Kirstie McDermott dot conf 2012 presentation

1 Find your USP (no, not your USB)

•Love your subject•Passion shows, and it attracts fans•Stick with it – readers will be happy to grow along with you•Be quirky•Offer a twist on a standard format - in a sea of baking/music/book blogs, how can you make yours shine?

2 Resist the temptation to diversify •It's often a 'just cos' thing•You get a bit bored or blocked with what you're bogging about, so you start writing about new, unrelated subjects•Can be PR-led•But why were your readers logging on in the first place?

4 Watch your tone

The 'I' voice is important

Be friendly and funny

Be colloquial – Irish people love

Irish content

Engage readers with stories, use

anecdotes

Never lose sight of quality

5 Be consistent, topical and timely

Set yourself achievable goals

Decide to blog 1,2,3 times a week

and stick to it

Be on time with news and trends

If something happened a week

ago, leave it

6 Schedule and plan

Your blog will suck up every

second of every minute of every

day of every month of every year if

you let it

Organise yourself! Use tools like

Wordpress Editorial Calendar

Schedule content ahead of time

Aim for a mix

8 Cultivate your source material

Is your blog self-directed?

Can you use PR firms?

Follow influencers in your area on

Twitter

Add relevant feeds to Google reader,

use Google Alerts

Immerse yourself in your subject

Subscribe to ezines, relevant directory

and industry sources

9 Respect those sources

If you've seen something elsewhere

and use it, credit the originator

Don't think it's important? It is!

The blogging vs print debate is

reductive and silly if you're stealing all of

Vogue's shoots for your fashion blog,

SANS CREDIT and then claiming blogs

will take down magazines

10 Listen to your readers What do readers want?

What are they asking for?

Keep an eye on comments and

feedback and do more of what gets lots

of engagement

Keep an eye on social shares

What's a hit? What fails?

Know your reader

11

Listen to Google

Learn to love Google Analytics

Take measurements – sometimes

you might be surprised that

comment-free posts are strong

search returners or shared

frequently

Try not to turn into weird

woodland fetish site

12

Yep, you can make money

Google AdSense is designed for

blogs

Get smart about placements,

custom channels and filtering out

the ads you don't want

Affiliate networks like Awin and

Commission Junction

But don't expect to get rich quick.

Or, er, ever

13

Because you're worth it

You've built your traffic,

reputation and brand awareness

Now it's time to start getting

some revenue back

It's not work unless it's being paid

for

14

The 'No-Budget' bleat

We want you to hang yourself off

a balcony backwards while in the

nip, whistling Dixie, live blogging it

and giving away 56,000 products

for our client you'll have to pay to

post out yourself

PS: we've no budget

15

Think about titles and keywords

Clever puns work well in

newspapers and magazines, but

are shag all use for search return

Make sure to get the subject of

the post into the title

Make sure to mention the product

in the first paragraph

16

There's no such thing as 'just' a blog post anymore

You need to think of the whole

360

It's a Tweet

It's a Facebook status update

Make sure your blog has good

social share buttons

Are you using Google+?

17

Twitter and Facebook work

You need search traffic and SEO is

vital, but a multi-pronged approach is

best

It's the having lots of eggs in your

basket approach

Auto-tweet your posts using

Twitterfeed or Dlvr.it

Use images on Facebook for more

traction

18

Pinterest is the new big referrer

Want to drive more traffic?

Pinterest is yer only man. Or woman,

as it turns out

Link to images, as opposed to

uploading them

Add a link to your site in the

description

Watermark if you're very concerned

about dissemination

19

Make friends

There's a social aspect to blogging that

can't be underestimated

It's a hobby that can grow into a

business

But it can bring you a whole new circle

of friends and that enriches your life on

another level too

20 But don't be a doucheThe web offers you amazing

opportunities to market your blog and

social media tools are one of the best

ways to do it

Aim to not be that person who leaves

asinine comments on posts they haven't

read, purely so they can leave the link to

sparkznshinepoodlesnglitter.blogspot.co

m at the end

No one likes that person

21

Make the most of the resources out thereBlogging can be a total money pit

You can feel you need a DSLR camera,

Photoshop, special lights, a studio, amazing

high-end gadgetry – you don't

Online resources like Plixr for photo

editing, Mailchimp for free lists up to a set

amount, Problogger and Copyblogger are all

great, and zero pee

CMS' like Wordpress and Drupal are free

22 Never stop learning

Stretch yourself constantly

Don't know CSS? Go on – give it a

go

Learn basic photo editing

Find out what all those buttons do

on your camera

Experiment with a video or two

Plan into the future for things you

might do next year

24 Yes, give out your stats

They're not precious pearls

Magazine and newspapers are

circulation audited – so why

shouldn't you be?

Important metrics are page

impressions and unique visitors

Hits are meaningless as a

measure

25 Learn how to say no

The biggest and best lesson to

learn

It will make you a better blogger

Learn that you own your blog, not

a PR firm and you can say no

Not everything can or will be a fit

Thank you!

@kirstie