business blog

A Key to Blogging Success: Fun is Mandatory

By Christian

There are so many things to talk about when it comes to making your blog successful. I’ve written 70 posts in the last couple months and I can already tell I haven’t even scratched the surface. Writing Next Level Blogger is going to be a blast! I wish the same enthusiasm for you and your blog. In fact, I want to make a quick argument as to why fun is not just nice; it’s actually the most important element of making your blog successful.

The technical aspects of successful blogging, internet marketing, seo and the like can consume you. There is a lot to learn. The flip side of that coin is that these technical aspects are also valuable. While I do believe it’s essential to take the time to learn the technical basics of blogging, I ALSO believe it’s essential to take a step back from learning at some point, and focus on DOING. The fact may seem self-contradictory, but it’s absolutely true.

The various aspects of success are very complicated, but achieving success is simple. It is not necessary to understand success in order to have it.

So the real question is this: do you want to understand every detail of what it takes to build a successful blog, or do you want to have a successful blog? It’s not necessary to do both!

In other words, you can read all day every day for the next year and still have a lot more to learn when it comes to search engine optimization, ppc, converting leads, etc. Or you can study a bit and then make the decision to IMPLEMENT on what you’ve learned. I recommend the latter.

It’s Smart to Be Dumb. Here’s why…

Why would you choose to implement when you clearly still have so much more to learn? Isn’t it better to learn as much as possible to make sure you’re doing things right? Actually, no. It’s a lot better to be out there hustling than it is to worry about doing everything perfectly.

The reason you choose to implement NOW rather than later, is because you have an idea that excites you…excitement and fun are the elements that are going to carry you through, not technical mastery. Trust me, if you’re having fun you are doing it right. It doesn’t mean you don’t have to work your tail off, but when it’s fun, it’s not really work, is it?

The Success Myth

It’s a myth that successful people do everything right…that they really have their act together…that they’re highly intelligent and sophisticated…that they’re more talented than you. It’s all B.S. The only thing necessary to get huge results is to put yourself out there. Yes, you will fail sometimes, and that’s OK. It’s also a myth that successful people don’t fail. They fail a lot. But they also never stopping hustling. That’s what it takes.

It might sound overly simplistic, but it’s just the way it is. The problem is this: most of us who haven’t achieved the success we feel we deserve just haven’t put ourselves out there enough. We may feel like we’re working very hard, but we’re working hard on the minutia of our business…we’re not hustling. We’re schlepping. It’s not fun to schlep. Schlepping does take care of minor details. But it doesn’t make big money. It doesn’t attract a large readership. It doesn’t achieve much at all in the grand scheme of things.

That’s why I’m arguing that the most important element of making your blog successful is fun. When it’s fun, you work hard, you never stop, you learn constantly, and when you fail you can’t wait to get right back in there.

It doesn’t take any less than this to make any business endeavor work, and blogging is no different.

If you want your business blog to rock, YOU have to rock. And if you want to rock…day in and day out…you simply have to be having fun. It’s absolutely essential!

You need to NOT concentrate on the small details. Don’t schlep. You need to concentrate on the big picture, and the big picture needs to be something that is absolutely exciting to you. It needs to wake you up at night because you can’t wait to get back at it in the morning. That’s what successful bloggers do. It’s what successful business owners in all areas do. They work 24/7, and they love every minute of it. Fun is mandatory.

Action is All that Matters

My hope for this post is to simply illustrate how important it is to act. Reading this blog and others in this space is a very smart thing to do, but the BIGGEST thing you can do to become successful is the simplest of all…dive in. Why? Because it’s fun. And fun is not only an absolute prerequisite to success, it’s also the most important ingredient to success. If you want this to work, it has to be fun!

Why It Really Is This Simple

The fact is you learn more by doing than by studying. Yes, you’re gonna make mistakes. Probably some really big mistakes. Who cares? The biggest secret to making a successful business blog is to make it FUN! That’s really the number one feature of any successful business venture anyway, isn’t it?

If you have a topic that you’re absolutely passionate about, launch it. Get out there and do it. If it’s fun, you will feel like me…that you have an endless amount of content you can produce, that the more you do the more ideas you get. If you’re having fun, the ideas never stop coming, your creativity is bottomless, your energy is piqued. Every new goal achieved simply energizes you even more.

