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Over the past few months my blog has received thousands of hits a day from users looking for information on how they can link Twitter to Facebook. The following is a brief collection of links that will help all of you find what you need:

Twitter’s official page on how to add Twitter to Facebook. The Twitter app for Facebook integrates Twitter into your Facebook experience.

Here is the most popular Twitter Facebook Application.

A blog post from a Facebook employee discussing Publishing to Twitter from Facebook Pages.

The Facebook application Selective Tweets. Selective Tweet Status lets you update your Facebook status from Twitter – BUT you can choose which tweets you want – just end a tweet with #fb when you want to post it as your Facebook status – simple!

A nifty Facebook Page that helps you manage your Facebook Fan Pages connection to Twitter accounts.

Hope this helps!

If you manage a Facebook Page, you now will be able to decide whether to share updates with their Twitter followers, and you also will be able to control what type of updates to share: status updates, links, photos, notes, events or all of them. If you have multiple Pages, you will have the option to link each of those Pages to different Twitter accounts. This new feature will soon be available at http://www.facebook.com/twitter.

http://twitter.com/widgets/facebook

Posted: 17 Aug 2010 07:09 AM PDT

Over the last few months I’ve been sharing a monthly breakdown of where my income comes from in the hope of illustrating some of the methods bloggers might like to look at when making money from blogging (see previous months linked to below).

The month of July was the second month in a row where eBooks were the biggest money maker for me. Here’s a pie chart showing the percentage breakdowns.

Before I say much more let me show you how the different income streams have tracked over the last 4 months (note I’ve expanded ’speaking’ to be ’speaking and events’ to include the ProBlogger Training Day (which wasn’t a massive earner as we kept the price down – but because it’s something I’d like to try again). I have also added a ‘total’ line to this chart to track total income.

A few comments:

• Obviously there was a big eBook spike in June as we launched a photography eBook that month. July was down on the launch month but still very healthy – partly because of a few specials that I ran in July (I did a ‘Christmas in July’ special as well as offering a few communities a discount on the 31 Days to Build a Better Blog workbook).
• AdSense was also pretty good last month – there’s no real explanation for this as traffic was steady. I can only guess that some advertisers were involved in a bit of a bidding war on Digital Photography School which drove prices up a little.
• Affiliate programs were quite down – that can be explained simply by me not doing as many promotions in July – mainly because there were not too many product launches in my niches (for some reason they always seem to come out at once).
• Direct Ad Sales are on the rise and you’ll see this continue to grow next month as I’ve been working with a direct ad sales rep who is now selling ads for my sites which has already led to some new clients.
• Over all it was a good month. While not as spectacular as July it was up on the previous two months significantly.
• Continuity Programs – a few people have asked what they are. In short – they’re membership sites – ProBlogger.com and The Third Tribe.

August is shaping up to be an interesting month. Later this week I’ll be launching a product here on ProBlogger (at a fairly inexpensive price point) which will be interesting to track. I’ve also participated in a couple of affiliate launches and have seen some interesting direct ad sales. I’m not quite sure whether it’ll be as good as July but am working toward it.

How was July for you?

If you’re interested in the previous months breakdowns they’re at:

• How I make money blogging: April
• How I make money blogging: May
• How I make money blogging: June

Posted: 25 Jul 2010 07:33 AM PDT

A Guest Post by Karol Gajda from Ridiculously Extraordinary.

I’m going to come right out and say it: I’m a Lady Gaga fan.

I didn’t really know who she was until about 6 months ago. I knew the name, but hadn’t heard the music or learned about the artist. Then I heard the music and my first thought was: “pop genius.” That said, it wasn’t until I heard/read a few interviews and witnessed how she carried herself that I actually became a fan.

Lady Gaga isn’t just a pop genius, she’s an unapologetic strong-willed marketing genius as well.

There is a lot to be learned from someone like that.

Here’s the tip of the iceberg …

1) Be opinionated. Take a side. Lady Gaga isn’t afraid to speak out on issues she feels strongly about. In doing so, she keeps herself in the public eye. Even more, she attracts her right people.

