Blogs can be a very marketable and very profitable tool if used correctly. Profiting from blogs is just a matter of grabbing the attention of an audience and not doing any actual salesmen selling. In this article you will learn the 13 most essential steps to successful blogging.

1) Where to start?

You should begin your blog with a free blog hosting service such as Journal Home or Blogger. Starting with a free blog hosting service allows you to begin blogging instantly without having any advance knowledge of scripts, hosting, or programming. It allows you to focus on your content and not the internal maintenance of the blog. The best benefit of starting with a free service is, in the case your blog doesn’t become successful you do not lose any money or are you left holding the bill. The great thing about a blog is that they are organized in chronological order, your latest entry is displayed first. When your blog traffic grows greatly and you are ready to upgrade to your own domain then you can simply make your last blog entry the announcement of your “move”. Simply add a last entry stating that your blog has “moved” and type the new blog URL address. Which directs visitors to your new blog site, keeping your following, without a major inconvenience to anyone. Upgrade as you need to…but only when you need to!

2) Niche

A niche is a targeted product, service, or topic. You should first decide on a product, service, or topic which interest you. Choose an area which you can enthusiastically write about on a daily basis. You can use keyword research services like Google Zeitgeist or Yahoo! Buzz Index to find popular searched topics. It does NOT matter if your topic is popular as long as there is a audience for your topic and the topic is precisely focused then your blog should be successful. Anything can be considered a niche as long as it has a target audience no matter how large or how small the audience is. A blog about your cat can be a niche or a blog about the species of the cat family can be a larger niche market, if there are people who are interested in hearing about your cat or the species of the cat family…you can even choose to build your audience for a market which an audience does not exist, but first you must build your blog.

3) Update Daily (nothing less)

This step is a must and not a suggestion. Updating your blog daily not only keeps your blog more interesting to readers, but it also gives your blog fresh content on a day to day making it more appealing to search engines. Not updating your blog on an occasional holiday or one day here and there is understandable to most, but missing days at a time or weeks is unacceptable and will most likely result in your blog being unsuccessful. To keep your blog traffic and retain your visitors interest it is a must to update your blog daily with multiple entries. You should try to update your blog everyday with at least 3 or more daily entries. The best way to accomplish this is to set aside 1-2 hours a day for tending to your blog and adding new entries. It may even be wise to schedule a set time which you dedicate to your blog each day. Give yourself work hours and treat your blog as a job, what happens if you don’t come to work for days or weeks…you lose money or worse you get fired! Same applies here…if you don’t update your blog for days or weeks you’ll lose visitors.

4) Traffic

It’s no secret. You must have traffic to profit from blogs. There are numerous ways to build traffic. Paid advertising, free advertising, viral marketing, search engine marketing, RSS/XML feeds, and word-of-mouth. You should always use your blog URL address in the signature of your email, forum discussions, message boards, or any other communication media. You should submit your blog URL address to search engines and blog directories. You should submit your RSS/XML URL feed to blog ping services like Technorati, Ping-O-Matic, and Blogdigger. You should confidently share your blog with family, friends, co-workers, associates, and business professionals when it relates. Many blogs can be considered as a collection of articles, for this purpose you should submit your blog entries (those that are valuable and lengthy articles) to content syndicators like GoArticles.com or ArticleCity.com. Once submitted your articles can be picked up and published by others. The trick is to make sure you include your Blog URL address in the “About the Author” passage. What this does is create link popularity and backlinks for your blog, when someone picks up your article from the syndication then publish the article on their website the “About the Author” passage is included with each publication and the link you included is followed, crawled, and indexed by search engines. Imagine if your article is popular enough or controversial enough to produce 10,000 publications across the web. The search engines is bound to find your site in no time with that many publications and credit you a authority on the topic, in return increasing your rank on search engines. The small effort of writing a well written article is rewarding. You should try to write at least 1 full length article every week for syndication and submit your article to at least 10 article syndicators.

5) Track Your Blog

How do you know if your blog has traffic? Just because no one is leaving comments doesn’t mean your blog isn’t growing. Many visitors do not leave comments but they are returning visitors. I know it sounds crazy but with blogs people are more interested in what “you” have to say! Many visitors do not comment their 1st, 2nd, or 3rd time. Some do not comment at all, but are active daily visitors.