And here is the key: when you are energized by your business, when you’re excited to get at it every day, when you can’t wait to see what ground you can gain every day…THAT is the place you want to be. That excitement and fun makes up for a world of not knowing exactly how to do everything.

Here are a few things you may not have considered:

It doesn’t matter if your site is not designed perfectly.
It doesn’t matter if your ads are not perfectly optimized.
It doesn’t matter if your blog is not 110% search optimized.
If you’re having fun, and you’re pouring yourself into what you do every day…success is in the bag! It’s a done deal. Maybe not overnight, but it’s as good as yours. First, if you’re having fun, you’re already a success. Second, if you’re having fun, you’re going to stick with it until things click. And the whole ride will be a blast 🙂

If you take anything away from this post, take this:

The answers and solutions (all the minutia) will come to you automatically as a result of your success, and your success will come as a byproduct of your excitement and enthusiasm. Don’t wait to have all the answers before beginning. Begin. The details will take care of themselves. Act.

What if You’re Not Having Fun?

I write about blogging. From a technical standpoint, a blog can be created in about 5 minutes if you know what you’re doing. If you’re not having fun, start something else. Seriously. Quit what you’re doing and do what you love. It takes hard work and tenacity to rise to the top in any niche. Make it fun. Fun first; from there, success is automatic. Besides, if you’re grinding through every day to become “successful”, you’re never going to make it. Do you really want to have a hugely “successful” blog that you hate running? Make it something you love. That way, success is yours from day one.

Your Business Blog is a Massive Asset – And Not for the Reason You Think

By Christian

I wrote a piece recently about why I refuse to depend on Google for my internet business, and in that post, I said there’s a big difference between the traffic you get and the actual business you’re building. In other words, your traffic should be able to wax and wane a bit, and your business should not be fundamentally affected. I wanted to go into that just a little bit further, because so many of us are tied into and quite literally addicted to Google traffic.

Are You Sitting on a Time Bomb?

I argue that one of the most valuable things you can do to build your business is to start a business blog. And every blog needs traffic, correct? So how can traffic be such a bad thing? Well, I’m not saying traffic is a bad thing, but anything can cause damage if it’s misunderstood and/or abused.

If your new traffic disappeared tomorrow, where would your business stand? Would your business be over? If so, you’re sitting on a time bomb!

The fact is that without traffic, you’ll never be able to build a business, but traffic is not the problem. Too many of us think because we’re getting a lot of traffic and comments that our business is doing well. These are good things, but again I ask the all-important question: What would happen if all your new visitors went away tomorrow? What are you left with?

Your answer ought to be: I’m left with a very effective blog and a powerful, targeted list of customers that I can cultivate and grow for years to come!

A Lesson From the Real Estate Business

If you follow this blog at all, you know that I have experience in the real estate business. While real estate professionals are just now coming into the internet space in force, and are just now learning how to use internet marketing competently (and I applaud them for it!), they have LONG been masters of what it takes to work a client list, and I think all us internet marketers can learn a bit from them!

Let me tell you something that might surprise you: some of the top real estate professionals in my network…I’m talking about Realtors who sell several hundred homes a year…guess how many people are in their database. Thousands? Tens of thousands? The fact is that many of them have a database of only a few hundred. That’s right. Hundred.

And these are pros that have not always been online, pulling in new leads from the internet. Internet leads to these professionals are gravy. Icing on the cake. How the HECK can you sell 500 houses a year, when your customer base consists of only a few hundred people?

The fact is that each of those people, knows other people. And if you have only a few hundred people who are truly advocates of your business, they will tell their friends, won’t they? So these savvy salespeople spend their time talking to their advocates. And those advocates send them referral business. Just one person can often refer several transactions per year!

If you have 300 people who truly believe in you and think you are the best at what you do, do you see how massively powerful that is? Can’t you see how 300 people is all it takes to make you very, very wealthy? If each of those 300 people refer you just 2 people each year on average, you will sell 600 houses, right? The average Realtor, who doesn’t understand this, sells 8 per year. This is how powerful a client list can be.

So if 300 is all you need, why is it so important to pull in a constant stream of new traffic every single day? It ought to be gravy, not the lifeblood of your business!

The Real Reason Your Blog is a Huge Asset

So many of us think that a blog is such a great asset to your business because it’s such a great way to pull in traffic and sales into your business. No doubt this is true!

