Pro blogging

[skyring]

I'm looking to expand and professionalise my blog(s) and I've come to the point of realising that iWeb/MobileMe and LiveJournal aren't supplying the environment I want.

What I need:
RSS feeds that work. I need buttons to allow people to subscribe, add a feed to Bloglines etc. make it easy for readers to subscribe.

A community that has its own life, and that I can manage. Livejournal has the ability for readers to comment and participate in a richer fashion than iWeb/MobileMe (which is essentially linear and difficult to manage). Often the discussions are richer than the original posting.

Trackbacks and links and things to fix my position withing the wider blogosphere. There are other blogs I want to be close to, to be able to comment on them and for those bloggers and readers to visit my blog.

Income generation through Google Adsense. LiveJournal doesn't do this, iWeb/MobileMe does, though it doesn't seem to do pay per view.

A "dashboard" to let me see what works, what doesn't.

Ability to set and customise themes.

Ability to upload entries easily, including multiple photographs.

A page/subpage sructure so the blog is a site rather than a page. There's material that I want upfront on every page, other stuff that doesn't need to be so prominent, but should be around.

Easy archive searching and browsing.

A site-wide search.

Integration with other sites such as FaceBook, Flickr etc.

I don't want to be a nasty money grubbing professional blogger with SEO tricks and one eye on the rankings and a site full of ads, but neither do I want to keep bumping along the bottom, pleasant though it is to entertain an audience of family and friends. I feel that I can expand my horizon a fair bit without too much effort, and while the current skyring.com.au site has a nice look to it, I'm running into limitations.

I'm passionate about taxis and travel. I need to stop rambling and become more focussed, and my writing needs to improve a fair bit. I can write well when I've the heart and mind for it. I take some reasonably decent photographs, and all told, I think I can produce a quality blogsite that will attract hundreds or thousands of readers.

But I need tools that will work on a Mac, preferably integrated with the software I already use, and I need a host that will give me the support I want.

I'm finding any number of ideas via Google, but it's hard to know what is hyperbole and what is solid. Any suggestions and advice from my all-knowing friends gratefully received.

Comments

[paulaplays.livejournal.com]

I will email you privately Pete with some ideas. I am not by any stretch of the imagination a "pro" but I set up a pro blog for someone and it did quite well. I also did my own blog during that time (a few years ago) and it won several awards. It was called Polliwog's Pond. It is no more. I have a new blog at www.paulasplayground.com but it's a bit stagnant (though still pulling in a small income each month) and I need to redo the theme. I strongly suggest your own domain name and wordpress (does that work on a mac?). Someone here on LJ who is doing well with blogging is Linda (whytraven and ravensroads here on LJ), I'm sure you and here know each other. She wrote the motorcycle trip/bookcrossing book. She is a goos one to talk to as well.

[skyring.livejournal.com]

Thanks, Paula!

Linda is my hero.

[paulaplays.livejournal.com]

Goodness! I'm surprised you could read that with all my typos!

Oddly enough, Linda is my hero too, as are you my friend!

I'm ecstatic that you plan on taking your writing and work a bit more public and global than is possible on LJ etc. Watch out world! Here comes Pete!

[whytraven.livejournal.com]

Wordpress will do everything you want, most of it off the bat, the rest with plugins. It's piss easy. I have seven installations right now.

Google adsense is a waste of time. You'd be better of with other kinds of monetisation, such as affiliate programs, ads, plugging your own books, etc.

Beware of text-link ads. Google has a habit of bitch-slapping your page rank down to zero if you sell links that pass link juice. It's fine to sell links that don't pass the juice, i.e which are marked rel=nofollow.

I made the decision you are making now a couple of years ago, for much the same reasons. I come to LJ to be myself a bit more, as much as you ever can be online.

A good book to get hold of is the Problogger book, written by Australian author of the site problogger.net. That's also a good resource, but I'm kind of over it.

When I first plunged into the outer blogosphere I was all gung-ho about rankings and stuff, but what it really boils down to is this: Write well, don't ignore your readers, answer comments, join in on intelligent memes like Thursday Thirteen, and be generous with quoting others. You basically reap what you sow out in the blogosphere. I got really sick of the whole SEO - money - money - money scene rather quickly. I do my own money-grubbing on my own terms.

