I’ve always wondered - “How did they make it to the top?” If someone could tell me the 10 ways to make me a popular blogger and make everyone link to me. I read and I read but it’s all the same s*** everywhere. B

So what does it take to become a popular blogger, accepted and trusted by everyone (well almost) ? I’ve found some traits interesting, from every blogger that I followed. Some were common, and some unique. As a blogger I think we should absorb the best ones, from the people who made it big. Here are a few i gathered, let’s see if you will disagree with me.

 12 habits of successful bloggers you should copy 

1 - Read more than you write ( Courtesy Darren Rowse )
I found this habit of Darren, very interesting. We bloggers spent a major part of our time tweaking, and writing contents for our blog isn’t it? And with a popular blog like ProBlogger, anyone would assume that Darren uses most of his time with his blog, writing content and tweaking the design. But it was interesting to know that Darren spends most of the time reading than writing.
That is indeed a great habit for a busy man like him. I guess it’s about keeping you updated and “in the loop” with the blogosphere.

2 - Respond to emails (Courtesy Darren Rowse )
Another habit of Darren that I admire. Even though he’s a celebrity, if you send Darren a genuine question/suggestion on email, it would most probably be replied. This shows how passionate he is and open to ideas. I think we all should keep this as a reference point and copy it in to our lives.

3 - Social media (Courtesy Pete Cashmore)
Every popular blogger is the super star in a social media network. A look at their friends number itself will make you feel like the silliest living thing on the planet. Well, it’s not magic that got them those many friends, but hard work. Popular bloggers are social media enthusiasts they talk to people, they are open to discussions and ideas and this reflects in their friends number on facebook or orkut. So go out talk to people and build your network, it’s a powerful tool.

4 - Be the first to jump in ( Courtesy John Chow )
I learned this from John Chow. John jumps first into any affiliate marketing or money making tool that comes in (or so I guess). And this is exceptionally good because if the tool takes off, he’s probably going to sit on top of a gold mine some time from now. All he needs to do is sign up at the first place. So be the first to jump into things, most of them are free, so what’s keeping you waiting?

5 - Ask questions ( Courtesy Darren Rowse )
Another one I loved about Darren. He always asks questions and manages to spark off discussions on the “seemingly” silly topics. It’s very easy for bloggers to “feel” that they are masters of the trade and asking questions only will degrade their status. Of course not!

6 - Be friendly ( Courtesy Michael Martine)
I love to talk to friendly people, and so do you right? To me, it’s not the knowledge level or celebrity status of a person that makes me respect him, but his willingness to be friendly and share the same frequency with you. Many a times, you have people who have enormous amount of knowledge but would never come down to your level and share knowledge with you. It’s a frustrating situation. But there are some very pleasant personalities like Michael Martine, who are very friendly and supportive. The interesting thing about talking to such people is that they are willing to share the same frequency with you, and they’ll share knowledge with you. It’d be a win-win situation than a one-way process. I wish more bloggers be this way, and it’d be lovely to network with them.

7 - Either be seriously good or be evil ( Courtesy Kumiko )
I learned this one from Kumiko. And she’s very right. People like to listen, hear and sometimes do evil. So if you are all set to grab people’s attention, either be seriously good or be damn evil - the smart way. Either way, do it the appealing and smart way. (Being evil doesn’t mean harming someone, but being smart.)

8 - Show off your money ( Courtesy John Chow )
I don’t think everyone will agree with it, but I have to agree that some guys do it best. Like John. This man flaunts his money like none does and hey, that’s his USP. So if you want to help people make money, come on first show me how much you got? (A good lesson to all those “money making gurus” on blogspot.)

9 - Give attention to details that others may miss ( Courtesy Amit Agarwal )
This is a simple yet very effective in convincing readers. A good example of this would be DI’s Amit Agarwal. Amit’s “WOW” factor in his posts are the simplicity. If you look at his popular posts, all of us would feel unanimously say - “Damn! Why didn’t I think about it earlier?”
That’s exactly what makes the man popular. He has keen attention to details and he brings up all the tips and tweaks possible for even the less important applications.
Paying attention to details finally pays off !

10 - Be consistent (Courtesy Amit Agarwal )
I think every popular blogger would agree with this one. Think about it this way, was Darren popular when he started his blog? Was Amit aware that he’s gonna be featured on the cover page of a national weekly? No, isn’t it?
So the point here is - Consistency. If you have the passion in you, keep it going and success will automatically fall in place.