But the REAL value of your blog is as a conversational tool with the base of followers you already have. When operated competently, your blog will no doubt continue to bring in new traffic to you for years to come. Congratulations for using such an awesome promotional and business-building tool!

But don’t neglect the REAL value…what you already have right in front of you…your existing customer list. Your list is your business, and your traffic is simply one of many ways to build your list.

If I have to choose between building traffic and interacting with my existing readers, which do you think I choose? Which one do you choose?

10 Essential WordPress Plugins for Your Business Blog

By Christian

I don’t typically do technical stuff on this blog, because my focus here is the effective use of blogging and social media and how to monetize your business using these tools. In other words, I don’t usually concentrate so much on the technical side of things, because my focus is on sales principles and the human element of making money online. However, it seems appropriate for me to share with you what plugins I personally use on this site and which ones I consider indispensable for any business blog.

If you’re going to operate a blog for your business, efficiency, effectiveness and security should be top priorities. Use these 10 Essential WordPress Plugins, and you’ll be in good shape 🙂

All in One SEO Pack – this one is a classic. It’s one of the most downloaded WP plugins of all time and for good reason. It is a huge asset to your blog with regards to search optimization.
WP Super Cache – this one makes your pages load faster. Why the heck wouldn’t you use it?
Google XML Sitemaps – builds and maintains a sitemap and robots.txt for you automatically. It also lets Google know when it should visit your site again to index new content. “What’s a robots.txt?” you say? You need this plugin.
Login Lockdown – if you’re not too concerned with someone hacking your site, you obviously are not aware of how often blogs get hacked and how much damage they can do. One way they get in is by randomly trying passwords over and over again until they get through. It’s called a brute force attack, one of the most common types of attacks. This plugin shuts your login page down after 2, 3 or however many false attempts you feel should be the limit.
Redirection – It’s essential to think ahead. You probably won’t need this plugin right away if you’re just getting started blogging, but it’s inevitable that you will take a page down, rename a post or something that will break links. This plugin allows you to make sure that everyone visiting your blog lands on a valid page. A very cool tool.
SEO Smart Links – strong internal linking is good for SEO. This wordpress plugin allows you to attach specific words or phrases, and anytime they appear on your blog, they will automatically link to whatever page you designate. This is a great tool for quickly establishing a good internal linking structure. Get it.
WP-DB Manager – your blog is going to require ongoing maintenance. Database optimization and repair, backups, etc. This plugin gives you an easy way to do a lot of these things, and it automates most of it as well, saving you time.
SEO Friendly Images – Images can be your friend when it comes to search engine optimization. Especially if you use good alt tags on all your images. For me, it’s easy to forget to do this, and it takes a minute, so this WordPress plugin automatically does it for you. Another no-brainer as far as I’m concerned.
MaxBlogPress Ping Optimizer – Pinging google and other directories when you produce new content is a good thing. WordPress does this automatically. The problem is that when you make a change to an existing post, WordPress pings em again. And when you make any other small change to your site, WordPress pings em yet again. Basically anytime you hit “save”, WordPress pings Google. This can get you blocked. Not a good thing. This WordPress plugin knows the difference between when you should ping search engines and when you’re just doing edits. This way, you’re getting all the exposure you need, and you’re not abusing the system. A lot of bloggers don’t even know about this. It’s a very good tool.
Google Analytics for WordPress – having some type of analytics program installed on your site is essential for anyone serious about getting results from their business blog. There are other more robust alternatives. Google analytics is definitely not the holy grail of analytics utilities. However for me it is the best, because it’s free and it gives me everything I need. I’m not going to spend all day analyzing my web traffic. I want a really good snapshot of what’s going on…where people are coming from, my most visited posts, etc. Google Analytics gives you this and more, and it’s free. As far as I’m concerned it’s the best analytics application out there for business bloggers, and this plugin makes installation a snap.

If you’ve been involved with using WordPress for any length of time, you will likely have heard of all these before. My personal take is to keep plugins to a minimum. I like to run as lean as possible with plugins, because the fewer you have, the fewer things can go wrong. I prefer to spend as much time as possible on content and networking…and as LITTLE time as possible on design and coding, etc. Technical stuff is not for me, although I’ll learn whatever I need to learn to get things working smoothly.

That said, a handful of plugins, like what is on this list, will save you a lot of time, make your business blog more secure and much more effective for both your visitors and for search engines.

All these plugins are available for download at no charge by visiting the WordPress Plugins page.