As been a psychologist, I thought.. what if I give my readers a few strictly professional advices? Just as a psychologist, and not as a fellow blogger or internet money making machine. So, here are a few tips. They are not a must, feel free only to implement those you feel good about and those that won’t change dramatically your way of blogging, unless you feel it needs to be changed. Anyway, let’s get started… - Don’t be so money oriented. The only way to win your readers *love* is not to talk with them about money, at least not all the time, unless you actually teach them how can they earn them themselves. People, who’s only concern and value seems to be money, tend to put off. Promote high values instead.
- Win your readers’ trust. You know how much fraud there is today on the internet. Everyone is looking for someone genuine, someone real and honest who will tell them the truth about some product or network and won’t try to promote them just to get a commission, never mind what crap they are selling. I refused tons of reviews offers and advertisers’ links only because I felt their products could not deliver what it promises. All these e-Books that guarantee to make you a millionaire… they do pay good money for advertising, but I knew that if my readers will see that I promote such websites, or buy that products and end up disappointed, and, will remember how ardently I was recommending it, they will never trust any other review I make or product I recommend. Basically, advice your readers to use only what you used successfully yourself. If you need to make money with a sponsored review, accept only relevant offers that you believe in yourself, and make it clear to the reader that the review was sponsored, either by placing it in a “sponsored reviews” category, or state it in the post. US law, for instance, demands disclosure of sponsored posts.
- Don’t lose your dignity in readers’ eyes. Talking about your downfalls and how much you need financial support, for example, is needless. Begging for donations under some poor excuses such as you can’t pay the hosting bill - won’t make you look good in readers eyes. Some will feel sorry for you and leave a cheering comment, others will throw a few bucks your way, but others will just not respect you as an online entrepreneur. I mean, you can’t cover 10$ a month? Okay, some of you can’t, and I am not saying there is anything wrong with not been as well-off as Darren Rowse, but letting the whole world know about it - is wrong. Most people tend to respect successful bloggers a lot more than beginners who struggle to make a cent out of their online business. Sad, I know, but this is how the world works.
- Be honest. Not many do it though. I know, when the feedburner has little subscribers, it’s so very tempting to link to someone else’s image, it’s very tempting to say you make 5,000$ a month with your blog in order to impress others and set your visitors counter to a starting number of one million. There are so many things you could have done to make your blog look hella’ popular, but the thing is, if someone will find out (and there are many third party tools to measure the real worth of your blog), you will lose your face once and for all. If your counter has little visitors and feedburner shows 2 subscribers, the best thing you can do it just not make them public, yet.
- Talk to readers. When making a blog post, keep in mind that you don’t write an essay that has to pass an exam and go to the archive, in hope to gather traffic from the SE one day. You have to talk to the visitor, make your writing interactive. Ask questions, answer to them. Throw some provoking statement (within limits, ok?) and approve or disapprove of it. Touch to reader’s heart by comparing online life to simple daily life examples, this will make you more real in their eyes and allow them to understand better what you are talking about. Cover frequently asked questions in your post, cover topics that everyone is talking about nowadays and give your own opinion. Be mean, have sense of humour, be cynical or very cheering, just make it clear to the readers that you are not a mere source of information behind a keyboard, you are a human with thoughts, character and ideas. Fascinating personalities attract, and everyone is unique in his own way, don’t be afraid to show it and win your online fans and admirers.
Okay, does it all help to make money? Yes. People will trust you and sign up with your affiliate links, knowing it works and you don’t lie. You will make it interesting to read your blog - they will come back, recommend your blog to others and it will grow. If you won’t talk about money in every post, they won’t feel like you use your audience as a mere tool to get paid for hits. Enjoy your blog, enjoy your writing, they will enjoy reading and money will come naturally.
That’s it for now. I might do a similar post in the future with more tips from my bank of knowledge. Hope this reading was interesting, interactive, honest enough and I didn’t talk about money too much, did I? Speaking of which, remind me to enlarge my “donate me!” button  |
