger’s Choice Awards. No. 14
Lorelle VanFossen
Lorelle on WordPress - lorelle.wordpress.com
Camera on the Road - www.cameraontheroad.com
30 Second Rundown:
A self-proclaimed blog evangelist, VanFossen is the author of the popular weblog Lorelle on WordPress, a public speaker, instructor, writer, and consultant helping people to get the most out of WordPress. Her articles have been published on many blogs such as ProBlogger.net, Blog Herald and Blogger and Podcaster Magazine. She is also the author of the fast-selling book, Blogging Tips: What Bloggers Won’t Tell You About Blogging.
Why She Matters:
VanFossen’s tips, articles and lectures on using WordPress are helping bloggers around the world make the most out of their blogging platform while at the same time helping them to build a better blog. No. 13
Rebecca McKinnon
Co-founder of Global Voices Online - www.globalvoicesonline.org
Rebecca’s blog - rconversation.blogs.com
30 Second Rundown:
McKinnon is an Assistant Professor teaching new media at the University of Hong Kong’s Journalism and Media Studies Centre with an impressive background as a TV journalist for CNN in Asia. She is also the co-founder of Global Voices Online, an award-winning international citizens’ media community in which she still remains involved with. McKinnon is also on the Advisory Boards of the Wikimedia Foundation and Policy Innovations.
Why She Matters:
Global Voices Online brings topics that the English speaking media often ignores to open discussion and calls attention to the most interesting conversations and perspectives emerging from around the world. In addition, Global Voices Online is a Top 500 Blog on Technorati, as well as being a Top 25k site on Alexa. No. 12
Elizabeth Spiers
Elizabeth’s blog - www.elizabethspiers.com
30 Second Rundown:
The founding editor of Gawker.com, the famed New York media gossip blog, Spiers went on to found Dead Horse Media, which publishes Wall Street gossip blog Dealbreaker.com, law gossip blog AboveTheLaw, fashion gossip blog Fashionista, and business management site Supermogul. She left Dead Horse Media in April 2007, citing a difference in direction with her partners. Her debut novel, And They All Die in the End, will be published by Riverhead (an imprint of Penguin Books) in Winter of 2008.
Why She Matters:
As the original Gawker girl, Spiers is among the most famous professional bloggers, having developed a distinctive style that has been imitated by many other bloggers — a snarky attitude, casual profanity, and genuine enthusiasm. She’s proven that she can start up popular blogs almost at will, and has said she has plans for more ventures in the near future. No. 11
Shai Coggins
No. 10
Lisa Sugar
Editor in Chief of Sugar Publishing - www.sugarpublishing.com
Editor in Chief of PopSugar - www.popsugar.com
30 Second Rundown:
In April 2006, together with her husband, Sugar founded Sugar Publishing and started a blog empire with PopSugar, a fast-growing celebrity gossip site that is now the flagship of the 16-blog network. The blogs in the network, which include such titles as FabSugar, BellaSugar and LilSugar, are aimed at women younger than 35.
Why She Matters:
When a blog network gets funding from a VC firm like Sequoia (the guys who funded Google, YouTube and a variety of other winners), you know it’s worth paying attention. With a rapidly expanding portfolio of blogs, the Sugars are running a tight ship. No. 9
Ana Marie Cox
Wonkette Emeritas - wonkette.com
30 Second Rundown:
Cox was a former editor at the influential website, suck.com, and the founding editor of Wonkette.com, the Washington D.C. political gossip blog owned by Gawker Media. She popularized the site through her witty, irreverent and sarcastic style, and was known as the Wonkette before retiring in 2006 (taking the title Wonkette Emerita) to promote her book. She has also written for Time magazine, contributing a D.C. column and writing for Time’s blog. She is now working as the Washington editor of Radar.
