ProBlogger - Latest Posts
Let Other People Do The Talking
Posted: 01 Mar 2008 07:57 AM CST
In this post Daniel Scocco gives some tips on letting others do the talking about you.
Example 1
Aaron Wall is one of the most famous search engine optimizers on the Internet (and consequently in the whole world). His book on the topic has sold thousands of copies, and he is able to pull a $500 hourly rate when he has time to run consulting projects.
Quite a mouthful, huh?
Yet, if you visit his website, you will not see the words “expert,” “guru” or “rockstar” anywhere. Here is the first paragraph of his “About” page:
SEO Book.com is a leading SEO blog by Aaron Wall covering the search space. It offers marketing tips, search analysis, and whatever random rants come to mind. ;)
Example 2
Copyblogger, with over 35,000 subscribers, is the leading authority when it comes to online marketing and copywriting advice. Brian Clark, the author, has created several successful websites in the past (some of which sold for big bucks), and he also performs consulting work.
With these credentials you could expect an epic “About” page, right? Well, not quite, here is the how he described himself:
Brian Clark is an Internet marketing strategist, content developer, entrepreneur, and recovering attorney.
I could go on with dozens of examples, but you probably got my point already. In one sentence: let other people do the talking. Do not brag about your achievements, do not highlight your qualities excessively, do not claim to be an expert, guru, rockstar, popstar or similar. Even if you really are!
If you are a real expert or guru, other people will do the talking for you. They will let others know the depth of your knowledge or abilities. They will call you with these terms, and the praises will be genuine and valuable.
Again, even if you really are an expert or celebrity on your niche, I would refrain from self-proclaiming that. It might sound that you are trying too hard to convince others, having an overall negative impact on your credibility.
Faking to be an expert or star when you know you are not, on the other hand, is almost guaranteed to result in failure. Some people argue that the “fake it till you make it” strategy works. It might in some cases, but it might also end up damaging your reputation for good.
What is the takeaway from this post? Stay humble and focus on doing your thing, regardless of how successful you might think that you already are. If your work is to be praised, other people will do it gladly.
Daniel Scocco is the blogger behind Daily Blog Tips .
Share This
You are subscribed to email updates from ProBlogger Blog Tips
To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. Email Delivery powered by FeedBurner
Inbox too full? (feed) Subscribe to the feed version of ProBlogger Blog Tips in a feed reader.
If you prefer to unsubscribe via postal mail, write to: ProBlogger Blog Tips, c/o FeedBurner, 20 W Kinzie, 9th Floor, Chicago IL USA 60610
Daniel Scocco
Go to Site
Search the Web
More from pro Bloggers tips
ProBlogger - Latest Posts
Writing with Confidence or Risking Your Reputation?
Posted: 20 Jan 2008 11:41 PM CST
A guest post over at John Chow’s blog today by Steven York titled Successful Blogging - 5 Tips for Writing With Confidence caught my attention today. The title was something that I was keen to read as I think that being confident as a blogger is important - however as I read it I found myself reacting against every point made.
The five points:
#1 - Don’t Ever Talk About Being Dugg/Reddited/Stumbled
#2 - Don’t Disclose Failure Unless It’s To Make a Point
#3 - Shout About Your Successes
#4 - Write with Authority
#5 - You Don’t Need To Tell The Truth All The Time
Now there is plenty of room for bloggers to blog in their own voice/style - but quite a bit of the advice in this post left me wondering what type of blog a blogger would build if they took all of the advice in it.
I was going to write a post on this topic - but ended up leaving it in a fairly raw form over on the post itself (I think my post is currently in moderation). I’ll repost my comment here in the hope that it’ll add to the conversation. I’ve added a few other thoughts to my original comments below (in italics).
====
Steven - I respectfully disagree with most of your points:
1. Talking about being Dugg/Stumbled etc can actually be a good move strategically. By mentioning it you introduce your regular readers to social bookmarking. I did this a couple of months ago on my photography blog and mentioned that the day before I’d had a lot of new readers from StumbleUpon and Digg. What I found is that most of my loyal readers had never heard of StumbleUpon or Digg before but many signed up to them that day. The next day I had massive traffic as a result of loyal readers submitting posts from my archives. I didn’t tell them to do it and only mentioned social bookmarking in passing but it was enough to get a lot of new readers using the tools.
While I agree that you wouldn’t want to constantly go on about how your blog has been Dugg or Stumbled I do think that an occasional mention can actually help to build a culture on your blog where readers naturally use these tools - something that a blog could really benefit from.
2. Disclosing failure is something that I think is important on a blog for numerous reasons. It makes you more relatable, it gives you something to build on when you teach how things SHOULD be done and it can show real character and transparency to your readers. I find that when I talk of my weaknesses or failures that many readers email me and comment thanking me for showing that side of things.