2) Don’t be afraid to make money. Blatant product placements in the biggest video of the year? Sure, why not? There is nothing wrong with making ridiculous amounts of cash if that’s what you want to do. There is no such thing as a sellout. If you want to put ads on your blog, do it. If you want to sell products, do it. Don’t apologize. You should be paid to create art. Being a starving artist is nothing to be proud of.

3) Don’t call your fans fans. Give them something unique to connect with. Gaga calls her fans Little Monsters. Chris Guillebeau has a Small Army. Adam Baker has The Militia. And I have the Freedom Fighters. (Whoa, I just noticed a bit of a military theme!)

4) Be different even if it’s obvious you’re trying to be different. But don’t state that you’re different, because if you have to put it into words then it’s not true. Confusing? How about this: there are too many normal people with normal blogs and normal writing. You are extraordinary so show it. (Show, don’t tell.)

5) Be good to your Little Monsters. Treat them well and they will reciprocate and make you a superstar. During concerts, Lady Gaga calls a fan in the audience from the stage and invites them to have a drink with her after the show. Whoa! What can you do to connect with your people on a deeper level?

Personal example:

For the Version 0.9 launch of How To Live Anywhere, if you were one of the 132 who bought in the first 24 hours you got a hand written postcard from Goa, India.

Why? 3 reasons:

1) I wanted to thank the Freedom Fighters for changing the world, because every sale in the first 24 hours got doubled (by me) and sent to Kiva.org. I ended up sending $1600!

2) I wanted to thank the Freedom Fighters for taking quick, decisive action. Because that’s really what the Ridiculously Extraordinary Movement is about, action.

3) In this ever expanding online universe I wanted to connect with the Freedom Fighters old school. Yeah, it took me a good 6 hours to write out those postcards, but it was worth it.

6) Piss lots of people off. You can’t please everybody, right? Take it a step further and piss off the people that you’re not going to please anyway. It keeps Gaga in the news and reinforces her message.

7) Befriend the right people. Lady Gaga has, among others, people like Perez Hilton on her side. Having someone like Perez, who influences pop culture strongly himself, in her corner is a perfect ally in her quest for pop world domination.

Produce killer content. Gaga writes ridiculously good pop hits. Undeniable. She doesn’t produce an extraordinary amount of content, but everything she does is done very well.

9) Don’t be ashamed of the mainstream. Gaga straight up admits her pop sensibilities are calculated. Everything she does is on purpose. Shoot for the top of your niche with your blog or don’t take a shot at all.

What did I miss? What other lessons can Lady Gaga teach us about blog domination?

Read more from Karol Gajda at Ridiculously Extraordinary.

Posted: 28 Jul 2010 04:21 AM PDT

One of the best new resources for those wanting to make money from blogging is a new eBook (and available as a ‘real’ book is How to Build a Successful Blog Business by Collis Ta’eed.

I had the opportunity to read this great new book last week and was really impressed by the mix of solid teaching, practical tips and fantastic case studies.

Collis Ta’eed is the creator of some highly successful blogging businesses – Envato, Tuts+, Freelance switch and AppStorm. He’s built something with his great team from scratch to be some of the most popular and profitable blogs going around. He’s someone that I respect so much that I’ve invited him to speak at the upcoming Melbourne bloggers day net week.

Topics in the book include a wide array of things including

• an introduction to
• teaching on how to plan and research your new blog
• tips on creating a brand, naming your blog, choosing domains and design
• a variety of teaching on staffing your blog
• content – how to write it, editing content, headline tips, evergreen content etc
• generating traffic for your blog – how to do it!
• monetization – teaching on an array of methods of making money from blogs
• building a long term business – expanding to multiple blogs and adding businesses to your blog

There are also 3 great case studies on the blogs that Collis has set up – these case studies are highly valuable in and of themselves and my favourite part of the book.

I found this 327 page book to be a refreshing read and one that I think will help a lot of people. For me the highlight was to get an insight into how another bloggers has approached his business – I picked up a lot of great ideas and know that anyone starting out will gain even more insight.