11 - Live on criticism (Courtesy Amit Agarwal )
Criticism and bad mouthing is the part of the game. No one would be popular without hearing abuses and criticisms. Or ask the blog celebrities today. They would most happily agree that through out their career, there were criticisms, bad mouthing swearing even. But the idea is to keep the flame burning, come what may. (A good lesson for young bloggers who fret over monthly AdSense earnings and Google PR)

12 - Link Voraciously (Courtesy John TP )
We all know it’s about the network ! Let me give you an example. John TP. This young man is not very common in comments or networking (John this is only an example, hope you will take it in the right spirits) so once I thought he’s not social. But looking at his posts, I found that John links voraciously, to every possible resource. And he even writes posts to refer someone or a tool. That’s a great virtue if you ask me. Because, you may not be good in socializing but linking to fellow bloggers and resources makes you equally popular. (This is a lesson to all those bloggers who think 24 times before linking to someone. Spare me, I think only thrice )

There must be a couple of other habits too that makes a blogger popular but I’m leaving it to you. We all know there are no “Top 10″ rules (Like the digg lists) to fame in the blogosphere, it’s all common sense and hard work. We all have the answers in us, it’s just that we are not speaking about it.

Got a doubt on SEO? Post it to me HERE. I'll try and answer it asap. :) -- Mani

The Indian blogging arena is on a high these days.In about an year there have been huge increase in the number of technology related bloggers in India. There are students, professionals and learners actively blogging on their respective fields of interest. Many of them also make decent amount of money online. I thought, with the new PR update happening, it’s time we rank some of the popular ones based on some common metrics like traffic. I hope you find it interesting.

According to traffic rankings, here are the top ten super stars.

1. Blog: Clazh -  Author: Arpit Jacob, Chennai
2. Blog: Technospot - Author: Ashish Mohta
3. Blog: Life Rocks - Author: Nirmal T V, Kerala
4. Blog: Online Tech Tips - Author: Aseem Kishore, US
5. Blog: Shankar Ganesh - Author: Shankar Ganesh, Chennai
6. Blog: Think Abdul - Author: Abdul Azeez
7. Blog: Freakitude - Author: Lovedeep Wadhwa
8. Blog: Jsbi - Author:Jason S
9. Blog: Madhur - Author: Madhur Kapoor
10. Blog: Rishi Raj - Author: Rishi Raj 

Professional bloggers like Amit Agarwal have set example to many young bloggers in India, and as I understand from talks with these bloggers, a good amount of them have been inspired from Amit. So he deserves a special applause.

Sporting a dashing image like this one in your posts really helps much to get the attention of readers.

Many a times, people search for images on Google Image search or Windows Live image search and simply pin up the image on the articles.Many a times, the images don’t fit well into the articles, and some “photoshopping” may be required to crop and fit it. But bloggers who write articles on the fly, may not have the time to photoshop an image, so rely to online image sources.

Here comes the role of image and text generators. They are very helpful for bloggers because they help to find the matching images and incorporate the appropriate text in them, with ease!

Gerard from The Generator Blog has quite some cool generators listed in his blog. Awesome work!
I managed to pick a few that may be of interest to bloggers.

• Dylan Message creator
  This one creates a movie where a series of messages(10 of them) is shown on each sheet the man is holding. A little heavy stuff, but cool!
• T-Shirt with slogan generator
  Give any word and the generator will give you a slogan corresponding to it written on a T-Shirt and a nice babe!
• Airline Sign generator
  This one writes your name on an Airplane. Neat and classy one, but better the name/message be short!
• Make angry Tom yell out whatever you want
  Enter some lines of text and get “Tom yelling at you” those lines.
• Generate a Neon sign
  Create a neon sign board with your name glowing up!
• Award/Trophy generator
  Generates a badge with a trophy image and your desired text. Great for quick awards!
• Wedding sign board generator
  Create a neon glow wedding sign board with your text written on it. Cool one !
• Zidane - Materazzi conversation video subtitle generator
  Write your own sub titles for the Zidane - Materazzi video, use your creativity!
• Create an Official seal
  With your text and company name on it.
• Convert RSS to Gif
  This generator converts your RSS feed entries to Gif format.
• Convert text to image
  This generator can convert any text file to an image document with the given parametres like image width and height
• Create Zombie like text image
  With this generator you can create a zombie like image(font) out of your text.