Why She Matters:
Cox was extremely influential in Washington politics due to the popularity of Wonkette. Cox and Wonkette gained notoriety in the political world for publicizing the story of Jessica Cutler in 2004. She was featured on the cover of many major publications, especially at the height of the 2004 elections, and her writing still often sparks controversy today. No. 8
Xeni Jardin
Co-editor of Boing Boing - boingboing.net
Xeni’s web site - xeni.net
30 Second Rundown:
Jardin is a tech culture journalist and blogger best known as the co-editor of the collaborative blog Boing Boing and co-host of the daily video log Boing Boing tv. Her articles have been published in a variety of magazines including WIRED, Los Angeles Times, MSNBC, Playboy and many others. She has also appeared on radio and television and runs hosts NPR’s “Xeni Tech” podcast. Jardin is a passionate traveller and has studied over a dozen languages including Maohi (Tahitian), Quiché and Kakchikel Maya (Guatemala), Nahuatl (an indigenous language of Mexico), Mandarin Chinese, and Yoruba (Nigeria).
Why She Matters:
Through her writing at Boing Boing, Jardin has provoked strong feelings both in favour and against her, resulting in a web site called XeniSucks (not updated since August 2007) and a GreaseMonkey script for filtering her posts out from Boing Boing. Still, Boing Boing remains hugely popular, ranking at top 5 on Technorati, and never in doubt that Jardin has made and is continue to make a lasting impact on the blogging world. No. 7
Heather Armstrong
Heather’s blog - www.dooce.com
30 Second Rundown:
Armstrong, who writes under the nickname Dooce, is famous for being fired from her job for things she wrote about her job and co-workers on her blog. The incident fired up the blogging community and earned her a celebrity blogger status creating a coinage that is all her own (to be “dooced” is to be fired for something you write online). She’s a designer known for quirky headers on her blog and a deeply personal and humorous writing style.
Why She Matters:
Dooce has been one of the most popular blogs for years (Top 50 Most Popular according to Technorati), and has won many awards for her incisive writing, wit and honesty. In fact, it’s her style that’s so influential, as it has affected the writing style (and design style) of many blogs to follow. No. 6
Erin Kissane
Editor of A List Apart - www.alistapart.com
Erin’s blog - www.incisive.nu
30 Second Rundown:
Kissane is a writer and editorial strategist focusing on good editorial practices and the importance of clear and precise business communication. She is also the editor of A List Apart, a weblog for people who make websites, where she helps the web development community to identify and promote better ways to publish content and build websites.
Why She Matters:
A List Apart is ranked 53 on Technorati and read like a bible by most web developers. Kissane’s ideas gets noticed and help define what the Internet will be today and in the future. No. 5
Michelle Malkin
Michelle’s blog - www.michellemalkin.com
30 Second Rundown:
Malkin is a columnist, author, political commentator, and a blogger with a politically and socially conservative blog that ranks No. 50 on Technorati. She makes frequent guest appearances on national syndicated radio programs and on television networks like MSNBC, Fox News Channel, and C-SPAN. She also posts regular video blogs.
Why She Matters:
Malkin’s writing has often been highly controversial, taking a conservative stand on many issues that have gotten her death threats and hate mail. Early this year, Malkin openly attacked the decision of hiring Marcotte (Ranked No. 19 on this list) as the blogmaster for the John Edward’s 2008 presidential campaign. Malkin’s blog is read by many, and is considered one of the top political blogs on the Internet, which is supported by her Technorati Rank of 55. No. 4
Pamela Jones
Editor of Groklaw - www.groklaw.net
30 Second Rundown:
Jones, originally known only as PJ, has one of the most influential voices on legal issues surrounding the open source and free software community. As the editor of Groklaw, she brings legal events affecting the online community to our attention and explains them in terms that everyone can understand. Her articles have appeared in various magazines including Linux Journal and Linux Today, and she is one of the contributors to the book Open Sources 2.0: The Continuing Evolution. In the early days of her blogging, Jones protected her privacy extensively and wished to remain anonymous, blogging under her initials ‘PJ’, even today, there is no photo of her available on the internet.