You can get a free sample of the book on the sales page for it (including full table of contents and the first chapter).

Posted: 28 Jul 2010 06:51 AM PDT

One of the great things about blogging is that it is very accessible to anyone with internet access. There are some fantastic tools around that are completely free that mean you can have a blog up and running within minutes of deciding to start a blog.

Free tools range from hosted blog platforms like WordPress.com and Blogger through to a myriad of plugins and themes around the web that can make blogging a breeze.

Of course while there are many many free options out there, sometimes to take your blog to the next level there can come a time when you need to spend a few dollars. I bit the bullet early in my blogging and did this first by paying for my own hosting and moving from Blogger to Movable Type (and later to WordPress.org). I also paid fairly early on for a custom design.

These days I continue to have a variety of expenses including hosting, design, paying a small team of writers (on dPS), paying for some admin support and some development costs.

There are also a number of paid tools that have become indispensable for me which I’d like to feature today. While there are free alternatives to some of them, I’ve found them to be of a standard that I’m more than happy to pay for.

1. Aweber

Perhaps the single most important decision that I’ve made in the last few years of blogging was to add newsletters to my blogs (particularly my photography blog).

I’ve outlined how I use newsletters to drive significant traffic and make money and have written previously Why I use Aweber so won’t rehash it all again – but this is a tool I’m more than happy to have invested in as it easily pays for itself and has been a key part of growing my blogs over the last 4 years many times over.

2. Ustream Producer Pro

This is the latest tool that I’ve invested in. It wasn’t particularly cheap at $199 but enables me to take my video streaming sessions up a notch and do things like have more than one camera angle, do live screen capturing, add a logo to my ustream sessions, import movies and audio into them, have extra transitions, do picture in picture etc.

Some of this is in the free version and you might find you don’t need to upgrade unless you want a few more bells and whistles.

3. MindNode Pro

I’m a big fan of mind mapping. I used to do it without having a name for it on whiteboards and note pads but when I saw online tools that could help me with it I was in heaven. I’ve tried a lot of the Mac based tools (both free and paid) and the one that suits my workflow best is MindNode.

Their free version is brilliant and you might not even need to upgrade but I’m willing to pay for the Pro version simply because it adds the ability to fold down sections of your mind map and do things like add images to it.

4. Market Samurai

I’ve not ever really paid money for SEO before until I came across the Market Samurai tool but it’s excellent. I may not use it quite to its fullest potential (yet) but have touched on how I find it useful for choosing a niche to blog about as well as optimizing a single post on your blog for search engines.

The cool thing is that they have a free trial of the tool which will give you access to its great features to try before you buy – you might find that that’s all you need to do some research and get your blog optimised pretty well.

5. Screenflow

This is a mac only tool which allows users to do great screencasting. I’ve used it more for private resources that I’ve developed for a couple of companies in consulting but it is a very cool way to show what’s on your screen in video as well as insert a view from a camera. A few videos I’ve made with it include -

• How Leaving Comments on Blogs Can Drive Traffic to Yours
• How I Use Social Media to Promote my blogs
• How to Use Google’s Wonder Wheel to find topics to Write about

Note: I am an affiliate for Market Samurai and Aweber but am both a user and a fan of both.

Posted: 04 Aug 2010 06:57 AM PDT

Voice can give a blogger a serious edge. Your unique voice can set you apart from the competition, form a foundation for your brand, engender audience loyalty, and more. If you find it difficult to retain readers, and you’re confident of the quality and accuracy of the content you provide, you may need to work on your voice.

What is Voice?

Voice is the tone in which you present content. Your blog’s overall tone is also affected by visual elements like colours and fonts, but voice is a critical element in the tone of your content.

If a message is what we say, then voice is the way we express what we say. Pace, rhythm, turns of phrase, idioms — even the way you use punctuation — all contribute to the voice of your blog. Unless you’re a die-hard writing buff, it probably won’t pay you to get too hung up on grammar or the finer points of semicolon usage. Instead, focus first on assessing your posts in terms of how they sound overall.

