The latest concept in online advertising is the video and audio ad units. Whilst still in its early stages, most bloggers can increase their blogging income by incorporating one of these ad units on their site.

I have my doubts as the long term value of audio ads in their current format. They do not have any user control and are generally played as soon as a page is loaded. This will have the effect of slowing the load speed of the page.

Video ad units on the other hand look to be a much better prospect. These load as static images and require the user to click to play. It takes a second click to visit the advertisers web site. Google are the latest to ad video ads to their ad unit inventory and come in a variety of sizes.

At present the number of advertisers using video ads is fairly low, however as the concept grows and the production costs fall and I can see many more advertisers adding the concept to their advertising programs.

Google have several articles relating to the concept that are well worth reading if you are looking to add other options to your blogging income portfolio.

WordPress 2.5 - the latest version of this popular blog software is almost ready for release - a release date will be nominated sometime over the next few days. You can however get a sneak preview by visiting WordPress. There sneak peak includes screen shots and a breakdown of some of the changes - and they appear to be major.

This release is later than first expected and although complete and ready for release, WordPress are only releasing it for final testing at present. Once they receive feedback on its stability and any bugs, they will release it to the general public. Once released, I suggest you carefully read all the upgrade instructions and make a full backup of your current blog before installing.

The WordPress blog software upgrade includes a fully redesigned dashboard and to quote WordPress:

[source] A customizable dashboard, multi-file upload, built-in galleries, one-click plugin upgrades, tag management, built-in Gravatars, full text feeds, and faster load times sound interesting? Then WordPress 2.5 might be the release for you. It’s been in the oven for a while, and we’re finally ready to open the doors a bit to give you a taste.

From the screen shots it does appear to be a much friendlier interface all over. Until I test it out I cannot comment on the load speed. That is one issue I hope they have addressed. Anyone who writes a blog will have that, at times, WordPress can be very slow when moving from one menu item to the next.

Overall it looks good. It looks fresh, the ability to develop color schemes will be nice but the functionality is going to be the most important issue. Be able to manipulate multiple items like your posts, pages or comments will be very handy.

For me, and for many others users, the most important component will be the ease of upgrade. If the upgrade is not a simple smooth process then I can see many bloggers shouting for help. If you are unsure or feel it may be a little difficult, wait a couple of weeks before upgrading. Let the masses upgrade first and learn from any of the mistakes they have made. If you do go through the upgrade, be sure to let others know of any problems and how you overcame them.

WordPress 2.5 - its overdue - but it looks like continuing the tradition of being the best blog software in the marketplace - and it is generally free - what more could you ask for.

How old is your blog? When was the last time you gave it a good overhaul? Blogs are a little like cars in a way. Over time they become clogged with little impurities and need a good service and tune up. You can do the job yourself - a home tune up, or you can find a mechanic, a good blog and website services specialist to do the job for you.

Giving your blog a regular service is not always difficult. It can be time consuming and may require the downloading and installing of more up to date components. The outcome may just be a leaner and faster blog that your visitors will appreciate.

Over time we tend to accumulate a lot of unnecessary fluff within our blogs. If your like me and like to fiddle a little, you will have plugins installed, some even unused. Perhaps there are a few themes just sitting and taking up space. Are your categories may be all over the place and without any structure?

Then there are some of the harder tasks like the datafile. Has that been checked and optimized at all since you started blogging? Yes - you can get a plugin to do that for you too.

If you have any doubts about giving your blog a good service, talk to a blog and website services professional. You will be surprised at how little it can cost to have your blog polished back to a shiny new lean machine. It will be brought up to date with all the latest software and running like a dream.

Preparing blog content can be difficult, particularly if you are trying to write a post everyday or even harder, trying to write a couple of posts each day. There are a couple of key points that make the preparation of your blog content just a little easier.

Format

Write in an easy-to-read light style. Blog readers have developed a reading style of their own. Don’t bother with long sentences or large paragraphs. Keep everything short and to the point. Your finished copy should be easily scanned. Articles should be between 300 and 700 words max. The ideal size is around 500 words.

