Internet Business Blog

PubCon Vegas 2007

Earlier in the month Danielle and I headed out to Las Vegas, NV for my very first PubCon convention. During our five day stay, I was able to sit in on nearly twenty five hours worth of sessions, network with some really cool people, and attend two of the best shows that Vegas had to offer. On this blog, I’ll be posting a rundown of each day. This is Day #2.

PubCon - Day 2

I’m not going to lie, I missed Richard Rosenblatt’s keynote speech on this day because we were out too late the night before. Since it was our first time in Vegas, we took advantage of the situation by staying up as late as possible :).

To kick things off, I skipped the first round of sessions to check out the Exhibit Hall where I picked up some really cool swag. I actually went in with an empty backpack in anticipation of this, and came out with it being completely full. I was a little dissapointed though that there were no vouchers this year beyond Joe Bucks. I was really hoping to score some Google, Yahoo, or MSN Adcenter PPC discounts. Oh well. Either way, it was a fun experience and I had a chance to meet with some of my current software venders, and have a good chat about PPC with both Google and Yahoo employees.

The first session of the day that I attended was called SEO Design and Organic Site Structure. Overall, the session was a good one and many tips were straight and to the point.

*Some* SEO D&OS Session Notes:

• Use CSS whenever possible!
• Design for your visitors first.
• Try to use Div’s instead of Tables.
• Get free follow links from Flickr picture descriptions.
• Anchor text internally to distribute link juice.

Next I sat in on an Alternate Discovery session which explained how to optimize documents such as PDFs and RSS for the major search engines. It also covered Podcasting and Blog SEO. It was an interesting session, where I learned some new material - especially concerning the PDF files and RSS feeds.

*Some* Alternate Discovery Session Notes:

• Google DOES NOT index RSS feeds.
• (pod) Some social networks encourage feeds (think Facebook).
• (pod) Use “Full Text” when configuring Feedburner feeds.
• (pod) If you post a podcast, post the transcript as well.
• (blog) Don’t pass link juice to Archives or Contact pages.
• (blog) Make use of Tag Clouds.
• (pdf) Good Structure is essential.
• (pdf) Avoid duplicate content issues. Don’t make PDF exactly like website.
• (pdf) These files *probably* pass link juice and PR.

This session was really cool. I thought that Stephan Spencer in particular did a really good job.

Final Thoughts

Admittedly, I was extremely tired after having only a couple hours of sleep, and still trying to deal with the two hour time difference. I headed out around 3PM that day to go get ready for Monty Python: Spamalot - which was awesome!

Caption: Danielle and I next to a Tony Award.

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Sara stated that the blogosphere felt rather small, and I quickly agreed. It seems like the more time that I spend within the blogosphere (professionally), the more I notice the same old blogs authored by the same “inner circle” of bloggers. This makes me wonder how many blogs remain undiscovered, and how deep the talent pool really could be if prospective bloggers were lead down the right path.

So Why Haven’t YOU Been Discovered?

There are many potential reasons for this, but none of them are the fault of the blogosphere and the sooner that aspiring bloggers realize this fact, the sooner that they will be able to harness their true potential and will become “discovered” so to speak.

Let’s delve into a couple of key factors that that I consider to be especially important:

Blog Networking

In my opinion, this is the #1 reason that you should own a blog in the first place. Turning a profit will come with time if you are truly dedicated to your craft, but networking with others in the blogosphere will help you now in so many other ways that it simply cannot be overlooked.

Social Networking. When I say social networking, I’m not about talking Myspace - I’m talking about MyBlogLog. If you’re going to be a successful blogger, you’ll have to find out where the successful bloggers network. Contrary to popular cultural belief, I refuse to believe that most successful bloggers are 16 year old girls writing about Paris Hilton or the latest episode of The Hills. Get out there, join blogging communities and network within your niche.

Comment on Similar Blogs. I make it a point every morning to wake up thirty minutes early and read up on what my blogosphere friends have to say. Not only will this keep you one step ahead of the game (since our industry changes so rapidly), but it also gives you a prime opportunity to leave a comment as well. Leaving quality comments are both a great way to meet new bloggers and gain some extra traffic at the same time. It’s also nice because those same bloggers will often return the favor by commenting on your blog, which always feels good. I try to make it a point to visit at least one new blog every single day on top of my current ‘rounds’ to ensure that I’m always meeting and interacting with new bloggers.

Join the Forums. Hang out with us. By visiting and posting on the forums, you’ll be able to learn from both our mistakes and successes. There’s a ton of webmaster forums and many of them now contain specific blogging sub forums. There are also a couple of excellent blog-specific forums that have started to sprout up over the past couple of months.