First, choose a word that best reflects how you want to sound — “friendly” or “authoritative” or “experienced”, for example. Then assess a cross-section of your posts, scoring each on how well you feel it meets that requirement. Voice is strongest when it’s consistent, so also look at elements like tags and category labels, email autoresponders, error pages, and so on, to see how well they reflect your desired tone of voice.

This process will probably let you identify some inconsistencies that dilute the voice of your blog — and make it more difficult for your audience to know what they can expect, or to identify with your blog’s personality.

Ensuring Consistency

For many of us, it can be difficult to work out exactly what makes one post  sound better — friendlier, more authoritative, or whatever — than another. All we know is that this post sounds friendly and relaxed, while that one is flat, and this other one comes across as a bit of a rant.

The good news is that you can take a number of steps to make the voice of your posts more consistent.

1. Picture your audience.

If you want your blog to sound friendly, you might imagine a good friend who’s in your target audience each time you write a blog post. It might sound odd, but holding a clear picture of the person you’re writing for in your mind while you write can have a significant impact on the tone of your content.

2. Watch your mood.

With experience, you’ll learn to churn out content on demand, in a consistent voice. But while you’re still getting a handle on your blog’s voice, it can be a good idea to try to write when you’re in a good frame of mind. Not just a positive frame of mind, but one that reflects your respect for your readership and your enthusiasm for your blog topic.

We all have moments when we’d rather be doing something other than writing a post for our blogs; try not to write at those times, at least while you’re finding your voice. If you’re not interested in what you’re writing, that’ll come across in your post’s tone.

3. Separate writing from publishing.

Try to avoid publishing posts as you write them. Instead, save the post and review it later, when you’re in a different frame of mind. This way, even if you can’t avoid writing posts in varying moods, you’ll be able to cast an objective eye over your posts, and to edit and tweak them in ways that reinforce the tone you’re aiming for.

Don’t be afraid to edit your posts if you don’t feel they’re couched in the right tone of voice. You might find that a quick review, with fresh eyes — and the implementation of a few well-chosen tweaks — prior to publishing makes all the difference to the tone of your posts.

4. Create a style guide.

A style guide — a set of rules for grammar, spelling and expression — can help you to automate elements of your blog’s voice.

If you can identify, by looking critically at your blog, and blogs you like the tone of, elements that detract from your tone, you can list them in your style guide. Over time, you’ll compile a list of rules that can act as a sort of template that you can apply to every post your write.

“Have I used friendly text for links, rather than simply pasting the URL straight into the body copy of my post?” you’ll ask yourself. “Have I mentioned the position of every individual I’ve quoted in this article, to show the quality of my research and my respect for my industry peers?”

Using your style guide as a checklist on which to assess your posts can help to ensure that the tone of your blog remains consistent.

5. Consider tactics that may dilute your voice.

Some blogging tactics may actually serve to dilute your blog’s voice. Guest bloggers, for example, probably won’t write the way you do, and may jar with readers’ expectations of your blog’s voice. Similarly, being paid to write a post in which you promote a product can alter your tone of voice in subtle ways. You may even write about certain topics within your chosen field in a way that doesn’t reflect the tone of your blog.

Before you adopt a new tactic on your blog, consider what it might mean for  your blog’s voice. Consistency of voice is crucial when it comes to establishing trust and loyalty among your readership, so it pays — in the short- and long-term — to weigh up the pros and cons of each new tactic before you adopt it.

Glen Stansbery outlined some handy tactics that can actively help to enhance your blog’s voice, but again, use these with discretion and caution. Giving various approaches an open-minded try before you set your heart on adopting them is a good modus operandi.

Have you established a strong voice for your blog? What advice can you share?

About the Author: Georgina has more than ten years’ experience writing and editing for web, print and voice. She now blogs for WebWorkerDaily and SitePoint, and consults on content to a range of other clients.

