Whether you like SEO or not, I hope you will enjoy my latest guest post “9 Search Optimization Tips with Benefits for Your Visitors.”

These 9 tips are geared toward simple ways to optimize your site for your visitors, not just for search engines, although these techniques might help you get better rankings as well. Included with these 9 suggestions are 35 resources and tools on implementing each of the on and offsite optimization recommendations.

This guest post is also an entry to the Bad Ass SEO Guest Blogging Contest. All support in the way of comments and tweets is greatly appreciated!

Continue Does Search Engine Optimization Benefit Your Visitors?

This post is part of a weekly series, Fetching Friday, featuring the resources mashup and a cool highlight reel from Blog World Expo 2009 on kikolani.com.

The Resources Mashup

Here are some of the best articles I have stumbled upon, retweeted on @kikolani, and read in RSS subscriptions this week.

Blogging / Writing

  • Community and traffic takes time and patience – 8 things you need to know about building both for your blog.
  • Become a playful blogger and inject some energy into your blogging – video and transcript of what to experiment with to get your audience excited about your blog.
  • Creative social sharing to promote your blog – a look at social networking groups, repurposing content, ebooks, and more.
  • How to build a reputation with your blog: interact with your audience – the third article in a great series about blogging and reputation.
  • Long term blogging strategies: which ones are yours? A look at what will help you be successful in the long run.

Continue Fetching Friday – Resources Mashup and Blog World Celebrities

This post is part of a weekly series, Fetching Friday, featuring the resources mashup and a little something personal on kikolani.com.

The Resources Mashup

Here are some of the best articles I have stumbled upon, retweeted on @kikolani, and read in RSS subscriptions this week.

Blogging / Writing

  • How to improve your writing and SEO for better blog posts – this ebook has just what you need to compose more engaging blog posts for readers and optimized pages for search engines.
  • 3 ways to keep readers on your site using Apture – how this popular toolbar plugin can help your site get sticky.
  • 7 ways to cheat the 10,000 hour rule and still be a better blogger – did you know that scientifically, it takes 10,000 hours of practice to be the best of the best in a field? This post shows how you can get there without that kind of dedication.
  • Why you don’t need to blog everyday – a small case study on bloggers who write daily vs. those who do not.
  • What you don’t know about blogging – what matters between niche, frequent posting, and content.

Continue Fetching Friday – Resources Mashup and a Little Something Personal

ProBlogger Copywriting Scorecard for Bloggers

UPDATE: The price will increase to $29.97 on September 1st – grab it now at $9.97!

As you’ve probably heard by now, Darren Rowse of ProBlogger and Glenn Murray of Divine Write just released the Copywriting Scorecard for Bloggers, a 100 point checklist of 63 key things to check before you publish to help you improve the quality of your blog posts.

If you’re insanely busy like most (working a full time job, writing for multiple blog sites including your own, etc.), the thought of going through a checklist for every blog post you write might sound a bit overwhelming. I know it did for me at first. But since downloading and reading through this 59-page ebook, I can give you these tips on how to use it more efficiently and get value out of it for every blog post.

What Does the ProBlogger Scorecard Cover?

In a nutshell, the main headings in this ebook include:

  • 5 things to do before you start writing.
  • How to plan your blog post.
  • 5 ways to make the writing process simpler.
  • 27 writing tips and things to avoid to improve your writing skills.
  • 6 recommendations to make your post easily scannable to capture your readers right away.
  • 10 ways to better SEO optimize your posts around your main keywords for better search rankings.
  • 20 common grammatical mistakes made in writing (including affect vs. effect, that vs. which, and lay vs. lie).

Continue How to Improve Your Writing and SEO for Better Blogging

Since the Apple iPad has come out, I have been dying to get one. One of my main reasons to have one is for when I am at seminars, such as the upcoming Social Media AZ, or when I’m at conventions like the upcoming Blog World Expo in October.

In the last few months, I have been following a great blog by a fellow Third Triber that has, thusfar, specialized in iPad news as well as entered several contests to win a free iPad (because I am currently saving up for a big trip next year, so I don’t want to buy it outright), but no luck in winning one so far.

iPad for Blogging and Social Media
Image Credit: Chester and the iPad

Continue Is the iPad Good for Blogging?

This post is part of a weekly series, Fetching Friday, featuring the resources mashup and a timelapse of Eyjafjallajökull on kikolani.com.

The Resources Mashup

Here are some of the best articles I have stumbled upon, retweeted on @kikolani, and read in RSS subscriptions this week.

Blogging / Writing

Continue Fetching Friday – Resources Mashup and Timelapse of Eyjafjallajökull

Popup opt-in forms are not new by any means to web surfers and blog readers. There have been several plugins built for WordPress, and designs by email marketing services available to manually install a popup form to greet visitors to your website asking them to subscribe to a newsletter or mailing list.

Popups Sweeping the Blogging World

The latest incarnation of popup opt-in forms seem to have hit websites by storm. This plugin creates visually appealing lightbox forms that increase your opt-in rate substantially.

Popup Opt-In Forms

And when I say hit websites by storm – I mean that I come across a blog using them at least once a day, and sometimes five times a day or more while perusing new articles from blogs I enjoy visiting.

The Survey

There are many sides to the argument – those who love it, those who despise it, and those who are in between. I have asked several website owners who use either the latest plugin, or another form of popup opt-in form, why they use them, and also the opinions of those who feel strongly against them. Here are the results of this survey.

Continue The Case For and Against Popup Opt-In Forms

This post is part of a weekly series, Fetching Friday, featuring the resources mashup, the 2010 Facebook Success Summit, and some funky hamsters on kikolani.com.

The Resources Mashup

Here are some of the best articles I have stumbled upon, retweeted on @kikolani, and read in RSS subscriptions this week.

Blogging / Writing

Continue Fetching Friday – Resources Mashup, Facebook Summit and Hamsters with Soul

This is a guest post by Hugh DeBurgh from The Passionate Warrior, who has dedicated his life to the achievement of the ultimate family lifestyle.

I’m a personal development writer. So I don’t usually contribute to social media sites. But I thought it might be interesting to uncover how today’s social media technologies are making it possible for many people to live the life of their dreams right from their living room – or, in my case, from my RV.

An Unconventional Lifestyle

I’ll start by telling you a bit about my own family’s experience.

You see, we don’t live a conventional life. We don’t work at conventional jobs. We don’t drive conventional cars, you name it – we aren’t conventional. We travel when we want. We live how we want. We stop and live anywhere that the scenery suits us. Or where the neighbors are nice. And if the neighbors become annoying? We move, of course.

I have no boss. Neither does my wife.

My kids attend no schools. Yet they know more about the world and the people in it than most kids can ever dream of knowing. And they can read faster than I can (at least my 11 year old can). They are children of the world, just as their parents are. No, we are not hippies. We don’t live out of a VW bus and sell hemp products.

We enjoy the good things in life. Luxuries. Technologies. Comforts.

If you met us on the street you’d think we were ordinary people, though perhaps a bit well-to-do. We shed the heavy expensive crap that sucks up most people’s resources. We discovered that we really didn’t need it.

So, what does our unusual lifestyle have to do with social media?

Continue How Social Media Can Help You Live Your Dream Lifestyle

This post is part of a weekly series, Fetching Friday, featuring the resources mashup, an easy tweet sharing tool, and Maru, the box sliding cat, meows on kikolani.com.

The Resources Mashup

Here are some of the best articles I have stumbled upon, retweeted on @kikolani, and read in RSS subscriptions this week.

Blogging / Writing

Continue Fetching Friday – Resources, Easy Tweet Sharing Tool & Maru Meows