Many of these generators are not exactly image generators, but flash based programs, so you may want to use the “Printscreen” option to capture the image and use it in your articles.

Image courtesy -Thilak

I’ve always been a fan of the Google page designs(example) as they mean to me the right blend of usability and technicality. There are a lot of things young bloggers can copy from Google to make their blogs search engine friendly.(You can see my Google inclination in the posts very evidently). Here are a few points I managed to gather for you (These are applicable irrespective of whether you are on wordpress,blogger,typepad or not).

1. Simple navigation structure
   Google makes it a point to keep their navigational structure simple, text based and always evident. You cannot miss a page that might be relevant to you from the navigation structure. Bloggers should follow this idea - Keep your navigation structure simple, either text based or CSS based and not Ajax or Java or DHTML script based.
   Tip - Java/Flash/DHTML site navigation scripts are funky and catchy but that will keep the search engine crawlers from finding what your content is.
2. Related posts
   Google always have the related posts throwing to you 3-4 topics from their FAQ pages with the title - “You might also be interested in..”
   This enhances the user experience by always making sure the information hungry searcher is not deprived of quality content.
   Bloggers can make related posts to appear in their posts using the related posts plugin.
3. Less images
   Google does not use images extensively unless there is a real need to show things as diagrams or photos.
   Less images means fast loading pages and less clutter.
   Bloggers should use less images, (like for instance button states) instead use quick loading CSS enabled menus and colour effects.
4. Highlight content
   Google always make it a point that every single time the content should be the hero in their article pages. Never in a Google page can you see an image or any other element stealing the show. It’s always content..content and content.
   Bloggers should make sure that the template they use should be one that highlights content more than anything else.
5. Keep all the options at your finger tips
   In every google page you can see that whatever option you can think of is available with the minimum clicks possible. This could be any related content that is suggested along the right hand panel as you browse along the content rich pages.
   Bloggers should make it a point that their best posts and resources should be all delivered in uncluttered boxes/spaces around or near the articles. This helps the user to make good use of their time spent on your webpage, with minimum waste of time.
6. Print option on all information pages
   Google takes into consideration all sorts of people when writing content. They have a printer button handy in almost all the pages, that can be used by anyone who has trouble staring on to the screen for hours together. Especially when there is lot of content, users have to spent lot of time reading stuff on the screen which can be tedious. Instead printing out the pages that interests them is a good option and enhances the end-user experience.
7. Search button on all pages
   The idea is to utilize that “unknown entity” from users. It is quite possible that even with all the above options, a user needn’t necessarily find the information he is looking for in your pages. Hence, he can use the search button, which is available on all the pages. He doesn’t have to try too hard to find the search bar, it is more likely to be in the top left /right above the fold.
8. Open to feedback
   Google is always open to feedback or at least “looks that way”. It has all the feedback (poll) buttons, in all the FAQ pages asking for user’s feedback.
   Bloggers can use this on their blogs to get feedback from readers too by using this plugin.
9. Two column layout
   A two column template with the content on the left hand and elements on the right hand side is the most effective and accepted form of website structure.
   Bloggers may have to be unique and select unique templates but it will be great to use a theme that follows this basic principle.
10. Use of recognizable common fonts
    The font and textual elements used in the Google pages are always simple common ones like Arial. They are cross browser compliant and everyone will find it legible.
    Bloggers should make sure that fonts used in your blog are legible to all the readers.
11. No funky graphics
    The last time I saw a graphic extensive page on Google was it’s April fool prank. Avoid funky graphics as it increases your page load time and kills user experience unless you have a photography or painting based blog. For information and content related ones, it’s a good idea to refrain from using heavy graphics.
12. Loads on pages with rich content
    Blogs are all about content and that’s what makes them loveable to search engines. So have lots of pages with rich content and when you are tired writing them have a look at the Google pages and you will never quit writing. It’s about feeding food to your crawlers so keep them coming religiously lest the crawler should go unfed.
13. Links to other resources
    Never keep your pages deprived of quality links to resources like Wikipedia and other authoritative sites. They enrich the end-user experience and credibility to your pages. Google always gives you informative links related to the current topic in their pages. Let the same be with you on your blog articles.
14. Use of bullet points
    A structured layout for information is not always possible without use of bullet points. And Google does it sweet with capsule bullet points. It is a treat to browse through rich information on bullet points, without which the information had to be all over the place and a waste of time for the user.
15. Evident headers
    Who is more SEO friendly than Google? None can be (for obvious reasons). Google uses headers that are evident both for search engines(good use of H1 tags) and humans(good use of strong and bold attributes) simultaneously. Bloggers should chose templates that will do the same, by providing the right reading pleasure for humans as well as search engines.