Posted: 04 Aug 2010 09:57 AM PDT

You can’t ignore video. It’s everywhere online these days – but are you using it well?

Youtube is one of the biggest search engines on the web, almost every product that is launched these days has accompanying videos from the product makers and bloggers are embracing it more and more as a way to communicate with their readers.

The problem is that many bloggers don’t know where to start.

Experienced video blogger – Gideon Shalwick – has this week released a great report to help bloggers through many aspects of using video on blogs to make money. It’s called ‘Rapid Video Blogging: The new Way to Easily Dominate Your Niche through YouTube‘.

Gideon gave me access to his report a couple of weeks ago and I found it so beneficial in my own use of video that the day I read it I created 4 new videos for my own blog AND offered to write the foreword for it!

This 90 page report covers the following:

• 7 steps Gideon has used to dominate niches with video
• How to create high quality videos – fast
• Tips for Setting up a YouTube Channel
• Why Video is better than Just Text or Audio
• How to Optimize Your Videos for Maxmium Impact
• Tips on Videos
• How to Monetize Videos

In addition to the eBook Gideon’s put together 3 videos to accompany it (it wouldn’t’ be an authentic video resource without some vids!).

Also – Gideon tells me that he’s giving away 3 iPads to anyone who downloads his report and leaves a comment on a video on the download page. So far there’s less than 300 comments so you’ve got a better than 1 in 100 chance – pretty decent!

So if you’ve been looking to learn more about using video to grow your online business – check out Gideon’s free report today.

Update: apologies but the initial link I used went to the wrong page – I’ve now updated it.

How to save your ecommerce traffic from Google’s Mayday update Google recently introduced an update to its algorithm that has seriously reduced some sites’ traffic for long tail search terms. The update has been dubbed ‘Mayday’, not after the cries of help from the webmasters negatively affected by it but because it happened on 1st May (or very close to then).While Google makes over 400 tweaks/updates to its algorithm every year, this one got more attention than most because a lot of sites saw a sudden drop on traffic, especially ecommerce sites.

Whether or not your site was affected by Mayday it reminds us of some serious lessons for looking after long tail traffic. Karon Thackston investigates and offers solutions.

Exclusive link building training webinar with Ken McGaffin
The importance of inbound links can’t be overstated. If you want your site’s pages to appear at the top of Google’s search listings, you must have a plan for attracting inbound links. On Tuesday, August 3rd, starting at 1pm (EDT, New York, GMT-04:00 - that’s 6pm BST, London) Wordtracker’s link building expert, Ken McGaffin will be hosting a 60 minute link building training session. Ken will give you clear insights and practical advice about:

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There’s no need to register: on Monday August 2nd, we’ll email you an invitation and your login details. This event is exclusive to Wordtracker newsletter subscribers, and there’s absolutely no fee. So, book the date and time into your diary now!

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Posted: 20 Jul 2010 06:50 AM PDT

I remember doing this for ProBlogger 4 or so years ago and coming up with a long list of potential things I could add to the blog including a job board, membership area, eBooks, ‘real’ book, events and more.

At the time I wasn’t ready to add any of these new products, services or featured – but having that list in the back of my mind enabled me to keep moving my blog forward towards achieving some of them.

The other benefit of identifying these potential income streams that you could one day develop is that others may already be developing them. This might feel a little like you’ve missed the boat but it could also be an opportunity as those with these products might be potential advertisers and/or might have affiliate programs that you could promote.

Once you’ve come up with your list of ideas feel free to share some of them in comments below – it’ll be great to see what everyone is thinking.

PS: stuck for ideas? I don’t blame you – it can be hard to think of how to add a product or service to your blog. Check out the list of products and services that other bloggers have added to their blogs in the results of a poll I ran here on ProBlogger exploring this very topic.

Posted: 13 Jul 2010 06:43 AM PDT

I am very excited today to be able to announce to you that at this year’s BlogWorld and New Media Expo 2010 that Chris Garrett and I will be running a full day of training – the ProBlogger Track.