Beware. You wouldn't believe how time-consuming and tiring this can be. ;)

[thebiblioholic.livejournal.com]

http://www.wired.com/entertainment/theweb/magazine/16-11/st_essay

"Thinking about launching your own blog? Here's some friendly advice: Don't. And if you've already got one, pull the plug.

Writing a weblog today isn't the bright idea it was four years ago. The blogosphere, once a freshwater oasis of folksy self-expression and clever thought, has been flooded by a tsunami of paid bilge. Cut-rate journalists and underground marketing campaigns now drown out the authentic voices of amateur wordsmiths. It's almost impossible to get noticed, except by hecklers. And why bother? The time it takes to craft sharp, witty blog prose is better spent expressing yourself on Flickr, Facebook, or Twitter.

If you quit now, you're in good company. Notorious chatterbox Jason Calacanis made millions from his Weblogs network. But he flat-out retired his own blog in July. "Blogging is simply too big, too impersonal, and lacks the intimacy that drew me to it," he wrote in his final post."

[asgard.livejournal.com]

If you do go "pro" please please double post your entrys here on LJ.

One of the things I LIKE aobut LJ is that it allows me to follow multiple people on my friends page.

Sure I use Google Reader to follow many sites via RSS feeds, but it just doesn't seem as "personal" anymore. With those I feel like I'm just one of the masses. With LJ it just feels more, personal.

p.s. I kept a successful blog for years way back when it was still very niche (even won a couple of awards local industry awards) I agree with the others, but can't also stress the importance of QUALITY content that makes the readers THINK, askes them for their opinions and thoughts. It then becomes less about you, and more about everyone.

[moem]

I'm fine with whatever you decide, as long as you're not anti blogging.

[skyring.livejournal.com]

Mmmm. Some good points. Twitter doesn't interest me - I like some meat in my reading.

And I'm not looking to make a million blogging - just to go one step further than iWeb or LJ will let me. I like blogging, and I like the interaction.

Naturally the top blogs are professional efforts, written by teams spanning time-zones, constantly trawling for news. But my taxi and travel tales aren't ever likely to reach that point. Getting high on a page rank isn't what I'm about. I just want to tell my stories and have people say, "that's funny!" or "that totally sucks!"

[thebiblioholic.livejournal.com]

I think you're doing a great job at that, wherever you host your blog.

[skyring.livejournal.com]

Text-link ads?

I've started up a WordPress account and will see where that takes me. Had a quick look over your site, clicked a few things, sighed happily.

[whytraven.livejournal.com]

I don't know how customisable the hosted wordpresses are; also, their t&c restrict many monetisation systems, or so I gather. I have Wordpress installed on my own server with my own mysql database -- do you have access to something like that?

Text link ads are two things: A list of links that somebody paid for in your sidebar, and also those really irritating contextual links that throw up ads when someone puts their mouse over them.

[onyerbike.livejournal.com]

Consider joining ljgenie and reposting this there. Keep in mind the format required by starting your entry with a "Dear ljgenie" variant. I'm sure someone there will have ideas for you.

[holmesfan.livejournal.com]

If all these informative ideas don't persuade you against hiking off into the blogosphere do please leave adequate links so your less technosavy supplicants can keep doing what they really love, reading, commenting and revelling in your rollicking yarns.
Pretty please!

[sirroy.livejournal.com]

I just hope you leave me, or at least "Roy and Audrey", out of your future bloggings. I never signed up to this nonsense.

[skyring.livejournal.com]

I'll respect your privacy on this, and to be honest, I don't have any plans to include you in future. Though, should you become a cabbie, that might be a different kettle of worms!

But you raise a good point. Just how far do I go in including my friends in my stories? I've managed a thin level of conceal by changing names. Anyone who knows me and my circle of friends will have no problem working out who's who, but a Google search won't pull up any real names.

[discoverylover.livejournal.com]

I'd like to second that!!

[whytraven.livejournal.com]

There is a Wordpress plugin that cross-posts to LJ. I use it. :)