The content of a site plays an important role in site promotion for many reasons. We will describe some of them in this article. Also added is some (boring yet readable)advice on how to populate your site with good content.

Content uniqueness.
Search engines value new information that has not been published before. That is why you should compose own site text and not plagiarize excessively. A site based on materials taken from other sites is much less likely to get to the top in search engines. As a rule, original source material is always higher in search results.

   - While creating a site, remember that it is primarily created for human visitors, not search engines. Getting visitors to visit your site is only the first step and it is the easiest one. The truly difficult task is to make them stay on the site and convert them into purchasers. You can only do this by using good content that is interesting to real people.

   - Try to update information on the site and add new pages on a regular basis. Search engines value sites that are constantly developing. Also, the more useful text your site contains, the more visitors it attracts. Write articles on the topic of your site, publish visitors’ opinions, create a forum for discussing your project. A forum is only useful if the number of visitors is sufficient for it to be active. Interesting and attractive content guarantees that the site will attract interested visitors.

   - A site created for people rather than search engines has a better chance of getting into important directories such as DMOZ and others.

   - An interesting site on a particular topic has much better chances to get links, comments, reviews, etc. from other sites on this topic. Such reviews can give you a good flow of visitors while inbound links from such resources will be highly valued by search engines.

   - As final tip…there is an old German proverb: “A shoemaker sticks to his last” which means, “Do what you can do best.” If you can write breathtaking and creative textual prose for your website then that is great. However, most of us have no special talent for writing attractive text and we should rely on professionals such as journalists and technical writers. Of course, this is an extra expense, but it is justified in the long term.

Wordpress plugins are made keeping in mind the utility and functional aspects of your blog. Sometimes, they turn out to help you make money from your blog as well.

Here is a great plugin which was meant for something else but ultimately will help you make money online.

This wordpress plugin is actually made for making announcements on the blog.
It adds a small ribbon image on the left or right of your blog, allowing you to link it to a page on your blog or an URL.

What it does?

- It adds a small ribbon (see left corner of this page ) to the left/right

- The image can be replaced with a customized one

- Can be linked to a URL

- Does not touch your CSS

- Easy to configure

How does it help you make money?

Simply, convert the ribbon to an Ad-spot on your site.
Replace the image with your advertiser’s logo/banner
Link it to the advertiser’s URL

Sell it off !

I’ve linked it to my “Advertisements” page so that a sponsor can pick it up.

Advantages
- The ad placement is unique.

- The spot is highlighted more than anything else on the page.

- There’s no way a visitor is going to miss the ribbon.

So install the plugin and cash in that extra money !

Download the plugin here

Blogging has evolved into a career over the years. Yes the ride has been quite bumpy and there are both losers and winners. The charm of the winners probably have taken over the loser’s plight and today more and more people are plunging into blogging.

Blogs are an excellent marketing tool too. Especially for online startups and products, which seek a viral effect of marketing. Blogging medium gives an excellent platform to such products and which is why top bloggers are always on the lookout. There is big money flowing in and by the next two years it’s expected to soar high.

Finding a job online is not difficult but to get a reliable payer and a reliable company to work with is really important. It was the old times when there were online jobs for click fraud (remember click monkeys?) and even scraping.

Today the horizon is all shiny and gleaming. There are lot of quality bloggers around who have the power to kill or raise a product. Mike Arrington from TechCrunch is a classic example.

So if you have good writing skills, a charm that will make others follow you, then probably you are in the right path. All you need is a platform and some topics to blog about (will be provided). A personal blog that will boast your talents is definitely a big plus. You can find good and reliable companies looking out for quality bloggers at Problogger Jobs board and Bloggerjobs

Hey did you notice it? Seems like everything in the blogosphere is viral? No, I’m not talking about “i-phone reviews” by someone who even haven’t seen one or “I hate Aglocco because you didn’t pay me ” campaigns ….(Yeah! I made that up).

Did you notice the new “Ad - crazy” syndrome happening?  yeah, poor souls like you and me are spared, this has only got to do with the “ProBloggers” who have sponsors waiting in Queue for an ad-spot.

