You do use Instagram, do you?

If not you definitely should. Download the app for free or visit Instagram to get started.

Visit Your Own Blog for The First Time - Then Start Making it Better

Of course it's physically impossible to travel in time and actually doing so. What I mean by this is that you should from time to time just go to your own blog and look at it as if it was your very first visit. Pretend that you're curious about what the blog has to offer and that you are eager to find it quickly.

Ask yourself questions similar to these:

- Does your blog instantly makes a good impression?
- Can you in a matter of seconds find which content the blog offers?
- Do the blog post titles sound interesting and make you feel like exploring the blog further?
- Is the blog post you decide to read well written? Does it link to other posts (preferably in a neverending chain of links that makes the reader keep reading the blog for as long as possible
- Do you feel the need to revise some content? (going back to earlier post I always seem to find things to improve when it comes to content and my understanding of the subject at hand)

The fundamental question you are trying to answer is of course: Would I enjoy visiting and keep visiting a blog such as this if I was one of the readers from my target audience?

When (there should be no "if" unless you have stopped improving as a writer and blogger) you find the question that you have to answer with a "No" - that is when you know that you have work to do and what that work should be aimed at.

After that, it's all about how much time you would like to spend on revising and polishing that precious gem of yours.

I honestly believe that I could work on my blog 24 hours a day for the rest of my life just going through my old posts and correcting/rewriting/developing them. Of course that is not realistic, even if blogging was my full-time job I would never spend more than 8 hours a day in front of a computer.

The point is that you should never be able to say "I don't know what to write, so I can't work on my blog today". The most popular posts of mine are revised versions of older posts. Posts that get better and better each time I go through them. Maybe one day they will be so good that I would actually enjoy reading them myself and even subscribe to my own blog.

Happy blogging! :)

How to get an Instant Boost of Traffic Without Paying!

These last few days I've had the biggest increase in traffic for my main blog since I started it. Want to know why? The big secret? A way to see the stats rapidly turning up without investing any more than some of your precious time...

One word (and site): Growsocials.com. A simple but amazingly clever idea built around a community helping each other through visiting each others sites, following Twitter profiles, liking Facebook and Google+ posts etc.

Here is the basic idea somewhat simplified:
- If I visit your site (or follow your tweets, subscribe to your YouTube channel etc) I get points
- If someone visits my site I pay points
- No points = No visits
- The more I visit others the more visits I get

I've tried it for a couple of days and it actually works! I really like the "give and thou shall get" philosophy behind and truly recommend it for anyone who needs to bring attention to some part of their web presence.

Happy blogging! :)

Find Just the Fonts You want for Your Blog!

Sorry for keeping you waiting for so long. The truth is that I haven't had any new remarkable strategies to share. I have pretty much kept doing the things I've already talked about here.

It seems to have given results. From being private blog #3500 in Sweden by the start of the year, I've now been below #3000 this month. Even went below the #2900 mark for a while.

So in case you haven't read my "most read" posts above and wonder why your blog isn't moving anything in the right direction in the ranks, take some time to skim through my suggestions and try them. (Of course let me know how it went as well :)).

Now for what really made me write this post:
dafont.com
It's a great site to find the right fonts for your blog or website. There are actually more fonts than you'll ever have time to go through. What's great about it is that you can type a word and then instantly see what it would look like using each particular font. Might come in handy now that Christmas draws near...

Happy Blogging! :)

Remember That We're Busy People These Days...

One important aspect to keep in mind when writing your blog posts is that today everyone seem to always be in a hurry to get somewhere.

If you can't capture your reader immediately and/or communicate what you wish to say in a really short while, it is likely that they will in a matter of seconds choose the "not interesting enough" or "way too much too read" exit.

Here are some things to keep in mind when writing readerfriendly posts:

1. Don't write too long. Remember, that for many people a blog post of 140 letters (maximum Twitter length) is the standard.
2. One way too get the most important points across, while allowing the reader to skim through, is to use bold text for key words and phrases
3. Stick to one subject for each blog post. If you have just one more thing to tell your readers about, make sure you publish and press the "New post" before doing so

Happy blogging! :)

You Do Use This Excellent Gadget, Do You?

The gadget I'm referring to is the excellent "Popular posts" that is now available if you use Blogger. A great way to bring attention to your most visited posts.

Add it in case you haven't.