Blog Optimization

Optimizing your blog is extremely crucial and its importance should never be ignored. I’ve been writing more and more material on this subject as of late and the fact is, search engine optimization is my livelihood. For WordPress users, I highly recommend downloading and installing All In One SEO Plugin Pack for a great start.

Blog Design

Though this may go hand in hand with blog optimization, it’s certainly important enough to list under its own sub-heading. I feel that it’s very important to have a unique design to separate your blog from the rest of the blogosphere. Think of it this way:

Are you more likely to remember a blog that looks like dozens of others, or are you more likely to remember the one that has its own unique look and feel?

Templates are great – as a starting point. Don’t make the mistake of treating them as a be all end all solution to your blog’s design. After all, you invest a good amount of time writing quality content; your blog definitely deserves its own unique look and feel.

You’re Thoughts?

Though this entry revolves around the subject of blogging, all of the key aspects will work well with most any type of website. The point is to get out there and network, optimize, and polish your design. After you draw each visitor in, make them want to keep coming back time and time again. – What are your thoughts on the subject?

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These are the million dollar questions of todays blogging community. Our topic for today sparks a lot of interest in our industry whether it be via the forums, post comments, emails, or even at keynote speaker conferences - and we’ve all asked it ourselves at one point in time or another. When is the right time to start monetizing your blog? And if the time is right now, how should you monetize it to reap the highest rewards that the internet has to offer?

When to Monetize

This is something that can be debated over and over, but I truly believe that you can and in most cases should start to monetize your blog or website from the the very beginning. However, you need to be extremely careful about the type of advertisements you display. Different advertisements give off different vibes (some good, some bad) so you need to make sure that the advertisements you’re displaying are both relevant to the visitor and mesh well with your blog design, or you will have very disappointing results.

Whether your blog receives 50 or 5,000 visitors per day, there is a common pattern involved. If your advertisements are targeted toward your audience you have pretty solid chance at making some real money. If your advertisements aren’t targeted, you will make next to nothing. You’ll also find that different forms of advertisements will perform better than others, which I will tell you about next.

How to Monetize

Here are some popular methods of blog monetization to get you started. This list is in no particular order, and I’m trying to be as unbiased as possible, so please bare with me until the end of this post (then you will see my honest advice).

1. Going Contextual. This is seemingly still the most popular form of blog advertisement circulating in the blogosphere. The biggest player in this market is undoubtedly Google Adsense, though there are many, many others as well. I’ve run many successful campaigns using contextual publishing, and their piece of the pie is still growing at a rapid pace.

2. Affiliate Programs. Affiliate programs are all around us, though most surfers never notice them for what they actually are. With proper masking, you can recommend products to your visitors, and they won’t even recognize the commi$$ion that you’ve just made. Furthermore, if you whole-heartedly believe in the product it’s a win/win situation. There are many excellent affiliate programs out there, just be sure that the products you choose could be of real value to your visitor demographic.

3. Consulting. You’ll notice a pattern when surfing many of the more recognizable blogs in various industries. The blog authors are generally available for consultation. This can be a very lucrative source of income assuming you have the expertise that others may be looking for.

4. Please Donate. This technique is sometimes frowned upon, but often misunderstood. Not every blogger likes to plaster their perfect design with advertisements. Some prefer to take donations. The WordPress “Buy Me a Beer” plugin comes to mind. After all, bloggers deserve a beer after a hard day of typing - correct?

5. Text Links. Selling text links is nothing new, in fact it’s been around for a very long time. The only difference is that now there are middle men who can do the leg work for you. Depending upon some key factors such as your PR and Alexa Rating, you can do quite well from selling text link advertisements alone.

No matter what sort of traffic your blog pulls in, advertising placement is crucial. Think about it. If you have an advertisement at the very top of your blog, many visitors will skim right past it due to banner blindness. Likewise, if you have an advertisement running in the bottom corner most will never even see it. For advertisements to be truly effective, they have to be within your visitor’s area of focus.

My Advice

You want my honest advice? Don’t put all of your eggs into one single basket. Use multiple methods of monetization. For blogs, I highly recommend affiliate programs, text links, and consulting (assuming you have the skill). If you have enough traffic, directly selling advertising space is also a very real option. I advise to stay away from contextual advertising when possible. I say this because not only does it look unprofessional, but I feel that the market has seen better days for this form of advertising as it pertains to the serious blogger.

A blog page on an online home business website is one of the best ways to increase the traffic inflow. Organization websites discuss topics related to there service and products where as banks website blog page discuss about banking issues i.e. tax credit, bad credit loans, chase credit card etc. Different professional have there personal blog pages to increase there awareness i.e. a banker may have blog related to credit card in which the topic under discussion could be secured loans, business credit cards etc.

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