Why She Matters:
Jones has been an active commentator in the SCO-Linux controversies and made the complex legal story more accessible for the rest of us. Her blog is read by millions and has won numerous awards, the most recently being ‘The Award for Projects of Social Benefit‘ from The Free Software Foundation. No. 3
Gina Trapani
Managing Editor of Lifehacker - www.lifehacker.com
Gina’s blog - www.ginatrapani.com
30 Second Rundown:
Trapani is the founding editor of Lifehacker, a Gawker Media weblog on productivity, software, tips and tricks. She is also an independent web programmer coding Firefox extensions and web sites. Her writing has appeared in Popular Science, WIRED and Laptop Magazine, and in December 2006 she released her first book, Lifehacker: 88 Tech Tricks to Turbocharge Your Day. The second edition, Upgrade Your Life: The Lifehacker Guide to Working Smarter, Faster, Better, came out in March 2008.
Why She Matters:
Trapani is perhaps the best and most widely influential of any of the Gawker Media bloggers. She writes about technology and productivity for the masses, and has attracted a wide following. Lifehacker has become a must-read for many people, bloggers and non-bloggers alike. Getting mentioned on Lifehacker can send almost Digg-like traffic to a smaller blog. No. 2
Ariana Huffington
Co-founder and Editor in Chief of The Huffington Post - www.huffingtonpost.com
30 Second Rundown:
Huffington is a nationally syndicated columnist, author of 12 books and co-founder and editor of the Huffington Post, a progressive political blog. She’s also a political commentator on radio and television (including a popular stint on Comedy Central), and once ran for governor of California during the recall election against then-governor Gray Davis. She pulled out of the campaign, which was eventually won by Arnold Schwartzenegger. She was previously married to (and is now divorced from) millionaire Michael Huffington, who became elected to the U.S. House of Representatives during their marriage.
Why She Matters:
The Huffington Post, which is very well-financed, is the No. 4-ranked blog on Technorati and gets more than 18 million page views a month. Her site is also popular not only because of her writing but because of her celebrity friends, including close friends Nora Ephron and Norman Mailer. In 2006, Huffington Post won the Webbies Award for best political blog and Time Magazine has selected Huffington on its list of the 100 Most Influential People in 2006. No. 1
Lisa Stone, Elisa Camahort Page and Jory Des Jardins
Founders of BlogHer - www.blogher.com
30 Second Rundown:
The power trio joined forces in 2005 to organize the first ever BlogHer conference as a way for blogging women to meet and support each other. Since then, the BlogHer conference has become a yearly event that collects hundreds of participants from all niches of blogging. BlogHer is also active on the web through the BlogHer community site, an advertising network, and a collection of web based tools for bloggers.
Why They Matter:
BlogHer is keeping the voice of blogging women loud and clear and encouraging women to start and succeed at blogging. Backed up with venture funding from Venrock, it plans to grow and organize more events as well as improve the online offering.  The Blog-Myth Revisited: Why You Need a Blogging SystemWhen you start a new blog, putting out a new post every day doesn’t feel like a lot. But how long can you keep it up? The initial passion keeps you going for a while, and after that you keep moving because of your strong commitment. But you are glued to your blog, and your blog is glued to you. Your blog will suffer from every life event that takes up your time (sickness, family matters, work), and your life will suffer from the fact that you can’t get away and leave your blog without risking its success.
As the best-selling book, The E-Myth Revisited, puts it: you have created yourself a job, not a business. You are working in your business, not on it.
Or in blogging terms: you are working in your blog, not on it.
You Need a System
If you are like most serious bloggers, you have made a sacred promise to write something consistently to keep your blog going. Maybe you even post in advance to cover for the short breaks, but still your blog is tied to your personal ability to deliver what you promise.
Your blog’s growth is tied to your ability to grow it.
This might not necessarily be a problem, but if you want to see your blog take off and grow into something bigger than you have ever dared to dream of, or if you want it to outlive your passion - or even outlive you, you may want to consider building a blogging system.
A blogging system is a set of guidelines that define how your blog should be run in different situations by all the different people involved. Clearly defined guidelines, I might add. This idea for blogging guidelines comes from the world of franchising, where for example at McDonald’s, the operations manual goes to great detail in explaining the new employee how she should wipe the floors or sell a hamburger. In our case, the context is different - but the idea of a manual is exactly the same as in the McDonald’s case.
In this post, I’ll explain the basic rules of building a blog machine that can be run by anyone following the instructions in your manual. When correctly implemented, the blogging system will give you more options than you’ve ever had before:
- Keep working in your blog: Following the new set of guidelines will make sure that your readers get a consistent experience and know what to expect when they come to your blog the next time. This will make the visit much more enjoyable.
