This is the companion blog to “The Rough Guide to Blogging,” available now (Fall 2006).
This is going to sound obvious but at the base of it, blogging is writing, and writing often begets better writing. So what happens when you get kids to blog a lot? They improve their writing skills, their vocabulary skills, and their organizational skills. What about improving their nunchuk, bowhunting, and computer hacking skills you ask? Well, that’s a separate thing… One handful of skills at a time!
It’s the Holy Grail of blogging: making money and turning blogging into a profession. While millions of people start blogs without any intention of making money off of their “hobby,” I’m positive nobody would turn down the opportunity to make a few bucks. It’s like making music. You can do it for fun in your garage, but if the opportunity comes along and a neighbor just happens to know an A&R guy and he likes your stuff, suddenly you are starry-eyed and dreaming of cash.
When I was on television — I like to say that, just to add an extra oomph to what I have in life — one of the questions presented to me in the brief five minute interview was “Can people make money doing this?” I’m sure I gave an eloquent, well-composed, coolly delivered answer that compared the blogger-conomy with Princetonian principles of supply and demand. Or maybe I said, “Yes it is possible to make money blogging, but it’s certainly not easy.”
The truth is that there are a lot of people making money blogging (and the media is pushing that angle) — but you probably won’t be one of them. It takes a combination of hard work, a large audience, and maybe a pinch of luck to take your blog from the late night past time to back breaking day job.
Bloggers have quit their jobs, been fired, and started entire new companies just in the name of blogging. Some have succeeded, some haven’t. Check out some of their stories, and if you still want to have a go of it, then figure out some way to crack the barrier between amateur and professional blogging. The odds are pretty steep, but the rewards are getting increasingly large also.
Modern Life Is Rubbish points us towards “Common traits of the top few blogs,” with nifty little pie-charts (reminiscent of our favorite game, Trivial Pursuit) that depict the percentage of bloggers using a particular blog platform, font, background color, and main subject of the blog. Neat-o!
Neil Patel of Pronet Advertising presents “My 50 Favorite Blogging Resources.” The list is well organized and includes blog articles, platforms, templates, and so much more. Plus, it seems like Neil has excellent taste since “The Rough Guide to Blogging” is on his list of recommended books. Bravo, bravo!
In addition, one of the commenters on this post suggested another excellent resource: “The Dirty Dozen’s 12 Suggestions For Making Your Blog Mark in the Blogosphere.”
WeblogToolsCollection.com is sponsoring a Blogging Essay Competition — for cash! The competition starts today and runs for the next 30 days. You can submit as many essays as you can crank out (of 1000 words or more) and there are prizes for runner-ups too. Oh right, the big prize? A cool $150 bucks.
Go read the rules and get to writing already!
Here’s a real oldie (from 2002) but goodie: “How to Write a Better Weblog” This classic article encourages bloggers to offer something new and to amuse your readers. And let’s not forget about the best line, “Great writing can’t be taught, but atrocious writing is entirely preventable.”
Good blogging never goes out of style, and neither does good (writing) advice. Read and react.
“Corporate blogging, though in its infacy, has got a shot in the arm… It is estimated that forty Fortune 500 companies publish corporate blogs, allowing CEOs, employees to bypass the public relations department, journalists and industry analysts and speak directly to the public. Amazon, Cisco and Oracle were early adopters with AMD, Dell, Kodak, GE, Intel, Microsoft, Sun, Yahoo and Xerox following suit.”
-Business Standard-