The Blog Marketeer

Recently, I was asked to critique a blog.

It was a personal blog.

The blogger is a friend of mine.

So, how do you critique a personal blog of someone you consider a friend.

It’s not easy.

Personal blogs are just that, they’re personal. The person blogging is blogging about their life, family, experience, likes or dislikes and opinions.

And opinions can neither be right or wrong. They can only be opinions.

Here are some tips for critiquing a friends blog:

• Be courteous – This is a friend, or at least an associate, so being mean or condescending to them will only invalidate any good points you have. This will also do damage to the relationship you have with them.
• Be honest – No one wants you to sugar coat the truth, but no one wants to mean beat up by it either. You can be honest and nice at the same time. Try it, you’ll like it!
• Be sincere – Let the person know that you believe what you are saying. If you like the work, let them know it. They may not believe you, especially if they are new to the blogging world. This can also lead to…
• Be encouraging – Encourage them to carry on and not give up with blogging. If they love to do it, then others opinions only serve to embolden them, and not destroy them anyways. We all want to be told we are doing well, even when we already know it.
• Be careful – Critiquing ones writing style is a far cry from critiquing ones writing. You can critique a post for grammar and style, but not the content and ideas. If you agree with the writers content, it makes this easier. If not, it can make it quite difficult.

Remember, being nice isn’t always what people want, but being dismissive isn’t what anyone wants.

Be a friend, be professional, be honest.

[Thanks Dru]

This is a sponsored guest post written by kuaga on behalf of goviral network. Post powered by Sponzai.

Are you paid to post videos on your blog? If not, this post is for you.

While many bloggers discover, watch and post branded videos on a daily basis, relatively few know how to earn on it. This post will shed light on how and what you can earn by posting branded videos.

What you need to know.

There are companies who will pay you to embed video ads on your site. Video revenue is considerably higher than Google AdSense. You will earn above $1 CPM and if you are smart about your placement you get up to $9 CPM. If you like, read more about it here. View your potential CPM earnings here.

Where to start.

One of the most notable platforms paying bloggers to post branded videos is goviral network. It’s free and easy to use – 1) register; 2) pick and post videos you like; 3) get paid monthly via Paypal or bank wire. Your revenue report is updated hourly and you get new campaigns alerts by email.

Sounds easy? Here is the link to sign up.

Don’t have a blog?

No worries. You don’t need any technical skills to create one. As long as you can click on your mouse buttons, you’ll pull it off. Try blogger. It’s fast and free.

Can’t be simpler, can it? Happy posting.

Funny, but true.

If you can fail at success, can you succeed at failing?

Of course, that would imply that you were attempting to fail.

This is up there with one of my favorite quotes a friend gave me, “the first step towards failure is trying.”

If you are new to the game of blogging or even simple website design, then you are probably a little nervous as to which application to use.

Have no fear, Open Source CMS is here!

Open Source CMS is a website geared towards giving soon-to-be bloggers and webmasters a preview, or demo, of what some of the major blogging and website CMS tools look like before they ever have to commit to one.

What?

Would you like to see what Drupal looks like live before you install it?

Open Source CMS can show you.

Would you like to see what Wordpress looks like live before you install it?

Open Source CMS can show you that too.

From CMS, to blogs to Wiki, Open Source CMS has descriptions, demos and reviews of all of the major players in website development and blogging applications.

Sweet. So what’s the catch?

It is only for PHP based applications.

Hence the name Open Source.

If you are in the market for a new CMS or Blogging app, I would suggest starting at Open Source CMS first.

Drupal Showcase Slideshow V3

If you have Gmail, and or are an avid Google fan, you have no doubt heard about Googles’ new attempt at enslaving the social networking world: Buzz.

Buzz, in a nutshell, is Googles’ attempt to combine their version of a social networking medium (Google Reader Sharing), mixed with other social networking applications, all placed inside of Gmail.

Having a Gmail account, I was initially offered to use Buzz. I took advantage of it, and even found it to some degree useful…for about 2 days.

Then the reality of what Buzz truly does set in.

All Buzz did was show me the posts and comments of my Google Reader, Twitter and Facebook followings again, in one centralized place. I can look at all of these by viewing my various other applications. And since Buzz doesn’t tie into Facebook, or Twitter, and can mark them as read, or viewed, going to these other applications means seeing the same posts and content again.

Not very useful in my opinion.

This may sound like a good idea, as far as minimizing how many web pages you need open to monitor you social networking apps, but sorting out what came from where can be a little tedious, and the overall look and feel seems dated and tired.

Besides this apparent lack of usefulness, Buzz has also been heavily scrutinized for it’s security failures, and flaws.

While the idea of having all of this social data centralized was a good thought, Googles’ Buzz should’ve been a more social networking advancement as opposed to a conglomeration of existing ones.

One would tend to think that of all of the software giants in the world, Google above all should have at least attempted to reinvent the social networking wheel by now.

And I don’t count Wave. I don’t even really acknowledge it.

Why can’t Google of all companies come up with the next big social medium that lights the world on fire?

And if that’s not their market, then what is the purpose of Buzz?

Several weeks, or months, ago I posted a warning to anyone adventuring into the world of pay per post blogging.

That warning was geared towards a very specific target that, at the time, I didn’t want to mention by name. I was in fact, giving them an opportunity to correct the error(s) they had made, while collecting more information about how they have treated others.