Style

It seems the preferred font for reading blogs is Sans-Serif and the size at 10 or 12 points. Any smaller and it is too much of a strain. Any larger and you are shouting. White space is another key preference. Small paragraphs create their own natural white space.

Delivery

Writing blog content that can be scanned quickly means delivering the content in nice neat little chunks. Bullet or numbered points are easily scanned. Small paragraphs with headings (as I have done with this post) also make for quick reading.

Keywords

Placing keywords in the article title are almost a must now. The keyword you use is also the  ‘keyword’ for attracting your readers.  For a 500 word article, you need only use the keyword six or seven times for SEO effect. Don’t fill the article with your keywords - keep the content interesting.

When preparing your content the most important thing to remember is why you are writing and who you are writing for. Don’t fall into the trap of saying I write for myself. If that is the case., why publish on a blog? You are writing for the general population.

Keep the articles user friendly, don’t fill them with keywords or long technical words. Keep the article as simple and straight forward as possible - but don’t dumb it down.  You need to provide good blog content, not dumb blog content.

WordPress is arguably the number one platform for bloggers in today’s Web 2.0 environment. Everywhere you look there are blog plugins that can do everything from changing your admin screen to administering comments to monetizing your blog - and everything in between. Not only are you faced with so many plugins, everywhere you look there is another WordPress tip about which blog plugin is best for your blog.

As a blogger it can be difficult to know where to start. Which blog plugin is right for me? Which WordPress tip should I follow? At the risk of being added to those questions, here a few tips to help you out.

Less is More: Start with the bare bones and build slowly. Don’t add every plugin that sounds good. Plugins actually slow down the load speed of your blog  so the fewer installed, the less drain on your blogs load time.

A Plugin Should Solve a Need: Plugins should really only be installed if they are either solving a problem (for example, a spam filter for spam comments) or fulfill a need (for example, improve your RSS feed).  I have come across blogs that have had both Askismet and Big Brother installed - and they wondered why they were having problems.

Plugins Should be Optimized: If you install a plugin then read the install files and the usage files. If there is a configuration option then ensure it is configured to do what you require. Some plugins will not work unless configured correctly.

Blog plugins are generally written to fulfill a need. At last count there were over 1500 plugins - possibly more. It is obvious you are not going to need all of them. You need to be selective with your choice of plugin. If it doesn’t do the job required, de-activate it and delete it and find a plugin that will do the job.

There are certainly a lot of directories available for site submissions and most of them are either blog directories or they accept blogs. An article on human edited directories by Chris Crum at Small Business Newz makes for interesting reading and raises several interesting points.

To summarize the article, Chris focuses on two issues with directories;

• Human edited listings:  These directories edit every listing that is submitted ensuring they are not only quality sites, they are also relevant to the category they are submitted in.

• Automatically approved listings: These are generally accepted using an email response. There is no quality control and sites may end up being listed in categories that are totally unrelated.

Does it make any real difference? A directory is a directory and all listings provide some value don’t they? This may be true. However if your site or your blog is listed in the wrong category then you may not receive the real benefit that could have been provided by a more relevant category. Not only that, if your entry has been accepted into the wrong category, how many others have as well?

Human edited directories at least ensure that you are in the correct category and that all the other sites are also in the correct category. More importantly, human edited directories are able to filter out the spammy and parked sites that offer no real value to the community. Automated directories accept all sites. As Chris says in his article:

[source]Don’t you think search engines would value a link that is listed among other quality links higher than one that is listed with a bunch of spammy ones?

I cannot help but agree with his argument although I think other issues still need to be considered. Some directories, although claiming to be human edited, leave me wondering when you see the type of sites included and the lack of quality control when it comes to category selection. I have seen XXX rated sited listed in Family or Parenting categories - so much for human editing.

Other issues include timing. I have sites listed with DMOZ and even after six months, they have still not been approved.  Like all things related to the internet, before submitting your site to a directory check that you are in the right category. Also check out the category to see what sort of sites are listed there - make sure they are relevant.