Tracking your blog does not have to be overly sophisticated usually a simple free page counter like StatCounter.com or Active Meter will do the trick. Install (copy/paste) the code into the html of your blog template and start tracking your visitors. Its better to use a service which gives you advanced traffic analysis, such as keyword tracking information, referral information, and search engine information. Visitors, returning visitors, and unique visitors should be standard for any page counter service you choose.

6) Listen to Your Audience

When using the proper page counter you should begin to see how others are finding your blog and if through search engines then which keywords are being used to find your blog. If constantly your blog is being found by 1 or more keywords then focus your blog around those keywords to make it even more powerful. When writing entry titles and entries use the keywords as often as possible while keeping the blog legible and interesting.

7) Multiple blogs

Use multiple blogging accounts to attract more people. This means you should have a blog with JournalHome.com, Blogger.com, LiveJournal.com, Blog-City.com, tBlogs.com, etc. The more blog accounts the better. You can copy/paste from 1 blog to all others. Having different blog accounts is like having a publication in different newspapers. This enables you to attract more visitors and this also increases the chance that 1 of your blogs will be in the search engine results for your focused keywords.

Short & Concise

Aside from the lengthy article a week for syndication and publication your blog entries should be short & concise (if you can help it). Sometimes there are exceptions to the rule and you have no choice but to blog lengthy entries, but try to avoid this as much as possible. You do not want your blog entries to become hours of reading. Visitors like to easily find information and skim through your entries. It is good to be detailed and provide useful information, but do not include useless information or run away sentences that veer away from your topic.

9) Digital Art

Try to include non-advertising graphics, pictures, photos, and art in your blog entries. Not too much. Once a week is fine. Graphics can sometimes bring your blog to life. Of course, the content of the blog is the most important aspect and you do not want to overshadow your content with graphics, but displaying graphics can add a bit of spice to the blog. Be choosy about your graphics and make sure they fit your entry topic. You should add content with the graphic, at least a caption. Original graphics, photos, pictures, and art is recommended.

10) Keep it Personal

A blog is most successful when it is kept personal. Try to include personal experiences which relates to the topic of your blog entry. Stay away from the business style of writing. Write with a more personal style and use first-person narratives. Do not write any of your entries as sales letters, instead share product reviews and personal endeavors.

11) Interact With Your Visitors

You now have the traffic you deserve. You should begin interacting with your visitors. Create a regular theme such as: “Monday Money Tip” or “Picture of the Week” which entices your readers to look forward to each week.

Give your readers advance notice about a product, service, or topic which you are going to review and then talk about later. If the President was scheduled to give a speech then in your blog you should state that you “will discuss the speech and give your opinion after the speech airs. Comments will be appreciated”.

Try your best to find exclusive information that not many have. Do not disclose any confidential or secret information which is deemed illegal or can potentially get you into trouble, but try to get the scoop before everyone else does. Such as: If your blog was about Paris Hilton (the socialite) and you had a blog entry about “Paris Hilton Getting Married” then it would be interesting to your readers if you had a actual picture of Paris Hilton engagement ring. Give your best effort to dig and search the internet for exclusive information and you will possibly come up with something useful. Your readers will appreciate this and they show their appreciation through word-of-mouth referrals. Imagine how many readers will tell their friends, family, and others about information they only can find at your blog.

12) Make Money

Once your blog has gained some real momentum and your blog traffic is increasing then it is time to start thinking about turning your traffic into profit. You should use contextual advertising, like Google AdSense or Chitika. Contextual advertising is usually text links which use the content of your blog to publish targeted ads on your blog. The payout is usually based on a pay-per-click model, meaning for ever click an ad receives you are paid a small percentage of the profits. In addition to contextual advertising it is good to also use graphical advertising such as: BlogAds.com, Amazon.com, MammaMedia, or General Sponsored Advertising.

13) You’re a Professional

You’re a professional now! What are you still doing with that free blog hosting service? It is time to upgrade to a domain hosted solution. You need to get a web host and choose a domain name for your blog then check its availability. Select the blogging software you wish to use, such as: Squarespace.com, WordPress.org, MovableType.org, etc. When you have your new blog domain setup and ready for traffic then it is time for you to announce your move on all your previous blog accounts. Your last entry to the blog should be a “move” announcement. The title should be “Moved” and the blog entry should state something like “Old Blog has been moved to New Blog please follow and bookmark this link for future reference. This way all returning visitors and new readers should not have any problem finding your new blog domain.