- Outsource some writing: When you have a clear manual to give to the potential blogger, you can safely hand some responsibility over trusting that everything will work smoothly, just like it should.
- Outsource all writing: Assume the responsibility of the blog’s editor and work together with paid bloggers to bring your vision about your blog to life.
- Outsource the editing: Once the writing part works well without your own input, you might want to consider also outsourcing the editing part to one of your writers. This is a big leap, because you are now giving up most of the control - moving to the role of an owner instead of an active performer.
- Sell the blog: It’s much easier to sell a blog that works than one that relies completely to your own work. In the case of a finely tuned blogging system, the transition from one owner to another may not even be visible to the readers!
The benefits for a functional blogging system are many, but how do you actually build one?
How to Build a Blogging System
First, you need to define the roles involved in your blog. At first, you’ll be filling all the positions, so make sure to divide the roles based on function and not the person doing the work.
Here are the roles I have identified for my own blogging system:
- Writer: The writer is the one who comes up with all the content for the readers to see. With guidance from the editor, he comes up with ideas for blog posts and brings the ideas to life. Most bloggers feel most comfortable in this role as it’s what blogging technically is about.
- Editor: The editor takes care of things such as posting schedule, the overall plan for the month at hand, and making sure the writers have everything they need to get their work done. He also checks spelling and grammar, and finds imagery for the posts before publishing them to the public.
- Owner: The owner is the person who started (or bought) the blog. He has the overall vision of where he wants to take the blog to, in terms of subject matter, monetization, readership, and brand. By paying the editor and writer to do their jobs, he frees time for looking at the strategic opportunities that lie ahead.
- Various support activities: When your blog grows, you’ll probably need to think about activities such as accounting, web design, advertising, and so on. These can fall on you, the owner, or you can outsource them to professionals.
With the roles in place, Michael Gerber, the author of The E-Myth Revisited says that your next step is to step into the lowest-level role and start working in it. But not just working but at the same time always considering how to best work in the role, writing down all the hurdles and solutions that come your way. Answering in advance the questions that a person filling that role would later have.
When you have completed a guide book for the first role (writer), you will want to try it out in real life by paying someone to work by the book and watching him closely to see if the guide provides the answers to all of his questions or not. If everything works, you can move on to the next role on the list and repeat the process.
What To Include in a Blogging Manual
Every blog is unique and every blogger values different things, but there are some common topics I think every blogging manual will need to include. The list below forms the basis of my own manual for the blog writer, and can be used as a starting point for manuals of your own.
The writer needs to know what you expect from him: what he should deliver, when you need to have the articles, and what to do in all kinds of special cases:
- Agreeing on posts: How do the writer and the editor decide on what the writer should write? This can include a process for setting up a meeting, or exchanging ideas over e-mail, as well as a description of how to use Google Calendar to define due dates for posts.
- Writing the posts: A wide topic that includes guidelines for various things like using headers, colors, and all the other formatting options in your blogging platform, tips for checking the spelling and grammar of the post, a guide for looking for photos from Flickr, a tutorial on using your blogging platform, a process for marking the post done and notifying the editor, tips for formulating a good opening sentence.
- Problem situations: What do you expect the writer to do when he realizes that he’s running late and won’t be able to make it? What about when after a while of writing, he comes to the conclusion that this topic will get him nowhere and needs to change the subject of the article in hand?
- Editing phase: Is there something the writer still needs to do when he has passed the article over to the editor? Maybe fix some problems identified by the editor? Or is that done mostly by the editor herself?
- Commenting: The writer needs to be there for a while after his post has gone live to answer comments from the readers and participate in the discussion. For how long? Which comments can be ignored? How quickly should the comments be answered? Are there any other policies you want to enforce?
- Getting paid: The actual paying would go to the owner’s operating manual, but it’s good to also make sure the writer knows how the payment process works. Include things like payment method (PayPal), the date at which the writer can expect to receive payment (and how often it happens), pricing rules, and a format for an e-mail notification when the payment has been sent. You may also want to add instructions for special cases such as what the writer should do if he’s not receiving a payment, and how to check that a payment has arrived.