A blog directories are blog directories and you are always going to gain some benefit from them.  Chris’ points are valid. You will get more benefit from a human edited directory than an automated one. In fact it is well worth the extra time preparing an accurate submission to a human edited directory. It is also worth the extra time waiting for approval. But man is it galling when they knock you back because they think you have selected the wrong category - and they don’t advise you on the right one.

Blogging income is difficult to generate these days. There is the constant problem of banner blindness to contend with. Often what are supposed to be context based ads appear to be totally unrelated. Affiliate advertising can be hit and miss and can often depend on trends.

The question is, what can you do to maximize any opportunities that come along. These tips may just help a little.

• Remove any under performing ad units, particularly Adsense. Adsense will pay all ads in your account based on the poorest performing. If you do receive a click, you want to receive the maximum benefit for it. If you have any Adsense ad units that have less than a 2% CTR, remove them.

• If you have affiliate ads running, take a moment ever now and then to write about them - promote them a little. A 125 x 125 banner sitting in your side bar will not often sell itself. A little promotion goes a long way.

• Rotate your banner ads. Take a moment every now and then to rotate your banner ads. When using affiliate banners, check and see if they have a range of banners available. Rotate through the range until you find one that is more successful than the others, or just keep rotating them. This helps to ease banner blindness.

• Change the location of the ad units. Trial different places on your site to see which area has the highest return - you may be surprised.

Be selective in your advertisers. If after trying out some of the above, the ad unit is still not earning, remove it and try something else. Not all ads suit all sites.

By following these blogging tips you may at least increase your blogging income opportunities. The key is to maximize the available space to get the best return possible.

One final tip - make sure your site is attractive and welcoming to your visitor and that there is something there for them, that is, content. If you don’t have content and you site looks over commercialized, they will not come back and no visitors equals no blogging income no matter how well placed the ads are.

Social bookmarking seems to be dividing into two distinct groups who are then using social bookmarking sites for different reasons.

The first group join social bookmarking sites that best reflect their genre and their interests. They interact within that social community slowly developing a group of friends (or at least acquaintances). Bookmarking is done on the basis of quality and interests and does not often reflect their own sites content. These users are more like your social butterflies in the offline world. If they find something new and interesting they like to be the first to tell others.

Part of this online socializing includes visiting other blogs from within your sphere of friends. If an article stands out then you will signal that fact to others by flagging it in someway. This then sets of a chain reaction where your friends refer that article to their friends. This of course is the viral principle at work.

The second group join as many sites as possible and make as many friends as possible. Their aim is to promotes their own content and get as much traffic to their site as quickly as possible. The quality of the article is not considered, in fact almost every article is either thumbed, dugg or flagged in some way in the hope that it will go ‘viral’.

Smart operators have found a way to have a foot in both camps. They sign up to as many good social bookmarking sites as possible. Spend as much time as they can to socialize and build a network. Once established, they then start to promote their own articles, often by getting their closest ‘friends’ to flag the article for them.

Which camp are you in? Social bookmarking that has been done carefully and with consideration to the friends list will generally drive more quality traffic, traffic that will stay and read and perhaps even subscribe.

Traffic that is driven from an artificially created viral exercise may be useful in pushing up the articles authority and search engine rankings. The traffic generated in this manner will generally have a high bounce rate and a very low conversion rate.

What is your preference? The buzz created from a close group of ‘friends’ that generates a reasonable conversion rate, or the buzz created from an artificial viral campaign that may boost your search engine ranking but has a low conversion rate?

Both can be effective. By gaining a higher search engine ranking the traffic derived will be quality traffic with a potentially high conversion rate. If you are smart, and can have one foot firmly planted in both camps, you will have the best of all worlds. A viral campaign that brings in traffic with a moderate conversion rate whilst boosting your search engine rankings. This intern leads to further traffic with higher conversion rates. Learn to work both ends of the social bookmarking scene. There are plenty of benefits to be gained.

Feedburner is, without doubt, the biggest server of RSS feeds on the internet. Using Feedburner to provide your content is easy to set up and is just as easy for your readers to subscribe to. The question is, my RSS feed is available straight from my blog, so why use Feedburner?