I first saw John Chow do it, then came in Darren, then John TP, then DailyBlogtips, then my buddy Kevin Bloggingtips. All of them have gone for a site template redesign and opted for a theme with more importance to ads. Particularly the square button (125 x 125)ones. What’s with this now?  

Darren has pulled off AdSense ads completely from his blog. So gone are the days when bloggers picked templates based on how it would accommodate AdSense ads and how the background colours blended with your AdSense ads.

Today we have templates that have 30% of it’s real-estate reserved for sponsored ads. In fact, these ads give them more money than Google Ads. When Google ads give them a dollar or two only when someone is clicking it, these image/banners ads are paid for impressions. And with probloggers enjoying huge traffic, it’s but natural for them to opt for these ads to AdSense.

An issue that’s raised (necessarily or unnecessary you decide) is the effect on user friendliness. It’s a fact that these blogs give more importance to advertising than the content, and this sudden change have even confused some readers. The bloggers argument is that sponsors like to show their ads ‘above the fold’ and hence they had to push the content to the lower half pane. Fair enough! John Chow has gone to extreme that almost all of this above fold region is either ads or promotion.

Another argument from the bloggers is that - regular readers always use a reader to read the posts. So the ads won’t bother them much. While the sponsors are targeting on organic traffic and “stoppers-by” from search engines, this is an excellent strategy where the ads are delivered only to the right kind of audience.

Now, that all probloggers are into “Ad-crazy” syndrome, I don’t think it’s far when we have Problogger and JohnChow look alike free themes on Wordpress.

Are you going for a redesign? Not me (atleast, until I have sponsors queuing up) !

This question was asked in one of the forums recently and it caught my attention.

In fact, it could be any blogger’s question. Let’s see what options we have.

Two perspectives to it.

1 - Blogger’s perspective

2 - Wordpress perspective

1 - Blogger’s Perspective

For blogger’s there are limited options but we have a good chance to write SEO friendly title.

In blogger,when you give long titles for your posts, it is truncated to a shorter version by default.

So if you had given - My first post for you to read, the URL would come across as - my-first-post-for.html

As you noticed, the rest of the entry is truncated. Though Google does not have an official document to support this, it’s safe to assume that Google will allow maximum 10 characters or near in their post permalinks.

In order to make your post titles SEO friendly, I would advice that you place your important keywords at the start of the title.

Ex:- Mesothelioma-reports-post.html is better than

the-reports-post-on-meso.html

If you put the important keywords to the right, then it may get truncated, which makes it non SEO friendly.

2 - Wordpress perspective

Wordpress users are at a luxury in this case, since wordpress will take up the entire length of your title in to their permalink.

Ex:- If your title is “Mesothelioma reports from america and argentina” then your permalink will be “Mesothelioma-reports-from-america-and-argentina”

So, as a general rule, it’s good to keep your post titles optimally around 100 character-ish. particularly blogspot bloggers, who are at a risk of getting their titles truncated.

Are you tired writing articles on your blog ? Can’t find topics to blog about? Losing out on the frequency of posts on your blog ?

Worry not. There are plugins to your rescue. Confused? Well, you should be. We’ve heard about numerous ways to help you write more articles on your blog.

Allow guest blogging, find more topics, ask questions to readers etc… Well, we have a brand new option now.

Allow visitors to submit posts/articles to you. Yes, allow all visitors (including all of them without any registration what so ever) to submit posts to you.

You know that your readers have a lot of contributions to make, but they don’t have a platform to express it. At the moment what they have is a contact form or email contact with you. If you are allowing guest blogging it again requires one to register first and then apply for a position etc. This filters down content and finally only a few make it.

But how about letting everyone contribute articles to you? Cool isn’t it?

This plugin does just that! It provides a submission page where in just like the ‘contact me’ page, users can submit articles to the admin of the blog.

The articles get saved as drafts in the dashboard where from the admin can publish the articles if found good. You can even allow special users to directly publish the posts. And you can also ban IPs from posting.

My only concern is about spam. Luckily, the submissions are saved as drafts only (except for the trusted users) so you can very well delete spam from the dashboard. but if there are too many of them (like how they normally are), then it may go into a waste-of-time exercise mode, deleting spam manually.

But this seems to a good plugin to increase the number of posts in your blog and as well as give privilege to users and gain their confidence by allowing them to participate in the blog. A must try for people running out of ideas to blog.

Download the plugin here
Test page here