In this post I want to share a little more information about what we’ll be doing in the ProBlogger track and also mention that the Early Bird Special (almost 50% off) for signing up ends 15 July. But first, let me tell you why I love BWE!

Why I love Blog World Expo

BlogWorld Expo is an event that I’ve had the privilege of attending for the last two years and for me it is the #1 event that I try to get to in the US each year. I love it because:

• Networking – thousands of bloggers and social media people in the one place opens up some amazing opportunities to build relationships and discover potential business partnerships.
• Learning – some great speakers share what they know at this event. Their expertise covers a range of topics, from design, to SEO, to monetization, to content creation, to community management. There are also a lot of social media specific topics as well as sessions for different niches. Over 200 speakers present – there’s some great stuff to learn from them!
• Not too Big but Big Enough – some other shows are so big that they become completely overwhelming. BWE is certainly big enough to attract great speakers and a large number of people to network with – but it’s not too big that you can’t find anyone. This being focused upon blogging and new media also brings it enough focus that you continually bump into people with shared interests.
• Relaxed and Friendly – my own experience of this gathering is people are very friendly, inclusive and chilled. This is not a hyped up conference, but there is a lot of fun and plenty of opportunity to interact with others (the networking parties are great in the evenings).
• Vegas – I’m not someone who could spend a lot of time in Vegas, but 3-4 days can be a lot of fun. This year BWE is moving from the convention center to Mandalay Bay which will mean that it is much more focused upon one area and hopefully more people will be staying close to each other. Less travel and more chance to interact.

What will the ProBlogger Track Cover?

Most of you should know Chris Garrett – he and I co-authored the ProBlogger Book. This will only be the 4thd time we’ve met in person and the 2nd time we’ll have run this type of thing together (we’re doing one in Melbourne in a few weeks too).

Chris and I are still finalising the exact schedule for the day but here’s what we can tell you so far:

• It will be held on Thursday 14th October. Please note this date so that you don’t just buy a pass for Friday and Saturday. There are other sessions on Thursday also which the Thursday pass will also get you access to.
• I’ve recently surveyed a segment of ProBlogger readers on the needs and challenges that they face as bloggers. We’ll be basing the sessions we run around the main needs identifies. These are ‘finding readers’, ‘making blogs profitable’ and ‘writing killer content’.
• We are hoping to mix things up a little in terms of how we teach these topics. We want each session to contain solid teaching (keynote style) but also time for practical case studies/interviews with people who know what they’re doing and some Q&A. So there will be a mix of keynotes, interviews and one panel on the day.
• Chris and I won’t be doing everything alone – we’re already pulling together a few other special guest presenters to bring their own expertise.

Also at BWE this year it looks like I’ll be involved in a number of other sessions including the usual ‘Super Panel’ that looks at monetization and another that I’m not sure I can announce quite yet.

BWE Early Bird Special Ends 15th July

If you’re coming to BWE NOW is the time to get your ticket as they are currently running an Early Bird Special that ends on 15 July. The special gets you nearly 50% off so it is well worth taking advantage of! Sign up to attend BWE here.

PS: Promote BWE as an Affiliate

If you’re a blogger with an audience that might like to also attend BWE – you can also become an affiliate for BWE (like me). They pay a 10% commission on any referrals you can bring in. With an average spend of $360 this is $36 per attendee referred. Sign up as an affiliate here.

Posted: 10 Jul 2010 07:36 AM PDT

This column is written by Kimberly Turner from Regator (a great tool that gathers and organizes the world’s best blog posts). – Darren

After a brutal summer flu took me down and prevented me from writing last week’s weekly trends post, I’m especially happy to be back to bring you a fresh list of the most blogged-about stories of the last seven days. This week, along with the trends provided by Regator, we’ll be discussing your blog’s tone/voice. We’re talking about something more than first person versus third person or opinion versus hard news.