Steven used the example of Shoemoney showing his big check instead of talking about his failures. I’d argue that while the check picture was crucial in his rise to fame that it was also his ability to talk about messing up. He’s written himself about this on numerous occasions. Check out his posts My Top 10 Worst Ideas to Make Money and My Advice to Connect with Your Readers.
3. Shouting about your Successes - I partly agree with you here but only to a point. If you don’t talk about your successes to some degree they might go unnoticed - but when you ’shout’ about them you can actually hurt your reputation. Constantly talking about how well you’ve done things can alienate readers who don’t achieve what you’ve achieved and it can come off as arrogant. I’ve seen numerous bloggers lose audience over being perceived in this way. I do agree with your words about using case studies to highlight your successes as this is a more helpful way to share them - but just be careful about doing it too often.
Again I’ll emphasize - that it’s not bad to highlight your successes - but do it in moderation and in a way that is relevant, relatable and on topic.
4. Authority - I agree with this point the most, although think that there is room for ambiguity on a blog. If you’re not sure about something - I wouldn’t recommend saying that you are or you could end up being caught out by readers. Authoritative statements that turn out to be wrong can hurt your reputation. It’s about being transparent - but also about covering your butt if you’re wrong.
Yes do blog with authority but only when you are an authority.
5. ‘You Don’t Need to Tell the Truth all the Time’ - Again I’m not so sure on this. While it is possible to write about something that you’ve never experienced I generally find that it’s more powerful to disclose your experience level on a topic. Again it’s about transparency - but also about connecting with your readers. Perhaps you’re different to me but I’d much rather read someone tell me how they’re trying something as a beginner than read something by someone who presents themselves as a know it all who obviously has little idea of what they’re saying.
Getting found out as a liar when you’re presenting yourself as an expert can have a lasting impact upon your reputation and blog’s profile.
I don’t mean to pick on your post - but what worries me about the style of blogging that you’re describing is that if people follow it they could end up hurting their reputation. While some bloggers might well get away with some of it - if you’re looking to build a blog with a long term profile in a niche and that is respected as a credible and authoritative source then I think a blogger needs to really consider the impact of taking this kind of advice.
=====
Perhaps I was being a little harsh or narrow minded with my comment. I do think that there is room for promoting your successes, being authoritative etc - but look at a lot of successful blogs and see people who are fairly humble and down to earth people. While there are certainly a few who follow the five points above and still get successful I’m not sure I’d be building a blog on these strategies.
To me blogging with confidence has more to do with knowing what you do know and knowing what you don’t. Blogging about your experience. Connecting with your readers. Building relationships based upon trust and blogging in a way that is true to your values. But that’s just me - what do you think?
Share This
Win a share in 5000 Entrecard Credits
Posted: 20 Jan 2008 02:05 PM CST
A couple of weeks ago in my Interview with Entrecard’s Graham Langdon I said at the end that I was going to run a competition to give away my Entrecard credits to some lucky ProBlogger readers.
The time has come.
I have 5000 credits to give away and I’m going to give them to 5 readers (1000 each). 1000 credits could buy you some nice publicity on some great blogs who run the Entrecard widget on them.
You can enter in one of two ways (in fact you can enter in both of them to increase your chances). To be eligible to win the 1000 credits you need to be an Entrecard user so that I can gift the credits to you.
Here are the two ways you can enter (you may do both).
1. Leave a comment on this post (one comment per person). Include the word ‘Entrecard’ in the comment to help stop them getting caught up in my spam filter.
2. Leave a recommendation for ProBlogger on Entrecard - the link to leave a recommendation is at the top right hand side of my profile page (one recommendation per person).
I’ll pick two recommendations and three comments (all randomly) at the end of the week and each of them will win 1000 credits.
Good luck!
Share This
How to Be a Rockstar eBook Seller [Interview]
Posted: 20 Jan 2008 07:38 AM CST
125X125-1In mid December last year I posted a mini review of a new ebook - How to Be a Rockstar Freelancer by Cyan and Collis Ta’eed from the popular FreelanceSwitch blog.
I enjoyed the book so much (and am always fascinated by bloggers making money from these types of resources) that I asked Collis if I could interview him about the process of writing and promoting the ebook. What follows is that interview:
Where did the idea for a book come from?
Actually initially I had been writing a book about business online, and I was about two chapters in when we launched FreelanceSwitch back in April 2007. The site was such a hit that I instantly dropped the business book and decided to write one tailored to the market we were creating.
I hunted around on Amazon to see what other books in the category were around and was pleased to find that most other books on freelancing are by writers for writers. I thought a book aiming to help all types of freelancers would be well received.
How long did it take to write?
I’d say in actual hours it was probably about 80 hours of writing, but it happened over a period of 9 months. Certainly I could never have written the book in two straight 40 hour weeks.
What I was unprepared for was that editing took the same amount of time. Fortunately Cyan was responsible for this task (as well as writing one of the chapters herself) and we also managed to rope Leo Babauta of ZenHabits in return for redesigning his site.