In short, write down the system that keeps your blog going, and make sure it’s one you can apply yourself as well.
When you see that your system is working, get out there and start hiring. With the new hire in place, keep your eyes open and follow how well the system is working: listen to the questions from the field and keep updating the guide with every new piece of advice you find from day to day.
This way, your blogging will transform from an ad hoc, learn as you go activity into something organized and reproducable that can serve your readers better while at the same time making your own life easier and less stressful!
 How to Take a Break Without Breaking Your BlogIt’s again the time of year when people start planning their vacations. But not everyone: most bloggers can’t even dream of taking a break. In many ways, bloggers are like entrepreneurs, and the most serious ones actually consider their blogs as businesses. And unfortunately, most entrepreneurs have one tricky problem: they don’t know how to take a break and relax.
Why relax?
Photo by Rick Harris
Sure, blogging is your passion. If it wasn’t, you wouldn’t be doing it. But quite often, getting some distance to the thing you do from day to day will help you improve.
When you are relaxing and don’t have to keep pushing out content to your blogs, your mind does its own work, looking at your business from a distance. It starts to see things that you could improve, it notices your strengths and weaknesses.
And most importantly, the time away refuels your passion. After a few week’s break you are filled with new energy to pursue your goals with new determination and power.
Maintaining a consistent posting schedule is my number one advice for bloggers, but still, even bloggers need to take a break every now and then to keep themselves running until the end of times.
But bloggers can’t leave their blogs!
Photo by Steve Webel
You’re right, it’s not easy.
But it’s not that much because of a lack of options - the real reason lies inside our heads: just like the self-employed entrepreneur we’re afraid of what might happen while we’re surfing at the Caribbean.
What if I don’t have a blog to return to after my two weeks offline?
What if my subscriber count drops dramatically?
What if I don’t want to return to my blog after I have taken some distance to it?
I’m sure these questions, and many more go through your mind when are planning your vacation. But let’s leave them aside for a while and look at the options.
The secret is that once you start planning, these questions will most likely become deprecated.
Find yourself some good guest bloggers
Photo by macten
Not so long ago, a blogger from Australia decided that he wanted to travel. He wanted to go all the way to California and participate in the SxSW event, but just like any pro blogger, he didn’t want to lose his blog during his time away.
His solution? Guest blogging.
Luckily this guy was so popular that people were fighting to get their posts accepted to the blog. He asked for blogging tips and in just a few hours had over 100 to choose from (he was looking for 13) and could safely leave his blog attended for a few days.
You all know this blogger. His name is Darren Rowse.
Pay someone to post for you
Photo by DavidDMuir
On April first, the most famous outsourcer on the Internet today shared his secret: he revealed that he had not written a single post to his blog during the past year. The most intriguing part of the story was that his blog is a personal blog bearing his name - and the writers were pretending to be him throughout the year.
A few hours later, Tim Ferris had to come out and tell his furious readers that this was just an April’s fools prank. But even so, there is no reason to think that this would be impossible. Tim’s original post gives good food for thought on how to outsource your blog during your break.
Maybe a bit too sneaky for a personal blog, but then again for a niche blog like FreelanceSwitch a similar approach has proven to be quite a liberating option. Most of the pots at FreelanceSwitch are written by freelancers who get paid by post - and even the editing task has been given away from the original bloggers. This way the blog has been transformed from a self-employment job into a real business that can thrive without the owner’s participation - who is now free to take the vacation (unless he’s busy working on something else).
If your blog is generating enough money to pay the writers, this might well be the way to go. But if you can’t afford paying $50-100 per post, keep reading.
Save your posts
Photo by Kate E. Did
A good practice often suggested to bloggers is to write your posts in advance. A buffer of a few days helps you keep up the consistent posting schedule even in a case of an emergency like you or a family member getting sick that will distract you from your blogging.
But the benefits of writing your posts in advantage don’t end here.
It’s a bit like saving. If you write one post to your savings account every now and then, and start saving early enough, you can collect enough posts to finance your two weeks away from the blog next summer. And your readers might not even notice that you are gone!