Think of your favorite blog. What keeps you coming back for more? The subject matter is certainly important, but it’s likely that the blogger’s voice and tone also play an important role in your appreciation for the content. Bloggers whose personalities shine through their writing are often more appealing, engaging, readable, and influential than those who hide their true voices. Read your three most recent posts. Do they “sound” like you? As in, would people who know you well in real life recognize your voice in your posts? Don’t beat yourself up if the answer is no. Maybe purposely adopting a voice that differs from your everyday voice, or maybe you haven’t been blogging long enough to find your writing voice. Give it time and, most importantly, have faith that your personal tone and voice will come with time and practice.

When I was a writing tutor in college, one of my peers who could verbally tell the most hilarious, charming stories you’d ever want to hear told me that he “couldn’t write.” I asked him to put down his pencil and tell me the story he’d told me a few days prior. I started a recorder and let him tell it. He conveyed it in his usual witty way and, when he was through, I stopped the recorder and we transcribed it, word for word. It was utter brilliance. He just needed to stop worrying about sounding “writerly” and start letting his natural tone come through. Let’s take a look at some posts about this week’s top stories that demonstrate the author’s voice:

1. Independence Day – The Frisky’s “6 Ways To Celebrate Being Single And Independent This Independence Day!” is an example of that blog’s positive, encouraging, reassuring tone. The post’s suggestions to raise a glass and celebrate by making a new friend or indulging in a craving are cheerful and bubbly.
2. LeBron James – Fanhouse’s posts, such as “ESPN Defends LeBron James Special,” are professional, straightforward, and unbiased. While this tone brings less personality than some others, it’s a valid choice for those who want to stay closer to the path of traditional journalism.
3. World Cup – Like all of Slate’s blogs, Sports Nut’s tone is conversational but also slightly high-brow. It doesn’t come close to being snooty, but the language (“idée fixe,” “guru of aesthetic purity,” “quixotic displays of good taste”) in “Why all soccer fans should root for Holland to lose to Spain” certainly caters to an educated audience.
4. Lindsay Lohan – The tone of ParentDish’s “Opinion: What Went Wrong With Lindsay Lohan” is sympathetic, earnest, and personal—traits that work well on a parenting blog.
5. Gulf of Mexico – The Consumerist often adopts a slightly cynical, snarky tone, but “BP Spill Now Spoiling All Gulf States As Tar Balls Hit Texas” takes it to the next level with bonus sarcasm and bitterness…but given the subject matter, they can hardly be blamed for that.
6. The Twilight Saga – As evidenced by the not one but two exclamation points in the headline itself, the tone of “Twilighters Own The Box Office! Eclipse Takes In $261.2M Worldwide!” is the same over-excited, enthusiastic, melodramatic style for which Perez Hilton has become famous. Love him or hate him, the man has a distinct voice.
7. Michael Steele – When it comes to being controversial, angry, opinionated, and divisive, political bloggers have every other niche beat, hands down. “Michael Ames–Lying Liberal Scumbag” from The Tygrrrr Express fits the mold, complete with “If Michael Ames thought I was fiery in Idaho, he is going to get the Bachmann Turner Overdrive treatment.” Bringing BTO into it is hardcore, am I right?
8. Mel Gibson – Unlike the aforementioned angry political bloggers, Feministing is not always full of rage but it is always exceptionally straightforward and to-the-point, as indicated in “Mel Gibson: Bonafide Abusive A$$hole.”
9. Emmy Nominations – BuddyTV’s tone is conversational but more importantly, the voice indicates that you are reading the words of  a highly authoritative expert, as indicated in “The 10 Biggest Emmy Snubs: Where’s ‘Sons of Anarchy’?”
10. The Social Network – Like its sister sites in the Gawker blog network, Defamer’s tone is colloquial, informal, and often tinged with humor. “The Facebook Movie Teaser Trailer 2: Too Fast, Too Serious” is a perfect example of how well this tone can work.

Are you careful to keep a consistent tone on your blog? Share your thoughts in the comments. See you next week!

Kimberly Turner is a cofounder of Regator.com and Regator for iPhone as well as an award-winning print journalist. You can find her on Twitter @kimber_regator.

