photo credit: .dan

• Blogger is notorious for spam blogs and blogger has a (next blog) by default
• Can’t upgrade or add features because you don’t control the software.
• Splits link popularity
• Everyone knows it’s free, harder to attract links with a free blog or something that shows less commitment.
• Your Co0branding your site with blogger which can mucks up your marketing message
• Since you don’t own your blog software, it can’t be leverage and sold the same way custom sites / domain can ( website are just like real estate)
• The default settings are attrocious for search engine optimization and social media marketing, so you’ll have to spend tons of time and have technical knowledge to fix this. Most people don’t, so their blogger blog dosen’t rank very well or spread on social media sites.
• Most of the design templates are overused, so your site will be recognized as a “generic” template which makes it way less impressive.
• Makes achieving any kind of wow factor difficult.
• Your allowing your content to profit / benefit Google.
• You account comes with a default subdomain - whatever.blogger.com
• None of the cool kids are doing it. (ok this one isn’t entirely true )

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PureText is a free little utility that allows you to copy and paste items from rich text editors (Word, Outlook, Browsers, etc) and strip all the garbage code off of it.

“PureText only removes rich formatting from text. This includes the font face, font style (bold, italics, etc.), font color, paragraph styles (left/right/center aligned), margins, character spacing, bullets, subscript, superscript, tables, charts, pictures, embedded objects, etc. However, it does not modify the actual text. It will not remove or fix new-lines, carriage returns, tabs, or other white-space. It will not fix word-wrap or clean up your paragraphs. If you copy the source code of a web page to the clipboard, it is not going to remove all the HTML tags. If you copy text from an actual web page (not the source of the page), it will remove the formatting.

PureText is basically equivalent to opening Notepad, doing a PASTE, followed by a SELECT-ALL, and then a COPY. The benefit of PureText is performing all these actions with a single Hot-Key and having the result pasted into the current window automatically.”

To use PureText- simply copy as normal, but when you need to paste the item in Wordpress or your blog platform, use Windows-V (or an assigned hotkey) instead of Ctrl-V. In an instant, now you have some clean text. Check out PureText and streamline your blogging today.

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It must be unique – different from the information on your website.
This content is used to promote you as an authority in your field. You will need to compose (or have someone compose) an initial individual or company bio that invokes authority. It should say who you are, what your experience is and why they should respect your opinion and recommendations.

Many customers provide two posts, initially:
One as an introduction which contains a bio or description;
Another post, containing content that can be used for promotion.
Example: An article offering tips and advice or discussing industry-related problems and solutions.

Sample Posts

In order to illustrate this, here is a sample ABOUT/ARTICLE section of the questionnaire. In this example, Blue Widget, Inc. manufactures and provides specialized service and support for blue widgets in the widget industry. Their current website is a brochure site that encourages visitors to buy blue widgets and offers support information.

Author Bio:

Paul Smith is the president of Blue Widgets Inc, a manufacturer of premium blue widgets. He has 15 years of experience in the widget industry, dealing with small businesses as well as large corporate clients. He is interested in helping people discover blue widgets and has worked for hundreds of clients over the course of his twenty years in the field. Paul is a member of the Blue Widget Professionals’ Organization and holds an MBA from Washington State University, where he focused on blue widget fabrication techniques. Paul enjoys playing golf on weekends and spends as much time as he can with his family.

Examples of types of posts you can write:
1. Tip post

Top 10 Tips for using Blue Widgets in your industry.

Hundreds of companies have discovered the value in premium blue widgets. Once you’ve bought a blue widget there are some easy things you can do to get more out of them. Here are ten simple tips to optimize your blue widget usage:

1. Be a _____
2. Watch _____
3. Be sure to ______
4. Know ____
5. Use ___ when _____
   
   

(Recap of news / industry related item)

“Blue Widget Sales up 1,000%
In the past week, Widget Magazine (link here) published a story about blue widget sales being up 1000%. This is another example of mainstream media giving attention to the new blue widget phenomenon. I expect growth to continue for some time, now.”

“From my experience as president of Blue Widget Inc, more and more smaller companies in the widget industry are seeing the tangible quality difference that sets blue widgets apart in their field. This shift is paving the way for a more large-scale industry migration towards blue widgets.” –Paul Smith, as quoted in “Widget Monthly Digest”.

2. FAQ Post

Q. What the difference between green widgets and blue widgets?
A. That’s a question I run into a lot, both from those who are new in the field, as well as those who’ve been involved in widgets for some time.

3. Further Ideas

a. Comment on a news item in your industry / field;

b. Answer a basic question that a perspective user / buyer may have;

c. Post and comment on some type of metric or article published somewhere else;

d. Relate personal stories or anecdotes, this is the place to be human and speak directly to your audience.

Here are some quick links to excellent articles about creating valuable content and a more effective blog:

http://socialmediasystems.com/11/12/business-blogging-tips-for-non-writers/
http://socialmediasystems.com/10/24/dont-be-an-im-a-realtor-too-site-stand-out-market-your-site-with-quality-content/
http://socialmediasystems.com/04/11/10-rarely-used-quick-and-easy-tips-to-supercharge-your-blog/

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Wordpress is web software for online publishing. Notice that I didn’t use the word blog, even though wordpress is blogging software. It has been expanded to be A LOT more then that and shouldn’t considered in the same class as most blogging software. It’s a robust CMS (content management system) that empowers every type of website with users that include CNN, Playstation and the New York Times. With website technology changing daily, choosing the right content management system or simply the actual software that organizes and runs a website is absolutely crucial to your success online. For most websites I’d highly recommend building with Wordpress and here is why: Wordpress is open source publishing platform, meaning it’s free and anyone can develop on top of it which makes available countless plugins, bells and widgets for use by any web designer or web developer. If you choose the wrong CMS to use with your website or configure it the wrong way you could easily end up with an outdated site, a large IT bill and no traffic. Instead of listing every reason why wordpress is so great, I’d rather list the four things that are wrong with most content management systems (CMS) and how Wordpress addresses these issues and why it’s such a great choice. What’s wrong with other blogging software and content management systems:

1. They’re not open source, meaning you have to pay for the scripts themselves and they have less developers working on them, so fewer updates, few possibilities to expand.
2. They’re not user friendly. Wordpress is the number 1 blogging software in the world and has gone thorugh so many versions that it’s become extremely easy to use and user friendly. Other content management systems have huge learning curves (look up drupal) and may need some coding skills just to administer.
3. Their future is uncertain - Many CMS’ come and go. With technology changing so fast lots of once robust supported platforms are abandoned or see their development stunted. Wordpress is growing fast as ever and just raised 29.5 million dollars to take it to the next level. This is one platform that’ll still be around in 5 years!
4. They have major search engine optimization flaws - Surprisingly even in 2008 I run into lots of content management systems with major flaws that prevent them from achieving proper search engine rankings. Even wordpress out of the box has lots of SEO flaws, but with all the open source development there are tons of plugins raning from sitemaps creation to eliminating duplicate content that make wordpress one of the best SEO machines out there.

Wordpress is a great choice with a future and is readily available. If you have a static or old website, consider using wordpress entirely as you CMS (content management systems) and moving ALL of your old content into it Websites running Wordpress range from out of the box sites that design. Wordpress has enabled people to build bigger, better, badder websites in less time and keep them up to date. . I’ve personally used Wordpress to build everything from magazine sites (rismedia.com real estate magazine), to ecommerce websites to small personal sites and large social communities (this one takes MU and lots of modifications). Stay tuned, I’ll be writing a series of posts that address some beginning concepts involved in blogging, community building, and choosing the right software and services to build your internet presence.

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