This is a fair enough question and you would be right, your feed is available straight from your blog. Feedburner however adds a little value to your feed, both for you the publisher, and for your reader.

For you the publisher, Feedburner provides a statistical analysis of your subscribers. While fairly basic, the statistics are still interesting provide an interesting look at your subscribers. Feedburner also makes it very easy for your readers to subscribe via email.

For your readers, Feedburner provides a feed that is easy to read and well set our. For email subscriptions, the feed can arrive with social buttons in place so they can bookmark the post with a single click.

Feedburner has now incorporated several ways to jazz up your feeds making them easier to use, easier to read and most importantly, easier to subscribe to. Their are numerous different widgets that you can place on your site to display feeds from any site you subscribe to.

RSS is now an important part of the blog world. With Feedburner, your  RSS feed can be modified to include advertising, special messages and bookmarking buttons - all managed from the one control panel. Feedburner, it is easy and it is free.

Blog software takes on many different forms and some would argue that a widget is not software. I differ. I feel that any piece of code that is run to gain an effect is software. This widget can be used anywhere, on a blog or on a web site.

The widget I am referring to is from Ezine Articles. This widget can be formated to display short extracts from articles from whichever category you select. Every time the page is refreshed a new set of articles are displayed. Is this fresh content? When a search engine spider visits it will read the data in the widget. The next time it visits the data will have changed and so the search engine will update its data. To that end, it is fresh content - just not in the format that we are used to.

The widget can be customized when it comes to colors and sits quite nicely in your side bar. The content can be customized to fit in with the genre of your blog. This of course provides additional reading material once your visitor has finished on your site. A little tip, don’t place the widget to close to the top. You want your visitors reading your work before spotting something else and moving on to that article.

Interesting question.  Do you concentrate on the various blog directories or do you concentrate on blog SEO? The real answer is most likely, ‘both’.

If you are wondering where you should concentrate your efforts then I suggest you forget the terminology for now. The real question becomes, do you concentrate on people (blog directories) or search engines and their spiders (blog SEO).

If you are looking to concentrate on people then your blog needs to reflect that. The content needs to be written in a user friendly manner. If your main focus is search engine rankings, your content needs to be keyword rich. Whilst you can write friendly keyword rich articles, it can become very taxing trying to produce it on a daily basis.

I hate to sound like I am sitting on the fence, however in this case I going to have to suffer a few splinters. I don’t see why you cannot do both, but in a less taxing manner. Write your articles in a user friendly manner; make sure there are an adequate supply of keywords within the articles. Whenever possible, write a full keyword rich article.

The user friendly articles, whilst still containing keywords, are going to keep your readers coming back. If you have the occasional keyword rich but slightly reader unfriendly, your reader are not going to be to troubled. It is the overall image that is going to be important.

What is your preference and does your blog reflect it. Writing for the masses enables you to use the various blog directories to their fullest. Writing for search engine spiders may not attract the masses but it will place you highly on the results pages for the various search engines. Write for both, and you will have one of those special blogs that attracts thousands of visitors each and every day.

Blog design refers of course to the design of your blog. Do you hire a professional to build a blog from scratch or simply buy a template. Even if you prefer to buy a good template, someone still had to design the template in the first place. In fact, if you decide to build a blog from scratch, chances are the designer will start with a template and modify it to your requirements.

There is nothing new about blog design. Web design has been around for a long time and blog design is simply an extension of that. In fact, blog design is more like a cross between good print design, particularly magazine design and web design.

If you look closely at a lot of blogs you will see some similarity with magazines or newspapers. Like all good print media, the look is important. The ads are carefully placed for maximum results. The content carefully crafted and placed to effect.

What the print media does not need to consider are the intricacies of the web. Blog design needs to allow for SEO policies; they also need to consider page loading speeds; and of course user interactivity like comments and click throughs.

When looking at your blog design, does it resemble a magazine, a newspaper, a web page or is it quite individual in its design? Or is it a blog that has just grown out of hand over time? It’s never to late to update your blog design.