At the level of a professional blogger you may want to team up with 1 or more other bloggers. This will create a more interesting and more powerful blog. The old saying “two heads is better than one”, more authors mean more advertising and exposure because each author will have a vested interest in the blog. The idea of a team blog is to make it profitable and rewarding for all authors, while continuing to target the blog topic and keeping the blog interesting for visitors.

Following these blogging techniques should make your blogging experience much more rewarding. There is no guarantee that your blog will become popular or a household name, but the effort should at least put you one step closer. Making money online is not an overnight experience like many may think, but making money online is definitely a foreseeable possibility. As well, growing popularity on the web is not an overnight experience, but through time, dedication, and persistence you will be rewarded with all the royalties of blogging.

So, you have a blog! Do you have traffic? Do you know how to build traffic to your weblog? There are seven proven methods for building readership of your blog. They start with defining the purpose, or life, of your blog. Then, after you have a blog worth promoting, driving traffic is crucial to your ongoing success at blogging.

Here are seven tips to help you build and hold an audience for your blog:

Tip #1: Provide quality content.

On the Internet, whether you are talking about websites or blogs, a lot of space is given to content. Everyone directs you to provide quality content. But, what is quality content? The quality of your blog’s content is directly related to how well you have defined your ideal audience.

A successful blog is written with a distinct audience in mind. In this way, you can provide content that is unique to your audience’s issues, needs, or desires. If you create content they like and wish to return to read, you have quality content.

The second issue is to stay true to your audience and tone of your blog. If people are reading your blog, it’s because they like your topic and tone. Try not to stray from your typical topics and style too much. This will give your readers a reason to link back to your blog on an ongoing basis, as will posting on a regular basis.

Tip #2: Blog regularly

If you don’t update your blog often enough, blog readers will move on to other blogs. There are too many blogs out there competing for attention. Blog readers will go where they can get enough of what they want.

Successful blogging takes a commitment of your time. When you begin blogging and wish to capture an audience, you should be prepared to blog every day. In this way, you can develop an audience who counts on you to help them begin or end their day.

This means you should also try to post at the same time each day. Your readers will get accustomed to your schedule and check your blog at the appropriate time. The time of day is not as crucial as the consistency in your posting.

Since you now have quality content and a regular posting schedule, it’s time to drive traffic to your blog. Your readers will do a lot to promote your blog just by telling their friends. Don’t count on this alone! You need to do some additional work.

When you post, make sure you set your blog to “ping” blog tracking sites every time you add a new post. Think of this as a means to get their attention. The ping says “Hey, we just added a new post”. An alternative to automatically pinging from your blog is to use pingomatic.com. This is a one-stop place to automatically ping everyone you should notify of your new post and only takes a couple of minutes to accomplish.

Tip #3: Mention your blog wherever you can

Mention your blog’s address in your email signature line, in forums where you post, on your business cards, on address labels and in conversations with anyone you meet. Use a tag line under your blog address to further entice them to visit. Mine reads:

Michele Schermerhorn

http://www.imarketblog.com

A sassy little marketing blog

Beyond just mentioning your blog in writing and conversation, you must actively participate in the blogging community too.
Tip #4: Participate in the blogosphere

Get involved in other people’s blogs. Visit blogs that interest you and are in line with the general topic of your blog. Then, leave thoughtful comments. Almost every comment option on someone else’s blog will allow you to post your blog URL and your email address. Help other bloggers out with traffic and they will help you.

If a blogger really likes your site, they will add you to their blogroll. A blogroll is generally found on every blog which understands linking to the rest of the blogosphere helps drive traffic. A blogroll is a listing of other blogs. Think of it as a “recommended reading list”. Don’t be stingy with your blog roll either. Add those blogs that you read and enjoy to your blogroll too.

Tip #5: Think keywords when you post

Think about keywords with your use of titles, links and blog posts. Search engines, like Google and Yahoo, like keywords. The more targeted your keywords, the better the chances of your blog appearing in search results. Search results can drive that extra traffic you want.

To increase the value of the key words in your content, make certain keywords are part of the hot link in your posts. Don’t use “click here” as the hot link. You will be wasting valuable real estate in your post. Instead use the relevant keywords for the hot link, like “a great marketing idea. This gives the keywords added emphasis with the search engines.