Let’s do some math:
If you post to your blog once per day, you’ll need 14 posts for a two week vacation. Assuming that you want to take your vacation in July, if you start saving today, you have ten weeks to get your finances together.
14 posts divided by ten weeks means you need to write 1.4 extra posts per week. By dropping your post frequency a bit, you can get away by saving just one post every week. Sure it’ll be hard to resist pressing the publish button when you have just completed a great post. But believe me, you’ll thank yourself in July!
Pick your perfect mix
This was the free option. It’s also the one that takes the most of your time, one of your most valuable possessions. That’s why, I suggest a mixture of all the different approaches: pay for a few posts, get some guest posts from your readers and blogging friends, and then write the rest of your posts in advance.
This way you can keep your blog alive while waiting for the summer - and during the summer when you are relaxing on the beach and thinking about your blogging strategy for the next year.
Bloggers (just like entrepreneurs) can take a few weeks or more off, if they really want to. The next question is: are you ready to do it?
 Six Impossible Things You Can Do To Improve Your BlogHow many impossible things did you do last week? None? If so, it’s about time to raise the bar. This week, I’m proposing to you, six impossible things that will make your blog more interesting, more appealing, or just that little important bit more popular.
But how do you do impossible things?
You can’t. If something really is impossible, then by definition, it is:
- not possible; unable to be, exist, happen, etc.
- unable to be done, performed, effected, etc.: an impossible assignment.
The trick is to know the impossible things from ones that just seem impossible:
- Landing to the moon? Impossible.
- Curing Polio? Impossible.
- Driving a car without a horse? Impossible.
- Sailing to India? Impossible.
- The Internet? Impossible.
You get the picture.
Most of the big inventions were considered impossible long before anyone dared to try them out. But history shows that the doubters (most of the human kind) were wrong. Those things weren’t really impossible - just hard to imagine.
That’s the loophole we are going to exploit today.
Getting Started With Doing Impossible Things
I will give you six ideas as examples to start with, but the real lesson is more profound. What I really want to show you is that it’s possible to learn a new way of looking at things: one that sees beyond the man-made limits we have set on our imagination.
Let me ask you this:
If everything was possible, what would you do to improve your blog?
Mark all of your answers down. No matter how impossible they seem. No censorship allowed.
Then take a look at your list and go through each of the impossible ideas one by one asking yourself why you think the item on your list is impossible. What needs to change for it to become possible? What would you lose by trying it out?
If it becomes clear that the price for trying to achieve the impossible thing is too high, leave the idea aside. Otherwise, make no excuses, just implement it.
Doing impossible things feels great, you know?
The Six Impossible Ideas
I promised six impossible ideas. And when you promise something, you need to do it - no matter how impossible it is.
So, here you go. Six impossible things you can do to improve your blog.
- Interview a celebrity: Pick one who fits your topic and who your readers are familiar with, but make sure to aim high. After all, I don’t think anyone considers interviewing Leo Babauta or Skellie impossible. But how about getting an interview from Steve Jobs or the other Steve from Microsoft? Impossible. (Which to us means “go for it!”)
- Organize a competition with prizes worth thousands of dollars: Last September, a blogger I was following at that time, DevDad, organized a competition with a new Apple iMac as the prize. I was astonished: how can this 22-year stay at home dad afford to do something like this? Impossible. Well, as you see, it really is quite possible, so your mission is to top this - how about a Ferrari this time?
- Do something impossible, then tell about it on your blog: My current number one goal is to implement a 4-hour workweek to have more time for my family. Most people will tell me that it’s impossible and I shouldn’t even think of doing something like that. I know it won’t be easy - but I also know that if I manage to do it, it will have two big effects on my blog: First, I will have something important to share with my readers. And second, I will have much more time available for blogging. Both great reasons for challenging the impossible.
- Make your blog appear in the evening news: In the world of advertisement, TV is usually the most appreciated, and expensive of the alternatives. But you can still buy it with money. To make things more impossible, I’m asking you to get your air time without paying for it - as a feature spot in the evening news. Scott Ginsberg did it by being the luckiest person he knows. What’s your approach?
- Build your blog to outlive yourself: Late
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