Moreover that was just a single edit. We are now working on a second edition with more edits and incorporating any feedback we’ve had.
Any tips for budding authors in terms of writing it?
My main tip would be that unless you a very self disciplined person there will be a lot of times where you *really* don’t feel like writing. The more you put it off, the worse it gets. I found it was best to allocate some time, a day or a few hours before work, and start writing, no matter what. Sometimes you delete everything you write in the first half hour, but once you get into the swing it gets easier and things flow.
The other tip is to not discount the editing process. As someone with no background in writing or editing, I completely misjudged how long it would take to edit a book and how much revision is needed.
Finally it’s worth registering your book with the library of congress in Washington. Although strictly copyright is bestowed on the author of the work automatically, having a registration makes proving your ownership a much simpler process.
What’s the relationship like between the blog and the book?
Having a blog is to me an ideal platform to launch a book. There are two reasons for this:
(1) You have an audience of people who are interested in your opinion on a particular subject. This is a natural group of people to purchase a book extending and formalising the knowledge you are giving out on the blog. Moreover it is a great platform to begin selling your book, as inevitably word of mouth helps drive sales.
(2) When you blog you develop a network of other bloggers who know you and more than likely see your book release a newsworthy event. We’ve been so fortunate that on the release of the book, a variety of sites have featured or mentioned it.
Additionally, we’ve found that selling a book has been an excellent way of monetizing the site. This is something we’ve struggled with, particularly with advertising which seems to be tough business to be in. Selling a product - be it a book, or a course like they say in Teaching Sells - is to me, a much more dependable business to be in. Where advertising is relying on a few, large transactions, selling a book is relying on a lot of smaller transactions. This is inherently more stable.
How are sales going?
Sales have been really good, exceeding our own expectations. Since I know, personally I’m always dying to get actual numbers when other people talk about things like sales, I’ve made a graph of the daily sales of the book for Problogger readers to reference (see below).
Some things to note are that periodically the sales spikes, particularly around the 18th of December when we sent out sample copies to many other bloggers to give away or review. Also the first day (the 14th) and the 22nd when we mailed out a discount offer for the book.
200801162133-1
So overall, it’s been good. I know that some ebooks sell in much larger quantities (e.g. the 37Signals book which has sold more than 30,000 copies) and I suppose many sell in smaller quantities. The main thing though is that the sales seem to be settling into a consistent earning proposition.
Are you able to get a break down on how many are buying it from Freelance Switch as opposed to from other sources? I’m interested in seeing if it’s readers who are buying it or others?
Not exactly, however we have an affiliate program, so I can say how much of the sales have been a result of that. About 1/3 of all sales come from an affiliate link.
You’ve decided to launch with an ebook but also say you’ll do a hard copy on lulu - What was the thinking there?
At 212 pages, the book is a fairly long read. Personally, I don’t tend to read long ebooks (although I still seem to buy them anyway!) With Lulu’s service there isn’t really any cost associated with selling a book in paperback in that you don’t need to hold stock or process orders. The cost per print of each book is around $8 plus Lulu takes a commission as well. So we’re selling the book for $35 on Lulu (Available here) and out of each sale about $21 comes to us.
In essence, there’s really no reason *not* to sell the book as a hard copy.
One day I hope that we’ll have enough capital to get the book into bookstores, but for the moment we’re content to have it as an ebook/lulu paperback.
What techniques have you used to promote the book?
Early on, months prior to completing the book, we added a page to the FreelanceSwitch site promising a book. We included an email newsletter sign up form that I created in about 30 seconds using CampaignMonitor which stated that subscribers would receive a $10 off voucher when the book came out.
Over the three months we had almost a thousand people sign up for the launch code. This meant that we had one thousand people to email when we launched the book. Sure we lost 33% of sales coming from those customers, but the tradeoff of getting momentum and early sales was worth it.
We’ve now got a subscription form for the next book - How to Be a Rockstar Wordpress Designer - up at http://freelanceswitch.com/book.
What section of the book are you most proud of/excited by - and why?
Oddly enough the thing that I’m most proud of is the branding of the book. Early on we had planned to call the book “Hired Gun” and make it a one off. But on the advice of our FreelanceSwitch subeditor John Brougher, we decided instead to create a brand for the book - How to be a Rockstar - which means that we can now release other books and leverage the success of the first.
So you can look forward to not only a second edition of this first book to be released soon (and made available to previous purchasers) but also other books in the same line.
Get a Copy - if you don’t have a copy of the book you can buy one at How to Be a Rockstar Freelancer.
Share This
You are subscribed to email updates from ProBlogger Blog Tips
To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. Email Delivery powered by FeedBurner
Inbox too full? (feed) Subscribe to the feed version of ProBlogger Blog Tips in a feed reader.
If you prefer to unsubscribe via postal mail, write to: ProBlogger Blog Tips, c/o FeedBurner, 20 W Kinzie, 9th Floor, Chicago IL USA 60610