It should be. Blog SEO should be a part of your everyday blogging. It’s strange as just about everyone knows what is involved with good blog SEO practices, or at least some of the minimum requirements. So why don’t they do it? I am not going to go through what is good blog SEO practices, we have many articles on the topic already. I want to look at your blogging habits  - or rather, I want you to look at your blogging habits.

Laziness? I think not. I think the problem is more a joint case of lack of motivation and poor habits. For many people, when they first start blogging, blog SEO is the last thing on their mind. So they blog away. Often ad-hoc, often off topic - if they have a specific genre that is, and generally with very poor blog SEO practices.

It becomes a habit - a poor blog SEO habit

Habits can be broken. They say it takes a week to form a habit and four weeks to break it. If you have fallen into the habit of not looking at the requirements for good blog SEO, then spend the next four weeks religiously following them. At the end of the four weeks you will find that you have now formed a new blogging habit - hopefully one that is good for your blog’s SEO.

Sometimes it can be difficult to come up with good quality fresh blog content each and every day. One solution is to use the occasional guest writers. The difficulty is knowing where to find them.

I know several blogs that advertise for guest writers however this option is fraught with several difficulties. The major difficulty is telling someone that you do not require their services (because you don’t consider their quality, experience or knowledge good enough). If you don’t handle this correctly you risk alienating them and any of their followers. The best way to handle this situation is use the ‘little white lie’ philosophy and advise them that you have already found sufficient writers.

Rather than advertising, there are two options that are far better. The first is to look at those that are advertising themselves as guest writers. You can visit their blog, look at the quality of their articles and get an understanding of their knowledge and skills.

The second method is to visit blogs that you enjoy reading and ask them if they would be willing to write a guest blog. If you use any of the social widgets that show your visitors then check out those that visit regularly. They obviously have an interest in your blog content and if they write in a similar genre then they may be quite happy to write a guest post for you.

There are several benefits to using guest writers. First the guest writer provides some degree of importance to your blog. Other think your blog is important enough to write a guest post on. For the author, they have their name and blog URL placed onto another site providing free links and exposure.

One of the biggest benefits is freshness that a guest writer can bring to your blog. I like guest writers that are a little controversial, who don’t mind speaking out. It creates an online conversation and of course they can be as controversial as they like, it is not you making the statements. You can often ‘feed’ of this type of post for several days with comments and follow up posts of your own.

A guest writer can be a great asset to your blog content providing a different perspective, a change in direction and a little controversy. All good for the continued life of your blog.

How do you measure the success of your blog? The are many blog metric tools available however when it comes to measuring the success of your blog, sometimes the simplest statistics are the best. An interesting article by Paul Wright at Fish and Clicks titled ‘The Best Blog Metric” was rather thought provoking.

Paul’s take is to use his RSS statistics as a gauge of his blogs success. To extract a quote from his article:

……in my opinion 1 subscriber is worth way more than 1000’s of irrelevant uniques. If this blog were an e-commerce site 1 subscriber would be the equivalent to a sale.

I cannot help but agree with the last part of that statement, for a blog, each subscriber is the equivalent of a sale.

Take a step back and consider what a blog is. I may be wrong, however my interpretation of a blog is that it is a vehicle that enables me to broadcast information to the masses. However the masses have to want to view what I am broadcasting. A blog metric tool needs to be able to measure that desire.

I can have a thousand visitors in a day. How many actually stop and read and how many drop in and just as quickly drop out again? There are blog metric tools that measure things like bounce rates, length of stay and pages viewed. Those measurements are not really a measurement of the popularity of your blog. Return visitor rates would be but they are not as easy to measure.

The one measurement that is a good indicator of your blogs popularity is, as Paul Wright suggest, your RSS statistic. It takes a conscious effort to subscribe and you are only going to take that step if there is some attraction, or as I describe it, a desire to read.

Using a service such as Feedburner has the added benefit of providing a limited range of statistics. It also has the facility to value add to the feed with advertising and dedicated feed messages.

How do you measure the success of your blog? Is there a blog metric tool that you rely on? Are your RSS numbers an important indicator of your blogs success?