One last thought on keywords for driving traffic; if you want a real leg up in the traffic game, in your linking code add rel=”tag”. This helps Technorati, a major blog resource, index your blog for their directory. But don’t stop there! It’s time to submit your blog to blog directories.

Tip #6: Submit your blog to blog directories

In addition to submitting your blog to the major search engines, make certain you submit the blog to exclusively blog directories like blogwise, blogcatalog, or bloghub. Many people find blogs through these online directories.

When you do submit your blog to these directories, remember to add a description that will entice your targeted audience to check your blog out. For instance, when I post my blog in blog directories, under description I put “General musings, rants, advice and strategies from a battle-worn veteran of the Marketing Wars, online and off”. Your description should help the potential reader understand your blogging topic and the flavor of how you write.

In addition to submitting your blog to blog directories, join a few of the free or inexpensive traffic exchange sites like blogexplosion or blogclicker.

Tip #7: Use free and inexpensive blog traffic exchange communities

There are many sites which can be termed “traffic exchange” sites for the blogging community. It won’t cost you anything to sign up. At the very least, join blogexplosion, blogclicker, and blogazoo. Once you sign up, you have two options to help drive traffic to your blog. Use both of them!

The first method is to earn credits (guaranteed visitors to your site) by using the “surf member sites” function. As you surf through those sites, you will be earning credits (visitors to your blog). When you find an interesting post, leave a comment as discussed above. When you find a blogger you like, add them to your blogroll and let them know you did.

The second method to drive traffic is to purchase credits. The cost is very cheap for the traffic you will drive to your blog. The more traffic to your blog, the more customers you’ll have. The more happy customers you have, the more they will tell others. The more they tell others, the more customers you get. Don’t you love this dance!

In summary, blogging may not be for everyone. However, it can be a great method for bringing your unique perspective to the Internet. You will surely find others who think the same way you do. Some bloggers will entertain you, some will inform you, and some will drive you to tear your hair out. Decide what type of blogger you want to be and be the best you can. See you in the blogosphere!

MICR printers use a special magnetic ink or toner and special fonts that can be read using an electronic data process system such as those used by financial institutions for processing checks. While the MICR printers have the highest benefits in payroll companies, insurance companies and financial institutions, other business do benefit from having a MICR printer in house as well. Most companies will purchase a MICR printer for printing accounts payable checks and payroll checks. However, MICR printers can also be used to print depository transfers, loan coupons and a wide variety of encoded documents.

Some MICR check printers are capable of printing other jobs as well, and are not solely used for check printing. This capability makes the expense of purchasing a MICR check printer much easier to bear if the machine can tackle a wide variety of duties.

Your business can save money by purchasing a MICR check printer and doing all your printing in house. One of the biggest savings with a check printer of this type is that it prints checks from blank, regular paper, so you won’t even have to buy blank check stock.

Laser printers for checks are not inexpensive by any means—they are quite pricey, but are easy to take care of. The toner cartridges are also quite expensive; however you can print thousands and thousands of checks with one toner cartridge before they need to be replaced.

If you buy a less expensive laser printer, then you will definitely get what you pay for. Chances are, the cheaper check printers do not have toner grip which could lead to incidences of check fraud. You will want to protect yourself at all costs, including using blank check stock that is of high quality. The higher the quality of check stock and the higher quality the printer, the less likely you are to fall victim to check fraud.

Compare models at a local office supply store or online. You will want to compare each laser check printer for function and price. If your laser check printer is capable of printing even more methods of security, such as micro printing, the printer is even more valuable and will further help prevent check fraud.

You should look for a MICR printer to print your checks. MICR, or Magnetic Ink Character Recognition check printers use a special type of toner that is recognized in electronic process systems that are commonly used by banks and other financial institutions. The ink imbeds the information of the check in the MICR ink, which can not be altered or changed in any way and helps to prevent check fraud.

When you are looking at MICR check printers, you should purchase one that meets the standards that are set out by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and the American Bankers Association (ABA). The standards outlined by ANSI and the ABA lay out particulars about MICR printing signal strength, font quality and permanence. Again, it would be helpful to find other companies that use the printer to find out about their success rates with checks clearing the banks that were printed with their MICR check printer and if they have had any incidences of check fraud.