Posted: 06 Jul 2010 07:04 AM PDT

It’s that time of month again where I talk a little about the split of my own income streams in the previous month. We’re looking at June here and I’m excited to share this month’s charts because it illustrates something that I’ve been saying for the last couple of months really well – things DO vary from month to month.

In April and May we’ve seen the charts look much the same from month to month with AdSense being the #1 earner, followed by Affiliate earnings, eBook sales and Continuity programs. This month we’ve seen AdSense toppled as the #1 earner.

eBook sales dwarfed all other income streams in June – mainly because I released a Travel Photography eBook. I should note that the figures I used to calculate this graph are not total income from eBooks but just my share of them (I do a revenue share with the author of this eBook).

Continuity programs also earned just a few dollars more than AdSense this month so it was pushed down into #3 position.

Interestingly the earnings in all areas except eBook sales, continuity programs and the Job board were down on May figures. I do tend to find this happens most years in the middle of the year – probably due to a bit of a downswing in the number of people in the northern hemisphere who are getting out and enjoying good weather in comparison to the number of people inside during winter months in that part of the world.

I thought it might also be interesting to share the different income streams over the last 3 months so you can see how they each do go up and down a little from month to month.

Last month a couple of readers pointed out that the charts are a little meaningless without actual dollar figures and people were confused about whether we were talking about the different areas being in the tens, hundreds, thousands or more. I’m not going to get into specifics on this except to say that June was comfortably in the six figure zone for a month after expenses.

July will probably return to a more ‘normal’ looking month – although I do hope to launch another small eBook here on ProBlogger in the coming weeks which could lead to that segment being a little higher than in April/May (although I doubt as high as June).

If you are a regular user of Internet, have you ever seen videos on YouTube, and even presented her own video. Millions of people visit YouTube each month, and although there are other similar sites, is the leader by far, and a perfect place to advertise your site or product.

Most people who sell on the Internet are familiar with search engine optimization and the role it plays in getting the classified pages on the first page of Google. This ranking is the holy grail of Internet marketing and can mean the difference between a website, prosperous money, and has fallen into oblivion.

These SEO techniques that can be used in a Web site YouTube. Why this is so good? How Google ranks video very well designed and optimized for video SEO page ranking will increase much faster than placing items in several places and the creation of backward linkages.
More →

Posted: 07 Jun 2010 08:36 AM PDT

I am very much excited to launch our new section here in Blogger Tricks… “Blogger Video Tutorials“. To make sure that you benefit in the best manner from this site, I have been working on this passionately for the past few days and have done about 25 video tutorials. Watch out for more interesting tutorials in the next few days.

Why video tutorials?

Well, to give you guys a fantastic multimedia experience where you can learn four times faster than reading lengthy texts. I saw the amazing result myself; reason enough to awaken myself to the fantastic world of video tutorials. Last year, I had uploaded a blogger tutorial to Youtube, just a basic video with poor quality. But people liked what they saw and I ended up with 50k views and 60+ comments. This gives me a strong reason to believe that video tutorials rock big time and I am going to make sure that all of my readers get the best.

So now, just sit coolly and watch the steps, maximize your learning experience and implement what you’ve learnt in your blog and watch your blog traffic and revenue rise.

Thanks for all your support and comments. My apologies for not being active for the past 6 months because I was busy with my exams. Now with the worst behind me(my exams..ha ha ha), I am ready to go full throttle on video tutorials, these 25 that I have done should be very useful for the newbies.

To your blogging success (now in a multimedia experience)

Kranthi

Here are some of them:
How to add Favicon to your Blogger blog ?
How to add Meta tags to your blog ?
How to submit blogger sitemap to Google ?
How to submit blogger sitemap to Yahoo ?
How to add adsense inside blog posts ?
How to add POLL inside Blog post ?
How to add Email subscription box to your blog ?
How to upload Javascript files to your blogger blog ?
How to add ALT text to images for more traffic ?
and many more….
and will add many many more soon…

Looking forward for your comments and any suggestions

Source from : http://www.bloggertricks.com/