Since that warning, the company (or individuals running the site) have made errors that have severed any and all relations we do or could have.

In a nutshell, here is what happened to me:

About 9 or so months ago, I created an account with blog advertising store, which at that time went by a different name. I created an account, and began writing paid blog posts as I have with several other companies like this.

The pay offered was a little better than most, with the start being usually north of $8 a post for a 200+ word post.

The original warning I didn’t heed was the minimum amount you needed to cash out…$100. Also, the site had no terms and or agreement of services documentation.

After 5 or six months, I hit my needed $100 threshold. The next pay date, which was always the 1st of the following month was November 1st. The first week of November came and went, with no payment received on my end.

Then I started to research more into this “company.”

What I found actually gave me a little hope. Another blogger for blogadvertisingstore, had just recently been paid after months of waiting, and badgering. I figured it was just a matter of when they had the cash, they’d pay it.

After Mid December, I decided to give it my all to collect on my earnings from the company that was avoiding any and all attempts to contact them like the plague. According to the blogger mentioned earlier, they found success by contacting clients of blogadvertisingstore that they had done work for via, blogadvertisingstore.

I attempted such a feat, even contacting customers I had not done work for. All I got for my effort was vague replies from these companies, and of course, no response from blogadvertisingstore.

After repeated attempts to contact blogadvertisingstore, via there contact form and any and all ways known to man, I gave up.

Then, a few weeks ago, I received an e-mail from them stating that my blog no longer met the requirements, or standards, to be able to post for them.

OK, so where is my money, was my quick response.

There response was typical. Nothing.

As of right now, I have been locked out of my account (or it has been deleted) and I have resided to the fact that this viral company will never pay me, or possibly any blogger for services rendered.

So, if you are considering writing for blogadvertisingstore, please do your own private research, and make sure you won’t get scammed like myself, and several others have been.

Be careful, and happy blogging.

With the current economy being what it is, it is essential for job hunters to have access to as many job websites and job seeker tools as is possible.

When researching websites that post job opportunities, most job hunters stick with the usual culprits, such as Monster and CareerBuilder.

But there are more options out there, especially for the trained professional.

Take the American Career Group for example. Ever heard of them?

Maybe not. The American Career Group is a recruiting and staffing company that uses the Internet to it’s full potential in filling jobs that need to be filled, with qualified professionals.

Instead of catering to every single profession out there, and thus, not being specialized in any field, American Career Group focuses on a select group of professions.

These professions include:

• Accounting and Finance
• Clerical and Administrative
• Customer Service
• Medical and Healthcare
• Human Resources
• Information Technology
• Marketing and Advertising
• Merchandising, Purchasing and Retail
• Sales and Sales Management
• Travel, Hospitality and Restaurants

By focusing on these selected fields of expertise, American Career Group can then focus on providing the best possible candidates to fulfill their job openings, while giving the job seeker the best possible job openings available.

When it comes to job hunting, now more than ever, it pays to do your research.

So if you are job hunting, even if you currently have a professional position, make sure you check out all of the angles. Then decide which one suits your needs the best!

Good luck!

While it is not uncommon for individuals, or even companies to request their sites be removed from Google’s’ massive index, it is also not uncommon for Google to remove sites themselves.

Sound fishy?

Google states in their webmaster help pages that they reserve the right to remove sites for legal reasons, and of course for sites that attempt to subvert the search engine crawling process.

But what if you feel your site has been targeted for other reasons?

Now, obviously if your site is geared towards things such as piracy or illegal trade, then you shouldn’t be feeling victimized, just a little guilty maybe. But if you feel you are legitimate in your web presence, then maybe you should re-evaluate your choice of wording or hyperlinks.

Another possibility, is to contact someone who has experience in the field of Internet reputation management. Carl Sgro is one of the many consultants that can guide companies and individuals through the process of reinstating a website into Google’s’ index. while this process may seem like a futile effort when going up against Google, business development professionals can be an essential tool in clearing you sites good name.

Carl Sgro has over 25 years experience helping companies grow and expand their web presence by using sound SEO and SEM principals. Such industry knowledge is invaluable when it comes to discovering why Google removed a site from their listings.

While consultants such as Carl Sgro are not the be all, end all of reacquiring Google status, it never hurts to have someone on your side when dealing with your businesses reputation and presence.

Most bloggers know that they can make a little side money by blogging about ads on their blog.

But how many know about, or what is entailed by sponsored posting?

While the concept is relatively simple, the ramifications on your blog are not as clear initially.

In essence, sponsored posting is when a company tells you exactly what a blog post on your blog will look like, and what it will have in it. In a nutshell, they write the post for you.

Sound good?

To some, this is a great thing. All you do is simply copy the post content, and paste it into a log post on your blog.

Easy enough.

But what if you don’t like what is either being sold, or how it is written. Remember, these are blatant advertisements. These are not subtle marketing hints that can be masked into a post pertaining to something different.

Of course, with most sponsored posting companies, you can opt out of a sponsored post. Of course doing this has it’s own ramifications, such as loss of immediate revenue, and posible future offers being reduced.

Basically, do the research before you enter the sponsored posting game. For one sponsored posting site to research, check out Sponzai, by Izea. They are reputable, and a good company.

Make sure you are comfortable with what someone else is writing on your posts before you agree to let them!

Good luck and happy blogging!