You will also want your check printer to be duplex capable, meaning that it can print either single or double sided. If you are printing checks, it is imperative that you can print double sided for the endorsement line on the back of the check, as well as other security features.

All check stock has basic security features on it to help prevent check fraud. Usually there is a void pantograph on the check that appears when the check has been photocopied. There are also chemical pantographs that are not visible until eradication chemicals are introduced to the paper.

When you print your own checks using a laser check printer, it is imperative to ensure that your printer will not alter or change the check stock paper in any way that would make the check appear to be voided. Using a quality printer is the key to printing your own checks at the office.

Some check printers will print some security features themselves, such as micro printing—the very small words that usually make up a photo or picture that can not be easily reproduced. A good check printer will also use toner grip—this method is a chemical coating that fuses the ink onto the face of the check so that it is not easily removed or rubbed off to be changed.

The software that couples with a MICR check printer allows you to design your own checks, including logos and signatures in the layout of the checks. You can choose from a wide variety of fonts as well as personalize your checks even further. Your MICR check printer will then print all of the data, including the signatures, logos, check form, bank information and the MICR line all in one pass of the paper through the drum.

MICR check printers offer a wide variety of security features which will deter fraud artists from committing check fraud using one of your checks. The MICR check printer imbeds the information of the check, including the name of the company, the amount the check was made out for and the name to who the check was issued right in the MICR printing. Fraud artists can not change or alter the MICR printing at all, and if they do try, the check will be caught by the bank before it goes through.

Most financial institutions use MICR printing and have an electronic data processing system to read checks as they are put through the bank. You can rest easy knowing that your printed checks are safe from check fraud if you use a MICR check printer.

Some MICR check printers offer toner cartridges and software that enable an all-purpose laser printer to print checks. Most MICR printers are laser printers because of the high quality that can be obtained by using laser printing methods and in many cases, are cheaper to replace the toner cartridges for than other types of toner systems. If you are looking at a laser printer for printing checks, then you will want to ensure that it is duplex capable, meaning it can print either single or double sided. The duplex capability is essential for printing endorsement lines and other security features on the back of checks.

MICR check printers use special toner cartridges that work the same as a regular laser cartridge; however they are much more costly. Some MICR check printers use cartridges that are less expensive or can be refilled. Check on the price of the cartridges before purchasing a MICR printer. However, the high cost of the MICR cartridges emphasizes the magnitude of quality when you are printing checks. If checks are poorly printed they will not be read at the financial institutions, and many poorly printed checks could lead to penalty charges that will make your investment in a MICR check printer a bad one.

Protect both your company and your investment in a MICR laser check printer by thoroughly researching the printer before you buy it. It is also a good idea to check with other businesses that use that particular type of check printer to see how their quality is maintaining itself.

Check printers are not uncommon, especially in medium sized businesses that have a few employees, but don’t want to hire a payroll company to do their payroll. In most cases, it’s considerably less expensive to do the payroll checks in house using existing staff. All you really need to print your own checks is a quality laser printer, blank check stock and a computer program that formats the checks to be printed.

In many cases, it’s simple and easy to print your own checks. The check printer programs do all the work for you, all you have to do is input some basic information and hit print. You will have to have your financial institution’s information in order to print from blank check stock, or use blank check stock purchased from your bank. The other information that you will need to print your own checks using a check printer is the payment information and who it is being paid to for inputting the information on the checks.

Micro printing is usually found in the lines on a check—the signature line or borders. They are not opaque lines as they appear, but rather a string of text that is so tiny, it can not be reproduced by a photocopier, scanner or regular printer. This micro printing line can say a wide variety of things—from the company name, the financial institution name to simply ’security feature’. These check printers are known as MICR printers (Magnetic Ink Character Recognition).

This type of printing prevents against check fraud—mainly when a person has a check from someone else and tries to alter the writing on it, most often to reflect a higher sum of money. The security features on the printed checks help to reduce the capabilities of check fraud artists from striking and passing a fraudulent check.

When you are looking at purchasing a laser check printer, find out what type of printing it will offer you for your checks. Is the printer capable of printing for other jobs, or is it only a check printer? Sometimes, it may be more beneficial to have a printer dedicated to only printing checks, especially if you will do a lot of in-house check printing with your check printer.