Blog on! :)

Make Sure That Your Readers...

I wish all readers a really great 2011. I'll start this year by suggesting a great Blogger Widget that should be somewhere at the top of your start page: The "Most popular posts" widget.

It's a great way to showcase your most popular posts and make sure that your readers keep reading them. Another positive spiral has been created!

Revise Old Posts and Show Your Readers that You Do It!

Don't know what to write? Then maybe you should spend some time going through your old posts. If you do, you will probably find a lot you want to change. When you do, don't forget to mark that particular post as "revised" and at which date you last did that revision.

Always strive to show your readers that you're actively improving and evaluating your blog and that it's up-to-date. The impression you make is almost as important as what you actually write.

Happy blogging! :-)

Turn Your Webpage into a PDF-document

Would you like to be able to convert a webpage into a PDF-document? Now it's easily done. Just head over to pdfmyurl.com and type in the URL of the page you want to convert to PDF.

Great if you have a lesson or article that you want to make available in a portable format. I plan to use it for the drawing lessons I've been writing, for instance.

Happy Blogging!

Get Maximum Traffic in Minimum Time - Keeping the Positive Spiral Turning

Do you recognize yourself in these words:

I should really be spending more time marketing my blog, but I just caaan't find the time needed to do so?

Then I have a very simple solution. The next time you use Google Analytics (a post about the importance of using this tool at an at least weekly basis can be found here) for your regular analysis and evaluation of your blog, do the following:

1. Make sure you're only viewing stats for the last week
2. Look at from which social (twitter, facebook, online forum) source you have been getting the most visits lately
3. Seek out that source - preferably every day that this particular source is the most traffic-bringing one - and do something (retweet, answer a forum post etc) to make people notice that your are still actively participating and interested in keeping contact.

This way you'll keep being noticed by the same "target audience" that have been most interested in your blog recently and - voila! - you are keeping a positive spiral turning in the right direction. You will also find that since your main source of traffic is the place most interested in what you write about, it is almost certainly a place where you as well will enjoy spending time keeping a social network alive.

Therefore I recommend that you skip any search engines or similar that may come up first and look for the first social source you can find. This is unless you are particularly interested in SEO, but that is another topic.

Blogging is all about communication and the ones most likely to be interested in what you have to say are people you know well. Therefore BUILDING AND MAINTAINING SOCIAL NETWORKS is the most important aspect of running a popular blog.

The good news is that this is one of the things that are most rewarding about blogging - if you're actively building and maintining contact with like-minded people you will no doubt make quite a few friends along the way.

It is my firm belief that only a person with a sincere interest in making and keeping new social connections and that senses a joy in doing so, will become a successful blogger. After all, if it's all struggle and no joy doing it - why do it at all?

Happy blogging!

Be Patient and Do Something To Grow Each Day!

So, your blog is not growing fast enough? Not getting as much traffic as you dream of? Feel you really SHOULD be promoting your blog more, but where o where to find time and energy for that?

Don't know if you recognize these things but they have certainly been something to tackle during my first years as a blogger. I have two suggestions, that at least has worked for me:

1. Patience, think about your blogging as a long-term activity

To build a successful blog takes time and commitment. There really seems to be no shortcuts in life and blogging is no different: Think of the growth of your blog in terms of months - or even years. If you can't imagine yourself keeping the same blog for more than a year I doubt that you'll ever be a successful blogger (whatever that is)

My most popular blog last year, Fantasytree, grew steadily in 2009. Not by far as much as I dreamed of, of course, and at the end f the year I thought: "I've put so much time and effort on this blog, it should have much more traffic, it should..." etcetera etcetera. Disappointed I checked the traffic increase for the year - and was surprised to see it had grown not by hundreds of percents, but by thousands!

Run your blog for a year and THEN evaluate how it has done. Remember that if you seriously think about making money blogging, you must be ready to do it for many years, maybe decades. Otherwise your probably not passionate enough. To be a pro blogger that is - blogging can be so much more than a job of course.

But I imagine that those who visit blogs like this one is rather serious and anxious about increasing traffic.

My second advice has to do with that enchanted word to anyone serious about building a succesful blog: TRAFFIC. How do you keep building traffic, day after day, week after week. My second advice for this time is really deceptively simple (but is working remarkably well for me):

2. Do Something To Make Your Blog Grow Every Single Day

No, no, no you say, don't give me this crap, tell me how to gain 10 000 visitors in a week, you might complain. The truth is however, the way I see it: If you can't start building up your blog in a more continuous way, starting with something each day, then you - in my humble opinion - never will have the drive/passion/enthusiasm to run a really successful blog.

Let me ask this: Can you honestly say that you do SOMETHING every day (of course even a blogger is allowed to be ill, go on vacation etc, here I'm taking about that usual "blogging day") to make your blog more succesful?

If the answer is "Yes", then you probably won't need my advice much longer. If it's "No" on the other hand, then why are you expecting your blog to grow so much?

Enough preaching (I often fall prey to the "Why can't people keep visiting my blog even though I'm not putting in the effort necessary to make it worth visiting at the moment - I have many old articles they should enjoy reading?"-thoughts myself), let's round this of with a few concrete examples of what you might do (at least I keep doing these) every single day in order to keep your blog growing. Just one of these each day is a great start. Sounds simple? It is theoretically, the catch is that you'll have to keep doing these things for days, months, years or even... oh my... decades.

- Visit one other blog in the same genre and write a comment, maybe even link to that blog
- Increase the number of followers on Twitter (you do use twitterfeed to post your blog posts as tweets, do you?)
- Find a blog directory where your blog is not listed and list your blog
- Send email to your mailing list or old readers
- Find a guest blogger
- Evaluate which posts are most popular and make a mental note to write a similar/follow-up post soon
- Be active in any online forum about something related to your blog and have a link to your blog in your signature
- Start another blog that links to the one you wish to grow
- Visit a blog on "How to build your blog" or read a book, watch a video etc about it (Warning: It's always easy to spend hours upon hours on the theory - what will bring in those real visitors, as opposed to those imagined, potential ones, though, is the actual physical actions/changes/contacts that you really make.)

Who said it should be easy to build a succesful blog? The challenge should be half the fun to the serious blogger. Remember: If you don't love what you're doing, why do it? You don't HAVE to be the most succesful on the planet. Having a good time doing something you enjoy can be quite enough.

Happy blogging!

Want A Guestblogger or to Guestblog Yourself? Try This Site!

I recently found a great site for finding a guestblogger. Or a blog that is looking for guest bloggers. The site is

blogsynergy.com

and seems to have great potential. (I have already found one new guestblogger for my blog Fantasytree.)

Why not give it a try, guest blogging can be a great way to promote your blog or your blogging skills.

Happy Blogging!

Just launched a new blog!

Happy to announce that I just started another blog. This time written in my native tongue (Swedish) and focusing entirely on my interest and progress in art.

I hope all Swedish readers will enjoy it. Find it here:
Pennans vandring (Way of the pencil)

Site update - Added 9 more links to the best blogs about blog improvement

Just found a list of the most popular blogs about blog improvement. The most popular one, Problogger was already in my list, but now I have added 9 more. None of these have less than 15000 subscribers. Do check them out (I sure will, as there were some I hadn't heard of).

Happy Blogging!

You do Analyze and Evaluate your Blog Regularly, don't You?

Every Monday I do a quick analysis of how my blogs are doing and try to establish a strategy for which changes need to be made in order to keep it as succesful as I possibly can. Of course I stick to the topics I ordinary write about, but I use the data collected from Google Analytics in order to perhaps put some extra focus on what seems to be most popular among my readers.

Let me illustrate this with a simple example:

You blog about apples and pears. You write ten posts, five about apples and five about pears (50% about each). When you use Analytic's "best content" tool you find that every post about apples has been visited 25 times, while the ones about pears have only had one or two visits. Should you then keep writing as much about pears as about apples?

Well that depends on the purpose of your blogging. If you write just for fun and don't care about traffic, by all means keep writing about those pears. Then you could even skip the posts about apples altogether.


If you want your blog to be popular, however, you must consider what your readers really want to read about. You must think of your blog as a business where you try to sell the product that is most popular at the moment (while at the same time offering those "pillar articles", quality content that will keep being valuable to your readers over a long period of time).

Of course you still have to enjoy writing your blog (why do it otherwise), but perhaps you could write 75% about apples and 25% about pears instead. Or focus on making your "pear articles" more interesting. But that might be a more demanding task than "switching focus".

To summarize I encourage you to use some kind of tool to analyze the general trend of your blog's popularity and also which subjects and posts that are most popular. I have so far only used the free Google Analytics and so far I have not needed anything else.

I suggest that you establish a routine (once a week, once a month, what you find suitable) and find answers to the following questions:

- How is my blog doing? Has it been getting more traffic or less lately?
- Any particular days when the traffic was remarkably good?
- Which were the most popular posts and topics? Did these posts contain something that other posts lack? What could that be?
- What do I think my readers want to read about? (A good way is to ask for their feedback. Socializing with your readers is not only enjoyable, it also keeps them returning for social reasons. Most people need attention. By being friendly, making sure to reply to comments you establish a positive atmosphere one that reader's want to come back to. But that's a topic of its own)

I do this by the start of each week, since I find this kind of analysis really interesting. I'm always curious about how my blog is doing and why. You must find what suits you, but if you're serious about improving the amount of traffic you must be aware of what attracts your readers.

Hope these suggestions were valuable to you. Do give feedback and let me know what you want me to write more about.

Happy blogging!

Happy New Year...

...to you all.

See you next year - surely it will be a great one for further blog improvement!

/M

Don't Forget To Embed Those Goodies!

Just quickly want to mention something that I have recently begun using much more than before; The opportunity to find enjoyable material on the web and embed it in your blog post.

So easy, can be done really fast - and the reader's enjoy it! A win/win situation - especially if you are short on time (like we all seem to be these days).

Here is how you do it:

1. Find the embeddable object (for me it's mostly been movie trailers and free online games)
2. Mark and copy the provided HTML code
3. Open the HTML of your post (here at Blogger you choose "Edit HTML" when you are writing your post).
4. Simply paste the code where you want the object to be and you're done.

Things to keep in mind is that you should find an embeddable object of the right size for your blog. Usually there are some different sizes to choose from. And - as always - that you don't overdo it. Consider the amount of loading time for the object as well and don't replace your writing entirely with free content. Find a balance.

Good luck on making your blog more attractive by adding embeddable content. If you find handling snippets of HTML tricky, just let me know and I'll help you out or write a more thorough tutorial on how you edit the HTML code of your posts.

Will finish this post with an example of what such an embedded object might look like. Before that I just want to say

MERRY CHRISTMAS
and
HAPPY BLOGGING!

(Example of an embedded movie trailer)

Another Reader's Site To Visit!

Just received a friendly comment from this nice site on fridge magnet design:
laughingfridgemagnets

Do pay it a visit. Also let me know if you would like me to add your blog/site to me "reader's site list".

How Do You Catch a Reader?

Imagine that you've written your best blog post ever. You know that if only people would read this post, then they would forever be hooked. They would start every day for the rest of their lives by visiting your blog...you get the picture.

The problem is that no matter how good posts you write, what most people will go by when deciding which blog to visit is The Title. In just a few words you have only seconds to capture a potential reader's interest before he or she moves on to the next blog, mail, RL issue etc.

That is why the title is so important. Those words are what will be skimmed by that potential stream of traffic and has to make them stop, make them curious and take a look. 

Here are some of the concrete ways to do this:


* Begin your post with a statement (Like The best horror novel ever!)
* Begin with a question (Like The best comedy ever?)
* Begin with something exciting or controversial (Like Maggie's Near-death experience proves there is an afterlife)
* Begin with something funny (Like Feeling hot? This review will rock your socks off)
* Begin with something that your intended audience REALLY would like to know (Like How to start writing posts that will double your traffic in a week)

I try to think Newspaper headline and ask myself "What would make me interested in reading this post?". Usually I choose a combination of the above tactics. For this post for instance, I tried to find a title that was:
- A question
- Controversial (it's not allowed to catch another person is it?)
- Funny (somewhat absurd at least)
- Of big interest for my intended audience

Of course I don't always succeed and you can't rely to heavily on one set formula. Sometimes you need to use your own intuition and imagination. Think psychology. If I add a link and name it DON'T CLICK THIS LINK! it will be really hard to resist. That's simple psychology. Our curious human nature.

Hope these suggestions help you. Let me know if they do - or if they don't.

Happy blogging!

Site Update - Link to News Blog Added. Want a Link to Your Blog?

Just received a mail where I was asked to add a link to the following Indian news blog:
http://2daynewsupdates.blogspot.com/


Of course I said yes after visiting the blog to take a look at the content. If you would like a link to your blog or site, please contact me.